The Bluebirds Trilogy Box Set

by Melvyn Fickling

  Chapter 13

  Monday, 22 December 1941

  Bryan trotted through the shredded remains of the admin tents, grimacing at the speckling of blood stains turning black on the khaki cloth.

  ‘Christ,’ he muttered. A fitter strode past him. ‘Where’s the intelligence officer, and where’s Copeland?’ he called after the man’s back.

  The fitter spun in his stride and pointed. ‘Storage buildings, outside the perimeter track.’

  Bryan redoubled his pace, squinting against the roiling dust thrown up from a section of Hurricanes scurrying across the field and climbing skyward. He headed towards two small, block-built huts on the airfield edge, not much bigger than bike-sheds. As he approached up the incline, he saw that camouflage netting had been strung between them and in its shade huddled a group of pilots in flying gear. The intelligence officer sat behind his trestle, its closest legs jacked up with rocks against the uneven ground; a level desk, an enforced normality.

  Bryan arrived under the netting and wormed his way through the press of airmen.

  ‘Where’s Copeland?’ he demanded. ‘I want to take my flight up.’

  The intelligence officer paused in his scribbling and looked up. ‘I have as many pilots as I need at the moment, Mr Hale.’ He nodded at the knot of men at Bryan’s back. ‘It’s probably best if you go and rest up somewhere. I’m sure they’ll be coming back tonight.’

  Bryan turned at the sound of a murmured commotion. His eyes followed a pilot’s pointed finger. High above the field, a 109 jinked across the sky, its yellow nose etching a jarring zig-zag across the gentle blue-grey dome. Behind it, a Hurricane wallowed in the opposite rhythm, snapping off bursts of fire as its target swung past its nose. From above, two more yellow motes curved across the scene, two more 109s. The stooping fighters slashed past the Hurricane, raking it with a moment’s maelstrom, tipping it into a spinning spiral with gouts of flame tracing its arc towards the ground.

  Muscles bunching with the need for action, Bryan pushed his way out from the crowd and loped back towards the perimeter, staying low and keeping his eye on the pair of Messerschmitts that now circled the airbase at a leisurely distance. Skittering down the slope, another engine note intruded, the coughing clatter of a Merlin throttling back in a landing approach. A swell of alarm filled his craw as the Hurricane wobbled towards the runway, its gear locked and its flaps down.

  With the immutable sweep of inevitability, the German fighters banked around their circuit, levelling out behind their floundering target like wolves at a calving. With the danger sensed late, the Hurricane’s wheels unlocked and lifted, and the engine note rose to a panicked scream. The fighter’s nose angled upwards and flew through a diagonal storm of ordnance. Cannon shells barked through the air, knocking shards out of stricken wings and ploughing gouges from the runway below, their impact on the hardened earth sending thudding vibrations into Bryan’s heels. The Hurricane sagged in the air like a deflating balloon and dropped fifty feet to the ground, bounced once with a broken back and separated into two pieces that spun to a halt amidst desultory flames.

  The Messerschmitts climbed away, lines of tracer fire from the ground waving behind their tails as they clawed back into their circuit. Bryan ran, his feet pounding along the perimeter track, suddenly exposed, soft and weak, his heart lurching as the Germans banked for another run. The enemy planes tipped into their turn, displaying their top-sides like courting birds, flashing the large black crosses atop their wings and the bright yellow plumage of their tails.

  Panting hard, Bryan swerved into the first blast-pen he came to, slid under the aircraft’s wing and rolled with his momentum until he hit the far wall. Metal slashed through the air above him like the ripping of canvas, overlain with the eggshell crunch of the disintegrating Perspex canopy on the Hurricane, and resolved by the explosive clatter of cannon-shells against the far wall spitting fragments to spatter back against the fuselage. A moment of calm, then the 109 zoomed over the pen with a concussive shock of compressed slipstream and a blinding swirl of choking dust.

  ‘Shit,’ Bryan muttered. Spitting grit-mired saliva onto his chin, he dragged himself into a sitting position. Rubbing his trembling thigh muscles, he surveyed the black Hurricane’s shattered cockpit and perforated engine cowling. ‘Shit.’

