The Burning Shore c-8

by Wilbur Smith

  Biggs was sitting on a packing case outside the tent, polishing Michael's boots, but he jumped to attention, his face expressionless.

  Enough of that! Michael smiled at him. Sorry about last night, Biggs. Bloody rude of me. I didn't mean it. I know, sir.

  Biggs relaxed. I felt the same way about the major. Biggs, wake me at three. I've got some sleep to catch up on. It was not Biggs who woke him but the shouts of the ground crews, the sound of running men, the deep bellowing tone of the anti-aircraft guns along the edge of the orchard, and the roaring overhead of a Mercedes aircraft engine.

  Michael staggered out of his tent with tousled hair and bloodshot eyes, still half-asleep. What the hell is happening, Biggs?

  A Hun, sir, cheeky brighter beating up the base."He's pushed off again.

  Other pilots and ground crew were shouting qnongst the trees as they ran to the edge of the field.

  Didn't even fire a shot Did you see him?

  An Albatros, blue with black and white wings. The devil almost took the roof of the mess He dropped something, Bob's picked it up.

  Michael ducked back into the tent and pulled on his jacket and a pair of tennis shoes. He heard two or three of the aircraft starting up as he ran out of the tent again.

  Some of his own pilots were setting off in pursuit of the German interloper.

  Stop those men from taking off! Michael yelled, and before he reached the adjutant's office he heard the engines switched off again in response to his order.

  There was small crowd of curious pilots at the door, and Michael pushed through them just as the adjutant untied the drawstring that closed the mouth of the canvas bag that the German machine had dropped. The chorus of question and comment and speculation was silenced immediately as they all realized what the bag contained.

  The adjutant gently ran the strip of green silk through his fingers. There were black-rimmed holes burned through it and it was stained with dried black blood.

  Andrew's scarf, he said unnecessarily, and his silver flask. The silver was badly dented, but the cairngorm stopper gleamed yellow and gold as he turned it in his hands, and the contents gurgled softly. He set it aside and one by one drew the other items from the bag: Andrew's medal ribbons, the amber cigarette-holder, a spring -loaded sovereign case that still contained three coins, his pigskin wallet. The photograph of Andrew's parents standing in the grounds of the castle fell from the wallet as he turned it over.

  What's this? The adjutant picked out a buff-coloured envelope of thick glossy paper sealed with a wax wafer. It's addressed, he read the face of the envelope to the pilot of the yellow SE5a. The adjutant looked up at Michael, startled.

  That's you, Michael, how the hell?

  Michael took the envelope from him and split the seal with his thumbnail.

  There was a single sheet of the same first-quality paper.

  The letter was handwritten, and though the writing was obviously continental, for the capitals were formed in Gothic script, the text was in perfect English: Sir, Your friend, Lord Andrew Killigerran, was buried this morning in the cemetery of the Protestant church at Douai. This Jagdstaffel accorded him full military honours.

  I have the honour to inform you, and at the same time also to warn you that no death in war is murder. The object of warfare is the destruction of the enemy by all means possible.

  I look forward to meeting you.

  OTTO VON GREIM. Near Douai.

  They were all looking expectantly at Michael as he folded the letter and thrust it into his pocket.

  They recovered Andrew's body, he said quietly, and he was buried with full military honours at Douai this morning. Bloody decent of them, one of the pilots murmured.

  Yes, for Huns, that is, said Michael, and turned towards the door.

  Michael, the adjutant stopped him, I think Andrew would have wanted you to have this.

  He handed the silver hip flask to Michael. Michael turned it slowly in his hands. The dent in the metal had probably been caused by the impact, he thought, and he shivered.

  Yes, he nodded. I'll look after it for him. He turned back to the door and pushed his way through the group of silent officers.

  Biggs helped him dress with even more than his usual attention to detail.

  I gave them a good rub of dubbin, sir, he pointed out as he helped Michael into the soft kudu-skin boots.

  Michael appeared not to have heard the remark.

