The Dust That Falls From Dreams

by Louis de Bernières

  ‘Good for submarine spotting,’ said Daniel.

  ‘No more submarines to spot,’ said Fluke. ‘I suppose you could sell them off to whalers. And why haven’t they issued us with parachutes yet? Don’t they give a damn? The Huns had them ages ago.’

  ‘Parachutes are for sissies,’ said Daniel. ‘True heroes bounce or burn.’ They both thought for a while of all those who might have been saved by parachutes.

  ‘Those RNAS types were damn good flyers, and they were all on land anyway, just like us. I feel sorry for them that they didn’t get much credit. But I’m damned if I can take all this navy mullarkey they’ve brought in with them. Why couldn’t they just be Royal Flying Corps?’

  ‘They wrote off my Tripe and let me have it,’ said Fluke. ‘Here’s to the naval types and their lovely old Tripes. And here’s a curse on all their naval mullarkey. And here’s to General Smuts. We forgive him.’ He tipped back a neat slug of whisky, and said, ‘Do you remember when we got so plastered that we couldn’t tell whisky and soda from champagne? Never been so sick in my life.’

  ‘Talking of credit,’ said Daniel, continuing on his own line of thought, ‘what about the poor bastards in two-seaters? Imagine being in a Harry Tate and getting set on by six Fokkers.’

  ‘And the night-flyers,’ said Fluke. ‘Got no credit at all.’

  ‘We were the Glory Boys,’ said Daniel.

  ‘Actually we can’t be, because the Glory Boys are the Norfolk Regiment, and we can’t be “Death or Glory” either, because that’s the Gloucesters.’

  ‘The Norfolk Regiment are the Holy Boys. You’ve got in a muddle.’

  ‘Quite right. As you were. Can we be the Glory Boys after all?’

  ‘How about the “Glamour Boys”?’

  ‘That’ll do me,’ replied Fluke. ‘You know we’re down from 188 squadrons to thirty-three? From now on it’s a tuppenny-ha’penny air force. And God help the navy. We’re done for. We are muchly confounded. What’s next?’

  ‘Just Empire stuff,’ said Daniel. ‘There’s a squadron of Snipes waiting to pounce on the Huns at Bickendorf if they get frisky, but apart from that it’s India or Egypt or Malta or Mesopotamia or Somaliland, for God’s sake. Everyone’s being sent to Egypt as far as I can see. It’s packed full of bombers. God knows why.’

  ‘Don’t want to go there,’ said Fluke. ‘Worst place in the world to catch a dose. That’s why we lost in the Dardanelles. We sent the boys to Alexandria first. You can’t fight when you’re stinging with clap.’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind going back to India,’ said Daniel. ‘There’s plenty of action on the North-West Frontier, and my brother’s there too. I don’t think I can drag Esther and Rosie out there, though. So many disgusting things to die of. Simla’s lovely, of course.’

  ‘Never give up, do they, those Pathan wallahs?’

  ‘Indeed they don’t. There’s no one more stupidly courageous, as far as I know, apart from us. Tell me, Fluke, do you ever have doubts about this Empire business? The White Man’s Burden, our civilising mission and all that?’

  ‘After that last bash, there’s not much to say for civilisation, is there? We did call it “The War for Civilisation”, didn’t we, though? It’s on our medals. Makes you think.’

  ‘Well, I’ve been thinking.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About the North-West Frontier. Those Pathans.’

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘Well, they’re tribal. They don’t give a farthing about anyone except their own relations. They’re religious fanatics who don’t know a damn thing about their own religion because they can’t read their own language, let alone Arabic. They think that whatever they do, it was the Prophet who told them to do it, even if it’s gelding their prisoners and boiling rice. They’re as high as kites on opium and hashish, and can’t even make sense of each other. They aren’t like us and they don’t want to be like us, and the moment we go they’ll revert to being exactly as they were before.’

  ‘The moment we go? Are we going? I thought it was all about keeping the Russians at arm’s length. I can’t see an end to that, can you? Now that they’re Bolshies to boot.’

  ‘It doesn’t feel like that when you’re there,’ said Daniel. ‘The Russians are the last thing you think of. You pay the chiefs to control their own tribesmen and you burn their villages when they don’t. Oddly enough, they often help you do it, because wanton destruction is just about their favourite thing, and anyway they move their pots and pans out first. You hang them for doing things that are perfectly normal for them, like robbing and killing their neighbours, and then you find yourself in the middle of a blood feud that’s never going to finish.’

