by Peter Albano
There was a long silence and every eye focused on the officer from Corps. Townshend spoke, his face a red mask of rage, his voice trembling. “I’m afraid, Major, this matter will go all the way to Whitehall—to a military court.”
“Let it go to Buckingham,” Randolph spat. “The Crown is paying us to kill and by Jove, there’re getting their money’s worth.”
The two officers whirled and pounded through the door.
An hour before sunset, the black Albatross with the yellow arrow on its fuselage hedge-hopped the poplars and roared over the field, twin Spandaus blazing. Two mechanics and an armorer were killed and three other men wounded. A bundle with a red banner tied around it fluttered to the ground as the enemy plane banked sharply and disappeared to the west. Only one antiaircraft crew at the west end of the field managed to fire a burst from a Lewis gun. The plane escaped undamaged.
An hour later after, sending up Hendon, McDonald, Gaskell, and Barton on a sweep around the field, Randolph stood in the mess hall with all of the remaining pilots and all of the off-duty men gathered around. Anger was on the faces of the silent men, a tangible force that filled the room. He opened the package. It was a cardboard container weighted with a half dozen bullets. It contained a letter. Randolph read it silently to himself and then—answering the curious stares—he read it to the squadron: “Major Randolph Higgins, This morning an S.E.5 with an orange propeller spinner murdered August von Landenberg and two stretcher bearers clearly marked with Red Cross arm bands. It is believed the aircraft was flown by you. You are also the man who killed Hauptmann Max Mueller when he was helpless to defend himself. These are acts of barbarism and savagery outlawed by the Geneva Conventions.”
Randolph threw his head back and laughed uproariously while confused and anxious looks were exchanged by the men. The major continued reading: “I would like to settle this matter between us. This would be done privately, like gentlemen; if the word has any meaning to you. I will be at fourteen thousand feet over Longueval tomorrow morning at oh-eight hundred. Longueval is midway between our lines. I will be alone. Meet me, if you have the courage. Gott strafe England! Major Bruno Hollweg, Commander, Jasta Boelcke.”
“Sir,” flight Lieutenant Anderson pleaded. “You won’t do it.”
“It’s a trap, Major,” Dunlap shouted.
“Hear! Hear!” resounded in the room.
Randolph held up both hands, silencing the shouts. “It’s worth a go.” There were groans. “I want that Kraut.”
Clutching the letter and smiling happily, Randolph left the room.
The next morning at 0715 Randolph took off in a new S.E.5 with the orange spinner attached to the propeller hub. It was a fine aircraft and he had put it through its paces the previous afternoon. Its left rudder was a little heavy, but otherwise it performed beautifully. As he climbed and pointed the nose of the fighter toward Longueval, he smiled, remembering how his pilots had pleaded with him to allow a patrol to accompany him. But Randolph refused, afraid the appearance of other S.E.5s might drive Bruno Hollweg off.
There was cloud cover similar to that of the previous day, but much lighter. In fact, as he approached Longueval at fourteen thousand feet, he broke into a clear bright sky surrounded on every quarter by towering ramparts of clouds that rose in rows and terraces like boxes and balconies. Soaring full to the heavens, he was in a vast coliseum. It was the Palladium, the Empire, the Hippodrome, the Palace combined and he a featured performer. He looked around for the telltale speck on the horizon but saw nothing. The clouds rolled and boiled, flashing lightning as if they were impatient for the drama to begin.
Banking, he scanned every horizon. Still nothing. He pounded his instrument panel. Then his eye caught a glint to the north. Airfoils leaving trails of mist behind as an airplane emerged from some high-flying clouds. A black Albatross. Bruno Hollweg. Randolph screamed with joy as he kicked rudder and banked toward the enemy. He jammed the throttle to full military power.
Closing at a combined speed of over two hundred fifty miles an hour, the two fighters closed the range quickly. In his mind’s eye Randolph could see David A. Reed burning and jerking as Hollweg’s bullets tore into him. The Geneva Conventions. He laughed and then licked his lips. There was a total lack of fear. Only a driving passion to kill—to kill even if it meant his own life. A compulsion to not only kill but also to wipe away the memory of Reed’s death that had tortured him day and night for months. And there were all the other dead young boys.
