Fatal Incident

by Jim Proebstle

  “Captain,” the major called out as he recognized Nick approaching the group. “Let’s have that plane ready for takeoff by 2045.”

  Nick resented being ordered around by this overstuffed officer, but swallowed his pride. “Are you sure your people are up to it?” It only took a few glances at the others to see they were dog tired. “A night’s rest might make the flight a little more palatable.”

  The major walked over in the crunchy snow to Nick and stopped with his face eye-to-eye with Nick’s. “I’m not sure you’d make it in the regular army, Captain. Seems like comfort is more important to you than getting things done. Now, if there are reasons why we can’t lift off in an hour, I’d like to hear them. If there aren’t, then I’d suggest we get to work.”

  “Twenty forty-five it is, Major!” Nick saluted, subverting his immediate negative reaction to the major’s air of superiority. He turned and walked away toward the tent where Robert, and by now Red, were sound asleep.

  “Up and at ’em, boys,” Nick said as he shook the bottom of both cots. “Major’s got his tit in a wringer about something, and he wants liftoff in fifty-five minutes.” Seeing just a little movement from Red and none from Robert, he shook the beds harder. “Let’s go!”

  Robert and Red stumbled around the tent scrambling to get dressed, get their gear, and get their brains out of a sleep fog. Nick prepared a flight plan. In twenty minutes all three were walking toward a Jeep in the cold night air. The vehicle hadn’t been started all day, and the inside was like an icebox. It took several grinding turns of the engine to get a response. Once started, Nick let it idle, almost as an act of mercy, while they packed their gear and positioned the plane’s engine oil in a box to keep the container from falling on its side. It was exactly for situations like this, and for assholes like Major Gordon, that made draining the oil the right call, he thought. His plan was to get to the C-45A with enough time to call in his flight plan, have Red put the oil back in the crankcase, and have Robert stow their gear. He had no intention of allowing the major even the slightest excuse to agitate his crew any more than they already were.

  “Red, Robert, let’s just get this flight over with. Any comments from our passengers that cause your blood to boil, bring ’em to me. As you would say, Red, the major’s got a burr under his saddle, and I don’t intend to make it our problem. We clear on this?”

  “Completely,” replied Robert, respecting the captain’s approach to head off a problem.

  “In the desert, the Mescalero Apache strip their enemy naked, stake ’em out on top of an ant hill, pour honey on their gonads, and …”

  “Enough, Red,” Nick interrupted. “Besides being a court-marshalling offense, we don’t have any ant hills or honey.” The tension eased and the men went to work.

  The trip back to Anchorage went as well as could be expected. Other than Nick and Red everyone slept the whole flight.

  It was almost midnight when Robert, completely exhausted, returned to his quarters and quickly got ready for bed. He decided to stow his gear before hitting the sack. He unzipped the daypack after dealing with his duffel bag and noticed a folded slip of paper on top. What’s this?, he thought, because he had no recall of putting it there. He unfolded the paper, revealing a handwritten note that said:

  ROBERT,

  TAKE THIS NOTE TO VLADIMIR AND MENTION, FIRST LIGHTNING.

  A FRIEND

  CHAPTER 24

  Nick was awakened early the next morning by one of the non-coms from flight operations rapping at his door. “Captain, Captain,” he said half out of breath. “Cricket said it would be okay to wake you. Sorry, sir.”

  “Oh, he did, did he? What’s so damned important?” he said, wiping sleep from his eyes.

  “We got a troop ship coming through in about an hour from Bethel. The captain radioed that he’s coming down with the flu and can’t continue on. These boys on board are long overdue for furlough, and Cricket wants to know if you’d take the rest of the flight.”

  “Where’s it headed?” Nick was a little defensive, afraid it might get in the way of his own long-awaited furlough.

  “Minneapolis-St. Paul and then to Chicago. Cricket said we have another pilot that can bring the ship back if you’d like to start your Christmas holidays early, sir.”

