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Ch 8
It was a warm October afternoon; she remembers the date, October 14th. Colette watched her Grandfather sitting in the backyard, drinking whiskey. She played with her Barbie dolls, only bothered a little by her nine year old Brother, Lou, running about with a large plastic model of a B17 bomber. The boy flew about the garden with his toy bomber, attacking whatever it is that nine year old boys attack with toy bombers. She concentrated on her dolls, ignoring him, as she usually did.
She doesn’t know what made her look up, at her grandfather. There was something wrong, she sensed it. Perhaps it was the way he held his shot glass, perhaps it was something else. She looked at the old man’s face. She dropped her dolls and approached her grandfather silently. He no longer watched Lou, his eyes lost in the distance. His face trembled.
Nothing like this had ever happened, but she sensed, as girls do, that there was something wrong, very wrong. The glass dropped from his hand, to roll on the grass, unnoticed. The old man stood up and turned to run into the house. She rushed to follow him, what she saw on his face freezing her with fear.
Grand Pa was crying.
“What’s wrong Grand Pa?” She cried as she ran behind him.
Her brother did not even notice.
The old man ran to his room with his granddaughter hard on his heels. He sat in the armchair, and tried to wave her off, but she would not be dissuaded.
“What’s wrong Grand Pa? Why are you crying?”
He waved at her to leave.
“Shall I call Mommy? Are you sick?”
“Don’t call your mother. I’m OK.”
“No you are not. You are crying,” She knelt by his chair.
His hand fondled her hair sadly, “I just remembered something sad.”
“Mommy says that if you share your sad memories, they feel better.”
“Your Mommy is wise Colette.”
“So tell me, what happened?”
The old man tried to contain a sob, and failed miserably.
“What is it Grand Pa?” the girl insisted, “You can tell me, I won’t tell.”
She took his hand from her hair and kissed it, “You’ll feel better.”
“Yes, perhaps I will; perhaps I will.”
His eyes, streaming tears, he asked his granddaughter to bring him the glass he dropped,
“Bring me the bottle too, and I shall tell you the story.”
Colette ran to obey her Grandfather, but not before she heard him say:
“I never told anyone.”
After he downed another shot of Jack Daniels he told her his story. She sat on the floor at his feet.
“I was only 20 in October 14, 1943. It was only my third mission. We were flying B17 bombers against Germany. The target for the day was Schweinfurt, the ball bearing plants…”
Colette did not know what ball bearings were, or where Schweinfurt was; she did know not to ask.
“…The German fighters waited until our escorts turned back, out of fuel. Then they came at us. Wave after wave,” The old man’s frame shook, “They threw everything they had at us. They murdered us. Some of our aircraft just exploded…No survivors.”
Colette could only hold her Grandpa’s hand to comfort him.
“Our group left England with 15 aircraft. I was the Bombardier, my position was at the nose of the plane, I handled a machine gun except just before we bombed. I saw one of our planes catch fire. The men bailed out, one by one, all ten of them,” he shuddered again. “As soon as their chutes opened, they were gone in a flash of fire. I watched the men falling.”
He drank another glass.
“Only two of the fifteen returned. Thirteen crews died that day from my group. My friends, gone.”
The old man seemed to recover some of his strength, “Two weeks later, I had to fly again against Germany. I could not get back in the plane. I could not face the flight to Hamburg. I told my pilot, I was shaking all over. He told me: Can you get to Dover?”
“I answered: Yes sir, of course I can get to Dover.”
“Then he told me: Then fly to Dover, when you get there, think about getting to the French coast, and once there to the German border, and only there, think about getting to the target.”
He raised his frame and looked his Granddaughter in the eye:
“When faced with an impossible task, break it in pieces.”
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