Trouble drove into town midafternoon in the form of the returning instructor and a pair of mechanics. Warren had hoped they’d have another two hours before they had to take off, but maybe they could fly to another field and wait there until dark. He didn’t overanalyze his options. He had to start the engine immediately.
He threw some green branches on the bonfire, hoping the added smoke would give them an advantage. “Time to go,” he told Julian. As Julian climbed into the rear seat, Warren clicked the ignition switch and strode to the propeller. Usually someone else spun the propeller so the pilot could control the plane from the second it had power. Warren hoped his legs would be agile enough to clamber into the plane in time despite the cold and the lack of chocks.
He spun the propeller once, twice. Nothing happened, but that wasn’t unusual. He had built the fire between the road and the plane, so he got in a few more spins before the instructor and his mechanics noticed.
The shouts in German barely reached him. Spin. Silence. Spin. Silence. Spin. A slight whir that quickly died out. Spin. More German shouts. Spin. The engine almost catching. Spin. A German rifle shot. Warren spun again and hoped Julian was ducking in his seat.
The engine finally caught on the fifteenth try. Warren ducked under the whirling propeller and climbed onto the moving plane, sliding into his seat without bothering to strap himself in. Straps were useful but only during stunts and landings. He doubted this plane would do many stunts, and he would worry about landing after he’d managed takeoff.
Rifle shots came with increasing frequency as Warren tried to pick up momentum. The car sped toward them, moving as quickly as the plane.
Warren heard a cry from the back seat. “Julian?”
“Just my arm. It’s not bad.”
“Come on!” Warren said to the plane. He had seen phenomenal Hun aircraft in action, but apparently they saved their good engines for something other than trainer planes.
He could count three rifle holes in the wings without even turning his head before the plane was fast enough to try for takeoff. The first time he failed, the front wheels plowing back into the snowy field, the plane losing momentum in the process. He checked over his shoulder. The car was gaining on him, its wheels better designed for travel through uneven snow.
Why couldn’t they have been training on a Fokker?
Warren tried again, and the gutless plane finally lifted from the ground. Another pair of rifle shots hit the fuselage, but now that he was airborne, he was certain those shots would be the last. Had the plane been armed, he would have been tempted to turn around and strafe the car, but perhaps it was just as well that he didn’t have that option. Strafing with a damaged plane was risky.
The trainer’s engine was almost as unimpressive in the air as it was on the ground. He had to struggle for each foot of altitude. He was high enough that he didn’t have to worry about trees, but what would happen when they flew over a battery of field guns? He kept looking for potential landing strips, somewhere to hide the plane until nearly dark, but nothing turned up. In the snow, he didn’t want to risk landing on anything questionable. He might get stuck on the ground and thus stuck in Germany.
“Julian,” he shouted over the engine.
“Yes?”
“If we land, I’m not sure we’ll be able to take off again.”
“Then don’t land until we’re in France.”
“We’ll hit the lines during daylight.”
“Do what you think is best.”
German pilots would have trained on a similar plane, so they would recognize it as theirs and hopefully hold their fire. The Allied airmen, on the other hand, wouldn’t immediately realize the plane was German. Would they show caution before attacking? The plane had no identifying marks, no clear sign to the uninitiated that it was German. Most of the pilots he knew would come in for a closer look before shooting it from the sky, close enough to see the plane was unarmed. If Warren signaled his intention to land in their territory, perhaps they would escort him down. The men on the front line and in the supporting trenches were less predictable, which was another reason to keep flying. Maybe by the time he reached the churned-up landscape of the trenches, he would be high enough to avoid small-arms fire. If he landed again and took off too close to the lines, he’d never regain the altitude he’d fought so hard for.
The plane flew on, sluggishly cooperating with Warren’s directions. Higher, faster, westward. The cold wind bit into Warren’s nose and cheeks, made his fingers ache with pain. He alternated putting them inside his jacket to keep the blood moving. On occasion he looked back. Julian was huddled in his seat, a pair of knitted socks over his hands and a wool cap over his head.
“How’s your arm?” Warren yelled.
“Numb. Too cold to bleed much.”
Warren glanced back at Julian’s arm, tied with a handkerchief. Another hour and they would be home. Another hour and they’d have medical care. Another hour and they would be free. Warren remembered to fasten his safety strap. He checked over his shoulder again; Julian had already buckled himself in.
The landscape passed below them in a white, brown, and gray patchwork broken occasionally by evergreen groves. Finally, the familiar sights of battle appeared. The stockpiles of supplies, the artillery teams. And then a long series of trenches. Warren wasn’t sure which section they were flying into. Would French poilus or British Tommies greet them when they landed? There were other possibilities too, but it didn’t matter much as long as they weren’t German.
The sun was low, making shadows long, but also highlighting the little two-seater. As he passed over the last of the trenches, now safely over friendly territory, he let out a holler of joy. They had made it. They had escaped.
His relief ended abruptly when an artillery shell exploded not more than fifty yards off. He saw another streak and identified the culprit—friendly Archie aimed at him. “Stupid devils,” he muttered under his breath. Rather foolish thing that, wasting shells on a slow-moving, unarmed plane. Warren dove under the next series of white explosions, cursing the artillery.
They managed to dodge at least a dozen bursts, reducing their altitude as they went. Then the world to his right erupted in a shower of light and shell fragments. He heard them ripping through the plane’s wing, and an instant later, a piece of shrapnel slammed into his face. Warren screamed in pain. He lifted a hand to his face, feeling the damage.
“Are you all right?” Julian called.
Warren’s hand came away red with blood. He could no longer see with his right eye, and he had to wipe away gore to see with his left one. He’d never felt such agony before. The plane had been shaken by the explosion, but it still flew. And like the mangled plane, Warren had to ignore the pain and carry on a while longer.
“Warren?”
“I’m taking her down.” Originally Warren had hoped to find a nice, flat place to land. He no longer cared about that. He just wanted to be on the ground again. The landing didn’t have to be pretty. They just had to survive it.
The fading light and the loss of vision in his right eye made it difficult for him to tell how close he was to the trees, to the ground, to the blur of men running underneath them, probably with rifles. He would have to land more by feel than by sight. He knew to slow down by cutting the engine off for intervals, knew he wanted to hit the ground at the shallowest of angles. Having never flown the plane before, he had no idea how long it would take to stop, but he touched down roughly and hoped the field ahead was clear.
It wasn’t. The edge of his eyesight was fading, so he never saw the tree, just felt it tear off the right wing. The plane twisted and skidded to a stop.
“Warren?”
Warren swallowed. He’d never run into a tree before, but he’d never had to land with such piercing pain in his face before either. He meant to answer Julian but never got around to it. A group of men approached. Dazed from the crash, he couldn’t even pick out which uniform they wore.
“They’re Aussies,” Julian said.
Warren nodded, but that made him dizzy. “Not one of my better landings,” he mumbled. A few minutes ago, he had been eager to be on solid ground again, but now he simply sat until some of the men released his straps and plucked him from the wrecked plane.
“Warren. Your face!” Julian broke off in a choking sound, either from shock or a relapse of his lung problems. Warren was in too much pain and was too exhausted to care which. He collapsed in the mud. While he waited for the stretcher, the world around him turned gray, then black.