Quill Pen Scratchings

Chapter 16

Tino grabbed Edmund by the shoulder.  “Help them get that first plane out.  One bomb could take out all these planes in here, but outside they would have to hit each one.”  He shoved Edmund toward the plane that was closest to the hangar door.  “You and you,” Tino shouted at two men near the back of the hangar.  “Get the fuel truck!” 

Edmund ran up and grabbed one of the wing struts and began pushing.  Several other men did the same and they pushed the plane out of the hanger and next to the airstrip.  Edmund could see that all along the airfield, the planes were being pushed out of the hangars.

“Stagger them so they are not in a straight line!”  The spotter who was up in the small tower yelled down and then he turned and held the binoculars up toward the eastern sky.  Edmund looked and he thought he could make out small specks against the cloudy mid-morning light. 

Another crewman next to Edmund shouted at him, “Pressé!”  Edmund ran back into the hangar where a group of men were pushing Knox’s airplane out of the hangar.  Edmund wanted to steer from the tail, but someone was already there, so he grabbed a strut and started pushing.  They quickly had the Nieuport out on the runway, and Edmund could see the approaching planes getting closer.  He stepped up onto the wing and removed the cap from the gas tank.  He could see the fuel truck moving from plane to plane, pouring gasoline into the tanks.  It finally approached Knox’s Nieuport, and Edmund watched as the men quickly filled the tank up with gasoline, spilling much down the side of the fuselage as they whisked the tank away. 

Tino came hobbling out of the hangar carrying the chocks and he put them under the wheels.  Edmund slid under the fuselage and opened a small cap to bleed any water that might have settled in the gas tank.  He stood up.  The German planes were very close, but nearly all the Escadrille’s planes were out of the hangars and on the runway, scattered so that one enemy plane shooting in a straight line couldn’t take them all out.  Edmund heard another sound and turned and saw the cars bearing the pilots approaching.  Too late Edmund thought, as he heard the enemy planes overhead begin to open fire.  They broke formation as they aimed for the scattered planes.  Tino grabbed Edmund’s coat and threw him to the ground. There were small explosions of earth all around them as the bullets struck the ground just behind Knox’s plane. All he could hear was the roar of the planes overhead and the firing of machine guns.  He stood up and looked toward the front of the runway just in time to see the second hanger explode into flames, and two of the planes closest to it were flung forward from the force of the blast.  Edmund stood still and watched, and now he could see men lying on the ground, some crying out in pain, some not moving. 

He could hear Tino shouting at him, as if from a great distance.  “…get the plane started!”  He shouted at Edmund.  “Grab the goddamn propeller!”  He watched Tino heave himself into the cockpit.  He didn’t know what Tino was doing.  Was he going to fly?  Tino was pointing at the propeller.  “Go! Go!”  Edmund could see Knox sprinting toward the plane and he understood.  He ran to the front of the plane and took the propeller in both hands.  “Contact!”  Tino screamed, and Edmund shoved down on the propeller blade with all his might and stepped back. The propeller spun hesitantly around twice and then jerked to a stop.  Knox was almost to the plane and Edmund could see a Fokker bearing down on them from above.  “Again! Again!” Tino yelled, and Edmund grabbed the propeller and shoved again, and the engine hesitated once more, but then seemed to catch fire, and the propeller roared into life, and the Nieuport strained against the chocks holding it in place.  Edmund ran and saw Tino jump from the cockpit as Knox approached and with a single leap heaved himself into the cockpit even as Tino hit the ground heavily and crumpled to the dirt yelling in pain.

“Thanks boys!  I will take it from here,” Knox shouted as he gunned the throttle and the engine exploded into full force.  Edmund and Tino pulled the chocks out from under the tires and the plane bucked forward like a bronco being let out of the gate.  Several of the Escadrille planes were now trying to take off, and they had to sit at the edge of the runway lest they collide.  Edmund watched as the pilots sat bravely waiting to get into the air.  Fokkers rained bullets down on them, but none seemed to hit. 

Another of the hangars exploded in flames, and Tino grabbed Edmund’s coat.  “Take cover! We can’t do any more out here!”  Edmund got up and ran away from the airfield.  He wasn’t sure where to go.  As he ran, he looked back as Knox and two other planes were now speeding down the runway to take off.  Edmund looked up and a single Fokker was bearing down on them from the side.  He could see the Fokker open fire, and he watched several bullets hit the rear of Knox’s fuselage, but they looked like they just went through the fabric.  At least Edmund hoped so.  But the plane next to and slightly behind Knox took the brunt of the shots.  The bullets hit the cockpit and the engine, and the pilot’s body slumped to the side just before takeoff.  The plane lurched off the right side of the runway and glided into a stand of trees.  The gas tank exploded, catching the trees on fire.  But Knox was in the sky. 

