The Red Baron: A World War I Novel (19 page)

“Captain von Richthofen, on behalf of the CEWRC, please accept this wreath honoring your glorious service to the Empire.” The man opened his arms wide as he continued the speech. “Additionally, let me add that—”

“Thank you,” Manfred snapped. He picked up the wreath and carried it into the house, closing the door with enough of a slam to dash any hopes of an encore.

He heard his mother making apologies as he retreated into the house. The walls of his family home had a half dozen wreaths hanging from the walls and doors, each one wrapped in ribbons of black, red, and white, mimicking the German flag. He tossed the newest addition against the doorway leading to the dining room and went into the trophy room.

An undercurrent of anger filled his mind as he paced across the room. He walked past the collage of fabric serial numbers squeezing and flexing his hands, the muscles of his upper back and arms tense.

The serial numbers nearly covered a whole wall. The tricolor bull’s-eye from his twentieth victory hung in a gilded frame next to a picture of him sitting in a cockpit, his head covered by a cowl. A glass case held sixty silver cups. Each bore an inscription detailing a victory: date, location, and the defeated type of aircraft. Every tenth victory cup as large as the
Ehrenbecher
that was the genesis for the collection.

“Manfred,” his mother said. Manfred crossed his arms across his chest to stifle his grasping hands and grunted a reply.

“Manfred, that was very—” Her stern tone shifted. “Would you please be a little more polite to guests?”

“I came out here to rest, not to be an exhibit,” he said.

“I’ll ask that no one else comes to bother you, tell them you need to rest.”

“It’s not a ‘bother,’ Mother. It’s just…thank you. I’ll be ready for guests soon.”

“Baroness,” Katy said from the doorway. “Time to change his bandages.”

Manfred walked from the dispensary, fresh bandages gleaming in the sunlight. A handful of well-wishers intercepted him before he could make it to the car Metzger had waiting. He signed Sanke cards and shook hands with starry-eyed civilians before he could slip into the backseat. After word got out that he went to the dispensary each day for fresh bandages, Manfred was sure the entire town of Schweidnitz had something signed by him.

Katy got in the car a moment later. “Can we please go to the dispensary at Schlesien, or Waldenburg tomorrow? This mob is getting old.”

Metzger drove on. “Sorry, ma’am. The gas ration is only enough to get us to here and back to the house.”

“You could change my bandages at home?” Manfred asked.

“Of course. That doctor insists on bringing you in only so he can brag about how he’s treated you for so many days. His head nurse told me as much,” Katy said.

“Metzger, save the gas ration for a few days. We’ll go to Waldenburg next, break up the pattern,” Manfred said.

Metzger opened his mouth to protest, then closed his mouth with a click of teeth.

“In fact, let me out once we pass the railway station. I’ll walk the rest of the way home,” Manfred said.

“Manfred, are you sure?” Katy said. He hadn’t had any exercise since the day he was shot.

“Join me?”

Metzger stopped at the station, and Manfred got out and opened the door for Katy. She left the car without taking Manfred’s proffered hand.

“What will the knitting circles think if they see you and me walking about?” she asked.

“I will introduce you as my fiancée and discourage all the young women who insist on taking a detour past my house,” Manfred said.

“Don’t you dare.” Katy waved to Metzger, but he was too far away to stop and pick her back up.

Manfred took her through a wooded trail, refusing any conversation, as his hunter’s instincts demanded stealth. Katy kept her eyes to the ground, mindful of the mud puddles that threatened the hem of her dress. She stepped around a wet patch and bumped into Manfred.

He stood stock still, his body half-hidden behind a tree. He held up a fist, his eyes locked on something moving through the forest.

“What is it?” she said.

Leaves rustled in the distance and a four-point buck emerged into a clearing. The deer raised its nose in the air, sniffing for predators. Manfred raised an imaginary rifle to his shoulder, and followed the deer as it moved closer.

