"Your son crashed on landing about twenty-five minutes ago, Sir," Galloway said.
"You're here, that means bad news," Stecker said.
"He's pretty badly banged up, Sir, but he's alive."
"Define `pretty badly,' would you, please?"
"Both of his legs are broken; he has a compound fracture of the right arm; his collarbone has probably been cracked. He almost certainly has broken ribs, and there are probably some internal injuries."
"Jesus Christ!" Stecker exhaled. "Is he going to live?"
"Commander Persons-I just left him-said that barring complications-"
"Persons?" Stecker interrupted. "Mean little guy?" He held his hand up to nearly his shoulder level, to indicate a runt.
"Yes, Sir."
"Barring complications, what?"
"He will recover and will probably even be able to return to flight status." I'm telling you that because that's what Persons told me, and because I want to believe it, not because I do believe it. When they pulled him from the wreck, I was surprised that he was alive.
"I don't like to think what Mrs. Stecker will do when she gets the telegram," Stecker said. "I suppose you've already set that in motion?"
"No, Sir. I haven't. MAG-21 handles that, Sir. You could probably talk to Colonel Dawkins-"
"What happened? `Crashed on landing'? Is that a polite way of saying it was his fault?"
"It looked to me as if his right tire was flat, Sir."
"You saw the accident?"
"Yes, Sir. I was right behind him in the pattern.
"And?"
And a second after he touched down, he started to ground loop to the right, and then he was rolling end over end down the strip; the only way it could have been worse was if there had been more gas in his tanks and it exploded "He was attempting to make a dead-stick landing, Sir. He was out of fuel."
"How did that happen?"
"They hit us pretty badly this morning, Major-"
"I was up earlier, I saw it."
"_and he stayed up as long as he thought he could, as long as he thought he had fuel to stay."
"You encourage that sort of thing, Captain, do you? Staying up there until you have just enough fuel to maybe make it back to the field?" Stecker asked nastily, and then immediately apologized. "Forgive me. That was uncalled for. And you were up there, too, weren't you, presumably doing the same thing?"
"We lost three Wildcats this morning, Sir. And the Air Corps lost two of their P400s."
"Counting my son?"
"No, Sir. Not counting him."
But including a Wildcat piloted by Major Jack Finch. Finch wouldn't have been up there if I hadn't told him he could, for auld long syne.
"All lost? Or just shot down?"
"One of the P400 pilots made it back to the field, Sir. Just him."
"Tell me about this flat tire," Stecker said after a moment.
"He told me that he'd taken some hits.... Major, I didn't mention this, but he shot down two Bettys and a Zero this morning. He's an ace. That makes it six total for him."
"All I knew he had was one," Stecker said. "The flat tire?"
"He called and said he'd taken some hits, so I pulled up beside him and took a look, and there were holes in the area of his landing gear."
"And you told him this?"
"I signaled him, Sir. His radio was not working. But he understands my signal."
"Then why didn't he try to make a wheels-up landing?"
"I can only presume he thought he could make it, Sir."
"And that he wanted to save the airplane?"
"Yes, Sir. I think that probably had a lot to do with the decision he made."
"What about the Pickering boy?" Stecker asked. "Was he one of the other three you lost?" Galloway was surprised at the question.
"No, Sir. He made it back all right. He was flying on your son's wing, Major." And he landed three minutes before your boy-time enough for him to be walking away from his revetment when your boy came in, to see the crash, and to run to the plane and listen to your boy scream for the five minutes or so it took to pry him from the wreckage. He made it back all right, but I'm going to have trouble with him. I know the look he had in his eyes.
"I know his father," Stecker said.
"Yes, Sir. Major, I have a jeep-" Stecker met his eyes.
"I've been trying to decide if I have the courage to go see him. Jesus Christ, they ought to skip a generation between wars so that fathers don't have to see their children torn up,"
"They're going to fly him out, to Espiritu Santo, Sir."
"If I ride down there with you, can I get a ride back up here?"
"Yes, Sir. No problem."
"Squadron commanders at Henderson have their own jeeps?" Stecker asked.