Читать книгу In the Way of the Reich - Paula Astridge - Страница 10

CHAPTER FOUR

Udet could vouch for that, because he’d had to hunt for that courage of his when he found out that he was a coward. Not long, in fact, after he arrived at Habsheim to take up his Fighter Pilot career.

The incident occurred on his third mission; a mission that had been simple enough, but disappointing to the extent that there were no enemy encounters. In a fool’s paradise, he had been flying home alone with a darkening blue sky above and a carpet of white clouds below. The surreal peace and beauty of the moment had him take time out to note that clouds did not actually have a silver lining, but one of gold, their soft edges reflecting the mellow afterglow of day.

He looked to the west to see the source of that beauty and had to shield his eyes from the glare, squinting suddenly to focus on the small black dot he saw on the western horizon. Two seconds more and he recognised it as an Allied Caudron coming straight at him.

The aircraft was closing in fast and was soon near enough for him to identify its wide wing span, dual motors and gondola hanging narrow between its wings like a bird of prey. There was no question in his mind that it was on the attack.

‘But this is against all the rules,’ Udet thought.

The Allied pilot, however, was speeding towards him, more intent on breaking those rules than Udet was on upholding them. Quickly, Udet reminded himself of his code of ethics: ‘Caudrons are strictly Observer planes and I am a Fighter. I must not fire.’

And so he didn’t, despite the fact that the Caudron was almost upon him. Close enough for Udet to see the square rim of the pilot’s goggles, behind which were the eyes of a killer — a killer who had just locked his deadly sights on his victim.

‘Hang the rules of war!’ Udet finally told himself. Suddenly, it had become a case of kill or be killed.

But when he grabbed for the bullet release button on his stick, his thumb froze with fear. The blood, suddenly coursing ice-cold through his veins, had paralysed his whole body and rendered his brain defunct. Numb with terror, he just sat and stared as the Caudron flew past, rattling off a machine-gun load of bullets into his plane, one of which ricocheted fair into his face, its impact ripping off his goggles and peppering his eye with a molten-hot volley of glass and metal splinters.

His right hand, which instinctively reached up to protect his face, was dripping red with blood. The raw agony of the wound was intense, but not as intense as the sweat-drenched panic that had him push forward, hard on the stick to nosedive through the clouds. With the instinct of a cornered beast, he fled for his life, making a frantic dash for home and safety.

‘You’re a coward, you’re a coward!’ were the words hammering away in his head when he finally managed to level out both his plane and pounding heart. His renewed clarity of mind making room for the more expedient thought: ‘Thank God nobody else saw this!’

Back safe and sound, but thoroughly ashamed on home ground, he said nothing to the ground crew who came running to see to his welfare. Nor did he open his lips to the medics who painstakingly removed the tiny glass and metal shards which had inserted themselves around the circumference of his right eye.

‘You’ve been lucky, Udet,’ one of them said, as he plucked out the last of the pellets and dropped it, with a clank, to a metal tray. ‘Not one of them actually penetrated your cornea. Half a millimetre to the left and you’d have been blinded for life.’

‘But what use was 20/20 vision,’ Udet asked himself, ‘if he could no longer look another man in the eye?’

It was in this self-deprecating state of mind that he went to his barracks and threw himself down on his bunk. There he tossed and turned all night, unable to sleep in the knowledge that he had failed. It wasn’t until dawn that he woke up to what it really meant to be a soldier: a definition which was to become the source of his success.

‘I failed,’ he admitted, ‘because at the point of combat I thought only of myself and my fear of dying. To be a soldier is to think only of the enemy and victory and to leave oneself entirely out of the equation. The line of demarcation between a hero and a coward is as narrow as the edge of a sword. So every fearful animal instinct must be defeated in favour of honour and duty to the Fatherland.’

It was a revelation that filled him with an overwhelming sense of calm and purpose. The tension that he had bottled up inside drained out as if someone had pulled the plug on his subconscious. With his hands now resting casually in his pockets, he looked out the window at his fellow pilots as they assembled on the airfield. ‘Had they all been forced to come to this same watershed in their lives?’ he wondered. ‘Had they all been compelled to make this pivotal life and death decision?’

At that moment Udet made his own decision, promising himself that from then on he would be nothing but a soldier. He would shoot straighter and fly better than any of the rest of them until the day that he had wiped clean the blot against his honour.

He did so in the space of a few short months. His outstanding rate of aerial combat kills dazzled the Establishment and put him well on his way to rivalling Richthofen’s record. Yet, although his string of victories rocketed him up the ranks of piloting and prestige, he was left with a terrible sense of loss, because, one by one, his close friends at Habsheim were dying.

Every one of them had been shot out of the sky in quick succession, leaving Udet alone. Not only was he in a perpetual state of mourning but he also felt strangely guilty about being singled out, about being the only one left alive. It was more of a burden than a blessing as he suspected that his own days must surely be numbered and that someday soon God may call in all debts due on his good fortune.

