Armageddon (91 page)

It was a magnificent ship destined to serve MATS as an interim plane until even larger and faster transports could be developed; America knew now that she must never again be without Airlift capacity.

The roomy forward-control cabin seemed like a summer palace after the confines of the Gooney Birds and Skymasters. Scott tested the ship with the Boeing people, certain that his new love of this big old bird was a sign of advancing age.

It was a long way removed from the first milk run to Berlin with the Gooney Birds setting down eighty tons a day ... the Skymasters brought in six and seven thousand tons. Yet, it was less than a year that it all had started!

On flight number two hundred to Berlin, Hiram Stonebraker handed him a set of gold oak leaves. “Major,” he said, “we’re kicking your ass upstairs. We want you over at Headquarters as vice operations chief.”

Scott would be the number two pilot in the entire Airlift. His first job would be to write a manual on the characteristics and use of the Stratofreighter in Operation Vittles.

As winter ended, old hands took new duties. New crews came with new ships. The long-standing joke of the Airlift, the illusive definition of “temporary duty” was finally explained. With the new crews coming from Great Falls, rotation from Germany was commenced.

Stan Kitchek was lost after Scott’s transfer to Headquarters. He was promoted to captain, accepted “permanent change of station,” made a first pilot, and transferred to the base at Celle which had been turned into the model of the Airlift, the epitome of precision of air-cargo transportation.

Master Sergeant Nick Papas was advised that he had a month’s leave accumulated, which was now payable. He phoned Scott.

“Want to say good-by to an old Greek?”

They met in the bar of the NCO Rocker Club in Wiesbaden a little later. Nick was packed and ready to take off.

“So, what are you going to do now?”

“Check the bank balances in Chicago. Then, who knows? I got twenty years service come September. Maybe I’m getting a little old for this crap. I may just do it up in real Greek style, have the relatives send a girl over from the old country.”

“Hey, how about that.”

“I never said anything about you and Hilde. I’ve seen a lot of fighter pilots in my twenty years. Lot of them don’t grow up. I never figured you’d get your wings clipped.”

Scott cracked an egg, emptied it into the mug of dark beer, swirled it around. “Know what, Nick. I looked real close in the mirror today. I’ve got four gray hairs. When I think about it ... I guess I’m the luckiest bastard who ever lived. It’s easy to come out of the clouds when you’ve found something better on the ground.”

“Sorry I won’t be standing up for you. When do you figure to get married?”

“Lot of red tape. We’re looking for a final clearance any day.”

Nick looked at his watch, gulped his beer down. “It’s that time.”

Scott drove him to Y 80 where he had passage on MATS on a States-bound Skymaster.

In the end there were no words to cover six years of intimate comradery.

“See you around, Major.”

“So long, Nick.”

He waited until Nick’s plane was out of sight, and with him a part of his own life had flown away.

German girls by the thousands were trying to marry American servicemen. Many wanted it only as an avenue of escape from the nightmare of their war-ravaged world.

American boys who had never been exposed to the open and free relationship of a European woman wanted one of their very own.

It became necessary for the American authorities to institute barriers and rigid screenings to prevent a flood of bad matches.

Scott went to Colonel and Mrs. Loveless and candidly discussed Hilde’s past. Clint acted as her sponsor, engineered the papers with his own brand of deftness. His influence with General Stonebraker, the general’s personal like of Scott, plus the Falkenstein name would all help to smooth the way. Even so, there was a long winter of red tape.

Clint went to see the final authority, the chief chaplain of USAFE, and judged him to be a true man of the cloth and decided to lay it on the line.

The chaplain found it refreshing. Finding a confessed prostitute was as rare as finding a confessed Nazi. After giving Mary Magdalene as the obvious parable, he interviewed Hilde and assured her she could set a date with Major Davidson.

Clint and Judy often said they had never seen two people more in love, more grateful for the existence of the other, more willing to give of themselves, more awed by their late discovery.

Colonel Matt Beck and his vice chief, Major Scott Davidson, sat before Hiram Stonebraker. The general chewed their asses out.

Incidents of Russian buzzings and close flying were mounting. A Skymaster had been bullied out of the corridor, was pounced upon by Yak fighter planes which forced it to land on a Soviet airfield. Matt Beck wanted fighter plane escorts.