One way or another, the German would never leave the arena alive. He would riddle him. Ram him. He would drive his propeller shaft down the throat of the Mercedes. The black, vulturelike wings grew in his range finder. He held his fire as his target grew, his bull’s eye the huge yellow propeller boss in the center of the whirling fan of the propeller. Struts, wires, the exhaust mounted on the right side and top of the Mercedes became clear, the radiator under the low top wing, and the pilot hunched down behind his guns and range finder. There was something strange about this machine—the configuration was not the same; did not fit precisely with the memory of the other Albatrosses he had fought.
The nose of the Albatross blossomed with bright sparks of fire as the twin Spandaus were triggered to life. Randolph thumbed the tit and his Vickers jumped and stuttered, his stick and rudder bar pulsing as the gun shook the aircraft. Tracers smoked past, snapping and whispering in his ears. Several thudded into his upper wing and he saw his smash into the German’s nose and wings. He thought he saw splinters fly from Hollweg’s propeller and he held his controls steady, the enemy plane filling his ring sights. Then the whole horizon. They were very close—under a hundred yards.
Grinning, Randolph made no attempt to change his course. Just before the point of impact, the German pulled back his stick and hopped over the S.E.5 like a runner clearing a hurdle, his undercarriage grazing the Englishman’s top wing. Immediately taking advantage of the S.E.5’s turning ability, the Englishman kicked left rudder and horsed the stick to the left and back. He came around expecting to find the Albatross swinging into his ring sight. It was not there. Instead, Hollweg had curved away and up, gaining altitude and making his turn far out of range.
Randolph’s stomach churned with anger and frustration. The rugged fighter appeared undamaged and it was much faster than any Albatross D.2 he had ever seen. Maybe it was powered with the new Mercedes D.IIIa engine—a new power plant rumored to have close to two hundred horsepower. Like a Nieuport, the outer chord of the upper wing appeared longer and the chord of the lower shorter, and a new strut had been added from the leading interplane strut to the leading edge—no doubt to improve visibility and prevent flutter in high-speed dives. In any event, it was a radically modified D.2 or an advanced type—stronger, faster, with better visibility, and a better acrobat. Randolph felt his guts tighten and a familiar sour taste filled his mouth.
Grimly, the Englishman pulled the stick back and made a wide, sweeping turn toward Hollweg. The German avoided the head-on pass, perhaps suspecting his enemy would ram him if given the chance. Bearing to his right away from Randolph, the two aircraft passed each other and then both pilots banked, forming a circular pattern with each aircraft on the ends of a diameter. Circling hard and trying desperately to close on each other’s tails, the diameter shrank rapidly and Randolph found his bank steepening and speed bleeding away. Closer and closer the planes whirled in their murderous carousel, the pilots staring across the shrinking distance between them. Neither man dared break the pattern.
Randolph was so close he could see Hollweg’s black jacket, white silk scarf. He wore the usual brown helmet of the German flying service and his goggles were up. Although his face had been darkened by exhaust and gun smoke, he appeared to be fair and young. In fact, the countenance appeared far more cherubic than lethal. His eyes were blue and glinted with hatred.
Horrified, Randolph felt his controls go mushy as the S.E.5, b
anking almost vertically, began to lose lift and threatened a high-speed stall. Hollweg, too, was in trouble, but he managed to flatten his turn and his great engine pulled him up and out of the circle and above Randolph. He began his turn toward the British plane. In a moment, Hollweg would have his killing angle.
Randolph had no choice. Kicking right rudder, he jammed the stick forward and split-essed out of the near stall into a power dive, the Albatross trailing. The major could see Hollweg in his rear-vision mirror, two hundred yards behind and gaining. The twin machine guns danced with red muzzle flashes and tracers smoked past, the stick jerking in his hands as the rudder took a blow.
Randolph kicked rudder and pulled the stick back, then rolled to his right in two quick, snapping barrel rolls. Sawing the rudder bar back and forth, he rolled, dipped, and weaved, throwing off the German’s aim and pointing the nose of the fighter toward a nearby cloud bank. The German was firing again as Randolph plunged into the milky-white cover. Watching his lateral bubble, compass, and altimeter, the major pulled back hard on his stick and climbed, clawing for life-saving attitude. Then a half roll and he headed back toward Longueval. Within seconds, he burst into the brilliance of the clear sky over the village.
