The Bluebirds Trilogy Box Set

by Melvyn Fickling

  They walked out across the grass and the hunkering profiles of the night-fighters in dispersal loomed out of the gloaming.

  ‘Look at them’ – Tommy breathed in admiration – ‘they want to go hunting.’

  ***

  Blackbird C-Charlie was the last in line to take-off and Bryan sat tapping his fingers on his knees, waiting for the call to taxi. Faint scuffles intruded from the fuselage as Tommy checked the spare ammo drums were secure in their stowage. Bryan’s eyes flicked over the oil gauges; temperatures climbing slowly. He tweaked the throttles back a notch, listening to the Beaufighters ahead of him get clearance from the controller, interspersed with already airborne night-fighters being vectored onto contacts.

  ‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird C-Charlie. Clear to take off.’

  ‘At last,’ Bryan muttered to himself, released the brakes and eased the throttles forward. He heard more scraping behind him as Tommy clambered into his seat and strapped himself in.

  ‘Operator to pilot. All shipshape back here.’

  The Beaufighter raced across the grass and eased itself into the winter air. Bryan retracted the undercarriage and flicked off the navigation lights. He tipped the aircraft into a starboard bank and pulled the nose over the horizontal to climb away from the airfield on a course towards the coast. The turbulence in the clouds rocked and buffeted the fuselage until they slipped out through the top of the weather into clear, ebony skies. Towering groups of cumulus, rent apart by dizzying gorges, jostled like moonlit icebergs in the turgid, swirling current of the night. On occasion, the deepest bowels of these ethereal monoliths illuminated with the foetal flashes of the storms they incubated.

  ‘Night-warden Control to Blackbird C-Charlie, we may have a customer for you. Make angels ten and listen out.’

  Bryan dropped into a ragged orbit, skirting the edges of the fomenting clouds to camouflage the fighter’s silhouette over the darkened landscape across which they marched.

  ‘Night-warden to Blackbird C-Charlie. Vector two-seven-zero. Bandit is outgoing. He should be crossing your nose from starboard to port. Flash.’

  Tommy bent closer to the cathode ray tubes and watched the static coalesce on the right edge of the screen. It writhed for a moment, then gave birth to a solid blip that edged its way across the green glow.

  Tommy flicked on the intercom, ‘I’ve got contact, Flight. Range two thousand yards. Start a shallow turn to port.’

  The fuselage tilted to the left.

  ‘Thank you, Night-warden, we have contact.’ Bryan’s voice gave way to silence, ruffled only by the sound of his breathing amplified by his oxygen mask.

  Tommy watched the blip drift towards the centre of his screen. ‘Straighten up, Flight. Speed is good. He’s jinking a bit.’

  The German aircraft was heading south, flying in a series of uneven curves, snaking its way towards the coast. The Beaufighter’s straight vector cut off the corners and the range closed steadily.

  ‘Six hundred yards…’ Tommy glanced between the two screens. ‘Altitude good…’

  The engines thrummed their sonorous song through the padded visor into his forehead, the noise underpinned by Bryan’s slow and steady breathing in his ears.

  ‘Three hundred yards, slow down a touch.’

  ‘I see him, Scott. You can take a look now.’

  Tommy wound down the brightness on the AI and swivelled his seat to face forward. Peering ahead through the plexiglass dome he caught the black bulk of a Heinkel 111 suspended in the night above them. To each side the billowing cloud-mountains ascended to form a moonlit valley. The German wound his way between these cliffs to avoid the turbulence within them. Tommy was struck with the absurd certainty that the enemy pilot was humming with pleasure at the surreal beauty of the scene around him.

  Strengthening flashes of lightning, like the cameras of jostling newshounds, flared the scene into stark relief. Tommy felt his jaw tighten; the black-painted Beaufighter sat naked and vulnerable, as visible to the German gunners as they were to him.

  Bryan closed the gap and Tommy followed the bomber’s silhouette as it swung closer, teeth gritted against the expectation of flashing tracer.

  Mirroring the Heinkel’s languid weaving between the cloudbanks, Bryan settled in directly below it. ‘Everything alright, Scott?’ Bryan’s voice betrayed his own suppressed tension.

