Chapter Twenty-Eight
Some Things Stick In Your Mind Forever
Some things stick in your mind forever.
As I swung into the first of our troop boxcars, some bright lad was all set for a little squaddie brew-up.
“Ah, shit.” I heard, as a private moved suddenly and a tin cup fell over.
“Relax, boys.” I told them. “Just passing through.”
The other side door was open, and a man urinated out of it. I waited in order to avoid any blowback from the slipstream.
“Cup of tea, sir?” A man asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
This guy has to be my new corporal.
We stood beside a couple of barrels with planks on them, which made a fairly decent sideboard. He put tinned milk, the evaporated type, and some sugar into the enameled metal cup. I was huffing and puffing from the exertion of getting in the boxcar, literally running alongside on a slow curving stretch, and waiting for willing hands to catch me up. There were eight or ten Indian troops among the platoon.
“They’re all good lads.” The man next to me said.
He had a single stripe on his shoulder, but we hadn’t been properly introduced.
I stuck out my hand.
“Tucker.” I said.
“Carson.” He replied. “Nine are from Calcutta, and one is from some little village up the road from Bombay.”
In the background men’s voices could be heard as the first five or six finished getting the tea in their cups and headed back to slump wearily down on their packs and bedrolls.
These were in the forward end of the car, because of the breeze coming in.
Someone had rigged up a stretch of stiff wire that held the door on the lee side of the box car open eight or ten inches, to let out the fumes from the little stove they had going.
This division had been decimated, and was now totally dispersed in small groups of reinforcements from a central pool, according to Howard-Smythe.
“This guy here.” He pointed. “He was an accountant in an insurance firm, before he enlisted.”
Well, I didn’t think everyone on the subcontinent grew rice, actually, and had met up with Indian troops before. Perhaps the corporal thought I was still wet behind the ears.
“Oh, really.” I said with interest. “Have him report to Captain Howard-Smythe in the morning.”
“That’s diabolically stupid.”
Someone behind us was muttering in the dark corner where some heavier equipment, boxes and crates were strewn about. One or two were already open.
The corporal moved off to investigate before I got too involved.
“…some people think they should have their own political party.” Came a voice from one group of lads. “But then they find the obvious recruits are all the same kind of people, who all think they should have their own political party.”
Chuckles all around that group.
Other fellows were groping in the grey leaden light. I sipped my tea, piping hot.
“Alfred. Where the fuck’s me pack?”
“It’s right over there, Dave.”
“Shit. This razor’s dull.” Said some kid with nothing more than peach-fuzz to worry about.
Draining the cup, I thanked the man by the brew-up central area, and continued with the walk-through. I answered questions as best I could, reassuring people that they would get their mail. Some needed a pat on the back. One boy was looking kind of sick so I told him to report to the doctor at the next stop.
That would smarten him up.
In order to be completely effective, all propaganda must contain an element of truth.
Hopefully the men were reassured by my confident air.
It looked like I knew what I was doing, but I was just faking it. The train was pulling to a halt again. Now what? At least it was a lot easier to go from the last boxcar to the first passenger carriage. Better than clambering around in the dark on a moving train. No wonder the boys called me mad. Funny, in one carriage, virtually everyone was asleep, except for one bleary-eyed fellow who was clearly confused as to whether or not to salute from the prone position.
I returned the salute politely enough.
“I’m not expecting a fanfare of trumpets.” I whispered on the way by.
Silly bugger blushed in embarrassment. Everywhere, people sleeping in the aisles.
In the next car, it was a bull session, and this time it was some guy quoting Cyrano De Bergerac.
“Sometimes the best causes are the ones that are already lost.” He was saying.
An intellectual in every crowd. Keep moving, although the conversation is intriguing.
Hopefully they’re not talking about me.
Next clump of lads, pretty quiet, although someone said, “…an ass like a tame bee,” as I went past the open compartment door.
Wouldn’t mind hearing more of that one, either.
Boys will be boys.
Reluctantly, I moved on. Next doorway.
“Give it up, Billy, give it up.”
I felt like standing sheepishly in the door and asking with a dumb look on my face.
“Duh. You guys playing cards?”
A CO has to keep a certain dignity. The wisecracks had better be good, or I keep them to myself.
“Yeah.” Someone won the pot, and the murmuring could be heard as I proceeded down the hall to the command cars nearer the front end. Another perquisite of rank, we get to be at the front of the train.
