“Why don’t you tidy up here while I go clean myself,” he said.
“Yes, sir,” Jon said, taking the broom and dust pan.
The man went into the house, and Jon set to work sweeping. When he finished, he collected the pair of tools that had been left on the mat below the white airplane and returned them to the workbench that ran along the back of the hangar. They were full of grease and oil, so he cleaned them with some solvent he’d noticed earlier. Then, since he was at it, he cleaned the other tools, many of which were filthy, and he organized them in a way that seemed logical.
As he was finishing, the man reappeared, carrying a leather jacket. The man tossed the jacket to Jon and said, “You’ll need this.”
Jon started to put the jacket on, and the man said, “Not yet. Let’s go over a few things first.”
The man walked to the rear cockpit of the biplane and motioned for Jon to come around to the other side. When Jon looked in, he could see a seat with another jacket laying on it. In front of the seat, situated much like the dash of a car, was a small panel. There were three dials mounted on the panel. The man pointed to one of them.
“This is your altimeter,” and he looked at Jon.
Jon nodded and said, “Tells you how high you are off the ground.”
“Right,” said the man. He pointed to the other two. “Direction and airspeed. For basic flight, that’s really all you need to know. Now, to control the aircraft, you have to understand the way the plane moves on three axes.”
He put his right hand out and held it level. Then he pointed with his left hand to a small wheel that protruded from the panel. “This is the yoke. You can turn it left or right.” He rotated his right hand so that one side came up and the other down. Then he rotated it back the other way. “You’re turning on the roll axis. Push it in.” He dipped the tips of his fingers on his right hand. “Or pull it back.” He raised the tips of his fingers. “And you’re turning on the pitch axis.”
He leaned further over and pointed with his left hand down at the floor, where there was what looked like a bar with two pedals. “That’s the rudder.”
“Which controls rotation along the yaw axis,” Jon finished.
The man looked at him. “Very good.” He rotated the tips of the fingers on his right hand, left and right, as if the palm of the hand was balanced on the tip of a stick.
“The last control you need to know about is the throttle,” the man continued, and he pointed to a metal lever with a knob on top of it that was located on the right hand side of the cockpit. “This controls the fuel mixture and makes the plane go faster or slower.”
Stepping back, he said, “Now you’re ready. Go ahead and put on that jacket and climb up into the front cockpit. There’s a helmet on the seat. Put that on and strap yourself in.”
Jon slipped on the jacket. It fit perfectly. He then stepped up onto the wing and, contorting himself slightly, eased into the front cockpit. As the man had indicated, there was a leather helmet on the seat. When he picked it up, he found that it was attached by a cord to an outlet on the panel. He swung the cord up and around so it was out of his way, and he sat down. There were straps on both sides of the seat and one beneath the seat between his legs. He pulled up the one between his legs and realized the ends of the two shoulder straps would attach to it by means of a buckle. He made the connections and adjusted the straps, Then he fit the helmet on his head, fastened the strap, and slid the goggles down over his eyes.
While Jon had been doing that, the man had been walking around the plane, gripping the flaps and giving them little shakes. Now, he stepped up on the wing and bent down over Jon, checking the connections on the straps. Apparently satisfied, he walked around to the front of the plane, put two hands on the wooden propeller and slowly rotated the blades counter clockwise through a full turn. He repeated that three times. Then, he took a firm grip on the curved edge of the propeller, lifted one leg, and, using his own weight, pulled down hard.
There was a putt, putt, putting noise as the engine fired to life, and the propeller began to turn on its own. To Jon, the sound was like a car engine that was out of tune. Looking forward on either side of the exposed engine, Jon could see a series of what looked like giant metallic praying mantises dipping their heads up and down in random fashion.
The man came around the wing and hauled himself up easily into the rear cockpit. Jon could see that the man was putting on his jacket and a helmet. Looking forward, Jon studied the controls in his cockpit. They were identical to those the man had pointed out to him in the rear cockpit.
“Can you hear me ok?” came a voice, and it made Jon almost jump out of his skin. It sounded as if it had come from inside his own head.
“Relax,” came the voice again, with the hint of a chuckle. He realized it was the man speaking, though his voice sounded distorted and tinny, as if it were being broadcast from an inexpensive radio.
“I’ve got a microphone back here, and you’ve got speakers in your helmet,” the man continued. “You can hear me, but I can’t hear you. So, if I ask you a question, either nod or shake your head. Ok?”
Jon nodded.
“If you get sick or feel like you need to come down for any reason, you tap the top of your head. Understood?”
Again, Jon nodded.
“Ok, let’s get this show on the road.”
The sound of the engine changed. It became deeper, the rough putt, putting noise settling into a regular thrum, and then they were moving.
The man guided the airplane to one end of the field and turned it so it was facing down a long open stretch.
“If you’d like,” came the man’s voice, “you can put your hands and feet on the controls. But do it lightly. Just to get a sense of how they work. I don’t want you to fight me. If I say ‘off,’ take your hands and feet away. Understood?”
Jon nodded. He placed his right hand gingerly on the knob of the throttle and his left hand lightly on the small wheel the man had referred to as the yoke. He set his feet so they were barely touching the pedals of the rudder.