The general said he didn’t have grounds for the request. Both Intelligence and his own estimates were that the Russians were putting on a last-ditch show trying to force more landings for face-saving value.

“What have we got? Gutless wonders? Now I don’t want any more of our people scared out of the corridors!”

When Scott and Colonel Beck were alone, they summarized the situation in a short sentence. “Too many replacement crews.”

Most of the original Airlift crews had been on bombers during the war and were disciplined to hold formation in the face of flak and enemy fighters. While the Russians annoyed the old-timers, they never made them deviate from course.

The two worked on a revision of pilot rosters to keep the maximum number of old hands in every time bloc and squadron.

Next day, Scott came into Colonel Beck’s office, annoyed. Y 80 had a time bloc scheduled for the 12th and 333rd Troop Carriers that showed it to be 75 per cent new crews who had never faced a buzzing. Moreover, nine of the crews were making their first run to Berlin. Russian activity was reaching a new peak.

“I think I’d better go down to Y 80,” Scott said, “and take this bloc in and out of Berlin a couple of times.”

The colonel agreed.

Major Scott Davidson briefed them. They looked to him with a sense of relief and with an admiration given an old flyer of his caliber.

“It’s a game of trying to make you flinch,” Scott said. “They’re like yappy puppies. Don’t let them know you know they’re alive. Let’s hack time now.”

Bloc time was twenty minutes away. Scott phoned Hilde.

“Going to take a couple of runs to Berlin, today,” he said, “we’ve got to get these people steadied down.”

Hilde masked her disappointment as always. She hated him to fly, and was in knots until he returned. She knew, though, that she could never say anything about it ... now or ever.

“I’ll go to the hotel and wait for you,” she said.

“I may be late.”

“I’ll wait ... Scott ... I go to my room and I look at the ring twenty times a day. Would it be bad luck if I wore it around my neck on a chain. That way I could tuck it into my bosom so no one can see I’m wearing it.”

“Great idea. I can fish it out later.”

“Scott!”

“Then ... you can stick it through my nose.”

“I’m serious. I want so much to have it close.”

“Sure. Maybe you’d better get some use out of it before it turns green. I’ll try to phone your sister if I have time.”

“Aufwiedersehen
... I love you ...”

“Me too ...”

He detected a tremor in her voice. Just sentimental ...

Scott lined them up over Fulda. They moved into the Southern corridor. Below the ground was lush and green with the coming of spring.

The interval was established for the 110-mile run to Berlin. For twenty minutes it was clear and smooth. Soon they would be under the control of Tempelhof radars.

His copilot, a likable young redhead a few months out of flying school, was on the yoke while Scott stretched. He looked over his shoulder to the flight engineer, another youngster ... and he missed Nick’s cigar smoke.

“Big Easy Fourteen calling all craft. Three Yaks at one o’clock.”

Scott took the yoke quickly. His copilot spotted them coming straight down the line. A hundred feet above them the Russians leveled off, ducked back into the clouds.

“They’re just clowning today,” Scott said on the intercom. “This is Big Easy One to all craft. Keep your interval. This is Big Easy One calling Tempelhof Airways. Are we under your radar control, over?”

“This is Tempelhof Airways. You are coming into Radar Control. Caution. There are twelve unidentified blips around your bloc.”

Scott frowned ... twelve ...

Omar Kum Dag was a rarity in the Red Air Force. He was one of the few flyers from Ashkabad in the distant Turkman Republic. His comrades considered him reckless. Kum Dag could be counted upon to take abnormal risks. His squadron leader was worried that he had a compulsion to either kill himself or prove himself because of his yellow skin and the constant teasing of the others.

They were not pleased when Kum Dag was assigned to the mission. After all, they were ordered only to have some harmless fun with the American birds.

“Look at that stupid son of a bitch doing a victory roll,” Scott snarled as Omar Kum Dag’s Yak zoomed and spiraled right in front of him.

The copilot was pale and unnerved. Scott gritted his teeth as the Russian dived perilously close again, now wishing for the first time he had the guns and speed to go after him. Fun was fun, but only a crazy man buzzed a defenseless craft like that.

