‘We wait for the army,’ he said.
The big dog took another lump of stringy flesh from the dead man’s face as the other two starving curs circled, whining their frustration, looking for an opening.
The first soldier arrived at Bryan’s shoulder and took in the scene.
‘Fucking hell,’ he breathed in disbelief.
The man unslung his rifle, settled the butt onto his khaki-clad shoulder and cocked the bolt. His single shot cracked through the still air. The dog’s head snapped away from the dead man, erupting with a plume of blood and shattered bone as the bullet stretched its jerking body out on the ground. The other two strays scampered away, clearing the far wall in a single bound.
‘Nice shot,’ Bryan murmured.
The soldier lowered the rifle. ‘Nothing to it,’ he answered. ‘I bloody hate dogs.’
Saturday, 21 March 1942
Bryan gazed across the aerodrome. The urgent need to fill craters had trumped the standard caution of the black-out, and across the flat expanse of Ta’Qali’s runways the flickering oil lamps around which men had worked through the night, wielding shovels and barrows, could still be seen in the strengthening sunlight.
‘Good morning, Hale.’ Copeland appeared at his shoulder.
‘Morning, sir,’ Bryan said. ‘What sort of bloody mess is this?
‘The sort you get when sixty-odd bombers turn up for a visit.’
Bryan glanced out to the eastern horizon where the ascending sun hardened the silhouette of Valletta and Grand Harbour. ‘Perhaps they’ve decided it’s time to finish us off. Let’s hope they think last night did the job.’
‘There’s a convoy steaming in from Alexandria,’ Copeland said. ‘If we can hang on… If the ships can get here…’
Bryan smiled. ‘Malta,’ he said, ‘one big Hobson’s choice.’
The sun’s yellow disc slinked higher, casting its slanting tendrils across the airfield and shortening the long shadows of the figures that toiled there. Bryan walked around the perimeter towards the Spitfires dispersed in and around the blast-pens. A knot of airmen sat around a small kerosene burner sipping from steaming mugs.
‘Tea, sir?’ One of them stood as he approached, holding out a full mug.
Bryan’s reply was cut short by the sudden snarl of engines and he turned to see a trio of 109s streaking across the far side of the field and curving away as shapes dropped from beneath their wings. The working parties on the runways threw themselves flat as the bombs burst around them. Bofors guns opened fire, snaking tracer in querulous spirals after the retreating fighters. The noise resurged as a second wave of 109s ripped across the field from a different angle, releasing more black canisters to drop into the confusion below. The alerted Bofors crew swung onto the new target, pumping shells across the attackers’ path. The outermost fighter collided with the stream of shells, shedding lumps from wing and body. It staggered out of formation, curving away from the airfield, still harried by ground fire and steadily losing height. The stricken craft’s companions banked in the opposite direction, zooming away for the coast and safety.
‘Get these Spitfires started up,’ Bryan howled against the receding noise. ‘Let’s get them off the ground.’
‘Too late.’ The airman still held the mug of tea in his outstretched hand.
Bryan followed his gaze to the northern horizon where the clear morning azure was infected by dozens of tiny dark shapes heading towards them at altitude in wave after wave. The slow metallic grinding of air-raid klaxons wound into motion around the field, rising quickly to a mournful, cavernous howl.
‘Shit,’ Bryan muttered, then spun on his heel. ‘Under cover!’ he bawled. ‘Get away from the aircraft.’
Mugs clattered onto the ground, splashing steaming tea onto the hard soil. Boots clattered and shouts rang out as the distant drone of engines swelled behind the advancing silhouettes, an ominous harbinger of the forces of explosive destruction creeping across the morning sky.
Bryan scanned the runways, discarded tools lay scattered around the half-filled craters, their erstwhile wielders sprinting away, legs pounding to get distance between them and the impending maelstrom.
The ground reverberated with dull, thudding reports as the heavy anti-aircraft guns around the aerodrome lobbed shells into the bombers’ flightpath, peppering the space with puffs of black smoke that drifted sideways in the breeze.
Bryan ran up the slope, away from the blast-pens, to the rows of slit trenches that slashed thin sanctuaries in the hard ground. He loped past two already full of huddled airmen, skidded to a halt and dropped into the end of the third. As his boots hit the hard-packed soil, the first whistle of falling ordnance cut through the increasing tumult of drumming engines.
