Part 1

PURSUIT

By Andrew A. Caffrey

A tale of the American “Balloon Strafers”

When headquarters separated Jack Langdon from his pursuit group and sent him to fly two-seaters, headquarters came very close to breaking a stout flying heart. For Langdon, there was nothing to do but pack and go; anything in the way of protest would have netted him nothing, besides being very bad taste. Nevertheless, between high dudgeon and low spirits, the boy hovered and suffered for days.

Flying _chasse_--pursuit--was the holding of all that war could give. But piloting a two-seater--any two-seater was just plain hell. You would not ask an Oldfield or a De Palma to drive a ten ton truck, and expect him to like it, would you? Nor would you detail Sande to ride a mechanical nag. Well, Langdon was to air what these others are, or were, to track and turf; and that, thoughtless headquarters should have known. But this same headquarters--Air Service, S.O.S. Tours--was no respecter of individuals. If the observation outfits were short of men, there was only one place to get them--from pursuit.

Langdon, when the ax fell, was at Issoudun’s last instruction field--the combat school--Field No. 8. Another day or two and he would have been safe.

“Now, look here, Langdon,” the officer in charge of flying at No. 8 had said, when the boy was called upon the carpet and assigned to report at Romorantin for De Havilland training. “We don’t want you to go out of this field tonight feeling rocky against us. We’re not discriminating. Tours called for five. There were only five of you ready to shove off. It’s tough; it’s rough; it’s rotten. You’ve put everything on the ball. You’re an A-1 _chasse_ flyer, and the best hand with a machine gun we’ve ever turned out. The game was made for you, and nobody hates worse than we do to see you leaving pursuit.”

“That’s all right, Captain,” Langdon had said. “You’ve been white to me here at No. 8; she’s a _bon_ school. But--and pin this in your hat--I’m not quitting pursuit. They can send me to the two-place hacks, but they can’t make me do two-place missions.

“I’m a pursuit man, and no matter where they sink me, I’ll still be a pursuit flyer. They can anchor me to an observation balloon’s cable, or put me on the business end of a shovel, but as long as I have life in me, I’ll fight this war _a la chasse_--right on the other guy’s tail.”

Late that night Langdon and his four fellow travelers detrained at Romorantin. Romo’, along with its many other things of air, was the first European home of the American made De Havilland plane. Langdon had only seen one of these big ships before--big to scout flyers. That was when Lieutenant Rube Williamson had flown the first DH from Romo’ to Field 8.

“Oh, these big crates are all right, I guess,” Rube had told the gang. “But a DH is a DH, and can never be a _chasse_ machine, you know. No matter how you figure, bunch, a ten ton truck is a ten ton truck and, if the truth must be known, that’s how these DH babies handle--like heavy duty trucks on old rubber. They’ve got lotsa power, but little pep; and less of that old maneuverability stuff than an Otis elevator. But let me tell you, cadets, when the nose of this hack gets away from you, it’d shame an elevator with the cables cut. Whew! They’re planting them every day at Romo’.”

* * * * *

At Romo’, Langdon and his mates reported for DH instruction.

“Are these DH’s bad?”

The instructor was fast on retort.

“Boy, I’ll say they’re bad! These here culls just ain’t got no conscience a-tall, nohow. For my own part, I’m going to quit air for the Tank Corps. As a rule, when these crocks hit the sod, nothing’s above ground but the rudder, waving like a flag over a hole in the ice. I came here with ten friends. Four of them are up there on the hill--boxed.”

“Ten friends?” Langdon mused, as though this had something to do with the business at hand. “Nobody in the world has ten friends.”

“That’s how it looks to you,” the instructor answered. “Any guys that are sent up here to fly DH’s sure have no friends! And that’s why you won’t mind being bumped off ... Anyway, let’s see what you boys can do with these arks. Who’s who here? Let’s get a look at your monikers. When I call your name, step stiffly to the front, stand at rigid attention and answer--‘Here, kind sir.’ Lieutenant John J. Langdon!”

