“No. How long have you been here?”
“In Germany, a fortnight. In this place, nearly twenty-four hours.”
“Have you been to Munich yet?”
“No, sir.”
“The Command in England must think well of you to allow you a pilgrimage of a month at your age.”
“The highly-born is very gracious. I suppose they do.”
The Knight thought, “And what a set of blind donkeys and outrageous idiots they must be. He may be the world’s best technician, but he’s an unsatisfactory subject or I’ll swallow my ring.”
“What kind of technician are you ?”
“A ground mechanic for aeroplanes of any kind.”
“You understand aeroplanes thoroughly?”
“Yes, sir. I believe I could make one that would get up if I had the tools and the time.”
“Have you been up?”
“On test, sir, many times.”
Alfred’s eyes gleamed, literally. He had a trick of opening them much wider when any thought excited him, so that more light struck on the balls. The Knight saw this gleam and a dangerous look that went with it. “Naturally,” he thought, “it must annoy a man past everything not to be allowed to acquire certain skills he knows he could acquire. And yet if we let the dangerous men learn to control the dangerous weapons of war where should we be ? This fellow goes up on test, and he watches the pilot like a hawk, no smallest movement escapes him. I’d bet anything he thinks he can fly an aeroplane, and knows he can fly a gyroplane.” A very fantastic idea was forming in the Knight’s mind. He thought of his secret, of his three dead sons, and of his father, who had all shared it with him at different times. All dead. No one now. And this man thought he could fly an aeroplane, but he probably couldn’t. Leave it to God—if the Thunderer strikes—then good. If not, if there is no God, or if God doesn’t mind, or if God is with that old von Hess, then—
When the Knight spoke again his manner had changed. It was the manner of an old man to a younger one of his own class.
“I know Salisbury and Bulfort and all that part well,” he said. “A long time ago I was the Knight of Southampton. I used often to go up to the Knights’ Table in Salisbury, and sometimes to Bulfort. For some reason they had much better food, and they were very pleasant men, the Army Knights. The Army always seems to get the best food, do what one will.”
Alfred said nothing, but he thought, “I wouldn’t mind dining in the Knights’ Table at Southampton for a change. I could do without Salisbury with an effort.”
“And it was at Bulfort,” the Knight went on, “that you met that young labourer, Hermann?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you made friends with him?”
“Yes, sir.”
“He was a most fortunate youth,” murmured the Knight.
“Sir?” said Alfred, not quite sure if he had heard correctly. He might have, but it was as well to make sure.
The Knight smiled.
“I know that it might be fortunate for a German youth to make friends with a certain kind of Englishman. Other people might see in it nothing but a condescension, caused by lust or idle curiosity or some other rather trivial motive, on the part of the German. But when I say he was a fortunate youth, perhaps I ought to add that he may be of all German youths the most deplorably unlucky. From one point of view, yes. Alfred, why is Hermann always so gloomy? He works on my own home farm, I am interested in the farm, I see him often. He’s a good worker, he likes his work, and yet he’s always overcast. Why is that?”
“I haven’t seen him for five years, sir.”
“You mean he could go on missing you for five years?”
“I don’t know, sir. Perhaps in a vague way he could. He was pleased to see me.”
“I can understand that. And you are aware of nothing in your friendship in England—nothing you told him, talked to him about—that might affect him adversely, even for five years?”
Alfred said very formally, “Most gracious highly-born, how could anything that an Englishman could talk of affect a Nazi adversely for five minutes?”
“Come, Alfred, there’s no need for all this fencing, you know really there is not. I give you my Knightly word of honour—” The Knight stopped. Alfred was looking at him in a strange way, almost pitying.
“Sir, where there is no liberty of judgment, there is no honour. ‘Nothing is dishonourable.’ If there is in a man’s mind any overriding idea, any faith, that can make all things honourable, however cruel, however treacherous, however untrue, in that man’s soul there can be no honour. Your word as a Teutonic Knight is no good to me.”