The deer turned, exposing its heart to Manfred’s faux weapon. Manfred mimicked a slight recoil, and then clicked his tongue twice. The deer froze, then bounded into the forest.

“If you had a rifle, would you have shot it?” Katy asked.

“No, I wouldn’t have shot him. I took a twelve-point buck before the war. Inferior trophies don’t interest me,” he said, returning to the trail.

“I imagine no animal could top what you have in your trophy room,” Katy said.

“Nonsense, I have always wanted to go on safari to Africa. Great cats, elephants—there’s this giant creature called a hippopotamus that is quite deadly in the water,” he said.

“No, Manfred, the airplanes.”

“Those,” Manfred continued through the shortcut, the second floor of his home obscured by branches shifting in the wind, “those aren’t trophies. They are evidence. I don’t expect you to understand. Pilots have to prove they make their kills; otherwise, there’s no credit. No credit, no awards. No awards, no glory.”

“That’s why you do it? For the glory?”

Manfred cut around the bushes marking the perimeter of the house, and led her into a rose garden.

“Once, yes. Now I do it out of habit, the higher-ups expect me to do it. Because I do it, my men do it.”

“What about the glory?”

Manfred cupped a rose and took a deep breath of its fragrance. He walked past a plot of cucumbers and tomatoes, plants that his mother would never have grown before the war.

“Would you believe me if I told you there was no glory? After my first battle, my heart knew that men bleeding and dying wasn’t glorious. All those years at the academy and in the cavalry preparing for that glorious charge into the enemy lines, and it never happened. My ego wanted to find it in the air, prove that what I believed wasn’t a lie.”

He ran a hand over his bandaged skull. “Look what I found.”

His mouth opened to say something more, but his jaw went slack as his eyes stared off into the distance. His hands reached out to either side of him. His knees buckled and he stumbled forward.

“No, no, no, your bandages” Katy caught Manfred as he collapsed. She fell back onto her seat and held Manfred against her on his way down.

He lay with his head in her lap, staring into the sky. Katy had one hand on his chest, the other cupped his head.

“At least I missed the thorns this time,” he said.

“What happened?”

“I just got dizzy and now I’m…” he looked up at her face and tried to sit up. Katy pushed him back against her lap. “Still dizzy,” he said.

“Stay still. You’ll fall into the dirt and ruin all that doctor’s hard work. Just stay here for a moment.”

Manfred’s face went red. “Katy, this is…compromising.”

“What—your mother never caught you with a girl?”

“That’s not what this is. But no. Lothar, yes.”

“Then this isn’t ‘compromising,’ then relax,” Katy said. They stayed there for a few minutes more. Katy ran the tips of her fingers down the side of Manfred’s bandages once, then closed her hand into a fist before she could do it again. The sound of wind moving through trees mingled with lark calls.

Manfred pulled at the grass under his left hand, and brought up a red poppy. He twirled one of the flowers in his hand, then plucked away the little bit of soil clinging to its stem.

“These grow at the Front.” He tucked the flower between the fingers of Katy’s hand. “I miss it,” Manfred said. “The noise, the artillery, machine guns, the constant sound of soldiers talking, working.”

“Hush. Enjoy some peace and quiet.”

Manfred grabbed her hand from his chest, and pushed it away. He sat up, tested his balance and stood up. He helped Katy back to her feet.

“There’s no peace for me, Katy. Not anymore.”

“There he is, Momma!” a child’s voice rang out from the road leading past his home.

Manfred saw the top of a boy’s head peeking over the manicured bushes, a woman in mourning black, her face hidden by a veil, held the boy’s hand.

“Must be friendlier,” Manfred said. He flashed a smile and walked to the gate.

The boy was five or six, difficult to gauge, considering how skinny he was. The boy’s knees were almost bulbous below his shorts, bright blue eyes were large in his shrunken face. His bare feet shifted in the gray dust of the road.

“I told you he would come!” the boy squealed.

