by Iain Maloney
‘Bill reckons it was mechanical,’ I said.
‘What do you think?’ said Terry.
‘No idea,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t here.’ I couldn’t make eye contact.
Joe landed, came over. ‘The fuck’s all this?’ he said, waving at the debris.
‘Clive,’ I said. ‘Dead.’
‘Dead?’ said Joe. ‘Really?’
We all watched his face, watched his reaction. Did we really think he was involved? ‘Fuck,’ Joe said. ‘Shame.’
‘Oh fuck off,’ said Terry.
‘What?’
‘Don’t give me that. You hated his guts.’
‘You saying I had something tae dae with this?’
‘I’m saying it’s a fucking big coincidence that the very man you vowed to kill is now dead.’
‘You’d better have something tae back that up with, pal.’
Terry said nothing. He didn’t even know Joe had been near the kites last night. ‘Aye, that’s what I thought. Well, listen, Taffy. I hear you repeating that tae anybody and I’ll fucking come after you, hear me? And if you think I was involved in this, then you dinnae want me coming after you, dae you?’
‘You’ve a screw loose, you know that? Fucking nutter.’ Terry walked off.
‘How about you two? You agree with that cunt?’
Doug shook his head, held his hands up. Joe looked at me. ‘Jack?’
I’d seen him near the kites. He knew that. He stepped right up to me.
‘Jack?’
Pause. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Course not, Joe.’
‘Good then.’ He walked off.
I looked at Doug. He shook his head. This was too much, too fucking much. I began to wish Swindon was over.
Everything was subdued. Another death. We’d seen so many since arriving in London, and still not a chance at combat. How many would die before we got payback? We had a ceremony for Clive, and all kites were grounded for a full inspection. The general theory seemed to be mechanical failure. No-one suspected foul play. Joe kept to himself. Whether he was guilty or furious at Terry’s accusation, none of us much felt like being with each other. I lay awake all night wondering what to do. If there was anything I could do. Only three options, it seemed: confront Joe with seeing him under the kite, tell Thor what I suspected, or do nothing. The first would land me in the infirmary, the second would end as soon as I said I had no proof. The third was easiest, but if Joe really had engineered Clive’s death, and I kept that secret, wouldn’t I then be a part of it? What would a man do? Act? Wait to see what happened?
The kites were given the all clear and I was able to go up. Everyone was nervous, but I wasn’t. Seemed I really did think it was Joe; enough at least not to worry about a mechanical failure. Again being in the clouds, feet off the ground, cleared my head. This was my last flight before my final assessment. Turned east and began running through everything I’d learned, then I spotted another Tiger coming at me. Terry again? I thought. I climbed three thousand feet more to get out of the way and to get above the kite, see if whoever it was had an instructor with them. The other kite climbed with me. Dropped a thousand and it followed. Banked steep left. Someone was after playing silly buggers. I slipped north, keeping almost parallel while closing the distance, trying to catch sight of the other man. Two fingers waved at me. Then the face. Joe. Suddenly he disappeared below me, reappeared moments later behind, right on my tail, like in combat. So it was a dogfight he wanted? My first instinct was to ignore him, not to get involved, but fuck it, I thought, I’m not going to let him push me around. I jerked the stick, corkscrewed the kite groundwards, sharply pulled up and spun the opposite way to shake him off. No joy. Opened the throttle and looped over, hoping to get behind him. Joe pulled a three-sixty to the right. Back where we’d started. Over my shoulder. Joe sitting too close so I opened the throttle, put her into a dive, drawing him with me but putting some distance between us. Levelled out, checked our positions. Close enough that Joe would get a damn good fright but far enough apart we wouldn’t crash into each other. I pressed down on the rudder and felt the kite slide through the yaw axis, opened the throttle and burst forward, dropping slightly to pass underneath Joe, banking on reflex. Another flick turn, eased out of it and followed Joe’s turn square behind him. He slowed down and I came alongside, gave him a ‘you’re dead’ gesture. He returned with a gesture of his own.
I was furious. He was laughing.