  Christmas Eve, 1941

  Bryan and Ben sat out on the roof balcony at Xara watching the twirling dance of fighters scribing spirals in the sky above a small gaggle of bombers that cascaded bomb loads across the southern docks of Grand Harbour. At this distance the aircraft were nothing but grains against the haze, and the bombs just a frisson of flecks that darkened the space through which they fell. But to one who knew the manner of such things, this diminutive display was a puppet-show of oblivion.

  One of the circling dots sparked with light, then flared more brightly, climbing higher at the unseeing behest of its burning pilot before curving into a parabola that decayed into a long, flaming spiral towards the sea.

  ‘We’re getting hammered,’ Bryan said. ‘Sending Hurricanes up against 109s, it’s tantamount to murder. I’m surprised we can’t hear them laughing from here.’

  Ben looked at his watch. ‘What time do we need to get to readiness?’

  ‘We don’t,’ Bryan said. ‘Every single one of our planes has picked up at least a dozen holes from strafing or shrapnel. I’ve declared them all unsafe to fly.’

  ‘Can you get away with that?’ Ben asked.

  ‘We’ll see.’ Bryan scratched at his chin. ‘They won’t come over tonight, anyway. Say what you will about the Germans, they do like a Christmas truce.’

  Smoke rose in slow coils from the docks, the bombers vanished north, their escorts dived away from their combats to follow them and Bryan squinted into the failing light to count the returnees to Ta’Qali. Three small shapes, descending as they flew inland, approached the airfield and dropped towards the landing strip. Bryan shook his head at the futility.

  ‘I was talking with the caretaker,’ Ben said. ‘He’s a local chap. Seems quite nice.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Bryan gazed at the returning fighters until they fell below the horizon and merged with the mottled landscape.

  ‘He listens to Italian radio,’ Ben continued. ‘He says they were talking about that cruiser that was sunk.’

  Bryan’s head swivelled to face him. ‘The Neptune?’

  ‘Yes, I think that was the one.’

  ‘What about it?’ Bryan’s voice held an edge of tension.

  ‘It seems an Italian patrol boat came across a drifting raft with thirty blokes inside,’ Ben said. ‘Apparently they’d all died, except one.’

  Bryan turned his gaze back towards Valletta. Far out to sea, a bank of dark clouds piled over themselves, conquered the horizon, then rallied to advance on the island.

  Christmas Day, 1941

  Bryan awoke with a start, at once alert and wary of a strange throbbing noise in his room. It took a moment to identify it as the low thrum of heavy rain on the flat roof. Pulling himself out of bed, he dressed quickly, scratched the fur from his teeth and tongue with a threadbare toothbrush, spat the foul yellow goo into the basin and swilled his mouth with dust-filmed water from the glass at his bedside. He grabbed a blanket from the bed and draped it over his shoulders against the uncommon chill in the air.

  Outside his room, the sound of carolling drifted up the stairs from the dining room, off-key and masculine. He smiled; it was Christmas Day. It had slipped his mind. He pulled the blanket closer around his neck and moved along the corridor, away from the singing, towards the roof terrace.

  He paused at the door and squinted through the glass. The wooden roof shingles weren’t fully watertight and leaks dripped water in many places, pooling into puddles on the floor. But the promise of the rain’s freshness drew him out. Stepping onto the balcony, he sucked in the sweet, cool air like it was ripe fruit. The landscape beyond the railings leapt out in sharper contrast; the wet sandstone glowe
d like mustard, the dusty, tired soil took on a fecund, hazel hue and the paddle-cacti accented the scene with vibrant, dripping greens, like clusters of emeralds strewn across the land by a profligate giant.

  Bryan dodged the streaming leaks and leaned over the bar, reaching under it in search of something to drink. His fingers found a bottle – whisky, nearly half-full. He pulled the cork with his teeth and took a swig. Grimacing against the burning in his empty stomach, he weaved through the cascades to find a dry spot by the railings. In the distance, where the land met the sea, lay Valletta, a battered city full of faithful citizens who, even now, knelt in supplication, giving thanks for what they had, no matter how much they had already sacrificed. He took another deep draft of the fiery liquor. Somewhere in that charnel house was a small girl, sitting in her mother’s arms, clutching a knitted toy, who couldn’t yet know just how much she had been required to lose.