The Knight received this bitter stroke in silence, apparently unmoved. For an instant the old hot imperious blood leapt up, thundering in his ears, trying to drown with its clamour the small cold sound of this truth which he now for the first time heard from the lips of another man. He had always known it. But that he should hear it said! That the shame should be spoken aloud! And yet, what was he, Friedrich von Hess, for, if it were not to hold on to the truth? Hundreds of thousands of Knights, but only one von Hess. Literally now, only one. Suppose he did give way to the old savage desire to sweep away what opposed, what was alien, what dared to criticise; suppose he had Alfred beaten or tortured or murdered, the truth would still be where it was before, in his own mind. “If no one knows it at all,” he thought, “if he is dead and I am dead, it will still be there. If there were no men at all, still certain things about men’s behaviour would be true. ‘Where there’s no liberty of judgment there is no honour.’”
The Knight unclasped his hands. He laid them side by side on the desk before him and looked down at them. He took off his Knight’s ring and put it on the desk. It lay between the two men like a great red shining eye.
“I give you my word as a man,” he said.
Alfred was moved and embarrassed.
“O.K., sir,” he said. “Well, I never talked to Hermann at all about anything I think. He was only a boy, anyway.”
The Knight sighed, and put his ring on again. His finger felt cold and forlorn without it, and until he died he must wear it. Curious to think that that might be so soon.
“I think,” Alfred suggested, “that Hermann is partly in trouble because he can’t do with women. But that was nothing to do with me.”
“It’s not uncommon. Well, I have decided,” said the Knight, getting up. “We’d better do it now.”
“Do what, sir?” Alfred asked in astonishment.
“You think, don’t you, that you can fly an aeroplane ?”
“I’m sure I can,” said Alfred stoutly, still quite at sea.
“Then you shall now take me up and fly over Munich and come back, and if we land safely I may have some more to say to you.”
Alfred’s first reaction was one of wild excitement and pleasure. To fly ! To have the thing, the lovely sensitive thing, in his own mechanical control and under his own personal will! Dangerous? Horribly, really. Death in an hour or two, a few minutes, what did it matter? To fly ! To fly ! Then he sobbered down a little, his eyes grew thoughtful.
“Would you tell me why, sir?” he said.
“I can’t. I can tell you that I am to a small, but deplorable extent still superstitious. This is a superstitious fancy.”
“We may be killed,” Alfred reminded him.
“I think it more likely than not. But you will perhaps admit that though a Teutonic Knight has no honour, yet he is not likely to be panickily afraid of death.”
“Of course. But why do you want to kill me? I’m longing for the chance to fly, it isn’t that, and I’m not afraid. But why?”
“A dangerous man will be dead if you’re killed.”
“I see. And if you are?”
“Another, still more dangerous. But now I shall tell you no more. When we get to the hangar I shall send off the men on duty and say I’m going to fly the machine myself.”
Alfred shivered with excitement.
“Suppose I turn us over before we get up? And we’re just bumped or something and can’t get out? They’ll find me in the pilot’s seat. An Englishman.”
“We must take some risks.”
“Is it a gyroplane?”
“No. A two-seater Hertz. Just a baby private plane.”
Alfred whistled.
“Do you still think you can do it?”
“I’m sure I can. Only I mean I’d have been surer still about landing a gyroplane. Why is it that when gyroplanes are just as efficient and far safer, we always go on making so many of the old-fashioned planes?”
“There’s no danger left anywhere in the Empire except in learning to fly old-fashioned planes or in flying them in bad weather. If there is no danger there are no brave men. We must have a hero’s military funeral now and then. I shall get one. You, however, will not.”
“I’ll do without that,” said Alfred, laughing delightedly. “Whatever your motives are, sir, I thank you very much. You don’t know what it means to a man not to be ever allowed to fly when he spends his whole life with aeroplane engines.”
“Those in power can always give curious and unexpected pleasures,” said the Knight sardonically. “Now if I had you tortured for the open insult you offered me you’d feel aggrieved, but as I merely give you a good chance of being burnt to death you’re very grateful. Now march.”
