a silly girl if I told you, that when I gaze out at that lovely forest, I find myself thinking, ‘What a beautiful farewell to earth’… ?”
She was trembling, almost on the verge of tears. He took her gloved hand in his and held it, rather tightly.
“It will be fine,” he told her.
Beneath the veil, she smiled in gratitude and, for a moment, she was indeed a girl again, and a beautiful one.
They were passing through a town, now—or rather a town in progress. Identical white stucco houses, each with a red tile roof, stood along either side of the autobahn, with dozens more in the process of being built. This, Charteris knew, was Zeppelinheim—a planned village for zep crewmen and their families. Finally, beyond the village, over a bridge, as the trio of buses barreled down a slope, the vastness of the new Rhein-Main World Airport revealed itself.
Many new buildings designed for airplanes had been constructed here in recent days, for what was being planned as a combined airship and airplane harbor, to accommodate passengers from all around Europe seeking passage to North or South America.
But what set this airfield off from all others was the immense zeppelin hangar, a virtual Olympic stadium with a roof, a staggering thousand feet long and twenty stories high, seeming ghostly and unreal in the misty twilight. Just beyond the yawning doors of the hangar, floating on its nose cone tethers, was the great seamed silver ship, an impossibly small ground crew scurrying beneath, like ants carrying off some enormous gourd from a slumbering giant’s picnic.
Miss Mather gasped in wonderment. “Forget what I said, Mr. Charteris…. Such majesty sweeps any of my doubts away.”
The archness of his poetic companion aside, Charteris also felt a wave of elation roll through him. They would soon be boarding the largest aircraft ever to trade earth for the heavens, a ship only a few feet shorter than the fabled ocean liner Titanic.
Once through the main gate, the buses drew up alongside the hangar, where the passengers were again rudely herded by Reederei officials in paramilitary midnight blue, into the cavernous building, the inside of which was illuminated by arc lights—or least partly illuminated: the greenish glow gave way to shadow in the upper recesses of the man-made grotto.
Yet again the travelers were subjected to queuing up at a table where another group of Nazi-uniformed customs agents inspected tickets and passports, and checked one last time for lighters, flashlights, or camera equipment (numerous books of hotel matches were confiscated). Dusk gave way to darkness as this tedious process continued, and Charteris approached his new old friend, Fritz Erdmann.
“Why all these precautions, Fritz?”
The Luftwaffe officer in mufti stood with arms folded, a posture more of supervision than observation. “Would you have the Zeppelin Company take chances with its passengers’ safety? The Reederei have a flawless record; I’m sure they’d like to maintain it.”
Very quietly, Charteris said, “It’s a bomb scare, isn’t it?”
Erdmann’s eyes tightened in an otherwise impassive mask. “I told you before, Mr. Charteris… I’m merely an observer, here.”
“Please, Fritz—it’s ‘Leslie’… and, since we’re friends, I must beg you please not to insult my intelligence. Hydrogen is the most flammable, hottest-burning gas in the world… and that big silver sausage is filled with it.”
“And that is why such careful precautions are being taken… excuse me.”
But before Erdmann could wander off, Charteris gripped him by the arm. “Why the hell don’t you people use helium, instead? Of course, you couldn’t make as much money that way, could you?”
With cheap, buoyant hydrogen, the Hindenburg could lift an extra sixteen and a half tons of cargo and passengers than with inert helium, a gas so safe you could smother a fire with it.
“I’m surprised at your ignorance… Leslie.” Erdmann plucked off the author’s hand as if removing a bothersome insect that had landed there. “The Americans control the world helium market… and their government refuses to export it to us.”
“Hell, that’s a difficult one to figure. Who wouldn’t want to help your man Hitler keep his airships safely flying?”
Erdmann chuckled hollowly. “I believe boarding is beginning, Mr. Charteris… Leslie. Perhaps you and your wry wit should make your way aboard.”
Stewards in white jackets and dark ties were escorting the ladies the brief distance between hangar and zeppelin. Umbrellas were available for the men, as well, and Charteris snatched one and sidled up to the Viking blonde before one of the stewards could beat him to the punch.
“May I?” he asked, offering