Bursting Balloons (Innocents At War Series, Book 5)

by Andrew Wareham

  “What have they done? Something unlikely such as winning a battle?”

  “Good God, no – though they are doing some good in the Black Sea, and their aircraft are doing some remarkable things, though they have too few of them. They have had a revolution and have attempted to create a parliamentary democracy. It won’t last – they have something called Bolsheviks who want to create a Communist state and they are rapidly falling into civil war. Too busy fighting each other to be an enemy to Germany, I suspect. Could lead to problems!”

  “Russia is a problem, to itself and to the rest of the world. Not to worry, sir – they’ll probably fall back into savagery and be too busy killing each other to be a problem to us. But Germany will be fighting on one front only, instead of two as at the moment. Could be a bit of a bugger, that. How soon will the American troops get here?”

  “Very quickly – a few of them to observe the Trenches and then train up their new bodies. Their army is tiny and poorly equipped. It will be good, but not for a year at least. Their Marines are also too few, but are the best of fighting soldiers. They will make a difference, I am told, and their first detachments will be over here very soon.”

  “We need them. Of course, I am one of them myself. Do you think I should register the children with the American Embassy? I must ask Monkey.”

  Three days were too few at home, but the bulk of the soldiers saw a week in a year if they were lucky. Tommy and Noah waved their farewells, sat in their train and smiled determinedly.

  “Transport waiting at Calais, so the movement order says, Tommy.”

  “Sat in the back of a steam Foden, most likely, Noah. Sent down to pick up stores and us thrown in as an afterthought. Just wait to see what it’s like. A field at the rear that’s been almost unused since it was opened? Not likely to be the last word in luxury.”

  Smivvels was waiting for them on the dock at Calais, having arranged with the seamen on the boat to be put ashore first, with Broughton and their trunks. Loud mention of their bosses, and their medals, pulled a lot of strings.

  “A car, sir, and a Crossley Tender, parked up by the Military Police barriers, sir. All ours. We are Ninety-Six and Ninety-Seven Squadrons, sir, and they’re marked up for us.”

  “Any pilots for us on this boat?”

  “No, sir. I asked the bloke with the list of passengers, sir. On your behalf, that is, sir. None for us, sir.”

  Tommy was not surprised; he was used to Smivvels organising his existence. He must remember to drop him a few francs later in the day. He strolled up to the Provosts, produced his papers, greatcoat hanging open. Noah was at his side, equally on display, ribbons prominent.

  “Thank you, sir! Transport is waiting, sir.”

  The Redcap cleared a path through the men forming up outside the gates, led the pair to their car. He did not bow as he opened the door, but the desire was there.

  They sat inside, on the back seat, as was proper.

  “Horrible crawlers, those bloody provosts, Tommy.”

  “Goes with the job, Noah.”

  Their driver turned in his seat, asked if they were ready to proceed and whether they wished to do any shopping in town before going to the airfield.

  “Take us to the field, please.”

  Fifteen miles saw them to a large gatehouse, immaculately and often painted, with a full platoon on guard. A shouting sergeant turned out the guard to salute as they stepped out of the car.

  The administration buildings were next to the gate, newly signed squadron messes immediately beside them. They walked the few yards across, ambled into the offices, spotted a door marked ‘Adjutant’ and wandered inside.

  “’Morning. Stark and Arkwright, Ninety-Six and Ninety-Seven Squadron, I believe. Have any of our people arrived yet?”

  “Good morning, gentlemen, welcome to the Calais Advanced Air Training School. You will wish to be introduced to the Commandant, sirs.”

  Tommy heaved an exaggerated sigh, deciding to establish the way things were to go from the very start.

  “I will wish to be told the state of my squadron first. Have my mechanics and pilots arrived yet?”

  The Adjutant showed signs of discomfort.

  “I believe the Commandant wishes to deal with all operational matters, sir.”

  “Give me your telephone – and that is an order, Captain…”

  “Hollebone, sir. Yes, sir. Here, sir, in the Admin Flight Sergeant’s office, sir.”

