‘You’ve heard Churchill,’ Bryan muttered, ‘he’s always saying “London can take it”.’
Carson’s frown deepened: ‘I don’t follow you.’
‘Well, if he thinks London can take it, what makes him believe Munich or Berlin can’t? If he expects German bombs on British heads to strengthen our resolve to resist, how will British bombs on German heads not do the same?’
Carson waved to the steward for another round.
‘So, we should let them get away with it, then?’
Bryan poured the fresh ale into his glass.
‘There’ll be a time to bomb German cities. But first, there needs to be something else that is scaring them stiff. That’s when bombing might crack their morale.’
Carson sipped his beer. ‘What else could possibly scare them?’
‘When we’ve got the British Army back onto French soil, threatening to cross The Rhine. That will be the time to clobber them.’
Carson barked a short laugh: ‘Are you mad, Hale? Do you honestly think we’ll ever get back onto the continent?’
‘Yes, I do. But we need the Americans to wake up and join in.’
‘So, what would you be doing with Bomber Command in the meantime? Send them home on leave pending an American invasion of Europe?’
‘No. They should be bombing the French ports to dust to make sure we don’t get invaded next year. And they should be bombing the Luftwaffe’s airfields in occupied territory, same as the German’s did to us all summer.’
‘So’ – Carson scratched his scalp – ‘your plan to fight a bomber war against Germany would largely consist of bombing France?’
Bryan sniffed and took a swig of beer. ‘Absolutely. Makes perfect sense.’
Long seconds of silence trailed between the two men.
‘When are you on patrol again?’ Bryan asked.
‘Tomorrow night.’
‘Let me come with you?’
Wednesday, 13 November 1940
Bryan braced himself against the armoured doors behind the pilot seat as Carson banked G-George away from the runway and switched off the Beaufighter’s navigation lights. A few hundred yards ahead of them, Moss in M-Mother doused his lights and vanished into the cavernous maw of the winter sky.
They listened to control’s course instructions to Moss and waited.
Then it was their turn: ‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird G-George.’
Carson flicked to transmit: ‘Blackbird G-George, listening out.’
‘Blackbird G-George, heading one-four-zero, patrol Channel east, angels fifteen.’
The Beaufighter’s nose lifted as Carson began the climb to patrol height and they lumbered on through the dark. Bryan’s eyes, hungry for light, were drawn down to the twinned luminescence of Southampton and Portsmouth passing beneath, blacked out but clearly discernible as faint, glowing patches against the jet-black English countryside. Further south a curved line of fluorescence betrayed the waves lolling against the beaches.
‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird G-George, heading zero-four-five. There is a hostile in your vicinity.’
Carson pulled the heavy night-fighter into a smooth bank to port and nudged the throttles forward. Levelling out on the new heading, they droned on.
‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird G-George, heading three-four-zero.’
‘I reckon the bugger is on his way to Oxford,’ Carson said, ‘or maybe Birmingham.’
He levelled out on the new heading and Bryan squinted into the night, willing himself to see the raider they chased.
‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird G-George. Flash, repeat, flash. Handing over.’
The coded instruction to activate the onboard detection apparatus heightened the tension in the cockpit as the seconds slipped by.
‘Pilot to operator. Do you have anything?’
‘Nothing definite yet, stand by.’
Carson’s hand drifted towards the throttles, the creeping fear of collision prickling across his skin. Both he and Bryan scanned the sky ahead and above, aching to catch a movement.
‘Pilot to operator. Anything?’
‘Not yet-’
The aircraft bucked with a vicious jolt, like a car hitting a curbstone.
‘Damn it,’ Carson cursed, ‘we just hit his bloody slipstream. You must have something on that screen.’
‘It’s difficult to say. It’s very indistinct.’
The Beaufighter lurched through another sickening thud of turbulence and Carson’s nerve failed him. He pulled back hard on the throttles and the two engines coughed and belched long banners of bright orange flames from their exhausts.
‘That’s torn it,’ Bryan shouted. ‘Move! Dive!’
