The High Calling (20 page)

Once he caught a reflected glimpse of himself in his windscreen and thought,
You’re looking pretty grim, old boy.

The green fields and the roads now were far beneath as Parker scanned the sky ahead for the first sight of the enemy. He got a new vector on the radiotelephone and then swung the group around to get the sun behind him. Suddenly he heard Brodie’s voice saying, “Hey, Skipper, there they are.”

“Report properly, Blue Three.”

“Oh . . . Blue Three reports enemy ahead, Red Leader.”

Instantly Parker found the dots coming across the Channel. Brodie had better eyes than any other man in the squadron.

The sun caught the Germans as they came in, and finally he could see the bright yellow noses of the Messerschmitt fighters sandwiching the bombers. The sky seemed full of them, packed in layers thousands of feet deep.

Leaning over, Parker switched on the reflector gun sight,
flicked the catch on the gun button from Safety to Fire, and then lowered his seat until the circle and dot on the reflector light shone dark red.

“Here we go. Pick your targets.” He swung the squadron around in a great circle to attack into the thick of the German planes. He put his thumb on the gun button, and the engine screamed as he went down in a steeply banked dive onto the tail of a forward line of Heinkels. It all happened very quickly then—in a matter of seconds. He touched the button, and the Spit shook as he fired three short bursts. He missed the Heinkel with the first two, but the third struck one of the engines, which immediately burst into black smoke.

Not good enough!
He leveled his plane and fired another burst at the Heinkel. He thought he had hit right into the pilot’s face, but he had no chance to analyze it. The air was suddenly filled with swarming fighters, and he was relieved to see that two squadrons of Hurricanes had joined the fray. He was much happier to have thirty-six planes on his side than the twelve they had started with.

He lost all awareness of time as he focused his energies on chasing the bombers. He had one in his sight, and when he pressed the firing button, a short burst followed and then nothing.

He pounded his fist on the dashboard in frustration and shouted, “This is Red Leader. Out of ammo!”

“Blue Three,” Brodie reported. “Me too, Boss.”

“Let’s go get some ammo.” Parker turned and was on his way out of the melee when he suddenly felt the Spit shudder and saw bullets riddle his engine canopy.

Got my engine!

But the engine was not completely gone. He fought to keep the plane aloft. Spitfires were a precious commodity, and Parker grimly decided not to bail out. “Come on, we can make it,” he told himself.

The Spit shuddered violently, and Parker desperately hung
on to the stick. His airspeed dropped under one-fifty, but if he could maintain that speed, he could land in one piece.

But suddenly he glanced up in his mirror and saw a Messerschmitt coming up fast. Parker tried to evade it, but the Spit would not answer to the controls. All he could do was wallow all over the sky.

Parker knew what was coming. He reached up and started to slide his canopy back. Before he could bail out, however, he looked over to his right and was shocked to see the German plane keeping pace with him. The pilot had his goggles up on his forehead so that Parker could see his face.

Parker knew there was no hope. He could not imagine why the pilot hadn’t shot him out of the sky. Even as he watched, the German’s white teeth flashed against his tanned face. The man laughed as he drew his gloved forefinger across his throat.

Parker knew his life was over. All the German had to do was pull away and then come back and riddle him. Fear seized him, but that emotion was quickly replaced with grief. He thought of what he would be losing. He thought mostly of his children. Other things that he would never see again flashed before him, but then, even as
he watched the German, an amazing thing happened.

A dark object had come between Parker’s Spit and the ME-109. Parker could not believe that a Spitfire had sandwiched itself between the two. The third plane was slightly lower than Parker’s, so Parker still had a good view of the German pilot’s face. He saw shock sweep across the man’s face, and then Parker saw the canopy of the other Spitfire open.

