Last Flight to Stalingrad by Graham Hurley

Author:Graham Hurley [Hurley, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Spoils of War
ISBN: 9781788547543
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

21

STALINGRAD, 17 SEPTEMBER 1942

Nehmann’s contact in Stalingrad was to have met him at the airfield. In his absence, Messner conducted a brief check of his battered Ju, peering at the damage to the engine, pointing out the oil streaks on the bottom of the wing, using his fingers to explore a deep tear at the base of the metal tailplane. The cannon shell, he grunted, had failed to explode. In one side of the fuselage, out the other. Nehmann walked round the tail in the dirty snow to see for himself. Messner was right. The exit hole was even bigger, the aluminium bursting outwards like a flower.

‘Didn’t believe me?’ Messner was stamping his feet again. In the wind, it was freezing.

‘Just checking. Life’s all small print, my friend. Your Generaloberst said that last week and he’s right. In my trade, if you get the details wrong it doesn’t matter because no one recognises the truth any more.’

‘And in ours?’

‘You probably die.’

Messner nodded, tight-lipped. Something had changed between them, and they both knew it. Nothing needed spelling out any more. Friendship was a big word but Nehmann was prepared to give it a try.

Already, the plane was half empty. An engineer, according to Messner, would be along to check out the damaged engine. There’d be nothing he could do to mend it but two engines, with a modest load, would be enough to get Messner airborne again and back to Tatsinskaya. Forward maintenance, he said, was a joke. In all probability the plane would have to be returned to the Reich for proper repair, just another reason why Richthofen was beginning to run out of aircraft.

Nehmann nodded. Messner had never been this candid before. Blutsbrüder, he thought. Blood brothers.

‘Is it like this all the time?’ Nehmann was looking east, towards the city centre, where invisible Heinkels were dropping hundreds of bombs and at least two of the gaunt apartment blocks appeared to be on fire. As well, from time to time, he could hear the distant howl of Stuka sirens as they dived through the murk to find targets among the wreckage below. If there’s a choir in hell, thought Nehmann, it would sound like this.

‘It’s a shithole,’ Messner said. ‘You’ve talked to any of the Russian prisoners? Come here a year ago and the place was a model city, everything new, everything working. That’s why Stalin gave it his name. Now? You wonder what’s left to fight for.’

They’d arrived at the edge of the airfield. A handful of men were gathered around a brazier, warming their hands. What might have been coffee was bubbling in a bucket, suspended over the burning wood. Messner bent for the ladle lying in the snow. A corporal in a mix of Wehrmacht and Russian uniform wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and gave Messner his empty mug. Messner spooned coffee into the mug and passed it to Nehmann.

‘You first, Kamerad,’ he said.

‘Kamerad?’

A new voice, rough, amused. Nehmann spun round. There was a smile on the battered face, which was unusual, but there was no mistaking the rest of him.

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