Baa Baa Black Sheep (3 page)

The pilots had been having quite a ball in San Francisco, telling anyone interested in listening that they were missionaries. And we were equally loquacious in telling our new shipmates, approximately sixty people we had never seen before. During our first conversations these lovely people listened attentively, refraining from talking about themselves.

At my table were two men and a woman doctor. But what I did not know, not until after I finished shooting my mouth off, was that the other three members of my table were honest-to-goodness missionaries. And furthermore, there were fifty-five of them aboard—men and women. How phony I felt. My orders on what to say, my passport, couldn’t possibly cover my feeling of embarrassment. If only I had let them talk first!

Sixteen hundred, the
Bosch Fontein
was ready to pull out. The recruiting captain, immaculate in a fresh uniform, presented Smith with a packet of sealed orders. He shook hands with us, placing an arm around each, telling us how badly he wanted to go overseas with us.

The
Bosch Fontein
was fast for a combination freighter-passenger. She was doing about sixteen knots. As we stood on deck, looking up and back at the Golden Gate Bridge, we knew that we were finally on our way. By 1730 we had progressed beyond the three-mile limit, so the ship’s cocktail
lounge was opened. Our twenty-seven gathered together in the ship’s lounge, which was to become our headquarters. Here we were occupied comparing notes upon our newly found traveling companions.

We were trying to figure out how a clergyman gag would stick with a gang of long-hairs, like we thought these people were. What would we tell them? Or should we merely clamp up and be the strong, silent type?

There happened to be three strangers in the bar. One I judged immediately to be a pilot because his eyes had crow’s-feet clear back to his ears. And his blue eyes—too blue to be described—peered out under half-closed lids.

I had noticed this same man all day out of the corner of my eye before the ship sailed. He had been always walking by, as if trying to listen in on our conversation. A German spy maybe, because I darn sure didn’t know German from Dutch. And over to our table he came, saying: “Mind if I join you? I’m Bob Heising.”

“What is the dope, boys?” he asked. “Where are you going? What kind of a deal have they got you on?”

“There isn’t any deal,” we tried to answer. “We are members of the clergy. Just what it says on our passports.”

“Oh, hold on a minute,” he laughed. “Let me in on the dope. I know pilots when I see them. I myself am going over to fly for KLM Airlines in Java.”

“No, no, we are not pilots,” we repeated, remembering our orders.

“Oh, now, come on, give me the dope.” He laughed again. “I have drunk myself out of enough jobs around the world to give you all a job.”

“But, no, we are not pilots,” we tried to say again.

But again Heising laughed: “When I see an Army Air Corps officer with LaFayette Escadrille wings on the bottom of his jacket, and practically kissing you all good-by at San Francisco, you can’t tell me you are a bunch of clergymen.”

What the hell was the use, trying to kid a guy like Heising and being ridiculous? The answer: we didn’t. The idea that if you can’t lick them then join them came in handy.

Bob Heising filled us with tall tales from practically all over the world. He told us about nearly getting killed one time in Mexico City when he and a couple other Americans went to see a bullfight, the reason being that they had
persisted in shouting:
“Viva el toro”
all through the performance.

Bob enlightened me on the fact that the pay we were getting was inadequate. The Dutch were paying pilots two thousand dollars per month. In defense I threw back: “How about the bonus of five hundred per shoot-down?”

“Man, have you got rocks in your head for brains?” he inquired. “Or did you spend too long in the ring?” He obviously noticed the scar tissue above my eyes. Bob definitely started me thinking when he told me a different side of the equipment we were going up against. He said: “All Japs don’t wear thick glasses, if any glasses at all. Hell, they wear clear goggles, the same as you do, dope.” Right then I commenced dividing my financial future by denominators of varying size.

At this time German submarines were knocking off shipping, but the
Bosch Fontein
’s crew was thoroughly trained in evasive maneuvers. Our pilots, too, stood watches in the crow’s-nest to help make the situation safer if possible. The voyage had its scares. Several times we spotted smoke on the horizon. One time I thought the
Bosch Fontein
was going completely over because her skipper turned the ship so sharply.