Dazzled by the exhaust flashes, Bryan clung on as Carson throttled forward and threw the fighter into a violent left bank. Golden orbs of tracer fire erupted from somewhere close by, licked past the cockpit and curved away, lighting an arcing tangent to the Beaufighter’s turn.
Carson eased back on the power and hauled into a long, shallow circle, bringing them back onto their original heading.
‘Pilot to operator.’ Carson’s voice betrayed a vibrato of fear. He took a breath and steadied himself: ‘Can you regain contact?’
Bryan tapped him on the shoulder and pointed out to the starboard quarter. A line of silver splashes stitched their way through the ebony landscape, the last one hit something that bloomed into a ghastly orange flower of fire.
‘He’s dumped his bombs,’ Bryan said. ‘He’ll be hedge-hopping his way home by now. We’ve lost him.’
Carson’s shoulder sagged under Bryan’s gloved hand.
‘Blackbird G-George to Night-warden Control. Contact lost, returning to patrol line. Listening out.’
Thursday, 14 November 1940
Alice slid two plates into the hot water and Jenny attacked them with a dishcloth, swilling off the remnants of mashed potato and putting them in the draining rack. She chased the knives and forks around the bottom of the sink and finally pulled the plug, studying her reddened hands as the water gurgled away.
‘What do you think they’re using hand cream for?’ she asked.
Alice placed the folded tablecloth in a drawer. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘They had no stock in the shop and the assistant said it was because of the war.’
‘I have some, somewhere. Wait a minute.’
Jenny rinsed the last suds out of the sink and wiped down the splashes on the draining board.
Alice plonked the small glass tub of hand cream on the kitchen table and grabbed the boiling kettle from the stove.
‘Time for a cuppa’ before our German friends arrive.’
Jenny sat down, unscrewed the lid and dipped into the white cream. She rubbed the salve in between her chapped fingers, enjoying the slippery smooth relief it brought.
‘I shall be twenty-nine next year,’ she mused. ‘I’m sure my mother will remind me of that when I see her.’
Alice sat down and put the steaming teapot between them. ‘Please don’t say anything about being left on the shelf. You’ve got a perfectly fine cure for that situation.’
Jenny paused the motion of her hands. ‘I haven’t heard from him in ages.’
Alice poured the tea. ‘And how do you feel about that?’
Jenny splayed her fingers, appraised her stretched palms and took another dab of hand cream. ‘As if he’ll never come back. The longer I don’t see him or hear anything, the stronger the wall becomes, the more confident I am that I’ll be able to deal with it when he gets killed.’
Alice sipped at her tea. ‘What if he was to come through the door right now?’
Jenny glanced wistfully down the corridor: ‘I’d want to hold him and kiss him and not let him leave.’
‘Mmm…’ Alice stood up. ‘Fancy a quick game of cards?’
They moved to the lounge and hunched over the coffee table.
Hand after hand of whist was won and lost. A lo
ng session of pontoon, using raisins from the kitchen cupboard as chips, saw Jenny bankrupted twice. Then the two women wracked their brains to work out the rules of half-forgotten games from their childhoods.
Alice leaned back in her chair to arch her aching back as Jenny dealt herself a game of patience.
‘What time is it?’
Jenny looked at her watch: ‘Just past eleven.’
‘There’s been no air raid warning.’
Jenny dropped the cards onto the table and stood up. Switching off the lights, she went to the window and pulled the blackouts open. London lay under the twin blankets of darkness and silence, each making the other heavier.
‘Oh, my word,’ Jenny whispered. ‘They haven’t come.’
Alice joined her by the window. ‘Or they’ve gone somewhere else.’
Friday, 15 November 1940
Bryan and Tommy sat in the adjutant’s office along with a second crew who were also undergoing training. Bryan sucked on a cigarette and tapped his foot in impatience; the afternoon was slipping away and he wanted to get a couple of hours into his log book before the sun went down. The adjutant entered and all four men stood.
‘Sit down, gentlemen.’ The older officer waited for the scraping of chairs to quell. ‘I’ve received instructions to make both of your crews operational.’ A wan smile passed over his lips. ‘Going by the book, you both need more hours and I should oppose this in principal. But the Germans have turned the screw and we need more guns in the air as soon as possible.
