Hope Takes Flight (10 page)

Finally, hearing a soft cry to his right, he turned and saw Marcel standing rigidly, his eyes wide with disbelief. He merely looked at Gavin, saying something Gavin could not understand. Then he grabbed his chest, and blood spurted from his mouth in a crimson fountain. He fell forward into the mud, his face burying itself, and lay still.

Gavin dropped his rifle and ran to him, but then he heard Moritz shouting, “Leave him! Leave him! Get going, Yank!” Gavin grabbed his rifle and started once again across the field.

Once more the charge was halted short of their goal. And one of the noncoms shouted, “Retreat! Retreat!”

Gavin, mad with battle lust, would have gone on, but Moritz grabbed him, turned him around, and gave him a kick. “Back to the trench, you stupid idiot!”

Gavin stumbled back to the line along with the rest. As the bullets crisscrossed the area, he somehow found himself sitting back in the water at the bottom of the trench. Then a thought occurred to him. As the others came stumbling in, he tried to climb back up on the fire step.

But it was the sergeant again who grabbed him, demanding, “Where do you think you're going!”

“It's…Marcel!” Gavin gasped, his eyes wild. “I've got to go back and get him! He's been shot!”

Moritz shook his head. He was a tough, crude soldier, but he had developed a liking for this young man. “Too late, boy,” he muttered in a kindly tone. “I saw him go down. Three bullets right in the chest. He's gone.”

Gavin stared at him. Slowly the meaning sunk in. Without a word, he stumbled away, sat down with his back against the bulkhead, put his head in his hands, and began to weep.

After the death of Marcel DeSpain, Gavin Stuart was careful to form no new friendships. He could not afford to go through that kind of grief again. He saw the men go down from time to time, and each time he had to tell himself they were just numbers. At night, he would sometimes dream of Marcel, but he never told anyone.

The year wore on, and one day early in May—the sixth, it was—Gavin was awakened from a nap by a shout. “Look! Look! He's coming down!”

Gavin rose with a start, looking around in confusion. Focusing on the noises coming from above him, he looked up to see a plane coming down directly in front of his position. It was, he knew instantly, an Allied plane, but there was no enemy aircraft in sight. The plane was belching white vapor, which Gavin guessed to be gasoline. He expected to see the frail aircraft explode at any moment, but it did not. It came down almost at full speed, it seemed, and Gavin could see that the pilot was still alive, though the plane seemed to be shot to pieces.

The aircraft touched down, miraculously kept going past crater after crater, until it dropped its wheels in a very small one. Then it bucked up into the air, performed a small flip, and landed on its back.

“Poor beggar,” Moritz said. “He ain't got a chance! Them gunners have him spotted.”

It was true, Gavin knew. German machine guns had already begun to rattle and several rifles as well—all aimed at the hapless airman. Fortunately the craft itself was hidden behind a huge mound, and the gunners could not get a clear shot at the victim, who was struggling in his harness.

It was one of those moments Gavin would never forget—the sight of that airman trying to get loose, the sound of the crackling gunfire. Afterward, he could never remember what went on in his mind. Everything seemed to have been blotted out. All he knew was that he was racing across the cratered field without a gun, and the sergeant was screaming at him to stop. He heard the whistle of a slug as it went past his ear. He dodged, fell down, and saw the dirt where he had been standing blow up into fine dust. Somehow he managed to stay concealed behind the raised mountains of the craters until he reached the plane. When he had made it, he scrambled underneath.

The smell of gas was strong and, looking inside, he saw that the pilot was covered with blood.
Probably dead
, he thought.

But at that moment the goggled face turned to him and said, “Get me out of this, will ya, fella?”

Gavin used his pocketknife to sever the straps. The pilot, a big heavy man, fell on top of him and the two rolled in the mud.

“Can you walk?” Gavin asked, jumping to his feet.

The pilot put up his goggles and glanced down at his bloody leg. “I don't think so,” he said. “But I can crawl. Let's get out of this place.”

The airman did his best, but halfway across, he fainted from the loss of blood. With bullets striking all around, Gavin managed to drag him to safety, using what cover he could find. The machine guns on his own side, he was aware, were crackling to cover him as much as possible. He fell halfway into the trench, wrestling the body of the heavy man over with him, and the two of them were at once pulled inside to safety.

“Here! Put him on this stretcher!” Sergeant Moritz barked. “He's bleedin' like a fountain!”

“Lemme go with him to the hospital, Sarge,” Gavin pleaded.

Sergeant Moritz grinned at him. “You bloody beggar! Ain't got the sense of a flea!” He shook his head. “Okay, you can go with him. But get back as soon as you can.”

