The Red Baron: A World War I Novel

by Richard Fox

  Schafer and Metzger left and closed the door behind them.

  “Manfred, look at this office. I am impressed,” Lothar said as he raised his arms.

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “No ‘Hello, Lothar. Nice to finally see you after all this time.’” Lothar said, raising his voice in a mocking tone.

  “Don’t get cute. How did you get orders to my squadron?”

  Lothar plopped down on a leather couch against a wall and kicked off his boots. He flexed his arms and got comfortable. “It wasn’t my idea. After the umpteenth letter from mother and father, extolling your virtues as a pilot, and dropping plenty of hints, I volunteered for pilot training. I graduated last week, and here I am.”

  Manfred rubbed his temples, another headache was coming. “Someone at high command must have a sense of humor,” he said. His fingers froze with a sudden realization. “Does Mother know you’re here?”

  “No. If I’d let her know, she would have spoiled the surprise and that priceless look on your face when I walked in the door.”

  “She is going to lose her mind when she hears about this,” Manfred said.

  “‘Don’t let Lothar get into trouble. You’re his older brother and you know better,’” they said at the same time, quoting their mother’s mantra.

  “So what am I flying? The Albatros D.III’s? Those shiny new Fokkers?” Lothar asked.

  “Come with me.”

  Lothar looked at an old Albatros D.II, its engine in pieces from yet another overhaul, and put his hands on his hips.

  “You’re kidding,” he said to Manfred.

  “No. I got my first twenty kills in her, and now she’s yours.” He pulled a pair of leather flight gloves from his belt and handed them to Lothar. “I wore these for my first twenty kills, and I expect at least that many from you.”

  “Manfred, aren’t these your lucky gloves?”

  “No. The jacket is lucky,” Manfred gave his flight jacket a quick pat.

  Lothar slipped the gloves into his belt. He bent over to examine the aileron on a lower wing—the wood splintered by a bullet—and frowned at the engine, like it was the body of a patient that had died on the operating table.

  “At least tell me how you do it,” Lothar said.

  “Do what?”

  “Shoot down so many planes. What’s your trick?”

  “I fly as close as I can, shoot, and down they go,” Manfred said with a smile.

  Lothar looked at his brother, his expression blank.

  “Manfred, I’m your brother. You can tell me.”

  Manfred laughed and led his brother from the hangar.

  The Albatros was painted bright red; a black Iron Cross outlined in white adorned the wings. It stood out from the rest of the squadron’s brown and tan planes, a bright standard before a line of knights.

  “What do you think?” Manfred asked.

  “It’s…garish,” Lothar said with a sneer.

  “I mean to stand out. This way you, and the rest of the squadron, can find your commander when we’re in the air.”

  Lothar picked at his bottom lip, an old habit from childhood that told Manfred his brother was thinking hard.

  “If we can spot you easily, so will the English,” Lothar said. “Why red? Why not white or…paint the top green and the bottom blue for some camouflage?”

  “The Uhlan’s regimental colors were red. The horse cavalry is gone, but now the air service is the cavalry of the air. So, still think it’s garish?”

  “Painting your plane red is either brilliant or spectacularly stupid. When can we fly?”

  “As soon as you and Hyneman get your engine put back together.”

  Lothar and Schafer flew aside their commander’s red Albatros D.III in the humid summer air. A gossamer haze clung in the sky, like a single cloud stretched across the sky.

  Manfred took his D.III into a quick dive, noting how long it took his fellow pilots to follow suit and how well they maintained formation. Schafer handled the maneuvers with ease, not unexpected for a pilot with two kills to his name. Lothar’s plane wobbled as it pulled out of the dive. Manfred shook his head and made a mental note to tell his brother how to handle his rudder after they landed.

  Lothar’s wings kept wagging after they leveled out. An icy prick hit Manfred’s chest as he maneuvered next to his brother. Engine trouble at this elevation almost certainly meant death for a pilot. Manfred cursed whatever bureaucrat decided to put his brother right under his nose.

  Lothar waved as Manfred flew alongside him, then pointed toward a lake far beneath them. Two Bristol two-seater reconnaissance planes, several hundred yards away, flying parallel to a railroad.