‘During last night’s full moon, they put several hundred bombers over Coventry. The raid lasted twelve hours. We’ve got no official figures yet, but some estimates have two thousand civilians killed or injured. There’s some speculation that Coventry has ceased to operate as a city. The Ministry is worried about the possible effects this might have on the country’s general morale and wants to bring down some raiders, get some pictures of wrecked bombers onto the front pages.
‘You all have leave for the weekend, reporting back to station no later than 11am on Monday. You two’ – he nodded at the second crew – ‘will be night-available on that day. You two’ – he nodded at Bryan and Tommy – ‘will join the flying rota on Wednesday. If there are no questions, you’re free to go.’
The four men stood and left the office.
‘Typical bloody Air Force,’ Bryan muttered as they walked into the fresh air. ‘They announce it’s a bloody emergency and then give you a two-day holiday.’
Tommy laughed: ‘I’m not complaining about that, Flight. I haven’t seen my little boy for a month.’ His brow wrinkled: ‘But I’ve never travelled home from here before.’
‘Where’s home?’ Bryan asked.
‘Peckham, south-east London.’
‘I’ll give you a lift. Be ready in an hour.’
‘I’m not sure, Flight’ – Tommy tapped his sergeant stripes – ‘we’re not really supposed to.’
‘Of course.’ Bryan nodded. ‘Well, I need to make a call from the telephone box outside The George. If you happen to be there, it would be rude of me not to offer you a ride.’
***
Tommy strode the last fifty yards towards The George as the big, black Humber passed him in the gloom and pulled into the car park.
Bryan climbed out and walked towards the telephone box.
‘Jump in,’ he called. ‘I won’t be a minute.’
Tommy climbed in and waited. The big car’s interior smelled of tobacco-aged leather with mildew undertones. A few moments later Bryan got into the driver’s seat.
‘Did you want to call your wife? I have some change.’
‘We don’t have a telephone,’ Tommy answered. ‘It’ll have to be a surprise for her, I’m afraid.’
***
Bryan roared along the country roads, anxious to make as much headway before the light failed completely.
‘Are you married, Flight?’ Tommy asked, letting his eyes unfocus on the blur of hedgerows barrelling past the car.
‘No, I’m not. Unless you include the RAF.’
‘I’m sorry. I thought, what with you making the telephone call…’
‘I did call a woman. But she’s not my wife.’ Bryan chewed his lip. ‘I’m not even sure she’s my girlfriend.’
‘Oh, so you’re still wooing her?’
‘It’s gone beyond that, Scott. We sort of started at the other end.’ Bryan sighed: ‘But she doesn’t want to admit there’s anything in it, in case I get the chop.’
‘I can see why some girls might think that way. Me and Lizzy spoke about it before we tried for a baby.’ He mused in silence for a second. ‘I suppose it might make you feel safer, living in the moment and not making plans. But the best things in life are the ones that grow over time, they bring the happiest moments.’
‘She certainly brings me happy moments.’ Bryan smiled in his turn. ‘Maybe I should call her bluff and survive the war.’
***
Darkness choked out the final vestige of daylight as the long road unfurled beneath them. Brief conversations alternated with lulls of cigarette-filled quiet. As they approached the suburbs of Kingston and Twickenham, Bryan nudged Tommy from a doze. The spidery talons of searchlights scratched the sky over the centre of London and the cloud base reflected the desultory flash of bomb strikes and the dull red tinge of fires.
‘The Germans are about.’ Bryan’s understatement belied the tension tightening his shoulders. ‘Hopefully they’ll be done by the time we get there.’
The only other traffic on the roads was near-empty buses, looming like the ghosts of galleons above them, and emergency vehicles, crashing heedlessly past on their way to the city. Bryan strained his eyes to stay on the road, pulling in every time an ambulance or fire bell closed from behind. Progress was slow.
As the road swung due west, the dim crimson glow over the city filled the horizon with the velvet richness of demonic theatre curtains, stitched together by the hellish flashbulbs of gunfire from the anti-aircraft batteries on Richmond Common.
