inconvenience with the shiny-pants Washington outfit with all the initials.
It's going to happen one of these times like that, isn't it, Ben. That Tepee Creepy outfit will yank you off somewhere to chase after another one of your team buddies and make you keep going, no more East Base, no more me. No more us, except pen pals. And that kind of ink never lasts.
Asking, she carefully confined it to: "What's next?"
Sensing treacherous territory, Ben answered with equal care: "Just more of the same, a catch-up piece on one of the guys on the team. He's—someplace I can't tell you about or why."
Cass let her puzzlement show. "Then how do you write about somebody like that?" Jake Eisman the other night had asked the same thing: "How in the hell do you show off Dex without blowing his cover?"
"Goddamn carefully," Ben recited the same answer. "Don't give me that look, you with the airplane. I know better than anybody that what they've stuck me doing in this war is a strange business, stranger some times than others."
"Touchy. All I was going to ask is, are you going to be away? To wherever this mystery gink is?"
"I find that out tomorrow."
"Ben?" Cass swirled the last of her drink, gazing into the bottom of the glass as if fortune-telling. "Something you better know."
At her tone, he braced back a bit against the bedstead. "Ready on the firing line, I guess."
"I'm a wingwalker."
He looked at her cautiously. "The county fair kind?"
"Fairs, air shows, rodeos, you name it. Anywhere people would pay to see somebody swoop over them hanging on to the struts and guywires of a biplane. If it was a woman, so much the better for the take." She tossed her head, as if the whipstream of wind from back then was in her hair again.
"I, ah, more figured you for a stunt pilot."
"That, too. We—"
Her voice caught on the word, Ben waiting unmoving until she could get hold of herself enough to go on. She had told him how she'd haunted the airfield outside Missoula when she was a kid, brassed her way into the Civilian Pilot Training course when there was a tiny opening for women, and in the end linked up with a smoke jumper turned aircraft rigger for the Forest Service; the wedding ring there on her finger told the rest of that.
"—Dan and I," she managed to get the words out, "talked about barnstorming across the whole country. Turn into flying gypsies, kind of. We weren't much more than punk kids, it sounded like heaven to us. Off we went, weekends, holidays, giving it a try wherever there was some kind of two-bit show. I'd loop the loop and all that, and for the finale a buddy of ours who flew for the smokies would take the controls and I'd waltz out onto the wing. We were hot stuff on the fairgrounds circuit there for a while. Then right away with the war, Dan's Guard unit was called up—you know all that."
Choosing between perils, Ben turned the topic back to wing-walking: "Uh huh, well, that's quite a talent."
"Know what the first rule of wingwalking is?"
He could tell this was not the time to guess
Don't sneeze?
"I'm here listening."
"Never leave hold of what you've got, until you've got hold of something else."
He covered her ring hand with his own, the ache for her now a sharp pain.
"That goes for guys as well as guywires, am I to understand? Husband kind of guy?"
"For the duration, Ben," Cass said levelly, "like every other damn thing. Even if I wash out of the war somehow or who knows what happens"—he understood that meant even if something took him out of the war in more or less one piece—"I couldn't do it to Dan, leave him while he's out there getting shot at. If I did, you would always wonder what sort of tramp you'd ended up with."
Her next words stumbled a bit but they came.
"We're loco over each other, but that can't change the fact that I am as married as a person can get." She poked him in a rib, trying to change the mood, her eyes saying she was desperate to. "So, football hero—why aren't you? It might
It's going to happen one of these times like that, isn't it, Ben. That Tepee Creepy outfit will yank you off somewhere to chase after another one of your team buddies and make you keep going, no more East Base, no more me. No more us, except pen pals. And that kind of ink never lasts.
Asking, she carefully confined it to: "What's next?"
Sensing treacherous territory, Ben answered with equal care: "Just more of the same, a catch-up piece on one of the guys on the team. He's—someplace I can't tell you about or why."
Cass let her puzzlement show. "Then how do you write about somebody like that?" Jake Eisman the other night had asked the same thing: "How in the hell do you show off Dex without blowing his cover?"
"Goddamn carefully," Ben recited the same answer. "Don't give me that look, you with the airplane. I know better than anybody that what they've stuck me doing in this war is a strange business, stranger some times than others."
"Touchy. All I was going to ask is, are you going to be away? To wherever this mystery gink is?"
"I find that out tomorrow."
"Ben?" Cass swirled the last of her drink, gazing into the bottom of the glass as if fortune-telling. "Something you better know."
At her tone, he braced back a bit against the bedstead. "Ready on the firing line, I guess."
"I'm a wingwalker."
He looked at her cautiously. "The county fair kind?"
"Fairs, air shows, rodeos, you name it. Anywhere people would pay to see somebody swoop over them hanging on to the struts and guywires of a biplane. If it was a woman, so much the better for the take." She tossed her head, as if the whipstream of wind from back then was in her hair again.
"I, ah, more figured you for a stunt pilot."
"That, too. We—"
Her voice caught on the word, Ben waiting unmoving until she could get hold of herself enough to go on. She had told him how she'd haunted the airfield outside Missoula when she was a kid, brassed her way into the Civilian Pilot Training course when there was a tiny opening for women, and in the end linked up with a smoke jumper turned aircraft rigger for the Forest Service; the wedding ring there on her finger told the rest of that.
"—Dan and I," she managed to get the words out, "talked about barnstorming across the whole country. Turn into flying gypsies, kind of. We weren't much more than punk kids, it sounded like heaven to us. Off we went, weekends, holidays, giving it a try wherever there was some kind of two-bit show. I'd loop the loop and all that, and for the finale a buddy of ours who flew for the smokies would take the controls and I'd waltz out onto the wing. We were hot stuff on the fairgrounds circuit there for a while. Then right away with the war, Dan's Guard unit was called up—you know all that."
Choosing between perils, Ben turned the topic back to wing-walking: "Uh huh, well, that's quite a talent."
"Know what the first rule of wingwalking is?"
He could tell this was not the time to guess
Don't sneeze?
"I'm here listening."
"Never leave hold of what you've got, until you've got hold of something else."
He covered her ring hand with his own, the ache for her now a sharp pain.
"That goes for guys as well as guywires, am I to understand? Husband kind of guy?"
"For the duration, Ben," Cass said levelly, "like every other damn thing. Even if I wash out of the war somehow or who knows what happens"—he understood that meant even if something took him out of the war in more or less one piece—"I couldn't do it to Dan, leave him while he's out there getting shot at. If I did, you would always wonder what sort of tramp you'd ended up with."
Her next words stumbled a bit but they came.
"We're loco over each other, but that can't change the fact that I am as married as a person can get." She poked him in a rib, trying to change the mood, her eyes saying she was desperate to. "So, football hero—why aren't you? It might
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