  “Tell Cricket I owe him one. I’ll be ready in half an hour.” This was the first good scheduling news Nick had had in months. After a quick shower he packed his duffel bag, being careful to protect the various presents he’d purchased. He took a minute and stopped to wish Red a Merry Christmas before leaving.

  By 1000, Nick was in the air with perfect skies. He smiled at the thought of how excited Martha would be with the surprise. They had to make a quick stop in Norman Wells on the CANOL to deliver some Caterpillar parts and then refuel in Edmonton. There was no reason why they couldn’t be in Minneapolis by 1930. No reason they couldn’t make Chicago by 2130. He’d be home the next day by noon—almost a full week ahead of schedule.

  December 12, 1943

  Enroute Norman Wells

  My Dear Martha,

  I’ll hand this card to you when I’m home—sure looking forward to time with you and ‘family’. I saw a distinctive, unnamed mountain today, about six thousand feet, in a conspicuous position where the Mackenzie and Liard Rivers come together. I named it Mt. Martha on the map. Further on, at the confluence of the Mackenzie and Keele Rivers lies a beautiful, uncharted lake with high cliffs on either side about seventy miles north of Mt. Martha that splits the range from east to west. I have put it on the map as Lake Martha.

  See you tomorrow on my surprise arrival.

  Yours,

  Nick

  Nick was in the air again, on schedule out of Edmonton, when his flight engineer knocked on the cabin door.

  “Captain, don’t mean to interrupt, but we’ve got a passenger out here who says she knows you. Wants to say hello, if it’s alright.”

  “She? Not a lot of those in the army.”

  “She told me her name is Anne Walsh.”

  “Oh hell,” Nick exclaimed. “Anne’s not a she; she’s a sister.”

  “I heard that,” came the voice on the other side of the door.

  “The ship’s yours.” Nick was happy to give the co-pilot a turn at the stick.

  “Anne, you old son-of-a-gun. How long have you been on the plane?”

  “Just boarded. Heading home for the holidays.”

  “Cleveland, if I remember right. Is the lucky boyfriend going to be home from North Africa?”

  “You do have a good memory, Captain.”

  “Just keeping track of the competition,” he said lightheartedly. “This flight only goes as far as Chicago. You do know that?”

  “A bus will take me the rest of the way.”

  “You didn’t say good-bye before leaving. I figured you had been relocated.”

  “Yeah, right after we had that date together. Remember?” They laughed. “I’m really sorry about not leaving a note,” Anne went on. “You were on your way to Bethel, and I needed to catch a plane for Billings the next day. A pretty lame excuse, I know. Billings has a great hospital, and I’m in the ER. It seems that the duty here for flight training isn’t hard enough. Most of these guys have a lot of free time and get hurt fishing, backpacking, climbing, hunting, you name it. It’s like summer camp for most of these boys.

  “How’s Martha?”

  “Bigger than a blimp.”

  “Wow, I hadn’t heard.”

  “Found out after arriving in Bethel. She’s pretty excited, but the morning sickness isn’t any fun.”

  “She’s pretty excited? What about you, mister?”

  “That’s what I meant, we’re pretty excited. It’s just harder to be tuned in when you’re gone the whole time.”

  “I’ll bet you plan to make it up over Christmas.”

  “Going to surprise her tomorrow night. She’s not expecting me until next week. What about you? Do you hear from Tom?”
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  “The postcards are usually a month late, but he’s put in for leave over Christmas. Sure hope he gets it.”

  “His duty is a lot different than ours.”

  “From what I can tell, they’re moving on to Italy. His communications duty puts him in some tough situations.”

  “You must worry about him a lot.”

  “I just keep moving forward each day, thinking that it’ll be over soon. I try to help the boys in my ER the way I would want Tom helped if he were hurt.”

  “Well, we’re about ready to begin preparations for landing in Minneapolis-St. Paul, so I need to get back to work. I’ll buy you a cup of coffee on the way to Chicago.”

  “You’re going to Chicago?” The enthusiasm in Anne’s voice hinted that she hoped they could spend more time together.