“Right, Sarge.” Four of them lifted the stretcher and began the trip through the maze of trenches. They staggered into the field hospital and Gavin said with more authority than he felt, “You fellas go on back. I'll stay with the pilot.” To his surprise, they nodded and left at once.

Gavin hovered nearby while doctors stripped the pilot of his uniform and began working on him. When they were through, Gavin edged close enough to peer down at the wounded man.

The pilot's eyes were open and he said, “Hey, you're the joker who brought me in, aren't you?”

Gavin grinned, for the accent was unmistakably American. “Sure did,” he said. “How you feelin'?”

The aviator said, “Well, from the sound of your talk, you must be from the good ol' U.S.A.”

Gavin nodded. “Way back in the hills of Arkansas. Are you all right?”

The pilot shrugged. “No, I think they're going to ship me to a hospital in Paris.” A light flashed in his eyes, and he said, “Listen. I want you to come with me, Bud. I ain't said thank you yet, and we got some talking to do.”

Gavin shook his head. “I can't do that. I'd be a deserter.”

The big man grinned at him. His face was pale from loss of blood, but there was something authoritative in every line of his body. “I'll take care of that,” he said. He called one of the French doctors over and rattled off something in French. The two talked for a moment, and at last the doctor nodded in agreement.

“He'll get word back to your unit. Tell him your name and your outfit. Then you can stay with me 'til I get out of that bloody hospital.”

Ten minutes later Gavin was climbing into the ambulance beside the wounded aviator.

“My name's Bill Thaw,” he said before he drifted off to sleep. “When we get to the hospital, you stay close to me. I'll tell them you're my body servant or wing man or something. I need somebody close to me besides these Frogs, okay?”

“Sure, Lieutenant,” Gavin assured him and patted the beefy shoulder. “Don't worry none. I'll stay right with you from now on.”

G
avin could not tear himself away from the shower. He had been admitted to the hospital as Bill Thaw's roommate or wing man and had been given a bed in one of the wards. Adjoining the ward was a bath, and the first thing Gavin did was to strip off his clothes and plunge under the cool water. Over and over again he let the soothing liquid run over his head, trying to wash away the filth that had accumulated during months in the trenches.

When he finally got out, he stared at the dirty clothes he had thrown on the floor. Determined not to wear them in that state, he washed them with laundry soap scrounged from one of the ward attendants. With no change of clothes until his wet ones dried, he crawled between the clean sheets and fell asleep instantly.

He awoke with a start. The familiar stench of the trenches and the sounds of cannon booming and machine guns rattling were missing. The silence seemed to sweep over him and startled him more than the explosion of a mine or a bomb falling from an airplane. He lay there, luxuriating in the feel of the clean sheets next to his equally clean body. He finally got up, put on his freshly washed uniform, and made his way out of the ward.

The other patients appeared to be sleeping, so Gavin left quietly. Going at once to the desk at the end of the hall, he found an attendant, a tall Frenchman, who spoke only broken English. After a struggle with the language, Gavin learned where Lieutenant Thaw was quartered. He made his way through the hospital, getting lost more than once. He finally found the room he was seeking.

Pausing outside the door of a hospital room, Gavin heard a very English voice behind him. “Are you looking for Lieutenant Thaw, Private?”

Gavin wheeled around and found himself looking into the face of one of the most attractive women he'd ever seen in his life. She was obviously a nurse, wearing a white uniform that reached to the toes of her polished black shoes, and some type of a fitted cap on her head.

“Why…I…yes, ma'am, I am.” He stared at her. “You're…uh…not French, are you?”

The young woman smiled at him. “No, I am English,” she said. “I'm Nurse Spencer.” She was rather tall—about five-eight, he guessed—and no more than twenty-two or twenty-three. Her ash blond hair and blue-gray eyes made a perfect match for her oval face.
But
, Gavin reasoned,
I haven't seen a woman in so long that even a female gorilla might look good to me!

“Yes, Nurse, I'm here to take care of Lieutenant Thaw until he gets out of the hospital.”

Nurse Spencer nodded her approval. “That's fine, Private. What's your name?”

“Gavin Stuart.”

“American, aren't you?” The nurse gave him an appraising look. “Well, I'm glad you're here. We're packed and jammed with the casualties from the big push. Have you had any experience nursing?”

Gavin scratched his head and stared at her. “Well, ma'am…I mean Nurse…not really, just tendin' horses and cows and dogs, I guess.”

Nurse Spencer laughed out loud, making a delightful sound. He had read somewhere in a book that certain women laughed with a tinkling sound, like music, but he'd never expected to hear it. “It's all about the same, I suppose,” she said quickly. “Come inside and I'll give you instructions.”

She half turned to go inside, but Gavin put a hand on her arm. “How is he, Nurse? Is he hurt bad?”

