Although this anthology does feature one additional example from a sports pulp, that example is a recount of a real event rather than a work of fiction, so we will pass over it and move to the next section, which is dedicated to World War I military aviation. The military section contains only one short story, George Bruce’s “Flaming Arrow,” originally published in The Lone Eagle in 1934.
Our editor and guide, Tony Goodstone, points out that writers of this type of fiction were concerned primarily with the specifics of the aircraft they wrote about. Bruce’s story is an example of this: It very much cares about the Nieuport the protagonist flies and the Fokkers and Pfalzes he dogfights with. This is a great example of action fiction: Bruce balances out the technical specifics with exciting depictions of aerial gun battles.
He is, however, less concerned with military strategy, so even a lay reader will discover several implausibilities in this story. The plot revolves around Ace Avery, a skilled pilot, who receives a suicide mission—he is to fly solo into enemy airspace and bomb a factory where the Germans are developing a new, super form of mustard gas capable of wiping out a small country in one drop.
Questions abound: Why would destroying one manufacturing plant assure that the Germans couldn’t produce this deadly material somewhere else? Why don’t the Germans make some kind of arrangements to protect their formula after they become aware of Avery’s mission (which they do)?
More especially, why does Avery have to fly solo? Supposedly, this gives him better odds, but he fails the mission on his first run … so he simply tries again the next day. The Germans already know he’s coming, so he has no stealth advantage. Why not bring more guns? Why not, as was common in World War II, send additional fighters to protect the bomber?
We don’t get answers to these questions, but they aren’t important. What makes the story work is its combination of genuinely exciting action with the protagonist’s inner struggle. Despite his reputation as the best flying ace in the skies, Avery is a man unsure of himself, someone doing his duty but not particularly brave or at all cocksure, who merely found that he has an especial talent for handling an aeroplane. There is nothing original about his character, but he is likable, and since he is the only character that the story presents to us, “The Flaming Arrow” has a chance for greater psychological depth, such as it is, than most of the other pulps in this collection. It is a convincing portrait of a man at war even if that man’s particular mission sounds unlikely.
