The Fly Boys (19 page)

“I can’t believe you,” Benny said, sounding angry. “How can
anyone
mourn the end of a war? Don’t you
care
about all the suffering?”

“Of course I care,” Steve replied, annoyed. “But I don’t
worry
about it. I mean, I didn’t start this war, but I did grow up with it. One way or the other, I’ve been flying a fighter since
I was seventeen. It’s been the only real job I’ve ever had, but now it looks like I’m about to be put out of work.”

“Hey, Steve, snap out of it!” Benny laughed. “Take a look at yourself! You’re selling yourself short! You’re a captain with
a chest full of medals and nineteen kills to your credit. Let’s see a little of that confidence you’ve shown in the cockpit.”

That’s just it
, Steve thought glumly.
What confidence out of the cockpit?

“There’s plenty of stuff you can do!” Benny was saying.

“Like what?”

“Well,” Benny hesitated, “you could go back to school. Go to college, like you’re always threatening to do!”

Steve nodded, but he knew he would never willingly put himself back in a classroom. He was no student. His sister, Susan,
was the kid in the family who’d been born with those kinds of smarts. She’d always been the A student, and outstanding in
music, dance, swimming, horseback riding; anything and everything she’d ever tried.

“Is that what you’re planning to do, Benny?” Steve asked. “You going back to law school?”

“Yeah, I’m thinking about it,” Benny said.

“You should,” Steve said firmly. “You’ve got the brains, and you’ve got the gift of gab. You were born to make a swell lawyer.”

“Thanks, I guess….” Benny chuckled. “But what about you?” he demanded, growing serious. “What were
you
born for?”

“What are you getting at?” Steve asked. “Flying a fighter was what I was born to do. That’s my gift, such as it is.”

“Steve, you’re Herman Gold’s son,” Benny said impatiently. “Your father has a huge company.”

“I don’t want to hear this, Benny—”

“It’s your duty to help your father run GAT,” Benny insisted. “It’s your fate—” Benny paused, thinking hard. “Just like when
a prince takes over from the king!” he finished triumphantly.

“I’m no prince,” Steve laughed. “And take it from me, my pop’s no king.”

“You’re too close to look objectively at the situation,” Benny said, “or you’d realize that with your aptitude, working with
your father is exactly what you should do.”

“You’re wrong.” Steve said.

“Okay,
be
that way,” Benny said, sounding angry. “
Be
stubborn! But you and I both know that you’re only trying to spite yor father.”

“That’s not it,” Steve said quickly. “I’m
not
being stubborn or spiteful—
really
, I’m not.” He shrugged. “Maybe it started out that way, but that’s not the way it is anymore.”

“Bullshit.” Benny began to turn away.

“Listen to me,” Steve urged. “If I could, I’d have things different. I
swear
I would. You don’t know how often I daydream about going to work with my pop,” he said wistfully. “In my head I imagine how
everyone sits up and takes notice of me as I lead the company my old man built to even greater heights.”

“You could do it,” Benny encouraged.

“No, I can’t do it,” Steve replied dully. “I
wish
I could sit behind an executive desk and know what to do, the way I know how to win while sitting in a fighter’s cockpit.”
He shook his head. “But I don’t. I can’t….” he trailed off.

“Well, why don’t you tell your father all this?” Benny quietly suggested. “And then
try
?”

“Because it’s just a pipe dream!” Steve snapped. “I’m a damned sharp fighter jock, nothing more and nothing less. Sure, I
could tell my pop, and I guess he’d be kind to me. He’d find me a spot in the executive suite. But let’s face the facts, Benny.
Without nepotism I wouldn’t survive a day at GAT anywhere but in the mailroom or on the assembly lines.”

“You’re being too tough on yourself.”

“No.” Steve looked Benny in the eye. “I’m just being honest. Try and understand. I don’t want my life to become a bad joke,
with the punch line being a nudge and a knowing snicker when they think I can’t hear:
’His qualifications for the job? Why, he’s Herman Gold’s son.’ “

Benny shrugged, obviously for once in his life at a loss for words. He gestured toward Steve’s empty glass. “Can I buy you
another drink?”

