“Herr Oberleutnant, the dugout is impossible to make in such conditions. The sand keeps going back into the hole as soon as the wind blows. As soon as we dig, it comes right back into it.”
“Herr Oberleutnant, how should we camouflage the fighters? We don’t have anything to cover them with.”
“Have the trucks with water arrived yet, Herr Oberleutnant?”
“What should we do about the latrines, Herr Oberleutnant?”
Herr Oberleutnant turned on his heel towards Willi and appeared for a second as though he wished to walk away from the whole enterprise and let them court-martial him for all he cared. As soon as he noticed the single figure, heading from the direction of the road, he rushed toward him, screaming with a frantic urgency which Willi would have ordinarily found comical, had it not been for the pitiful state of affairs on the base. “You! Are you with the supply unit?”
“Who, me?” Willi even looked over his shoulder, wondering if his new CO addressed someone else behind his back. Surely, he noticed his pilot’s uniform◦– newly issued, Afrika Korps tan one. “No, I’m from your Staffel… I suppose. I’m Oberfähnrich Wilhelm von Sielaff, fighter ace.”
“Fighter ace without a fighter?” Oberleutnant gave him a thorough, mistrustful once-over as though ensuring that he was indeed a pilot.
“Engine problems. I had to leave it there, on the road.”
“That’s not good. Our Staffel consists of battered fighters as it is and we can’t afford to lose—” Oberleutnant suddenly stopped mid-word. “Wait, what was your name again?”
“Wilhelm von Sielaff, Mein Oberleutnant.”
“Not Kronprinz von Pas-de-Calais von Sielaff?” This time the CO broke into a wide grin.
Willi lowered his head against all military regulations, hoping to conceal his chuckling. “Jawohl, Herr Oberleutnant. That’s me, all right.”
Instead of a torrent of reprimands and moaning as to what did he possibly do to his superiors to receive such a clown into his staff, his new CO shook his hand quite amicably and invited him into his “headquarters”◦– one of the trucks in urgent need of camouflage.
“I heard a lot about you, Oberfähnrich von Sielaff! Come, you’ll tell me all about your exploits over the Channel. Is it true that you once engaged eight enemy fighters at the same time?”
“True, Herr Oberleutnant. But I hit only three of them before my unit caught up with me and did away with the rest.”
“You crazy daredevil!” The young Oberleutnant, who was barely thirty, judging by his youthful face and a much more liberal bearing than all the previous flight commanders that Willi had encountered, clapped him on his shoulder once again. “I’m really looking forward to flying with you! I just have to see you in the sky after everything I heard. Will you fly as my wingman on the next sortie?”
Willi hesitated for a moment. “I don’t know if you read my service record yet, Herr Oberleutnant, but my previous commanding officer stated in it◦– and quite truthfully◦– that I make a lousy wingman.”
“Let me see that.” He outstretched his hand for the service record. Willi pulled it out from his backpack, cringing at the size of it. It was surely thick enough with violations for an entire Geschwader.
Oberleutnant leafed through the file, his grin growing wider and wider. Finally, he outright burst out laughing.
“Restricted from flying for today’s mission. Reason: too hungover to fly. Is this even a real entry?”
“Very much so, I’m afraid, Herr Oberleutnant. Yes.”
“I think we’ll work just fine together, Oberfähnrich von Sielaff. Welcome to JG-27, 1 Staffel.”
“You just look at him! Look what he’s doing, the crazy son of a bitch!” Oberleutnant Degenhardt added a few elaborate curses which, in his understanding, signified the highest of praises.
Willi, encouraged by his new commander’s “show ‘em what you got” spoken right after the pre-flight briefing, didn’t think twice before breaking formation at the first sight of the enemy and throwing himself into the fight, heavily outnumbered ten to one. He flew as a Rottenführer for the first time; yet, he appeared to completely forget about such thing as a wingman who sheepishly clung to the Schwarm, most likely thinking it to be suicidal to follow his leader into a veritable death trap◦– a formation called Lufbery, a large circle of enemy planes that used each other for protection.
Johann increased his throttle at once to catch up with Willi, who had already lowered his airspeed, lowered his flaps to almost stalling speed, and slipped into the enemy formation.
“Got one.” The radio crackled with the sound of Willi’s calm, collected voice.
Indeed, one of the Hurricanes began trailing smoke and rapidly losing altitude. Wilhelm, meanwhile, slipped out of the line of fire just as British bullets struck one of the Hurricanes that happened to be where Willi’s fighter should have been. A mask of horror and guilt, etched on the Brit’s features as he realized that he had shot down one of his own instead of the insolent Hun, flashed before Willi’s eyes as he watched the Hurricane slipping down, smoking, tumbling to its death. But it was no time for regrets; only time to increase throttle, line up the third kill and take it down before the rest of his Schwarm formation caught up with him, at last, to do away with the rest of the Lufbery.
“Watching you is like watching ballet!” Oberleutnant Degenhardt offered Willi his hand as soon as the Schwarm landed back onto the field. “I’ve seen talented pilots in my life but you… How do you manage not to lose your altitude during your stall maneuvers?”
“Oh, it’s easy. You just have to chop the throttle, kick the rudder, roll the stick and you’ll keep your altitude.” Willi shrugged as though it was as natural as teaching a friend how to ride a bicycle. There’s nothing to it, Hans; just keep it straight and pedal.
Oberleutnant Degenhardt tried all of those pointers later, just for practice; finally landed his fighter, wiped the sweat off his brow and, to his pilots’ questions only scratched his forehead in a puzzled way. “I lost half my altitude just recovering from the stall. How the hell he does it is beyond my understanding.”
Wilhelm von Sielaff had been officially allowed to fly solo from that day on. He appeared in the dugout where Johann was scribbling a letter home and without any preamble started saying, in a rushed manner, that he would ask Herr Oberleutnant to reappoint him as Johann’s wingman if Johann wanted; that he would never abandon him and that he would fly with him for the rest of his life as number two if needed, until Johann broke into a fit of chuckles and interrupted him with a raised hand.
“I finally got rid of your unreliable persona and you want to invite yourself back into my company? I think not.”
Willi was beaming, his face with a tropical tan nearly radiating with happiness. “You’re not mad, are you?”