On the walk to the hangar the Knight strode along in front, easy, graceful and very upright, while Alfred followed as suited his lowly status, ten yards behind. At the hangar the Knight’s pilot on duty and two mechanics sprang to attention.
“I’m going to take the machine up myself,” said von Hess, deigning no further explanation, though he had not piloted a machine for several years. “I may be back to-night, or I may not. All you men can go off duty. Dismiss.”
They saluted and turned on their heels, walking smartly across the landing-ground.
“Who is going to start it for him?” a mechanic said.
“That fellow, I suppose.”
“Who’s he?”
“Don’t know.”
“Do you think the old Knight will be all right? He hasn’t flown for ages.”
“It’s nothing to do with us. Obey orders, ask no questions. I hope he will be all right,” added this correct Nazi anxiously. “He can get up, but is he in good enough form to come down again? I think in spite of what he said we’d better hang about near the ground. What d’you think, Willi?”
Willi nodded.
“Yes. He may find he doesn’t like being up and come down at once and land all of a sprawl and we might be able to pull him out or something. We’ll stay about for a bit.”
Alfred meanwhile had run the machine out of the hangar. It was very light and easy to handle. The Knight got into the back seat.
“Shall I start it, sir ?”
“One minute. If we come down not too well but not too badly try to get us out of our seats.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And just get into your seat a second and see that these speaking-tubes are working all right. When we’re up I’ll give you the course and you can fly on the compass. It’ll be easier for you than looking for landmarks, and you don’t know the country. There, did you hear that? I whispered it.”
“Yes,” Alfred whispered back down his tube.
He got out again, started the engine and tuned up. Everything was in perfect order, of course. A lovely thing, Alfred crooned, listening to the roar of the engine with an expert’s perfectly trained ear. Not too new. Ah, you little beauty, you’re mine, mine! Now then! He was not very much astonished that he got the aeroplane into the air without mishap. That was easy really. And yet when he stopped bumping and knew he was in the air he couldn’t repress a bellow of triumph.
“Hoorah !” he yelled. “We’re up, sir !”
“Go how you like,” said the Knight’s voice through the speaking-tube, “until you’re well up. Then I’ll give you the course. Remember this isn’t Salisbury Plain. It’s hilly country and you must be well above it.”
Alfred rose farther and then started to bank. The little aeroplane was very sensitive.
“It’s too easy!” Alfred shouted. “Oh, its gorgeous ! It’s heaven!”
“Get more height as quick as you can,” was the Knight’s reply to these boyish exclamations. “It’d be silly to hit a mountain when you’re enjoying yourself so much.”
Alfred went on up, as fast as he could make the machine climb. He was intoxicated. He wanted to get about a mile above Germany and then lay the course straight for England, and fly till he got there, and then hide the aeroplane in some secret place. And what should he do with the Knight? Kill him, kill him ! Kill every Knight and every Nazi that dared to stop a man flying! Kill them all !
“That’ll do now,” said the Knight’s voice, cutting through the roar of the engine. “Get on your course.” He gave the course and Alfred managed to come round and keep fairly well on it. “You’re a natural pilot, Alfred. I’ve hardly felt a lurch.”
“Yes,” thought Alfred, “I am a natural pilot, and half your clod-fisted Nazis are most unnatural ones.” And to his dismay it seemed only a minute or so later that the Knight told him to look down. There below them lay the Holy City of Munich, quiet and white in the afternoon sun. Alfred would have liked to drop a bomb on it, particularly and specially on the Sacred Aeroplane.
“Some day,” he thought viciously. “Smash it all up somehow !”
“Now go back,” the Knight ordered. “Come round in a wide sweep and I’ll give you the course again.”
Alfred shouted very loudly down his tube.
“I’m not going back !”
“Don’t roar like that,” the Knight said. “These tubes have amplifiers and it makes nothing but a buzz if you shout. Speak quietly. What did you say?”
“I’m not going back!” repeated Alfred in a quieter but extremely vicious tone.