***
After a brief hiatus at Dover, and a very slow, but thankfully calm passage, then came the nightmarish hassle of getting all hooked up again. We finally chugged and clunked into a marshalling yard near St. Omer, France. Nearby was the bustle of the Royal Air Force Depot. Pulling in during the night, we made sure to be on the very farthest verge of the yard. No one even bothered with us.
My head felt a little woozy, with a rushing and beating in my eardrums, just for a moment. We used to call it angel’s wings. A sign of over-tiredness. It was a strange kind of thrumming in the inner ear, often on one side of the head or the other.
“Send in Ali Baba and his sidekick Shifty.” I asked the Captain, who was just leaving after an early consultation.
A hubbub came at the door. Who’s this?
Dawley.
“Hey, buddy.” I said, as he came into the command centre.
My office was long and skinny, with lots of windows. I quite liked it, especially the stove, and the bed, and the roof over my head. A bunker on wheels, courtesy of the Siddeley-Deasy Car Company. There was a little plaque and everything.
“Well, this is the way to go to war.” He murmured in dry humor. “Is this thing armored?”
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| "Is this thing armored?" |
“Yeah.” I giggled. “You know me. Always thinking.”
We shook hands and he grabbed a seat. Corporal Bill came in with cups, steaming with strong coffee. Then he set out cream and sugar. Dawley was opening a briefcase.
“Here are the materials you requested.” He began. “You have planes at the aerodrome, and the commandant says come and pick them up when you’re ready.”
Dawley must have flown in to the St. Omer base early. Up with the birds. I like that.
“How come you got this job?” I asked him. “Did you say or do something to upset someone?”
“No. I asked for it.” He assured me. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
A knock sounded at the door.
“Sit tight.” I motioned. “Come in.”
“I would rather be ripped apart by lions than gnawed to death by rats and vermin.” He said inconsequentially.
Ah. Office politics. Well, that’s always the way, right? Poor fellow got sick of kissing ass.
‘Ali Baba,’ and, ‘Shifty,’ stood in the room, a trifle ill at ease. Aware that they haven’t done anything lately, a thief also knows that the first thing he ever stole was his own honor, his own reputation. Thieves are aware that their word doesn’t amount to much. It makes them feel a little vulnerable sometimes.
“Where did you get that tin stove, the one you boys use for brew-ups?” I began affably enough. “Is that an American invention?”
Dawley sat there watching sardonically.
“Um, um, oh, er, well…” Began Ali.
His pal fidgeted, and focused in on the papers on my desk. I transfixed him with my gaze and he looked away, reddening slightly.
“How much would it cost me to get another half-dozen?” I asked Ali in a pleasant and even voice, neutral, and non-judgmental.
“Oh.” He came back in a different tone. “Oh, well, we couldn’t charge you, sir.”
Dawley grinned in appreciation, probably ‘cause he knew I would have a big shopping list. We’d sprung these boys from the hoosegow for a reason.
“Just let us know what you want. We’re only too happy to get it for you.” And he took a quick and sneaky glance at his partner in crime.
No disagreement there, merely a look of awe. What kind of CO was this?
“That’s right, only too happy.” Said Shifty, tugging on a forelock and shuffling his feet.
Snuffling at his grubby and tattered coat sleeve. These gentlemen hadn’t been issued new clothes yet.
“I have a list. We’ll need a couple of extra box cars.” I told them. “Wait until dark. Get some French railroad guard uniforms if you can.”
They agreed that this might be a good idea.
“One more thing. Stand up straight when you talk to me.” I let them go, no doubt grateful to do so.
“And talk to Sergeant Jaeckl about some new clothes.” I called, as the door closed ever so gently behind them.
“For starters, we’ll be at Aire.” I informed Dawley. “We think we can find a rail siding, next to a big open area, and if we have to knock down a few trees, so be it.”
“I’m all for new tactics.” He noted. “This mobility is going to pay off. I just know it.”
As long as Military Intelligence was cooperating.
“Anyway, here are all the reports you requested. Biographies, the jastas und stafelln und geschwaders of the enemy forces, and their locations. Enemy aces, enemy aircraft, enemy aerodromes as of Friday, activity on a variety of fronts.”
Major Dawley and his office were very thorough.
“It’s as up-to-date as we can make it.”
He shuffled papers to and from the briefcase. My work was cut out for me.