  ‘You don’t think it’s all worth it, then? East is East and West is West?’

  ‘I’m all in favour of having adventures,’ replied Daniel. ‘I had a wonderful time when I was a Frontier Scout, and in the Sikhs, but you know, there does come a time when you have to ask yourself, “Well, are you actually doing any good?” ’

  ‘Truth to tell, I’ve had many a furtive doubt myself.’

  ‘I lost two brothers in South Africa,’ said Daniel, ‘and my best friend at Westminster died of blackwater fever in Kenya. Another old mucker died of typhoid in India, and his wife too, who was a sweetie if ever I met one, and on and on it goes, Britain’s finest and best swallowed up by the Empire.’ He paused, then added, ‘Don’t mistake my meaning, old chap, I’m as much of a jingo as anyone, and I’ve got two countries to be a jingo for, and I enjoy Empire Day and Bastille Day as much as anyone else. The old chest swells with pride, doesn’t it? You can hardly help it. Even so, look at the price of it all! You build roads and railways, and set up clinics and schools, and then the subject peoples aren’t grateful enough for any of it to be worth it, and when they get awkward about it, we bash them on the head with sticks, and then they get even less grateful. I don’t think we should be wasting our lives on them. Look at Macedonia. You set up a League of Nations mandate to guide the liberated but benighted ones towards democracy, whereat they wax exceeding wroth against the infidel, and they simply have a marvellous time taking potshots at us.’ He paused, and added, ‘In the end, doing something just because the government tells you to isn’t enough, is it? That isn’t what patriotism really means, is it? If you love your country, it shouldn’t be at the expense of anyone else, should it?’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Fluke, ‘I see that ye are one of little faith these days. Bunking off church parades and backing off from the good old imperium. Better not go round telling too many people; they might think you’re a socialist and stop inviting you to hunt balls.’

  ‘I generally keep all this to myself. Worry not. And hunt balls are my idea of Hell. But I do suspect that more and more people will start to have the same doubts. I think it’s inevitable.’

  ‘Time for us both to resign, methinks, before they catch us at ten thousand feet with idle puttees and without a tie on. Hateful thought. We can always join up again if anything exciting happens. You know what,’ said Fluke, ‘wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could buy up some buses and set up in business split-arsing at county shows?’

  ‘Everyone else has had the same idea; even Rosie’s father suggested it. We should have left the RAF the moment the war ended, like Cecil. He got that wonderful job with Vickers and went straight to China. The market is saturated and bursting at the seams. There are thousand of flyers and thousand of machines. The Yanks have got hordes of barnstormers, but here it hasn’t caught on. The other thing would be to set up postal services in rather big places like Australia or Tanganyika. Has anyone ever thought of a flying medical service? For civilians?’

  ‘No idea. It does occur to me that if you want to have a passenger service you’d have to buy bombers. Do you suppose there are any Gothas left?’

  ‘Very crudely built. I’d go for a Vickers Vimy,’ said Daniel, ‘or a Hereford.’

  ‘Let’s go upstairs for a flip and throw our bu
ses about,’ said Fluke. ‘Let us dispel the gloom, and frolic in the empyrean. Rumour hath it that our machines are warmed up even as we speak, and the cumuli are cotton castles on this fine and frivolous day.’

  ‘I’ll take that as an order, Squadron Leader,’ said Daniel.

  ‘Major to you,’ said Fluke.

  ‘And I shall forever be Captain,’ said Daniel, ‘on the assumption that the prospects of promotion end whenever a war does. If I could take my Snipe with me I’d resign tomorrow.’

  What finally caused him to leave was the departure of Fluke himself. Fluke had gone on impulse to the Argentinian Embassy in London in order to offer his services in the setting up of their fledgling air force, and this amazing stroke of initiative had borne fruit almost immediately. There was still plenty of scope for war in South America.