“On the job, kind sir,” the new arrival answered. “And I’m a guy as ain’t got no friends.”

“Langdon?” the instructor repeated. “I’ve heard of you, Lieutenant--never mind the salute. Weren’t you the bird who flew Major Greene from Mitchel Field clean to Hazelhurst, upside down, and told him that you were trying to get a look at your landing gear--that you thought you had blown a tire on the takeoff?”

“The same dizzy guy,” Langdon said. “And wasn’t it strange? I couldn’t get a look at those wheels; and that was why I flew the major all the way back to Mitchel in the same way, upside down. Till I’d tried it, you couldn’t tell me that a pilot wouldn’t see the bottom of his plane by turning the bottom up. Is it not all strange, kind sir?”

“It sure is,” the instructor agreed. “But lend an ear, Lieutenant. We have a commanding officer here who likes to ride in DH’s. One of these days I’ll manage to get you and him in the air in the same ship. Do you begin to see light?”

“That’s one of my worst troubles, kind sir. My eyes take in too much light. The docs have a fancy name for it. But, anyway, it causes me to see--or think I see--fun in things that strike others as being drab. For instance, after that flight at Mitchel, Major Greene said that it was his first trip in the air.”

“And the records,” the instructor smiled, “prove that it was his last. Now, ten years later, the record still stands.”

After one turn of the field with Langdon on the controls, the instructor gave him an O.K. He simply said, as he stepped from the plane:

“You’re jake, Lieutenant, but if I were you, I wouldn’t land these DH’s out of a loop like that. Hell, Langdon, life’s sweet, even at an observation school. Come on now, go on living. Maybe you’ll get a shipment back to _chasse_. Others have done it, and the war is young. You know your air, and that’s no small item. But the good ones, Langdon, are the ones we pack in large boxes. And the other kind, damn ’em, we can’t get rid of. You know, there are observers here, Langdon, who just won’t qualify. They’re afraid of the Front and won’t leave Romo’. And just so long as their observation work is below grade, we can’t ship them out. What’s the use? They wouldn’t be worth a damn to any squadron....

“Now, just a minute. A mighty thought strikes me. Langdon, I’m going to put some of these dumb johns behind you. Maybe you can show them their objective. If you’ll fly ’em the way you just flew me, the Front will look like an old ladies’ home to the most timid of these goldbricks. Oh, just one more word before you take off. Don’t fly as close to other planes as you flew to that one a little while ago. That was Colonel Kingsley. He’s from Tours. Man, you were too near.”

“That was all right,” Langdon assured the instructor. “I wasn’t trying to pull anything fast. I just wanted to learn something. You see, I’m accustomed to flying rotary motors with propellers turning at about 1400 revs. Well, this Liberty was doing about 1700 revs per minute and I just wanted to get a peek at that other bird’s instrument board. It was all right; his was turning the same. But 1700 r.p.m. seemed mighty fast.”

“Hell!” the instructor said. “I hope your clock never stops, or you might try to get a peek at some other pilot’s wrist watch. But go ahead, take off. See you later ... We’re going to like each other, Langdon.”

* * * * *

With a full tank, good for four hours’ flight, the new DH pilot went back into the sky. Off toward Vierzon, at sunset, he spotted something that made his heart glad. There, with about twenty thousand feet under them, was a Nieuport “27” patrol, from Field 8. He knew that they were from No. 8 because, coming in close, all five Nieuports revealed ship numbers with which he was familiar. All of them were students; not an instructor’s ship was among the lot.

Langdon felt fine. He climbed on the front man’s tail, broke the formation and tried to induce the bird to go “round and round”. The lead man was not looking for combat with a DH. He went into a dive and waved Langdon away. But the merry one followed. Then, with his power running wild, the retreating Nieuport flyer burned out his rotary engine. Langdon saw the propeller stop. Then he leveled off and started to climb back to the rest of the flight. A man with a dead engine is no man at all.