Tommy stared ahead, straight-backed in his seat.
‘I try not to imagine this,’ he murmured. ‘What kind of war is it, when the wives and children are in more danger than their soldiers?’
‘It’s the kind of war we have to win,’ Bryan replied. ‘If this’ – he nodded at the fire glow – ‘is part of winning it, then those wives and children will go down in history. If we lose, it will just be a sickening waste and we’ll never be forgiven for not surrendering.’
The cloud cover thinned and the barely-waning moon slid lazily out from its muffling blankets to sit stark and bright on the ebony felt of the night. Its frosted rays edged the road with silver tresses as the puddled tarmac reflected the light.
‘Whatever they’re aiming for, they won’t miss it now.’
Bryan lit a cigarette and offered one to Tommy.
‘You can drop me off at Clapham Junction, Flight.’ Tommy accepted the smoke. ‘I’m sure I can get a bus from there.’
Bryan looked out to his right, south towards Balham. The sky over Jenny’s home remained resolutely dark.
‘Don’t be an arse, Scott. I’ll take you home, it’s only a couple of miles.’
Crawling through Brixton and bearing north-east to Camberwell, the Humber whined along in low gear. The crumpled bark of bomb strikes rippled in from the middle distance. Tommy wound down his window and hung his head outside, trying to gauge the direction of the raid.
‘I reckon they’re over the docks again,’ he said. ‘Hopefully they won’t drift too far this way.’
They turned onto Peckham Road and Bryan slowed. A writhing coil of smoke curled down the thoroughfare, spewing from a seething conflagration in the shop frontages. Advancing at walking pace they crept past the bomb strike, rubble and glass crunching under his tyres. They emerged on the windward side of the fire and visibility returned.
Tommy, still hanging out the window, craned his neck back to the burning buildin
g. Wardens stood on the pavement, held at bay by the gouts of leaping flames spiralling out of the shattered shop.
‘Bloody hell.’ Tommy pulled his head back into the car: ‘That’s the chip shop. They’ll have a job putting that one out.’
A fire tender clanged its way along the other side of the road towards its impossible task. As it passed, Bryan caught a glimpse through the windscreen of the taught faces on the men in the cab and a stab of empathetic fear tightened his chest. For a moment, the nakedness of total exposure to the crushing force of high explosive sent a rush of panic up his throat.
‘There’s a railway bridge up ahead.’ Tommy’s voice jarred Bryan back to the moment.
He swallowed the ball of tension. ‘I see it.’
‘Under the bridge and first left. My house is at the top end’
Bryan pulled the Humber into the left turn and grimaced as the car slewed and wobbled.
‘Feels like I’ve picked up a puncture.’
Bryan drove with exaggerated care to the end of the road and parked on the pavement. Both men got out and Bryan checked the wheels. One at the back sat low on its rapidly deflating tyre. Tommy came and stood beside him.
‘You’ll need some light to fix that,’ he said. ‘Come inside and wait for the all clear. Then we can get a torch on it.’
Away to the north-east a string of explosions pummelled a line of destruction through the streets of Woolwich.
‘Alright, Scott,’ Bryan murmured. ‘I could do with a rest from driving. Thank you.’
Tommy grabbed his bag from the car and Bryan stood back as he knocked on the front door and fell into the embrace of his surprised and delighted wife.
Another stick of exploding bombs in the distance pulled a flinch across Bryan’s fixed smile with each detonation. At last, Tommy disentangled himself and gestured towards him.
‘Lizzy, this is Flight Lieutenant Hale. He’s the pilot I’ll be working with.’ He turned his smile to Bryan. ‘Flight, this is Lizzy, my wife.’
‘Come inside, Mr Hale’ – Lizzy smiled – ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’
Bryan followed them through to the kitchen and shrugged off his greatcoat. Being inside the house imparted a flimsy sense of security, despite the distant impacts rattling the windows. The room was lit with candles and Bryan accepted the plain wooden chair he was offered.
The Bluebirds Trilogy Box Set Page 39