signaled to the airman to remove the wheel chocks. Harald felt a lurch, and the aircraft moved forward.
The pedals at his feet moved as Poul used the rudder to steer the aircraft across the grass. They taxied to the runway, which was marked by little flags, and turned into the wind, then they stopped, and Poul said, “A few more checks before we take off.”
For the first time, it occurred to Harald that what he was about to do was dangerous. His brother had been flying for years without an accident, but other pilots had crashed, and some had died. He told himself that people died in cars, on motorcycles, and aboard boats-but somehow this felt different. He made himself stop thinking about the dangers. He was not about to panic and disgrace himself in front of the class.
Suddenly the throttle lever beneath his hand moved smoothly forward, the engine roared louder, and the Tiger Moth eagerly moved along the runway. After only a few seconds, the control stick eased away from Harald’s knees, and he felt himself tip forward slightly as the tail lifted behind him. The little aircraft gathered speed, rattling and shaking over the grass. Harald’s blood seemed to thrill with excitement. Then the stick eased back under his hand, the aircraft seemed to jump from the ground, and they were airborne.
It was exhilarating. They climbed steadily. To one side, Harald could see a small village. In crowded Denmark, there were not many places from which you could not see a village. Poul banked right. Feeling himself tipped sideways, Harald fought the panicky notion that he was going to fall out of the cockpit.
To calm himself, he looked at the instruments. The rev counter showed two thousand rpm, and their speed was sixty miles per hour. They were at an altitude of one thousand feet already. The needle on the turn-and-slip indicator pointed straight up.
The aircraft straightened out and leveled off. The throttle lever moved back, the engine note dipped, and the revs slipped back to nineteen hundred. Poul said, “Are you holding the stick?”
“Yes.”
“Check the line of the horizon. It probably goes through my head.”
“In one ear and out the other.”
“When I release the controls, I want you to simply keep the wings level and the horizon in the same place relative to my ears.”
Feeling nervous, Harald said, “Okay.”
“You have control.”
Harald felt the aircraft come alive in his hands, as every slight movement he made affected its flight. The line of the horizon fell to Poul’s shoulders, showing that the nose had lifted, and he realized that a barely conscious fear of diving to the ground was making him pull back on the stick. He pushed it forward infinitesimally, and had the satisfaction of seeing the horizon line slowly rise to Poul’s ears.
The aircraft lurched sideways and banked. Harald felt he had lost control and they were about to fall out of the sky. “What was that?” he cried.
“Just a gust of wind. Correct for it, but not too much.”
Fighting back panic, Harald moved the stick against the direction of bank. The aircraft lurched in the other direction, but at least he felt he was controlling it, and he corrected again with another small movement. Then he saw that he was climbing again, and brought the nose down. He found he had to concentrate fiercely on responding to the aircraft’s slightest motion just to keep a steady course. He felt that a mistake could send him crashing to the ground.
When Poul spoke, Harald resented the interruption. “That’s very good,” Poul said. “You’re getting the hang of it.”
Harald felt he just needed to practice for another year or two.
“Now press lightly on the rudder pedals with both feet,” Poul said.
Harald had not thought about his feet for a while. “All right,” he said brusquely.
“Look at the turn-and-slip indicator.”
Harald wanted to say,
“When I take my feet off the rudder, you’ll find the nose will yaw left and right with the turbulence. In case you’re not sure, check the indicator. When the aircraft yaws left, the needle will move to the right, telling you to press down with your right foot to correct.”
“All right.”
Harald felt no sideways movement, but a few moments later, when he managed to steal a glance at the dial, he saw he was yawing left. He pressed down on the rudder pedal with his right foot. The needle did not move. He pressed harder. Slowly, the pointer edged back to the central position. He looked up and saw that he was diving slightly. He pulled the stick back. He checked the turn-and-slip indicator again. The needle was steady.
It would have seemed simple and easy if he had not been fifteen hundred feet up in the air.
Poul said, “Now let’s try a turn.”
“Oh, shit,” said Harald.
“First, look left to see if there’s anything in the way.”
Harald glanced to the left. In the far distance he could see another Tiger Moth, presumably with one of his classmates aboard, doing the same as he. That was reassuring. “Nothing nearby,” he said.
“Ease the stick to the left.”
Harald did so. The aircraft banked left and he again experienced the sickening feeling that he was going to fall out. But the aircraft began to swing around to the left, and Harald felt a surge of excitement as he realized he was actually steering the Tiger Moth.
“In a turn, the nose tends to dip,” Poul said. Harald saw that indeed the aircraft was heading downward, and he pulled back on the stick.
“Watch that turn-and-slip indicator,” Poul said. “You’re doing the equivalent of a skid.”
Harald checked the dial and saw that the needle had moved to the right. He pressed the rudder pedal with his right foot. Once again, it responded only slowly.
The aircraft had turned through ninety degrees, and Harald was eager to straighten up and feel safe again, but Poul seemed to read his mind-or perhaps all pupils felt the same way at this point-and said, “Keep turning, you’re doing fine.”
The angle of bank seemed dangerously steep to Harald but he held the turn, keeping the nose up, checking the slip indicator every few seconds. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a bus driving along the road below, just as if nothing in the least dramatic was happening in the sky, and there was no danger of a Jansborg schoolboy dropping out of the heavens to his death on its roof.
He had turned through three-quarters of a circle before Poul at last said, “Straighten up.”
With relief, Harald eased the stick right, and the aircraft straightened.
“Watch that slip indicator.”
The needle had moved left. Harald pressed the rudder pedal with his left foot.
“Can you see the airfield?”
At first Harald could not. The countryside beneath him was a meaningless pattern of fields dotted with buildings. He had no idea what the air base would look like from above.
Poul helped him out. “A row of long white buildings beside a bright green field. Look to the left of the propeller.”
“I see it.”
“Head that way, keeping the airfield on the left of our nose.”
Until now, Harald had not thought about the course they were following. It had been all he could manage to keep the aircraft steady. Now he had to do all the things he had previously learned and at the same time head for home. There was always one thing too many to think about.
“You’re climbing,” Poul said. “Throttle back an inch and bring us down to a thousand feet as we approach the buildings.”
Harald checked the altimeter and saw that the aircraft was indeed at two thousand feet. It had been fifteen hundred last time he looked. He throttled back and eased the stick forward.
“Dip the nose a bit more,” said Poul.
