The Hidden War

by David Fiddimore

  ‘OK. We could . . .’

  ‘. . . and the other pilots are in the accommodation with you. So I think we’d better forget it for a little while.’

  ‘Then why did you come round here, and stand so close?’

  ‘Teasing,’ she said, smoothed her dress down and pushed my hand away with the same motion. God was sending me one of His little messages. As usual, the reception wasn’t so good, and I should have listened more bloody closely.

  When I walked into the pub the party was in full swing. They’d bussed in a number of nurses from the hospital in Folkestone to get things going. There was a small jazz band tootling away somewhere. I recognized the clarinet break on ‘Dippermouth Blues’ and promised myself to find out what a dippermouth was one day. Elaine’s Terry joined me up at the bar. He still walked with a limp from the stabbing. He looked a bit sheepish. I had to look up to him to hear what he was saying of course. It was like standing alongside a cliff face. He started with, ‘I wanted to apologize about the fuss the other night.’

  ‘That’s all right . . . Terry, isn’t it? All done and dusted.’

  ‘’s right. You won’t be givin’ her the sack then?’

  ‘Of course not. The place couldn’t run without her. They’re more likely to sack me than sack her. How’s your leg?’

  ‘Still sore. She touched a nerve.’

  ‘Women have a habit of doing that, don’t they?’ At least that raised a grin.

  ‘I won’t be able to work for’t least another week.’

  ‘I know. She told me.’

  ‘I don’t know what came over me that night. I just didn’t like the way he looked at her.’

  ‘I told you, it’s finished . . . nothing’s going to happen.’

  ‘Thanks. I’ll remember this.’

  ‘Don’t bother. Buy me a pint instead; I’m parched . . . and if I ask Elaine for a dance later on don’t bash me for it!’

  He grinned at this, and said, ‘No fear; she’d only get the knife into me again.’

  Was that an attempt at humour? Knife and fork? I wasn’t sure.

  I danced one with her, and led her back to him. It was a halfway decent party. Scroton had turned up, and Mortensen, and once I thought I had a glimpse of Milton dancing with one of the nurses, but that was impossible. When I got back to the hut I was the only one without a nurse, and lay awake listening to my pilots mating discreetly in the dark.

  Lying there, waiting for sleep to claim me, it struck me that Terry Curtis had just apologized to a man who had been shagging his missus, and for whom his mighty right hand had just won a sizeable promotion. There was a lot of bad karma there; I’d better watch out for myself. And he’d kill me if ever he found out, of course. In fact I thought about myself, and wasn’t too keen on how I’d behaved of late. The problem with deciding to turn over a new leaf was that I’d enjoyed the old leaves so much. My life was just like my last school report: Could do better. It was a long time before I slept.

  There was one other thing. I had tired of the party around midnight, and wandered out into the car park to smoke my pipe and look at the stars. An airliner with all of its lights showing droned overhead on its way to France. Just for a moment there was the trace of a familiar obscene smell in the air. Gasoline and burnt meat. Probably just in my memory, but you never can tell.

  Dorothy was sitting outside my office window the next morning. Scroton complained to the Ground Crew Chief about the engines. He only complained about Dorothy because he was still a little in love with Whisky. There’s no telling some men.

  The Chief looked hassled. He explained, ‘There’s bugger all the matter with her, or her engines. It’s just the way you operate her.’

  ‘Might have known it would be my fault.’ That was Scroton.

  ‘She’s too fat, too heavy and too low to operate efficiently from grass strips. When she’s laden you just need so much more power from the engines to get her up from grass – particularly if it’s wet – and you put more wear on them. Fly her off a patch of concrete and she’s a different beast. That’s all . . .’

  I walked over. ‘There’s concrete all over Germany, Chief . . .’

  ‘Then get her out there as quick as you can.’ He wiped his hands on a petrol-smelling rag. I turned away momentarily because it reminded me of Milton again. ‘. . . and start making a profit off her.’

  I touched his arm. ‘Will do, Chief. Let me see her maintenance dockets, and those for the Lancs, sometime today, will you?’

  After he had sloped off Scroton said, ‘You’re getting airs and graces, Charlie. Be careful now.’

  ‘I had a girl named Grace once. I was nuts about her: we all were.’