“Okay. Now I need to borrow one of your pilots and a plane, so I can go up to Paris.” He said. “I’ll get those certain little items you requested.”
He was serious, although in point of fact the whole idea had a certain ludicrousness about it. We were going to try to create a ‘gravity-suit,’ and our big brainstorm was to wear girdles and such-like under our flying clothes. We even planned to try tight stockings. I’m not lying, it was just quicker and cheaper than going through the more usual purchasing commission.
The usual design-and-bid process, with tenders and all that bureaucratic red tape would simply take too long. We figured the planes were capable of pulling a lot more ‘gravities,’ than the human body could tolerate for more than a few seconds. Some ‘poof,’ named Parnall at the Royal Aircraft Testing Establishment came up with the idea. The idea of ordering the men to wear the stuff, well, that might take some courage.
We had to put up with some of that kind of thing, because we were experimental.
And they were writing the cheques.
Mind you, it was true enough that men ‘greyed out,’ when pulling out of steep dives, although no one had ever confirmed, actually blacking out. That was all speculation. From the point of view of an observer, in the case of an aircraft where the pilot took a single bullet to the spine, or simply blacked out, and then spun in, how can you tell the difference? You can’t. You can only speculate as to why your buddy, in an otherwise intact airframe, suddenly loosened up in a turn or a pullout and then crashed, or flew straight and level, maybe slightly drifting, until small arms fire or anti-aircraft fire took him out. Was my buddy asleep? Blacked out? Or, ‘just dead?’
“Well, at least make sure they’re all one color,” I suggested. “For the love of God, make sure they’re not pink.”
“They probably don’t make khaki kinky-clothes.” He quipped.
I have to admit, I was stumped for a response to that one.
Another thing on his list was hockey tape, the kind we used to hold our sticks together back in Canada, after taking a pounding on the frozen, rock-like surface of a pond.
Perfect for patching bullet holes in airframes, and inventing anti-gravity suits.
The first hockey pucks were frozen horse-patties. We called them shit-pucks.
Later, when games were broadcast on the radio, the name was changed for obvious reasons, including an ‘all-ages’ audience.
“All done then? I’ll call for a pilot. Presumably you have a car.” I told him, and we shook hands.
Dawley was soon on his way over to the airstrip with McGill, one of the newbies.
McGill had twenty or thirty hours on Avros. He should be fine. I hoped. The Biff was easy enough to fly. He should be able to tell the difference. What’s next? I picked up the first one on the stack and opened it. Men’s voices were raised outside the train, as the sergeant organized some sort of group activities. Until our motor transport caught up with us, it was a good time to rest and catch up on the reading.
“Did you ever answer that letter, sir?”
Now it was Corporal Bill’s turn to plague me. “The pretty smelling one?”
“Holy, schmoley.” I grumped. “Will you fellows never leave me alone?”
Putting down the file, I looked through last week’s mail. That ought to keep us busy for a while.
“It doesn’t take a fool to see what’s going on here, but I do.” Said the corporal.
“What?” I questioned sternly. “What are you implying?”
“You’re afraid of this Russian lady, sir.” Smirked Whittington.
“Ha. Damned right I am,” I told the cheeky bugger. “She’s got a reputation as a real man-eater.”
“She’s probably a spy, or a divorcee, or something.” I added.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Sir.” He answered.
As long as they put a ‘sir’ on the end of it, I pretty much tolerate it around here.
“You bucking for a transfer, again?”
He shut up then.
“I promise to answer the mail, all right?”
He nodded and went back to work. Cheeky bastard.
***
The plotting and scheming never let up for a moment.
Half a dozen of us sat around a big table in the other half of the carriage. Black, Powell, Andrew, Howard-Smythe, myself, and the corporal. We were planning, plotting, scheming, bull-shitting and in general trying to wrap our minds around all the work that needed to be accomplished before the first machine took to the air.
“We need to get our act together, gentlemen.” I advised them.
We were fortunate, in that some of our aircraft had never been uncrated. They were easy to put back on a train. The disassembly of twenty-seven aircraft took about a week before the train arrived, and three more days elapsed while loading.
We were behind the eight ball as far as time was concerned. Time is the one precious element. Almost any other resource can be replaced, even blood. Ideas skipped and danced in my head.
“Ideas, boys?”
They were growing into the job, each and every one of them, each in his own way.