Twelve hours done. Once more up with Thor and that was it. I passed. Leading Aircraftman Jack Devine. Officially none of us knew what our final grading would be. There was still the PNB split: pilot, navigator, bomber, but those of us who had gone solo, had done so successfully and had received glowing reports from our final assessment were confident. Not everyone had finished, the weather playing havoc with schedules, so we wouldn’t be leaving for at least another week. Terry and Doug had passed but Joe was having a bit of trouble with his final few flights. We’d got away with our dogfight, but he’d got too cocky and nearly stripped the wings off his kite diving her on full bore beyond the two-seventy limit before pulling back on the throttle. Graham tore a chunk off him, something no-one thought was possible, and he had to behave impeccably to pass the final test. He managed it, just.
I spent the last few days lost in myself. I took to sitting in secluded parts of the base with my trumpet, using it as an excuse to be alone. I tried experimenting but nothing was coming out right. Did I really think Joe had messed with the kite? Dates were confirmed. We’d be leaving on the twenty-eighth for fourteen days embarkation leave, followed by regrouping at Heaton Park, Manchester, for final training assignments and shipping overseas. We were done. Next time we got in a kite it would be in some far flung part of the Empire. But we’d still be together. Of the twelve who arrived in Swindon eleven had made it. Just Clive. Leading Aircraftmen. LACs. The camp was awash with newly-made LACs running about with bit of paper, books, cash, doing whatever it took to get the signatures we needed in order to receive the vital railway warrant that let us go on leave. At the station Terry went west, Doug, us two Scots and a few of the others caught a train back to London and then north. At York we said goodbye to Doug. At Edinburgh, Joe and I parted.
‘What are you going to do?’ I asked.
‘First thing,’ said Joe, ‘is tae hit every bar on Sauchiehall Street, then get myself a wench. It’s been too long.’
‘It’s been a month,’ I said. ‘Don’t you remember Mary?’
‘A month?’ said Joe. ‘Christ, as long as that? You?’
‘Work on the farm, I suppose. Not much else to do in Inverayne.’
‘Well, see you, have some fun,’ said Joe. ‘No idea when we’re going to get leave like this again. Don’t piss it away.’
He started to walk away.
‘Joe,’ I called out. I don’t know why, but I’d started.
‘Aye.’
‘Tell me,’ I said. ‘Clive. The kite. The night we were on guard. You didn’t, did you?’
I watched his face, the emotions cross it. Anger, fear, hatred. Then a smile. ‘Jack,’ he said. ‘You’re a smart lad. So listen tae me. Dae yourself a favour. Dinnae ask me that again, right?’
That wasn’t an answer.
‘Off you go, Jack. Back to your farm. Straighten up and fly right, Jack. You’ll get on just fine.’
The east coast, the green fields, the cliffs, the sands of Montrose and Stonehaven, Dunnottar castle. What would it be like? Late summer the air would be full of insects, the smell of Ma’s flowers, the fields a few months shy of the harvest. This was the time for climbing trees, running through fields and being shouted at for messing with the crops. For swimming in the river, dropping in from the big swing, for all-night games. But I’d be doing none of that now. I was going home a man, Leading Aircraftman Devine.
I could forget about Joe for a couple of weeks.
Inverayne, Aberdeenshire. August – September 1943
Left leg in snow up to thigh.
Right in deeper, up to top. Seeping into boots. Chilling. Drop pack and sinks out of sight, black hole where it landed. Gone. Already more snow filling hole, erasing what was there, blizzard throwing on top. Swirling wind. Scarf unravelled, whips off, billows away, ghostly. Chilled to the bones. Step forward with difficulty, like some metal machine, raising foot as far as can, falling forward, snow impacting under weight. Make progress, but slowly. So slowly. Feel like will never make it. Never make it to the end of the road, to where the house is, where the home is, home is where the…
Home is where the
Nothing. Three walls. Portion of roof defying gravity. There must be rubble under all that snow. House can’t just disappear.
Keep moving forward though seems pointless. Can’t still be there, in the cellar under snow and rubble? Must have moved and never told me. Can’t wait here. No forwarding address here. Should turn around and leave, go back, back to where come from.
I should go back.
Go back.
