I knew the essentials. A single-prop engine with cantilevered wing. Passenger seat located in front of the pilot seat. I had this. Lindbergh had been a great tutor. But what he hadn’t covered in my short introduction to aeronautical education was the catapult. My mind raced to make up ground as my hands worked to unfasten the lines to the tarpaulin. By hook or by crook, I was getting airborne in front of a capacity crowd of armed Nazis. What could possibly go wrong?
Lars instinctively helped me unfasten the tarp. He busied himself while I looked down over the edge of the transom at the Lido Deck below. All eyes were still fixed on Garbo being led by Nazi escorts into one of the Athenia’s lifeboats. The lifeboat would be lowered over the side down to the ocean’s surface to an awaiting Nazi transport boat.
I turned back to the newly exposed seaplane and sank to my knees. Garbo and I appeared to be headed on separate journeys now. She was to be sold like a beautiful slave to the highest bidder. I was the schmuck who was going to try and go out in a blaze of futile glory and take a few Nazi thugs with me. One moment in Garbo’s arms, the next, gone like quicksilver. Life was so fucking strange.
I hurried back to the seaplane, inspected the machine. The little puddle-jumper was designed to be flown ahead and bring the mail into port. Then the seaplane would be refueled, new cargo loaded, and it would stand ready to be hoisted back into the catapult when the mother ship arrived in port. All hunky-dory, except for the fact I wasn’t going to be landing in port. Or on land, for that matter.
Lars gave me a boost as I got into the cockpit of the plane, strapped my camera above the dash, just behind the tiny windshield. I stared at the instrument panel. The fuel gauge read full. Check. Thank God. Then I looked up at the single-prop engine in front of me. Was I out of my fucking mind? Check. I turned the ignition switch. Her engine came to life, but then I remembered the propeller needed to be turned over. Shit.
I looked down at my little friend, Lars. He looked up at me and gave a solemn smile. I indicated with hand gestures what I needed him to do. He nodded at me and dutifully walked around the front of the plane toward the prop. The kid was turning out to be the best friend I ever had. The best friend I would ever have.
While the seaplane’s engine idled, my mind raced back to the singular issue of landing. Taking off was relatively easy. Landing was something else. And landing on water was something else beyond that. I’d heard enough stories of water landings to know the margin of error was next to nil. Water plus velocity equaled a hard, unpredictable surface, which on impact could knock you unconscious, swallow and drown you. A pilot who hit water at the wrong angle became hamburger in a can. A can that could explode in flames at any second. Not exactly my idea of fun.
Then again, what the hell was I worried about? The Nazis would blow me out of the sky once I took off. They’d take care of my landing for me. One less thing for me to focus on. I was destined to crash and burn, so why not just go with it.
I watched as Lars grabbed the prop with both hands and was about to pull her down, when I heard the report of rifle fire. Aimed our way. The Nazis had found us out and opened season on our asses.
“Holy fuck,” I said.
To his credit, Lars stood his ground and pulled harder on the propeller. The prop turned over, then stopped. Another crack of rifle fire came from below. This time, we both looked down, saw they weren’t shooting at us at all but at a ship’s officer fool enough to try and rescue Garbo. A Nazi sniper on the Nazi battleship shot at the First Officer of the Athenia twice, the second time hitting him in the head. He fell off the side of the ship and hit the water, dead.
Lars turned and grabbed hold of the prop again. This time he pushed up clockwise, before wrenching down counterclockwise. The propeller turned over and revved up, generating a pillar of wind. Lars shielded his face and ran back over to stand below me in the cockpit. I looked down at the seaplane’s control panel and grabbed the throttle.
“Thank you, Lars.” I screamed over the engine noise.
Lars had his hands over his ears when he smiled. Then he removed one of them to give me the thumbs up. Sweet kid.
The catapult release on the seaplane’s dash was clearly marked. I grabbed hold of the lever and said a Hail Mary. How long had it been since I’d done that? I pulled on the catapult lever.