Luckily, his fear of death was not as it had been. Given that he had seen his comrades plummet to earth with such regularity, he had become almost immune to its shock factor. Although, when his best friend, Karl Esser, simply disappeared one day after battle, he wept.

‘Where’s Esser?’ he had asked as he got out of his plane and quickly scanned the airfield.

Being the last to land back at base after their successful dogfight against a British squadron of Nieuports, he was surprised that his friend’s plane wasn’t there. Esser had had a good day, with two kills to his credit, and was bound to want to celebrate.

‘Didn’t you see him?’ Squadron Leader Heinrich Gontermann answered. ‘He flew off into the west, chasing down the last of the Brits’ planes. Flogging a dead horse, in my opinion,’ he continued with a shrug. ‘But, I suppose, when you’re onto a good thing …’

They received a call from the infantry two hours later to confirm that there was ‘plane down in C Sector, and to please come and claim the remains.’ So their Commanding Officer, Puz Reinhold, obliged. He returned to camp soon after with a small canvas bag in his hand. One that was only big enough to house the body of a baby, but which held all that remained of Esser.

Reinhold, himself, went down not long after. When they found the wreckage of his plane he was still sitting fully intact inside it, poised behind the stick with his right hand on the machine-gun button. His face was frozen in the tension of the last combat, his left eye squinting and his right, wide open as if he were still aiming at the invisible enemy. A bullet had penetrated his head from behind, coming out in front between his eyebrows, the entry and exit wounds so neat and small that they were almost imperceptible.

‘This is the way I would like to die,’ Lieutenant Willy Glinkermann said, which seemed a meagre enough request for a man who was about to do just that. But it was a death wish denied. A few days later, he went down screaming in a ball of flames. The powers-that-be had not even seen fit to show him the mercy of a clean, hard hit to ground before he was burned alive.

Unaware of Glinkermann’s horrific fate, his fellow pilots set out some champagne and cake for him at Udet’s birthday party. It was a celebration in which they all heartily indulged, oblivious to their compatriot’s pain and suffering. The loss of Glinkermann’s life force was only sensed by his faithful dog; a loyal, wolf-grey German shepherd that waited for him back at base. Having walked at Glinkermann’s heel for 10 years, he was not prepared to take a single step without him and stayed sitting on the airstrip long after midnight when the telegrammed news of Glinkermann’s death was received. At the funeral, the dog lay down on his master’s grave, hastening the moment that he would join him.

It was at this point that Udet felt close to doing the same, and so he wrote a memo to First Lieutenant, Kurt Grasshoff, The Commanding Officer of Jagdstaffel 37:

‘I am the last of Jagdstaffel 15. All my friends are gone and I am feeling uneasy in my solitude. I am hoping that you can secure me a transfer to your group on an entirely different war front. Please forgive me for taking advantage of your past kindness to me in order to request yet another, but I feel that for the time being my stoicism has deserted me. I am surrounded by nothing here but ghosts and graves.’

The fact that Udet had only just turned 21 didn’t help. His astonishing feats of heroism and skill belied the fact that he was still barely beyond his teens. He was the youngest Flying Ace on record and was soon to become renowned as the highest scoring German Ace to survive The Great War, doing so at 22 with a staggering 62 victories under his belt.

It was Richthofen who first saw the spark of greatness in Udet’s future, and went out of his way to make himself a part of it. On March 15, 1918, he caught up with Udet’s Jasta 37, which was on the move to a new encampment at Le Cateau. On the fateful day of their meeting it was pouring with rain. Abandoning all thoughts of open-air travel, Richthofen exchanged his mode of transport from wings to wheels. As he rounded a blind bend in the road he slammed on his brakes, careening his Mercedes across the asphalt to a slippery, mudsplattered stop. He had come within inches of rear-ending the last transport truck of Udet’s Mobile Unit. To add to it all, he had to clamber up a sludgy slope to find Udet in his tent.

Through the post-winter deluge, they exchanged salutes. Richthofen was as calm, cool and collected as Udet was astonished over the great man’s unexpected appearance at his canvas door.

‘I’ve come to thank you, Udet, for saving my life,’ the Baron said, declining Udet’s offer to come inside.

Drenched to the skin, Richthofen was unperturbed by the rain that saturated his uniform. Water was running from the tip of his peaked cap and streaming down his face as he extended his hand to shake Udet’s, His normally cold, blue eyes expressed a warmth of sorts which was flattering in the extreme to his subordinate.

‘I’m only glad, Sir, that I was in a position to do it,’ Udet replied.

‘Not half as glad as I.’

Richthofen’s words of gratitude came with a broad smile. For a fleeting moment that, uncharacteristic smile lit up his face with a boyish charm. However, the moment of candour between them didn’t last long. Quickly, the Baron got back to business, straight-mouthed.

‘To that end, Udet, I was wondering whether you’d like to take a position on a full-time basis as a member of my Fighter Group One?’