Christ, they were like my own sons.
“I like the electric fuel-pump idea, but we shouldn’t modify all the planes at once.” Offered Powell.
Most of us agreed with his opinion.
“We’re going to be bolting brand-new engines, right out of the crate, onto some tired old airframes.” He added. “They’ll require running in, and thorough testing.”
“Smart thought. Let’s make sure all the pumps don’t fail after twenty minutes of flying time.” I acknowledged.
“I’m not wearing no frilly girl’s underwear to fly and fight the enemy.” Stated Andrew firmly.
Grunts and nods.
“I think the men would mutiny.” Said Corporal Bill.
But there were pretty firm orders, and there’s always a way.
“Oh, I got that one all figured out.” I assured them. “We make it a punishment, and keep it top secret. Swear them to secrecy and make them sign the form. Howard-Smythe has the procedure. He’s got a memo, just get them to sign it first. It’s all in the set-up, and how you present it to the individual offender.”
That made them sit up, even Andrew, all tousled hair and sleepy black eyes.
“That’s fucking brilliant.” Gaped Andrew. “I have new respect for you guys. The poor bastard has to fly the test, write a report, sign his name in the history books, and he can’t even warn the next guy.”
All the squadron leaders roared with laughter. Howard-Smythe, Whittington, (the corporal) and I just sat and grinned because it wasn’t quite so new to us.
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| We're going to lace that real tight, gentlemen. |
“I can’t wait till Biggsy pisses me off again.” Murmured Powell, his squadron leader, from across the ten-foot long desk whipped up from saw horses and plywood. “Can I use this retroactively?”
The table was strongly braced with some light framing, to keep it from sagging under maps and coffee cups. I couldn’t help but laugh again.
“That’s the spirit.” I murmured genially, continuing the discussion by nodding at Howard-Smythe, who had something to say.
“It keeps Whitehall off of our backs, though I shudder to think of what happens if someone gets shot down behind enemy lines.” Chuckled Howard-Smythe, who always followed our conversations with intense concentration.
“Or what I would put in a letter to his mother.” I grinned ruefully. “Shot down while testing a new flying-suit.”
“A fairy suit.” Interjected Andrew. “His bounteous decolletage exposed to the enemy in gallant fashion…”
“All right, all right, that’s enough Andrew.” (Sounds like Biggsy all right, sort of went through my mind.)
“Well, it’s better than just faking the reports.” He admitted. “Of course, squadron leaders are exempt?”
I have the right to remain silent.
He didn’t like that too much, but he shut up promptly. I just sat rubbing my whiskers for a long, drawn-out moment, and then reached for the tobacco tin.
“What are you worried about? You never fuck up, do you, Andrew?”
The corporal, who was all ears, caught the funny little gleam in my eye.
Suddenly the corporal spoke.
“And when future generations look back, never let them forget, that these were all volunteers.”
‘Heh-heh-heh.’ We all chuckled in unison, Andrew somewhat reluctantly.
A notion popped into my head, unbidden.
“Herman Goering wears women’s clothing. We have that from a number of sources,” all of which were, ‘Top Secret,’ and, ‘Mostly Bullshit.’
But I only told the men what they absolutely needed to know, right?
Extremely economical with the truth, that’s the ticket sometimes. And then wildly exaggerate at other times. It gets the job done. A little hemming and hawing. Let them chew on it awhile. Men are very suggestible creatures. That’s why women find us so fascinating.
“The next item on the agenda.” Began Howard-Smythe in his gentle and politic fashion.
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| "Next on the agenda..." |
“I have to go and find us a field, who’s our best gunner?” I asked.
“One of us could go, skipper.” Suggested Powell.
“All right, Powell. You can be my gunner.”
There were more chuckles.
“I don’t think that was exactly what I had in mind.” He complained, but he didn’t have the experience in field selection.
I knew what I wanted, and yet having him along was a good idea. Some day he would have to replace me. It was inevitable that someone would have to replace me…some day.
Probably sooner rather than later.
“Let’s have a look at the map.” I said, and Andrew slid it over the table.
“There’s a little place called Aire, on the Riviere Lys.”
I pointed it out.
Lately I was spending a lot of time poring over maps, in addition to all my other duties.
“There’s a double track, and at least two sidings. One here, and one here. It is, literally, a milk run for the railroad. And this looks like flat ground, but I don’t know if it’s well drained fields, or scrub and trees. We have to look.”