The Russian captain leading the squadron admonished Kum Dag angrily as the Yak streaked up to the clouds and circled for another pass. He was ordered to quit, but Omar Kum Dag did not hear.

He was detached by the roar, the surge, the mania to come even closer so no one would ever again doubt his courage.

“This is Tempelhof calling Big Easy One. There’s a blip on your tail ...”

Hilde’s hair fell into her eyes as she flitted about the kitchen in that sort of furor she always generated while making a meal. She talked to herself, admonished herself for the lack of seasoning in the soup.

She stopped for a moment, wiped her hands, felt through her blouse, and touched the ring that lay between her breasts. It made her happy and she began to sing ... tonight she would love him and love him and love him.

Colonel Loveless closed the kitchen door behind him.

“What on earth are you doing home, Colonel? It is only three o’clock.”

The colonel looked deathly sick and he began to tremble as an unintelligible sound came out of his throat. Hilde dropped the plates from her hand.

“No!” she screamed.

“Oh God ...” Clint moaned. “Oh God ...”

“Scott! Scott!”

He gripped the writhing girl and held her until a blackness overcame her.

Chapter Forty

S
PRINGTIME!

Ulrich Falkenstein had shepherded his people through the winter. He felt it proper now to respond to invitations and receive ovations for his people in Paris and London, New York and Washington.

In exactly four years after the last Russian cannon fired down the Unter Den Linden, the greatest paradox of the century had happened. Berlin had completely reversed its meaning in the eyes of the world. In the resurrection of 1949, a stunning series of events occurred that halted the Communist scourge on the European continent.

Western Europe, now infused with the blood of the Marshall Plan, staggered from its ruins and the despair was replaced by a dynamic new birth. The sound of building was heard again.

As the West took this new lease on life they declared that they would defend themselves from further Soviet outrage in unity. In this springtime of 1949, NATO, the common defense, was born as a son of the Truman Doctrine.

In the resurrection of 1949 a new German state of the three Western Zones was in the making. A constitution was drawn with mankind’s hope that a new kind of Germany would emerge.

The Soviet Union had failed. They had failed to stop the formation of a Western-oriented Germany; they had failed to drive the West from Berlin. The Airlift poured six and seven thousand tons of goods into Berlin every day. The pressure was off the West for negotiations for a settlement.

More generators were flown in and as the coal stocks grew the electrical capacity was raised. Raw materials were flown in and the acute job shortage began to ease.

The Airlift was now putting down tonnage equal to what the rails and highways had delivered before the blockade.

Consumer goods began to appear in dribbles: clothing, soap, bedding, books, radios, shoes, pots, pans. The B marks were replaced by the same Western currency used in the zones.

Those devils who used the threat of starvation were now finding themselves on the receiving end. The Western counterblockade staggered Soviet Berlin and Soviet Germany, creating havoc and turning the tables. Time, that ally which the Soviet Union used as a merciless tactic, now turned into a tactical enemy ... now it was they who wanted to make a peace.

Hiram Stonebraker ordered the Combined Airlift Task Force to create an all-out operational assault on every tonnage record with an elaborate plan. With weather promising, midnight of the day of April 16 was chosen as the start of the twenty-four-hour period. Woody Beaver seized upon the occasion to name it “The Easter Parade.”

At midnight the first blocs moved for Berlin from Y 80 and Fassberg with all other bases in ready.

M.J. and Hiram breakfasted at his usual hour of 0600. As he ate, he called the Control Center. His chief of staff was already there and reported everything had moved through the night on schedule.

Stonebraker quelled his anxiety. It would be a long day, the plan was daring, and he wasn’t sending in a single goddamned ounce of cheese.

“You know, M. J.,” he said in a rare show of nostalgia, “I signed the order yesterday taking the last Gooney Bird out of the Lift. I’ve been thinking about it. It’s a fine old ship. Maybe nowhere near as sophisticated as these new birds, but it knows all the tricks of the sky. When our backs were to the wall and it was needed ... it came through. They tell me the Gooney Birds will all be retired, but I’ll bet you that ten years from now in any air base in the world ... you’ll find a Gooney Bird.”