Before I knew what the fuck was happening, me and two thousand pounds of metal were thrust airborne. I cleared the Athenia, instinctively pulled back on the stick and revved the throttle. The responsive little plane ascended into the sky in a near-vertical trajectory, like a rocket. Great way to stall an engine, Moseley. She stalled all right. I leveled her off and pulled on the choke again. She sputtered back to life as soon as I refreshed her engine’s oxygen supply. Too close for comfort.
I looked down and saw everyone looking up at me. Saw Lars between the two smokestacks waving a hand. I must have been putting on quite the aerial acrobatics show. Even Garbo was attuned to me. She sat perfectly still beside Nick, watching me from the open-air transport boat as it navigated the waves from the Athenia to the awaiting Nazi battleship. I managed to take several aerial shots of the transport boat with my camera. At least, I thought I did, blindly clicking off shots while my eyes where solely fixated on Garbo. Watched while she turned away.
I had what I needed. I could turn, fly away and live to fight another day. And maybe that was for the best. Maybe telling Garbo’s story of bravery would rally a movie-loving world to viciously attack Hitler, force him and Nick to return her unscathed. Then we could be together again. Together forever. It was worth a shot, wasn’t it? Better than what I currently had planned. Better than failure and certain death. Maybe even get my beloved killed in the bargain.
I banked the little plane to the right and began my journey away from Garbo. This was it. The moment I knew was inevitable yet wished never to come to. The right decision was to go and get reinforcements. The moment when fantasy collided with harsh reality. I had been given an out, and now I had to take it. Seth Moseley, scumbag tabloid reporter, lives on to tell the story yet again. Hurray for scumbags everywhere.
I plotted my course with the compass affixed to my plane’s control panel. Heading was north by northwest. I’d fly to the horizon, then take a right. It would be night soon. I’d be flying blind with only my self-hatred and the little dashboard light to guide my way. I was exhausted but knew the moment I fell asleep, I’d be dead.
What was so bad about dying, anyway? Whatever waited for me on the other side couldn’t be worse than what I’d experienced so far here on earth. So much human misery. A fair share of it caused by yours truly. The porter Lars’s face flashed before my eyes. It would be a relief when it was all over. Still, I never thought it would end this way. End with me flying away from Garbo.
I headed toward a Sucker Hole. What pilots called a glimpse of blue sky through the clouds. They called them that because there was usually a storm brewing on the other side. The patch of blue was a mirage to sucker you in. Then it was too late. There was no going back.
An errant ray of sunshine came out of nowhere and glistened off my little plane’s port bow. A pure white light that grew in intensity engulfed the plane’s fuselage and me until everything glowed as one. Where the hell had that come from? I looked down at the controls but couldn’t make them out. I had to fly on instinct. The same instinct that back on the ship had told me to turn around and kiss Garbo. The very same instinct that had told me it wouldn’t be our last kiss.
I was floating midair in a pool of light when I realized I wasn’t worried about death anymore. Aware for the first time that I had been fearful of the end my whole life but was now free of fear. I lifted my hands off the controls and raised them into the air. The plane responded, the nose slowly dipping into a descent. In another minute I’d be in a tailspin, but I didn’t care. I wanted to be on the other side, where there was no fear, no more misunderstanding.
Then, as quick as it came, the sunray was gone. The sky returne
d to a cloudy gray. I lowered my hands back to the controls, unsure of what had come over me. I pulled the little plane’s nose up and approached the Sucker Hole. My gateway out of the storm clouds. Then the thought of turning around struck me. Hard.
If I turned around now, I’d be swearing out my own death warrant. Be blown from the sky as sure as that First Officer from the Athenia had been picked off her port side by a Nazi sniper for even thinking of coming to Garbo’s aid. Become one in a faceless sea of honored dead.
Garbo. She was under Nick’s spell as well. He was using her as bounty, booty, or whatever the hell the pirate lingo was? He was the Athenia’s dark passenger whose intention all along had been for Garbo to be his meal ticket. She thought she was destined to save the world. I feared how she’d react to the news that instead, she was to be sold on the world’s biggest auction block? Made a mockery of in front of the entire planet.
Hold on a minute.