  ‘Sweet as a nut, Flight.’

  ‘Right, attacking now.’

  Tommy watched the bomber sinking towards Bryan’s sights. The lightning flashes reflected on the Perspex casing of the raider’s ventral gun position, barely eighty yards ahead.

  ‘He’s asleep,’ Tommy muttered to himself. ‘He must be asleep.’

  Silver-blue exhaust flames fluttered delicately along its engine cowlings as the German bomber settled in front of C-Charlie. The Beaufighter made a slight twitch to the right as Bryan centred the gunsight. Then the cannons in the floor erupted into thudding cacophony.

  The sky ahead immediately blossomed into bright orange flame that engulfed the night-fighter as it ploughed through the explosion. The Beaufighter heaved upwards with Bryan’s instinctive attempt to avoid disaster. A large, soft bundle bumped off the observation dome, cartwheeling backwards into space, and shards of metal clattered along the fuselage, like nuts and bolts strewn against a corrugated-iron shed. Then the night-fighter broke through to darkness.

  Tommy blinked against the coloured blobs that mired his vision and pulled his gasping breath back under control. The engines’ roar continued smooth and untroubled.

  ‘Are we still in one piece?’ Tommy’s voice rang brittle in ears still clanging from the cannons’ noise.

  ‘Yes’ – Bryan sounded dazed – ‘I think we got away with it.’

  Tommy glanced at the AI displays. A blip fell away on the right side of the screen. He craned his neck out to scan the starboard quarter, catching his breath at what he saw.

  The wrecked Heinkel dropped through the night, its one intact wing propelling its dive into a languid spin, drawing a spiral of burning petrol that traced its progress seaward. The severed wing followed, spewing occasional coughs of flame and reflecting flashes of moonlight as it spun downwards into the storm-wracked clouds.

  ‘Blackbird C-Charlie to Night-warden Control.’ Bryan’s voice had regained an enforced steely edge. ‘Have dealt with your customer, do you have any more waiting?’

  ‘Good work, C-Charlie. No, they’ve all gone home. Thank you and goodnight.’

  The Beaufighter swung around to a northerly course and started to shed altitude. Tommy loosened his harness a notch and gazed up at the stars as cordite fumes cloyed in his throat.

  Chapter 16

  Monday, 16 December 1940

  Jenny trotted up the steps, showed her pass to the guard on the door and entered the warm fug of the ministry’s foyer. Untangling her scarf from her neck she hurried across the parqueted floor to catch an open lift. She closed her eyes for the few precious seconds it took the lift to tick up to her floor. Dragged from her reverie by the opening doors, she emerged into the corridor and clacked towards the records office. Her supervisor approached, pushing a file trolley in the other direction, and raised enquiring eyebrows.

  ‘Bus detour,’ Jenny blurted as they passed. ‘Road blocked. Sorry.’

  Dashing into the large open-plan workspace, Jenny at once slowed her rush; her eyes fell on James sitting in a chair by her desk, legs crossed, engrossed in a newspaper. She peeled off her overcoat as she crossed the room.

  ‘Mr Bartlett, I’m so sorry I’m late.’ She draped her coat across the back of her chair. ‘There was a road blockage from last night’s raid. The bus had to take a huge detour. I hope you haven’t been waiting long.’

  James lifted his head and smiled.

  ‘Think nothing of it.’ He folded his paper and shoved it into his jacket pocket. ‘It’s always good to catch up with the news.’

  Jenny sat down and faced him across her desk. He
r scramble through the heated building in her winter coat had left her cheeks glowing with warmth. A bead of sweat formed at the nape of her neck and trickled down between her shoulder blades. She straightened her back against its tickling passage and felt it dissipate below her waistband. Her lower back prickled gently with the heat and she tensed her buttocks to unstick her skin from the fabric of her underwear.

  ‘Where shall we start?’ she asked.

  James pulled a notepad from a briefcase by his feet and flipped the pages.

  ‘I’m primarily interested in the areas of London that have suffered the largest concentration of destruction from the bombing, areas where most buildings are beyond repair.’

  Jenny picked up a pen and started notes of her own.

  ‘Residential or industrial?’

