Piece of Cake

by Derek Robinson

  Within a minute the ground underfoot began to be boggy. They plodded on. Stickwell lost a gym-shoe, sucked off by a particularly greedy bit of bog. They came to a ditch, waded through it, and climbed the bank to find a barbed-wire fence on top. Cattermole went over first and got his shorts hooked while straddling the wire. Stickwell tried to free him and dragged the barbs across the inside of his thigh. “Stupid bastard!” Cattermole shouted.

  “Don’t you talk to me like that,” Stickwell said. He was very angry, but he was also on the wrong side of the wire; and he was a lot shorter than Moggy.

  Fanny Barton finished the run first. The fog had begun to fade, and Kellaway saw him fifty yards away, running as easily as most people walk. God, what a splendid-looking chap he is, the adjutant thought. I wish I could draw him. I wish I could draw his smile. As the figure came closer he imagined Fanny Barton’s smile, the way it began with the eyes, wide-set above high cheekbones, and then suddenly reached the mouth and stretched the slim lips so that they made deep, bracketing creases outside them; and then just as quickly the smile faded and left Barton’s usual expression: alert, watchful, ready.

  “Well done, Fanny,” Kellaway said, and was rewarded with that flash of smile. “Jolly good show.” The others were soon in sight, their wet gym-shoes pattering on the roadway like faint applause. Barton jogged up and down while they came in, everyone mud-streaked and panting dragon-breaths. “Jolly fine, damn good effort,” Kellaway called out. “Sterling stuff. Rule Britannia.” Billy Starr was the last to finish. They cheered him in, and he ran the last ten yards backward.

  “Truly magnificent,” the adjutant said. “Has anyone seen Moggy and Sticky? You should have lapped them.”

  No answer.

  “How odd,” he said.

  “Those blasted cows are following us,” Stickwell said.

  “They’re not cows, they’re heifers,” Cattermole told him.

  “Thanks very much, Moggy. That’s a great help. When the buggers trample me to death I’ll feel a lot better for knowing they’re not cows. Bloody hell, there’s millions of them.”

  The fog had lifted a little, and the field they were trudging across was indeed full of cattle, many of which were trotting after them.

  “They’re just curious, Sticky. Ignore them.”

  “Oh, sure. Ignore a dirty great horn up my rear end. Let’s get out of here.”

  Stickwell began running. The cattle increased speed to a slow gallop. By the time he had covered fifty yards a small herd was cantering after him.

  Cattermole plodded on, watching them fade into the fog. Several minutes later, when he caught up, Stickwell was on the other side of a fence and he was throwing lumps of mud at the animals. “Bloody brutes tried to eat me,” he complained.

  Cattermole climbed the fence. They walked along a farm track and met a man mending a gate. “Which way to Kingsmere aerodrome?” Stickwell asked.

  The man looked at them and tossed his hammer from hand to hand. “How do I know you’re not German spies?” he asked.

  Stickwell glared. “What makes you think German spies go wandering about Essex in their underwear, covered in shit and chased by wild bloody cows?”

  “Heifers,” Cattermole said.

  The man whacked the gatepost a few times while he thought about that. “Go back the way you came,” he said. “Take the second turn on the left, and Kingsmere’s three mile straight on.”

  “Three miles?” Cattermole said faintly. “Three miles?”

  “He’s lying,” Stickwell said. “He thinks we’re spies, he’s deliberately sending us the wrong way.”

  The man contemplated his gatepost and gave it another whack. “Now get off my land afore I set the dogs on you,” he said.

  “Come on, Sticky,” Cattermole said. They trailed back the way they had come.

  Shouts of challenge, and unoriginal insults, and howls of pain, and hoots of laughter echoed along the corridor. Fanny Barton lay in a hot bath and listened: that was Moke Miller’s laugh, so it must be Fitz Fitzgerald trying to pick a fight with Mother Cox, since Moke and Fitz usually stuck together; and those forthright Lowland curses must be coming from Pip Patterson, who didn’t usually put himself out to protect Mother, so he was probably just trying to get past the others without being flicked with a wet towel. The bathroom door shook as bodies crashed against it. Barton breathed deeply and easily. He knew he wouldn’t be disturbed. There was a powerful rumor going about that the Ram intended to weed out several pilots, so this would be a very bad moment to annoy a flight commander; what’s more, Fanny had always made it clear that he didn’t enjoy horseplay. If the others wanted to wrestle and chase and chuck things at each other, that was okay as long as it didn’t involve him. He wasn’t being stuffy; it just wasn’t his style, that’s all.

