My Honor Flight

by McCurrigan, Dan

  We walked all around the tower, talking about its history, and the history of Paris, and other historic sites in the city. She told me she would show me the city for the next three evenings if I desired. By the time our walk had ended, I was so drawn to this woman that I wanted to spend as much time with her as I could. She overpowered my faithfulness to Debbie.

  I actually loved Claire. I loved Debbie too. I think it’s a pile of BS when anyone says you can only love one woman. I rationalized it that Debbie and I weren’t married yet, and given the hell I’d been through, surely she would understand if I stayed with this woman during my stay in Paris. It was an escape for me. Just talking about her city and her life, and not thinking about killing, and mud, and always wondering when a bullet was going to find me.

  I spent the rest of my leave with her. Day and night. It lasted three days, and then Buzz Company had to move out. We both knew we would only know each other for a few days, and we didn’t care. We just wanted to forget the reality of war for a while. We both cried when I started to leave her apartment to return to Buzz Company. We knew we would never see each other again. As I turned to leave her for the last time, she spoke.

  “Wait, I have something for you.”

  I turned back. She held out her hand in a fist. I put my hand under hers, and she released her fingers. It was a simple metal key ring. Sturdy and surprisingly heavy.

  I frowned at it, then at her, gently shaking my head.

  “I don’t understand?”

  “I would hope that you will carry this with you, for every day, to remember me.”

  I nodded, the tears streaming down my cheeks. Hers too.

  “I will carry this. But I won’t need this to remember you every day.” I said. “I have nothing for you...”

  I ran down a mental checklist of my belongings, trying to think of something I could give to her. Then it hit me. I dug into my pocket.

  “Please, take this,” I said, as I handed her the gold piece. My lucky gold piece.

  She knew the significance of the gold piece. We’d talked about it as I’d shared some of the things that had happened during our fighting. She held her hand to her chest, and brought her other hand to her mouth. She shook her head. Then she grabbed with both hands at the gold piece, forcing it into my palm and squeezing my fingers around it.

  “No! You are not done with fighting. You will need anything that can help you!”

  I nodded, and we hugged, and gave one long, final kiss. Then we stared into each other’s eyes for a very, very long time. I wanted to stay there with her.

  Then I turned, and never saw her again.

  I never told your great-grandmother about all that. Even though I had been unfaithful, I think she would have understood if I’d told her. But I couldn’t see that it would do any good to bring it up. I’ve wondered over the years where Claire ended up. Did she have a family? Did she ever think of those days and me?

  Anyway, if someone were to ask me what the best day of my life was, I would have to say it was being in Paris when they were liberated, and seeing the resulting true joy of humanity. And I still carry that key ring in my pocket. I’ll be buried with two rings, from the women I love—my wedding ring from Debbie and the key ring from Claire.

  Chapter 14 - The Chateau

  After Paris, the Ninth fell into a funk. We’d gotten a taste of life away from battle and camps and GI ration food. We didn’t want to go back into combat. Buzz Company’s first assignment after Paris was to work with another company to clear some villages some two hundred miles southeast of Paris. We didn’t understand why we were headed that direction, but it wasn’t our job to question the assignments.

  The company met light resistance in the village. Our platoon didn’t have any casualties. On the outskirts of the village was a big mansion, built around 1830. The krauts didn’t wreck it because they used it for their field headquarters. We set up camp there. Ivy grew on all the buildings’ stone walls, and the surrounding land looked like a park, with plenty of trees and a creek wandering through a clearing. It was really nice.

  The civilians were grateful for us chasing off the krauts, and they gave us plenty of food and wine. We got two days off, which was a surprise to us because we’d just had a week off in Paris. Apparently it was a logistics issue as they figured out where to send us.

