Piece of Cake

by Derek Robinson

  “Doesn’t he, by God? He’s off his rocker there.”

  “He wants to change the guns. In fact he wants to change a lot of things. Fortunately he hasn’t been able to influence my pilots. He’s become such a crashing bore that they simply change the subject.”

  “I gather he didn’t make himself too popular by going all sniffy with Jacky Bellamy about your Dornier.”

  “Ludicrous. It’s one thing to bitch and bind after things go wrong, but this chap was pooh-poohing the squadron’s first success! I mean, really …”

  “He reckoned it was a fluke, or something.”

  “What concerned me slightly was whether she might listen to him. You know: two Americans. I had a little chat.”

  “So she told me. You convinced her.”

  “Good.”

  “Yes, we need that woman. Seen her latest piece?”

  “No?”

  “Oh, it’s first-rate. She wrote up the military funeral you gave the Jerry crew. Brotherhood of the sky, generous victors, clean-cut English youth pay tribute to a gallant foe, that sort of thing. We came out of it steeped in Christian decency. Went down a treat in Washington, I’m told. I’ll send you a copy.”

  They watched Reilly flounder in the snow, trying to chase a squirrel. “Daft dog,” Rex said fondly. They climbed the steps to the terrace and went inside.

  Sherry.

  “Cheers. Well, Rex, what’s to be done?”

  “Since he’s determined to be chopped, sir—cheers—I shall have to chop him, shan’t I?”

  “If you do, will he be discreet about it?”

  “No. Probably not.”

  “No. In any case that sort of thing always gets out and people always get it wrong. Stuffy English squadron cold-shoulders unorthodox Yank, that sort of thing. Could do great harm.”

  “But that’s absurd. We all know—”

  “It doesn’t matter what we know, Rex. We need American help to fight this war, or so I’m told, although why that should be I can’t understand, they certainly weren’t much use last time, not until it was too late anyway …” Bletchley took a mouthful of sherry, worked it around his teeth, and swallowed. “Hart stays. Look at it this way: he’s the price you pay for Jacky Bellamy’s articles. What you must do is make sure he shoots down a Jerry as soon as possible. Then she’ll really have something to write about.”

  Rex nodded sombrely. “Frankly, sir, what gets on my tit is his rotten formation-flying. It’s quite deliberate. I honestly don’t see how I can tolerate that. It’s not fair on the rest of the squadron.”

  “There’s a simple answer. Don’t take him with you.”

  Rex raised an eyebrow.

  “Let him fly on his own. I’ll get you a new pilot to replace him, plus an extra Hurricane. Then Hart can fly his own patrols. I can send you a bit of bumf to cover it, if you’d like.”

  Rex examined the idea from all sides.

  “It might look better,” he said, “if it had a name.”

  “All right. Let’s call him your Reconnaissance Liaison Unit.”

  Rex nodded. “That’ll do nicely. Thank you, sir. He’s not a bad pilot, you know. He just doesn’t fit in. Reconnaissance Liaison. Good. Perfect.”

  Not much snow fell during the week of the survival exercise but the air was cold and it grew steadily colder, with a wind that came hunting out of the northeast as if it had an old score to settle. The adjutant could not remember such a cold winter. He went for a stroll one evening and felt the bodywarmth being sucked from his face and hands and neck. Ten minutes of that was enough. He went in and stood with his back to the fire and wondered how they were getting on.

  Stickwell was the first to give up.

  He arrived in a taxi on the Wednesday afternoon, sneezing hard and slightly burned about the right foot, which had been too near his campfire when he dozed off. There were also some fingers that looked frostbitten.

  Kellaway had to pay the driver. It came to nearly two thousand francs. “Where on earth have you come from, Sticky?” he asked. “Christ knows, uncle,” Stickwell said hoarsely. “It might have been Bulgaria. Or maybe Belgium. It began with a B, anyway. They weren’t very nice.” He sneezed. “Kept telling me to bugger off. So I did.” As he hobbled inside, clutching the adjutant’s arm, Reilly snarled at him. “They all do that,” he said. “Just ’cus I pinched one of their bones, they all gang up on me. Rotten stinking lousy greedy filthy brutes.”