  Manfred nodded at his brother and looked at his fuel gauge. The gauge read less than a quarter of a tank, a little more than they’d need to fly home and not enough for a dogfight. Manfred looked back to his brother, and saw him dive into an attack.

  Manfred’s hand squeezed his control stick with enough force to almost rip it from its moorings. Lothar had jumped the gun and obligated Manfred and Schafer to an attack from a position of weakness. Manfred followed Lothar toward the Bristols and hoped the English weren’t spoiling for a fight.

  The Bristols spotted Lothar and banked away from each other. The rear gunners from both planes opened up; tracers converged on Lothar’s plane in a deadly cross fire. Lothar’s Albatros pitched over on a side and dove past a Bristol, firing the whole time.

  Manfred’s face went slack in shock as the Bristol erupted into flames. The pilot steered the burning plane to the ground and Lothar broke off his attack and flew for the other Englishman. Manfred waved to Schafer to support Lothar, and he kept on the dying plane.

  Manfred could have ended the burning plane’s plight with a single blast from his machine gun, but the enemy pilot was trying to land. There was a chance the pilot could land safely. So long as he kept to that path, Manfred would let him live.

  A church, on the bank of the lake, loomed in the distance, and the Bristol was flying right for it. Manfred watched as the gunner shook the pilot, who had slumped against the side of his cockpit. The gunner leaned over the side and saw the church, only a few seconds away.

  The gunner pulled himself onto the side of the plane, and leapt off. His arms pinwheeled as he fell the last thirty yards to the earth. The gunner smashed to the earth and rolled like a loose barrel before coming to a rest.

  His plane continued on and smashed into the steeple. It hung, trapped, in the structure like a bug in a spider’s web. Smoke seeped from the wreck, and Manfred pulled up lest he meet the same fate.

  Manfred looked over his shoulder. Two men were dead. Dead by his brother’s hand.

  Lothar chased the remaining Bristol over the lake. Lothar fired from a mere twenty yards away and the Bristol plunged toward the water. The Bristol hit the water prop first, and the rear gunner spat out of the plane and hurtled across the surface. The man hit the water and skipped back into the air. He smacked into the water again and sank a few feet from the shore.

  The victorious plane flew next to Manfred. Lothar unbuckled himself and stood up in the cockpit. He beat his fists against his chest like a great ape, his mouth open in a roar lost to the engines and wind.

  Manfred shook his head, found Schafer flying high above them, and led them back to Douai.

  “Did you see him, Manfred? The one that skipped across the lake like a stone?” Lothar said as he stripped off his fur jacket, his face half-covered with the black of gun smoke. Schafer stood next to him, a nervous look on his face.

  Manfred locked eyes with Schafer, and then he tilted his head toward the manor. Schafer took the hint and left with a jog.

  “How many do you have? I’m two closer to catching up with you. Can we go—”

  Manfred reached out and grabbed his taller brother by the tunic and shoved him against his plane. Lothar smacked against the plywood, his face a mask of surprise.

  “What the hell were
you thinking? I didn’t give you permission to attack, and you nearly got yourself killed!”

  Lothar batted his brother’s hands away. “What does it matter? I got them both,” he said through gritted teeth, the same way he spoke every time he and Manfred fought as children.

  Manfred pointed at Lothar’s propeller, a pair of bullet holes through a wooden blade. The graze of bullet had left a streak of split fabric over the lower wing, a hairsbreadth from Lothar’s cockpit.

  “You got lucky! You flew straight into the gunners’ fire. If you’d waited for Schafer and me, we could have taken them at the same time.” Manfred rapped his fist against the fuel tank, the knocks rang hollow. “You committed us to a fight when we were low on fuel, and we made it back on fumes, Lothar.”

  Lothar wasn’t arguing with him and Manfred knew he was getting through to his brother.

  “If we’d run into more English, we would be dead.”

  “You said…you said you wanted to make sure that we are brave,” Lothar said.

  “You are brave, Lothar, but you were reckless. You aren’t the only pilot in the air; remember that,” Manfred said. “Just because you’re my brother doesn’t mean I can treat you differently than the rest of the pilots.”