  Fanny’s real name was Keith. He’d been christened Keith Donald Hugh because his father was intensely keen on cricket; one day, he hoped, his son would play cricket for New Zealand, in which case he would need three good initials to distinguish him from all the other Bartons. The boy was hopeless at cricket. He was good at athletics, but that meant less than nothing to his father: running round in circles, waste of time, where does it get you? After cricket, only two things mattered to Mr. Barton: sheep, and the royal family. His house had very few pictures, but what there were showed either prize Merino rams or King George in his robes. Both subjects had a heavy-lidded, overdressed look, and Keith grew up associating the one with the other. He came to hate life on the farm. It was dreary, exhausting, repetitive work with a lot of greasy, clumsy, bloody-minded animals. The first chance he had, he got out: out of the farm, out of New Zealand, right across the world to Britain, into the Royal Air Force.

  That was a very long time ago. Now he was twenty-four and a flight lieutenant. He couldn’t even remember how he’d got the nickname Fanny. Everyone had a nickname in the squadron, it was part of Fighter Command’s undergraduate quality: an implacably bright, slangy, superficial attitude, the kind of outlook that took nothing seriously except the supreme importance of being in Fighter Command; and that went without saying.

  He pressed his feet against the bath, rested his neck on the other end, and slowly tightened his muscles until his body began to emerge from the water. He pushed harder until his buttocks were clear and he was arched, dripping and steaming, in the cool air. After a few seconds the strain made his muscles quiver. Outside, the horseplay had ended; the corridor was quiet. Fanny Barton held his breath and idly wondered what would happen to a well-trained and beautifully coordinated body when it received a burst of machine-gun fire at a height of three or four miles. The idea did not disturb him. He had thought about it too often for that; and in any case it would be somebody else’s body taking the bullets, not his. He lowered himself, welcoming the warmth, and reached for the soap.

  “You’re bleeding all over my leg,” said Cattermole. He was carrying Stickwell on his back.

  “I know,” Stickwell said. “Don’t worry, it’s only my toe. Mind you,” he added, “it hurts like hell.”

  The fog had continued to lift, and now it was only a tawny haze. The lane stretched in front of them, dead straight for at least half a mile.

  “You wouldn’t have cut your stupid foot if you hadn’t lost your stupid shoe,” Cattermole grumbled. He stopped, heaved his passenger to a more comfortable position, and plodded on. “I didn’t lose my shoe, did I?”

  “Think yourself lucky, Moggy. Very, very lucky.”

  Cattermole thought, and glanced down at the fresh blood streaking his leg. “I hope you haven’t got anything, that’s all,” he said.

  “What d’you mean, ‘got anything’?”

  “I mean I don’t want to get infected.”

  “How the hell can you get infected? I’m the one who’s hurt, for God’s sake. If anyone’s going to catch lockjaw it’ll be me.”

  “Lockjaw? Why lockjaw?”

  “Oh …” Stickwell tried to remember some sixth-fo
rm biology. “Blood poisoning. You cut yourself and then tread in cowdung and … Anyway, it’s not very nice, I can tell you. You go paralyzed and die, or something.”

  “I see,” Cattermole said. “And that’s the filthy muck you’re spreading all over my leg, is it? Thanks very much. Charming, I must say.”

  Stickwell leaned out and looked down. “You’ve already got every other kind of filthy muck on your leg, Moggy. Mine won’t do you any harm.”

  “For Christ’s sake stop rocking about.” They covered another forty or fifty yards in silence. Then Cattermole said: “What time is it? I can’t see my watch.”

  Stickwell twisted to the left. “Looks like ten past ten,” he said.

  “Ten past ten … Say we left about nine … Hell, the others must have finished hours ago.”

  Stickwell grunted.

  “The Ram’s not going to like this,” Cattermole said. “You know how keen he is on physical fitness.”

  “Potty about it,” Stickwell muttered. He was getting pins-and-needles in his legs.

  “Kellaway says the Ram keeps talking about chopping chaps who aren’t fit enough.”

