Would I? It did not take me many fractions of a second to impress on him that I certainly would. But here Captain d'A—— demurred. It was, he said, absolutely forbidden that any one should go up in army aeroplanes except aviators on military duty. Those were the strict army regulations. He was quite right and entirely justified in his attitude. But Captain F——, who was a good sport and had become quite a chum of mine, said, "Oh, let him go up. After all, the Swiss Military Attaché went up the other day. I'll take the responsibility." And as he was in immediate authority while we remained with the 5th Army, Captain d'A—— good-naturedly shrugged his shoulders and let it go at that.
So I hurried down with the Aviation Captain to his tent to put on a warm aviation suit, while the Caudron was prepared for our flight. As we approached his tent, a single-motored aeroplane took aboard its pilot and observer, its propellers whirred and roared, and it rolled casually away up the gradual slope, through a field of standing grain, till near the hilltop it took to the air as easily as a bird and spiralled up toward the low-lying dark clouds.
In the Captain's tent I struggled into a heavy suit of black fur made like a suit of combination underwear, legs and body all in one piece, put on a pair of goggles and a heavily padded helmet, and emerged to meet the disappointment of my life. Down pattered some drops of rain, down spiralled the aeroplane which had just gone up.
"Too bad," said the Aviation Captain. "I can't send a machine up in the rain."
I pleaded with my staff-officers to wait here for an hour to see whether the rain might not stop. In vain. Even that good sport Captain F—— was adamant. We could not possibly wait, because it would completely throw out a visit to a horse hospital, and an inspection of an army corps supply-train which were both unalterably fixed upon our schedule. We were very late already. We must be off.
Well, then, could we not return early to-morrow morning to get the flight?
"Malheureusement ça ne peut pas se faire." (French euphemism for "No.") To-morrow morning I was slated for a visit to a base hospital which, including motoring there and motoring back, would consume most of the morning.
But I would infinitely prefer to go for a "petite promenade" in the Caudron than to inspect the most unique base hospital in the world.
Yes, they could understand that perfectly, but unfortunately the hospital was among "the arrangements" and the "petite promenade" was not. Personally they would throw the hospital overboard in a minute, but the matter was beyond their control.