  He led them through.

  “Flight, will you get Mr Baring at HQ for me, please.”

  Three minutes of silence followed, then the equipment was passed to Tommy.

  “Maurice? How are you? Yes, very well. Arrived here at the Calais Advanced Air Training School, just making my number. What? No, I’ve never heard of it before either. Having just a little difficulty in explaining the time of day to the Adjutant. Certainly, he’s waiting at my side.”

  Tommy passed the handset across, listened to the brief litany of ‘yes, sir’, ‘no, sir’ that followed. Noah looked out of the window, hands behind his back, eminently uninterested. The Adjutant put the telephone down.

  “Major Stark, eleven of your pilots arrived yesterday and four more are due this afternoon. Major Arkwright, your figures are ten and five. Those who have arrived are on the parade ground at the moment, the Commandant considering that they needed to smarten up.”

  “Do what? Get them into the Mess, now! I give orders to my squadron. If the Commandant wishes to take any action, then he will do so through me. Noah?”

  “Stop pissing about, Captain Hollebone. I want my people off that bloody square in two minutes flat. Run!”

  Tommy watched the Adjutant out of the door.

  “Which is the Commandant’s office, Flight?”

  “Through the Adjutant’s sir, no other way into him.”

  “Then we shall wait for the Adjutant to get back to us. Take me to the Mess, if you please.”

  “I think the Commandant will wish to see you immediately, sir.”

  “I think I wish to see my squadron’s mess, Flight.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Tommy sat at a table near the Anteroom door, signalled to the Mess Sergeant.

  “Ninety-Six Squadron or Training School?”

  “Squadron, sir.”

  “Good. I am Major Stark.”

  “Sergeant Adams, sir.”

  “Good. What time is lunch?”

  “Luncheon is served in the School dining room, sir. Mess dress, at one o’clock, sir.”

  “It will be served to my squadron in my Officers Mess. Working dress.”

  “Yes, sir. It will be arranged, sir.”

  The pilots came in, hot and sweaty and indignant; they saw Tommy and drew up into a double rank, at attention, as they had just been taught.

  “Very pretty, gentlemen. Sit down, tea or coffee, but the bar ain’t open yet. I’m Major Stark you are Ninety-Six Squadron and all orders come from me – not from anyone else at all!”

  Tommy glanced around the faces, hoping to see at least one of older men.

  “Thank Christ! Hell-For, are those captain’s stars I see on your shoulder?”

  “A thank you from Photographic Intelligence, Tommy.”

  “They must be bloody mad! You’ve got a Flight, of course. Any other captains?”

  Two red-faced pilots stood forward, fuming from being put on a parade-ground.

  “Fredericks, sir.”

  “Goldmark, sir.”

  “Good. What squadrons before this? I don’t know either of you, I’m afraid.”

  “Three, sir, and then Home Service. Both of us. We crashed into each other so they sent us back together. We joined Three a few months after you left, sir.”

  “Excellent, you have Flights, of course. I shall lead the fourth Flight. Single-seaters, as I expect you know, and we shall aim to patrol with three Flights each day, in order to allow one day off in four.”

  “Ah, beg pardon, sir, but it is
almost lunch time and we need to change dress. We have been told that any officer who is late or incorrectly turned out will be ‘sconced’, whatever that means.”

  “No idea – some dickhead playing public schoolboy games, I must imagine. It will not happen in this squadron. Working dress all day, except when flying, of course – your choice then, wear whatever keeps you warm. All meals will be eaten as a squadron, Mess dress of an evening, unless we are flying late, which we may be in the summer months.”

  There was a general air of satisfaction.

  “What about Mess fees, Tommy?”

  “Same as in the past, Hell-For – the Adjutant, when he gets here, will deal with them. Why?”

  “The Colonel here informed us that we were to be members of the School Mess and that runs at twelve pounds a week.”

  “He’s wrong. My Squadron, our Mess. No pilot in my Mess will spend more than one half of his pay as Mess fees. The Adjutant will fix that up!”

  Sergeant Adams came across to Tommy.