  So we were sitting around playing cards under the shade trees. The day was a sleepy one. About mid-afternoon, a curious French kid came up and watched us play cards. He was probably about eight or ten years old. He was trying to figure out the rules of the card game as he sat next to me, looking at my cards. I was having some good-natured fun with him, even though we didn’t speak each other’s language. I’d tussle his hair or poke him in the ribs. Or I’d show him my cards and ask him to pick which one to play. He’d point at one and look at me questioningly. I’d shake my head. Then he’d look back at the cards, and pick another. If I nodded, he’d beam. Then he’d pick the card and lay it on the table. And then if it was a winner, the rest of the men would groan, and that boy would just giggle like all get out. We were having a great time.

  Chartelli was cooking up another scam. He was trying to arrange a stickball tournament for the next day.

  “See, we can have nine teams, and have everybody face each other. Work our way up to a championship. Everybody put a buck in, and then the winning team wins the money!”

  We continued to play cards, didn’t say anything.

  “Come on! Hey fellas, this is an easy way to pick up some scratch! And you know I’m the stickball champ. This is almost guaranteed—”

  He stopped talking as a jeep pulled up to the mansion. We watched as the passenger talked with a GI up by the stables and pointed the visitor to us.

  He was a sergeant. He walked into the shade.

  “The guy up there says you guys are the Ninth Platoon, Buzz Company?”

  “All damn day!” said Chartelli.

  “I’ve got something for you,” said the sergeant, reaching into a breast pocket. He dangled something from a chain. It was one of the medals from the Buzz Company Olympics.

  “Guy who had this said that no matter what, he wanted this to go back to the Ninth Platoon of Buzz Company. He said you would know what to do with it.”

  “The guy bought it back in that village?” someone asked.

  The sergeant nodded. “The only casualty from that fight.”

  Chartelli gulped hard, and took the medal. He turned it over and examined it. “Chinups.”

  Nobody said anything. I thought back to that day in England so long ago. Then I thought about how Trumbull thought the medal winners would have the best chance of surviving. I looked over at him. He was scowling at the ground, scuffing at it with one foot.

  “Thanks, Sarge,” said Chartelli. “Appreciate you taking the time.”

  “Yeah, don’t mention it. Sorry, men.” He turned and returned to the jeep, and it rumbled out of sight around the stable.

  “What do we do with it?” asked Lou Robinson.

  Chartelli shook his head. “Damn. That guy’s name was Dick Monte. He was from Chicago, I think. Damn. He was a good kid. He talked about playing pro baseball when we got back.”

  I threw my cards in, and the rest of my table did the same. We were all quiet.

  “I think we should treat them like our letters,” said Big Swede. “We should get it to their families, explain what it was.”

  A lot of us nodded.

  “Yeah... Yeah,” said Chartelli. “That’s a good idea, Swede. I’m going to go around the company and tell all the medal winners our plan. Tell them they got to identify a buddy who will get the medal to family if they don’t make it. I’ll write down the list of winners and contacts, get it to Cap or something.”

  “How about you pass that around for a look-see?” asked Trumbull. The medal slowly made its way around the group. When I got it, I thought it was strange that it looked as new and shiny as the day Monte won it. But we’d
all been tarnished in our own ways—shot at, scared, or just plain worn down. The little kid motioned for it. He studied it, but didn’t seem impressed. He didn’t know the story behind the tag.

  I didn’t feel like playing cards any more. I got up for a walk along the little stream. The kid walked alongside me. We figured out each other’s names. His name was Guillaume. Then he grabbed my hand and yanked on it, and motioned that I should follow him. We walked maybe a quarter mile along the stream until we came to a spot where it widened into a shallow area about twenty feet on a side, maybe a foot deep. The water was clear, so we could see the pebbles in the mud. The kid shucked his shoes and waded in, and motioned me to join him. I hesitated, looked around. We still were near krauts. But here we were isolated in a forested area. There would be no reason for anyone to be here but us. I put down my rifle and took off my shoes.

  The water was warm, yet refreshing. The kid reached down, picked up a little pebble, and chucked it at the edge of the water. I realized he was trying to hit a frog that was sitting in the mud. The kid motioned me to try. After a few times each, the kid succeeded in hitting one, scaring it into the water. As it jumped, the frog let out a little squeak, and the kid busted out giggling.

