Dark Days Of Summer (Innocents At War Series, Book 4)

by Andrew Wareham

  Angus was all that was promised; he was of athletic build; possessed keen, piercing blue eyes and a charming smile; he had to be prompted to achieve a sentence more complicated than ‘good morning’.

  “Angus. Your Flight Commander tells me that you have settled well into the squadron.”

  “Yes, Tommy.”

  He had learned the first rule – when addressed by Christian name, respond in kind.

  “Do you like flying?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does it frighten you ever?”

  “No.”

  “Are you happy in the squadron?”

  “Yes, Tommy. I am always happy.”

  Tommy gave up, said how pleased he was with his progress and that he knew he would do very well in France, and sent him away.

  Terence followed – short and dark, a classically Irish face. He spoke with no trace of a brogue and was known never to have left England.

  “Terence – settling in well?”

  “Very much so, Tommy. Really enjoying the flying, you know. When do we go to France?”

  “I don’t know, Terence. Not tomorrow – more than that I cannot say. I hope to organise a week of leave before we go. Have you relatives within an easy train ride of Andover?”

  “The family lives in London, Tommy.”

  “Good. The reports I have say that you are a good pilot, Terence, which agrees with all I have personally seen. Last chance - if you have decided that flying is not for you, you can transfer out of the RFC. I don’t want you to go, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t want you to kill yourself in the wrong trade.”

  “No, Tommy. I like flying. I will fly after the war – it’s what I want to do.”

  “That’s what I hoped to hear, Terence. You will do well in the squadron, that I am certain of.”

  David entered the office very quietly, took his chair with a polite word of thanks.

  “Haven’t had a chance to talk with the newest men, David – so taking the opportunity now. Your father is a musician, I am told. Do you play?”

  “Piano, Tommy – not truly good, but better than most.”

  “Have you talked to Fred Petersham? He had hoped to be a concert pianist, but found he was not quite up to the mark, I gather.”

  “I did not know that, Tommy. I shall make a point of conversing with him.”

  “Do so – you will have plenty of opportunities in France. I don’t know when we are going yet, but it must be soon. Your name is definitely on the list of good pilots to go with us, unless you don’t wish to. You have the chance to transfer to the Army, if you wish. It is sometimes the case that a man discovers that flying is not for him, even though he is good at it. There will be none of this Lacking Moral Fibre nonsense if you decide you don’t want it. I am saying this, by the way, to each of the four of you today. I want you in my squadron, but only if you want to be here. I shall be putting you into my Flight, by the way – we are organising into our operational Flights now, and as the boss, I get first pick, provided flying is what you want.”

  Tommy hoped that the boy might be proud of being picked out as, presumably, a very competent pilot. He showed no signs of elation, however.

  “I want to fly, Tommy.”

  A quiet and no doubt honest statement.

  “Then you will. If it ain’t the flying, what is the problem? You seem worried, David. Is all well at home?”

  The question brought a little more of life into David’s face, but not into his voice.

  “I don’t know, sir. I have not been home for five years. Father lives in the north of Yorkshire, a long journey from Winchester, and he could not afford train fares. I stayed at school during the holidays; the people at Winchester were very kind. We stopped bothering to write three years ago.”

  The statement was made quietly, with no inflexion, no importance apparently given. Tommy responded in kind.

  “On your own, in fact. I am as well, for both of my parents dying – my father spun in at Brooklands just before the war.”

  “I read of that, sir. In the Times.”

  “He was well-known as a flier, which is how I ended up in this game. You must not stay here on your own when we have leave. We don’t work that way in the squadron. We look after each other. Brothers, and all that. There is a spare room at River Cottage – Noah won’t be using it any more now that he is getting married.”

  “But, I can hardly just move in on you and your wife, Tommy.”

  “Yes, you can. No problem at all. Consider it arranged. What will you do after the war, David?”

  Slightly more animation now.