Like a hyena deprived of its meal, the black Albatross was below and ahead of him and sniffing at the clouds where the English airplane had disappeared. The Englishman laughed. Hollweg still did not appreciate the S.E.5’s great climbing ability. He had the advantage now. He jerked the S.E.5 over onto its back and in a single smooth motion brought the stick back hard again, tramping on the rudder bar and whipping the inverted fighter into a split-ess that accelerated it downward into a screaming dive, earth, sky, and the entire arena whirling around him. He brought the nose of the S.E.5 to the black Albatross’s tail.
Showing his experience, Hollweg turned the Albatross brutally to meet his attacker, but the slower turning speed of the German fighter took its toll. The Vickers yammered and tracers smashed into Hollweg’s upper wing and fuselage, a cabane strut disintegrating into a stream of splinters. Then the German was firing and in a wink the planes passed each other. Randolph cried happily. Fabric was ripping from Hollweg’s upper wing and he was losing coolant. The Hun whipped his damaged machine into a tight turn, heading toward the clouds where there was a slight division between towering, dangerous thunderheads. With the S.E.5 close on his tail, Hollweg dove desperately for a dense mass of cirrus just to the right of the cleft in the clouds, which now had taken on the appearance of a great canyon between white Alpine towers.
Two specks were high in the canyon between the thunderheads. “Swine!” Randolph screamed. “A trap! A gentleman. You bloody bastards.”
He was so close to the Albatross he could feel the S.E.5 bounce in his enemy’s prop wash. Ignoring the two specks that had enlarged into a pair of Albatross D.2s, the major punched the tit. The Vickers spit out Randolph’s hatred and the smoke and cordite that blew back into his face hit him like a double charge of Johnnie Walker. He saw his bullet strikes on his enemy’s radiator and engine. Pushing the stick forward gently, he brought the stream of tracers down, trying for a killing shot into the cockpit. Randolph screamed with joy as motes of fire burst from the Albatross’s engine and then red flame streamed back and black smoke struck the Englishman in the face. Releasing the tit, he reveled in the smell of burning oil, petrol, fabric, and wood. The Albatross dropped off on one wing and began its last plunge, Hollweg standing, screaming, and beating at his burning flying clothes.
A quick glance told Randolph the two Albatrosses were screaming down in power dives and would be in range within seconds. He knew he was almost out of ammunition and his only chance was the clouds—wing-breaking winds and lightning be damned. He rolled into a dive and pointed the nose of the fighter toward the base of a thunderhead where rain fell in a gray mass and lightning flashed. But the Albatross could outdive the S.E.5 and the pair of enemy fighters gained slowly. “Come on! Come on, old bird!” Randolph shouted, glancing into his rear-vision mirror.
The two enemy planes had separated slightly, one back of his right elevator and the other his left. They would catch him in a cross fire. Tracers smoked and then more white trails whipped past and Randolph could hear the roar and clatter of the four Spandaus. Dropping below two thousand feet, the clouds were very close and he was entering the first filmy wisps. More strikes and fabric ripped from his top wing. Horrified, he felt the stick jerk and the controls grow sloppy with slack. Looking at his left wing, he saw the aileron shot from its hinges and tear loose, followed by huge patches of fabric, exposing ribs, spares, and control wires. With its trim lost, and bouncing and vibrating, the S.E.5 dropped its left wing and tried to roll to the left. Randolph corrected by horsing the stick to the right and gripping the stick with all his strength.
Instinctively, he hunched forward, trying to make himself a smaller target when his instrument panel disintegrated and a red-hot poker struck his left leg. The pain was excruciating and he could feel warm liquid in his boot. Suddenly the Hispano-Suiza began to vibrate and oil squirted like black geysers through bullet holes in the top and side of the cowling. The engine shrieked and clattered and a loose connecting rod beat itself to fragments. He felt heat. He smelled burning petrol as thick black smoke filled the cockpit, but he dared not cut the ignition. He would never make the cloud and his left leg felt paralyzed. But there was a small foothill, a precursor of the thunderstorm directly ahead. He plunged into the white vapor and finally cut his ignition. The Spandaus stopped. He pulled the stick back into his stomach.
