Amerika (24 page)

Mason, the red-haired flight engineer said in awe, ‘She’s really something.’

‘I’ll say.’

‘Way prettier in person than the movies.’

‘Yep.’

‘Taller too.’

‘You two are about the same height. You’d make a perfect match.’

Mason blushed furiously. ‘Cap wants you in ops. We’re almost ready to board.’

I caught a last glimpse of Ava as she sailed past Purser Nawrocki and into the lounge. The brass-trimmed doors hissed shut upon the secrets of the very rich and the very well connected, now safely inside, protected from the rabble.

Nawrocki saw me approaching and grinned. ‘All the chickens but one are in the hen house.’

‘Let’s see the manifest.’

A quick glance showed almost two-thirds of the passengers had German surnames. No surprise there. The higher-up compliance officers used the clippers the way New Yorkers used to use the subway to get from point A to point B. Which still ran, by the way, but only on lines running north of Ground Zero.

‘Even got a priest on board,’ Nawrocki said. ‘So much for the vow of poverty, I guess.’

‘Maybe the Pope’s picking up the tab.’

‘Don’t make fun of my faith, cap.’

‘Wouldn’t dream of it -
Sprechen sie Deutsch?
’

‘Natürlich, mein Kapitan.’

‘Good thing, because your tongue will be twisting plenty on this trip.’

He shrugged. ‘These guys speak English pretty good.’

‘They should, the bastards.’

A soft voice. ‘Pardon me. May I go in please?’

The short, pudgy man wearing a long grey leather coat. He held his black leather briefcase against his chest as though it contained diamonds.

‘I’m on the Lisbon flight.’

‘Yes sir,’ Nawrocki briefly consulted the manifest. ‘You must be
Sturmbahnfüher
Bauer?’

The man smiled slightly.

‘An impressive sounding title, but then, that’s Germany for you; always trying to impress the world.’

He turned to me and said, ‘I didn’t recognize you in uniform,
Herr
Carter -- or should I say
Kapitan
Carter?’ He clicked his heels slightly and nodded.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Last time we met, Mister Diaz and you were locked in a jail cell in Washington D.C. and not a bit happy about it either, as I recall.’

‘You’re the Gestapo guy at the airport?

‘Police inspector is more precise. But yes, I am he. And what about you?’ His pale grey eyes regarded me calmly. ‘You told me you were operating an aviation charter company in Florida, and yet here you are in uniform.’

I had to think fast or the game would be over before it got started. ‘My plans didn’t pan out. Lufthansa made an offer. I followed the money.’

‘Still, you tried, and that’s everything, isn’t it?’ He glanced toward the waiting room then back to me. ‘You’re involved with our clipper flight?’

‘First officer.’

‘Excellent.’ His leather coat creaked as he shrugged his shoulders and suddenly looked sheepish. ‘I confess I am deathly afraid of flying. But it’s the only way I can get home to my family with any degree of convenience. Ships take forever, and I am prone to seasickness.’

Nawrocki said, ‘We have Schnapps on board, if that’s any help.’

He patted his briefcase. ‘I have my own ammunition as well, but
danke schön
all the same.’

‘
Gut reise
,’ I said.

He brightened. ‘You speak German?’

‘Just enough to survive.’

He glanced around the teeming rotunda. ‘The world grows smaller every day.
Nicht war?
’

‘Bloodier too.’

‘War is inevitable,
Herr Kapitan
. It is the nature of the beast.’

‘Beasts maybe, but not men.’ I pointed at the slowly revolving globe.

‘There’s room enough for everybody here. Why’s Adolf grabbing what doesn’t belong to him and killing innocent people to do it?’

‘A candid question.’

‘Well?’

‘I am afraid it beyond my scope of knowledge to answer you.’

‘You mean you’re afraid somebody might be listening?’

He grinned suddenly. ‘Yes, and that person might be you.’

‘You’ve got to be kidding. Me?’

‘How do I know you’re not an SS undercover agent loyal to the Third Reich, on a mission to uproot traitors working the midst of one of our neutral nations?’

‘Not a chance.’

‘You are sailing under your own colors then?’

‘Yes,’ I lied, and then touched the gold wings on my chest. ‘Pan Am circles the bloody earth - with Lufthansa’s help of course.’

‘Yet another topic for vigorous debate. Perhaps we can have it tonight during the flight? I will ask for the second sitting if you promise to join me.’

‘My pleasure,’ I lied again, but had no choice. Nazi or not, the customer is always right.

Pan Am’s crew operations room was the exact opposite of the opulent Art Deco design of the passenger rotunda. Pitiless fluorescent light glared down upon the institutional gray tables, chairs, counters and battered map and weather boards that filled the small room. Here was where prior to the ‘War-that-Wasn’t,’ Pan Am planned its Atlantic flights with precision born of long experience aided by a deep fear of the Dutchman’s wrath if they got it wrong.

Not much had changed since Lufthansa took over. Pan Am meteorologists, flight dispatchers and maintenance workers still staffed the place, with only nominal supervision from the Germans, who acted like nervous new owners of a Kentucky Derby winner. At least that was my impression as I passed one of them on my way to join the crew gathered around Captain Fatt at the map table.

‘Captain Carter,’ Fatt boomed. ‘Always a pleasure to have you join our happy family. We are a happy family, aren’t we boys?’

The six naval officers, now disguised in their Pan Am uniforms, muttered their agreement. Not counting the stewards, a total of eight crewmen would staff the flight, each relieving the other during the endless hours of flying it would take us to make our way to Lisbon to snatch our prize.