  Rex came down the stairs. “You didn’t last the course,” he said. “That means you’re dead.”

  “Yes, sir.” Stickwell wiped his dripping nose on his stained sleeve. “I thought being dead would be more fun.” He sneezed again.

  “Poor show.”

  Next day a French army ambulance brought in Cattermole. He said he had cholera; they said he had food poisoning. On Friday, Mother Cox was delivered by the gendarmerie: a charge of arson was being considered. “They’ve got it all wrong, adj,” Cox said earnestly. “It wasn’t really a barn, it was a sort of a hen-house, and it wasn’t any use to anyone, you could tell …” He was followed by Pip Patterson, also in a taxi; he was crippled with chilblains. Fanny Barton was the only member of “A” flight to walk home. He limped up the driveway on Saturday morning, intact but exhausted and twelve pounds lighter.

  “No sign of anyone from ‘B’ flight,” Kellaway said to Skull. “That’s funny.”

  “Perhaps they all got captured by French mountain troops.”

  “No, Rex invented them. I expect Flip’s trudging around in circles somewhere. He was always hopeless at navigation.”

  Sunday passed. Skull telephoned several hospitals and préfectures in and around the Vosges. Nothing. Rex began to look worried. “We can’t afford to be caught at half-strength,” he said. “What if the snow goes? ‘A’ flight’s in no shape to fly.”

  On Monday morning, the extra pilot promised by Bletchley arrived. His name was Dutton; David Dutton: tall, heavy-shouldered, with a bushy ginger mustache. Kellaway took him into the mess and introduced him. The pilots did not move from the armchairs in which they lay sprawled.

  “Hello,” Dutton said.

  “Don’t be so sure,” Cattermole said, not looking up.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “If you’re a replacement,” Stickwell began. He paused to cough wheezily. “Who are you replacing?”

  “Whom,” Cox muttered.

  “No idea,” Dutton said.

  “I’m dead,” Patterson said feebly. “Replace me.” His eyes closed.

  Fanny Barton was slowly waking up. “Hello,” he mumbled.

  “This is Dutton,” Kellaway told him.

  Barton blinked, and drifted off again. Silence, apart from slow breathing.

  “They’ve had rather a rough week,” Kellaway explained.

  “Yes?”

  More silence. Cox settled deeper in his chair. “Whom,” he whispered to himself.

  “Well,” Dutton said, “Perhaps I’d better …” A prolonged blast on a two-tone car horn interrupted him. He followed the adjutant to the window. On the forecourt was a green Bentley Continental tourer, with the top down. “‘B’ flight’s back!” Kellaway announced. Nobody answered.

  A minute later, Flip Moran crashed into the room, followed by Fitzgerald and Gordon, each fighting to beat the other through the door. Then came CH3, playing a small accordion. “Scramble, scramble!” Moran shouted. “Everyone outside for lifeboat drill! There’s a war on, you know!” Fitzgerald and Gordon rushed around, tipping armchairs. Cattermole swore grimly. Moran blew shrill blasts on a whistle. They all looked tanned, fit and smartly uniformed. “Where on earth have you been?” Kellaway asked. CH3 sounded a confused but happy chord. As the accordion wheezed shut, a flap on the top sprang open and a little cuckoo popped out. “Switzerland,” CH3 said. “You missed a treat, adj.”

  “Switzerland,” Rex said heavily.

  “B” flight was in his office, together with Kellaway and Skull. The skies had cleare
d and the room was awash with sunlight.

  “Explain,” he said to Moran.

  “There’s not a lot to tell, sir. As soon as we met up we—”

  “Wait. You all met up? How? You were dropped at least ten miles apart.”

  “Smoke signals. CH3 lit a fire and made smoke signals. We all headed for them.”

  Rex sniffed, and looked sideways at CH3. “Red Indian lore, no doubt.”

  “I saw it in the movies, sir.”

  “Then we found a village,” Moran said. “We pooled our cash and took a taxi to the nearest town. Épinal. Then we caught a train to Geneva.”

  “Money?”

  “CH3 telephoned his bank in New York. They cabled some dollars to a bank in Épinal. That took a few hours, of course.”

  “We went to the pictures,” Flash Gordon said. “Greta Garbo. Very nice.”