The whistle crashed into a detonation that rolled into the next and the next, generating a percussive tattoo of rolling cacophony that pulsated a rhythmic throb of blast waves across the top of the trench. Bryan gaped his mouth to protect his bulging eardrums from the suck and blow of the air around his head, curling his body down into the insulating security of the earth. The impacts pounded in swathes across the aerodrome, separating into individual explosive concussions as they crept closer. Smatterings of gritty soil mixed with sharp shards of bedrock cascaded onto the sheltering men and Bryan tensed his muscles against the expectation of a direct hit, his mind draining to a blank at the prospect of a single bright moment of crushing oblivion.
The marching annihilation stepped over his refuge and advanced up the slope, losing its cohesion and degenerating into ragged and sporadic blasts that eventually surrendered to silence. As the ringing in Bryan’s ears receded, the jerking motions of the shoulder pressed against him became synchronised with sound as the airman’s hysterical sobs penetrated the fug of concussion.
Bryan stood upright and searched the sky. The bombers had gone, their retreat marked only by the occasional glint of sunlight on Perspex high in the sky as they banked away out to sea. He climbed out of the trench, squinting against the rolling barrage of dust that drifted across the aerodrome. Through its obfuscating blanket, the burning flares of fierce fires pricked at his eyes. As the dust unfurled its grip, the damage to Ta’Qali became apparent. Flames licked from the hulks of vehicles and aircraft dotted around the perimeter track. A conflagration raged from a fuel store out at the aerodrome’s edge. But Bryan’s critical gaze focussed on the runways; pitted with dozens of craters, many overlapping, Ta’Qali looked unusable.
****
Dusk crept over the shattered aerodrome and Bryan slumped against the rough stone next to the tail of a Spitfire. Two more smaller raids had sent him and the ground crews scuttling for cover and the intermittent detonation of delayed action bombs tore new holes in the runway and frayed everyone’s nerves.
Copeland arrived and hunkered down next to him. Both men watched as the oil lamps stuttered back into life, illuminating the men that shovelled and tamped the splintered earth.
‘It’ll be a week before this place is fixed,’ Copeland muttered.
‘If they’re stupid enough to leave us alone to fix it,’ Bryan said.
An extravagant grinding of gears caught their attention. Both men stood and sidled out of the blast-pen. A large truck lumbered through the station gates, its hooded headlights sweeping a dim arc on the ground as it pulled up and parked. A second truck swung in next to it, followed by several more. Figures tumbled out from the vehicles and formed into ranks. Shouts of command and admonishment rang out followed by a brief silence. One more order, bawled louder than the others, and the ranks broke up, fanned out and trotted towards the runway.
‘Well, I’ll be blowed,’ Bryan said. ‘The army’s come to lend a hand.’
Sunday, 22 March 1942
Bryan pushed through the door of Xara Palace and headed for the dining room. With thoughts of food, the background rankle of hunger that he’d learned to ignore elbowed its way back into his consciousness. A thick and gamey odour hung over the pots on t
he serving table. Despite its cloying unpleasantness it roused his saliva to flow.
‘What’s this?’ Bryan asked.
The orderly lifted the lid from the pot. ‘We think it’s rabbit.’
Bryan nodded, wrinkling his nose against the pungent aroma rising with the steam.
The man ladled a portion of stew into a bowl and handed him a small slice of dark-coloured bread. Bryan saw Copeland at a table, gnawing on the crust of his bread, and went to sit opposite him. Bryan dipped his own slice in the stew, breaking up the slick of yellow grease that floated on its surface.
Copeland’s jaw worked like a dog chewing a shoe. ‘The army’s done a bloody marvellous job,’ he said around his food. ‘A couple of small raids slowed them down, but not by much. Their CO reckons we should be in business at first light tomorrow. Which is just as well.’
Bryan took a spoonful of the stew, grimacing at its salty sourness.
‘The convoy’s late,’ Copeland continued, ‘so instead of arriving in the dark tonight they’ll be steaming in tomorrow morning. We’ll be flying cover over them for as long as we’re needed.’ He smiled at Bryan. ‘Get your flight to readiness before dawn, you’ll take second patrol.’