“No, thanks.” Steve smiled. “Getting drunk is the
second
best thing I do. Lately I’ve been doing it a lot, but I’ve decided that I’m not going to get drunk anymore. Becoming a booze
hound isn’t the answer.”

Benny, smiling, said, “You do know that you’re my best friend? And if there’s anything I can ever do for you?” He paused,
looking embarrassed.

Steve chuckled. “I guess I’ll miss you
almost
as much as I’m going to miss my fighter.”

“Thanks a fucking heap.”

Benny was frowning, pretending to be pissed, but Steve saw the pleased look in his buddy’s eyes.

“I’ll see you later, huh?” Steve said, gathering up his cigarettes.

“Where you going?” Benny asked.

“Just for a walk,” Steve said, lighting a smoke. “I’ve got to think things through.”

Steve pushed his way through the crowded club and out into the warm night. As he walked, he wondered:
What’s to become of a guy born to be a warrior once the shooting stops?

BOOK II:
1945–1953

NATIONAL SECURITY ACT SIGNED INTO LAW—

Air Force Made Independent Branch of Service—

Philadelphia Bulletin-Journal

AIR FORCE BOMBS CAPITOL HILL—

Defends Controversial B-45 Bomber Program at Senate

Hearings—

Washington Star Reporter

ZIONISTS DEFY ARAB THREAT OF HOLY WAR TO

DECLARE INDEPENDENT STATE OF ISRAEL—

Baltimore Globe

REDS BLOCKADE BERLIN!

U.S. Vows Not to Be Intimidated—

Air Force Responds With Airlift—

New York Gazette

BROADSWORD’S HIDDEN TALENTS HELP FIGHT

THE COLD WAR—

Modified GAT XP-90 Jet Fighter Flies Surveillance Over

Russia—

Aviation Trade Magazine

COMMUNIST TRIUMPH IN CHINA—

Mao Tsc-tung Establishes People’s Republic—

San Francisco Post

REDS CROSS 39TH PARALLEL—

INVADE REPUBLIC OF KOREA—

North Korea, Backed by Russia, Pushes Toward Seoul—

President Truman and United Nations Vow Swift Retaliation—

Boston Times

KOREAN WAR HERO’S EXCLUSIVE—

My Story: How I Captured “Yalu Charlie”—

by Lt. Colonel Steven Gold—

PhotoWeek Magazine

Steven Gold was bored as hell.

It was a warm Friday afternoon. Indian summer in Washington. The Senate hearings being held to explore the advisability of
continued funding for the Air Force’s hair-raisingly expensive B-45 bomber program had been running six hours a day for the
past week. For the past hour an assistant to the Secretary of the Air Force had been droning into the microphone.

Steve restlessly shifted in his hard-backed folding chair, trying to get comfortable. He was seated in the next to the last
row, way back near the caucus room’s main exit. From where he was sitting he could hear footsteps and soft chatter echoing
in the corridor outside.

Must be office workers leaving to get an early start on the weekend
, Steve thought enviously. He stared up at the four enormous crystal chandeliers illuminating the marble-paneled room. During
the past week he’d already amused himself counting the light bulbs in each fixture. Twice.

“Now then, Mr. Chairman …” The witness paused to nervously clear his throat. The microphone amplified it into a lion’s roar.
“Allow me to bring you up to date concerning what the Secretary has been doing since July 26 of this year, when President
Truman signed the National Security Act which brought into being the United States Air Force as an independent branch.”

A wave of restlessness moved through the crowded gallery. The hearing’s chairman, Senator Hill, rapped his gavel in warning.

A photographer, shaking his head, got up and left. His camera bag jingled loudly as he walked to the exit.

Lucky bastard
, Steve thought enviously as the photographer passed him on the way out. Steve couldn’t leave. He had orders to attend the
hearings from gavel to gavel.

“The witness may proceed,” Senator Hill intoned. He and the other senators seated up at the front of the room looked as sleepy
as Steve felt.

“Thank you, Senator. Now then, when President Truman signed Executive Order 9877, which defined the roles of the three services
…”

Steve glanced at his watch. Just another couple of hours until adjournment for the weekend. His attention shifted to the couple
seated up front.