  “Arrived Geneva on Tuesday,” Moran went on. “Then we—”

  “How? How did you get into Switzerland without passports?”

  “I had my US passport,” CH3 said. “My uncle happens to be at the American embassy in Berne, and he fixed things for the others.”

  “His uncle happens to be the ambassador,” Fitzgerald told Skull. Skull nodded wisely. Rex had turned away.

  “We bought the Bentley in Geneva and drove to Chamonix and skied for the rest of the week,” Moran said. “Then we came back.”

  “Jolly good hotel,” Fitz said. “Lots of popsies, damn good band, bar never closed. Super.”

  “All paid for in dollars, I take it,” Rex said.

  “The skiing’s probably better at Gstaad,” CH3 said, “but we couldn’t get through: the pass was closed.”

  “What appalling luck,” Rex said. “My heart aches for you.”

  “Still, we had a smashing time in Chamonix,” Gordon said. “The Swiss are—”

  “That wasn’t the object of the exercise though, was it?” Rex demanded. “I sent you on a survival scheme in the Vosges, not a popsy-party in Switzerland.”

  “You didn’t tell us not to go to Switzerland, sir,” Moran said.

  “You knew very well what was intended.”

  “I know what the orders were, sir. You said our task was to survive for one week. How or where we did it was left to us.”

  “Rubbish. You didn’t solve the problem, you ran away from it.”

  “If I may say so, they exercised a certain strategic nous,” Skull remarked. “Supposing the Vosges to be full of nominally hostile troops, the best course was to move into a safer area. Why, after all, face the enemy on his terms?”

  “Because the real thing doesn’t work like that!” Rex barked. “You’ve got to take war as it comes, not as you’d prefer it! You can’t dodge risk because it’s … it’s … it’s inconvenient.”

  “Then the terms of the exercise should have said so,” Moran declared stolidly.

  “They did. The spirit of the test was perfectly obvious. You were to survive on your own resources.”

  “I used my resources,” CH3 said.

  “And they helped you spend them.” Rex waved dismissively at the others.

  “I take it we were meant to cooperate,” Moran said.

  “Besides, it wasn’t all plain sailing,” Fitzgerald added. “I had to haggle like mad with the bloke who owned the Bentley.”

  “Oh, get out.”

  “B” flight went away.

  “The trouble with the rich,” said Rex, “is they think they can buy their way out of everything.”

  “You should know,” Skull said.

  Rex was taken aback. He slapped some files together and banged them into a tray. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.

  “Well, by any normal standard your family is extremely rich, isn’t it? All those factories. Corsets and so on,” Skull told Kellaway.

  “Foundation garments,” Rex said. “And I’d rather it wasn’t generally known, if you don’t mind.”

  “Don’t blame you,” Kellaway said.

  “It’s not a question of snobbery. I don’t give a damn whether the factories make knickers or nutcrackers. I just don’t want people thinking I’m a soft touch, that’s all.”

  “Then why do you pay half of everyone’s mess bill?” Skull asked.

  “Because I choose to. Hornet squadron means a lot to me. I like to think that we set the standard in Fighter Command. I like to think we’re something special, in the air and on the ground.”

  “We are,” Kellaway said loyally.

  On the way downstairs, Rex said: “What’s he going to do when he meets a flock of Messerschmitt 110’s? Cable his bankers in New York?”

  “You’re taking it personally,” Skull said. “You should concede that they exhibited considerable initiative, and accept that fact.”

  “They dodged,” Rex said. “Well, they won’t dodge again, I can assure you of that.”

  The windows in the summerhouse were made of stained glass. At night the colors died, but the hurricane lamp hanging from a beam was just strong enough to pick out the reds, the blues and the greens. There was an oil-heater beside the door. Hot air trembled above it and lifted specks of dust in a helpless rush toward the roof. The place smelled of paraffin and old apples and hay. The hay was underneath a sheet of canvas, and the canvas was underneath Nicole and Flash.

  He felt hot. He put his arms outside the blankets and stretched. His left hand touched a pile of apples, so he took one and ate it, quietly. He was still hot. He opened the blankets and let the air get at his body. Nicole groaned when she felt the draft, so he re-arranged the blankets. She snuggled into them like an animal making its nest, and gave a little grunt of contentment.

