Cassada by James Salter Page B

turn and disappeared into the glare of the sun. The Canadian leader held up his thumb to cover it and then his entire hand. He didn’t see them. He continued to block out the sun, waiting for them to come out on one side of the glare or the other. Leveling out, he kept looking and heard his wingman call, “Eight o’clock!”
    He strained to look back, over his shoulder. Sure enough, there they were.
    â€œHard left!” he called.
    They began a tightening circle, turning amid their own contrails, which were persistent and thick. In the end the two opposing leaders were heading straight down, speed brakes out, canopy to canopy, rolling around each other like a barber pole. Through the very top of the canopy the Canadian could look into the other cockpit and see the pilot’s head there, thrown back too. They were that close, absolutely vertical, the rate of descent needle straight down, the altimeter spinning like a wheel. Around and around, headed for the clouds until just above them they pulled out and began scissoring, almost in a stall, noses high, lurching past each other.
    Slowly, sweat pouring from him, the Canadian began, because of the tanks, to get the better of it, skimming over the cloud surface. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of the second American, come from he didn’t know where and unbelievably close, the intake as big as a piano. Without pausing he pushed over and into the clouds.
    He was safe there, unfollowable. He made several turns and at the end climbed out again, half expecting to see them waiting like terriers over a rat hole, but they were gone. He couldn’t see them anywhere, nor his wingman. He called but got no answer. Only when he was nearly back to the base at Gros Tenquin did he get the wingman to reply.
    â€œWhat happened to you?”
    â€œI lost you when we went below the cons,” the wingman said.
    â€œI’ll say you did.”
    The victors of the combat in which they had been matched against cleaner airplanes landed low on fuel in light rain. The ceiling had come down. The leader—it was Grace—was summonedfrom the locker room almost immediately. Isbell had learned from the servicing crew how much fuel had been left in the planes.
    â€œDebrief later,” he told Grace. “I want to talk to you.”
    â€œYes, sir,” said Grace in a serious voice, his flying suit dark where he’d been sweating beneath his parachute.
    The door closed behind them.
    In the briefing room, Godchaux waited, biting at the corner of a fingernail and looking at the floor. When somebody asked him a question he answered with only a grin. He bit at his fingernail again.
    â€œPretty close on, eh, Captain?” Abrams said in some confidence to Wickenden.
    â€œToo close.”
    â€œBoy, oh, boy.”
    â€œI wouldn’t talk about it,” Wickenden said. “You start talking about it and the first thing you’ll have the group commander down here wanting to know what’s been going on.”
    â€œCaptain,” Abrams said, wounded, “I wouldn’t say anything. You know that.”
    â€œJust so you understand.”
    â€œSir, I’d never say a word.”
    â€œJust forget it. Make believe it never happened, that’s the best thing.” The door to Isbell’s office had been closed for nearly fifteen minutes. “Staying up there like that to tangle with someone, knowing what the weather was,” Wickenden declared. “Plain stupidity.”
    And a flight commander, he refrained from saying. Ought to be grounded, as well as that clown Godchaux, in there where the rest of them were coming in wanting to hear about it. Experience, he once told Wickenden, that was the thing. Correct. Using his head once in a while, that was the experience he needed. Just occasionally. Once a month, maybe. Even that would make a difference.
    It was like an infection. Wickenden could see it spread. He