W E B Griffin - Men at War 1 - The Last Heroes

by The Last Heroes(Lit)

  It was so quiet that Sarah took a long time to go to sleep.

  The next morning, an enormous breakfast was served in what they called the morning room. There were three kinds of eggs, and biscuits, and ham, and bacon, and sausage.

  Afterward, the girls put on bathing suits. Ann and Charity wanted to take advantage of what they called real sun.

  By noon, Sarah knew that she had had enough sun. She tanned too easily, even under the shade of an umbrella. So after lunch, when the girls went back to poolside, she went instead into the library and looked around until she found something with pictures: Hincker's Illustrated Chronicle of the Army offorthern Virginia, an old, huge volume of etchings of the Civil War. She fell asleep with it on her lap.

  She woke to the sound of an automobile horn tooting "Shave and a Haircut, Two Bits" and looked out the French windows to the drive in front of the house.

  A shiny Buick convertible, with roof down and red leather upholstery, was pulling up. Two good-looking men were in it, wearing white uniforms that seemed very bright in the sunlight. And, she noticed, gold aviator's wings were pinned to their breasts. The driver got out, reached into the backseat, and picked up a white uniforrn cap. Sun glinted off the insignia and gold strap. Then he walked around the front of the Buick and came up onto the veranda, moving with muscular grace. She was disappointed when he disappeared.

  He was the best-looking young man she had ever seen. He must be Ann's cousin, she thought, or Ann's cousin's friend.

  Then the door to the library opened, and there he was.

  "Hello," he said. He smiled. He had beautiful teeth. "I'm Ed Bitter. Where is everybody?"

  Sarah felt naked in her bathing suit. Naked, she thought, but not ashamed, even when she saw him looking at her legs and chest.

  Ann's mother appeared, then Robert and one of the maids.

  "We were all upstairs, trying to bed down the army... or should I say, the Navy... we're going to havel" Jenny Chambers said, giving Ed Bitter her cheek to kiss. She saw Sarah. "I see you've met Sarah. Sarah, this is Edwin Bitter, my sister's son."

  "How do you do?" Ed Bitter said. The flicker of interest in his eyes died... she'd become only a friend of Ann's-which is to say, a kid.

  "Go out by the pool," Jenny Chambers said, "and I'll send some beer out, and I'll sort out who's going to sleep where. Sarah, take him out and introduce him to Charity, will you?"

  "Yes, ma'am," Sarah said, furious with herself for her polite, little girl's response. She should have said something adult: "I'll be happy to," or "Certainly," or something like that.

  The other man in the car came in. He was taller, but not nearly so good-looking as Ann's cousin.

  "Welcome back, Dick," Jenny Chambers said. "Follow Sarah to the pool. There's beer."

  "Yes, ma'am," the other one said. "Hello, Sarah. I'm Dick Canidy."

  She smiled, but she didn't say anything. She walked past the good-looking one into the foyer and led them through the house to the pool.

  Bitter went to a galvanized washtub full of ice and beer and took out two bottles. He tossed one to Canidy, who snatched it out of the ail They sat down on folding canvas lounge chairs. Bitter unfastened the snaps of the high collar of his white uniform tunic. The way he was sitting on the lounge chair, with his legs extended and crossed, his white trousers were drawn taut at his crotch.

  "So tell me, Ann," Bitter said, "how's Bryn Mawr? You catch a man?

  "Drop dead, Eddie," Ann said.

  "Isn't that the whole idea of going to college? To catch a man?"

  There was a timbre in his voice that Sarah felt in her belly.

  Thirty minutes later, Charley Chambers arrived with his friends from the University of Alabama.

  They were boys, Sarah thought, even though they were only a Couple of years younger than Ed Bitter and his friend. Immature boys. Ed Bitter and his friend thought so, too, for just about as soon as the introductions had been made, he made a signal to his friend, and they left "to get out of the uniforms." Sarah really hated to see them go.