  Sunday, 28 December 1941

  Bryan leaned against a tree at the edge of Hastings Gardens. The position gave him a view down Mint Street and Jacobella’s route home from church. He rubbed his cheeks with both hands in an attempt to scrub away his tiredness. He checked the sky above and behind, as if he was in a cockpit, the menace of the marauding 109s pricking away at his peace of mind. Nothing moved in the grey dome that sat over the island except the wispy remnants of rain clouds hurrying to catch up with the retreating rainstorms. The familiar flow of released congregations lapped into the street and Bryan felt his stomach muscles tense as he searched for the familiar figure.

  Jacobella appeared amongst the crowd, her head inclined downwards, her progress up the steep incline slow. As the people around her filtered away into doorways and up side streets, he saw that Luċija walked next to her mother, hand in hand.

  Eventually the pair reached the top of the hill and crossed the road to where Bryan waited. Luċija beamed a smile and held up the knitted airman for him to inspect.

  Bryan mirrored her smile. ‘He’s a handsome chap,’ he said. ‘Is he a pilot?’

  Luċija descended into sudden shyness, cuddling the doll close to her chest.

  Bryan switched his gaze to Jacobella. ‘How are you?’ It was the fewest words he could use to pose the largest of questions.

  She looked over his shoulder, scanning the horizon. ‘Come inside for a while,’ she said, ‘it’s safer indoors for the little one.’

  The trio walked the short distance along the side of the gardens and entered the house. Jacobella lifted her daughter onto the couch, kissed her forehead, and walked through to the kitchen. Bryan followed her and stood in awkward silence. She lit the stove and lifted a saucepan onto the flame.

  ‘Sit down.’ She spoke without turning. ‘Will you eat with us? My cousin had to kill a goat when it broke a leg. He gave us some of the meat for our Christmas table. I’ve made some stew with the last of it.’

  ‘Yes, thank you.’ Bryan looked for a moment at the back of her head. Her dark hair, dulled through lack of washing, hung limp in a simple ponytail. He sat down at the table. ‘How are you? He repeated the question.

  ‘I was told what they said on the radio.’ She lifted the saucepan’s lid and stirred the contents slowly. ‘There were more than seven hundred men on that ship, and now there’s only one left alive.’ She replaced the lid and put the spoon down on the draining board, finally turning to face him, her eyes glistening with moisture. ‘That’s too many wives and mothers all clinging onto the same, single hope,’ she said quietly. ‘Today, with Luċija in my arms, I committed Mikiel to Our Lady with a silent prayer. He’s at peace now.’

  Bryan shifted uneasily on his chair. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

  Jacobella smiled and wiped a tear from her cheek. ‘You’re doing it.’ She retrieved three plates from a cupboard and sat down opposite him. ‘My family is the world to me. But it’s important to have a friend who knows about the world. You make a difference, Bryan. That’s all you need to do.’

  Bryan felt his cheeks redden. ‘How is Luċija?’

  Jacobella glanced through the door to ensure her daughter was occupied. ‘She is used to her father not being around. She knows something is wrong, but she can’t tease it out from all the other things that are wrong in this poor old city.’ Her face brightened slightly. ‘She certainly loves that doll.’

  The saucepan lid rattled in resonance with the bubbling stew and Jacobella rose to stir it. Breathing in the heady aroma of cooking meat, he moved his fingers on the wooden table, worn smooth by the hands of strangers, and gazed at the stone walls, darkened by the passage of other bodies.

  ‘It’s ready,’ Jacobella said, ‘let’s eat.’

  New Year’s Eve, 1941

  Bryan looked at the three figures hunched in the darkness under the camouflage netting. Huddled in flying jackets against the night’s chill, they smoked cigarettes in cupped hands. The breeze mounted upon itself, then dropped to rise again, its antics presaging more rain. The men’s murmuring voices laid a mellifluous undertone to the intermittent flap and crack of the netting above their heads.

  Bryan glanced at his watch; five minutes to midnight. He drew in a breath to announce the approach of the new year, but paused as a low rumbling intruded into the night. Thunder? No, it swelled rather than faded.

  ‘Listen,’ he hissed, silencing the hushed conversation.