Maybe I’d been thinking about all this ass-backwards. Nick had acted like he was the one who had sent for me. Knew my history and had planned everything down to the very last detail. But what if he hadn’t? What if the opportunist had merely capitalized on my being aboard? Had improvised yet again and enlisted me into service? After all, hadn’t Garbo been the one hiding in the men’s room? The one who had sucker-punched me over the head? She had played a velvet-gloved hand in my destiny, not him. What if?
Nick had appealed to the old Seth, the gambler. The one that got the story and got away clean. He hadn’t known about this new Seth. The committed, love-struck schmuck who stayed and stood his ground. I couldn’t blame him for not knowing of New Seth’s existence. New Seth had only been born just recently. Just now. In flight. Brought into being the same moment that stray beam of light appeared and, like a fulcrum, switched up the controls. Now New Seth spread his wings and turned on a dime. Pulled back on the throttle and took on torque. Steered the airship around and back. The little plane yawed.
“Fuck it,” I said as I turned her into the wind and gunned the engine. “No Sucker Hole for me.”
Nick thought he’d figured all the angles. But he hadn’t seen anything yet. I was headed back to Garbo without a chance in hell of surviving. But that wasn’t the point anymore. Now-or-never had become now-and-forever. A solemn vow to see things through to the bitter end. To get my hands dirty for the first and last time. To take a stand and fall with Garbo, Keeper of the Light.
The cloud cover was thick. A storm system was moving in and had lowered the ceiling of visibility over the Athenia since I’d left. But even before I dropped altitude and burst through the clouds, I knew I was on the right track. A beacon of light on the water’s surface was guiding me in. I believed Garbo herself was bringing me home.
I knew the second they saw me. Order gave way to mayhem aboard Garbo’s tiny transport boat. A mad scurry of Nazis blurred around her, while Garbo remained perfectly still. Garbo and Nick beside her, who wasn’t a Nazi after all but a con man extraordinaire. Both turned in unison and watched me, each one’s facial expression in perfect contrast to the other. Garbo smiled while the last rays of sunlight played in her hair. Meanwhile, Nick darkened and, I imagined, bit his lower lip.
I came in hot. Brought the little mail plane around and down toward Garbo’s transport boat. My plan was to buzz them. Close enough to let them know I meant business, without colliding and killing myself along with the most beautiful woman who ever lived. I knew the Nazi battleship wouldn’t dare fire on me for fear of killing Der Führer’s would-be prize possession and meal ticket to immortality. Or so I hoped.
As I passed overhead, I saw Nick beside Garbo. He’d gotten over his shock at my untimely return, taken out his gun and trained it on me. He fired off a couple shots as I returned fire with my camera. Meanwhile, several of Nick’s Nazi play pals turned tail and jumped ship. They weren’t into taking any chances on a crazy American with an apparent death wish.
I pulled back up into the heavens and banked right, intent on circling and doing another run. That’s when I first saw the small bullet holes in my right wing. Nick had good aim, and he wasn’t shooting blanks. The canvas wing flapped in the G-force of my ascent. I prayed she didn’t rip any farther. Small holes I could live with. Big ones became big problems.
This time, I lowered my altitude quickly, purposefully. I’m sure everyone onboard Garbo’s ship thought I was making a suicide run, because even more of them bailed over the side. The ship’s pilot began evasive maneuvers and was no longer headed for the Nazi pocket battleship. I knew so long as he held a bearing for the battleship, her powerful deck guns would remain silent for fear of hitting Garbo in the cross fire. Now he forced me to open my flank to the battleship in order to follow him. In a few short moments I’d be a goner. I had to act.
I brought the plane down and began my final descent to the ocean’s surface. I felt my stomach rise up in my throat. My gut wanted to jump out of my mouth in order to save itself. Even my internal organs were turning against me. Who could blame them?
I touched down on the ocean’s surface, not three hundred yards from Garbo’s transport boat. I pulled back on the seaplane’s stick and brought her little nose up while sailing ever closer toward Garbo’s boat. That’s when I saw the Goddess stand up, when everyone else onboard crouched down around her, even Nick. They raised up their hands to her, imploring her to take cover. But she paid them no heed. Remained righteously defiant.
Then calmly and slowly Garbo began to disrobe. First, she removed her overcoat. Then her silk blouse. Then her skirt. Momentarily distracted from my own imminent death, I snapped several shots of her intoxicating striptease.