One of the remaining four, when Langdon closed down on their rear again, deliberately killed his motor and went into a spin. The other three, somewhat bewildered, remained to mill a bit. But when Langdon’s propeller came near to biting chips out of one of their rudders, that Nieuport also called it a day. Enough is enough. Langdon saw the machine start down for a landing.

Jack Langdon had discovered something. What had started as fun, took on the magnitude of worthwhile research. He had learned that a DH, rightly flown, could combat--could go round and round--with a _chasse_ plane.

The remaining two Field No. 8 ships had followed their disabled mates to earth. Jack Langdon hung around to make sure that five safe landings had been made; then he laughed, sang a bit and looked about for new worlds to conquer.

West of Bourges, he found a Farman “pusher” from the French school at Châteauroux. It was drifting along at eight thousand feet. Langdon came up from the rear and had his left wingtip nestled in close to the Frenchman’s outriggers, before the Châteauroux flyer noticed that he was not alone. Then a badly frightened face under a large crash helmet stared, wild eyed, across that short space. Langdon’s heart skipped a beat with the shock. The face under the helmet was a boy’s.

“You damn’ bully,” Jack Langdon said to himself. “Get t’hell gone from here before you scare this game little frog to death.”

He throttled his power, dropped his right wing and slipped away from the Farman. Then he turned back, headed into the last rays of the sun and cut for Romo’. There was joy in his heart, and he was making himself all kinds of fine promises.

These DH’s, he decided, were not the poorest things in the air, and if a young fellow were to apply his best talents-- Well, chances were, he could manage to make himself felt.

“Yes, sir,” he said, talking aloud. “I’ll talk with the riggers. See what they think about washing some of the incidence out of these wings. Bet with the outer wing bays washed flat, there’d be no drag and the old crate would swing around on a dollar. And that will speed her up a lot, too. No question at all. If we flatten these surfaces out, we’ll add eight to ten miles per hour. What _can_ be done, is _going_ to be done, or I’m a wet bird. In the meantime, unless they put the screws on me, I’ll combat everything that flies in this neck of the tall timber.”

Early the next day, though, they did climb Langdon’s frame. They climbed him twice. Once on account of the complaint that Field No. 8 sent through from Issoudun; again because of a wail that came up from Châteauroux.

“I don’t blame the French kid in the hayrack Farman,” Langdon told the officer in charge of flying, upon whose carpet he was arraigned. “But those dudes from No. 8 should hang their heads in shame. The idea of refusing combat with a DH! Those five birds should be forced to stand a court-martial, sir. Why not make this an issue, sir?”

“By hell, Lieutenant, there’s food for thought there! But look here, Langdon--be careful not to climb any of these two-place Sopwiths that you see fluttering around here; any Sops, Avros or Caudrons. They’re always full of fat majors and lean colonels, to say nothing of a few supernumerary generals of sundry ranks. And if you ride any of them, the war ends for you. We have one cadet in the guard house now. He dared to come in with a dead stick when a major was trying to take off.”

“Well, what the hell should he have done?” Langdon asked. “Stay up there with a dead motor till the major decided to take off?”

“That was the cadet’s problem,” the officer in charge of flying stated. “And he didn’t get the right answer. The major gave his own ship the gun and crashed into the cadet’s plane. Don’t you work up any problems here, Langdon, unless you can see the solution beforehand. A pilot in the guardhouse is no flyer at all.”

“I’m immune, sir. You know how blacksmiths and guardhouse keepers laugh at love, or something like that? Well, I’ve fallen in love with DH’s. That’s strange, I know; but it’s a fact. Me and the DH’s are getting together, and we’re going some place.”

“I’ll give you a push toward the Front, Langdon, as soon as I see a chance. Now get into the air and pile up as many hours as you can. That’s what counts. These forty and fifty hour pilots are not lasting long on the Front.”