This was a strategic, and very busy rail corridor. The network was extensive, with all kinds of side lines and spurs off to different villages and industrial complexes. It wasn’t hilly, but there were ravines, rivers and creeks, and patches of forest that were marked. It was the unknowns that needed to be settled, like in algebra.
“We’ll leave in the middle of the night. But first I want any prying eyes to get a good look,” I explained some, but not all of my concerns. “Then we’ll pull onto our siding, and unload. We’ll assemble as many as we can in twenty-four hours, then fly a mission. See how it goes from there.”
The enemy had spies everywhere. After we pulled our little disappearing act, they would be forced to look for us all up and down the front. It was just an added fillip, tossed in for effect. Most squadrons took weeks or even months to deploy and achieve combat effectiveness. Enemy spies would be expecting that.
My men would have one day.
“I’ll try to get more of this sorted out before you get back.” Said Howard-Smythe. “Here comes Jaeckl now. Any problems, Sergeant?”
It appeared not, from the head-shake and shrug. ‘The Adj’ had some papers. Bill was just typing them up. I signed something he shoved in front of me, then another.
“Well, I am out of here. What the heck is with this music?” I gasped, as some foreign, rotten noise came in through the gently billowing curtains at the window.
The boys had brought a Victrola along and I hadn’t the heart to deny them permission.
“It’s a sign of the increasing alienation of young people, in an abnormally-isolated, and rather small demographic group, in a sort of depersonalized urban society, where…”
“Never mind.” I barked at the corporal. “Where’s my fuckin’ coat? Come on, Powell, come on.”
We headed for the door.
There was a soccer game in progress. Men lounged about both inside and out. We stepped over men sleeping in the doorway at the top of the short steps that led from the rail carriage to the ground.
“The real problem in my mind, is the fuel supply.” I told Powell. “We have to feed the aircraft, our motor transport, whenever it gets here, and the train, and the men…”
“I know, its complex. But I think it’s worthwhile.” Said Powell. “We’re breaking new ground.”
“I would prefer not to.”
An old joke, but I don’t think he’d ever heard it before. He chuckled.
The music blared up again for a moment as someone changed recordings.
“…she wasn’t much to wrestle, but you should have seen her box…” and the men around the machine laughed uproariously.
I have to admit to a grin myself.
“Holy, cow.” Said Powell. “I never heard a record like that before. What, is the whole world going crazy?”
“Yeah, that’s funny, Powell. Is the whole fuckin’ world going crazy?”
Dumb question, Powell. Of course the world is going crazy.
“Look around you, man.”
He had nothing to say.
“Get with the program, Powell.” I grinned, a tad unkindly.
It must have taken us half an hour to pick our way over the busy marshalling yard.
Every time we came to the end of a train, we were confronted by another. Then we had to decide whether to go right or left. Every train in the yard was a long one. Once, a train was going east, so we went west, hoping to see the caboose or brakemen’s car. The damned train stopped and began backing up.
“Fuck.” Said Powell.
I couldn’t help but agree, and it was high time he learned some new words, perhaps from someone other than me.
The ugly danger of getting a foot stuck in a switch, and being run over by a moving train, was an added headache. This helped me to decide to let Powell fly. It had the added bonus of providing an opportunity to watch him work. I had asked for the best gunner, after all—
I hadn’t even flown with him yet. We finally found the control tower for the vast operation, and commandeered a vehicle from the pool of military vehicles standing out front. When time is short, everything seems to take forever. Powell was feeling it too.
“It’s a good thing the chaps have a ball to boot around.” He began.
The car stood waiting for a chuffing yard engine to rattle past us in a cloud of smoke and steam.
His voice rode up with the noise level. “We have to find our way in this.”
The chauffeur was unperturbed, a man of patience who knew his way around. It was a sprawling complex of warehouses, machine shops, assembly areas, repair areas, scrap and storage areas, barracks, officer’s quarters, and finally the aerodrome. Turns out we could have walked three-quarters of a mile straight across the fields and found it ourselves.
“How come there’s not too many aircraft flying about?” Powell asked.
“Yesterday five squadrons came through here.” The driver told us. “Today, almost nothing.”
We talked him into driving out amongst the solid-looking wooden hangar structures.
“There. That one’s ours.” Said Powell, pointing over the driver’s shoulder.
We swung and burbled to a stop.