“Oh, no. The wound in his leg is healing nicely. It didn't break any bones. I think he can go home in a couple of days. The main thing is to see that an infection doesn't get started. Of course, he lost quite a bit of blood so we need to build his strength up. Come along. He was awake a few moments ago.”

She led him into the room, and there, sitting up in bed, staring at them was Lieutenant Thaw.

“Well, it's you again, Nursie. I think it's about time I had another bath.”

A slight touch of crimson colored the nurse's cheeks, and she shook her head, saying firmly, “One bath is all you get, I'm afraid. But if you want another, here's your new nurse.”

Thaw grinned beneath his bushy mustache. “Well, that's a fine kettle of fish! Good things don't last very long, do they? When do I get out of here, Nursie?”

“In two days, if you behave yourself. Now, I've got work to do.”

When she left the room, Thaw turned to Gavin. “What's your name again? I'm a little fuzzy about what happened.”

“My name's Gavin Stuart, Lieutenant.”

“Well, Gavin, I owe you my life, so I guess I'm going to let you take care of me to make sure you did a good job. Here, why don't you sit down and tell me all about yourself. What are you doing over here, anyway, all the way from America?”

Gavin sat down and began to answer Thaw's questions. Soon Gavin found he had told the aviator more than he'd intended to.

“So,” Thaw said with interest in his dark eyes, “you say you came over to fly airplanes, but you haven't done any flying. Is that right?”

Gavin nodded sadly. “Well, that's about it. I've tried everything I can think of.”

Thaw winked at him. “No, not everything. You haven't tried Bill Thaw yet. How about giving me a shot at it?”

“You mean…I…you could get me into the Air Force?”

“I can do better than that,” Thaw grinned. “Have you ever heard of the Lafayette Escadrille?”

Gavin shook his head. “I know an ‘escadrille' is a name for a French flying unit, but I never heard of the ‘Lafayette Escadrille'.”

“Well, you're going to be happy to hear it now. The Lafayette Escadrille,” he said, “is a new unit composed entirely of Americans. There aren't many of us yet, but our numbers are growing all the time.”

“Americans? I didn't know there were that many Americans over here.”

“Quite a few of them joined the Legion like you did. Others who could fly got into the regular Flying Corps. A man called Bill Prince put together the Escadrille. He got some bigwigs back in the States interested, but the French wouldn't listen to him at first. They were too afraid of spies to let any Americans into their forces. But Prince kept at it. And now, as of March 14, 1916, the Lafayette Escadrille has become an official unit of the French Flying Service.”

“Do you really think I could get in?” Gavin demanded, his eyes bright. “I wouldn't want to mislead you, Lieutenant. I'm not a very good flyer.”

Thaw laughed. “None of us were when we started. But we're going to have a fine training program, and we've got some good men. Of course,” he said, shrugging his burly shoulders, “a man learns best by watching what the good flyers do and trying to imitate them. But I figure I owe you a few lessons, so when you get me out of this place, we'll see what we can do.”

For the next two days, Gavin hardly moved from Bill Thaw's side. Consequently, he got well acquainted with Nurse Heather Spencer, who, he found out, was not a regular nurse but a volunteer who had come over from England to help care for the wounded. She had told him this about herself over a cup of tea when he caught her between rounds.

“I came over to serve God, Private Stuart,” she said simply. “I could've gone as a mission volunteer to Africa, where some of my friends went, but I found that I have just as good an opportunity to share the gospel here as over in the Dark Continent.”

Gavin was dumbfounded. He'd had the notion that all missionaries and most Christians, for that matter, were dour-faced and determined to put an end to all fun wherever they found it. “Well, my brother's a preacher,” he said blankly. “An evangelist over in the States. But I guess it hasn't rubbed off on me yet. I don't have any more religion than our horse back home.”

Heather Spencer was an astute young woman. Already she had learned that she could not force men to believe in God, and she wasn't about to begin now. She simply said, “The time will come, Private Stuart, when you will know God. Every man has that time, I think.” She put her hand on her cheek, bracing her elbow on the table. “I think God is on some sort of manhunt…or womanhunt. He wants everybody to know his love, so he sends hundreds out to find them. His scouts are chasing after us, and every one of us has some sort of bloodhound hot on his trail. Sooner or later he will find us.”

Gavin was entranced. He shook his head in wonder. “I never heard anything like that before. What would God want with a guy like me?”

The nurse said gently, “He wants us all, every one of us. From the savage in Africa to the Eskimo eating frozen blubber to the King and Queen in Buckingham Palace, God loves us, one and all.”

The conversation was then abruptly broken off by the arrival of others, but Gavin never forgot what she said. It burned through his head, and he repeated it to Thaw.

