***
Maggie spent several minutes in the bathroom, splashing her burning cheeks with cold water and re-pinning her hair, praying to God to ease the leaden feeling in her chest and guide her actions and thoughts.
Ready at last, she retrieved a wheelchair from its nook by the nurse’s station and, smiling brightly, entered Rob’s room. “Are you ready for your outing? The overcast is lifting.”
He bit his lower lip.
“Is your headache no better? Is your back hurting?”
“The headache’s gone and my back’s the same.”
“Something’s wrong.”
“I’d like to start the morning all over again. Can we?”
Her shoulders relaxed. “We can try.”
“Will you come and sit here on the bed?”
She hesitated.
“Please. I haven’t told anyone else. It’s something I just discovered.”
He was actually speaking in sentences. She sat on the bed beside him. “Well?”
“I have something to show you.”
“Show me? I thought you had something to tell me.”
“Both. Pull the sheet down, please.”
Her curiosity piqued, she drew the sheet off of his legs.
“Watch.” He clenched his tongue between his lips and closed his eyes. The toes of both feet moved.
She leaped up. “Och, how can you call that a wee thing? You can move your toes! That’s wonderful. Do it again.”
“Wait a minute, I have to concentrate.” A moment later, his toes moved again and those delightful dimples danced beside his lips with the breadth of his smile. “Well? Surprised?”
“Of course I’m surprised. More than surprised. I’m so happy, I could dance.”
He patted the side of the bed. “Now, I’ve something to say.”
She fought an internal battle for control, forcing a smile when she sat beside him. “Whatever can you say to top that?”
He reached for her hand. “I never could have done it without you, Maggie. I—”
“Och, no—”
“Don’t interrupt. I need to say this.” He brought his other hand over hers. “I was out of line the other day. I had no right to ... to ...”
“Kiss me?”
“To kiss you. Not that I didn’t want to,” he added quickly. “I did, more than you’ll ever know.”
“And?”
“And I never stopped to think about ... about ... Oh, Maggie, I wouldn’t hurt you for anything in the world.”
He clasped her hand so tightly, she squirmed.
“Sorry.” He measured her palm against his. “Look at that. I can close my fingers completely over yours, that’s how much smaller your hands are.”
“But you have verra, verra large hands.”
“And they can cover yours.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“I don’t know, exactly.” He sighed. “I guess I’m trying to apologize for how I’ve been acting. I’m just not good at conversation. Like I’m lacking in something important, that I don’t know how to relate to people.”
“I haven’t seen that in you.”
“You have a kind heart. You wouldn’t.”
“Nonsense. I’ve heard about your famous battles with Wing Command. You seem very capable of defending your men.”
“You mean my infamous battles. Look, I can give concise orders and I can argue like mad for what I believe in, but until I met you, I don’t think I ever spoke a complete sentence to a woman. Put me in a social setting and I’ll end up with my foot in my mouth every time.”
She stifled a laugh. “With the size of your feet, that must be quite an accomplishment.”
“Touché.” He looked at her for a long time, as though memorizing every feature. “Can we start over again, Maggie, please? I’ll try to do better.”
“Only if you promise you’ll do your exercises without complaining.”
“I promise.”
She leaped to her feet. “Then I’ll ring for an orderly. Your first exercise today is a ride in the garden.”
***
Maggie knew Rob regretted his promise many times over the following days. The exercises were grueling and painful, yet he never complained. The movement in his feet and legs improved. In time, he moved his ankles and knees a few centimetres apart without any assistance. He even began eating more.
He also kept his word about trying to learn what he called “chit-chat.” She carried the burden of most conversations, though he teased her when she used too much Scots. When he spoke, it concerned the present, never the past or future. Many of the paralyzed lads she nursed could not face the unknowns this early in their recuperation and naturally avoided the future.