The cloud was much larger than he had at first thought. He was at a thousand feet, almost level, but flames were creeping back from the engine. Reducing the stick to three-quarters right, he tramped the rudder bar despite the pain, nursing the airplane carefully, allowing the damaged left wing to drop and pull the S.E.5 to the left toward the beginnings of a left-hand spin. He had to take the chance. Then, as the fighter began to turn, he kicked hard right rudder and forced the nebulous spin into a sideslip, blowing the flames away from the cockpit. Watching his compass and groaning with pain, he nursed the falling plane south. He broke out of the cloud.
He was two hundred feet above no-man’s-land and the Albatrosses were gone. Flames had broken through the fire wall, bursting through the shattered instrument panel and began leaping up through the floorboards. Blood had filled his boot and spread across the floorboards. He could smell burning leather and blood as his boots caught fire and there was a pop like a gunshot as the alcohol in his compass came to a boil and the instrument exploded. He screamed and beat at the flames with a single glove.
No longer answering to the controls, the airplane dropped in a flat turn toward a jungle of barbed wire. A wheel caught on a concertina and the S.E.5, moving at at least eighty miles an hour, spun around like a child’s top, shedding its top wing, and crashing into a shell hole. Randolph felt the nose plunge into the soft, wet soil. Then the fighter gyrated wildly, bouncing out of one hole and into another, spars, braces, and ribs parting like gunshots, finally coming to rest with its belly to the sky.
Randolph, thrown from side to side and feeling his head crack against the coaming time and again, was knocked into blackness. But the darkness could not blot out the heat—a pitiless, searing inferno that burned layer after layer of clothes from his body. He was hanging from the cockpit, burning alive and too weak to release his safety lock. Never had he felt pain like this. He was screaming and continued to scream when the strong hands reached him.
“Cut the bloody straps a’fore we burn our bollocks off, you lead-swingin’ arse hole,” a strident, hoarse voice commanded.
“Right, Sergeant.”
There was a tugging and sawing and suddenly he fell headfirst into two pairs of strong arms and then with mingled curses he felt himself crash into the bottom of the hole in a heap with his rescuers. His nose was in mud and it stank of cordite and rotten flesh. He hea
rd the deliberate pounding of a Maxim firing in the distance.
“Grab ‘im by the ‘and. I’ve got t’uther,” the hoarse voice said. “And keep your arse down ‘til we’re through our wire. Fritzie will bugger you with seven-nine-two ball.”
“Right, Sergeant.”
Randolph felt his hands and wrists grabbed and then he was being pulled across the muddy ground. The Maxim fired again and he heard zinging and pinging sounds as bullets struck the wire above his head, particles of rust falling on his face and into his eyes. He screamed with pain as his wounded leg scraped over a rock and then a strand of barbed wire dug into his side and he felt burned skin peeling off his side and thigh. A new level of pain had been invented for him and him alone. Darkness blotted out the horror.
The pain jarred him back into consciousness. He was lying in the open with hundreds of others on a stretcher with a blanket over him. There was a wrecked farmhouse nearby with a large white banner emblazoned with a red cross hanging from it. He was in a casualty clearing station. There were groans, shouts, screams all around. A white-hot pain added Randolph’s voice. It was an hour before someone came to him. He was given water and then he was injected with morphia. Pain fading, he dozed off into cool darkness.
The rocking and the clatter of steel wheels on rails awakened him. The pain rushed back. He was in a hospital train, jammed into a carriage with dozens of others. He was assaulted with the stench of wounds that had rotted, vomit, stale urine, unwashed bodies, and excrement. There was a dressing on his leg wound and his flying clothes had been cut away from most of his torso. A greasy dressing had been smeared on his burns and he was covered with gauze. The pain returned and an exhausted orderly injected him. As he drifted off, he heard voices. “Bloody crime—a scandal. All of them left out too long. We’ll lose half of them to gangrene, sister.”