'Who saw the crash?'
'Only myself. I would have finished Ball by drinking his blood, but there was fire. I judged it unwise to touch ground.'
'You have not recently been in communication with British Military Intelligence?'
Goring snarled, pig-like tusks sharp. 'You upstart cur, I'll have you whipped ...'
'He's right, Hermann,' Theo said, calming the recording officer. 'Someone gave the British an accurate account of your victory over Albert Ball. It could only have been the observer of the Baron's RE8.'
Poe, vindicated, continued, 'if he gave his account to his superiors, he must ergo have survived and returned to his lines.'
The completed puzzle hung in the air. Theo waved his cigarette holder and his cloud drifted apart.
Lothar whistled. 'Manfred will not be pleased. It's rare that his little jokes backfire.'
The fliers seemed cheered that Baron von Richthofen had made a mistake. Maybe it proved the Red Battle Flier was made of the same stuff as they. Human stuff, after all,
'The Baron should have killed pilot and observer,' Theo agreed. 'It may be a great error on his part.'
'There is still no proof the observer survived, Theo,' Goring said. 'It is most unlikely.'
'There is no proof, but I am satisfied. And so is Herr Edgar Poe.'
The fliers regarded him with a mix of admiration and contempt.
'I understand you find my brother hard going? Can you imagine what it has been like having Manfred as an example for a whole lifetime?'
Lothar von Richthofen leaned against the battlements. The breeze riffled an aviator's scarf away from his casually worn Pour le Merite. With white grin, shiny-peaked cap, black leather boots and breeches and loose crimson blouse in the Russian style, he looked far more the dashing hero than his brother.
'Even if the gods of battle will it and Manfred falls, I will never be the Red Baron. I will always be the Red Baron's brother. I have my medals. I have my score. But I fly in his shadow.'
The afternoon was overcast but Poe wore tinted spectacles with side-panels. He heard the minute sounds of distant birds more acutely than the nearby din of war. To his ears, the castle was a living thing of creaking stone and breathing wood.
'We are very different, he and I,' Lothar declared. 'Even when warm, Manfred was not "warm". Given that I have chosen a life of service which will, in all probability, not last long, I feel entitled to take my pleasures to excess. As a poet, you will understand what I mean. But I doubt Manfred has ever been with a woman except for feeding. Even then, he prefers his dogs. And his fallen foes.'
Lothar was his brother's opposite. He described exploits in embroidered detail, making an uneventful patrol one of Sinbad's voyages. In the Great Hall, he would give thrilling accounts of his battles, performing rather than reciting. Other fliers hung on every word, every turn of combat. It would be a simple matter to make of Lothar von Richthofen's reminiscences a heroic autobiography.
'He is a good soldier,' Poe suggested. 'He flies by the rules, fights by the rules . .
'The sacred dicta of Boelcke?' Lothar said, eyebrows arching.
'Manfred has made them his Bible, a manual for survival, for victory. As for the soldiering, it's hard to say. I fly close to the wind. I was always the boy who got in trouble while Manfred did his duty, or enough of it to get by. But it's open to debate whether he is really the better soldier.'
'I don't understand.'
Lothar watched a hawk wheel and circle over pigeons. Perhaps he was studying the tactics of aerial predators?
'Ask Theo if Manfred is a good soldier. That business with the RE8. You know what he did?'
'He took the pilot in mid-air and drained him.'
'And he left the observer. The man could not possibly have got control of the aircraft. Imagine his panic, his fear, as the RE8 went into a spin. Consider his frustration, his powerlessness.'
Poe thought it must be like being buried alive. Having written of the condition while warm, he had experienced it upon his turning. The stinking closeness still tormented his imaginings. No, that was a more protracted fate. To go down in an aeroplane must be like waking in a coffin as it is conveyed into the furnace of a crematorium.
'To Manfred, that man's fear was almost as rich as the pilot's blood. He feeds on that as he feeds on the fawning of his admirers. Secretly, he is delighted you are to write this book.'
'That is not my impression.'
Lothar's grin was wolfish. 'Make no mistake. He has heard of you, Poe. If only for The Battle of St Petersburg. You've been well chosen.'
One of the hawks took one of the pigeons. Poe heard the tiny neck snap. The sensations of the world crowded in on him. Little sounds from the countryside all around. The water lapping in the lake. Footsteps on frozen grass.
'It was impossible that the British observer could survive, but in war the impossible is commonplace. It is customary to kill one's foe as many times as possible, to be sure. It was important the observer be killed. It was the primary objective of the flight. Yet Manfred took delight in torturing him rather than going for a clean, certain kill. His pleasure, his feeding, his score... these were more important to him than executing his mission. In this case, that may have consequences we shall all regret.'
'This must be a constant complaint against heroes.'
'I am a hero too, Poe,' Lothar said, hands on hips, a deadly Adonis. 'I concede you are right. This is a part of all of us. Certainly, all of us in JG1. But it is all of Manfred. He is not a man, he is a weapon. I love him for he is my brother, but I would not trade hearts with him, not for his score, not for his fame.'
The hawk soared higher. Poe and Lothar both followed its path, turning to keep the bird in in their sights.
'Manfred kills, Poe. That is what he does. That is what he is.'
30
Returned to Life
Over the protests of the nurse, Kate walked with Edwin in the hospital grounds. Shortly after dawn, the moon was not yet down. Her glasses were sensibly tinted. Daylight hurt her only at the height of a cloudless summer day. The gauzy blue dawn light of French winter was as cool as a night of the crescent moon.
Edwin held her hand. His grip was firm, hers weak. He was changing. So, she supposed, was she.
He had not told her much of his mission to Malinbois, just that he had been in an aeroplane brought down by enemy action and had made his way back across the lines. Some of his reluctance to give detail was imposed by the Diogenes Club, who wished to keep their secrets. But there was in him some spark of strangeness. He now had his own secrets. This Edwin Winthrop who returned was not quite the man who had gone out.
'I'm in flying school. Diogenes is lending me to the new show. They'll need trained intelligence people.'
The Royal Flying Corps was being divorced from the army and reformed as a new service, the Royal Air Force. Edwin no longer wore his staff officer's pips.
'I'd have thought that after the last jaunt, you'd wish never to go near an aeroplane again.'
His face was set, his mind closed to her. 'Unfinished business in the air, Kate. I have to get back up there.'
The sun came out and Edwin flinched. His eyes closed to slits. She knew, at once, why.
There's a demon in the sky and I must kill him.'
They stepped into the tangled shadow of a bare tree.
'You've vampire blood in you,' she said.
He nodded. 'A pilot I was shot down with. Albert Ball.'
She had heard of Ball, a decorated ace.