But why not his past? Had he been ignored or never allowed to speak as a bairn? Chilled by the thought, she told him silly stories and sang humorous songs, treasuring the smiles that made his dimples dance
***
A few days before they were to leave for Innisbraw, Rob’s nightmares returned. First, one early-morning dream filled with brief images of his crew’s faces as he announced the target for the day and Rich Florey, his tail gunner, gave him a crooked grin and flashed him a thumbs-up.
He woke feeling restless and uneasy. He had picked up some flak in his back and crashed trying to land on the runway. The question that had been at the back of his mind for weeks finally pushed its way forward. What had happened to his crew?
No one here would know. He could ask Doctor McGrath to find out, but he wanted to hear the answer himself.
Though it upset Maggie, he found it hard to respond to her questions that day. He could only choke down a few bites of food. Even the scone with honey, a treat he looked forward to every night, had no taste.
“Are you in pain, Rob?” Maggie turned off the light and pushed aside the blackout curtains. “You left most of your plate and you didn’t even finish your coffee.”
“No pain,” he said. “Tired, I guess.”
“Are you certain your back’s no’ hurting?”
“I’m fine. Go to bed, Maggie. You’ve been on your feet all day.”
When she reluctantly left his room for the night, he fought to stay awake, so desperate not to doze off, he resorted to pinching his arms and face. He succumbed to the inevitable at 0330.
He was instantly caught up in a horrible, graphic, noisy nightmare. The flak surrounding the Liberty Belle looked thick enough to walk on and his ears rang from the constant staccato of machine-gun fire and the warning shouts of his crew over the interphone as wave after wave of Fw 190s filled the windscreen.
“Florey’s dead, blasted Krauts got him!”
“Pilot to crew, bail out, bail out!”
“Florey’s dead, blasted Krauts got him! Florey’s dead, blasted—”
He woke, fighting the sheets tangled around his shoulders and arms, breath coming in strident gasps. Rich was dead. How could he have forgotten that? His eyes burned with tears that refused to fall. He inhaled deeply and struggled out of his soaked pajama top. If only he could open the window and feel the fresh air on his face.
The pounding of his heart subsided. Had thoughts about never walking again overwhelmed all memories of that last flight, burying them beneath unrelenting layers of fear? Guilt brought a bitter taste to his mouth.
Rich was dead, but there were eight other men still on that plane. Had he waited too long to order a bailout?
He closed his eyes and put his arm over his forehead. Maybe if he could recall the details of that strike he could discover if he had made an error in judgment.
CHAPTER 8
His last flight with the Liberty Belle.
Dark shadows obscured corners as Colonel Savage entered his OP’s office at 0300 and made his way toward the front of the room. “At ease,” he said before pulling the drape back from an easel holding a large map adorned with red ribbons marking the mission route. He took a pointer and tapped a name circled in red. “Today??
?s target is Metz.”
He studied the faces of the nine men settling onto benches in front of him, feeling both pride and deep concern. To a man, his own crew had volunteered for this risky mission. “Before we have the weather, I want to make something perfectly clear. When I asked for volunteers, I didn’t expect my own crew to step forward. This mission is no milk run. We’ll be going in alone, no fighter cover. Now’s the time to slip out of here, no questions asked, absolutely no repercussions.” He smiled grimly. “If I had a choice, I’d beat you to the door.”
He waited for a few chuckles to die out, briefed them on the weather, and handed his bombardier and navigator their flak and route charts, reminding them all to pick up bailout and survival packets before dismissing them. As he watched them file out, he prayed their trust in him to bring them back safely was not misplaced.
Den Anderson intercepted him as he was leaving for the hardstands. “Rob, I want to fly right seat on this strike.”
“Jack Spears is my co-pilot. I’m counting on you to fly lead on that alternate target later this morning.” He clapped the major’s shoulder. “See you as soon as you’re wheels down.”
Den flashed him a thumbs-up. “Good luck, Bucko,” he said as the colonel’s jeep began to move.