  ‘That’s how I feel about the Countess. When will you send me back to Berlin?’

  I wished he hadn’t asked me that.

  I went down to see the boys on the Friday night. It was staged as a surprise visit, and I made no promises about the next time. There was a patch of flat mown grass behind the bay, and we played cricket on it all weekend, using James’s old gear. I avoided Dieter’s probing attacks on my matrimonial status . . . rather skilfully I thought.

  After Elaine had dropped the portcullis on me I had been looking forward to palling up with Evelyn again, so I was disappointed to run into her old man in the bar early on Friday night. He looked rather grim, but at least he apologized to me.

  ‘We got off on the wrong foot,’ he said. ‘Thought you were staff. Sorry about that.’ I liked him even less for the form of his apology than for his original assumption. ‘. . . and pleased things worked out fine with your little boys.’

  ‘Thanks. It was just a storm in a teacup. I was choked at the way everyone rallied round.’

  ‘Eve came down as soon as we heard. I couldn’t get away.’ Eve.

  ‘I’ll find a way of thanking her properly one day.’

  ‘She’d like that.’

  Did I feel like a bit of a bastard? No. I’d never feel bad about putting one over on him. There was something on his mind; I could tell.

  ‘She found your cook a pillar of strength in the boat apparently.’

  ‘Good. I didn’t even know he could sail. Probably a quick learner: he looks the type.’

  ‘I dare say. She’s been out sailing with him every day this week. Showing him the ropes.’ As he said it a picture of a big old-time sailing ship came into my mind, and I realized that it was probably another one of those phrases that the Navy handed down to us. He paused before adding, ‘Don’t suppose I’ve anything to worry about, do you?’

  No, I thought, but maybe I have!

  ‘I wouldn’t know. Sorry. Wouldn’t have thought so – anyway I’m the wrong person to ask: never here.’

  ‘Quite. Sorry I asked. I just thought . . .’

  ‘Shall we nick a couple of James’s scotches before anyone comes back into the bar?’

  He took the hint, but it was just as I suspected: my options were closing down.

  Maggs cornered me after church. She asked, ‘What’s the matter, love? You looked pinched.’

  ‘One of those weeks; nobody seems to want to know me.’

  ‘No woman wants to know you, you mean.’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Prob’ly your own fault. I told you to try ’arder.’

  ‘That too.’

  ‘Don’t worry, love. Maybe you need the time to get your breath back.’

  ‘That too, too.’

  On Sunday evening James and I walked around the bay in the late evening. Jules had finished serving, and was helping Maggs and the potboy behind the bar. James had taken up a pipe, and we discussed tobaccos. The shingle crunched under our feet. From a distance we might have looked like two ships under steam. We realized that my last farewells had been premature, but he asked, ‘This is really it, this time?’

  ‘I think so, James. The Airlift is on. The Russians seem determined to starve us out, and we seem determined to prove them wrong. The politicians are waffling
, as usual, and the papers are just standing at the ringside, holding the coats and egging everyone on.’

  ‘. . . as dangerous as we thought?’

  ‘I don’t know. The scary part is that if it turns nasty, it will happen fast. One minute we’ll be flying established routes and schedules, albeit under some pressure, and the next they’ll be shooting us down.’

  ‘Like dancing an excuse me but getting no notice of the change of partners.’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ‘What do you want me to tell Dieter? He reads the newspapers you know.’

  ‘The truth, always the truth. I once promised him that. In some ways he’s as grown as we are James, he’ll know what to do.’

  ‘You ever wondered if you make too many promises, old boy?’

  ‘Someone else asked me that.’

  ‘Recently?’

  ‘No. Years ago.’ I shivered, and said, ‘Let’s go back in. I’m getting cold.’

  I got only as far as Wunstorf in one hop, sitting at the old radio operator’s seat in Whisky. Scroton and Crazy Eddie had a cargo of powdered milk in tins, which is pretty light for its bulk, so Whisky flew like a skittish colt, and Scroton enjoyed himself. One of Chiefy’s ground handlers flew as loadmaster. We’d have one of those on each flight from now on. Crazy Ed looked grey. He must have been on another bender. I mentioned that to Dave when we were on the ground again. He shook his head and said, ‘I don’t think it’s the booze. I was out with him last night and he was fleeing after three pints.’