  Although he had lain down again after the disturbance of the German aircraft's fly-over, he had not managed to sleep. Yet he felt calm, even placid. What's that, Biggs? he asked vaguely.

  I said, I'll have your number ones laid out for you when you come back, and I've arranged with the cook for a good five gallons of hot water for your bath. Thank you, Biggs. Not every day it happens, Mr Michael. That's true, Biggs, once in a lifetime is enough. I'm sure you and the young lady are going to be very happy. Me and my missus been married twenty-two years come June, sir. A long time, Biggs. I hope you break my record, Mr Michael. I'll try One other thing, sir. Biggs was embarrassed, he did not look up from the lacings of the boots. We shouldn't ought to be flying alone, sir. Not safe at all, sir, we should take Mr Johnson with us at least, beg your pardon, sir I know it's not my place to say so. Michael laid his hand on Bigg's shoulder for a moment.

  He had never done that before.

  Have that bath ready for me when I get home, he said as he stood up.

  Biggs watched him stoop out through the flap of the tent, without saying goodbye or wishing him luck, though it took an effort to restrain himself from doing so, then he picked up Michael's discarded jacket and folded it with exaggerated care.

  When the Wolseley engine fired and caught, Michael advanced the ignition until she settled to a fine deep rumble. Then he listened to it critically for thirty seconds before he looked up at Mac who was standing on the wing beside the cockpit, his hair and overalls fluttering in the wash of the propeller.

  Lovely, Mac! he shouted above the engine beat, and Mac grinned.

  Give them hell, sir, and jumped down to pull the chocks from in front of the landing-wheels.

  Instinctively Michael drew a deep breath, as though he were about to dive into one of those cool green pools of the Tugela river, and then eased the throttle open and the big machine rolled forward.

  The knoll behind the chAteau was deserted once again, but he had not expected anything else. He lifted the nose into the climb attitude and then changed his mind, let it drop again and brought her round in a tight turn, his wingtip almost brushing the tops of the oaks.

  He came out of the turn with the chAteau directly ahead, and he flew past it at the height of the pink-tiled roof. He saw no sign of life and as soon as he was past, he banked the SE5a into a figure-of-eight turn and came around again, still at roof level, This time he saw movement. One of the windows at ground level, near the kitchens, was thrown open. Someone was waving a yellow cloth from it, but he could not make out who it was.

  He came around again and this time dropped down until his landing-wheels almost touched the stone wall that enclosed Anna's vegetable garden. He saw Centaine in the window. He could not mistake that dark bush of hair and the huge eyes. She was leaning far out over the sill, shouting something and waving the yellow scarf that she had worn the day they flew together to meet Sean Courtney.

  As Michael lifted the nose and opened the throttle to climb away, he felt rejuvenated. The placid and passive mood that had held him evaporated and he felt charged and vital again. He had seen her, and now it would be all right.

  It was Michael, Centaine cried happily as she turned back from the window to where Anna sat on the bed, I saw him, Anna, it was surely him. Oh, he is so handsome - he came to find me, despite Papa! Anna's face crumpled and reddened with disapproval. It is bad luck for a groom to see his bride on the wedding day Oh nonsense, Anna, sometimes you talk such rubbish.

  Oh, Anna, he is so beautiful!

  And you will not be if w
e do not finish before this evening.

  Centaine fluffed out her skirts and settled on to the bed beside Anna. She took the antique ivory-coloured lace of the wedding dress into her lap, and then held the needle up to the light and squinted as she threaded it.

  I have decided, she told Anna as she recommenced work on the hem of the dress, I will have only sons, at least six sons, but no daughters. Being a girl is such a bore, I don't wish to inflict it on any of my children. She completed a dozen stitches and then stopped. I'm so happy, Anna, and so excited. Do you think the general will come? When do you think this silly war will end, so that Michel and I can go to Africa? Listening to her chatter Anna turned her head slightly to hide her doting smile.