The green “go” flare lit up the dark sky at exactly 0400 and Wright cyclone engines roared as the B-17 rumbled down the runway. By 0530 they were cruising at twenty thousand feet on oxygen and deep into German-occupied territory.
Savage scanned the cloudy sky. Looked good so far; no bandits in sight. He pressed his throat mike. “Pilot to navigator. How are we doing, Loomis?”
“On time and on target, sir.”
“Roger that. Listen up, crew. It won’t be long before one of their HS-126 spotter planes picks us up. Let’s hope they think we’re a reconnaissance plane. No unnecessary chatter.”
By 0710, the cloud cover dissipated and they encountered their first enemy aircraft. Savage saw the telltale spots through the windscreen and pressed his throat mike. “Bandits at 3 o’clock high.” Seconds later, the loud clatter of machine gun fire filled the air as enemy planes screamed toward the B-17.
Why were so many fighters coming after a single bomber? Had his decision been faulty? But he had seen the same Intel report General Wells had referred to: only one French Underground uncorroborated report from a single informant. In his judgment, all these fighters could mean one of two things: either the factory was the real thing or they didn’t want their decoy revealed until the entire group was involved.
“Got another one climbing our tail,” Rich Florey shouted over the interphone, his two tail guns firing sustained bursts.
“Coming right at us!” the turret gunner shouted. Savage and Jack Spears instinctively ducked as an F.W.-190, the yellow circles painted around its engines glaring in the rising sun, streaked by within a few feet of the cockpit canopy before taking a direct hit from the turret gunner and exploding behind them.
“Pilot to turret,” Savage radioed. “Good going, Gil, but next time, don’t wait ’til you can see the whites of his eyes.” He ignored the excited chatter in his ears and pressed his throat mike again. “Pilot to navigator. How long to the initial point?”
“Three minutes to IP, sir.”
He tapped his co-pilot’s knee. “Time to take her down, Jack.”
They continued to fight off the bandits until they leveled off at nine thousand feet and went off oxygen. As the first black puffs of anti-aircraft fire erupted around them, the German Fw 190s suddenly peeled off and disappeared, apparently unwilling to chance being shot down by their own ground-fire.
Chalk up a big one in favor of the target’s being a decoy. If that factory was the real thing, the Jerries might sacrifice a few fighters to keep the bombs from falling.
Spears did a crew check. They all answered but Florey, the tail gunner.
Savage pressed his throat mike. “Rich, you okay back there?”
No answer.
He sent the flight engineer to check on Florey, stomach cramping. Oh, Lord, don’t let him be hit.
The flak intensified and each close blast rocked the plane, sending pieces of shrapnel hurtling through the thin aluminum fuselage.
“Pilot to bombardier. Coming off the IP. Can you see our target?”
“Sure can, sir.”
“Let me know when you’ve got your PDI centered.”
In less than a minute, the bombardier radioed, “PDI centered, Colonel.”
He made a small course correction until the needle on his own PDI was centered before lifting his hands from the yoke. “It’s your airplane, Brian.”
Seconds later the bombardier shouted, “Bombs away!” and the plane bucked higher into the air with the release of six thousand pounds of weight.
Savage took the yoke again and radioed the bombardier. “How’d it look?”
“Right down the smokestack, sir!”
Grinning, Savage let out a deep breath. “Good work.” He turned to his co-pilot and pulled back on the yoke, adjusting his air-speed to compensate for the reduction in power. “Okay, let’s get back upstairs and make a niner zero degree turn to the right, Jack. Let’s go ho—”
A violent blast swallowed his words. Something slammed into his back and the breath left his lungs. Captain Spears fought the controls as Savage gulped in air. “Damage report,” he gasped.
A moment later the flight engineer reported in. “Wings and fuselage took a lot of hits from those fighters. Got a six-inch hole in the right side next to the waist gunner’s station and Florey’s dead. Blasted Krauts got him.”
Another burst of flak shook the plane, then another. The two left engines trailed flames.
