A Higher Call

by Adam Makos

Some twenty minutes after his encounter with the B-17, Franz landed at Bremen Airport to have his radiator changed. He wanted to get home to Wiesbaden but also knew he could not risk catastrophic engine failure on the flight there. He had chosen Bremen Airport over Jever Field to avoid questions about his encounter with the American bomber. Franz knew from the moment he had peeled away from the bomber that he had committed a dangerous act. He could not tell anyone the truth—he had helped the enemy escape. If anyone pinned him to that act, he knew he would face a firing squad. People in Germany had been killed for far less. The prior June, a woman had been executed for telling a joke during a break from work at a munitions factory. Her crime was to say: “Hitler and Goering are standing atop the Berlin radio tower. Hitler says he wants to do something to put a smile on Berliners’ faces. So Goering says: ‘Why don’t you jump?’”