  We spent about five minutes at it, and then I hit one. We were laughing hard, then I heard a twig snap to our left. Guillaume kept laughing, but I looked toward the sound. A German soldier stood not forty feet from me, his rifle aimed at my head.

  “Shit!” I yelled, and turned to look at my rifle, some ten feet behind me and toward the kraut.

  “Nein!” the kraut shouted sharply. Guillaume stopped laughing and looked at the kraut. His eyes were wide, and his mouth twitched into a little sobbing face.

  The kraut threw a hand up in the air, and then put it back on his rifle. He said something in German, pointed at me, and then threw his hand up in the air. I figured out that he wanted me to put my hands up. I slowly raised both hands.

  I just stared right into the eyes of that bastard. He looked at me and he didn’t blink. We were locked there in the afternoon sun. I didn’t hear anything at all. If there was a breeze blowing, I didn’t feel it. I didn’t hear or feel Guillaume near me. All I could do was stare at this soldier. I was going to die. And I was pissed off.

  I couldn’t think of what to do. Guillaume was standing just to my right, so he was shielded behind me. My sidearm was on the right, so the kraut couldn’t see it. But he surely knew it was there, and there was no way I could pull it before he shot me. I thought about calling for help, but we were too far from the chateau.

  He motioned for me to go to the shore. I didn’t like that. He was probably going to position me so he could put one in my head, instead of the side of my torso. What about the boy? Would he kill him too? Or let him go? Keeping my hands up, I turned and slowly waded to the shoreline. I hesitated and looked at Guillaume, nodding to indicate that he should stay to my left. He followed, mimicking my pose and actions. We walked next to each other, and I tried to shield him by keeping between him and the kraut.

  When I looked back at the German, he pointed at my sidearm holster, and then flicked his finger toward the water.

  “You want me to throw my gun in the water?” I asked. He made the motion again.

  I started to drop my right hand to my holster.

  “NEIN!” he shouted. I froze. He said something in German, and pointed at my left hand. I understood. He wanted me to pull the gun out with my left hand, so I wouldn’t be able to hold it correctly. I slowly reached down to the holster with my left hand, pulled the snap, and with two fingers, lifted the sidearm slowly out of the holster.

  He shouted something at me and flicked his hand toward the water. I sighed, and tossed my gun about ten feet into the water. I watched the ripples. I still had a boot knife. I cussed myself that I never had Duncan show me how to throw a knife. But he always said they threw special knives in the circus, so it probably wouldn’t work anyway.

  I decided I would try to talk my way out of this, even though he didn’t understand a lick of English.

  “Look, you got us. Let the boy go,” I said, tilting my head toward Guillaume.

  Our eyes locked again, and he just stood there looking at me. He started walking toward me, real slow. That made me happy. If he could get close enough, I might be able to grab his rifle and push it away. Maybe I could have a chance in hand-to-hand combat. Keep coming, you son of a bitch.

  Without taking his gun off me, he reached my rifle. He slowly bent down and picked it up, and tossed it into the water. I kept jawing at him.

  “Well, you are thorough, I’ll give you that. What’s your name, anyway?”

  He just stood there looking at me, the gun never wavering.

  “Come on, pal, let the kid go.”

  He was my age. Young. We could have been schoolmates back home.

  “Look. You got us. You won. Why don’t you go back to your buddies and tell them how you caught an American?”

  Still nothing. After another minute, he pulled his sidearm from its holster and pointed it at me. Then he leaned the rifle against his leg. With his left hand, he reached up and unbuckled his helmet strap.

  “What the hell are you doing, buddy?” I said, trying to be as friendly as I could.

  After the buckle was undone, he grabbed his helmet and pulled it off. I gasped. His hair was unruly—dirty blond and stiff, with cowlicks everywhere. Just like mine!

  I saw the faintest sign of a smile on his face. He lowered his pistol.