“I’ve had two hundred hours, sir, and I’m ripe for the bow. All my old bunch are fighting the Battle of Paris right now, and here am I poling DH’s for the everlasting glory of the S.O.S. The thing ain’t right, sir, no matter how you figure.”

* * * * *

During the day he flew different missions with two of the instructor’s worst goldbricking observers. Each time Langdon arrived over the practice objective--Neung, Orleans, Chinon, Blois--he would yell back--

“Do you get it?”

“Too high,” the student observer would invariably sing out. And, as a rule, the approach altitude would be above fifteen thousand feet. “Too high, Lieutenant.”

“Hold everything! We’ll fix that all right,” Langdon would assure the victim. Then he would put the rambling DH into a tight power spin and cut down the altitude so fast that no rear seat observer would care to be present a second time. Or, if he did not spin, he would execute a vertical sideslip that, by rights, belonged to much smaller and trimmer craft. At any rate, each man he took up finished his observation class in one quick lesson. The unfortunate goldbrick would come back to Romo’, pea green and dead eyed.

“Can he fly?” these boys who had liked Romo’ so well would say. “Can he! Oh, hell, give me air.”

But no more air with Langdon. Within the week, he had every goldbrick off the instructor’s hands.

“But I don’t want you to get too good, Langdon,” the instructor would warn. “They’ll keep you right here for the duration if you do. Then you’ll have to pull something raw to get moved. For instance, stop rolling your wheels across the shop roofs. You think they don’t see it, but the headquarters gang have been watching you. You know how they like to be entertained. Don’t show ’em anything. But here’s good news:

“I’ve got you lined up for a mission to Paris. You’re going to lead a ferrying group close to the big town and deliver ten DH’s for Front line squadrons. No, you don’t get a smell of the Front. Your mission ends when you deliver the ferry at Orly. But you’re going to get a chance to _oo-la-la_, kid.”

“Strange, but that leaves me cold,” Langdon replied. “I don’t want to fight that Guerre de Paree till after I’ve won the right to spread my line on the boulevards. Then I’ll strut. And don’t think that I don’t want to. Boy, I’m saving up for the biggest pair of chest wings that’s ever been worn on a Yank blouse. And that’s some big. And I’ve got me a swagger stick, too. It has a spark plug in the end of it, and a machine gun cartridge on the tip. You see, I’m a regulation Yank. All set and a-rarin’ to go--when the right time comes. Yes, sir, Paris is going to sit up and rub a pair of bleary eyes. Yankee Doodle’s going to ride right into town and on the make, too.

“But how about giving me a final _lâche_ and kicking one _bon pilote_ toward the Promised Land?”

“No can do right now, Langdon. But I’ll tell you what might be done. If a call for DH men comes down the line while you’re up Orly way, I’ll get a wire to you there and have your orders sent along. If you’re traveling light, take your personal junk by air on the ferry trip.”

“I’ll do that,” Langdon said. “The other pair of socks won’t be any kind of a load for a DH’s observation pit. When do I head this ferry?”

“Tomorrow. That is, if the new planes are all assembled by that time. They’re all on the floor in final assembly now. In the meantime, be a good guy, Langdon. Watch your step. And if you run across any Issoudun Nieuports, Spads or Morane Saulniers--well, snub the whole gang. What’s a bunch of _chasse_ pilots to a guy who can do his _chasse_ in a DH? Stick to your class, kid.”

“Damn’ tootin’!” Langdon said, and went out to fly--and snub everything on wings.

At 2 p.m, the next day, Langdon stood in the cockpit of the point DH of a grounded V of ten such planes. The nine who were to follow him were, to a man, of Langdon’s type, eager for anything, and anxious to get under way on this cross country hop. Cross country flying, at that time, rated high among the glories that went to make the romance of air. It was all adventure. Impatiently, the waiting nine goosed their motors and watched for the second when Langdon’s hand should fall. At 2:05, the leader slid into his seat, cracked his throttle, lifted his tail and took off. Two by two, in an ever mounting cloud of dust, the others took up the slack, filled in on Langdon’s rear and roared into flight. A turn of the field, and the shabby V formation went into the north. All ten did not get to Orly that day. Langdon watched three of the boys make safe landings with dead, or dying, motors, at Neuville, Etampes and Juvisy.