  Lothar crossed his arms and nodded. “I don’t want special treatment. Just let me fight.”

  “Go and get proof of your victories,” Manfred said. He turned and walked out, but stopped before he reached the door. Lothar had taken life with ease, with joy. He couldn’t let his brother grow into a butcher of men.

  “Lothar, when you get to that church, find out what their names were.”

  Manfred lounged on the steps of the manor. His pilots and the rest of his squadron milled about on the well-manicured lawn. High command assured Manfred that General von Hoeppner, commander of the German air service, would arrive at any minute and they should be ready to receive him. Naturally, the purpose of the visit wasn’t shared with Manfred. They’d been there, waiting in front of the squadron headquarters for two hours, for Hoeppner’s convoy of official vehicles to arrive. Even in command of his own squadron, Manfred couldn’t get away from the “hurry up and wait” dictates of higher headquarters.

  Lothar and Schafer were in a competition to toss pebbles into an empty ammo can, thinking up new and inventive insults for misses. Wolff sat with a pad of paper on his lap, penning yet another letter for Maria.

  Allmenroder and Reinhard sat next to their commander.

  “Maybe we should ring the action bell, pretend we saw some English, and come back when our tanks are empty. Make them wait on us for a change,” Allmenroder said.

  “Do you want to see Russia that badly?” Reinhard asked.

  Manfred gave Allmenroder’s suggestion some serious thought, but the rumble of a distant car engine stopped him from giving an incriminating response.

  Manfred stood and smoothed out his uniform. He walked to the middle of the lawn, turned to his men and shouted, “Fall in!”

  His men formed ranks quickly—pilots in front, the rest behind. Manfred performed an about-face and waited.

  Hoeppner was in the third of four staff cars, a short man on the wrong side of fifty. He carried a walking stick with a crystal top, and worse, a cavalry saber at his waist. Hoeppner strode from his car, a thin man with a monocle and a glove over his left hand, behind him.

  Manfred saluted as the general approached.

  “Lieutenant von Richthofen, so nice to finally meet you in person.” Hoeppner touched the brim of his hat with the tip of his walking stick to return the salute. He looked at his wristwatch and smiled. “And I’m right on time—excellent, excellent.” Manfred fumed, but kept his mouth shut.

  A pair of men carried a camera from the trunk of a car and went about setting it up a few yards away from Manfred.

  “I’ll have you know that High Command is very pleased with how you’ve turned your squadron around. Even the Kaiser brags about you,” Hoeppner said.

  “The Kaiser?”

  “Of course, my dear boy, why else do you think I’m here?” He turned to the follower, a captain with no medals on his uniform, and took a wooden box from him.

  “You should have had this sooner.” He gave the captain a dirty look. “But there was an issue with the paperwork.”

  Hoeppner tucked his walking stick under an arm and opened the box. A blue-and-silver enameled Maltese Cross, crafted gold eagles between each arm of the cross, lay on a bed of black satin. Manfred’s breath caught in his throat, the honor he’d longed for was finally at hand.

  “Lieutenant Manfred von Richthofen, the Kaiser has bestowed the Pour Le Merite to you for your conspicuous gallantry in the face of the enemy.” Hoeppner took the medal from the box and clasped it around Manfred’s neck. Hoeppner took his hands away from Manfred’s neck and shook his hand. He kept holding it until the camera flashed.

  The pressure of the Blue Max around his neck felt warm, like a hot wire was around his neck and not a length of ribbon. He thought of Boelcke, who always wore the medal when he flew, and he vowed to follow his fallen mentor’s example. Despite the award, he still hadn’t lived up to Boelcke’s example.

  “Well done, we expect nothing less from you in the future,” Hoeppner said. Hoeppner stepped back and began clapping. Manfred’s squadron joined Hoeppner in applause, and cheers broke out from the rows of soldiers.

  Pilots broke formation and lined up to shake Manfred’s hand, each mouthing words of congratulations, all lost in the moment as Manfred allowed a smile to spread across his face. In this moment of triumph, he could let the mask of command crack in front of his men.