  “Yes, but it will be late, and my early turnaround the next day means I have to get my beauty sleep. I’ll take a rain check for the next time we run into each other.”

  The next day Nick arrived in Minneapolis on time. He let himself into their place in Minneapolis and made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich while waiting the two hours for Martha to get home from work. He was a little disappointed that the house hadn’t been decorated for Christmas yet, but thought that it would be fun for them to do together. They could do it that night. It felt good to just sit on the couch and do nothing. It wasn’t long before he was sound asleep. The lack of sleep from the Yukon Flats trip must have caught up with him, as he didn’t awake until he heard the key in the front door. Martha had stopped after work to visit with her friend Alice and by now the house was completely dark.

  He instinctively got up and sprang toward Martha from the other room exclaiming, “Surprise, Honey! I’m home!”

  “Aaaaaah!” Martha screamed in complete shock and dropped her groceries. She slipped on the rag-braided, circular entry rug, caught a heel, and lost her balance with a buckled knee. She hit her head on the brass handle of the entry door and dropped to the floor with a hard thud. Blood came quickly.

  Nick could see the entire event in his mind’s eye, as if it were replayed in slow motion—him awakened from a deep sleep, calling out Martha’s name enthusiastically, her shock that someone was in the house, causing her to slip on the rug and fall. “Oh my God, what have I done!?” He turned on a hall light and quickly retrieved a towel from the kitchen to act as a compress for the wound. He placed a small pillow from the couch under her head as he made attempts to revive her. The blood was making quite a mess.

  Martha’s head began to turn slowly. She groaned in pain as she tried to open her eyes. “Don’t hurt me,” she pleaded. “I don’t have any money.”

  “It’s me, Honey. It’s me. I’m so sorry. It was an accident.”

  Recognizing Nick for the first time, she said, “What are you doing here? You’re not due home for another week.”

  “It’s a long story, but I think we need to get you to a hospital first. Are you okay to stand up?”

  “I think so. Why did you scare me that way? I hope the baby’s okay,” she said with an added level of alarm.

  “Your face took a pretty good whack on the fall, but I think you’ll be fine. What’s Doc McNally’s number?”

  Fortunately, the Doc was in and said he’d meet them there.

  “Just keep her quiet and still,” he told Nick before hanging up.

  Nick quickly grabbed a few things Martha needed and made it to the hospital in twenty minutes. The next couple hours were occupied with waiting and filling out forms. Luckily it was a Monday, and Doc McNally was still on call. He showed up shortly after they arrived. After a brief examination, he diagnosed a broken nose and administered some pain medication. He packed her nose with sterile gauze. “The important part is that the baby will be okay,” he said as he secured the dressing with tape across the nostrils.

  “What were you thinking, Nick?” Martha said after the doctor left.

  Nick tried to explain, but in retrospect none of it made sense to him either.

  “I know you meant well, Nick, but you weren’t considering me in this little surprise of yours. I’m glad you’re home early, but couldn’t you have just called? God, my nose hurts!”

  “Sorry for trying to add a little fun into things. Let’s just drop it,” he said defensively. “It was an accident.” Nick walked away frustrated, trying to make sense of two broken noses in his life within the last thirty days.

  The next morning things weren’t any better. He heard Martha exclaim from the bathroom, “This is awful. I look like a prizefighter, Nick. Come here!”

  He groaned under his breath, knowing that his penance was far from over. He walked across the hardwood bedroom floor and down the hall in his cotton pajamas toward the bathroom.

  “I can’t believe it,” he heard her say.

  He was shocked when he first saw Martha. She faced the medicine cabinet mirror poking at a mass of greenish-yellow bruises across the bridge of her nose and cheeks. The bruises were much worse than those of Robert’s. Must be the effects of the solid brass door handle. It couldn’t have been worse if I’d sucker punched her with brass knuckles myself, he thought. Would people think I hit my wife? Why am I even thinking that? The anticipation of a perfect Christmas vanished as dread filled the pit of Nick’s stomach.

  “It’s not too bad,” he lied.