  “I’m fit,” Stickwell said. “Nothing wrong with me. I just can’t walk, that’s all.”

  “Imagine getting chopped and posted to some bloody awful Battle squadron,” Cattermole said. “I don’t fancy that.”

  “Do get a move on, Moggy,” Stickwell said.

  “All because of coming in last in a damn-fool cross-country run. No fear.” Cattermole dropped his passenger and began running. Stickwell’s legs folded and he sprawled on his back. “Moggy!” he cried. “Moggy, you bastard!”

  “I’ll tell him you’re on your way,” Cattermole called back.

  “But I can’t walk.”

  “Then hop!” Cattermole shouted. “Hop!” He demonstrated the action, a lanky, filthy, half-naked figure hopping down the middle of the lane. Stickwell sat and watched him go. A breeze was at work on the remains of the fog. He shivered, and got to his feet. “Bollocks,” he said to the world at large.

  “All right, what’s this?” Flip Moran asked. He flashed a card about a foot square and hid it behind his back.

  “Messerschmitt 110,” said Mother Cox.

  “Junkers 88,” said Moke Miller.

  “Balls. It’s a 110,” said Pip Patterson.

  Moran looked at the other pilots in the lecture room.

  “Well, it’s not one of ours,” said Dicky Starr.

  Moran held up the card. “Messerschmitt Bf 110,” he said. They stared at the plan-view silhouette of a twin-engined plane. Miller groaned. “So what’s the difference?” Moran asked him.

  “Twin tail-fins on the 110,” said Mother Cox. “Obviously.”

  “Flip had his fingers over the tail,” Miller protested.

  “Useless fart, Moke,” said Patterson.

  “The Jerries are very keen on this machine,” Moran said. “It seems they’re using it in Poland at this very moment.”

  “It seems they’re using everything in Poland at this very moment,” said Cox.

  “Two Daimler-Benz engines, each as big as a Merlin,” Moran said, “so it’s not slow. Now then, what’s this?” As he flashed another card, Cattermole opened the door and they all turned to look. He was still in gym-kit, and his chest was heaving.

  “That’s a Fokker,” said Fitz Fitzgerald confidently. “Ugly, isn’t it?”

  Patterson whistled. “But what an undercarriage.”

  “Hello, chaps,” Cattermole gasped.

  “Terrific camouflage job,” Fitzgerald said. “Blends perfectly with the sewage works.”

  “Where’s the Ram?” Cattermole asked. “I’ve looked everywhere.”

  “He’s gone to London with the adj,” Barton said.

  “What?” Cattermole sagged against the wall. “Why?”

  “There’s something odd about you, Moggy,” Moran said. “Did you omit to shave, or what is it?”

  Cattermole sank to a squat, leaving a long wet stain on the wall. “What a swindle,” he muttered.

  “Is that real blood, Moggy?” asked Starr, pointing.

  “Not mine.” Cattermole picked feebly at his leg. “Sticky’s.”

  “You ran him down, did you?” said Fitzgerald. “And then you kicked him to death?”

  “He had it coming to him, rotten little swine,” Miller said. “Bags me his Buick.”

  “Why’ve they gone to London?” Cattermole asked again.

  “There’s a flap on,” Barton said. “The Ram’s been called to an urgent meeting at the Air Ministry.”

  “Bloody Poland, I suppose,” Cattermole muttered.

  “Europe is at the crossroads,” Patterson said knowingly. “Hold you it was. You watch. Anything might happen.”

  The telephone rang and Moran answered it. The message was brief.

  “Get your woolly socks on,” he told them. “That was the controller. Squadron’s been put at fifteen-minute readiness.”

  “It’s those damned war-clouds,” Patterson said.

  When Stickwell hobbled in on blistered feet, everyone else was in flying kit. The squadron remained at readiness for the rest of the day, nervously bored, arguing about the BBC news bulletins (rapid German advances, resolute Polish resistance, intense diplomatic activity) and passing around the various rumors that sifted in from God-knew-where (sector ops room? sergeants’ mess? a visiting ferry pilot? the Battle boys across the way?) to the effect that a pair of Spitfires had shot down a reconnaissance Dornier over Kent; the Duke of Windsor had met Mussolini; the Prime Minister had collapsed with a heart attack (“That’s the only attack you’ll get out of him,” Flip Moran remarked); U-boats had torpedoed an American liner in mid-Atlantic; a cloud of poison gas was drifting over the English Channel; and trains loaded with tanks bearing Polish markings had been seen arriving at the Port of London.