  One of the boys who had come with Ann's brother said something to her.

  "I'm sorry," Sarah said. "I was woolgathering."

  "I said I'm David Bershin," he said.

  Sarah smiled at him.

  "Sarah Child," she said, giving him her hand. "I guess that you're at the University of Alabama, too, David?"

  "Yes, but call me Davey," he said.

  "That sounds Irish, not Jewish." She laughed. And so did he. He had a sweet, open laugh.

  He was a nice boy, she thought. She knew she should try to like him and not Ed Bitter the sailor. But... "Can I get you a beer?" Davey Bershin asked.

  "When in Rome," Sarah said. He smiled his sweet, open smile at her and went quickly to the galvanized tub full of ice and beer.

  Forty-five minutes later, a single-engine biplane flew over The Lodge at about five hundred feet.

  "That's Daddy," Ann said. "Let's go get him."

  When they went through the house and onto the veranda, Ed Bitter and his friend were about to get into Ed's Buick. Both were dressed for tennis. Sarah saw that Ed Bitter's muscular legs were lightly covered with pale hair.

  "Where are you going?" Ann called to him.

  "To get your father," Ed replied.

  "We were going to do that," Ann complained.

  "This car is here, dummy," Ed said. "Come along if you want to."

  "All right," Sarah heard herself say, and started down the veranda steps. Ann and Charity did not follow her.

  "That's all right, you go get him," Ann said. Sarah felt like a fool. She started to turn around, then decided she would look like more of a fool if she stayed.

  "I'm interested in airplanes," she said to Dick Canidy.

  "Me, too," he said. "This one is supposed to be special." He opened the passenger door for her and motioned her inside.

  "What's special about this one?"

  "It's a stagger-wing Beech with a big, fat Wasp engine," he said. "Makes it go like the hammers of hell."

  She had no idea what that meant. Ed Bitter was now beside her on the hot leather seats, his hairy leg beside her smooth one, his knee brushing gently against hers as he pushed on the starter mounted on the accelerator pedal and turned the engine over.

  When they reached the airplane three people were standing beside it, two men and a woman. Sarah recognized one of the men as Ann's father. And besides, Brandon Chambers was very hard to forget, for he was very large-280 pounds-and very present wherever he was, with a bellowing, almost always laughing voice that dominated his hearers more powerfully-though usually more cheerfully-than a great preacher's. He sailed up to the car and gave his enormous hand to Ed Bitter.

  "We have," Ann's father said significantly, "just been talking about you, Ed."

  "Have you?" Ed replied.

  "Hello, Sarah," Brandon Chambers said. "It's nice to see you, honey." And then he looked at Ed's friend. "You must be Lieutenant Canidy," he said.

  "Yes, sir." Canidy reached across Sarah to shake his hand. "How CIO you do, sir?"

  "I was doing a lot better, frankly, Lieutenant," Brandon Chambers said, "before I found out about this China insanity. I'm glad you're here."

  Sarah wondered what the "China insanity" could mean.

  Ann's brother Mark walked up to the car and shook Ed's hand.

  "You're out of your mind, you know, Ed," he said. "I thought you'd be smarter than that."

  "And it's nice to see you, too," Ed replied. "Dick, this is my cousin Mark. Mark, Dick Canidy."

  "The other crusader," Mark Chambers said dryly. "How do you do, Lieutenant?"

  "And the lady, Dick," Ed Bitter said, "is Mark's wife, Sueellen."

  "How do you do, Mrs. Chambers?" Dick Canidy said.

  She walked to him and gave him her hand.

  "Please call me Sue-Ellen," she said. "Any friend of Eddie's, et cetera."

  4 6That's very kind of you," Dick Canidy said.

 
"I'm Sue-Ellen," the woman said to Sarah, giving her her hand. "Why don't I get in the back with you and Lieutenant Canidy and leave the front seat to the broadbottomed lairds of the manor?"