  “Beg pardon, sir. The colonel has ordered the cooks to serve luncheon in the dining room, sir. Nothing to be taken across to the Messes.”

  “Sorry gentlemen, luncheon will be delayed by a very few minutes.”

  Tommy trotted across to Noah’s Mess, found him coming out of the door at speed.

  “That prick of a colonel, Tommy, has just countermanded my order to the kitchens!”

  “Mine too, Noah.”

  They marched shoulder-to-shoulder into the Adjutant’s office.

  “You, Captain Hollebone, will telephone HQ and inform them that the Commandant of this self-styled Advanced Training School has seen fit to attempt to give orders to my squadron over my head. I am about to punch his teeth down his throat.”

  “No you’re not, Tommy. I saw him first!”

  “Irrelevant - I’m senior to you.”

  “I’ve got bigger fists.”

  “Let’s both have him together.”

  Captain Hollebone ran to the telephone, debating whether to call a squad from the guardroom and deciding that he did not dare.

  They pushed open the door to the inner office, discovered a vaguely familiar face behind a very large desk.

  “I know you. You were a fool last time I met you. You haven’t changed. What’s your name?”

  The Colonel stood, smiling triumphantly.

  “I, Major Stark, am Colonel Wilbraham, and, sir, I command here.”

  “That’s it, I knew I had dealt with you before. Sefton Brancker sacked you as an incompetent tit, as I remember. How did you keep your commission?”

  “I was not sacked, Major Stark! I was transferred here to open this school. As for keeping my commission – there are those in the RFC who value a proper discipline!”

  “So they sent you to a so-called school which has been empty of pupils ever since. It still is. Our two squadrons are using your facilities, for lack of an alternative location. None of my people come under your command and you may not give orders to them. We will put our staff into the kitchens from tomorrow. For today, we shall use your facilities. I expect General Trenchard to be on the telephone by now. I suggest you inform him that you will offer wholehearted cooperation, sir.”

  They walked out, discovered the Adjutant holding the telephone and seeming much harassed. There was a familiar voice roaring at the other end of the line.

  Tommy took the receiver and said a few words, turned to Wilbraham.

  “Colonel, General Trenchard wishes to speak to you. Mr Hollebone, you will order the cooks to serve luncheon in the Messes.”

  Hollebone ran.

  Colonel Wilbraham was wilting on the telephone, shoulders slumping.

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  He put the receiver back on its hook, stared blankly at Tommy.

  “I am to report to HQ for assignment, gentlemen. Thank you. You have finally destroyed my career and ensured that the RFC will never be a senior and disciplined service in its own right!”

  “Very good, old chap. Can’t hang about – don’t want my lunch to get cold.”

  The mechanics had suffered three days of Colonel Wilbraham’s regime, mostly on the parade ground, and were less than pleased. Tommy and Noah listened to their complaints and apologised – the squadrons needed their mechanics.

  Tommy and Noah marched into the Adjutant’s office.

  “What did Wilbraham spend the mess fees on?”

  “We have a rather fine cellar, sir.”

  “Excellent. Has it got any beer?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Pity, the mechanics prefer beer to wine. They will get a bottle of wine each with dinner tonight, and every night until the cellar is empty.”

  “But, you can’t do that! There are some very fine vintages there, to be appreciated not guzzled down by Other Ranks!”

  “One bottle apiece with dinner, tonight and every night. You will arrange this, or your successor will. There are always spaces for officers up in the Trenches.”

  The Adjutant surrendered, asking if he could be permitted to arrange an immediate delivery of beer.

  “The Frogs have got some breweries in the north of the country, sir. They produce a light beer, but it’s really not too bad. If the mechanics prefer beer…”

  “See to it. If the funds don’t run to it, speak to me. Do not, under any circumstances, inform the mechanics that the beer has been paid for by me. I do not countenance bribery.”

  The Adjutant was lost, could not understand what was happening, took refuge in routine.

