To the Last Man - Jeff Shaara [36]
Thaw emptied the steaming remains of the pot into a thick clay cup, handed it to Lufbery. He put the scalding coffee to his lips, caught the sharp smell of oil, held the cup away. Thaw said, “What? Something wrong?”
Lufbery offered the cup, and Thaw smelled, said, “Damn!” He looked around toward the mechanics, and Lufbery saw the men turning away, heard low laughter. Thaw poured the coffee on the ground, said, “Not funny. Not one bit.”
One man looked up, feigning innocence, said, “Ah, but Monsieur Thaw, if the castor oil is good for the Nieuport motors, it is good for your motor as well, eh?”
Thaw looked at Lufbery, said, “Third time this week. I made the mistake of telling them that the motor oil they use here is the same junk my mother gave me when I was a baby. Bad enough we have to smell that stuff when we fly.” He shouted to the mechanic now, “That’s the last time! The next man puts castor oil in the coffee will test my Lewis gun from the unfriendly end!”
The mechanic waved at him, still smiling, no one believing Bill Thaw would stay angry for long. Thaw said, “Let’s go to the house. Chapman will want some coffee too. I’ll make more there.” Lufbery looked at the fat bandage around Thaw’s left elbow, said, “Still hurt?”
Thaw shrugged. “Only in the morning. Which is now. Wakes me up early. Damned shame. I have all this vacation time, and my arm acts like an alarm clock.” He glanced at the sky. “They’ll be gone for at least another hour. We should go. I’d like to be here when they get back.”
Lufbery knew it was Thaw’s particular quirk, that he would always be at the field when the planes came in from a patrol. It was becoming that way with all of them: Rockwell, Thaw, and now Chapman, who sat confined to the resident quarters with a fat white bandage on his head. The wounds to the pilots had not been life threatening, the injury to Thaw’s arm the worst, but every wound had forced each man to stay on the ground until the captain cleared him to fly again. Regardless of their injuries, Lufbery could sense that each man regarded his ground time as a sort of punishment.
They walked to the house, Thaw leading the way. Lufbery was by far the shortest man in the squadron, had learned to scramble to keep up with the others, especially when they were as energized as Bill Thaw. Thaw was only twenty-three, but he wore a fat walrus moustache that made him seem much older. With his stocky trunk, thick arms, and big dark eyes, some said he looked like some sort of Mexican bandito.
They were on the main road now, kept to the grassy edge, suffered through the dust of a train of trucks and buses, more French troops and their equipment rolling toward Verdun. The convoy passed, and Lufbery brushed dirt from his uniform, said, “Poor devils.”
Thaw stopped, seemed surprised.
“Who? The poilus? They’re the lucky ones. They get to fight and die for their mother country. No better way to go. Not like the Boche. They’re fighting to conquer. Not much spiritual fulfillment in that.”
Lufbery had rarely heard any of the pilots mention religion, was curious now.
“Is that important? You believe we’re being judged by God?”
Thaw shook his head. “Never give it much thought. Most of the Frenchmen are good Catholics though. You ever seen one after a cathedral’s been blown to hell? They cry more for a building then they do for each other. How ’bout you? You’re born here, right?”
Lufbery nodded, started walking again. “Don’t think my father cared much if I was a Catholic or not. My mother died when I was a baby. Don’t know what she would have thought. I’ve been to so many places—the Orient, Arabia, Cuba, most every big city in America. So many different ways people talk about God. Not sure how anyone can claim they know the one true way.”
Thaw