They’d come in about a half hour ago. They guy was average, but the dame with him, a brunette with curly shoulder-length hair,
was a knockout. She was wearing a light green silk suit and a soft black hat that looked like a beret. Thanks to all the coverage
that guy Dior had been getting in the photo weeklies, Steve knew enough to realize that what she was wearing was the latest
out of Paris, and had to have cost plenty.

The brunette was looking around in that politely bored, languid, aristocratic way that reminded Steve of some of his mother’s
woman friends. He watched as she discreetly arched her back, stretching like a purebred feline.

Wonder what it would take to get her to purr?
Steve grinned. No question it would be worth the effort.

Steve also wondered for the countless time if the bookish-looking guy next to her was her husband. Somehow he didn’t think
so. She just didn’t look married. But then, the really classy ladies in his parents’ social circle never did, Steve reminded
himself. Not even when they were grandmothers.

The official at the witness table was continuing his testimony.

“The Air Force’s first step on the road to the development of postwar U.S. air power was the decision to create a force with
global capabilities, the Strategic Air Command, which came into being in March of last year. SAC reorganized air power into
three Commands: Strategic, Tactical, and Air Defense. The theory behind SAC is that a bomber delivering atomic weapons can
handle any situation where diplomacy proves ineffective. Predictably, a certain branch of the service lobbied hard against
this point of view—”

“Excuse me,” one of the subcommittee members, Senator Tabworth, broke in. “I presume the witness is referring to the Navy?”

“I am,” the Air Force official said stiffly.

This ought to be good, Steve thought, perking up. The Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman, Senator Hill, was solidly behind
the Air Force, but Tabworth, who’d served on a battleship in World War One, was the subcommittee’s chief proponent of the
Navy point of view. He’d publicly vowed to do all he could to help the Navy scuttle the B-45 and get the millions earmarked
for the bomber project reallocated for the development of a larger class of aircraft carrier capable of launching airplanes
carrying atomic weapons.

At the front of the room Senator Tabworth was gearing up to make a speech. “May I remind the witness that the proud United
States Navy, which has over a hundred and seventy year history of defending this great nation against—”

Hill rapped his gavel. “Would the senator please make his point?” he asked wearily.

“I will, if the chairman shall allow it….” Tabworth huffed.

Steve found it amusing that these two guys, who for the past week had been bickering like Abbott and Costello, looked so much
alike. They were both in their sixties and built slender, except for their potbellies. Both favored three-piece suits and
bow ties, wore wire-rimmed specs, and had about five strands of hair apiece, which they wore plastered across their scalps.

“If the last war has taught us anything,” Tabworth was orating, “it is that the common foot soldier is necessary to get the
job done.”

“Except in Japan,” the Air Force official at the witness table quipped.

Good for you
, Steve thought as an appreciative chuckle erupted across the room.

“Atomic weapons will be important,” Tabworth agreed, “But such weapons will never replace troops, and that means Navy transports
will be necessary to get the troops to where they are going, and that means Navy
carriers
will be necessary to
supply
those troops with air support—”

“Thank you, Senator Tabworth,” Hill determinedly interrupted. “Now then, the witness may continue.”

“If I may address Senator Tabworth’s point,” the witness began. “The Air Force views the strategic bomber carrying atomic
bombs as the single decisive factor in any future conflict with our likeliest adversary: the Soviet Union. Troop involvement
in a conflict with the Russians would be minimal, if at all.” The witness paused to glance down at his notes. “Concerning
this topic, I would like to quote the Air Force’s Chief of Staff, General Carl Spaatz: ‘We will not have to plod laboriously
and bloodily along the Minsk–Smolensk–Moscow road in order to strike at Russia’s vitals. Hence the war may be concluded within
weeks and perhaps days.’”

Nice rebuttal
, Steve thought to himself. Behind him he heard the door opening and closing.

“This seat taken, Captain?” a man whispered as he sidled into the row and sat down next to Steve.

Steve glanced up. It had been so long that it took him a moment to recognize the face. “Uncle Tim?” he whispered.

“Long time, no see, Stevie.” Tim Campbell grinned, the laugh lines deepening around his wide-set, dark eyes.