The pilot was now able to sit in a chair. A burly brute with a splendid physique, he had thick black hair, and snapping black eyes. His flowing mustachios were the pride of his heart. “Better watch out for that kind,” he said. “They mean marriage.”

On the third day the pair prepared to leave the hospital. Thaw was on crutches but able to maneuver fairly well. As they left the hospital, Gavin spotted the blond nurse and said, “Excuse me, Lieutenant. I'll go say good-bye to Nurse Spencer.” He ran over quickly and pulled off his hat, cradling it in his hands. “We're leaving now. I want to thank you for all the kindness you've shown to the Lieutenant…and to me, too.”

Heather put out her hand and took his in a surprisingly firm grip. “I'll remember you in my prayers,” she said. “You, and the lieutenant as well.” She smiled and added, “Come back and see me if you're ever in Paris again. We can talk.”

“I'll…I'll do that, miss,” Gavin said and backed away awkwardly, turning with a wide grin for Lieutenant Thaw.

As the two got into the cab that was to take them back to their unit, Thaw said, “That's a good-lookin' woman. But she's too religious for me. She wouldn't even let a fella chew tobacco, would she?”

Gavin quickly changed the subject. “Well, I guess we'll be parting company, Lieutenant. It's back to the trenches for me.”

A delighted grin crossed Thaw's lips beneath the black mustache. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a paper. “Nope. That's where you're wrong. You're going to be a pilot in the Lafayette Escadrille.” He handed the paper to Gavin, who read it, his eyes almost bugging out as he learned that he was now assigned to the Lafayette Escadrille and was to report for active duty immediately.

Gavin, like most of the Stuart clan, was not one to show his emotions much. But he had to blink the tears back as he stared at the paper, not daring to look up. “Lieutenant Thaw, I'll never forget this,” he said when he could manage to speak, “Never!”

Thaw glanced at the boy and frowned. “Not sure you ought to thank me, Gavin. The losses are going to be terrible. The Germans have the best planes and more of them. Until we catch up, we're like clay pigeons up there.”

“I'll never forget it,” Gavin repeated. Then he looked up and smiled. “That nurse said one time that God does strange things to people. She told me that. And now I sort of believe it, from the way things are working out.”

Without further conversation, they rattled along over the rough streets of Paris, out into the countryside. As they headed toward the Lafayette Escadrille Air Station, Gavin was thinking,
This is what I came for…to fly. This is what it's all about
. Then he added a little prayer.
God, if you are there, thank you…thank you a lot
.

With a carefree heart, Gavin Stuart drew on black leather pants, jacket, goggles, gloves, and crash helmet. He discovered that from the moment he first slung his leg over the edge of a cockpit and a gold-braided, high-ranking brass hat clapped him on the back, saying, “
Mon enfant,
you are a pilot!”, he never had anyone with him. There was no dual control in the ships. He was strictly on his own.

Of course, there were instructors—the older pilots. Bill Thaw, especially, kept his eyes on Gavin throughout the first days and weeks. Nothing seemed to escape him, and by easy stages, Gavin absorbed enough fundamentals to keep from killing himself.

The school at Buc, near Versailles, was a training center for pilots who would eventually go into pursuit squadrons. If a man didn't make a good showing, he was eliminated and sent back to his regiment or to some other duty. But nearly everyone who got to Buc finished with honors. Of the sixteen candidates in Gavin's class, fifteen got their brevets.

The training was no bed of roses, Gavin learned. He was shaken out of sleep at dawn every morning with only a cup of lukewarm chicory, masquerading as coffee, to sustain him until the first meal at eleven o'clock. Then the class members went out, shivering, to one of the fields, each awaiting his turn on the wonderful and fearful contraption known as the Blériot model plane.

The Blériot was a source of never-ceasing wonder. It seemed to be constructed of odds and ends of wood, discarded matchsticks, and the like, which were wired together in catch-as-catch-can fashion with baling wire to form the fuselage. Old handkerchiefs were sewn together to cover the rings in the part of the fuselage around the pilot's seat. The remainder of the fuselage was left naked, which gave the ship a kind of half-finished appearance.

When Gavin asked why they weren't covered, Thaw shrugged. “Easier to replace than brace wires when they get hit by a bullet or when they get a little strain on them.”

To make things more complicated, the planes' engines were not identical and ranged from a three-cylinder Anzani Italian radio motor to the sixty-horsepower LeRhone rotary motor.

In addition, the stick in the Blériot had an odd feature—a triangular-shaped grip on top with a contact button on one side so the motor could be blipped on and off. Instead of grasping the stick like a broom handle, the pilot curled his fingers around the top bar of the triangle. There were no ailerons; the wings, owing to their light construction, warped quite easily. It was an out-moded system, of course, for the Wright brothers' first plane had used this system.