  I couldn’t help it. I just busted out laughing. He started laughing too. Who would have thought that two guys with the world’s worst hair would be standing here next to each other? Two men from separate worlds, standing here by a Frenchie pond on a nice warm afternoon.

  The laughing only lasted a minute or two. We were both still smiling. Our hair wasn’t the only similarity. We had the same build, the same face shape. We could have been brothers.

  His smile slowly faded, and he pointed the sidearm at me again. He pointed at the ground. I stopped smiling too. I nodded, and dropped to my knees, facing him.

  “Nein,” he said with an assuring tone. He smacked his butt with the pistol and pointed it at the ground. He wanted us to sit down. He started talking a lot, but I didn’t understand any of it. But like I said, he was talking real friendly. He was making a lot of hand motions too. He was motioning that we were to stay where we were, and he was going to walk away. I nodded. I thought he was going to let us go. Frankly, I couldn’t understand why. I was an easy kill. Maybe he was worried that there were more GIs around.

  He holstered his sidearm, pointed his rifle at me, and backed his way slowly out the way he had come. He stopped when he reached the trees. He talked quietly, but in a tone like we were old friends—light and soft.

  He put his hand to his chest, and said, “Dieter.” He pointed at me.

  I put my hand on my chest and said, “Douglas.” I pointed to the boy and said, “Guillaume.”

  He nodded, then he motioned with his hand that we should stay put. I nodded. He smiled at me, then he winked. I chuckled and nodded. My twin was going to let us live. My eyes teared up. No one had shown me mercy since I’d been in this damn war. I watched him disappear into the trees, and I hoped I’d never see him again, because surely one of us would have to kill the other.

  Guillaume and I hugged and both talked nonstop in our own languages. We knew what each other was saying. We were coming off the adrenaline of nearly getting killed, and then we laughed as we’d point at my hair, or point back at where the kraut had been.

  We headed back to the chateau. I never shared the story with anyone. Didn’t want to put up with the lectures of going out in enemy territory by myself, or putting my weapon down.

  *

  A couple of days later, we were pushing hard through a village northeast of that chateau. The krauts were outnumbered, and we were routing them out of the village. Our platoon came through after the initial batt
le, and we were securing the buildings. I walked past a small house, and saw a German lying on the floor with his feet sticking out the door. I pointed my rifle at the feet, and then, real careful, I worked my way closer.

  The kraut was twisted. He was on his side, stretching for a pistol about twelve inches out of his reach. I pulled the rifle in tight to finish him, when I saw his hair, just like mine. There couldn’t be another person in this area with that curse.

  “Dieter?” I whispered.

  His trembling hand stopped reaching for the pistol, and relaxed on the floor. He breathed hard. I didn’t let up my guard.

  “Dieter?” I asked again, only this time sharply.

  “Da,” he said, and then something I didn’t understand. His voice was raspy and tired, and he gurgled as he breathed. There was a pool of blood oozing out from under him. I was pretty sure it was my twin from that chateau’s creek, but I couldn’t see his face, and I couldn’t see under him. He might have a grenade or a knife.

  “Show me your hands!” I yelled. He just lay there breathing. “Show me your goddamn hands!”

  By this time, my ruckus had drawn the attention of a few others. Tinpan and Harry Trumbull walked up, guns pointed toward the doorway.

  “What the hell is goin’ on here?” asked Tin.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Just back off for a minute.”

  “You got a live one there?”

  “Yeah.”

  Tin stepped up and looked. “Well, goddamn. That much blood, this kraut’s dead. Nothing we can do for him. Let’s move on!”

  I looked at Tin and Trumbull. “Keep moving along this street. I’ll be along in a couple of minutes.”

  Tinpan looked hard at me. “Jesus, Mack! You got a taste for watching people die now?”

  “No!” I yelled. “He’s shot to hell. He’s dying. Let him be. I’ll stay here until he’s gone.”

  They looked at me for a minute, then shrugged.

  “I don’t see you in five minutes,” said Tinpan, “then I’m comin’ back here, shootin’ anything that moves.”