Chapter Two Thousand Four Hundred Thirteen
7th November 1975
Balderschwang, Bavaria
There were times when having a high-ranking Medical Officer and the Princess Royal of Germany for a wife was a serious disadvantage. Ben had discovered this again and again as there was very little information that Kiki didn’t have ready access to. That was how she had found out that he had been pulled into King Albrecht of Bavaria’s inner circle and the UZfLv program. As far as Ben knew, meant the same thing as the name of the American program, Suppression and Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses. Of course, the Americans called their program SEAD dropping the first D. Almost every pilot Ben that knew was superstitious to a degree and would likely avoid anything called S/DEAD as if were the plague. They also referred to the aircraft modified for the mission as Wild Weasel, whatever that meant.
When Kiki found out that Ben had actively involved himself in the project, even flying some of the mock attacks where he could demonstrate to the members of Jasta 23 the tactics which had worked in Argentina she was decidedly unhappy because she had thought that he had gotten past what she called taking stupid chances.
That might have been the end of it, except Doctor Ernesto Guevara who had walked with Kiki across much of South America when they had been trapped behind the lines during the Patagonian War, had been doing a speaking tour after the book about the experience had become a Global bestseller. He had mentioned the incident where he and Kiki had been trying to charter an airplane to fly them to somewhere friendlier than Santiago. Only to watch as the airport had been blown to smithereens right in front of them. He had Kiki sitting in a taxicab laughing hysterically and saying that she was cursed. Evidently, Ernesto had compared his notes and discovered the identity of the fighter-bomber Squadron that had blown up the flightline of the Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport, Schlasta 5, an element of SKG 18, and Ben himself had been leading the flight. It was a sobering thought that he had only narrowly missed killing his wife, who had been pregnant with their daughter. Considering why he had volunteered to go to South America in the first place, to look for Kiki if he got the chance after she had gone missing, that whole situation had almost taken on the bleakest kind of irony. If Kiki and Ernesto had been just a few minutes earlier getting to the airport or the Jabos had arrived a few minutes later…
It was about that point when Ben decided that he should probably not fly practice missions for the foreseeable future. Besides that, he had made his point with Jasta 23. What remained was finding the solutions to the problems that he had identified. That was what had prompted him to put a call into Wilhelm Falke, better known to the world as Wim. No one knew as much about the systems and tactics used to defeat air defenses as Wim did. Ben had certainly heard him complaining about those things often enough. What would Wim do now that they were in a position to offer solutions?
Montreal, Canada
It had not been Marie Alexandra’s intention to replace Cheshire, but she had always had a cat or a dog. First Fleur, who had been a shockingly tolerant participant in Marie’s games though she would never have done anything to hurt the terrier mix who had been her childhood companion. There was of course Cheshire, the big moggie who Marie had acquired as a kitten. He later became just as much Sophie and Angelica’s cat as Marie’s. Marie also liked Sophie’s puppy Sprocket.
Earlier that year just after she had returned from Germany, Marie had found stray tuxedo tomcat haunting her grandparent’s garden and decided to see if she could win him over. It had been a slow process, but she had earned his trust. Figuring out a good name for him had taken longer. Eventually Marie had settled on the name Porthos, from the Three Musketeers, which was perfect. In the books and movies, Porthos was a big, strong, boisterous extravert. Which described Porthos the cat during his better turns.
As autumn was turning into winter, Marie arranged for Porthos to occupy the basement. Whatever objections Oma Blackwood might have had vanished along with the mice that had infested that part of the house. Porthos seemed particularly satisfied and less interested in the food Marie left in his bowl.
“There is a letter from a legal firm in Ireland, that is odd” Oma Blackwood said as Marie entered the kitchen from the basement. The cook was in the final stages of preparing dinner and Oma was “supervising” though Marie couldn’t imagine her actually cooking anything more complicated than tea or toast. “You are not in some sort of trouble? I know that your mother plays fast and loose with the law at times. I would hate for you to get drawn into that.”
“No” Marie replied, as she saw the stack of the day’s mail. Out of long practice, Oma and Opa’s mail was opened by the household staff. Marie had felt that it was a violation of her own privacy at first until she found out that it hadn’t been done on purpose. Seeing the letter, Marie saw that Jack must have had it written largely in Irish. “I did some work for Jack Kennedy, one of the firm’s partners, as a Translator last July.”
“And that is why he is sending you letters written in gibberish?”
Marie almost said that it was an offer relating to how the entire world was coming to Montreal next summer and he was making a generous offer for her services as a translator. It was too bad for him that she was making other plans.