Go
I woke with a start, cold sweat, looked around trying to regain equilibrium, find my feet, solid ground. The dream image fading slowly, the snow and the ruined house. Just a dream. The summer sun flowed in through the window. No snow. Just a dream. The house was still standing. Just a dream.
Aberdeen station, bags coming down from the luggage racks, people eager to get off, waiting at the door. I saw the ruined house standing in the snow, the image superimposed on the station as I waited for the next train. Ahead of me the tracks and the opposite platform, but around the edges, around the periphery I could see trees, snow, three walls. Could hear the wind and feel the chill. Stamped my feet and stretched, trying to wake up properly, to shake the dream.
The train pulled in. I wished I had something to read, a Melody Maker, Doug’s poetry, Joe’s Manifesto, anything to get my mind off that image. Inverayne. Hard to believe. I leant on the bridge and looked down at the shallow, wide flow. Further upstream the river ran by the end of the bottom field. We’d built the swing, swam when it was warm enough. Me, Dod, Lizzie, our friends. Willie Rennie. I dropped my cigarette end, watched it tumble into the water and disappear. An equation describing the path of a falling bomb. The hill into the village. Laden with kit I hardly broke a sweat. Much fitter. I had two routes, one straight though the centre of the village, past the school, the post office, round by the church and then down the dirt road to the farm, or right, skirt the playing fields, go by McLean, the game-keeper’s house, through the big field. I chose the latter, not in the mood to exchange even the briefest of pleasantries with anyone. Fences. Dry stone dykes. Barriers everywhere. They’d always been there of course. Lambs’ wool on the barbs. Balance on the dyke. I noticed them now. Demarcation. Most of this land was Southall’s. I hoisted my bags higher and spat on the ground. Joe was in my head. That grin.
‘I’m all done here.’
‘Do yourself a favour, Jack.’
Was he a killer?
‘Oh, Jack, we just got your letter this morning,’ Lizzie said as she ran over to greet me. I was surprised at how much more like a woman she’d become. I had to count from her year of birth to be sure, but she’d turned seventeen while I’d been away. In my head she was always a little girl, hair tangled, mud under her nails. She looked tired, her blonde hair up, twisted into a bun and caught in a hairnet, arms covered with diluted blood and feathers.
‘Chicken for tea?’
‘No, I just killed Ma. Want to help me bury her?’
I was home. Thank God it’d been Lizzie I’d met first.
‘It’s good to see you.’
‘You too, Jackie. Let me look at you in that uniform.’
I did a turn for her, then saluted.
‘Very nice,’ she said. ‘It suits you. Better than Dod’s old clothes, anyway.’
‘Thanks. How are you? How are things here?’
‘Och, you know.’
I followed her. ‘As bad as that?’
‘Do you really want to know?’ She returned to plucking the chicken. I offered to help but she waved me away.
‘Well, I’ll hear all about it sooner or later, and I’d rather hear it from you than from Ma.’
‘Oh you’ll hear about it from her right enough. You know her. She’ll never miss a good opportunity to complain.’
‘So, what is it?’
‘Och, nothing specific. Just the usual, times ten. You’re not here to help Da and the only boys left in the village are either weak, stupid or both, so hiring is going to cost more. Ma’s just the same, only now you’re not here so she takes it all out on me and Da, though he’s smart enough to stay out in the fields from sun-up to sundown,’ she said slapping the bald bird down and removing the feathers that had stuck to her forearm.
‘Where is she?’
Lizzie jerked her head in the direction of the roof. ‘Up there, probably counting her cigarette cards.’
‘Counting them?’
‘She thinks things are disappearing. As if anyone would steal a cigarette card of W. G. Grace.’
I shook my head. ‘Da’s out in the fields?’
‘The bottom field, I think. You going to go see him?’
‘Aye. Unless you want a hand.’
‘There’s no room for two in here, especially when one of them is a lump like you. Go see Da. Here,’ she said. ‘Take him out a cup of tea.’