From sundown to sunrise all ports were closed. No lighting of matches on deck was permitted. All garbage was saved until sunset, then tossed overboard, so that the ship would be a whole night’s run away from any submarine spotting the debris the following morning.

Of course it took very little time before these genuine missionaries realized that we were traveling under false colors and weren’t missionaries at all. But the manner by which they let us know that they knew was done rather cleverly—not in the Heising manner.

One day one of the real missionaries came up and asked if I would give the sermon for next Sunday’s services, explaining that the duty was rotated. I had to decline the invitation to lead the services. But I wish now that I had gone ahead and given it anyway, because then—today—I could say: “Well, I’ve done everything now.”

As it was, the same missionary invited me to the next Sunday service aboard ship. He was one of the younger missionaries, and he himself gave the sermon. But as he did so (I was seated in one of the first rows) he seemed to direct
the entire sermon at me and at the group I represented. His point was how horrible it was for people to fight for money.

This sermon did leave an impression on my soul, lasting for a couple of hours, at least. Then I went back into the old routine of boredom and practical jokes with the other pilots: Three weeks at sea with ex-Captain Smith’s unnecessary regimentation, as I recall, had commenced getting on others’ nerves as well as my own, and one evening a couple of the pilots were putting up a mock fight in the dimly lighted ship’s corridor next to the bar. The fight sounded authentic enough. But I knew that it was a sham when Dick Rossi ran into the bar, pleading for help. Dick winked at me when I offered assistance, so I nodded, and then deliberately lagged behind. Smith officiously stomped from the well-lighted bar and into the corridor where the action was taking place. He held the two ruffians apart by the scruffs of their necks. A third party, unknown to me, planted a well-timed right on Smith’s eye.

Poor Smith would have held a general court-martial right then and there, and said so, if there had been sufficient military-court experience among us. But unfortunately none of us had ever sat on a court-martial of any type. And again, the dear captain couldn’t possibly try twenty-six pilots. No one seemed to know who had committed the dastardly act.

Four weeks out the tension mounted still higher, as we were unescorted and zigzagging all over the Pacific Ocean, it seemed. The pilots had begun to snarl at each other in earnest. A few had lost too much in card games. As for the others, I never knew what went on in their heads.

One day when I was in the ship’s doctor’s office having a bothersome wart removed from my elbow, two pilots brought in the bloody and unconscious form of Bob Prescott. The doctor was in the middle of his cutting on my elbow when Bob came to and realized where he was. Bob reeled and started out of the door, saying: “Just hold everything, Doc.”

“Vait vun minute. I fix you next,” the Dutch doctor called to Bob.

But Bob left, saying: “Just wait here, Doc. I’m going out and bring you another customer.”

At that particular moment I didn’t know what he meant by that, but I didn’t have to wait long. The doctor had just completed my simple operation and was bandaging my elbow when Prescott came back, being steadied by the same two
pilots. Upon inquiring I was informed that Bob’s intended customer was six-foot-two-inch, two-hundred-twenty-pound Gunverdal, who wouldn’t have harmed a fly unless in self-defense.

And I can never forget stopping by one of the poker games Gunverdal was seated in. He was apparently losing a large sum of money, and was laughing so hard that tears were running down his cheeks. Observing all this, I asked: “Gunny, if you’re so far behind, how come you’re laughing?”

Gunverdal, amid bursts of convulsive laughter, said: “I’m not laughing, believe me, fellows. I’m crying.”

What a long time without sighting land! The first visible land in about a month came one morning when I awakened to discover islands passing alongside. We were heading west in the Java Sea, north of the Sunda Isle. It was a tremendous relief to see land, even small patches of it.

About a month out of Honolulu, where we had stayed only long enough to take aboard water, the
Bosch Fontein
had put into Soerabaja, Java, then into Batavia, then back to Soerabaja again, then finally to Singapore.