The noise of the engine grew even louder as his right hand—the one gently holding the throttle—moved forward involuntarily, and the plane started rolling down the field, the bouncing becoming more pronounced as the speed increased. The bouncing abruptly stopped, his left hand came back slightly, and, with a sudden feeling of exhilaration, Jon realized they were in the air.
#
Ben Wheeler eased the craft up through a lazy left turn, climbing slowly. For years, he had been giving rides to people who had never been in airplanes before, and he knew to keep the maneuvers gentle. He set a course roughly due east that would take them just south of the town of Jackson, and he brought the plane up to eight hundred feet. Out of habit, he looked around, but there was nothing else in the air.
What was it about this boy?
The kid was smart as a whip. That was for sure. But that wasn’t it.
Ben was almost embarrassed to admit to himself he’d awakened that morning looking forward to spending time with the young man. I must be getting old, he said to himself. That’s got to explain it.
He scanned the instruments, and took another look around. Then he made a decision. He reached for the toggle on the microphone.
“You want to take a shot at flying it yourself?”
He expected some hesitation, but there was none. The boy’s head jerked up and down enthusiastically.
“Ok. I’m going to let go of the controls at the count of three. Don’t worry, though. I’m right here, and I’ll take them back the moment there’s any problem. Understood?”
The boy’s head again moved up and down.
“Here we go. One, two, three,” and he took his hands and feet off the controls.
The left wing dipped, the nose dropped, and they started to lose altitude. He was about to grab the controls when the wings suddenly leveled and the nose came up. Not bad. He checked the altimeter. They had lost
about fifty feet. As he was looking, however, they started to climb. They came back up to eight hundred feet and leveled out. In a moment, they were flying exactly as they had been, on the same setting.
What the hell?
He tapped the microphone. “Good recovery.”
He glanced around, then reached again for the microphone. “Ok, see the railroad tracks coming up?”
The boy nodded.
“When we get to them, I want you to turn south. Put them on your left and follow them until they get to the gorge by Middleburg. Then, turn to a heading of two eighty. Understood?”
Again, the boy nodded.
Shaking his head, Ben tensed for the next maneuver. Banking slightly, the boy eased the plane through the turn, compensating for the inevitable loss of lift by pushing the throttle forward, then, as they came out of the turn, bringing it back to where it was. When he had completed the turn, they were exactly where Ben had told the boy he wanted to be. And they were at the same altitude.
What the hell?
They flew in silence for a few minutes. Below them appeared the river, then, in the distance, the spot where the sides of the river grew steep, and the course was spanned by the railroad bridge. As the bridge slid below them, the plane again banked, and the boy executed a perfect turn, leveling out and heading exactly on a course of two hundred and eighty degrees.
Ben just shook his head.
They were now on a line that would take them back home. Ben allowed the boy to fly for a while. As they approached the airfield, he got on the microphone again.
“Ahead at eleven o’clock is the field we took off from. Do you see it?”
There was a moment’s hesitation, as the boy looked, then nodded.
“We’re going to land in the same direction we took off. But we’ll circle it first. Stay on this heading. When I say turn, bring the plane onto a course parallel to the line we want to use when landing. Understood?”
The boy nodded again.
Ben had taught hundreds of students in his day. He had never allowed a novice pilot to land a plane on his first flight. Well, he said to himself. There’s always a first for everything.
Ben talked the boy through the final turns, getting him lined up on the roadway.
“Bring the altitude down slowly. I want you to be at a hundred feet when we hit the point where the road turns. Got it”
Another quick nod. The boy was concentrating hard. Good.
Ben had his hands and feet in place, ready to throttle up and take the plane around again if necessary. They dropped down through two hundred, then one hundred fifty feet. As they reached the point where the road turned, they were at exactly one hundred feet. The last line of trees passed quickly below them.
“Ease back on the throttle and let gravity do the work, nice and gentle.”
The ground was coming up.
“Just before we touch down, raise the nose slightly and throttle back.”
The ground began rushing by. Then the two wheels touched down with a barely perceptible bounce, the tail settling onto the ground a split second later.
The kid had made an almost perfect three point landing on his first flight ever.
“I got it from here,” Ben said, and he took control of the plane, bringing it rapidly to a near stop and wheeling it around to head back to the hangar. As they taxied back, Ben asked himself if he had ever seen anything like this before.
Nope. Never.
When they reached the hangar, Ben rotated the Jenny and killed the engine. Then he removed his helmet, swung his legs up over the edge of the cockpit and dropped to the ground. A moment later, the boy did the same.
“That was extraordinary,” the boy exclaimed.
Ben looked at him, standing there by the side of the plane in that leather jacket, his smiling face radiating excitement. “Ben,” he said, without thinking about it.
“Sir?” the boy said, a look of puzzlement mingling with the animation on his face.
Ben realized what he’d said and recovered quickly. “Ben Wheeler,” he replied, putting out his hand.
Understanding replaced puzzlement, and the boy reached out to shake his hand. “Jon Meyer.” Ben noticed that his grip was firm.