She poured two mugs and I set off with them, down over the lawn and past Ma’s flower beds, which looked abandoned. Through the open gate in the old stone wall and into the bottom field. The house and most of the land had once been part of the Inverayne House estate, and had been the gardener’s home. It had all been sold off when the Southalls had a cash-flow problem and Da bought it. The land was dotted with high granite walls that enclosed the old gardens and greenhouses, but which were now filled with crops or animals. Dod had joked that the pigs behind their five feet thick, fifteen feet high defences were the best protected pigs in the world. I could see Da at the bottom of the hill, digging. The drainage ditch that diverted flood water from the river had collapsed. It was a two man job at least. He straightened up and, leaning on his spade, peered at the figure approaching him.
‘That’ll be you, Jackie?’
‘Aye. Got some tea for you.’
I was suddenly aware that I still had my forage cap on. I wished I could whip the cap off but couldn’t without spilling the tea. I reached my father, who eyed me with a sceptical expression. ‘Helluva smart. Fit are ye?’
‘Leading Aircraftman.’
‘Ye been up yet?’
‘Aye, twelve hours.’
‘Solo?’
‘Aye.’
‘Imagine that. An here’s me thinking it’s only the likes of yon Southalls that get tae dae thon.’
‘Aye, well. There’s a war on. Shakes things up a bit.’
‘It does that, laddie, right enough.’ He drained the lukewarm tea. ‘Ye get back the now?’
‘Aye, half an hour or so.’
‘Well, you’ll be well rested.’
I took the hint. ‘You needing a hand?’
‘No needin but I wouldnae say no.’
‘I’ll just go change. You got a shovel down here already?’
‘No, grab one on your way back.’
‘Aye.’
Changing back into my old clothes and getting a spade in my hands. It wasn’t another world or another time, it was the same year and these were the same crops I’d helped plant. Definitely fitter though. Even Da commented. The trench needed lengthening, deepening and reinforcing, so we worked from the middle out in opposite directions, digging down and back, away from the river, using the dirt and rocks to build up a bank on the riverside. In spring the river widened and deepened, and in the years before the ditch had been dug the bottom of the field had been a bog. Earthworks and drainage had extended the amount of usable land and kept the river at bay. It needed constant attention. How quickly I’d got out of the rhythms of farm life
, working while there was sunlight, resting when it was dark. I kept wondering what time it was, but it didn’t matter. What were the lads up to? Not digging, that was sure. Terry would be making some money, selling or buying. Doug would be outside, like me, maybe walking, maybe reading, maybe spending time with his parents.
‘No done yet, Dod,’ Da called over. ‘I’ll let you know when we’re done.’
I didn’t acknowledge the mistake, just got back to work. What brought it on today?
The sun was setting and it was getting harder to see. We’d done a hell of a lot and I even got a pat on the back as we were walking up through the field. ‘Good bit of work there. That RAF’ll make a man oot e yi yet.’
‘So they tell me.’
‘They treatin ye richt?’
‘Aye. It’s hard, ken? But it’s hard for everyone.’
‘That’s good. Sorry aboot that, back there. Cryin ye Dod.’
‘Dinnae worry.’
‘Jist yer startin tae look affy like him, especially in thon uniform.’
I was surprised he even noticed the mistake, let alone brought it up.
‘I think av still got a bottle around somewhere. You’ll join me in a dram?’
‘Aye, thanks very much.’
We sat around the table while Ma ran in and out of the kitchen, fussing despite the fact that Lizzie had done everything. Lizzie was sitting opposite me wishing Da didn’t think it uncivilised for women to drink. Ma had said little to me since we’d returned and washed up for dinner. Nothing more than an ‘ah, you’re back then?’ Since then she’d been pretending to be busy, running about, acting as if she’d just remembered the most important thing, stopping mid-step and turning on the spot. The performance meant ignoring that Lizzie actually did all the work. Eventually, Ma sat down, the food on the table beginning to get cold. Da seemed oblivious, especially after the whisky had been poured. He wasn’t much of a drinker – you can’t be when you have to get up at dawn and deal with beasts – and his cheeks were already flushed, even though we were only at the soup. The soup was thin and watery, what with rations and the time of year, and I had to admit that so far, mess food was more filling, but whatever herbs Lizzie had used were the exact taste of home. This soup, I now realised, thin though it was, was what I thought of when I thought of home. That smell, that taste. Had Lizzie learned the recipe exactly from Ma? Or had she been cooking it all along?