Bryan nodded, picking a thread of gristle out of his teeth. ‘I hope they’ve brought some bully beef.’
Chapter 16
Monday, 23 March 1942
Bryan taxied his fighter along the perimeter, an airman lending a guiding hand on each wingtip. He cast a suspicious gaze along the runway as he approached its end. The patchwork of varying shades attested to its recent damage, but it appeared flat and solid. Copeland’s flight sat waiting, so the squadron leader obviously had no qualms about the repair work. Nevertheless, Bryan pulled his straps a notch tighter as insurance against the Spitfire’s narrow undercarriage. Swinging onto the runway he waited for Ben to settle in behind him.
Copeland’s voice buzzed into his earphones. ‘Falcon Leader to Control. We’re ready to take off. Listening out.’
‘Hello, Falcon Leader. You’re clear to go. Bring ‘em home lads, we’re nearly out of cigarettes here. Control out.’
Copeland and his wingman surged forward. Bryan waved his attendant airmen away and gunned the engine. His Spitfire accelerated along the strip, jolting and banging over occasional pot holes like a Bentley on an unfamiliar country track. His tail lifted and the weight on his tyres reduced until the rumbling ceased and he climbed away from the field.
Ben settled in behind his starboard wing and Bryan pulled them both in behind Copeland’s flight, taking an east-by-south course to head out towards the sea and the approaching convoy. Their track took them over the southern side of Grand Harbour where hazy smoke still rose from the previous days’ blitz. Over his port wing, Valletta stretched away on the water’s north side. Crumpled wrecks of buildings serrated the city’s profile, like piles of broken crockery, and smouldering fires lent their own smoky layer to the murky mist that settled over the water. Barrage balloons swayed in the stiff breeze, ascending slowly on their cables to meet the tribulations of the new day, bucking lazily like tethered whales. The sun, very low on the horizon ahead, still lacked the force to dazzle, its outline shimmering through the hazy morning air.
The minutes crawled by and Bryan’s eyes watered for squinting into the limpid light. A shape disrupted the horizon and he wiped away the moisture to focus on the anomaly. One shape became many and they resolved into a group of vessels in the distance.
Bryan thumbed transmit. ‘Falcon Three to Falcon Leader, I think I see several ships ahead, on the port quarter.’
‘Thank you, Falcon Three. That looks like our convoy, alright.’
Four merchant ships ploughed deep wakes in the choppy sea as they raced for the refuge of their destination. A tight ring of destroyers sailed around them and, further out, cruisers carved curving S-shapes through the waves.
Naturally wary of naval gunnery, Copeland adjusted their course to pass south of the convoy, outside its tight defensive screen, then looped around behind it and cruised away to the north.
‘Loosen up, Falcon aircraft. Keep alert.’
Relieved to have the rapidly strengthening sunshine away to one side, Bryan scanned the sky for anything on its way south from Sicily whilst keeping a wary mirror-eye on the receding convoy. Within moments, Bryan saw what he was looking for; many black motes popped into being against the deep blue backdrop of the Mediterranean dawn.
Copeland saw them too. ‘Bandits dead ahead, thirty-plus, bombers and escort.’
The four Spitfires cruised on, climbing slightly, as the enemy formation approached a bit to their port side. The bombers, accounting for two-thirds of the armada, travelled in two distinct groups of different aircraft. Their escort sat high above them, weaving lazily to avoid outrunning their charges. Copeland levelled out, higher than the bombers but below the fighters.
‘Falcon Leader to Falcon aircraft. One pass through the bombers then break hard. Watch your tail, those are 109s up there. Good luck. Tally ho!’
Copeland pulled into a long bank to port and dived towards the bombers, dragging his wingman with him. Bryan waited for a second or two, then followed him down with Ben in his wake.
The Italian planes glowed pale ochre in the sparkling sunlight that shone from behind the undetected interceptors. Bryan watched the two Spitfires ahead of him skim over the first formation. The blocky fuselage of a bomber sprouted a plume of fire from its port engine and sank out of formation. Bryan chose another sandy-coloured body from the wallowing shoal of attackers and opened fire. His cannons jolted streaks of white smoke that passed above and below his target. He held the firing button and pulled the stick to sweep his shells at the next bomber in the formation and saw fragments burst away from its tail as it slid past his windscreen.