  86

  Daniel’s Last Binge

  Daniel forewent the opportunity to go to Argentina with Fluke, because Rosie had bluntly refused to accompany him. The thought of South America filled her with horror, because she had read accounts of missionaries being eaten by cannibals in the Amazon. She could not be persuaded that the Argentines were just like the Italians, but much more prosperous and civilised, even ignoring the firm opinions of her own father, who was still making decent sums from developing the Argentine railways. He had been quite taken with the idea of having his own daughter on the spot, as a kind of ambassador. She was not, in fact, inclined to go anywhere at all, because of worries that she had been keeping close to her chest, for good reasons of her own that she was frightened to divulge.

  The night before Fluke and Daniel left the Royal Air Force, there took place the most marvellous binge since the German surrender. Their mess had been removed from the cricket pavilion because of the danger to it brought about by binges, and was now a small complex of Nissen huts and temporary sheds set up on railway sleepers at the furthest corner of the vast playing field, lest the schoolboys fall witness to the antics of the gallant aviators, and be tempted to emulate them. The food was ordered from a nearby hotel, arriving in aluminium vessels resembling enormous mess tins, and the alcohol was brought in from its cellars.

  After a comparatively civilised feast of roast beef, followed by bread-and-butter pudding, and after the loyal toast, Fluke made a speech in honour of Daniel, comparing him to Albert Ball, and Daniel made a speech in honour of Fluke, comparing him to Billy Bishop. These were accompanied by jeers and cheers, and the hurling of buns at the speakers. The Wing Commander, who had arrived in his personal Sopwith Pup for the occasion, stood up and made an elaborate speech in honour of them both, describing them as stout fellows and Hun-getters the like of which we will never see again, now that the Huns have all been got, and mighty pippers and balloonatics before the Lord. He proposed a toast to ‘Good old Boom and Baring’.

  Then the ragging began. Pilot Officer Jenkins played cakewalks on the piano until someone kicked the stool from under him. Daniel stood on the table and sang ‘She Was Poor But She Was Honest’ in the filthiest and longest version he knew, and then sang it again, accompanied by a banjo player who was playing something else altogether, in a different key. They all sang ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’, and Jenkins woke up and played ‘Any Time’s Kissing Time’ and then passed out again. Inspired by this, Fluke took his turn on the table and danced an imaginative Highland fling, like a grasshopper in a frying pan, until the table collapsed, amid great splintering. Not to be undone, the Wing Commander, who was a real Scot, crossed two knives on the rug and demonstrated how to do the Highland fling properly.

  Fluke climbed on the piano and tried a Cossack dance, but it was an upright, and the top was hardly wide enough, so his left foot became jammed between it and the wall. Carter and Bressingham cleared everyone to the perimeter of the room and had a duel with chairs, which Bressingham won, to great acclamation.

  Then Bressingham proposed a bullfight, and brandished the tablecloth as everyone in turn put their fingers to their foreheads and charged him at a crouch. ‘Olé, olé, olé!’

  The gramophone was wound up and Wootton demonstrated how to dance whilst performing a handstand. A small group of them played Cardinal Puff, with champagne and whisky, until there was no choice but to go outside and vomit in the fresh air.

  ‘Drunk last night, drunk like the night before,

  And we’re going to get drunk again tonight

  If we never get drunk no more.’

  Daniel shouted for silence and said, ‘Brothers, over many months I saw many empty chairs, and nothing gives a sentimental airman like me a greater pain than the sight of empty chairs in the mess. Tomorrow there will be two empty chairs. But grieve not! Fluke and I will return, yea, just like Robin Hood, in the hour of need. We are not dead. We are merely sleeping in the wings.’

  ‘Like King Arthur, you BF,’ said Bressingham.

  ‘Like King Arthur,’ said Daniel. ‘I said King Arthur. Robin Hood? Who said Robin Hood? Nunc est bibendum!’

  ‘Nunc est bibendum!’ they roared, and, at this signal, the rumpus began with high cockalorum, and continued with Harry Kelly’s tank game. Fluke emptied out the coal scuttle into a corner, and Daniel went to his hut to fetch another. Then he and Fluke went to one end of the mess and put the empty scuttles on their heads. The sky pilot blew the whistle for the commencement of battle, and Daniel and Fluke charged blindly for the other end of the room whilst their baying and jeering comrades pelted them with coal. It pinged and clanged on the scuttles, and Fluke and Daniel blundered about trying to find the surviving table.

  At last the table was found, climbed upon and occupied, and the ammunition had run out and needed to be gathered up. Daniel and Fluke had won, as they always did, once again proving the invincibility of the tank, even when the drivers can’t see anything.