  Sarah slid across the seat and got out the driver's side, and then climbed in the back. Sue-Ellen Chambers got in the middle, and Canidy got in beside her, while the other three men took suitcases from the plane and put them in the trunk.

  "Is my leg bothering you, Lieutenant?" Sue-Ellen asked. "I'm sorry. I didn't get the first name."

  "Dick," he said. "No. I was afraid my leg was in your way."

  "There's never enough room in the backseats of convertibles," Sue-Ellen asked, "is there?"

  "Nice flight?" Ed asked as they drove off.

  "While we waited for you," Brandon Chambers said, "I figured it out. I made two hundred thirty-five miles an hour from Nashville to Mobile and then two hundred thirty from Mobile here."

  "That's faster than an F3F- I ' " Ed replied.

  Sarah noticed the hairs on Ed Bitter's neck, and wondered what they'd be like to touch.

  Sue-Ellen Chambers pushed herself off the backseat with a hand on Dick Canidy's leg.

  "Sorry," she said to him, and then to Ed, "I don't remember this car, Eddie. Is it new?"

  "I've had it just over a month," he said.

  "It's very nice," she said, then slid back, wiggling her hips.

  At the house, they all went back to the pool, where they sat around a large umbrellaed round cast-iron table.

  Robert appeared with what looked like a pitcher of tomato juice and glasses for all of them.

  Sarah took a sip of the tomato juice. There was a bite to it. There was something alcoholic in it, gin or vodka, and Worcestershire, too, and some other flavors.

  "Sarah, honey," Mr. Chambers said. "Would you excuse us? We've got a little private family business to discuss with these two innocents."

  "Oh, certainly," Sarah said, flushing. "Excuse me."

  "Excuse us," Mr. Chambers said, "but this just won't wait."

  She went to the far end of the other side of the pool and sat down in an unusual wicker chair. It had a funny little parasol to shade whoever was sitting in it from the sun. She pushed herself all the way into it.

  She could hear Mr. Chambers's voice, of course; but she was surprised that she could hear Ed's too, faintly but clearly, like at Carnegie Hall. She had once gone to Carnegie Hall when there was nothing going on, and her father had demonstrated that it was possible to stand on the stage and whisper, and the whisper was audible in the very last row of seats. Something like that was happening now.

  "If you don't mind my asking, Lieutenant," Mr. Chambers said, and was interrupted by Ed Bitter.

  "You're making him uncomfortable, Uncle Brandon," he said.

  "My question, if you don't mind my asking," Brandon Chambers went on, ignoring him, "is how your parents reacted when they learned you were going to China."

  "We're not supposed to discuss any of this," Ed Bitter said.

  They were going to China!

  "I'm not a god damned Japanese spy, Eddie," Brandon Chambers said impatiently. "And it wasn't really that hard for me to find out more about this operation than you in all likelihood know."

  "My father is a clergyman, Mr. Chambers," Canidy said. "I didn't think I had to tell him any more than what we are supposed to say, that we've been hired by the Central Aircraft Manufacturing Company, Federal."

  "What kind of clergyman?" Sue-Ellen asked. "Episcopal," Canidy said. "He's headmaster of a boys' school."

  "Legend has it," she said, "that ministers' kids are really hellraisers. You don't look like a naughty boy, Mr. Canidy."

  "Sue-Ellen!" Mr. Chambers said impatiently. "Sorry," she said.

  "Well, I'll tell you this, when Eddie's parents heard about it, they had a fit," Brandon Chambers said.

  "They should not have called you," Ed Bitter said. "I told them not to say anything about it to anybody."

  "They wisely decided that they should call me because I was likely to know somebody, or Mark would, who could find out what is really going on. And I have. Mark and I have."

  "Well, it's done," Ed said. "There is really no point to this conversation."