  ‘Fleeing?’

  ‘It’s a Scots word that Hardisty uses. It means dancing drunk. I think there’s something the matter with him.’

  ‘Perhaps all he’s doing is topping up the drink already inside him.’

  ‘No. That’s not it either. I’ve seen him go for a week without a drink and it still hits him as quickly.’

  ‘It’s probably time I instituted regular medicals for our flying crews anyway, instead of waiting for the Air Ministry to catch up with you lot.’

  Scroton smiled, ‘You’re beginning to sound like a bloody manager, Charlie.’

  They unloaded Whisky’s milk, and a similar load from a Briton Air Dakota that had come in from Southend, on to an RAF York which flew it straight on to Gatow. It would take at least two Yorks full of dried milk powder a day every day just to keep the nursing babies going. Whisky was then loaded with wooden crates for the Army, and was due for Lübeck . . . where she would be based for a while. Scroton would get to see his Countess every other day. I wondered where Randall was, and how I could keep them apart.

  Before Whisky left, some RAF electrical types swarmed all over her cockpit and removed the magic box from underneath Scroton’s seat. I asked the flight lieutenant in charge of them, ‘Testing finished?’

  ‘No. We’re switching it to an RAF Hastings. It’s an interesting box of tricks, isn’t it?’

  ‘Was there a problem with it in the Dakota?’

  ‘No, but the Intelligence wallahs with radios tell us they intercepted some Red Air Force traffic a couple of days ago. They were asking their pilots to report sightings of red-painted Daks, so I was told to whip it out. Better safe than sorry.’

  ‘How often have you used that thing over here?’ I asked Scroton.

  ‘Six times. Maybe eight.’

  ‘Bollocks.’

  ‘I will feel a bit naked without it.’ He’d missed the point, hadn’t he?

  The station commander was an all-right type. He offered me a lift into Gatow in another Hastings the following day, which meant that I was stuck at Wunstorf for the rest of the afternoon and night. Then he sought me out at the crowded bar in the evening, walking across the room straightening his moustaches with his fingers. I’ve seen cats do that sort of thing. He said, ‘There was someone asking for you at the gate. I know the man from a few years back, so I took the liberty of having him passed through, and brought here. OK with you?’

  ‘Fine. It’s not a Yank named David Thomsett by any chance?’

  ‘Tommo? You know him? No. Someone who flew with one of my squadrons in the war.’ He turned to look over his shoulder, and Bozey Borland marched through the door to the bar, escorted by an RAF Regiment one-striper. The escort saluted, and the station commander thanked and dismissed him. Borland said, ‘Hello, guv’nor,’ to me, and ‘Hello, Porky,’ to my companion.

  The station commander turned to me and said, ‘I know that you’re Halton’s Charlie Bassett, but we haven’t been properly introduced. I’m Peter Churchill – no relation. I used to be fat once upon a time. They still call me Porky.’

  Then he turned back to Borland. ‘Hello, Bozey. Who are you with?’

  ‘I don’t know yet. Mr Bassett promised to find me a job with someone if I could get to Germany on my own . . . before we get down to business, am I allowed to buy anyone a drink in here?’

  ‘Think we could manage that.’ That was Churchill. Then he said, ‘Glad to see you, Bozey.’ I found that I was too.

  Borland and I found our way to a small lounge with prewar modernistic furniture which was a lot more comfortable than it looked. I flagged down one of the white-clad German Mess boys and got him to bring us long whiskies and a beer. Before Bozey got into his stride I held my hand up and told him, ‘I don’t want to know how you got out of England. OK?’

  ‘What the eye doesn’t see the heart can’t grieve over?’

  ‘Something like that.’ We sipped our beers. ‘But I am pleased to see you.’

  ‘Pleased enough to give me a job?’

  I thought about it.

  ‘Yes. Yes, I think so. Depends what you can fly.’

  ‘Virtually anything. I’ve flown singles, twins and multis since the RAF kissed me goodbye. Anything that would pay. What will it pay, by the way?’

  ‘I don’t know. Not much: I’ll have to ask my office. Bottom whack I expect, but better than sitting on your arse in Wormwood Scrubs stitching mailbags.’

  ‘Do criminals still have to do that?’