  ‘Either… both. It doesn’t matter as long as whatever stood there before has been flattened. I need detailed street maps indicating property use and land registration where possible.’

  Jenny glanced up as she scribbled: ‘What about dock facilities?’

  ‘Include them, but mark them as such. I imagine they’re being repaired ad hoc, no matter what the damage, so they may not be relevant.’

  She nodded. ‘Churches?’

  ‘Identify them, along with the extent of damage if known.’

  Jenny glanced up again: ‘Monuments?’

  ‘Ditto.’

  Jenny scratched this last note without looking down, preferring to watch the other’s dark eyes flitting over his papers as he ticked off his points.

  ‘Now, once we’ve got that organised, I’ll need charts of the corresponding infrastructure; everything underlying these areas. Sewerage, water supply, gas and electricity supplies, to street level only.’ He smiled briskly. ‘How long do you think you need?’

  ‘It’s a big job’ – Jenny glanced at her in tray – ‘and it’s getting bigger.’

  ‘You’re right, let’s do it in chunks. Start at The Tower and map east. Do the north of the river first, then the south. Let me know when you’ve got the first batch sorted.’

  He held Jenny’s gaze for a moment before he rose from his chair and left.

  Jenny glanced from her notes to her in tray and back again.

  ‘Tea first,’ she murmured to herself.

  Thursday, 19 December 1940

  ‘Blackbird C-Charlie to Night-warden. We’re still stooging around. Have you forgotten about us?’

  ‘Hello C-Charlie. Sorry, nothing doing at the moment. No trade.’

  Tommy amused himself by following the other Beaufighters in the taxi rank as they drifted across his screens, checking their altitude differed enough to pose no threat of collision. He glanced up through the Perspex dome into the deep, clear night. There were no clouds and little turbulence. The moon, not yet full, reflected sufficient light to navigate by the glinting waterways, yet left adequate gloom to obscure a slinking raider.

  Tommy shivered against the metallic chill in the fuselage. He wound down the brightness on the tubes and let his eyelids droop.

  The rasp of a voice on the radio jerked Tommy back to consciousness; ‘…return to base. Thank you and goodnight.’

  He turned up the brightness and watched the aerodrome’s homing beacon swing onto the screen.

  ***

  ‘Where the bloody hell were they?’ Bryan made a wide gesture at the crystal black sky. ‘The conditions are perfect.’

  Tommy clumped through the rough grass next to him on his slightly shorter legs.

  ‘According to The Daily Mirror, Bomber Command hit Mannheim on Monday. They were aiming for factories. But by all accounts, they made a merry mess of the town centre. Maybe that was enough to make the Germans see sense. Perhaps they’ve given up bombing as a bad job.’

  Bryan slung him a sideways glance.

  ‘Why would they?’ His voice carried the tension of his frustration. ‘Their losses are miniscule. It’s more likely they’ve run out of bombs and are waiting for a delivery.’

  They trudged without speaking for a few moments and Bryan’s irritation dissipated.

  ‘Would you like a lift home at Christmas?’

  ‘That’s very kind, Flight. Are you going to see your girlfriend?’

  ‘No. I’m going to visit my parents.’

  ‘But, I thought…’

  ‘Whatever other faults she may have, my mother still makes a halfway decent Yorkshire pudding.’

  Friday, 20 December 1940

  Jenny picked up the telephone and dialled an extension.

  ‘Hello, Mr Bartlett? It’s Jennifer from archives. I have the first batch of documents ready for you.’

  The handset clattered back into its cradle and Jenny waited. She found herself watching the door, a slow buzz of expectation settling in her bowels. Moments later James entered the archive office and threaded his way across to her desk.

  Jenny rose and smiled: ‘This way. I’ve laid the plans out in the meeting room.’

  He followed her to a room sectioned from the main office by half-glazed walls. His step quickened when he caught sight of the plans and he pulled a pair of tortoiseshell glasses from his top pocket.

  ‘I’ve labelled each map with its London postal sub-district.’ She fished a sheet of paper from amongst the maps. ‘These are the colour codes for the different types of building. Solid colour indicates undamaged or repairable, cross-hatched indicates severely damaged or destroyed. There’s a corresponding plan of services for each area. I’m sorry to say they are not the same scale, but I’ve marked the boundary of each map onto the service plan so they can be cross referenced. It goes without saying, this is only as accurate as the reports I’ve received. Who knows what will change tonight?’

