James Salter - Cassada

“Never mind about him, White,” Dunning calls. “You’ll never find him in the weather.”

No answer.

“White Lead?”

There is nothing.

“Do you read mobile, White?”

“Roger.”

“Make another approach. It’s looking better down here. It’s breaking up a little.”

Cadin takes the mike.

“White Lead, this is Colonel Cadin. Stay cool. Never mind the weather, you can make it in.”

“You were blocked. I couldn’t read.”

Cadin repeats his instruction and as he finishes they hear the end of something White is saying, “… clear on top.”

“Where are you, White?” he asks.

“I’m climbing.”

“You’re not on top?”

“Tops are about nine thousand.”

Dunning stands silent, trying to think. Things are running through his mind like a stream. They’re both going to bail out. He has to get them down somehow, at least one of them. Godchaux shakes his head a little, looking at the ground. Harlan is watching the rain. It’s not coming down harder, but neither is it letting up. The water shines on the roof of the Volksbus and around the runway lights. The runway will be slick. That’s the least of it. No one’s going to be using the runway, Harlan thinks. They could be parked right in the middle of it, as far as that goes. Dunning takes back the mike.

“White,” he calls abruptly, “don’t climb any higher. That’s an order. Make another approach.”

“I’m at forty-five hundred now,” Cassada reports.

“Don’t climb! Do you understand? Shoot another approach.”

“I’m at five thousand, Major.”

He is doing the unthinkable. His heart skidding wildly in his chest, he is spending the last of his fuel, like diving, though this is the opposite, with lungs bursting and no breath left, almost none, into the rolling dark water where he must try and find someone drowned. He is casting his own chances away, from either some fierce sense of duty or the confused desire to do what Isbell would have done, or perhaps be with him in disaster, the two of them at the last.

For a moment they are all persuaded. It’s a slim chance but somewhere up there Isbell is flying in silence. There’s at least the chance of them seeing each other, joining and trying it together one last time.

“He don’t have the fuel,” Harlan says quietly.

They don’t hear him or don’t want to. There’s always the last minute. You come to fields you’ve given up on, you knew you would never be able to find. At the last moment they appear magically as if summoned out of nothing. It could be like that.

“He don’t have it to spare,” Harlan warns.

Godchaux stands in the doorway hugging himself and looking outside. The beige felt shows under the turned-up collar of his blouse. He blows into the end of his fist to warm his fingers. He shakes his head again. His expression is calm but all this is amazing to him, unbelievable. It’s already part of lore.

Dunning leans on the counter, staring out. The seat of his trousers is wrinkled from sitting all day, and the back of his jacket. One chance in a hundred is all, but still a chance. He brings the microphone to his mouth, ready to speak. His thumb fiddles with the button. Finally, unable to stay silent, he says,

“Are you on top yet, White?” He presses the button in and out to make sure he’s transmitting. “White from mobile, are you on top yet?”

Harlan says nothing. He would like to say, what’s the point of his going up? He’s headed the wrong way. You don’t get down by going up. You don’t have to go to college to figure that out. The thing that’s really too bad is they can’t talk to each other. That would be nice, to hear them, Cassada and the captain, especially the next five minutes. Old Wickenden was right for once. They should of listened to him. Sometimes these regulars know what they’re talking about. It’s the law of averages.

“Fortify White from mobile,” Dunning calls. He says it twice, then a third time, looking around at the cloud bases as he does.

Godchaux is blowing on his fingertips.

“Fortify White,” Dunning says urgently, “do you read? White from mobile, do you read?”

Beneath the palms, someone was trying to start a weapons carrier. It was a full colonel, his head bent forward as he looked for the ignition switch in the dark.

“Chance of catching a ride with you?” Isbell asked.

“Who’s that?” the colonel said, turning.

“Captain Isbell, Colonel.”

“I’ll see if we have room,” he said and waved an arm at a group coming down the front steps of the club, holding on to each other and singing. “Let’s go!” he called, looking for the switch again. “Goddamn champs! Let’s go!”

They began climbing in. Isbell waited. The colonel was touching everything on the panel, feeling for the switch. “How’s things in the old 5th?” he said to Isbell. “Bunch of hamburgers.”

“We’re doing all right, Colonel.”

“Oh, yeah?” He glanced up and saw Piebes, winner of the air-to-air. “Get in here, you goddamn dead-eye,” he said.

Piebes tried. He managed to lift one leg onto the running board. He seemed to wonder about what to do next. He was wearing the colonel’s hat, grinning, the silver streaks of lightning visible in the dark.

The colonel slapped the passenger seat beside him. “Sit down,” he said.

“Aye, aye, sir,” Piebes said, pulling himself in. His head hit the canvas roof. Somebody picked the hat up for him.

The colonel stiffened to find the starter with his foot and pushed down. The engine turned over a few times and caught weakly.

“Great equipment,” he said. “Get aboard,” he told Isbell.

The back was crowded, Isbell could see. “That’s all right, we’ll catch the bus.”

“Make up your mind, for Christ’s sake,” the colonel said.

The weapons carrier backed up and then roared off without headlights. Near the theater someone turned them on. As they passed some lights, the colonel could be seen bareheaded, Piebes in the hat.

Isbell walked back to where Cassada was standing. People were still coming out of the club. There was the sound of a woman’s heels on the cement. It was too dark to see.

“Who was that, Colonel Neal? He seemed pretty happy,” Cassada said.

“Famous figure.”

“Why is that?”

“You know how old he is?” Isbell said.

“No.”

“Thirty-four.”

“Is that all?”

“He was one of the first men in his class to make bird.”

They were alone in the darkness, beneath the stars.

“Major Dunning’s older than that,” Cassada remarked.

“Well, that happens, too. But he’s in line for a promotion. His record’s good.”

“How old are you, Captain?”

“Thirty-one,” Isbell said.

Cassada shook his head a little.

“It’s a long pull, isn’t it?” he said.

“Not for everybody,” Isbell replied.

“Colonel Neal.”

“He’s not the only one.”

“You’ll get a squadron next.”

“I might. I hope so. Not here. I’ll be going home too soon. In the States, maybe.”

“Well, let me know. I’d like to be in it,” Cassada said.

“I’ll come looking for you.”

The bus came rattling up, headlights quivering before it. It was filled with airmen and NCOs. Isbell stood with Cassada in the back, at the end of a line of lolling heads and the slow reveal of faces as they passed a streetlight. A sergeant was talking. “Lieutenant,” he recited, “I loaded them myself, that’s what I told him.” He had a hard, lined face. Isbell could see him as they went by the hospital.

“You know what he says to me? He says, Bonney, that’s good enough for me. That’s good enough for me, he says. I tell you, that means something when they talk to you like that.”