“Guess that’s all right by me,” he mused, after he and the others had circled about the unfortunate each time. “Those boys either had motor trouble or they know chickens in these towns. If it’s motor trouble, it’s common and unavoidable; and if it’s chicken, it’s class and _pour d’honneur d’Air Service d’Ame-rique_. And either way, or both, I’m for ’em. Just three little jobs for Field Service; and Field Service must have something to do.”

Through benefit of Field Service they were all at Orly next noon.

“I’m going to hold you boys here for a few days,” the commanding officer said when they reported for return railroad transportation. “We expect to have a flock of ships going back to Romo’ for repair. And you’re the men to ferry them. Enjoy yourselves.

“How’re you boys fixed for francs?” And the commanding officer, who was young himself once, smiled.

* * * * *

On the second day of their lay-over, orders for the Front came through for Langdon and two of his ferry mates. A Roman holiday was held, and the three borrowed scout planes to celebrate. Langdon flew his through the _Arche de Triomphe_ at high noon, wearing a high hat. He got away with it, and nothing much was said.

“But,” the Orly flying officer reminded him, “you’d have rotted in Prison Camp No. 2 had things been messed up in the _Place de l’Arche de Triomphe.”_

“Ain’t it the truth, sir?” Langdon had agreed. “Nowadays failure doesn’t pay. Yes, sir, a guy’s crazy to slip up.”

“Tomorrow, Lieutenant Langdon, “the Orly official went on, “you three transfers, with you in charge, will ferry three of these new DH’s up to the Trente-Neuf squadron’s ’drome. You’ll get their location last thing before taking off. It’s an American group in an American sector--a sector all bought and paid for. Major John Mack’s in charge up there. Boy, you’re in luck--drawing a C O. like Mack. He’s one of the gang and actually flies. Pilots from the front seat too, and without a second lieutenant hidden away on the rear controls. Give the major a hello for me, Lieutenant. Get the numbers on those three ships and look ’em over. If you want anything around here, ask for it--and see if you get it! Or if you want anything, take it--and see if we care!”

The next day was fine. It was life’s rosiest for three willing Yanks. Birds were singing, poppies blowing and the skies were high and clear.

“Follow me,” Langdon said.

The ferry up was without event; and the Trente-Neuf’s ’drome was where a blind man could find it. Later, Langdon and his mates were to learn that German airmen also located the place without much trouble.

“You boys,” Major Mack said, “can see the highway commissioner and take out registration papers on those machines you ferried up. We’ve lost a few men in the past week--flu, you know--and it won’t be many hours before you’re out on your own. The Trente-Neuf welcomes you. It isn’t much of a name, but the outfit’s top-notch. Also, remember it’s your home; and a home’s what you make it--between drinks. And right now and here--no drinking, boys, except at mess and between meals.

“Look around now. Get to know the mechanics. Treat ’em right--the mechanics--and they’ll treat you right. Don’t ever forget to remember that air battles are won on the ground. You know, they say a celebrity is only a dub to his valet. That’s the way up here. A cocky pilot finishes fast and quick on these strange airways. I know because I’ve lost several pilots in battle who were never game enough to get out of the weeds. Why, to get them, an enemy pilot would have to use telepathy.

“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, boys, and report for mess in clothes. That’s all the orders we have here. If you salute me, I’ll credit you with a gold star. If you don’t salute me, I’ll never hold it against you. This old uniform of mine is a disgraceful affair and by all rights does not rate a salaam. Go; come when you’re in trouble.”

The three saluted us though it were a pleasure, and went out.