  The yellow SE5a bored up powerfully into the soft grey belly of the sky. Michael chose one of the gaps in the lower layer of cloud, roared swiftly through it and burst out into the open corridor. High above there was still the same high roof of solid cloud, but below it the air was limpid as crystal. When his altimeter registered 8,000 feet, Michael levelled out. He was in the clear, equidistant from the layers of cloud above and below him, but through the gaps he could pick up his landmarks.

  The villages of Cantin and Aubigny-all-Bac were deserted, shell-shattered skeletons. Only a few stone chimney-pieces had survived the waves of war which had washed back and forth over them. These stuck up like funeral monuments from the muddy torn earth.

  The two villages were four miles apart, the road that once joined them had been obliterated, and the front lines twisted like a pair of maimed adders through the brown fields between them. The shell holes, filled with stagnant water, blinked up at him like the eyes of the blind.

  Michael glanced at his watch. It was four minutes to four o'clock, and his eyes immediately returned to their endless search of the empty sky. One at a time he lifted his hands from the controls and flexed his fingers, at the same time wriggling his toes in the kudu-skin boots loosening up like a runner before the pistol. He reached up to the firing-handle with both hands, to test the trim of the machine, and she flew on straight and level. He fired both his guns, a short burst from each of them, and he nodded and blew on the gloved fingers of his right hand.

  I need a drink, he told himself, and took Andrew's silver flask from his pocket. He took a mouthful and gargled it softly, and then swallowed. The fire of it bloomed in his bloodstream, but he resisted the temptation to drink again. He stoppered the flask and dropped it back into his pocket. He touched the left rudder to begin his turn into the square patrol pattern and at that moment he picked up the flea-black speck on the grey mattress of the clouds far ahead and he met the turn, holding her steady while he blinked his eyes rapidly and checked his sighting.

  The other machine was at 8,000 feet, exactly his own height, and it was closing swiftly, coming in from the north, from the direction of Douai, and he felt the spurt of adrenalin mingle with the alcohol in his blood. His cheeks burned and, his guts spasmed. He eased the throttle open and flew on to meet it.

  The combined speeds of the two aircraft hurled them together, so that the other machine swelled miraculously in front of Michael's eyes. He saw the bright blue of the nose and propeller-boss hazed by the spinning blades, and the wide black hawk's wings outstretched. He saw the helmeted top of the pilot's head between the two black Spandau machine-guns mounted on the engine cowling, and the flash of his goggles as he leaned forward to peer into his sights.

  Michael pushed the throttle fully open and the engine bellowed. His left hand held the joystick like an artist holding his brush with the lightest pressure of his fingertips, as he positioned the German exactly in the centre of the concentric rings of his own gun-sight, and his right hand reached up for the firing-handle.

  His hatred and his anger grew as swiftly as the image of his enemy, and he held his fire. The battle clock in his head started to run so that the passage of time slowed.

  He saw the muzzles of the Spandau machine-guns begin to wink at him, bright sparks of fire, flickering red as the planet Mars on a moonless night. He aimed for the head of the other pilot, and he pressed down on the trigger and felt the aircraft pulse about him as his guns shook and rattled.

  No thought of breaking out of that head-on charge even occurred to Michael. He was completely absorbed by his aim, trying to stream his bullets into the German's face, to rip out his eyes, and blow his brains out of the casket of his skull. He felt the Spandau bullets plucking and tugging at the fabric and frame of his machine, heard them passing his head with sharp flitting sounds like wild

  locusts, and he ignored them.

  He saw his own bullets kicking white splinters off the German's spinning propeller, and in anger knew that they were being deflected from his true aim. The two aircraft were almost in collision, and Michael braced himself for the impact without lifting his hand from the firinghandle, without attempting to turn.

  Then the Albatros winged up violently, at the very last instant avoiding the collision, flicking out to starboard as the German hurled her over. There was a jarring bang that shook the SE5a. The two wings had just brushed each other as they passed. Michael saw the torn strip of fabric trailing from his own wingtip. He kicked on full rudder, into that flat skidding turn that only the SESa was capable of, and felt the wings flex at the strain, and then he was around. The Albatros was ahead of him, but still out of effective range.