Bryan barrelled out of the Italian formation into empty sky. He pulled into a hard, starboard turn, searching the void above him through blurring vision for the retribution that must be falling towards him. Three shapes flashed by in quick succession, breaking into a fan of whirling adversaries. Bryan held his own turn to follow the fighter on the right of the trio, hoping Ben was still behind him to lessen the odds by attacking one of the others. Out of the right side of his canopy, Bryan became dimly aware of clusters of anti-aircraft shells exploding in the sky and plumes of water blossoming from the sea, before the jinking tail of his quarry descended from the top of his windscreen, dragging his concentration back to the physics of aerial battle. He needed the bulk of the 109 to pass through the gunsight to place his shot into its path. The swastikaed tail edged lower and Bryan’s thumb hovered over the firing button. He glanced in his mirror as a black shape swung into view, flashes lighting its cowling.
‘Shit.’ Bryan reversed the direction of his turn. His target whipped away out of sight and his blood pounded through his forehead with the change in g-force. He clenched his jaw against the pain as his vision muted to red, fighting to hold the turn for as long as his faculties allowed, then he straightened into a shallow zoom, searching the sky with recovering eyesight. There was nothing near him. He wallowed back and forth to check his blind spots; he was alone.
‘Falcon Leader here, regroup over convoy. Disengage and regroup.’
Copeland’s voice startled him and he searched the horizon for the ships. The smudging stain of dispersing AA smoke lent him a clue and he banked towards it. Away to the east, receding into the distance, the bomber formations ploughed homewards with the 109s zig-zagging behind them, deterring pursuit.
Three familiar shapes circled on the edge of the convoy, Bryan altered course to join them.
****
Airmen buzzed around the aircraft as they landed, toting petrol cans and ammunition belts, unlocking panels and checking flight surfaces. Bryan sat on a rock by a slit trench, sucking on a cigarette and teasing the tangles from his greasy hair with oil-grimed fingers. The Spitfires being refreshed for more battle sat in a tight group just off the runway.
Bryan fretted about the target this would gift to a strafing attacker. He glanced to the eastern horizon, hoping no Luftwaffe’s attacks would penetrate as far as Ta’Qali. He pulled back his cuff and checked his watch, it was barely nine o’clock in the morning.
‘Hale!’ Copeland called out as he strode towards the Spitfires. ‘Look lively. I need a wingman.’
Bryan flicked his cigarette butt away over his shoulder and trotted down towards his commander, pulling on his flying helmet as he went.
Copeland stood quizzing a crew chief about the fighters’ readiness. As Bryan arrived, he turned to him, fastening his own chin strap as he spoke.
‘Take this one.’ He nodded his head towards the nearest Spitfire. ‘Some of the ships are approaching Grand Harbour. They want something over them to watch them in.’ He winked and trotted round to the next fighter in the line.
Bryan pulled on the parachute harness that hung from the wing and clambered up to settle in the cockpit. Men scurried under the fuselage and shouts of warning rang out before the two Spitfires coughed into life and taxied out onto the runway.
Bryan cocked his head to one side to watch Copeland’s aircraft around the upward-pointing bulk of his own engine cowling. Seeing his leader surge away, he waited for a count of three and eased his own throttle forwards to hoist his fighter into the air and settle behind his flight leader.
The cross-country flight was short, and they were still climbing as they crossed Marsamxett Harbour with Valletta on their starboard wing. Bryan glanced down to find the finger of open space that was Hastings Gardens, relieved to see Windmill Street stood intact.
The pair of Spitfires flashed out over the sea and banked to starboard around the mouth of Grand Harbour. About half-a-mile from the breakwaters, a cargo ship sailed towards sanctuary shadowed by destroyer. A mile behind her, another merchantman with similar close support laboured towards land.
A flicker of movement caught Bryan’s eye; screaming along at wave-top level and hugging the coast, a yellow-nosed fighter poured a stream of fire along the deck of the first cargo ship, vaulted over her masts and veered away due north, sprinting for home, followed by a furious stream of tracer from the destroyer’s guns. Copeland banked away to give chase and Bryan banked in the opposite direction to circle the vessels and guard against more hit-and-run attacks.
The Bluebirds Trilogy Box Set Page 68