Savage fought the yoke. “Set the fire extinguisher valve and stand by to pull charge.” He’d been hit, but how badly? Strangely, he felt little pain in his back. The engines still trailed smoke. “Pull both charges, then feather.” The pain he felt over losing his tail-gunner was another matter; Rich Florey had been like the younger brother he never had.
The co-pilot feathered both left engines. “Engines off. You all right, Colonel?”
“Just some cramps in my thighs. Handle the rudders for me while I work them out.”
The flak gradually dissipated.
Savage looked at the falling altimeter. “Let’s see if we can goose a little more out of those right engines.”
The next two hours passed in a blur. Flying on only two engines, and both on the same side, made the flight extremely difficult. Both he and the co-pilot fought to keep the aircraft steady and on course.
The constant bone-rattling vibration took its toll. Savage’s strength waned and it became harder and harder to keep his eyes open and focused on the instruments.
When they were over the English Channel, he pressed his throat mike. “Sparks, radio Ground Control we’re coming in on two engines.”
“Yes, sir.”
Spears tapped his arm. “Better make that one engine,” he said, indicating the oil pressure gauges. “Our outboard must have sprung an oil leak. Pressure’s diving.”
“Tell the crew to chute up,” Savage ordered. He stared at the gauge. The image blurred and he blinked his eyes. If he had to order a bailout, he could never survive a jump when he couldn’t move his legs. The engine sputtered five minutes after they cleared the top of the chalky Cliffs of Dover.
Though the co-pilot feathered the engine, they lost more altitude. They were getting too low—it was now or never.
He toggled the bailout button and the buzzer rang one long ring throughout the airplane. “Pilot to crew, bail out, bail out!” He looked at his co-pilot. “You, too, before we’re too low.”
“But the rudders …”
“I’ll take them now.”
Spears unbuckled his harness. “Let me stay and help get her down.”
“Get out now, Jack!” Savage thundered.
The captain left his seat as the airplane began to yaw.
; Without the use of his feet on the rudders, Savage couldn’t keep the B-17 stable with only one functioning engine. He thumbed on the autopilot and prayed the last engine would hold out for another few minutes without throwing the plane into a cartwheel.
He switched on his overhead mike. “Army one-six-eight to niner-four-seven Control, do you read me? Approximately two miles due east on the neck. Coming in on one engine. May be a little short.”
“Roger, Army one-six-eight. We read you five by five. You are cleared for straight-in emergency landing on runway two-one-oh. Good luck, sir.”
He stared at the altimeter. Down to one thousand feet and sinking fast. If he could only hold on long enough to reach the field. He shook his head again to clear his vision. The pain in his back was almost gone and a strange euphoria came over him. He peered through the pitted, milky windscreen.
There, straight ahead: Edenoaks.
He thumbed off the autopilot and gripped the yoke tightly.
Three hundred feet.
Too low.
Two hundred feet.
He had a fleeting image of the Scottish leftenant, her blue eyes raised shyly to his and he was sorry he had never had the opportunity to see her black hair spilling down her back.
One hundred feet.
Fifty.
Twenty.
He could see the runway ahead. If he could just make it over that security fence. He hit the switch to kill the engine.
He’d lost the elevation to clear it.
“Lord, help me!” He brought his arm across his face and braced himself.
CHAPTER 9
Exhausted, Rob lay quietly for a long time, his breathing ragged. Reliving that last flight convinced him there was nothing he could have done to alter the ultimate outcome.
Had he ordered the bailout soon enough? He could have called it over the Channel, but that would have put his men in the drink, always a dangerous alternative. And as for himself, it was just his time. He could have been killed, like ... like Rich. In so many ways, that would have been easier. If what he had believed since childhood was true, it was Earth one second and Heaven the next.
The thought of spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair was unbearable. Did that make him a coward?
Probably.
***
Maggie served him his dinner of tattie brie.
He took only a few spoonfuls before pushing the tray away.