  Hoeppner pulled Manfred aside and walked with him toward the flight line.

  “I’ll need your expertise for a few moments while Gempp prepares things inside,” Hoeppner said. “What’s this I hear about you painting your plane red?”

  Manfred suddenly felt very hot under his collar as they came around the corner of the manor.

  “Sir, we’ve found that letting the pilots personalize their paint schemes helps with identification in the air.” Manfred wondered how long he’d get to keep the Blue Max after Hoeppner saw what he’d done.

  “‘Pilots?’ What do you—” Hoeppner stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Squadron 11’s planes. Each plane was painted red with a different accent color: yellow, green, black, blue. Only Manfred’s Albatros was pure red. As a whole, the entire squadron was a riot of color.

  “God in heaven, you’ve got a flying circus!” Hoeppner said.

  “Sir, it works. The pilots see me in the air and follow my lead. It does make awarding victories a bit easier when the red-and-yellow plane shoots down a Tommy, it was my brother Lothar flying the plane,” Manfred hoped his explanation held up as Hoeppner appeared on the brink of hyperventilating.

  “If we’re going to bill you as a knight of the air, you should have your own heraldry,” Hoeppner said. “Too bad we can’t take color photographs,” he said.

  Captain Gempp reached out and tilted Manfred’s chin slightly higher and took two steps back to the camera trained on Manfred. Gempp bent to the same height as the camera and held a hand in front of his face, two fingers in a ninety-degree angle.

  “OK,” Gempp said. The camera flashed, and the cameraman went about replacing the picture plate.

  Gempp pursed his lips. “Richthofen, drop your right hand off your hip and hold it just in front of your waist. Smile, smile!”

  “Captain Gempp, that was the nineteenth photo. How many more do you need?”

  Gempp made a tsk-tsk noise and stepped closer to reposition his subject.

  “This is just the beginning. The Intelligence and Propaganda Department needs you as the center of our efforts. I’ll have your Sanke card in the hands of every school boy by Christmas. OK.” the camera flashed again.

  “Let’s get a close-in shot with his collar raised,” Gempp said as he consulted a clipboard. “Dress uniform, all medals,” he said to Metzger, wh
o scurried from the room.

  “This strikes me as a bit unnecessary,” Manfred said. He worked his jaw to lessen the ache that came with a half hour of constant smiling.

  “Nonsense, you are a hero of the German Empire; it’s my job to make sure the people know it.” Gempp handed Manfred his flight jacket and officer’s cap and waited for him to put them on. “You’ll have an entire line of Sankes, and I’ll dribble them out to different parts of the country, get the rumor mill going about some rare card with you standing next to your D.III.” Gempp used his right hand to adjust Manfred’s collar; his gloved left hand never left his waist.

  “We’ll need your autobiography for sale by the end of the year. Do you keep a journal?”

  “I’m not much of a writer; how can I take the time from fighting for a book?”

  “Don’t worry, the book is nearly finished. We just need a few details from you, give it your voice. OK.” the camera flashed.

  “You wrote my life story without me?” Manfred said, surprised that such a thing was even possible.

  “The Intelligence and Propaganda Department knows what it has to say. I’m afraid you don’t quite understand, Lieutenant. You are a symbol now. You’re handsome, brave, from a noble family—we couldn’t have created a hero like you even if Siegfried walked among us. All we need is for you to keep shooting down the English…and don’t get shot down in turn.” Gempp took the coat and hat from Manfred as Metzger arrived with the dress uniform.

  “All this time I avoided getting shot just to stay alive, now I have to think of my fans,” Manfred said, without humor.

  “Quite right.” Gempp ticked off another item on his clipboard. “I need Wolff and the other Richthofen after this. They’re good candidates for their own marketing campaign after they earn a Blue Max.”

  A reconnaissance flight discovered the preparations an hour ago. The English had massed at least three brigades of infantry, nearly ten thousand men, for a push against the Germans at Lens. The mauled German defenders were undermanned and cut off from supply by an English bombardment that hadn’t let up in three days. There was little chance they could hold the line from the impending assault.