The next sight was one he would never forget, even if he lived to be a very old man. Brodie Lee raised himself up until his upper body was free of the canopy. He was holding his ivory-handled pistol and taking dead aim. Parker could not hear the shots with his canopy closed, but he saw Brodie’s hand kick up with the recoil—and he saw the shots hit the canopy of the 109. They all appeared to hit their mark, and he watched the German’s face dissolve into a bloody mass before he slumped face over the stick. The 109 nosed over and headed straight for the earth.

Brodie followed the fighter plane down until it crashed, setting off a red blossom as it exploded. He pulled the nose up and found Parker again, settling in just off his wing. Brodie laughed and blew imaginary smoke away from the pistol’s muzzle. “Let’s go home, Boss, and get some more bullets,” he said into his radio.

Parker still could not believe what he had seen. He was overjoyed that he was not going to die, at least at this moment.

The Spitfire was shaking badly, but he was able to get it back to the airfield. “Come down, Blue Three.”

The two Spits landed, and three mechanics ran over to greet the pilots. Parker gave instructions concerning his plane and then came over to meet Brodie.

“Can we get back in time, Skipper?”

“No. It’ll be over. Those 109s only carry enough fuel for a four-hour flight.” He put out his hand and gripped Brodie’s warmly. “You were a welcome sight up there, Brodie.”

“Glad to be there.”

“It’s your third kill.” He suddenly laughed. “I’m going to have a hard time getting headquarters to believe that you shot down an ME-109 with a pearl-handled pistol.”

“It ain’t pearl-handled. It’s ivory.”

“All right. Ivory, then. I was a dead man until you showed up.”

“I hope the rest of the boys are all right.” He looked up at the sky and was quiet for a moment. “I think I saw Neville Sutton go down. I hope he made it.”

“Me too. He’s a married man.”

Parker had not seen a parachute and neither had Brodie. Parker was dreading the letter he would have to write. “The worst is coming, Brodie. A lot of us won’t be here when this is over.” He shook his head. “Just be glad you’re not married.”

****

Parker found Raymond Bailey in much better condition than he had been after being shot down back in June. As he entered the man’s hospital room, he saw Diane Weber, the pilot’s fiancée, sitting with him.

“It’s so nice of you to come, sir,” she greeted.

“I’ve got to keep up with my best flier.”

“How was it today, Skipper?”

“I’ve had better days.” He laughed suddenly and said, “I saw something I never thought I’d see.”

“What was that?” Raymond asked.

Parker told him how Brodie had squeezed his plane between Parker’s and the German’s and shot the pilot with his ivory-handled pistol. Raymond, of course, found the whole thing hard to believe.

“Fortunately there was a witness. Archie Kent-Wilkins was on his way to help, and he saw the whole thing. I was afraid we’d both be thrown out of the air force with a story like that.”

The three made small talk for a while, and it appeared that Raymond was making good progress. Much to everyone’s relief, the doctors had been able to save his legs, and he was well on his way to recovery.

“Kat Winslow has been by several times,” Diane mentioned. “It made me jealous, it did.”

Parker knew what visits from a friendly face meant at times like this. He was glad that Katherine had stopped in to see Raymond. Parker visited for a few more moments and then went off in search of Kat. When he found her, she was filling in her replacement, Meredith, for the next shift.

The two greeted him warmly, and he told them about Brodie’s feat. “I’m putting him up for a decoration. He’s probably the only man to shoot down an enemy plane with a pistol since the Great War!”

“He’ll be impossible now,” Meredith said. “No, he was
already impossible. His head will be as big as that plane he flies.”

“I’m proud of him,” Kat said with a warm smile.

“So am I,” Parker said. “If he hadn’t showed up, I wouldn’t be here.”

Kat felt a sudden chill of fear and said quickly, “Would you like to walk me home?”

“Be glad to.”

The two left the hospital and as they walked, Parker said, “I haven’t had a chance to thank you for what you did for the children. From what my mother tells me, they had the best birthday party imaginable. They loved the stories you told them. They insist you just made them up.”

