Max notes their departure time as 8:18 p.m. in his logbook.
The great web of handling lines are drawn into the ship at Pruss’s command, and the crewmen beneath the gondolas give a heaving, upward push. There is a lift and a pull, and she hovers twenty feet off the ground for a moment as the crew cheers. Then Pruss gives the order for two tons of water to be released from ballasts on either side of the ship, and like a balloon no longer tethered to the hand of an impatient child, the great silver zeppelin rises into the rose-colored Frankfurt sky.
THE AMERICAN
The American has made himself presentable and is sitting alone at the far end of the narrow dining room. He picked this seat so that he could see the entire area, could monitor the comings and goings of everyone else. The American likes the sense of control this gives him. He’s early, the other guests having gone back to their rooms to change before the late dinner. The only other passengers in sight are a teenage girl patiently watching her two younger brothers. They lean over the observation windows, their noses pressed against the glass as the airship floats over the darkened countryside. He watches the children with a growing sense of unease. They are wild and loud, and one of the small boys pounds his fist against the glass. The American fears the little cuss will discover the windows can be opened and that he’ll tumble out and drop to his death below.
He balls his fists in his lap. Clamps his lips tight to restrain himself from scolding the child. What happens to the boy is no concern of his. He shouldn’t care one way or another. But he does. The American had a brother of his own, and he remembers those moments when they played with abandon, unfettered by fear or consequence. But that was a long time ago. Long before the First World War stripped away the vestiges of their youthful innocence. He knows how the world works now. And that young boy stands no chance.
The child grows foolish now, showing off for his siblings as he tries to scramble up onto the windows themselves. His sister, tall and blond and rail thin, rises smoothly from her seat and cuffs his ear. The movement is so quick, so graceful that the boy does not see it coming.
“Nein,” she says.
“You’re not my mother,” he howls. “You can’t do that!”
“Go on, then. Tell Mama. See if she doesn’t cuff you again. And for impudence this time.”
The two boys rush off, intent on telling their version of events first, and the girl follows slowly behind, head high, back straight, secure in her position as eldest child. The boys can say what they like; their parents will believe her. She knows this and leaves the dining room without looking the least bit perturbed. The American is certain that she will not embellish what the child did. She will simply deliver the facts, perhaps with leniency even, and let them decide.
A-deck is made up almost entirely of passenger cabins. The staterooms below, on B-deck, are new, added early this year to help accommodate the growing demand for passage on the Hindenburg. But the primary quarters are up here. Twenty-five cabins with two berths each, a dining room and promenade on the port side, and on the starboard side, the lounge, reading room, and a second promenade. The only area on A-deck that is not accessible to passengers is a small serving pantry beside the dining room. No bigger than one of the cabins, it has two long counters with overhead cabinets filled with extra utensils, glassware, and linens. Along one wall is a dumbwaiter used to lift food from the kitchen below. It is too small to hold a grown man—a young child perhaps, but that does the American no good—and he has already ruled it out as a possible means of escape should he need to get out of sight quickly.