  There was a wheelbarrow race round the huts clockwise, and then a three-legged race around them anticlockwise. Somebody ripped up the ludo board, and somebody else poured the chess pieces in the piano to see if he could make it jangle.

  Boom alert! Take a note, Baring! The Wing Commander will now make shampoo! Orderly! Fetch the whisky and the champagne! Yes, sir! Two bottles, orderly! Yes, sir! Orderly, fetch the sponge and the bucket! Yes, sir!

  The Wing Commander emptied the whisky and champagne into the bucket, the sponge was dipped, and the Wing Commander ceremoniously baptised each in turn. The men attempted to catch the drips that ran past their mouths.

  We shall each sup in turn from the bucket! Orderly! Time to pass the bucket! Yes, sir! Dis manibus! Deo invicto Mithrae! To us! To the dead Huns! To good old George! To Albert and Mick and Arthur and James and the whole damn lot of ’em! Orderly! Whisky, champagne! Yes, sir! Orderly, arm us with siphons! Yes, sir! Let battle commence! B flight against A and C! Wait…wait…stand by…on my order…Open fire! Orderly, the fire extinguisher, the fire extinguisher! Yes, sir, the fire extinguisher, sir!

  There was a treetop battle. Men climbed on the shoulders of another, and a general melee ensued, which did not finish until the last pair remained standing. Carter broke his wrist and did not realise until the following morning, when the pain of it surpassed that of his hangover. When it was clear that no more mayhem was conceivable or possible, and that they could not be more sodden, they sang to the melody of ‘My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean’ their own squadron’s version of the Flying Corps anthem.

  ‘A poor aviator lay dying

  At the end of a bright summer’s day.

  The weeping ack emmas had gathered

  To carry his fragments away.

  The engine was piled on his wishbone

  His Vickers was wrapped round his head,

  A spark plug he wore on each elbow,

  ’Twas plain he would shortly be dead.

  He spat out a valve and a gasket,

  And stirred in the sump where he lay,

  And then to his wondering comrades

  These brave parting words he did say.

  “Take
the magneto out of my stomach,

  And the butterfly valve from my neck,

  Extract from my liver the crankshaft,

  There are lots of good parts in this wreck.

  Take the manifold out of my larynx,

  And the cylinders out of my brain,

  Take the piston rods out of my kidneys,

  And assemble the engine again.

  Pull the longeron out of my backbone,

  The turnbuckle out of my ear,

  From the small of my back take the rudder,

  There’s all of my aeroplane here.”

  So hold all your glasses right steady,

  And let’s drink a toast to the sky,

  And here’s to the dead already,

  And here’s to the next man to die.’

  ‘Encore! Encore!’ cried Fluke, and they sang it over and over until at last, for the first time in years, it seemed funny again.

  Then the Wing Commander ordered a rag, A and B flights against C flight, and Fluke grabbed a cushion. They scrummed down, arms locked about each other, and the Wing Commander tossed the cushion into the middle. Until the cushion burst apart and filled the air with white feathers, they had as good and rowdy a game of indoor rugby as one could possibly hope for inside a large wooden hut. The Wing Commander got a black eye, even though he was non-combatant.

  Finally there was no one left standing except Daniel and Fluke, staggering with their arms about each other’s shoulders as they surveyed the spillage and the ruin of the furniture and the fallen. Even the gramophone was wrecked.

  They collapsed side by side against the wooden wall, sliding down it together, and Fluke put his head back and sighed. ‘Ripping binge. The rippingest. Verily, I am by the waters of Babylon.’

  ‘It’s the saddest day of our lives,’ said Daniel.

  ‘It’s all postscript now,’ said Fluke. ‘Nothing but bloody postscript. We got matched to the hour, thanked God for it, got through it, binged and biffoed, cursed God and the politicians and generals, shouted and laughed, lost our friends, hurtled about in the sky, slaughtered and murdered and nearly got killed God knows how many times, got the gust up so we could hardly drink for the shakes, and now it’s all gone. Do you remember Albert, lighting a magnesium flare in the dark and walking round it ’til it went out, playing his violin? And Mick playing that “Caprice Viennoise” on his violin and always saying it was too hard? Do you remember the bombing raids with fruit? I got a rigger with an orange, once. What happened to Mick’s cat?’