  After a moment she opened her eyes.

  “Flash …” Her voice was still croaky with sleep. “Why haven’t you tell me … told me … that you go away … for a week?”

  “I didn’t have a chance, Nicole. It all happened very suddenly, you see. Would you like an apple?”

  “You could have send me … sent to me … a letter.”

  “No time, my love. All very urgent, you see. Action stations, emergency, all hands to the pumps.” He took a last bite. “Besides, I’m not much good at letters.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “Can’t tell you, I’m afraid.” He looked for somewhere to put the core, and finally stood it on top of an empty wine-bottle. “Top secret.”

  Nicole pressed her face into the blankets. “You disappear during a week,” she said, muffled. “I think you never, never see me again.”

  “Yes, well, that’s war for you, isn’t it?” The top of her back was exposed and he ran a fingernail down her spine. She shivered. “England expects, and so into the valley of the shadow of death ride the six hundred …” He rubbed his arms, which were developing goosepimples; and that jogged his memory. “Hey! Just remembered. I bought you something.”

  He jumped up and fetched a book from his greatcoat pocket. “The Miracle of Human Biology, by a bloke called Braine. It’s in English, I got it in Geneva. It says—”

  “Genève? En Suisse?”

  “Yes. Only you’re not supposed to know that, sweety. Better forget it. All fearfully hush-hush, you see.” Flash squatted on the blankets, his feet tucked under him. The hurricane lamp picked out the ripple of his ribcage. It gilded his narrow shoulders and his slim flanks but left his front in darkness. Nicole, watching him, thought he could he any age from fifteen upward: he was so completely unmarked, so light and free. He seems more natural with his clothes off, she thought, and then told herself: Well naturally, of course he does, you idiot … “There’s a very interesting bit about why people blush,” Flash said, flipping the pages. “Do you blush, Nicky? I used to blush all the time. He says—”

  She reached out and plucked the book from his hands. “I don’t care what he says. Ce n’est pas important.”

  “Oh.” He linked his hands on the top of his head and rocked on his heels. “Well, qu’est-ce que c’est … um … im
portant?”

  “Nous sommes importants.” She wriggled out of the blankets, and something in the pit of his stomach lurched. He stopped rocking. Steady on, Gordon, he told himself. You’ll do yourself a damage if you go on like this …

  “Listen, Flash,” she said. “Perhaps you go away again next week, yes?”

  “No. Well, it’s possible. I mean, the way I see it—”

  “I don’t like to be left alone. It makes me very unhappy.”

  “Oh, me too.” He gripped his left big toe with his right, and made them wrestle. “I agree, it’s a shocking bind. But that’s war for you, isn’t it? Not much anyone can do.”

  “There is one thing we can do.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The same as lots of other people do.”

  “We’ve already done that. I can probably manage another helping, if that’s what—”

  “Flash listen. It’s different for you. You have your squadron, your friends, your flying. But I am alone. When you go away … You could be transferred tomorrow and then … Don’t you: understand? I’m no good alone. I’m afraid.”

  “Get yourself a dog. Nice labrador.”

  She hit him with the book.

  “You’ve gone and broken it,” he said, rubbing his arm.

  “Good! Good! I break all your arms! I break your legs! I break your head, your stupid English head!”

  “Not me, you idiot. You’ve broken the book.”

  She hit him with it again. Torn pages fluttered.

  “For God’s sake! What the hell’s the matter with you?”

  Now she was crying. Within seconds the tears were running down her cheeks and splashing on her breasts. Flash had never seen anyone cry so much, so fast. He was alarmed but he was also intrigued, and made a mental note: female tear-ducts. “What’s wrong with labradors?” he said. “Very chummy dogs.”

  “You, you’re a stupid! You don’t think, you don’t feel, you have no heart …” She went off into a stream of tear-stained, hiccuping, incomprehensible French.

  “Well, I’m sorry I’m a stupid,” he said. He put his arms around her and to his surprise she came willingly, eagerly. “It’s not my fault. I happen to come from a very long line of stupids. You may not believe this, but my family is descended from an original Norman stupid. His name was Sir Gordon de Stupid. If you want pure stupid breeding, you couldn’t do better than us.”