“I did make up some of them. Your children are delightful, and it’s fun to see their eyes light up when you do something so simple for them.”

“Well, it was wonderful of you to do that.”

They had almost reached the door of the apartment building when Kat said, “I got a letter from my folks with a few snapshots. Would you like to see them?”

“I’d love to.”

The two went up to the apartment and sat together on the couch. Relaxing and looking at the pictures was a welcome relief after the pressure of the day. He could still not believe how close to death he had come.

He turned his attention to the photographs. “The triplets have grown so much. Look how big they are.”

“They’re going to be big like their mother, I think.”

As they looked at the rest of the photographs, Kat gave him some details about what everyone was up to at home, but his mind was elsewhere. Finally he thanked her rather absently and then got up. He said good night and started to open the door.

“What’s wrong, Parker?”

“It’s . . .” He could not finish, and to Kat’s surprise she saw tears gather in his eyes. “What is it?” she whispered.

“We lost a good man on the scramble today. Neville Sutton.” The grief that he usually managed to conceal was suddenly impossible to hide. “He’s been married only a few weeks, and now he’s gone.”

She put her arms around him and whispered, “I’m so sorry, Parker. So very sorry!” She saw that grief had reached down into the very depths of this tall man. She also knew instinctively that he would never have revealed himself to anyone else.

There was a strength in Parker Braden she had rarely, if ever, seen in a man. But now that strength seemed to be gone. The grief over the young man he had obviously loved had robbed him of it. She was looking up at him, her lips broad and maternal, her warm eyes full of compassion, and she whispered again, “I’m so very sorry.”

He leaned forward and, without meaning to, kissed her on the lips. He had not intended to do any such thing, and his sense of loss was suddenly joined by memories of long ago when he had held her and kissed her. He was also faintly aware that she was responding to his kiss.

Suddenly Kat put her hands on his chest and stepped back. She knew she had stepped over a forbidden line. “Good night, Parker.”

“I’m . . . I’m sorry, Katherine. I didn’t mean—”

“It’s all right. We’re all vulnerable at times, and you had a shock today. We’ll talk later. Good night.”

He turned and left without another word. Kat stood motionless, shaken by what had happened. She realized she still had strong feelings for this man. This only made her miserable, for she knew they could never pursue a relationship.

“It will never happen again,” she whispered fiercely. “Not ever!” Blindly she turned, knowing there would be little sleep for her this night. She thought she had buried the memories of her time with Parker three years earlier. But now they came back strong and vigorous. She knew there would be no hiding from them, but she also knew she had to build a barrier
against her feelings for this man she had found again—and now must lose a second time.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Cowboy Breaks the Rules

Steel cots had been placed around the walls of the ready room, and most of the pilots spent considerable time in them. Their sleeping quarters were farther away from the field, which meant either walking or catching a ride on a truck, and too often they no sooner were in their own bed than the radio began squawking for a scramble. The remaining furniture of the ready room consisted of an odd assortment of chairs ranging from overstuffed leather easy chairs to cheaply made straight-back kitchen chairs, all the worse for wear.

The walls were lined with pictures that matched the tastes of the pilots. Many of them were pinups of scantily dressed women peering coyly over their shoulders, but some airmen with classic tastes had also put up prints of
The Blue Boy
by Gainsborough and Whistler’s painting of his mother. These seemed rather incongruous, and the ears of both the boy dressed in blue and the gray-haired mother must have burned at the sizzling language that went on in the ready room.

The longer walls of the rectangular room contained three windows each, which admitted the mid-July sunlight. The light was filtered by smoke from cigars, cigarettes, and pipes, and there was a distinct odor of raw alcohol in the air as well. Drinking was not expressly forbidden as long as the pilots could control their appetites. Each flight leader was supposed to monitor the habits of the two other pilots of his flight. A radio propped on a shelf was blaring forth the
voice of Ray Noble woefully crooning “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.”