  ‘I’ve got no idea, but it seemed an appropriate time to mention it.’

  He laughed, and pointed a finger. ‘I met some people who knew you. They said that you could be deceptively pleasant before you pulled the trigger.’ That was nearer to the truth than I wanted him to be.

  ‘I like people to know where they stand with me.’

  ‘Fair enough. When do I start?’

  ‘I’ll see if I can get you on a flight to Berlin with me tomorrow. You’ll be the spare man there. We were supposed to have a small accommodation hut at Gatow, but we’ll be lucky if we even get an office, so you have to shift for yourself. Most of the commercials just have to put up with RAF rules.’

  He nodded slowly and said, ‘You’re right, boss.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘It beats sewing mailbags in Wormwood Scrubs.’

  ‘Tell me that again in a week.’

  He shared my concrete cabin, taking the upper bunk. He snored. Maybe I’d made a mistake.

  In the early hours of the morning I was awakened by an RAF corporal who shone a torch in my face, and shook me gently. ‘Mr Bassett, sir?’

  I felt slow-witted. Muzzy. ‘Uh-huh. Yeah.’ It was like being on a squadron again, and being awoken for a raid.

  ‘Station commander’s compliments, sir, and would you join him in the Watch Office?’

  I nearly asked Is it urgent? Before realizing that no one would get me up at this time if it wasn’t. Borland must have been a light sleeper. He grunted while I was dressing in the dark, and asked, ‘Want me to come, boss?’

  ‘No. I’ll send for you if I need you, but thanks anyway. Go back to sleep.’ I heard him roll over, and he was snoring again before I let myself out.

  Churchill had left the Watch Office by the time I reached it, and I had to follow him down to the operations room they were beginning to call Flying Control. It was a large room with huge charts on three walls, and a dozen staff even at that time of night. Half a doze
n pilots were receiving a briefing of some kind around a table in a corner. Two of them were obviously Yanks. Peter Churchill was standing with his back to me, looking up at one of the charts. When I joined him he nodded. No preliminaries.

  ‘We lost your Dakota.’ A vision of Scroton and Crazy Ed’s faces swam before me. Then he added, ‘The pink ’un. Dreadful colour for an aircraft by the way. Asking for trouble.’

  Max then . . . and Red Ronson, or Lieter or whatever his name was. I still hadn’t responded, so he asked, ‘You OK?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  An erk wandered past, and after he had gone by there was a mug of cocoa in my hand. I took a sip. It was strong and scalding hot. I asked Churchill, ‘What happened?’

  ‘I don’t know yet. What was he hauling?’

  ‘Bulk foodstuffs of some kind: flour I think – nothing dodgy. Don’t you have radar coverage of the corridor?’

  ‘There’s a gap. Your bod was in it, on the way back to Lübeck . . . apparently there was a very dense burst of Russki radio jamming . . . your bod was heard to say Wait one, as if something had happened, and that was it. He didn’t come out the other side.’

  ‘Any reports?’

  ‘None. It’s not as busy at this time of night. There was someone three minutes behind him who didn’t see anything. We’ve warned all flights to look out for fires on the ground. It’s been forty-five minutes now, so I decided that someone should tell you. OK?’

  ‘I’ll hang around if that’s all right.’

  ‘Fine. Do you want to call England?’

  ‘No. Not yet. I’ll wait until morning. We may have heard something by then.’

  I sat in on a radio and navigation briefing for something to do. The radio beacons were simple medium-wave jobs . . . picking them out was kids’ stuff, and the Eureka radar beacons were very reliable . . . in 1940s terms, that is. Navigation between them should have been a piece of piss: all you had to do was watch out for the guys in front and behind you. What would Max have been doing? I knew what Max would have been doing: he would have been relying on an old guy with a magnetized nail on a piece of string. It had been my mistake as much as his. Magnetized nails can’t talk to radar beacons. Bollocks.

  I don’t know what time the sun came up, because the ops room was under the concrete. When I stepped onto the tarmac it was a step into a watery dawn. About eighteen aircraft had flown through Pink Pig’s last piece of air space, and nobody reported anything on the ground. Maybe they were flying too high. I needed some unofficial help from someone a lot better at flying low, so I walked back up to the Watch Office and put a call through to a pilot named Dare. I wondered if he was as good as his name.