  “Find a job, Tommy, and be my own man with a decent income. Earning a wage as an officer, and with the additional flying pay, has told me I never want to be poverty-stricken again! I don’t know how I will find a place in business, but I shall!”

  “My wife’s father, Lord Moncur, may be able to help there. As far as I am concerned, my pilots are part of my family, David. We look after each other.”

  Tommy sent the boy away, suspecting that he might have found the right words. He was unable to imagine just how lonely the boy must have been. He would have been equally bereft himself, he suspected, if he had not had Monkey there, always present and part of his life. He must have a word with Monkey; she had discovered Mrs Wyndham for Noah, could perhaps achieve the same for David. It would do the boy good to have company.

  He glanced at the clock on the office wall, called for John, last of the four, to come in. He would be able to get away before five o’clock, could be home by six, with a little luck on the road.

  “John, come in, take a seat. All well?”

  Most things were well, except that John’s father, a Senior Civil Servant attached to the War Office, was busily pulling strings.

  “He wants me out of the RFC, Tommy. He can put me into a posting at Catterick Camp as a full lieutenant in an office there, Pay Corps, never to leave England. I want to stay with the squadron, Tommy.”

  “Jim! Can you come in a minute?”

  They explained the problem to Jim.

  “I’ll make a telephone call or two, Tommy. Can scotch that little wangle, no difficulty at all!”

  “Problem solved, John?”

  John was dumbstruck – he had not imagined that his powerful father could be stymied in such a fashion.

  “We could have done nothing in peacetime, John. In war, the men in uniform actually have a little say in what goes on. Now then, are you happy with flying the Strutter?”

  “I would rather it was a single seater, Tommy. It’s heavy, isn’t it.”

  “I should put you into an RE7, young man. Then you would know what heavy meant. The new Sopwith may be what you want, when it is finalised.”

  “I am a little worried about my observer, Tommy. He does not seem to be a good shot with the Lewis. When we attack a target on the ground, he misses more often than not, sometimes by as much as six feet!”

  “Within six feet is good shooting, John. Allowing for bumping – for no man can hold a plane unfailingly steady - it means that many of his rounds will be on target. Have you talked with him about fighting in the air?”

  “Well, no – what is there to say, Tommy?”

  “There will be targets that you cannot hit with your Vickers. You need a signal to tell him to make the shot. He may spot a target that you cannot see – he must have some way of drawing your attention to it. Flight-Sergeant Balcombe has a bamboo cane he keeps in his cockpit, to lean forward and prod me with if needs be.”

  “Is it a good idea, Tommy, to encourage Other Ranks to be so familiar?”

  “Flight-Sergeant Balcombe is learning how to fly – he is competent already. A very few weeks in France and I shall put him up for his commission. He will be part of our Mess then. There will be other observers who will make the step up as well. Of course, you know that Noah did so and seems to have been rather successful.”

  John did not know that, was inclined to be horrified that it h
ad been permitted.

  “But… how can a sergeant discover how to be a gentleman?”

  “While a man can fly well, he needs no other qualification in this squadron, John. We found at Brooklands, before the war, that natural fliers came from all ranks of life. One man, who has done very well since, was a plough-boy who started out by hanging around the planes, fascinated by them, lending a hand to carry bags or push a plane. He made himself useful and became part of the scenery and learned more and more and occasionally got to sit in a machine, and, like me, was used as ballast when we needed to fly a two-seater. He became a pilot by accident and was found to be good at it and made a few pounds for himself and then made a few suggestions on design and was taken on by de Havilland and is now very big in his factory. There are others who can do as well as him.”

  Dark Days Of Summer

  Chapter Three

  The happy couple sped off in Tommy’s Lanchester, borrowed for a week, bound for a hotel near Northampton before making their way to visit the bride’s parents near Norwich. The meeting had been arranged the week before – it being an essential that the bridegroom must be introduced to the family, although they had been unable to attend the wedding. Noah did not know why they had been absent, and his wife only said that she suspected it was because they had had no part in arranging or approving the match. She feared it was because they regarded Noah as wholly unsuitable for the family.

