'Thanks, Chico. Meet Colonel Dick Baedecker.'
Baedecker shook hands, and then they were moving across the tarmac to where the mechanics were sliding back the side door of a helicopter parked behind the larger Chinook. 'I'll be damned,' said Baedecker. 'A Huey.'
'A Bell HU-1 Iroquois to you, tenderfoot,' said Dave. 'Thanks, Chico, we'll take it from here. Nate's got my flight plan filed.'
'Have a good trip, Colonel,' said the sergeant. 'Nice meetin' ya, Colonel Baedecker.' As Baedecker followed Dave around the ship, he felt a slight sinking sensation in the region of his solar plexus. He had ridden in Hueys scores of times — even clocked thirty-five hours or more flying them during the early days of his NASA training — and he had hated every minute of it. Baedecker knew that Dave loved the treacherous machines; much of Muldorff's experimental flying had been in helicopters. In 1965, Dave had been on loan to Hughes Aircraft to sort out problems in their prototype TH-55A trainer. The new helicopter had a tendency to drop nose first into the earth without warning. The research led to comparison field studies on the flight characteristics of the older Bell HU-1, already in service in Vietnam. Dave was sent to Vietnam for six weeks of observation flying with the army pilots who were reported to be doing unusual things with their machines there. Four and a half months later he was recalled after it was discovered that he had been flying combat missions with a medevac squadron on a daily basis.
Dave had used his experience to solve Hughes's problem with the TH-55As, but he had been passed over for promotion as a result of his unauthorized flying with the 1st Cav. He also received notes from both the Air Force and Army informing him that under no circumstances could he put in for retroactive combat flight pay. Dave had laughed. He had been notified two weeks before leaving Vietnam that he had been accepted into NASA's training program for post-Gemini astronauts.
'Not bad,' said Baedecker as they finished the external checks and moved into the cockpit. 'Got your own slick for weekend jaunts. One of the perks of being a congressman, Dave?' Muldorff laughed and tossed Baedecker a clipboard with the cockpit checklist. 'Sure,' he said. 'Goldwater used to get his free rides in F-18s. I've got my Huey. Of course, it helps that I'm still on active reserve out here.' He handed Baedecker a baseball cap with the insignia AIR FORCE 1_ sewn on it. Baedecker tugged it on and set the radio headset in place. 'Also, Richard,' continued Dave, 'it might reassure you to know — as a concerned taxpayer — that this particular pile of rusted bolts did its duty in ‘Nam, ferried around weekend warriors out here for ten years, and is now officially on the spare-parts list. Chico and the boys keep it around in case anybody has to run up to Portland to buy cigarettes or something.'
'Yeah,' said Baedecker. 'Great.' He strapped himself into the left seat as Dave waggled the cyclic control stick and reached down with his left hand to squeeze the starter trigger on the collective pitch control lever. It had been the constant interplay of controls — cyclic, collective, rudder pedals, and throttle thrust grip — that had given Baedecker fits when he had been forced to fly the perverse machines twenty years earlier. Compared to a military helicopter, the Apollo lunar module had been a simple machine to master.
The gas-turbine engine roared, the high-speed starter motor whined, and the two forty-eight-foot rotor blades began to turn. 'Yowzuh!' called Dave over the intercom. Various dials registered their appropriate readings while the whop-whop-whop of the main rotors reached a point of almost physical pressure. Dave pulled up on the collective control and three tons of well-aged machinery lifted off its skids to hover five feet above the tarmac.
'Ready to see my shortcut?' Dave's voice was flat and metallic over the intercom.
'Show me,' said Baedecker.
Dave grinned, spoke quickly into his mike, and confidently pitched the ship forward as they began their climb into the east.
San Francisco was rainy and cold for the two days Baedecker and Maggie Brown were there. At Maggie's suggestion, they stayed in a renovated old hotel near Union Square. The halls were dimly lit and smelled of paint, the showers were jerry-rigged onto massive bathtubs with claw feet, and everywhere hung the exposed pipes of the building's sprinkler system. Baedecker and Maggie took turns showering to remove the grime of their forty-eight-hour train trip, lay down to take a nap, made love instead, showered again, and went out into the evening.
'I've never been here before,' said Maggie with a wide grin. 'It's marvelous!' The streets were busy with rushing theater-goers and couples — mostly male — walking hand in hand under neon signs promising topless and bottomless delights. The wind smelled of the sea and exhaust fumes. The cable-car system was down for repairs, and all of the cabs in sight were either filled or beyond hailing distance. Baedecker and Maggie took a bus to Fisherman's Wharf where they walked without speaking until a cold drizzle and Baedecker's injured ankle forced them into a restaurant.
'The prices are high,' said Maggie when the main course had been served, 'but the scallops are delicious.'
'Yes,' said Baedecker.
'All right, Richard,' said Maggie and touched his hand. 'What's wrong?' Baedecker shook his head. 'Nothing.' Maggie waited.
'I was just wondering how you were going to make up this week's worth of classes,' he said and poured more wine for both of them.
'Not true,' said Maggie. In the candlelight her green eyes seemed almost turquoise. Her cheeks were sunburned even under their tan. 'Tell me.' Baedecker looked at her a long moment. 'I've been thinking about when Tom Gavin's son pulled that stupid stunt in the mountains,' he said.
Maggie smiled. 'You mean dancing naked on a rock during a lightning storm? With a tent pole in one hand? That stupid stunt?' Baedecker nodded. 'He could have been killed.'
'This is true,' agreed Maggie. 'Especially since he seemed intent upon taking the names of all the gods in vain until he pissed off the wrong one.' She seemed to notice Baedecker's intensity and her voice changed. 'Hey, it turned out all right. Why are you letting it bother you now?'
'It's not what he did that bothers me,' said Baedecker. 'It's what I did while he was up on that boulder.'
'You didn't do anything,' said Maggie.
'Exactly,' said Baedecker and finished his glass of wine. He poured more. 'I did nothing.'
'Tommy's father got him down before either one of us could react,' said Maggie.
Baedecker nodded. At a nearby table several women laughed loudly at an unheard joke.
'Oh, I see,' said Maggie. 'We're talking about Scott again.'
Baedecker wiped his hands on a red linen napkin. 'I'm not sure,' he said. 'But at least Tom Gavin saw his son doing something stupid and saved him from possible disaster.'
'Yes,' said Maggie, 'and little Tommy was . . . what . . .? seventeen, and Scott will be twenty-three in March.'
'Yes, but . . .'
'And little Tommy was ten feet away,' said Maggie. 'Scott is in Poona. India.'
'I know that . . .'
'Besides, who are you to say what Scott's doing there is disaster? You've had your chance, Richard. Scott's a big boy now, and if he wants to spend a few years chanting mantras and giving away his lunch money to some bearded horse's ass with a Jehovah Complex, well, you've had your chance to help him, so what do you say you just get on with your screwed-up life, Richard E. Baedecker.' Maggie took a long drink of wine. 'Oh, shit, sometimes, Richard, you give me such a . . .' She stopped and began to hiccup violently.