“I’m sorry, sir, he was so excited to see you,” the veiled woman said. Shoes made of cardboard peeked out from beneath the tattered hem of her dress.

Manfred opened the gate and knelt on a knee in front of the boy. “No problem, miss. What’s your name?”

“Joachim Schwehr. Do you remember my Papa?” Joachim asked.

Schwehr. Manfred found it familiar, but couldn’t place it.

The memory of Sergeant Schwehr came back. One of the cavalrymen he lost during his baptism by fire. He remembered Schwehr thrown from a wounded horse, then felled by French bullets.

“I remember your father. Of course I do,” Manfred said.

“Momma said he died saving you in France.” The boy jerked his hand away from his mother. Twig-like fingers reached out and touched the Pour Le Merite at Manfred’s collar. “Because he died you got to win all these medals. Said that the Kaiser man says you’re a big hero. That makes it OK that Papa died.”

“Sir, I’m sorry. We’ll go now. Didn’t mean to disturb you.” She reached for the boy, who wiggled from her grasp.

Manfred reached out and grasped the boy by his arms, they felt like little more than skin and bones beneath his shirt. “Your Papa was a very brave man. He saved my life.” Manfred undid a button on his tunic and reached inside to unsnap the pin behind his Iron Cross.

“But, I would give all these awards back so that he could still be with you,” Manfred handed the Iron Cross to Joachim. Joachim took the medal, then hugged his arms around Manfred’s neck.

“I miss him,” the little boy said.

Manfred returned the hug. “I miss him too.”

“Joachim, we have to go,” his mother said.

“Wait, let me get you something,” Manfred turned back to his house, and found his mother waiting for him. She held a pack of wrapped summer sausage and a tin of soft cheese. Since Manfred’s return, guests had brought gifts of food. The kitchen larder was almost overflowing with sausage.

Manfred took the food and gave it to the widow, who didn’t protest too much against the gift. Joachim waved to Manfred as his mother led him away.

“How did you know I’d give them food?” he asked Kunigunde.

“I didn’t. It just pains me to see the little ones suffer like that,” Kunigunde looked at her son’s dirty pants.

“Katy is dirty too. Something you want to tell me?”

“No, nothing.” Manfred walked back into the house.

“Manfred.”

“Nothing.”

Voss.

Wolff.

Manfred sat in the trophy room, a pair of telegrams in hand. He’d found the telegrams in the stack delivered to his house each morning. The death notices mixed in with wishes for a speedy recovery from the King of Bavaria and a wedding invitation from some noble in Pomerania that claimed a distant kinship.

Voss had tangled with four of the new British S.E.5 fighters over the Belgian countryside, alone, and come out the loser. If there was any pilot who might have triumphed against such odds, Manfred would have bet on Voss.

Wolff went down trying to ambush a flight of Allied bombers.

Voss and Wolff. Both were fine pilots, brave fighters, disciples of Boelcke and winners of the Pour Le Merite
;
just like him. Manfred wasn’t surprised at their deaths. Death was an accepted part of flying and war, not a thing that could be avoided in the course of duty. It would be easy to give in to despair, as Bohme had almost done. After three years of war, he was inured to loss. At least he could claim vengeance against the English, if he could fly.

But what if he’d been there? Would he have spotted an error in Wolff’s attack and vetoed the battle? If he’d flown beside Voss, they would have emerged victorious.

He’d sent Metzger to the army telegraph station in town to get more details. Nothing could be done for Voss and Wolff, but he craved details.

Manfred loathed himself. Here he was, far from the war, nursing a wound born from a lucky shot while his friends fought on. Fought without his leadership and skill to aid them. Fought without him there to make a difference.

He stood up and wiped tears away from his face with his sleeve. Tinnitus rang in his ears and he felt the pain vise tighten around his skull. Would he ever heal? He’d demanded a transfer into the air corps because he wanted to fight; now he was even more useless than when he’d sat at a communications desk far from the Front.