  “Not too bad! It’s a disaster. There’s no way I can even cover it up, Nick. And the throbbing just won’t stop.”

  Nick knew the whole mess could have been avoided if he hadn’t been so stupid. It didn’t seem fair. He had been looking forward to coming home for so long and went to such an effort to make his arrival exciting and fun. “Is there anything I can do?” he asked feebly.

  Martha started to cry. “Nothing’s right anymore. You’d rather be off with your army buddies gambling than be home anyway. And now this! You’ll have to call me in sick,” she said with a defeated tone, knowing they needed the money. He reached to console her, but she eluded his grasp and was gone before his hand could reach her shoulder. She stormed out of the bathroom and down the hall, and then slammed the bedroom door behind her.

  He stared into the bathroom mirror only to see a blank expression staring back at him. He put both hands on the edge of the porcelain sink to prop himself up while he considered his predicament. The de-icing challenge with Red was much easier than this, he thought. At least we could predict events. This situation had gone completely out of control—well beyond the turmoil of the broken nose.

  She spent the rest of the morning alone in the bedroom while Nick aimlessly wandered the rest of the house. No matter how he reviewed the facts and circumstances leading up to the broken nose, he couldn’t make the logic work that would claim his innocence. He read for a while, but struggled to hold onto the words. He switched from magazine to book with no improvement. Music from a local radio station settled some of the hostility generated by the silence. He moved around their small living room, refreshing himself with the pictures of Martha and him, family and friends, and the few art pieces they had collected. The envelope on the mantel caught his attention, as it seemed out of place. He was surprised to see that it was addressed to him, but there was no stamp. Nick wrestled with the ethics of opening a letter that was never sent. The envelope had been sealed, so he felt it was probably similar to the postcard he wrote on the flight home—why mail it when you can hand it to the person? He opened the letter.

  December 8, 1943

  My Dearest Nick,

  I know that I can’t expect you to understand how lonely I am when you’re away, but I have always felt some comfort thinking that you felt the same way. Your three cards today detailing the vacation you seem to be enjoying with the boys playing poker makes it difficult for me to share any compassion for your situation. It doesn’t seem to me that the lost Thanksgiving for us was much of a disappointment to you when compared to the excitement of your gambling escapades. Maybe Mother was right. You’ll always put yourse
lf first. Your baby and I will need a father and husband when you return—will you be there?

  The family had so many plans that involved you and when you couldn’t make it all of us genuinely felt sad for your hardship. I can safely inform them that you survived quite well. It concerns me, Nick, that I don’t seem to know who you are at times. This makes me feel very alone and sad. What’s happening to you? Your baby and I don’t have much of a choice but to wait and hope that your carelessness for how we feel and your insensitivity over our situation will pass.

  Maybe I should wait until tomorrow to see if I feel the same way about your cards before sending this letter.

  Love Always,

  Martha

  The three postcards detailing his “gambling escapades” were inserted into the envelope along with the letter.

  Doesn’t she see that these postcards are my attempt to keep her from worrying? I didn’t tell her about the consequences of losing an engine at nine thousand feet. I didn’t burden her with the monotony involved in waiting four days for a new engine and then adding the frustration of having the ship commandeered by the army. Does she really think that gambling is my new mistress? All I can do is deal with the reality presented. Why does she have to get so emotional about everything? Nick’s thoughts bore a hole in his stomach. And the last straw was the comment referencing her mother. Maybe it is easier to be single while at war, he thought, reflecting back on his conversation with that new co-pilot he flew with about a month back. Nick’s shoulders were tight with tension. He needed some understanding, too, he thought. But today, however, was not the day to engage a pregnant, hundred and twenty–pound adversary with a broken nose, bruises, and hurt feelings. He smiled a bit at the image.

  “Can I get anything for you, Hotshot? I’m going out for a few minutes and thought maybe some pistachio ice cream might help.” It was her favorite and Nick wasn’t above bribing her at this point.

  “Don’t you care how I look at all?” came her reply. “I suppose you want me to look fatter than I already am with this baby!” The bedroom door slammed.