Warriors

characteristics. Now, what controls airspeed?'

Rajid thought for two seconds. 'Pitch and power.'

'Right. If you have zero pitch, or angle of attack, what happens?'

'You fly faster. For the same throttle setting you fly faster. If you reduce power you lose altitude.'

Bennett turned onto the downwind leg, leveling off at pattern altitude.· 'Now, you know that you can maintain a steady rate of descent at a given power setting with a certain pitch angle. Like you do on final approach to landing. But you can also fly slowly while maintaining altitude with a bit more power.'

Rajid just nodded, uncertain where this was leading. Bennett had discussed the situation with Rajid's instructor, being careful not to upset the boy's training. Now he demonstrated his point: Anyone can fly fast. It takes an aviator to fly as slowly as possible.

'Mr. Hamir, I'm pulling the nose up thirty degrees. We'll start to settle at this reduced power setting, won't we?'

'Yes, sir. Unless we add more throttle.'

'Exactly right! So here we go.' Bennett carefully jockeyed stick and throttle until the F-20 settled into a nose-high attitude, maintaining level flight. 'We're doing about a hundred and thirty knots, and I'll see if we can keep that speed all the way down.' At each ninety-degree turn he lowered the nose slightly, avoiding the natural tendency to bleed off airspeed in the corners.

'You see there? By leaving the throttle alone, we're controlling our airspeed and rate of descent with pitch. If I set this up right, we'll maintain this rate of descent onto the numbers.'

With the nose cocked up, the Tigershark came around on final with the gear and flaps still retracted. Bennett extended the wheels and flaps immediately after rolling out on final approach, adjusting stick and throttle to compensate for the increased drag. He maintained the nose-high descent almost to the runway lip, flying the airplane onto the white-painted numbers well below normal landing speed.

'Now, Mr. Hamir, why do you suppose anybody would want to do what we just did?'

'Well, sir, to land as short as possible.'

'Right again. But your training has told you never to fly low and slow near the ground. It's dangerous, and accounts for a lot of landing accidents.'

'Yes, sir.' They turned off at the first taxiway and headed for the ramp.

'So what do you make of this demonstration? Am I teaching you bad habits?'

Rajid was quiet for a moment. 'Sir, I believe this is an exercise to build proficiency.'

Bennett liked what he was hearing. Good lad. 'And all the students will learn to do this. It's unlikely they'll have to land that short on any runway, but knowing you can do it makes you more comfortable in the airplane. Just don't do it on your own yet-you'll get to it in a few more flights.'

Bennett walked away from the F-20 and the quiet young Arab, feeling about as good as a flight instructor can feel.

Riyadh

The door opened and Bennett caught his breath. Claudia wore a knee-length yellow silk dress, her legs outlined against the thin fabric. Her long hair fell free, unrestrained by the ribbon she normally wore. It was the first time Bennett had seen her in anything but a conservative business dress.

She greeted him with a quick hug, then led him to her small dining alcove for coffee. Bennett decided the apartment was much like its occupant: organized, direct, stylish. He had only seen as much of it as was visible from the doorway twice previously, most recently several months ago when they had dined together before he had left for the States.

They sat down and Claudia poured some coffee. Handing him his cup, she looked him squarely in the face. 'You flew in with a fighter plane again?' He noticed a peculiar expression on her face, a jesting tone in her voice.

'Yes, I delivered our maintenance supervisor for a meeting. Why?'

Claudia suppressed a girlish giggle. 'I was just thinking about the first time I saw you. The marks on your face from the oxygen mask. They're not as noticeable this time.'

He leaned far across the table, his face within six inches of hers. 'Maybe you're just getting used to being around fighter pilots.' He could smell her perfume again. Their noses touched.

Claudia leaned back. 'I guess you're flying more often now.' Bennett said he was and she caught the gleam in his eyes. This was obviously a man committed to his work. He told her about his flight with Rajid and about some of the other students. The first class was now into its formation-flying stage, and the second had just started dual instruction. The pace was accelerating.

After a time Claudia suggested they move to the large sofa in the living room. The afternoon shadows were lengthening outside. They sat close to one another and Claudia leaned casually against the padded couch. 'John, we've known each other for, what? About eight or ten months?'

He thought for a moment. 'Yes, about ten.'

'I was just thinking. Even though we haven't seen each other very often, I can talk to you. And I hope you don't mind a personal question about your work.'

'Not at all.'

'I know, or at least I've met, a lot of military people. I go out with some of them on occasion but I don't date anyone regularly. But in your case, I just wonder why you'd want to go back to doing the same thing you did for twenty years. I mean, coming all the way to Arabia and starting an air force when your family is back in the States.'

Bennett thought a moment. 'This is actually a lot more than just a job, Claudia. I've thought a lot about what kind of person I am to run off halfway around the globe when my son was getting married and I was becoming a grandfather.

'I'll put it this way. Being a fighter pilot, a professional warrior, isn't just something I do. It has more to do with who I am. It's not even a life-style-it's, well, an identity.'

'I hope you didn't think I was being critical,' Claudia said.

'No, no. I'm plenty critical of myself. But maybe it's programmed in my genes. Maybe I had no choice-I had to be a warrior.”

Claudia looked perplexed. 'You mean Robert Ardrey's Territorial Imperative and all that?'

'Well, not exactly. But some of my relatives might agree. You see, my family is from Florida, and we've always had military men in the clan. My uncle was a Navy ace in World War II-that made a big impression on me. But my great-grandfather was the real influence. Great-Granddaddy Bennett was a wealthy plantation owner who also taught mathematics at the college level. He wasn't obliged to go to war-'

'You mean the Civil War?'

Bennett put on a stern face and spoke with an exaggerated Colonel Culpepper accent. 'No, ma'am. Ah mean Th' Wah of South'n Independence.'

Claudia laughed.

'Anyway,' he continued, 'the old gentleman went into debt to form and equip his own artillery unit. He had no military training but he was damn good at it, and by war's end he was a colonel in command of a regiment. When I was a kid I read some of his letters that my grandfather had kept. It didn't fall into place until years later, but some of Great-Granddaddy's comments came back to me.

'In I864, after almost three years of war, the old boy wrote his wife that he was actually enjoying himself. I wish I could remember the exact phrase, but he said that leading men in battle was the grandest feeling he ever experienced.' Bennett turned somber. 'When the South surrendered, it broke his heart. He died a couple years later.'

Claudia leaned closer. 'And you feel that way about leading men into battle?'

'It may seem peculiar, but I've always distinguished between combat and war. There's a difference. I don't know of anybody who likes war, or the causes of war-greed, envy, ambition, or just plain stupidity. But I wish I could feel the way Great-Granddaddy did about his war. Vietnam was mine-four combat deployments in seven years. For most of us, victory was simply surviving. Down deep, I suppose I regret that my war wasn't as… satisfying as some others.' He had almost said as fun.

Claudia gave him a tight-lipped look. But her eyes revealed a willingness to understand him. 'So, you're