But the only answer from his passenger was a faint cynical laugh. Alfred flew straight on, but the Knight said nothing more, and Alfred began to feel ashamed of his childishness. He hadn’t the faintest idea where he was going or how much petrol there was in the machine.
“Can I go on a bit farther before we go back?” he asked soon.
“Who can stop you? But you’ve been up long enough for the first time. Far longer than a new Nazi pilot would be allowed. There’s a nerve strain even if you don’t feel it. You’ve got to land yet. You’re doing well, but don’t forget that.”
Alfred started to come round. The Knight gave him the course, and again Alfred seemed to have hardly any time to enjoy himself before the Knight said, “Now look down. Can you see the landing-ground, over there to half left? Now spiral down to it and try not to get too far away. Land with your nose towards the hangar, that’s right for the wind. Now I’m not going to say another word.”
Alfred came down rather well, and had the plane in nice position for landing, when he became aware of a group of men running over the ground towards the hangar. He went up again.
“Afraid ?” asked the Knight.
“Those blasted fools!” said Alfred breathlessly.
“They’ll get out of the way. Now do it this time no matter where they are.”
“But the idiots are standing still now !” cried Alfred in agony. “If they’d only keep on running !”
“They’re wondering what on earth I’m doing. Don’t worry about them. Pretend they’re not there.”
Alfred circled again, came down, flattened out and rushing over the heads of the mechanics landed far beyond them. Bump—hop! Bump—hop! Bump, bump, bump, safely down—now nothing can happen but a tip-over—oh, Hitler, the hangar! He had left himself too little room for the run up. It seemed as if the hangar was rushing at him with enormous speed and mouth wide open to devour him. He switched off and tried to turn the plane; nothing happened, he ran straight on into the hangar and fetched up with a splintering crash against the further conc
rete wall. He hit his head on something and was half dazed, but he was aware of the Knight’s voice a long way off speaking out of the deafening thick silence, “Get out, man. Quick.”
He scrambled out, surprised to find all his bones whole. Gradually his head cleared. The aeroplane was much battered about the engine and propeller, but there was very little human damage. The Knight was standing on his feet holding a handkerchief to his nose and a hand to his left ribs.
“Are you all right, sir?” Alfred asked, feeling his own head.
“A bruise or so. You weren’t really going very fast.”
“What ploughboy work!” muttered Alfred, in disgust with himself. “I’ve smashed the lovely little thing up. What ingratitude! I’m so sorry, sir; it was rotten. But I believe I’d have done it all right if it hadn’t been for having to miss those blasted fools.”
“You should have gone at them as I told you. Then you’d have had plenty of room.”
The mechanics now came tearing in to see what had happened. Their relief at seeing the Knight on his feet outside the aeroplane was very great. They looked at him sheepishly, for all of them had disobeyed his orders to go off duty, and tried to control their noisy panting. The Knight’s dignity was in some rather miraculous manner unimpaired by his bleeding nose. He waved his disengaged hand at the huddled aeroplane.
“I’ve smashed that machine up,” he said coolly. “I don’t think you can do much with it here. You’d better get another one sent down at once from the works. Telephone. And by the way, am I forgetting things or did I tell you men to go off duty?”
“Yes, highly-born, you did,” they said, standing like a little row of stone statues.
“Then what did you come back on to the ground for?”
No one replied. Then Wilhelm, the pilot, an oldish man, said, “My lord, we were wondering—we were afraid—” He stuck, not liking to say that they all thought he might make a mess of his landing, and possibly set the machine on fire. The Knight looked at them over the top of his handkerchief until they couldn’t help wishing that he had hit his head just hard enough to be unaware of their disobedience, then he swung round and walked out of the hangar, turning his handkerchief to find an unreddened patch. In a few steps he swung round again and called out sharply, “Alfred ! Have you a clean handkerchief?” Alfred jumped forward, fumbling in his pockets. No, he hadn’t one. There were two in his sack, which was still in the lobby of the Court-room.
Swastika Night Page 7