Armageddon - Leon Uris

There was one key man missing from the pilot team. Someone with practical experience in government. From the records, Captain Maurice Duquesne of the Free French Forces had all the obvious qualifications. He was an elected official of an area similar in size to Rombaden/Romstein; sous-préfet of an arrondissement of the Department of Belfort, Province of Lorraine. Duquesne had lived on the German border, opposite the Black Forest, and spoke impeccable German.

But he was arrogant and from the instant of meeting let Sean know the American was a Johnny-come-lately. France knew how to handle Germany. Americans knew nothing.

The decision on Duquesne was his most difficult. Obviously the Frenchman believed he should command his own team. Yet, despite trouble signs, Sean could not let him go.

Sean remembered the first time he saw General Hansen and sized him up as a foul-mouthed, sawed-off blowhard. He learned bit by bit that Hansen was neither crass nor stupid. Hansen had the thing he lacked—experience. There was much to be learned from the man.

Duquesne had practical government experience. Through day to day intercourse he knew more about the Germans than Sean’s scholastic theorizing from a distance of thousands of miles.

He gambled with Maurice Duquesne.

There were others on the pilot team—Americans and British and French. With Blessing’s enlisted man’s police force and the clerks and medics, he brought fifty officers and men back to Queen Mother’s Gate.

General Hansen reasoned that Sean had a good team on paper, but, next to Dante Arosa, Sean was the youngest officer. Could he gain the respect of the older and wiser men? Would he be able to breathe life and fire into the plaster models of Rombaden? Could he change complacency into the spirit of a mission?

Hansen’s doubts soon faded. Sean attacked Rombaden/ Romstein with a zeal that turned the pilot-team studies into something of a crusade.

Even the arrogant Maurice Duquesne showed traces of respect for the energy of the man and called a truce. For now, Major O’Sullivan was a dynamo, but these maps and questions and problems in theory were far removed from the field of battle. Duquesne knew that most battle plans go awry when the first shot is fired, and he reserved his final judgment for that day....

The pilot team was knitted into an exclusive, proud unit. Sean O’Sullivan had mastered a page from Andrew Jackson Hansen’s textbook. He was able to muster uncommon loyalty from his men by letting a man know he was needed. At the same time he let him know he could do without him also.

Chapter Eleven

SEAN ENTERED HANSEN’S OFFICE. Nellie Bradbury and Henry Pringle sat chalky-faced on the big leather couch. Hansen’s expressive face was wrinkled in pain.

Sean’s palms became wet and his throat caked dry. Oh God! I’m dreaming! Sean tried again and again to force the question from himself. He broke into cold sweat.

“Your brother Tim is dead,” General Hansen said at last.

Sean nodded his head to say that he knew, and he walked to the window and stared blankly down on the courtyard with his back to the others. Ten unbearable moments of silence passed with the only sound a deep quivering sigh from Sean now and again.

“He went after a V-1 base,” Bradbury said. “This time he led some others in. They saw him get it.”

Hansen took Sean’s arm and led him to a chair. “Here son, have yourself a drink.”

Sean pushed his arm away. They watched him stiffen to fight off a convulsion. A numbness fell over him.

“Let yourself go,” Big Nellie said.

And then, only the terrible silence again and Sean’s dazed expression.

“He was one of the best, Tim O’Sullivan was,” Henry Pringle said in an almost cheerful voice. “A flyer’s flyer. Went out big. He won’t ever be forgotten.”

“Shut up, you stinking ghoul,” General Hansen hissed. “It makes me sick the way you goddamned flyers worship death.”

“Lay off him, General,” Big Nellie said. “Pringle and I have cried for these boys till there’s no tears left and no other way to send them off.”

“You think we celebrate because we’re happy? We’re scared and sick and we all die of fright every night when the door opens and half a squadron walks in ...”

They quieted as Sean stood and walked from the room.

The needle of his father’s record player scratched out through the sound horn a distorted reproduction of John McCormack’s voice:

“Kathleen Mavourneen! awake from thy slumber,

The blue mountains glow in the sun’s golden light...”

“You listen to me, Tim. I had to take two fights to pay for your tuition. You’re not running away to the Lincoln Brigade. I busted this hand getting you into college and I’ll bust the other one on you keeping you there.”

“... Ah! where is the spell that once hung on my numbers?

Arise in thy beauty, thou star of my night.”

A sudden shift of the wind whipped the spray into the cave and onto the three brothers. Liam shielded the book from the water. Sean and Tim watched the waves fall back, slither down the rocks and race seaward again. Liam read from the book again, in his thin voice.

“He fell as fall the mighty ones,

Nobly undaunted to the last,

And death has now united him,

With Erin’s heroes of the past.”

Parnell! As Liam read, Tim’s eyes searched wildly for those places beyond the horizon where adventures waited, not only in daydreams. “Read from O’Casey, Liam!”

“You and your Irish patriots make me sick,” Sean said.

“Mavourneen, Mavourneen, my sad tears are falling,

To think that from Erin and thee I must part;”

“How in the hell can you remain so impersonal to a war that’s taken our brother! ...We were coming over German land ... I almost always saw Liam’s face outside the window ...and then ... I would visualize Liam’s grave ... I wanted to fly so low I could chop them up with my propellers.”

“Stop carrying the flag, Tim.”

“Oh God! Why does the wrong brother have to die! ...Liam could have brought us honor.”

“It may be for years, and it may be forever;

Then why art thou silent, thou voice of my heart?”

“Your father is a very sick man, Sean. It will take months of rest and care for him to recover from this attack and he will never be the same as before.”

“Poppa, you’re not to worry about anything. I’ll take care of the family.”

Private Liam O’Sullivan, a poet. A gentle boy. Dead. Age twenty-two. Kasserine Pass, North Africa. Died as quietly as he lived.

First Lieutenant Timothy O’Sullivan. Rebel. Age twenty-five. He died somewhere over Germany in a flaming pyre ... as violently as he lived.

“It may be for years, and it may be forever;

Then why are thou silent, Kathleen Mavourneen?”

“Sean. It’s me, Dante. You can’t keep sitting like this in the darkness. Sean, for God’s sake break down and cry. Curse, hit the wall, get drunk. Sean, please answer me. Sean, you can’t keep sitting in the darkness ... Sean ... Sean ...”

He blinked his eyes open and licked his dry lips. Father O’Brien slowly came into focus. “You’ve been locked in here for five days. Tim has made his way to heaven. The living must be served.”

He came to a sitting position slowly, sipped some water, and lit a cigarette. He was weak and haggard and dizzy. “Father,” he croaked hoarsely, “I don’t want to listen to any Jesuit double-talk.”

“The spiritual aspects can be explored later. I’m thinking of something more practical, like eating a decent meal. If you don’t come out of here you’re going to be taken to the hospital and fed intravenously.”