Read Chapter 5: THE PRICE OF VICTORIES

Lemaire lived, though the surgeon said he would not fly again for months.

The official finding came before sunset: probable assembly error following recent control maintenance.

The mechanic blamed was Besson.

He was placed under arrest.

"Impossible," Besson said when military police came for him. "I never touched the aileron guard."

The maintenance sheet said otherwise.

His signature appeared beside the entry.

Luc watched them take him away.

"This is how it works," he told Perrin. "The killer signs another man's name, creates the failure, then lets the paperwork convict him."

Perrin rubbed his moustache. "And if we say that now, they ask how we know. We show the forged card. They say Besson forged your name before you exposed him."

"He was sleeping during the trap."

"Confirmed by Marchal, another mechanic. Not enough."

Vautrin arrived after evening patrol and listened.

"We need the Fabre letter," Luc said.

"I sent a request."

"Under your own name?"

"No. I asked a friend at group intelligence to look for it."

Perrin swore softly. "Every extra man is another leak."

Vautrin removed his scarf. "Every extra day is another funeral."

The next morning brought Sous-lieutenant Adrien Cazeneuve, cousin to Armand. He was a handsome twenty-two-year-old with clean boots and a new leather coat. His uncle, Luc learned within an hour, sat on the board of a company supplying fabric to the army.

Adrien took Lemaire's patrol slot.

The pattern seemed almost too obvious now.

"Why kill Girard first?" Luc asked Vautrin. "Girard's crash opened a slot for Lemaire, not Adrien."

"Unless Lemaire was expected to die sooner."

"Or someone is not arranging one promotion. Someone is shaping the entire squadron."

That thought was worse.

Luc began asking questions about victories.

An ace was not merely a good pilot. In 1917, victories created reputations, decorations, transfers, command opportunities, newspaper profiles, access to generals and politicians. A pilot with five confirmed victories entered a different world from one with four. Confirmation depended on witnesses, wreckage, location, and officers willing to support a claim.

Delorme had twenty-one.

Cazeneuve had thirteen.

Vautrin now had twelve.

Valette had seven.

Luc borrowed the squadron victory ledger from a clerk by claiming he needed dates to match engine hours. He copied three months of entries.

That night, he and Vautrin compared them with maintenance incidents.

A pattern emerged.

Fabre had reached seventeen victories before his fatal cable failure. Delorme had eighteen.

A pilot named Roussel had nine and was challenging Cazeneuve for deputy command when an engine fire forced him down behind French lines. He survived and transferred.

Valette had filed two disputed claims in March. Three days later, his magneto failed during patrol. He glided home.

"You never told me," Vautrin said.

Valette shrugged when confronted. "Magnetos fail."

"And you did not think it strange?"

"Everything is strange after three years of war. That is how war hides itself."

Luc asked who had repaired the magneto.

"Chardin. Fabre's mechanic."

Chardin again.

"Where was he transferred?"

Valette's expression changed. "I heard he was sent to a depot near Châlons."

Luc secured permission for a parts run the following day. He drove a lorry south with Perrin through villages reduced to walls and signposts. At the depot, clerks searched lists.

No Chardin.

One old sergeant remembered the name.

"He came through in February," he said. "Stayed two nights. Then military police took him."

"Why?"

"Theft, I think. Selling aviation parts."

"Where was he sent?"

The sergeant checked a ledger.

"Prison at Clairvaux pending court-martial."

Perrin and Luc exchanged a look.

They returned after dark.

Vautrin had news waiting.

His friend at group headquarters had found Fabre's complaint.

Not the original, but a registry entry proving it had existed.

Subject: irregularities in victory confirmation and maintenance assignments.

Addressee: Commander, Groupe de Combat.

Date: four days before Fabre died.

The actual letter was missing from the file.

"Someone removed it," Vautrin said.

"Who had access?"

"Group staff. Squadron command. Couriers. Clerks."

Perrin sighed. "Half the army."

Luc looked at the registry entry.

A thought came to him.

"Not half the army. The person who removed the letter had to know it existed. Fabre probably told someone here."

Vautrin nodded slowly.

"Delorme. As commanding officer."

"Or Cazeneuve."

"Or both."

A shout came from outside.

They ran to the hangar.

Smoke poured from Number Six's engine bay.

Someone had set Luc's workbench on fire.

By the time they extinguished it, his pocket ledger was gone.