  They expected to stay for no longer than an uncomfortable, dutiful morning visit before continuing to the airfield near Colchester where Noah would be taking over his squadron, which had organised rental of a house. The RFC was able to cut any number of corners when it wished and arrangements for a newly married major with the VC were very quickly made.

  His new bride had explained that her parents had disapproved of her first husband, she thought for being no more than the son of a country gentleman, a mere squire, and a captain in the Yeomanry rather than a proper regiment. The fact that he had been heir to a large estate had interested them not at all – breeding counted for more than a bank balance. When her husband had died in the first days of the war, they had been supremely uninterested, other than to enquire whether she needed an increase in her income – they would not see her suffer financial hardship. She could not imagine that either could conceivably approve of a pilot with no pedigree at all. Her widow’s jointure was to terminate at her remarriage, although she owned the house in freehold, which would leave her with no more than her father’s two hundred a year for her clothing, but she had no qualms at living on a major’s salary, especially with the addition of flying pay which effectively doubled it.

  Noah was worried that Lucy might be unhappy at being purse-pinched – he did not see that he could afford servants, he feared.

  “I can cook, and I know how to keep a house clean, sir! In any case, I can learn. Simply to be Mrs Lucy Arkwright is all I require to be happy, my love!”

  They drove through Norwich and a few miles out on the road towards Cromer, turning onto a narrow lane and then into an avenue with tall elms spaced at precise intervals on either side.

  “Stop at the next bend, Noah.”

  He obeyed as they came in sight of a mansion sat in parkland, a six-acre lake to one frontage, woodland to another.

  “It’s huge!”

  “Very big, certainly, more than sixty bedrooms and bitterly cold in winter. You can see the North Sea from the upper windows, and the wind sweeps in all the way from Siberia. It is handsome, though. My elder brother, Rupert, loves the place, which is fortunate as he must inherit. Neither of my other brothers can stand it, nor can my little sister, and the boys are rarely here since growing up. Both have gone to war, of course, East Norfolk Regiment, as goes without saying. Rupert will not go - he cannot, for breaking a leg in a fall out hunting five years ago, and healing lame.”

  “Lucky man, despite the burden of being crippled, Lucy-love. He will survive this war.”

  Noah put the car in gear and eased it down the drive and onto the semi-circle of gravel in front of the steps leading up to the front door.

  “Eight steps, forty feet wide, marble – is this what they call a Palladian house?”

  “This elevation is – rebuilt in the mid-eighteenth century. Too formal for my taste – I much prefer the Elizabethan wing, which was the original house.”

  “I have not got a family seat to show you, of course, due to the fact that I have no family that I know of!”

  “You have now. You have me.”

  “And more than that, I could not ask for!”

  An elderly groom appeared, walking briskly despite his evident age.

  “Good morning, ma’am. Good morning, Major! I will take the car to the garage, sir.”

  Noah handed over the keys, surprised.

  Mrs Arkwright spoke, intent on the groom’s reply.

  “Thank you, Wilks.”

  “Pleasure, ma’am. I wish you happy, ma’am!”

  She smiled her thanks.

  “Now, there is a surprise, Noah! The servants have been informed of the marriage, with no overt disapproval. He would not have wished me happy had it been implied that my husband was not the thing!”

  They walked hand-in-hand up the tall steps, the pair of doors opening precisely as they reached the top.

  “There is a little window just to the side, look, Noah. The butler gives the word to the footmen to time everything to a T.”

  The footmen had been to war and come back with two arms between them, but seemed able to perform their tasks – basically to open doors, stand decoratively and serve at table.

  The butler gave a quick bow and mustered a grandfatherly smile.

  “A pleasure to see you at home again, Mrs Arkwright! Welcome to the House, Major Arkwright!”