‘The good news is that we’re ready to go,’ Fatt continued. ‘The bad news is that the seas are picking up at Horta. We may have to lay over there until the winds die down. If that happens, Captain Carter, here, will be in charge of humoring our dear, beloved VIP’s.’

Nawrocki grinned at my unenviable assignment. Playing nanny to disgruntled passengers was not an easy job. He and Phillips, the steward, would bear the brunt of the social duties as was company custom, but passengers always liked it when an officer attended to them on a regular basis to keep their blood pressure down.

‘How long’s our first leg?’ I said.

Fatt  deferred  to  Stone,  our  navigator,  who  said  in  precise  tones befitting his job, ‘Fifteen hours, fifteen minutes.’

‘How many seconds?’ I said, and the others laughed. But Stone just looked at me and I regretted my bad joke.

Our laughter drew the attention of the Lufthansa flight supervisor, who edged closer. I sent Fatt a warning message with my eyebrows and he had Mason begin his litany of fuel estimates and go-no-go predictions, while I did my best to look serious and interested in the all-too-familiar pre-flight rituals that mark the beginning of the transition of eighty-four thousand pounds of engineered metal into a graceful figure of flight.

On paper it looked easy. Flying always does. From Baltimore we’d lift off and head southeast fifteen hours to a tiny speck of land in the Azores called Faial, where we’d refuel in Horta Bay, and with any luck - in short supply at the moment if you believed the meteorologist - we’d take off on our second and final leg to Lisbon, where we’d arrive six hours and forty- four minutes later, according to Stone, who’d changed his somewhat casual attitude ever since Fatt pulled the rug out from under him during our check flight. Now he was all business, so much so that he was already wearing his white uniform cap, squared away just right, covering his freshly-barbered scalp, whereas the rest of us were a bit more relaxed as we slouched over the map.

But despite the casual appearance I felt nervous as hell. About our crew, I mean. Flying for Pan Am was like climbing a long ladder where you begin as an apprentice pilot, work your way up through radio operator to flight engineer to junior pilot, senior pilot, and then to the hallowed ‘Master Pilot Flying Boats’ rating. If, for instance, the radio operator is disabled during a flight, seven other Pan Am crew members know exactly what dials to turn, what frequencies to use, and within seconds can be tapping out Morse code with the best of them.

Problem solved.

That said, other than Fatt and me, we had a bunch of flying sailors on our hands. While they were the best for security reasons and the most militarily  inclined  should  the  need  arise,  their  cross-training  was  much weaker than ours. All the more reason for me to keep a sharp eye on Stone and Mason and all the others. Could they cover for each other like Pan Am crews? Maybe so, but I wasn’t counting on it. The Navy worked with strict division of command. Pan Am worked the opposite. Even so, opposites attract, right? So maybe things would work out after all.

Fatt’s finger landed on Portugal. ‘What’s Lisbon got on the table?’

Stone consulted his weather forecast notes. As he did, the German supervisor stepped in and said a bit too loudly, ‘They are reporting mostly cloudy, twenty-seven degrees centigrade, winds two-six-zero at ten.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ Fatt said. ‘Or should I say
danke
?’

‘Either will suffice, kapitan.’

‘Is that weather current or for our estimated arrival?’ Fatt continued. A slight hesitation. ‘That would be for now.’

Stone looked up from his weather notes.  ‘Low pressure system reported on its way out in the next twelve to fifteen hours.’

‘My, my,’ Fatt said. ‘What a difference that will make, don’t you think,
Herr
- sorry, I didn’t catch your name.’

A slight nod. ‘Weinacht.’

Fatt stuck out his huge hand and swallowed up the supervisor’s. ‘More than a pleasure, I’m sure,
Herr
Weinacht. So how do you like working this side of the pond?’

The man hesitated, trying to gauge Fatt’s intentions. Good luck, I thought. Nobody ever knew what Fatt would do next, most of all himself.

Weinacht finally said, ‘I find Lufthansa flight operations quite similar to yours.’

‘Birds of a feather,’ Fatt crooned.

‘Except that I must approve your flight plan before you can depart.’

Fatt looked like somebody slapped him. ‘Since when did that start?’

A thin smile. ‘Regulations from our Berlin office.’ He put out his pale white hand. ‘May I see what you have prepared? That is, if you’re ready for my review.’

Fatt’s jaw muscles bulged but he held his tongue. Like watching a volcano get ready to pop, but then it doesn’t. Weinacht pursed his lips and traced his manicured finger down the long list of items that made up our complicated flight: planned courses, winds aloft, fuel estimates, weights and balances, souls-on-board, and so on and so forth, while the rest of us stood like guilty schoolboys waiting for the master to grade our tests.

‘Alles ist in ordnung
,’ he said finally.

‘Whatever the hell that means,’ Fatt snapped.

‘It means that you have done adequate preparation for me to grant permission for you and your crew to safely transport the souls on board this Lufthansa flight to Lisbon, Portugal, and then return to this operating base.’

‘Just ‘adequate preparation’?’

‘At the present time Pan American crews are the most qualified in operating Lufthansa’s Boeing flying boats, but we will be replacing you with properly trained German personnel in the very near future.’

‘How near’s that future, pal?’

Weinacht said nothing. Just thin smile as he signed his name. When he finished he said, ‘
Gut reise
,
Kapitan
.’

Even  with  swastikas  on  her  triple  tail,  the 
Yankee  Clipper
  looked beautiful as she rubbed against the dock, her silver-painted metal skin a brightly polished sheen in the late morning sunlight. An impressive stack of rising cumulus in the east gave fair warning of a bumpy ride to come later on, but hopefully we could skirt around the more serious columns of rising air.