To the Last Man - Jeff Shaara [225]
Schmidt was all smiles now, rubbed his hands together.
“Quite so, Captain! I must ask you . . . where are your pilots? I expected something more . . . um . . .”
Fleckmann said, “Captain, we had been told to expect a formal reception from your command.”
Richthofen lost all strength for the smile, thought, Of course, a formal reception: an empty promise from some overly gracious officer in Cologne. He pulled at himself from the inside, heard a voice in his head: calm.
“Sir, this particular field is the operating base of Squadron Eleven. Most of the pilots are presently on a mission. It was my intention to have them assembled for you; however, the enemy was not aware of your visit, and some of their pilots inconvenienced us by attacking our troop positions. I thought it important that we respond.”
Richthofen instantly regretted his sarcasm, but Schmidt seemed not to notice, nodded his agreement. “Excellent, Captain. Then I am fortunate indeed. I shall have the opportunity to hear of their mission firsthand, just as you will!” He looked at Fleckmann now, nodded toward the man’s pad of paper. “This will do nicely, yes.”
CAPPY, FRANCE—APRIL 18, 1918
They had moved again, the entire fighter wing swarming over the charred ruins of another village, assembling and organizing at another abandoned aerodrome. Richthofen paid little attention to maps, knew only that Cappy was west of Lechelle, farther west than he had ever been. Again they occupied a field that had once been British.
The reports flowed through his headquarters of the vicious fight on the ground in front of them, the great German thrust widening a gap many miles into the strength of the British defenses. But the success of the German advance was exhausting itself, the select shock troops of the infantry moving too far too quickly, outdistancing their own supplies. It had been the same since the beginning of the war, every major offensive stalled by the inability of the support behind them to keep up. It was not always the fault of men, but of equipment, the railway lines inadequate to the task, many of the tracks having to be rebuilt by the same men who had destroyed them. The roads were desolate wastelands, obliterated by the artillery, and so the engineers had to be sent forward, to rebuild the pathways for the supply trucks. Far out in front, the German foot soldiers who had so completely shattered the British defenses found themselves without food and shoes and even ammunition. And so the generals had to slow them down, infuriating Ludendorff as well as the infantry. Every man on the German front lines knew that if they could only push the fight another week, widen the gap a few more miles, the British might collapse completely, might seek the sanctuary of the French coastline, scramble onto the ships that would carry the Tommies back to England, and right out of the war. But there was no more energy for the push, and along the front lines, exhausted German soldiers watched helplessly as shattered remnants of British units regrouped and dug in and faced them now with a renewed defiance.
DUSSELDORF, GERMANY—APRIL 19, 1918
The weather had been bad for several days, heavy spring rains keeping the air fighters on the ground. As winter passed, Richthofen had continued his string of victories, had stunned the High Command on April 2, when word of his seventy-fifth kill had been confirmed. He had given the number little thought, but there was something of a milestone in the figure, another opportunity for the photographers of the Information Section to offer the German people a new outpouring of Richthofen publicity. Richthofen ignored the attention to this one arbitrary number, and within another week had shot three more British planes out of the sky.
He had not been able to fly now for nearly ten days, but would not endure the idleness by sitting quietly at the aerodrome.