  "It's not done," Brandon Chambers said. "You can still change your mind. You're still in the Navy. All you have to tell them is that you've changed your mind. Minds," he corrected himself. "Everything I'm saying applies to you, too, Dick."

  "You went off as a volunteer pilot before the World War," Ed Bitter said. "And we're going off now. Why was it right for you and wrong for us?"

  "I didn't have anybody, like me," Brandon Chambers said, "who had been there and who could tell me it was a damned-fool thing to "It didn't seem to hurt you any," Ed said.

  "I was lucky," Brandon Chambers said. "There were thirty-six people in my draft when we went to France. Eleven came back. Two out of three of us were killed."

  Oh my God! Sarah thought. He's going off to war!

  "You weren't a trained pilot," Ed protested. "We are."

  "Just because you've got a few hours in the F4F-3 doesn't make you Eddie Rickenbacker, Ed."

  "I didn't know you knew about that," Bitter said.

  "Buzzing the Naval Academy," Brandon Chambers said, "is not the same thing as going to war, Eddie. Do you really think the Japs aren't well trained? Well equipped?"

  "I didn't say that."

  "For your information, Mr. Expert Aviator," Brandon Chambers went on angrily, "the Japanese have equipped their Air Corps with Howard Hughes's fighter plane."

  "What?" Canidy asked.

  "The Mitsubishi A6M," Brandon Chambers said. "It's a carbon copy of the lowwinged monoplane Howard Hughes designed. I saw it being tested. He offered it to the Army and Navy, who were too dumb to take it. I don't know how the Japs got their hands on it... I heard through the Swedes, but that could be just a story... but they've got it, and they're mass-producing it."

  "Is it any good?" Canidy asked.

  "It's better than anything we have, including the F4F-3," Chambers said flatly. He turned to face Ed Bitter and went on. "If you have some schoolboy notion that you'll be able to sweep the Japanese from the skies like Superman, and come home a hero in a couple of months, covered with glory, forget it."

  "I'm a naval aviator," Ed Bitter said levelly. "I'm going to go over there and be very careful and team the practice of my profession. And then come back to the Navy and teach others what I have learned. That is not a schoolboy notion."

  "You're a god damned fool!" Brandon Chambers exploded. "The first thing a pilot who has been there learns is that only god damned fools volunteer for anything."

  Ed Bitter stood up, white-faced. That somehow interfered with the acoustics, and Sarah Child had to strain to hear him.

  "Thank you for your concern and your hospitality, Uncle Brandon " he said stiffly, artificially. "Dick and I will be going now." : :,Let me put one more question to your friend," Brandon Chambers said. "Is Eddie doing this because he is still young and stupid enough not to want to look like a coward in front of you? He can't quit now, in other words, now that you've led him into this?"

  "I didn't lead him into anything, Mr. Chambers," Canidy said coldly. "Nor he me. We were asked, separately, and we accepted eparately. The fact that we're friends hasn't entered into it." s 4 4Then answer me this: Why are you doing it? Why are you going to go halfway around the world to fight a well-equipped, welltrained enemy in obsolete fighter planes?"

  "Two reasons," Canidy said after a moment. "For one thing, it's going to get me out of the Navy. With a little bit of luck, in a year I can be out of uniform once and for all, and finally working as an aeronautical engineer, which is what I am, and what I want to do. I've got an offer from Boeing."

  "And the other?"

  "For the money. Six hundred dollars a month, and rations and quarters, is twice what I am making now. And there's five hundred dollars for every confirmed kill."

  "At least Brandon Cha
mbers said, "he has reasons."

  "So do I ' Ed Bitter said.

  Brandon Chambers said nothing else for a minute, and Sarah saw Ed Bitter staring off into the pine forest. After a moment, Dick Canidy got to his feet.

  Ed Bitter's leaving, Sarah Child thought. He's had a fight with his uncle, and he's leaving, and he's going to get killed in the war and I'll never see him again.