  The growling grew in volume, evolving into the beating clamour of unsynchronised engines. Bryan leapt to his feet and stepped out from under the netting. The light from the near-full moon dusted the airfield like icing sugar, and through its weak gleam a twin-engine raider bore down, fast and low, bomb doors open. It streaked the length of the runway and objects tumbled from its belly. Two bounced and skittered along the ground, the others burst with bright orange violence, stitching a procession of explosions in the wake of the speeding aircraft.

  Bryan dropped to a crouch as blast waves plucked at his clothes, shielding his eyes with an arm. ‘Junkers 88,’ he called over his shoulder. ‘The bastard came in too low for RDF.’

  The engine note dropped a tone as the raider banked away. Bryan pulled himself upright and the three pilots joined him outside the shelter.

  ‘Should we get after him?’ one suggested.

  Bryan shook his head. ‘The runway’s full of new holes and there are unexploded bombs out there somewhere.’ The engine noise swelled again. ‘And he’s coming back.’

  Bryan herded the men under cover as the German bomber made another pass, raking the Hurricanes in the perimeter blast-pens with machine-gun fire from its nose and ventral guns.

  ‘Damn it!’ Bryan raged with frustration. ‘Where’s the bloody AA?’

  The bomber banked around again, the engine noise rising to a bellow as it made another firing pass. Shouts drifted on the breeze from the blast-pens, small arms popped and crackled in futile defiance.

  Bryan stood rigid, breathing heavily through his nose. The bomber came around for another pass and he growled through gritted teeth. The rattle of the German guns tore once more through the night, suddenly joined by the thump-thump of a Bofors gun on the other side of the field. Tracers whirled into the air, sweeping wide of the raider’s wing and spiralling in its wake as the pilot jammed his throttles wide open to run for home.

  The thumping stopped and the engines receded to a gentle buzz. Shouts and cries of pain echoed from the perimeter and flames flickered from a burning fighter.

  ‘Happy new year, gentlemen,’ Bryan muttered. ‘Welcome to 1942.’

  The netting above his head flapped violently with a stiffening breeze and large drops of rain splashed onto the ground, dotting the earth with dark circles.

  New Year’s Day, 1942

  The windows and doors of the palace rattled quietly in rhythm with the gusting winds that lashed the rain onto the bastion walls of Mdina. Bryan stood at a window in the dining room, watching the gale push slicks of water around the panes. Behind him, Copeland sat hunched over a tin mug.

  ‘I’
ve had enough of sitting around waiting for the Luftwaffe to call the shots,’ Bryan said. ‘It costs money and lives to get those bloody fighters over here and then we leave them standing around so the Germans can send over a single aircraft to stitch them all up.’

  ‘It’s not as if we can hide where we are,’ Copeland said, stirring his tepid tea.

  Bryan turned to face the other man. ‘I agree. So we need to be in the air. We need to run standing patrols.’

  Copeland shook his head. ‘You know why we can’t do that. We need to preserve our fuel stocks. If we’re prudent we might have enough to last us until June, maybe July.’

  Bryan sat down on the other side of the table. ‘There’s no point in conserving fuel so we can trickle Hurricanes into the sky to get shot to pieces.’ He lowered his voice. ‘How many pilots did you lose in day-fighting in the week before Christmas?’

  Copeland regarded him across the table with a level gaze. ‘Over half our strength.’

  ‘And how do the rest of them feel about that, sitting in obsolete fighters fitted with half the number of pea-shooters they should carry, waiting for state-of-the-art Messerschmitts to come over and shoot whacking great cannon-shells up their arses?’

  Copeland stayed silent.

  ‘We need Spitfires,’ Bryan said. ‘It’s as simple as that.’ He stood up and paced back to the window. ‘And while we’re waiting for them, we should use the fuel we have to meet the enemy in the air, on our terms.’

  Copeland pushed his chair away from the table and stood up. ‘Let me see if I can talk to someone,’ he said. ‘I can’t promise anything, Hale, but I will try.’

  Sunday, 4 January 1942

  Bryan stood beneath the tree at the top of Mint Street, waiting. The rain had eased off to a fine mist that swirled in the fitful breeze like the gossamer smoke from empyrean fires. He saw Jacobella and Luċija trudging up the hill and went to meet them.

  ‘Hello,’ he called out as he approached.

  Mother and child looked up, both smiled.