  It was a long, restless afternoon. At about four o’clock Fanny Barton tried to contact the Ram at Air Ministry, just to know what was really happening. A harassed telephonist connected him to an air commodore called Ramshaw, who seemed to be in a crowded and noisy room; he let Barton say a dozen words, barked “How the hell should I know?,” and crashed the phone down. Ten minutes later the adjutant telephoned Barton. “I got some sort of message that you’d got some sort of message,” he said. “Not really,” Fanny said. “I just wanted to keep in touch with the CO.” Kellaway laughed. “So do I, old boy. Haven’t seen him for hours.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “God knows. This place is pure bedlam. I can’t even get a cup of tea.”

  “We’re on standby.”

  “Are you? Jolly good. Actually I think everyone’s on standby, except me. I’m at instant readiness, although for what I really haven’t the faintest … Ah, thanks immensely … Tea at last,” he told Fanny.

  “They say some Spits got a Dornier over Kent,” Fanny said. “Is that right?”

  “Spits? I heard it was Defiants from 264 Squadron. Only it wasn’t a Dornier, it was a—”

  The line went dead.

  “Any joy?” Cattermole asked, from an armchair.

  “Not much,” Barton said.

  “Come and play ping-pong, Fanny,” Starr called. “I’ve smashed everybody else. If I beat you I’m world champion.”

  They were released by the controller at 8 p.m. “So much for your wonderful war-clouds,” Cattermole said as they peeled off their flying overalls.

  “A little more respect, young man,” said Patterson, “or you won’t get invited to my twenty-first birthday party.”

  “When?”

  “Today, actually. Not that I’ve arranged anything …”

  “Don’t worry about that, Pip. Sticky, d’you feel like a party? Silly question. Okay, you can drive. Where’s Mother Cox? Mother, lend us a couple of quid.”

  “No fear.”

  “Well, all right, a fiver then. It’s for a good cause. We’re going to get blotto.”

&n
bsp; “I might come with you,” Cox said. “I could do with a glass of ale. We won’t be late back, will we?”

  “Heavens, no!” Cattermole said.

  When Squadron Leader Ramsay and his adjutant arrived at Air Ministry, they were told that the meeting had been rescheduled for later in the day; meanwhile a secret briefing had been laid on, so secret that Kellaway was excluded; so secret, indeed, that nobody seemed sure where it was taking place. An elderly warrant officer with a clipboard searched repeatedly through a sheaf of duplicated papers and eventually directed the Ram to a remote anteroom. This turned out to be full of Bomber Command aircrew. One by one they were called out until, after an hour, only the Ram and a Fleet Air Arm liaison officer remained. Nobody knew why they were there. Nobody knew anything about the elderly warrant officer. The Ram cornered a civil servant and for ten minutes there was intensive telephoning around the building. “Group Captain Matthews wants to see you both,” the civil servant said at last. “Room 4502.”

  “Who’s he?” the Ram asked.

  “I’m not sure. He’s either DTA to the AOCFFU, or he’s deputizing for PQLO on the ADGB, You’ll have to ask him, I’m afraid.”

  They had no opportunity to ask him. As soon as they entered room 4502, Matthews handed each of them a booklet called Glossary of Anglo-Polish Aeronautical Terms. “See what you make of that,” he said. “Back in ten minutes.” He hurried off.

  The Ram waited half an hour and then went in search of fresh orders. The corridors were full of urgent figures clutching important documents. He saw a flight lieutenant whom he recognized as the assistant to the staff officer of an air vice-marshal in Fighter Command, and explained his problem. “Crikey, you ought to be in Conference Room G,” the flight lieutenant said. “Something to do with anti-aircraft fields of fire, I believe …” But when the Ram found Conference Room G it was occupied by a pack of wing commanders arguing about aviation-fuel stocks.

  He thought hard for a couple of minutes, and decided to cut his losses and get back to Kingsmere. The adjutant, however, was not where he had left him. He asked at the reception desk. Nobody knew anything about Kellaway but there was an urgent message waiting for Squadron Leader Ramsay: call extension 7171 immediately.