Edmund ran on and he saw two men on a small platform firing a brace of two Lewis guns at the Fokkers.  The guns were mounted on a swivel that allowed them to turn freely.  The whole platform had always been under a canvas tarp since Edmund had been at the camp, and he had never really paid that much attention to it.  The men had loaded two box clips on top of the Lewis gun.  They held much more ammunition than the dinner plate-shaped clips that the airplanes used.  Once the guns were loaded, one of the men—Edmund suddenly realized that it was Luc—was firing the guns at the attacking German planes.  The noise was deafening as Luc kept firing the twin guns into the air.  Edmund tried to see where he was shooting, and he couldn’t see any German planes close by.  The second man who was now standing below the platform on the ground saw Edmund and shouted in French, “More ammunition!  More ammunition!” and he pointed towards the supply tent. 

Edmund nodded his head and sprinted off, looking back over his shoulder as he went.  He was almost knocked over when a third hangar exploded and was engulfed in flames.  He ran into the supply tent.  No clerk sat behind the desk now.  He ran to the ammunition storage racks and picked up four boxes of the Lewis gun ammunition.  He wedged two under each arm, and then carried two more by the handles.  He wanted to get out of the tent as quickly as he could because he could hear the planes flying overhead and the guns firing and the bombs exploding.  He sprinted back out toward the gun emplacement.  He could see Luc firing up at a Fokker that was diving at him.  Luc didn’t seem to be hitting the plane, but bullets were pounding into the dirt in a line heading straight for the gun and for Luc.  The man who was helping load the guns was killed first where he stood on the ground beneath the gun platform.  The man knelt and then simply collapsed onto the ground.  Luc’s head spun to the side in a spray of blood and grey matter.  Edmund ran as fast as he could, but he felt as if he were in water.  When he got there, he tossed the four boxes onto the gun platform and climbed the short ladder to where Luc’s body still stood with half of his forehead missing, caught by the shoulder straps of the harness that had been built onto the back of the gun carriage.  Edmund lifted Luc’s arm and gently laid his body down beside the gun and then threw down the two empty ammunition boxes from the tops of the guns.  He loaded two of the boxes he had carried out and fired two test rounds from each gun to make sure they were properly loaded.  He slipped into the harness.  The handles and the shoulder bar were slippery from Luc’s blood. 

He stood and looked for a target.  He spotted a Fokker flying across the horizon, but it seemed too far away for the guns.  He also saw two Nieuports pursuing another Fokker, but again, they were all too far away.  Edmund thought one of them was Knox, but he couldn’t be sure.  Maybe the attack was over.  Then he spotted two German planes coming in from his left, from the west.  They were headed toward the remaining hangars.  Edmund thought they were just in range, so leading them carefully, he fired in short bursts at the front plane.  He couldn’t tell if he was hitting anything.  He watched as the one that was trailing slightly behind banked toward him.  Edmund opened fire on it as it turned toward him.  In a moment, Edmund was lined up in the Fokker’s sights, and he could hear the German guns firing above his own.  He could feel bullets ricocheting off the gun platform and off the Lewis guns themselves.  A small spray of hot metal peppered the side of his face, but he kept firing straight at the enemy plane.  Soon it flew over his head and Edmund turned the guns as quickly as he could and continued to fire into its tail.  Smoke began pouring from the Fokker’s engine, and he thought he could hear it sputter.  He continued to fire until the magazine boxes were spent.  He watched as the plane climbed higher, and then, safely out of reach of Edmund, it turned north and east and back to the safety of the German lines.  With rage Edmund threw down the empty magazine boxes and reloaded the guns.  His right arm seemed to be feeling a bit heavy, and he felt it with his left hand.  He had been shot, but it seemed to only have grazed the surface.  He also felt the side of his face, and it stung badly, but overall, he didn’t appear to be too badly hurt.  He looked down at Luc, whose remaining eye stared off into the sky.

The plane that had remained on course toward the hangars had dropped one bomb which exploded to the side, partially collapsing a wall.  It climbed, and began banking, as if for another try, and there Edmund could clearly see Knox dropping down on the tail of the Fokker with his guns blazing.  He thought he could see wood and fabric splinter on the Fokker, but it didn’t seem fazed by the attack.  Then as Knox circled around for another attack, the Fokker suddenly banked hard into him and raked the side of the Nieuport with bullets.  Knox’s engine burst into flames, and the plane seemed to waver, and it rose sharply into the sky where it stalled, and then gently turning to the side, as if in slow motion, it started down toward the earth, increasing to a terrifying rate, and then with a dull thud Knox crashed into soft ground in a field near the end of the airstrip. 