‘Yes, Herr Rittmeister!’ Udet swiftly replied, with a second salute and a crisp click of his heels. There was no need for him to pause and ponder such an offer.

‘Good, well then that’s settled. I also believe that congratulations are in order,’ Richthofen moved on, ill at ease as he always was being the focal point of another man’s gratitude. ‘News has it that you’ve just shot down your twentieth plane? That’s quite an achievement.’

‘You should know, Sir. You’ve done it three times over,’ Udet said, smoothly returning the compliment. ‘For me, as yet, the last kill is unconfirmed.’

But Richthofen waved away this small piece of humility. ‘A few either side of 20 is good enough for me.’

As it was also for Germany when Udet was awarded The Blue Max. The medal arrived neatly packaged at his front door in Munich where he had gone to recover from a chronic middle-ear infection.

‘You’ll never be able to fly again,’ his family doctor told him.

To which Udet answered: ‘To hell with that! If I can’t fly I may as well be dead.’

So Udet set himself the task of improving his damaged sense of balance. A task made a little easier with the help of his long-term girlfriend, Lola Zink. Along with his astounding array of accolades came Lola’s undying devotion and new-found desire to become his wife. That same array of accolades, however, opened Udet’s eyes to his vast options and made him cool on the whole idea of tying himself to one woman for life.

This swift change of heart was ironic as it had been he who had relentlessly pursued Lola for four fruitless years at school. Back then he would have laughed out loud had he any notion that one day he’d be in a position to casually cast her aside. She was every schoolboy’s dream. But the truth was that now she bored him, as did everything off the battlefield.

Tantalised as he still was by her kisses and caresses, he was strangely unmoved when she coyly knocked back his more intimate advances. Her commonplace propriety had him heave a sigh, not of frustrated yearning, but of excruciating tedium. He found himself wondering what else the relationship could give him. She wasn’t exactly the most scintillating or intellectual of companions, and now was making it clear that she wasn’t prepared to fill the awkward gaps in their conversations with any sort of physical exchange. Obviously, if he wanted to go beyond Point X, he had no choice but to ask: ‘Will you marry me?’

He threw the half-hearted question at her as they strolled through the streets of Munich. She linked her arm through his when she answered: ‘Yes.’ Her grasp all the more tight and possessive now that he was sporting his dashing new uniform and Blue Max.

‘I’ve got him! I’ve got him!’ Lola was thinking with savage, feminine satisfaction.

Now that her instincts for financial security were satisfied she was able to rest easy, safe and sound in the knowledge that both she and her husband-to-be had effectively been pulled from the field of play.

This could not have been further from the truth as far as Udet was concerned. He had only just begun to fight and had no intention of sitting out the game of life on the bench while lesser men played the field.

Yes, the flattery of Lola’s love had gone to his head. As had all the rest of the adulation he had received over the last few months. In fact, he was riding high in all respects ever since Richthofen had put him in command of his Jasta 11, one of the four squadrons of his Fighter Group One. To top that off, the Red Baron had gone one step further by offering him his close friendship; a brotherly bond that stripped away all the social constraints of aristocrat and commoner.

‘I’m sending you on a few weeks rest and recovery Ernst,’ Richthofen said, when Udet had finally admitted to having a severe middle-ear problem. He had hidden and put up with the infection for months until it had him buckle over in pain. It was a throbbing agony that, for fear of being grounded, he had ignored until he’d shot down a further five enemy aircraft and started to see double. At which point, he’d felt duty bound to confess, but had put up a solid argument against Richthofen’s advice.

‘I am not going to leave the front,’ Udet insisted.

‘You’ll be more trouble to me than you’re worth if your balance gives out for good,’ the Baron said, following up his seeming lack of sympathy with the command.

‘Now go home and get better. But make sure you do it fast, because we need you here and I’ll miss having you around.”

Udet knew exactly what he meant, because two weeks later Richthofen was dead. His sudden passing left a black void in Udet’s world that would have him miss his friend for the rest of his life.

The earth shook beneath his feet when he read the Flash Bulletin. Hot off the press, it was slapped on the Council Chamber wall, right in front of Udet, as he and Lola wandered by. The two of them had been laughing, sharing the joke of walking past the King of Bavaria’s residence on the Theatinerstrasse where Udet had just received the military protocol of having the guards fall out and present arms in honour of his Blue Max. So thrilled had he and Lola been with the ritual that they had decided to promenade past the gates seven more times to enjoy a series of encore performances. Udet’s happiness, however, was brought to a jarring halt when Richthofen’s death notice was thrust in front of him.

ACHTUNG! ACHTUNG! BARON VON RICHTHOFEN SHOT DOWN AND KILLED!

The bold headline came at Udet like a punch in the face. He reeled back in disbelief. Yet that dark moment’s acute shock and disbelief was only half as bad as the long-term sense of loss and emptiness which was to engulf him for years to come. Quickly, he grabbed for Lola’s hand to steady himself and grasp at something, anything that was real and would stop him hurtling into an abyss of despair.