Charteris took Hilda’s arm and-following behind several other passengers, who were still moving slow, taking it all in-escorted her to the starboard side, where a spacious lounge was outfitted with modernistic tables and chairs of an aluminum chrome so light a child could lift them.
The lounge-dominated by a huge mural-style wall map with sailing ships, denoting the routes of famous explorers-was bereft of the feature that had been its most popular item on the maiden voyage: the lightweight yellow pigskin-covered aluminum Bluthner baby grand piano, around which Charteris and his wife, Pauline, had so often stood as Captain Lehmann played. He and Pauline would offer slightly tipsy renditions of Cole Porter, to the delight of their fellow passengers. “Cheek to Cheek” had been their showstopper.
“Leslie,” Hilda said. “Is something wrong?”
“No,” he said, realizing he’d paused in reflection, now moving on, dismissing a pang of loss that he told himself was for the Bluthner baby grand but was in fact for his soon-to-be ex-wife. “Let’s find a nice front-row seat.”
Separated from the lounge by an aluminum railing, an observation deck ran the length of the starboard side (a similar one would be found portside). A number of passengers-Miss Mather among them-had found positions along this promenade. Padded upholstered rust-orange benches, now and then, sat at a right angle to the wall of big slanted windows, offering an aquariumlike view on the world below.
Right now that view was of the Nazi Boy Scouts and that blue-and-yellow-garbed brass band, as well as several dozen spectators-friends and relatives denied permission to go aboard before castoff, waving their bon voyages in the rain.
Charteris and Hilda had just taken one of the seats-barely room enough for two, but a pleasant sort of crowding, the author thought-when the brass band began to play “Deutschland uber Alles.”
“Ah,” Charteris said, “we’ll be casting off soon…. Would you like to remove your raincoat?”
“No, thank you. I rather enjoy this breeze.”
The slanting windows were open, letting in cool evening air but no rain; even at cruising speed, Charteris knew, nasty weather could not find its way in these ingeniously rigged windows, which had a generous shelflike sill. Unfortunately the blaring German band-somewhat off-key-was having no trouble getting in.
When the band had completed the ponderous anthem, the crowd applauded and cheered and whistled; above this clamor came a voice over the ship’s loudspeakers, a blaring announcement in German that could be heard outside, as well.
“Will the wife of Colonel Erdmann please come forward!”
So Erdmann of the Luftwaffe was a colonel-but unlike the stockyard king from Chicago, Nelson Morris, Fritz hadn’t bragged about the fact.
From the crowd stepped a slender woman in a green-and-white gingham dress and large-brimmed green straw hat, protecting herself and her stylish attire under an umbrella. Even at this distance, it was apparent that Mrs. Erdmann was a strikingly attractive woman. A steward ran to greet her and escort her to the ship, the pair walking out of view from the promenade windows.
“Privileges of military men,” Charteris muttered, glancing around to see if Erdmann was on this side of the ship.
He was, but not with the others, at the slanted windows-the Luftwaffe colonel had taken a seat, by himself, in the lounge area, which was otherwise unpopulated, his hands folded on the table, his expression an odd amalgam of glum and anxious.
Soon the woman in green and white emerged on A deck, appearing like an apparition; and she was indeed striking, Charteris noted-brunette, slenderly shapely, her face a pale oval, as perfect and lovely as the image on a cameo brooch.
Erdmann sprang to his feet and she rushed to him. They embraced, not kissing, not speaking, just clutching each other with a passionate intensity that caused most of the passengers witnessing this private moment to turn away, out of respect, or embarrassment.
But Charteris watched. As an author, he had trained himself to observe and this farewell was both touching and unusual. Erdmann’s wife was grasping her husband so tightly her knuckles had whitened; and when they finally drew away, her face was streaked with tears. He withdrew a handkerchief from his suit coat pocket, dried her face with it, then pressed it into her hand. They kissed, briefly, and he walked her toward the stairs, both of them disappearing from view.
Charteris caught Miss Mather’s gaze, down the promenade; the spinster was frowning as her eyes sent him a question: Had Erdmann, too, had a premonition?
“What do you make of such an emotional auf wiedersehen?” Hilda asked.
Charteris shrugged. “That gentleman is involved with ship security. He may know something we don’t.”
“I cannot say I like the sound of that.”
“I can’t say you’re alone.”
Then a voice blared over the loudspeaker, first German, then English: “Schiff hoch! Up ship!”
The band began to play again, a reprise of the national anthem; figures were scurrying below, loosening mooring lines, unhooking the nose cone at the bow, searchlights on the field fanning the great ship as if at a motion-picture premiere. Diesel engines sputtered to life, but on the observation deck, the sound seemed muffled, even remote.
Down on the runway, Mrs. Erdmann had not rejoined the crowd-she stood closer to the ship than anyone else, staring up at the windows, waving with the handkerchief her husband had given her to dry her tears. And indeed Erdmann stood at the promenade windows, now, staring down at his wife, his hand raised in a frozen wave that uncomfortably resembled a Nazi salute.
Then Mrs. Erdmann and everyone else on the airfield grew smaller.
THREE
At 8:15 P.M. the HINDENBURG, on a northwesterly course, making for the Rhine River at Cobenz, sailed into an overcast-cloaked twilight. Below, the Hitler youth belied their adult uniforms and became the children they were, running after the silver airship as it rose, as if pursuing a balloon whose string had slipped through their fingers. Nazi caps flew from their heads as they raced after the shrinking ship, until the airfield fence at the pinewoods brought a sudden stop to their carefree chase. The hatless boys gazed up at the great ship, an airfield searchlight holding its circular beam on the tail fin where rode their beloved swastika; then the spotlight switched off, ship and symbol disappearing into the gathering darkness.
In the well-lit world of A deck on the Hindenburg, Charteris and his new friend, Hilda Friederich, were standing at the windows now, the author catching the young woman, when she seemed to lose her balance.
“I am sorry,” she said, breaking from the brief embrace. “I’m afraid I am a trifle dizzy….”
“It will quickly pass,” Charteris said, knowing this reaction was typical of dirigible departure, a momentary disorientation caused by the sight of the ground swiftly receding and the people below growing smaller and smaller, combined with the absence of any sense of motion, of any awareness of being airborne.
He himself did not experience this sensation, however; to Charteris, there was only a feeling of buoyancy, a lightness, as if gravity had suddenly lessened. The start of a journey by any other mechanical means-airplane, railway, motorcar, tramway-could not compare with the smoothness, the effortlessness, of a zeppelin casting off.