on the finish.” He squeezed my arm; he squeezed it hard. “We’re going to bring Charlie back, Nate. Come along.”
I went along.
Lindbergh took the controls, of course, and Breckinridge—who was also a pilot, as were so many of Slim’s pals—took the copilot’s chair. Condon and Irey sat behind them, and I sat behind Condon and Irey. In one corner of the plane was Lindbergh’s bundle, loosened enough to reveal its contents: a blanket around some baby clothes and a bottle of milk.
Lindbergh placed his hands on the wheel and sighed, contentedly, and then he gunned the Sikorsky’s engines and I felt my stomach fall to my shoes as we lifted off. In retrospect I realize the takeoff was smooth, but it seemed to me at the time that every nut, bolt and screw holding this mechanical beast together was shaking apart. The bellow of the twin engines was deafening and as Lindbergh swung the ship around, slowly circling the field, I was thankful I hadn’t eaten lately.
Lindbergh pointed the plane toward the climbing morning sun, as we skirted the Connecticut shore. I sat, the seat beneath me rumbling, my eyes closed. We were soon heading toward Martha’s Vineyard, over the northern end of Long Island Sound. But I didn’t know that.
I told myself if I had to fly, what better pilot could I have for my first air voyage than the most famous pilot in the world? At the same time I realized that this particular pilot was one of the most reckless daredevils ever to take flight.
Finally, as the hum of the plane and even the vibration of my chair began to lull me, I looked out my window at the placid blue glimmering surface of the Sound. It, too, lulled me. From up here, the world became something abstract—colors, shapes, patterns. The day couldn’t have been a clearer, more perfect one. It was even cold enough, in the cabin, to keep that damn milk from going sour.
Just as I was getting comfortable, Condon began talking. I couldn’t quite make it out, at first, but he seemed intense, serious.
After a while I tapped Irey on the shoulder and he leaned back, and I said, “What’s the old fart babbling about, anyway?”
“Excerpts,” Irey said with a glazed expression.
“Excerpts?”
“From the Song of Solomon.”
Suddenly the rumble of the Sikorsky’s engines seemed a blessing.
I had a clear view of my two pilots, despite my rear seat, and I noticed, after a while, Lindbergh turning the controls over to Breckinridge. That was almost a relief, as of the two colonels, Breckinridge struck me as the staid one—no stunt-flying from him.
But almost immediately we began to lose altitude.
The fucking ship was sinking like a stone!
“Slim!” Breckinridge said, trying not to panic. “I’m trying to pull up, but…”
Lindbergh reached over and took the wheel momentarily, got it back on an even keel, and returned the controls to Breckinridge. Lindy was smiling, faintly. Breckinridge swallowed, his expression baffled.
I, of course, had died of a heart attack long before.
Not long after, Breckinridge shouted again. “I’m trying to turn right, and it’s turning left! What in hell is wrong….”
Lindbergh again took the controls and banked the plane to the right, without problem.
Breckinridge was looking carefully at his friend. Then he slowly began to smile. “You rascal.”
Rascal?
And Lindbergh began to laugh. I’d never heard him laugh, not like that.
Breckinridge was grinning. “You crossed the wires on this crate, when you looked it over….”
Lindbergh’s laughter filled the cabin, drowning out even the drone of the twin engines. He was like a college boy watching a frat-house friend open a door and get drenched by a bucket of water. Irey looked back at me, whiter than his shirt. Condon seemed to be praying.
Lindbergh reached beneath the control panel on Breckinridge’s side, laughing softly as he did, and made some adjustments and said, “I got you, Henry. I got you.”
“You rogue. You rascal.”
“You fucker!” I said.
Lindbergh looked back, startled, then embarrassed, “Didn’t mean to scare you, Nate. I just like to put one over on Henry now and then.”
“Keep in mind I didn’t bring a change of underwear, okay?”
“Okay,” Lindy called back to me, shyly smiling. “Sorry. Forgot this was your first time up.”
I supposed the reemergence of Slim’s notorious practical-joker side was a good thing. But I couldn’t work up much enthusiasm about it. I shut my eyes. Actually slept a little.
Irey’s voice woke me, as he called back to me: “We’re getting there.”
I looked out the window at a blemish on the blue mirror below.
“That’s Cuttyhunk Island,” Irey said, turning toward me. “First of the Elizabeth Island group.”
The plane swooped low and my stomach did a flip.