Everyone stopped. Even the ship’s captain turned to watch Garbo step out of her clothes. Truly a sight to behold if ever there was one. Garbo’s naked body shone and shimmered bright white against the darkening atmosphere, like starlight in the shape of the most beautiful female form God had ever created. I slowed the engine to coast in closer.
Nick stood back, his gun at his side. He was slack-jawed, his mouth hanging open at the hinges. I wondered what he was thinking. Fancied he was forced to reconsider his position. Even the devil himself, when faced with something as stunning, pure, and elemental as Garbo in the raw, must give pause. Surely such reverence for absolute beauty was an unwritten, supernatural law?
I taxied in toward the Nazi vessel and used Garbo’s nakedness as my cover for sneaking up close. She remained nonplussed, uninhibited, strong, standing in her birthday suit. Then, with those beautiful blue eyes of hers cast down, she turned and in one fluid motion swan-dived off the side of the ship into the ocean.
All eyes followed Garbo overboard. Her body glowed white within the blackness of the Atlantic while she made long, confident strokes toward me. I willed her to swim faster. I wanted her to make up the distance before anyone got any smart ideas. Any ideas at all.
Then someone started taking potshots at my Garbo. I looked up and saw Nick. He had somehow recovered from his shock and was aiming his pistol at Garbo’s submerged heavenly body. Thank God bullets hit the water harmlessly around her. But I feared his aim would soon be true and find her. That’s when I was the most scared, truly frightened for the Divine One’s safety.
Then inexplicably, masses of white bubbles rose up from the depths all around Garbo’s body. Nick stopped shooting. But Garbo continued to swim, surrounded by froth and fury. Was it a torrent unleashed by the elemental Goddess herself? I snapped away several more photographs as I slowed the seaplane down to an idle. Garbo was now equidistant between the plane and the transport boat. No more than one hundred fifty yards from me. But I was no longer able to distinguish Garbo’s body from the sea. The disturbance in the water escalated ever more. I was horrified.
Water swirled and shot out of the ocean in funnels. Sea foam formed everywhere and shined bright in the last vestiges of sunlight. Garbo was gone. Oh my God, she was gone. Had Titan himself claimed her for his queen? I raised my camera’s viewfin
der to my face, unable to imagine what was to happen next and wanting to capture the unimaginable.
Then Garbo came, rose up out of the sea between Nick and me, arms held out plaintively before her. She literally stood on the water parting at her feet. Her beautiful, perfectly proportioned feet stood as if they were on terra firma. I shot off exposure after exposure of film. Clicked away as I watched thick strands of Garbo’s shoulder-length tresses flow in the wind. Her body centered in my viewfinder, Garbo glowed brighter than the planet Venus rising behind her. Yeah, I clicked away, all right. Long after I had run out of film.
Beneath Garbo, the Nazi U-Boat emerged. The one I’d seen off the Athenia’s port bow the first night I was aboard ship. The conning tower was marked “U-30.” Garbo stood on the foredeck, her expression never wavering. Her eyes fixed on the horizon, her body caught in the last of the sun’s burning amber reflection. Garbo turned to me and silently commanded me to her.
I put my camera down and worked the seaplane’s controls. I brought the seaplane right up beside the surfaced U-boat. Came so close that my right pontoon scraped loudly against its dark metal hull. I bet it made a hell of a sound to the Krauts inside that can. A soundtrack to go along with the improbable image in their periscope of a naked sea goddess, climbing aboard a seaplane and into the seat in front of me. No, I wouldn’t have believed it either, if I hadn’t been there myself.
Garbo put her bare-naked bum on her seat as I pulled back on the throttle and headed our little plane for open water. The engine roared as we gained speed, experienced some chop. We cut long white lines in the sea before gaining altitude and lifted off the ocean’s surface completely to ascend into the heavens. I looked right and caught a glimpse of our shadow on the clouds. Saw it surrounded by a circle made up of brilliant red, green and blue bands. A glory Lucky Lindy had called it. Then the sun vanished a moment later, making it impossible to tell water from sky.
Looking for Garbo Page 21