  “Yes, sir. Signals, sir, recently in. The adjutants and their staff, sir, for your squadrons, are in France and should arrive here today. The first aircraft are due tomorrow. Your cooks, sir, came with the mechanics, but were not permitted access to the kitchens, the commandant wishing all of the trainee pilots to use the school facilities.”

  “Good. We shall get them to work immediately… How did they get transferred? They were local women, I thought.”

  The Adjutant knew nothing of that. Tommy decided he was not going to ask. Noah agreed, the less they knew of such a matter, the smaller their chance of being court-martialled for it.

  Dinner was a better meal than lunch had been; they thought there was a good chance that breakfast would be back to the old standards. The pilots expressed their appreciation of the table wine they were offered. Captain Hollebone had apparently decided that he wished to remain in his office, doing remarkably little, as he had for the previous year.

  The new men arrived in time to eat – showed themselves to be undistinguished and very new. They enjoyed the food.

  Tommy called the pilots together after breakfast, sat them in the anteroom with coffee or tea and introduced them to their new squadron.

  “We are to fly a new Scout, a Sopwith. It is a fighter in the true sense of the term. Twin Vickers, synchronised, a match for anything Jerry has in the sky at the moment. The new plane is faster and handles better than anything else you will meet for the rest of this year. I estimate we have six months in which we will be able to kick Jerry where it hurts. He will develop an answer, in time, but not for a while.”

  Some of the younger ones cheered. All seemed rather pleased.

  “That said, there is a slight problem – it is very hard to fly! Getting it into the air is not easy and keeping it there will demand good flying. Most of you are not good pilots.”

  He waited for them to protest, but they had the wisdom to be silent. They had in fact been warned at their training fields that the old hands – and Tommy was one of the oldest – ate greenhorns who irritated them.

  “I am glad that you do not disagree, gentlemen. I do not know how many hours you have got, but a good pilot needs two hundred. Hands up any man with two hundred hours.”

  Hell-For and the two captains raised their hands, self-consciously.

  “How many?”

  Hell-For took the lead, playing up to the audience.

  “Three hundred, Tommy
, mostly with you.”

  “Four-fifty, Tommy, churning up and down the Home Counties.”

  “Much the same, Tommy. Driving BE2cs and old Bristols and even a bloody Gunbus for a time!”

  “Good – at least you know how to fly, and you have used a rotary. Who else has flown a rotary?”

  All had three or four hours of experience on training planes, mostly later versions of the Avro 504, which was well-behaved, as rotaries went.

  “The new Sopwith is a very powerful rotary – so what will it do?”

  “Pull right, sir?” One of the unknown youths who had the strength of mind to open his mouth; Tommy took a look at his face, tried to memorise it.

  “Tommy when we are together. ‘Sir’ if there’s brass about. Yes. It will pull right, harder and quicker than you could imagine. I have flown the damned thing already, so I will show you what you must do. What you must not do is die, so any flight in which you first, leave the ground, and second, land again, will be a success. Our Adjutant is in his office and his clerk is typing up the lists. You will be assigned to your Flights, obviously at random – we know nothing of you yet. Three apiece to the captains and to me. None of the Flights, including mine, are senior. You are equal, as yet. You will not continue to be – some of you will make full lieutenant before others. Some of you will make a kill very quickly; others won’t. Any questions?”

  The same young gentleman spoke up.

  “Yes, Tommy. What happens if we fail, if we aren’t successful pilots?”

  “Don’t worry about that. You’ll realise you haven’t passed the exams when you spin in. The moment you hit the ground and hear the petrol tank blow, you’ll just have time to work out that you didn’t make it.”

  There were no more questions.

  “Good! There will, by the way, be no more parades or drill. What was this ‘sconce’ that one of you mentioned?”

  Hell-For answered that the man who was penalised had to buy a round of drinks, or a bottle of wine apiece at dinner, for every other pilot. It was no small penalty for the bulk of them who lived on their pay, having no private income.

  “Unlawful under RFC regulations! All sconces will be wiped from your Mess Bills. The Adjutant – our man – will be President of the Mess and will set the fees, which will be far more sensible than the ex-Commandant specified.”