  “Thank you, Culversham. It seems a long time since last I was here.”

  “Too long, ma’am!”

  He led them correctly through to a withdrawing room, everything of the most formal, Noah saw, glancing about him nervously.

  “Major Arkwright and Mrs Arkwright!”

  Two gentlemen, in lounge suits, father and son by appearance, and two ladies, in spring dresses, mother and daughter, dark-haired and blue-eyed and similar facially to Lucinda but, in Noah’s opinion, less handsome.

  The older man stepped forward.

  “Well, Lucinda? You seem to have made a better choice, second time around! Major Arkwright, I am pleased, and proud, to make your acquaintance, sir! My wife, Lady Holt; my son, Lord Fakenham; my daughter, Miss Amanda Hunter. Confusing set of names, ain’t it? You are welcome to your wife’s home, sir, and I am glad to see you here as my son by marriage.”

  Noah made his thanks, shaking hands as they were offered.

  “Can you stay for a day or two, Major, or must you hasten to your posting?”

  “I must be in Colchester for next Monday, sir. I ought to be seen there by Saturday, in order to make the acquaintance of my Colonel before I formally take over the squadron.”

  “Then you can certainly stay until Friday. That is settled – we have a room prepared in the hope that you could.”

  “Thank you, my lord. I was not at all sure that I would be welcome here, I must say.”

  Lord Holt glanced about him, saw that his daughter was engrossed by her mother, lowered his voice.

  “I had no time for her first husband, Major, though I could not refuse my permission for fear of creating a scandal which I did not want. I never saw him as much of a man! It was whispered to me in fact that he died from a rifle bullet in his back! Whether he was shot running or by his own men is unknown – either is discreditable! You come with a record that none could argue with. I know one or two fellows in London, of course, and the word that has been passed to me is that you are one of the best. I don’t know what your parentage is – and from what I hear, neither do you! I will tell you now that I don’t give a damn either!”

  It was not what Noah had expected.

&
nbsp; “They call you Noah, I believe.”

  “They do, sir. I was named Cuthbert. I always tell people who ask that it is a family name – but in fact I was third into the Home that year, so I was a ‘C’. It was the rule there, sir – boys were renamed so that they left the streets behind them!”

  “How old were you?”

  “Six or seven, I think, sir. I had been on the streets with my little brother since I could remember – the other boys had looked after us at first. Then he ran too slowly one day when the police were making a sweep and the pair of us ended up in the Home. I chose never to escape – though some did, it was always possible - but I liked a roof over my head and regular meals, and learning in class, so the pair of us stayed. I went into a factory at twelve and joined the Army just as soon as I looked big enough, was put into the Engineers for being able to count and was allowed to transfer to the RFC as a mechanic. There, of course, I met Tommy Stark and was swept along on his coattails.”

  “He did not earn that VC for you, Noah – that was all your own doing. What have you got in mind for after the war?”

  “Possibly to stay in, sir. I think I must make Brigadier, at least.”

  “You will go higher than that, if you remain. There will be other possibilities, of that I can assure you. What of your little brother?”

  “Daniel joined up in ’14, sir. He writes to me every month. He is a corporal in one of the Middlesex battalions, and says he is happy where he is. He has no ambition to fly, sir, and refused when I offered to pull the strings to transfer him to the RFC.”

  “I can have him moved across to a garrison posting, in India perhaps, Noah. He would survive the war probably. If you thought it better, then he could stay in France as a gunner in airfield defence, for example.”

  The offer was too good to be refused – Noah made his thanks.

  “He is all I have ever had as family, sir. Until now. I can’t remember anything of my parents.”

  Lord Holt was unsurprised at that admission. He had made his own enquiries and had found that there were no prior records of Noah at the Home – he had arrived as a ‘boy of about seven years, named Arkwright probably’. It seemed that he had been unsure of his surname, had thought it sounded something like ‘Arrite’. He was truly an unknown.