The Erection Set

“Really, Major, if it wasn’t for this girl ... daughter of one of your senators, y‘know ... sort of asked for me and it’s hands across the ocean and all that sort of crap, y’know? Now, she’s a new Mark Thirteen and never been scratched. Only two milk runs on photo across to the sub pens...”

“She armored?”

“Full up, Major.”

“If I get my ass snarled on this one ...”

“Blimey, Major, I got them all prepped. No sorting out to do at all. Beansey, Jerry and Tag are off your wings. Good chaps, those. Twelve kills among them. Relatively new and not like you at all, but remember, dear boy, you wanted to fly the Spit ...”

“No time goes on my record?”

“’Pon my word, Major. I wouldn’t want to go before Old Snarly for anything. Realize you and the flight surgeon are having it out over those missing missions, but don’t forget, it was that little niece of mine who lifted your records. Good job, what?”

“Yeah, lovely.”

“Too bad you chaps get rotated so soon. It’s really a gorgeous war,” he said. “Tell me, Major, why don’t you want to go home?”

“Long story, my friend, And like you said, it’s a gorgeous war. I always did want Spit time. That crate handle well?”

“You should know, Major. Much better than the Nines. Just remember to find me an empty Mustang on the next Nuremberg run. There’s a farmhouse there occupied by a particularly nasty character who stuck a pitchfork in my buttock when I bailed out on his property. Damned near didn’t escape. If it weren’t for the little beauty across the river who always had been partial to the sons of John Bull I never would have made it. Quite an interesting stay, that was.”

“You Limeys are nuts,” Dog said.

“Determined, you must admit.”

“Sure, to lay an American senator’s daughter.”

“Oh, just trying to improve our relationship with the colonials, Major. Enjoy the Spit, old boy. My batman has everything arranged. Would appreciate it if you could bring her back more or less unscathed. Old Snarly has an eye for details like bullet holes and he knows my new buggy is still a virgin. Unpenetrated, y’know?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, cheerio.”

“Dog,” I asked him, “why the hell do you squeeze In extra missions? You coulda been out long ago. You like all this crazy fighting?”

“Something to be learned,” he told me. “You survive or you don’t. Get the worst of it in now and all the rest will look easy.”