“Well, Jon, that was an excellent job of flying. You’re absolutely certain you’ve never flown before?”
“Yes, sir. Believe me,” he grinned, “I would have remembered that.”
#
Ben set Jon to work washing down the Jenny and walked into the hangar to retrieve a wrench. He’d noticed a wobble in the undercarriage. He opened the drawer where he kept his socket set and reached for the wrench, then froze and stared in surprise. The wrench, universal joints, extenders and sockets all gleamed back at him. They looked new. He opened a couple of other drawers. Same thing. He stood back and shook his head.
The kid had cleaned his tools.
Jesus, he thought, I told him to do a little tidying up. But this is crazy. He turned and looked out the entrance of the hangar. As he watched, the boy dipped the sponge into the bucket of soapy water and began assiduously scrubbing down the side of the fuselage.
Ben chuckled to himself. Then he closed the drawer. The undercarriage would wait.
He walked out of the hangar and headed for the house. “I’m hungry,” he called out. “Let’s get a bite to eat.”
Jon looked up, surprised, and watched as Ben walked into the house. Then he dropped the sponge into the bucket, wiped his hands on the side of his pants, and followed.
“How about some scrambled eggs,” Ben called from the kitchen when he heard Jon enter.
Jon appeared at the entrance to the kitchen and said, “Sounds great.”
Ben pulled down the skillet from its hook, lit the burner on the stove top, and retrieved a bowl from the cabinet. He grabbed a handful of eggs from the basket that had been dropped off earlier that morning, cracked them one at a time and emptied the contents into the bowl.
“Are these two boys your sons?”
Ben looked back and saw that Jon was leaning over the kitchen table studying the photograph that he’d taken out of the cabinet the previous evening. He had meant to return it to its usual place, but forgot. Damn.
He turned back to the counter. “Yes,” he said, as he whisked the eggs. “The one on the right is Tommie, and the one on the left is Ben, Jr.”
After a moment, Jon asked, “How old are they now?”
Ben paused before answering. “Tommie turned twenty-one a few months ago. Ben would have been twenty-three in a few days.”
“Would have been,” Jon repeated.
Ben took a deep breath. He really hadn’t wanted to have this discussion, but he’d foolishly left the damn thing on the table. “Ben died,” he said simply. Then, realizing that was a little abrupt, he added, “It was a week before his eighteenth birthday. Complications from pneumonia. That’s what the doctors called it.”
“I’m sorry,” Jon said simply.
Ben shook his head. “No need. Not your fault. Nobody’s fault, really. Just one of those things that happens.”
“Still, I bet you miss him.”
If you only knew, Ben said to himself. Out loud, though, he said, “Of course.”
After a minute, Jon asked, “So, where is Tommie?”
Ben shut off the heat, lifted the skillet, and began transferring the eggs to a pair of plates he’d previously laid on the counter. “I don’t know.”
He turned with the plates, and, when he saw the shocked look on Jon’s face, he laughed. “Oh, I didn’t mean it like that. The army’s got him.” He set one of the plates down in front of Jon and the other in front of the chair across the table. “They’re supposed to be teaching him how to fly. Thing is, he’s been flying all his life, from the time he and his brother were tall enough to see out of the cockpit.”
He stepped over to the refrigerator and removed a bottle of milk. “Of course, the army’ll teach him how to fly the army way.” He poured the milk int
o two glasses. “Which, in this case, might not be all that bad a thing.”
“What’s the army way?”
Ben laughed again. “You know, I was in the army, and I can tell you there are about a hundred answers to that question. Most of them are not appropriate to repeat in polite company.” He set the two glasses of milk on the table and sat down. “I think,” he continued, “if Tommie gets anything out of the army, it should be a little discipline.” He raised his fork and waggled it from side to side. “Not that Tommie is completely undisciplined. It’s just,” he paused, thinking about the best way to put it. “It’s just that he has a little too much of his mother in him.”
Jon looked as though he was going to say something, but he didn’t.
Ben smiled wryly. “You were going to ask about his mother, right?”
“I don’t mean to pry. I’ve already asked a lot of personal questions.”
Ben shook his head. “It’s ok. That part of my life is ancient history.” He took a sip of milk. “I got married when I was in the army. I joined right after we entered the war. Nineteen-seventeen. I had this notion I would go over there and single handedly take on the Hun. The army had other ideas, though. They thought I was a little too old to be flying their precious planes. They wanted younger guys. I was thirty-four at the time. So, instead of going to France, I went to Mississippi, where I taught a lot of those younger guys how to fly.”
“You taught them the army way,” Jon said, with a smile.
“I taught them the army way,” Ben agreed, smiling as well. “Or my version of it.”
He took a bite and chewed it, remembering. “I met the boys’ mother at a dance sponsored by the Magnolia Society, or some such grand thing. She loved my uniform. I was the dashing army officer she’d been waiting for all her life. She was ten years younger than me, but she didn’t think I was too old for her, and I didn’t think she was too young for me.” He paused. “Turns out, we were both wrong.
“Shortly after we got married,” he continued, “the war ended. The army had no more use for me. Which was fine. I’d pretty much had my fill. I took my discharge, and we moved back here.”
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