The Fledgling

by Charles Nordhoff

I got absolutely lost the other day, for the second time since I have been on the front. I was flying at about nineteen thousand feet, half a mile above a lovely sea of clouds. I supposed I was directly over the front, but in reality there was a gale of wind blowing, drifting me rapidly "chez Boche." Three thousand feet below, and miles to the northeast, a patrol of German scouts beat back and forth, a string of dots, appearing and disappearing among the cloudy peaks and cañons. Too strong and too far in their lines to attack, I was alternately watching them and my clock—very cold and bored. Suddenly, straight below me and heading for home at top speed, I saw a big Hun two-seater, with enormous black crosses on his wings.

At such a moment—I confess it frankly—there seem to be two individuals in me who in a flash of time conclude a heated argument. Says one, "You're all alone; no one will ever know it if you sail calmly on, pretending not to see the Boche."

"See that Boche," says the other; "you're here to get Germans—go after him."

"See here," puts in the first, who is very clever at excuses, "time's nearly up, petrol's low, and there are nine Hun scouts who will drop on you if you dive on the two-seater."

"Forget it, you poor weak-kneed boob!" answers number two heatedly. "Dive on that Hun and be quick about it!"

So I dived on him, obeying automatically and almost reluctantly the imperious little voice. With an eye to the machine-gunner in the rear, I drove down on him almost vertically, getting in a burst point-blank at his port bow, so to speak. Pushing still farther forward on the stick, I saw his wheels pass over me like a flash, ten yards up. Pulled the throttle wide open, but the motor was a second late in catching, so that when I did an Immelman turn to come up under his tail, I was too far back and to one side. As I pulled out of the upside-down position, luminous sparks began to drive past me, and a second later I caught a glimpse of the goggled Hun observer leaning intently over his cockpit as he trained his gun on me.

But beside old Slapping Sally his machine was as a buzzard to a falcon; in a breath I was under his tail, had reared almost vertically, and was pouring bullets into his underbody. "You will shoot me up, will you?" I yelled ferociously—just like a bad boy in a back-yard fight. "Take that, then—" at which dramatic instant a quart of scalding oil struck me in the face, half in the eyes, and half in my open mouth. I never saw the Boche again, and five minutes later, when I had cleaned my eyes out enough to see dimly, I was totally lost. Keeping just above the clouds to watch for holes, I was ten long minutes at one hundred and thirty miles per hour in getting to the lines, at a place I had never seen before.

Landed at a strange aerodrome, filled Sally up, and flew home seventy-five miles by map. As usual, every one had begun the old story of how I was not a bad chap at bottom, and had many noble qualities safely hidden away—when I strolled into the bar. Slight sensation as usual, tinged with a suspicion of mild disappointment.

Almost with regret, I have turned faithful old Slapping Sally over to a newly arrived young pilot, and taken a new machine, the last lingering echo of the dernier cri in fighting single-seaters. I had hoped for one for some time, and now the captain has allotted me a brand-new one, fresh from the factory. It is a formidable little monster, squat and broad-winged, armed to the teeth, with the power of two hundred and fifty wild horses bellowing out through its exhausts.

With slight inward trepidations I took it up for a spin after lunch. The thing is terrific—it fairly hurtles its way up through the air, roaring and snorting and trembling with its enormous excess of power. Not half so pleasant as Sally, but a grimly practical little dragon of immense speed and potential destructiveness. At a couple of thousand feet over the field, I shut off the motor and dived to try it out. It fairly took my breath away—behind my goggles my eyes filled with tears; my body rose up in the safety-belt, refusing to keep pace with the machine's formidable speed. In a wink, I was close to the ground, straightened out, and rushing low over the blurred grass at a criminal gait—never made a faster landing. It is a tribute to man's war-time ingenuity, but, for pleasure, give me my old machine.