Edmund screamed and shot at the Fokker as it flew off to the west.  It was too far away, but Edmund shot at it until he was out of ammunition.  When his guns were silent, he realized that the sky and the rest of the camp were quiet also.  The Fokkers were gone, and so were the Escadrille pilots.  In pursuit, he supposed.  There was a crackling noise as the last of the bombed hangars was still in flames.  Edmund looked down at Luc, and then at the man who lay below the gun platform.  Men were already starting to run towards Knox’s plane, but when they got there, they just stood and stared with their hands on their hips.  Four men lay dead on the ground near the hangars. Two looked like they had burned to death.  Men were covering them and also trying to put out the fire on the burning hangar.  Three of the Escadrille’s planes sat on the runway in various states of destruction.  They had never made it off the ground.  Edmund didn’t see Tino anywhere.

He climbed down from the gun platform and began the long walk to where Knox’s plane lay in a heap.  He was afraid to get there quickly, but he broke into a run after a few steps anyway.  Several men stood around the plane in silence, and they parted slightly when he got there.  The first thing he noticed was the last repairs that Tino had made to a section of the tail were still intact, the stitches still perfect.  The whole tail section was in one piece, but the Lakota Indian head was torn and crumpled.  The wings lay in two sections, and the propeller was buried into the ground.  Something lay under a coat that had been put there by the first man to make it to the crash site.  Edmund stood, trying to recognize the wreckage as the plane that he had spent all his time worrying over for the last months, then he looked back at the body under the coat.  But something wasn’t right.  It didn’t look big enough to be a man. 

Edmund began looking over the wreckage, and then he saw Knox’s left boot hanging over one of the wings.  He walked over to it.  It was clear that the other men had seen it, but no one had approached it.  He stood next to it, and he could see that Knox’s foot was still in it, and his pants were still neatly tucked into the boot.  His leg up to his knee was still in the pants, but above there the pants just flattened out like a deflated and bloody balloon.  Edmund reached out and lifted the boot off the wing and then put a hand under Knox’s calf.  It still felt warm and strangely heavy to Edmund.  All the men watched him in silence.  He carried it over to where the rest of his body lay and he lifted part of the coat and placed the leg underneath. 

Edmund stood back up and continued to look down at the body.  Most of the men had turned away and were looking back at the wreckage of the camp. 

“Hell of a mess to clean up,” one of the men said in French.

“Yeah.  Anyone know who we lost?”  Someone mentioned some names.  Edmund continued to stare down at Knox’s body. 

“Spotter says the Boches are over Bar le Duc now.  Our boys are in pursuit, but they are giving it a hell of a pounding.  Seems like they want revenge for our little New Year’s raid,” he said, laughing slightly.

Edmund looked up, “Bar le Duc?” he said.  The man nodded.  Edmund jumped over the wreckage of the Nieuport and sprinted toward the front gate of Behonne.  He thought he could hear explosions off in the distance, but he wasn’t sure.  He started to run out of the gate, but he knew he would be too late if he tried to get there on foot.  He quickly looked around and saw several open-topped Renaults parked near the administration building.  These were the cars that had brought the pilots from the chateau.  Edmund ran to the closest and flung the door open.

“Stop!”  One of the sentry men was pointing his rifle at Edmund.  “My orders are to shoot any thief that touches these cars.”

“Please, I have to get to Bar le Duc!”

“Well then you had better start walking.”

“But I…”

The sentry slid the bolt home and loaded a round in the chamber and took careful aim at Edmund’s head.  “Now.”

Edmund seethed with anger, but he knew he would be of no use to Clemence if he was dead.  He took two steps backward and was about to turn and start running toward Bar le Duc when he saw Tino step around the front of the car behind the sentry and smash him across the teeth with his silver headed cane.  The sentry collapsed on the ground and did not move. 

“You had better get out of here,” Tino said, opening the door of the car.  Edmund hesitated.  “Go on!” Tino yelled.  “See if she is okay.  And here,” he reached down and picked up the sentry’s rifle.  “You had better take this just in case.”  Edmund grabbed the rifle and jumped into the front of the car and turned it on.  The engine roared to life. 

“But what about him?” Edmund said, nodding toward the sentry. 

“Don’t you worry about him.  I know a few things about this asshole,” Tino kicked him lightly in the ribs, “that he wouldn’t necessarily want people to know about.  He won’t say anything.  And if he does?”  Tino thought for a moment, “Then I took the car.  No problems.  Now get the hell out of here.”

“Thanks.” Edmund looked at Tino and didn’t know what else to say to express his gratitude.

“I owed you.  Now go!”

Edmund put the car into reverse and spun the tires in a half turn until he was facing the front gate and then put it into gear and sped out onto the road toward Bar le Duc and Clemence.