  Michael thrust with all his strength on the throttle handle, but it was already wide open, the engine straining at full power and still the Albatros was holding him off.

  The German turned and went up left, and Michael followed him. They climbed more steeply, going up almost into the vertical, and the speed of both machines began to bleed off, but the SE5a more rapidly so that the German was pulling ahead.

  It's not the same Albatros. Michael realized with a shock that the relocation of the radiator was not the only modification. He was fighting a new type of aircraft, an advanced type, faster and more powerful than even his own SE5a.

  He saw the wide sweep of those black and white chequ ered wings, and the head of the German pilot craning to watch him in his mirror, and he tried to bring his guns to bear, swinging his right sight in a short arc as he wrenched his nose across.

  The German flipped his Albatros into a stall-turn and came straight back at Michael, head-on again with the Spandaus flicking their little red eyes at him, and this time Michael was forced to break, for the German had height and speed.

  For a crucial moment, Michael was hanging in his turn, his speed had dwindled and the German rounded on him, and dropped on to his tail. The German was good, Michael's guts tightened as he realized it. He pushed his nose down for speed, and at the same time flung the SE5 a into a vertical turn. The Albatros followed him round, turning with him, so that they were revolving around each other like two planets caught in immutable orbits.

  He looked across at the other pilot, lifting his chin to do so, for each of them was standing on one wingtip.

  The German stared back at him, the goggles making him appear monstrous and inhuman, and then for an instant Michael looked beyond the bright blue fuselage, up towards the high cloud ceiling, his hunter's eyes drawn by a tiny insect speckle of movement.

  For an instant his heart ceased to pump and his blood seemed to thicken and slow in his veins, then with a leap like a startled animal, his heart raced away and his breathing hissed in his throat.

  I have the honour to inform you, and at the same time also to warn you, the German had written, the object of warfare is the destruction of the enemy by all means possible. Michael had read the warning, but only now did he understand. They had turned his woolly-headed romantic notion of a single duel into a death-trap. Like a child, he had placed himself in their power. He had given them time and place, even the altitude. They had used the blue machine merely as a decoy. His own naivety amazed him now, as he saw them come swarming down out of the high cloud.

  How many of them? There was no time to count t
hem, but it looked like a full Jasta. of the new-type Albatroses, twenty of them at least, in that swift and silent flock, their brilliant colours sparkling jewel-like against the sombre backdrop of cloud.

  I'm not going to be able to keep my promise to Centaine, he thought, and looked down. The low cloud was 2,000 feet below him, it was a remote haven but there was no other. He could not hope to fight twenty of Germany's most skilled aces, he would not last for more than a few seconds when they reached him, and they were coming fast, while the blue machine pinned and held him for the killing stroke.

  Suddenly, faced with the death which he had deliberately sought, Michael wanted to live. He had been dragging back on the joystick with all his weight, holding the SESa into its turn. He flicked the stick forward and she was flung outwards, like a stone from a slingshot.

  Michael was hurled up against his shoulder straps as the forces of gravity were inverted, but he collected the big machine and used its own impetus to push it into a steep dive, going down with a gut-swooping rush towards the low cloud bank. The manoeuvre caught his opponent off-balance, but he recovered instantly and the Albatros was after him in a blue flash of speed, while the swarming multicoloured pack was overhauling them both from above.

  Michael watched them in the mirror above his head, realizing bow much quicker this new type of Albatros was in the dive. He glanced ahead to the clouds. Their grey folds which had seemed so clammy and uninviting a few seconds before were his only hope of life and salvation, and now that he had started to flee his terror came back and settled upon him like a dark and terrible succubus, draining him of his courage and manhood.

  He wasn't going to make it, they would catch him before he reached cover, and he clung to the joystick, frozen with his new and crippling terror.

  The clatter of twin Spandaus roused him. In the mirror he saw the dancing red muzzle flashes, so close behind him, and something hit him a numbing blow low down in his back. The force of it drove the air from his lungs, and he knew he must turn out of the killing line of the blue Albatros's guns.