It was not that we were completely disinterested in the sight of Soerabaja. Nor were we completely disinterested in the sights of Bali, which some of us got to visit while our vessel was laid up at Soerabaja. But I got a litte sick at one of the sights I saw on Bali. Maybe it was sort of religious ceremony of some kind, or maybe it wasn’t. But a beautiful Balinese girl was being held down on the ground while a priest was filing off her teeth. And even now, today, I can still hear the sound of that file. I had to hurry away. The rest of the scenery, though, I highly approved of. No brassieres and so forth.

At Soerabaja I said good-by to Bob Heising, never to see him again. But I did hear about him. Three years ago I read in the newspapers that he had flown into the top of Mount Fugi in Japan.

It would appear—though I don’t really know—that fate had turned off the switch on a great guy for the last time.

Leaving Java for good brought no regrets, brought little feeling for that matter, as I was anxious to be on my way. My feelings seemed to parallel my life of travel. I was forever going somewhere but never getting anywhere. For the most part I was always leaving some geographical location just prior to my being asked to leave. By uncanny foresight throughout my life I have been able to sense these critical departure points. Anyhow, I spent a lifetime priding myself that I had never been fired.

Our course held us in almost constant contact with the northern coast of Sumatra, winding in and out of the smaller islands off its coast. For hours we appeared to be barely moving, as we wound our way into Singapore’s harbor, which gave the impression of great security. It was surrounded in its entirety by high landscape. Then I realized what the British meant by saying that Singapore was impregnable. Of course they were speaking about bygone history and meant that this stronghold was completely safe from invasion by sea. They were under the supposition that this was the only manner in which an enemy would attempt to attack Singapore.

But after leaving Soerabaja and reaching Singapore, where we were to remain three days and three nights, we found ourselves sitting in Raffles Hotel. Here one of our flyers happened to recognize a distinguished-looking elderly man, sitting at one of the tables. Dick Rossi, the flyer—thank God for guys like him—was always arranging things of genuine interest for us to do. Dick had also planned that little sojourn to Bali. And to this day I’m positive that many of our yearly get-togethers would have been just good ideas if Dick Rossi hadn’t taken time to plan these and write each one of us a personal reminder.

Anyway, Dick went over and introduced himself to this
elderly gentleman, then returned saying that this man was the Sultan of Johore—the most powerful of all the Malay States sultans. When we inquired of Rossi what the Sultan was showing him in a leather case, he informed us that he was carrying bourbon in it. Actually it gave the outward appearance of a large pair of binoculars.

I was to learn a lot more about him during the subsequent days, of course. I was to learn how the British Government paid him tremendous sums a year just to keep his good will, although the Sultan was very wealthy in his own right.

For some reason he must have had a liking for us or been bored by his own surroundings, because he sent us a note written half in Malay and half in some other language. It was his own manner of writing code, we were to learn later, and the only people who could understand the writing were the officers of his guard at the border station of his realm. And the note turned out to be an invitation for all of us flyers to visit his palace, the codelike note itself being a permit to pass his gates.

The palace was on the other side of Singapore, across and beyond the famous causeway the Japanese later were to storm to get into Singapore.

On reaching the palace grounds and showing our strange permit we were escorted through the Sultan’s old castle. We were not invited into the new castle because his family resided there, and one had to be a Mohammedan to get into this new one.

But the old one was beautiful enough, containing showcase after showcase of solid-gold statues. Some of them were almost waist high and so heavy I doubted that one man could have tipped them over.

The banquet hall was so large it could seat four hundred people, and the service sets were of solid gold and sterling silver. It took little imagination to place visions of bygone nobility in their colorful costumes seated, bowing, or strolling elegantly about this palace.

The Sultan had his own private golf course, and some Englishman (I can’t recall his name) was managing it; he kept it as groomed as any golf course in the world. It was too hot for us to play, however. Besides, not expecting this, those of us who had golf sticks had left them stowed aboard ship. So
instead we were entertained in the bar of his clubhouse, a truly up-to-date affair, a thoroughly modern building, especially for that end of the world.