“Thanks for the ride.” I told the man, and handed him a fiver. “Go get yourself a beer. That’s a direct order, soldier. I’m on an expense account.”
The army general who owned this machine was going to have to wait a while.
Powell grinned as he began to put on his flight suit, from the duffle bags we both carried. We pulled it all out. This particular Biff was a good plane. One of Bishop’s students was kind enough to fly it over before joining a squadron.
The fact that this gave him an extra day or two in Paris with his girlfriend had nothing to do with it, I can assure the reader. Better than sitting on a train, right? And the Channel crossing could be rough on the stomach. Better to avoid sea-sickness. Once you’ve had it, you’ll understand. I gave it a thorough pre-flight nevertheless. You can never be too careful, and planes do wear out or require maintenance.
“Can you land an aircraft in that field?” I called.
“Do you mean the one beside the train?” He asked, and I nodded. “Well. There’s only one way to find out.”
“All right, let’s go find us an aerodrome.” I said when he was ready.
Then I swung the prop for him and clambered aboard. I levered the safety to ‘off,’ and ejected a cartridge from the machine gun. Theoretically the thing was ready to go, but it’s difficult to trust some stranger, far, far away. It was tempting to fire a few rounds into the nearest tree trunk, but the urge was restrained. Safety back on for the moment. Where’s the strap? It may be necessary to rotate in the gunner’s or observer’s role, and these straps were different than the pilot’s. Familiarity breeds contempt, and I wanted to make sure everything was just right. I hadn’t flown as a back-seater for quite a while.
We taxied out into the morning sunshine. Soon we were swaying and bumping over the grass, and then we settled into flight. There were fresh magazines on angled pegs, and there was a date written on the tops of the drums in pencil. Re-loaded yesterday morning. Somebody had a brain in his head. It’s rare thing, too. ‘February 22, 1918,’ so it says.
Powell flew at about five hundred feet.
Then he side-slipped and fired a short burst into an adjacent stream. He was using his head. German raiders could conceivably make it this far, on some strategic bombing attempt, or on a deep reconnaissance. The best place on the map was only about twelve miles from the front lines.
We flew on, pushed by the mid-morning breeze. As usual, it was picking up in force, coming in from the North Sea. Powell followed the tracks, then they broke away from the river bank. Shortly, we began to pick up the little side-spurs that interested us. Due to the close cockpits of that aircraft, it was easy to direct him to a couple of options. After Powell looked them over from about a thousand feet, he finally picked one he liked better and brought us down. He did a picture-perfect touchdown, a nice three-pointer.
“Well, what do you think?” He bellowed over the idling engine.
“It will have to do for the time being,” I yelled back. “Let’s get back to the train.”
If we sat too long, we would overheat.
The engine roared. We were soon winging our way back to St. Omer, as I scanned the sky behind and around out of habit.
Old habits die hard, but then so do I.
Like how I sat down in the seat properly, and tightened up the straps, and put my hands up on the coaming, just like I always did as a gunner-observer. Because when Powell brought her into the field, he tipped her over on the nose. No big thing, really, it happened all the time. He was a little spoiled by the hard, rocky field we had at home, with its clay smears and all. At least it wasn’t too soft. This little field was all wet and bumpy.
It was just the long grass, and the spongy turf, the result of a recent rainy spell.
The prop hit and bottomed out, and we went up and over. It was all I could do not to bang my face on the front of the cockpit. We dropped back down again ‘on all three.’
Figures came running pell-mell across the field which doubled as a soccer pitch. The first few men came slithering up to a stop. They saw us sitting there with dumb looks on our faces. Then the whole damned crew was laughing.
“Welcome to France, Powell.” I muttered as we got out.
“Thanks.” He grumped, as the NCO’s put the men to recovering our mount from the middle of the pasture.
“It’s not your fault, Powell. I suppose should have warned you.” I told him affably.
And that’s just the thing, isn’t it? I have total responsibility. Total responsibility for Powell, and all the other men. As if I didn’t have enough to think about, the little mishap was a reminder of what could happen at any time. With the unfamiliar approach, being in the back seat, and the excitement of the nose-over, I never even noticed a train parked right beside ours.
“Jesus H. Christ.” Groaned Powell in dismay. “Did all them fucking Brass Hats see that landing?”
“We’ll find out in a minute.” I noted, perhaps with a little more assurance than was actually the case.
END
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