  James nodded: ‘We can be sure it won’t be getting better, though.’

  Jenny stepped back, clasped her hands in front of her and watched him shuffle and pore through the charts and diagrams. The moments ticked by.

  ‘Is it what you expected?’

  ‘Yes.’ James straightened up and removed his spectacles. ‘It’s really good work. Thank you so much for your efforts.’

  Jenny beamed a smile: ‘May I ask how the maps will be used?’

  James pulled up a chair next to the meeting room table and sat down.

  ‘How’s your history?’

  Jenny pulled up a chair opposite him. ‘Test me.’

  ‘1666?’

  ‘The Great Fire of London.’

  ‘That’s correct. As you know, great swathes of shops and houses were razed to the ground.’ James folded his specs and tucked them back into his top pocket. ‘When Sir Christopher Wren saw the extent of the damage, he realised a great opportunity existed for him to recast the city of London in a more European style. He drew up plans for squares and plazas with roads radiating out from them like sunbeams from the sun, new streets and thoroughfares lined with new shops and houses, new apartments with domed roofs and balconies.

  ‘He drew up exquisitely detailed plans for a New London and presented them to parliament. But while he was busy at his drawing board, and later, while the politicians ground away in their committees, the people who had owned the buildings came back. They swept away the ashes, uncovered the foundations of their shops and homes and started to rebuild everything exactly the way it used to be.’

  Jenny frowned: ‘That seems perfectly natural.’

  ‘Maybe so, but simply ending up with what you had before seems like a lost opportunity to me. Surely it’s better to build something new with passion rather than restore what your ancestors accepted as good enough?’ James tapped the pile of papers. ‘So, this time around we’ve decided to get on with the planning before the fires go out.’

  ‘But don’t we need to beat the Germans first?’

  James regarded her, a shadow of amusement flitting across his features. ‘It will need rebuilding, whoever wins.’

  ***

  Jenny folded a silk blouse and draped it into her suitcase.
r />   ‘When are you leaving?’ Alice leaned against the door frame watching her.

  ‘Tomorrow, probably lunchtime.’ She leafed through more hangers, choosing another blouse to pack. ‘I feel like a bit of a traitor, having a full week holiday when there’s so much work on.’

  ‘We can’t stop being human, Jen. We can’t let them take everything away from us. Here, I got you a little gift.’ Alice brought a small brown paper package from behind her back and held it out: ‘It’s homemade, nothing much. Open it now.’

  Jenny pulled at the string bow and peeled back the paper. The package contained a knitted figure of a man, about six inches tall.

  ‘It’s a voodoo doll.’ Alice beamed with pleasure at her cleverness. ‘You can pretend it’s that nasty salesman from Highgate and stick pins in it when you’re angry. Or it could be Bryan and you can stick pins in it when he doesn’t do what’s expected of him.’

  Jenny turned the figure over in her hands. It wore a blue tunic and sported a flash of blond hair.

  ‘Alice… you’ve made it look like Bryan.’

  ‘Or’ – Alice ignored her comment, took a step forward and laid a palm on Jenny’s shoulder – ‘you could put it in your bottom drawer and save it until you meet someone else, just in case he’s not quite so perfect as you hope he is.’ She pressed a card of pins into Jenny’s free hand. ‘Happy Christmas.’

  Saturday, 21 December 1940

  Jenny crunched over the gravel, through the gates of Du Cane Court and onto the pavement. She hefted her small suitcase in her hand and headed north towards Clapham South. Passing under the railway bridge she glanced across to the tube station entrance. A couple of vans stood parked next to the pavement. In one, a workman poured tea from a thermos. He caught her eye and winked over the hand-rolled cigarette dangling from his lips.

  Jenny smiled and walked on, the beneficence of Christmas already infecting her heart. Her step faltered as she passed the fresh tarmac that traced the circular ghost of the bomb crater and she glanced up at the scaffolded frontage of buildings in which there could be no seasonal cheer.