A Pair of Silver Wings

by James Holland

  ‘The Blue Brigade,’ said Volpe. ‘Yes, I like it. Giorgio?’

  Giorgio nodded. ‘It’s simple, and it doesn’t sound political.’

  ‘Good,’ said the Colonel. ‘The British will not just send you arms but uniforms as well. ‘Wear them. Eduardo, get rid of that old jacket and put on your battle blouse again. I know the mountain people are behind you but you must show them that you are an effective fighting force, not a rabble; that you are fighting for the freedom of Italy. Then more will follow, and when things get tough – and they will – they will be less likely to waver. Gentlemen, if you can begin to severely hinder the German lines of communication to the front, then the Allies will have a greater chance of breaking through before the winter, and your freedom will be assured.’

  There was silence for a moment, then Edward said, ‘What about the mountain people?’

  Colonel Bianco nodded his head. A candle flickered behind him; half his face lay in shadow, while the other, a smooth cheek and defined jawline was coloured by a flickering orange glow. The atmosphere seemed tense, close. He spoke softly, his voice lowered. ‘This is war, Eduardo. Innocent people will get killed wherever the fighting passes. But you have to remember that here, operating from these mountains, you can make a big difference. If, by your efforts, peace comes to this area sooner, then the hardships that have to be endured until that day comes will have been worth it.’

  Edward felt sick. He wanted to stand up and leave right away, to find Carla and to tell her to come with him; they would flee and hide until this monstrous storm had passed. Why here? he thought. Of all the places in the world, why does this tiny community have to get caught up in this appalling mess? He thought about the Casalinis and the Pian del Castagna, of the generations that had peaceably lived and toiled on the land. I must leave them, he thought. I must do what I can to help them keep apart from all this.

  ‘If we’re going to do as you ask,’ said Volpe, ‘we are going to need a lot more arms. We have plenty of rifles, but they’re old and we don’t have enough ammunition. We need machine guns, grenades, mortars, and bullets – lots and lots of bullets. And soon.’

  Colonel Bianco held up his hand. ‘I know, I know. Don’t worry. The British will make three separate drops by aeroplane this month alone. You need to prepare a drop zone.’

  Giorgio and Volpe looked at each other then at the priest. ‘What about where Eduardo landed?’ suggested Giorgio. Edward felt his heart sink – it was too close to the Pian del Castagna. ‘That cornfield – it’s hidden from both valleys.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ said the Colonel. He produced a map – a pre-war military map of the area. They debated for a moment where exactly the field was until Edward said, ‘May I see? I might not have much weapons training, but I do know how to navigate.’

  ‘Yes, let Eduardo have a look,’ said the Colonel. Volpe passed it over. Edward scanned it, finding ‘Pde Pian del Castagna’ almost immediately. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘This is the field, right here.’

  Colonel Bianco made a note of the grid reference then said, ‘Now, you have a radio, don’t you?’ Volpe and Giorgio nodded. ‘All right, good,’ he said, then outlined the drop procedure. They were to tune in nightly to the BBC. If the British were preparing a drop in the next few days, they would hear the phrase, ‘Prepare yourself, Mario, prepare yourself, Mario.’ When they heard the words, ‘The birds are singing,’ that meant the drop would be the following evening at ten o’clock. They needed to be ready in the field. As soon as they heard the aircraft coming they were to start flashing the letter ‘M’ in morse, then light a series of flares in the shape of the letter ‘T’. ‘Those are your two code letters,’ the Colonel told them. ‘Get any part of them wrong and the pilot will turn around and go home. Understood?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Volpe. ‘How soon, though?’

  ‘Soon,’ said the Colonel. ‘Days. Make sure you’re ready.’ He pushed back his chair noisily and stood up. Taking his hat, he said, ‘I must be off. I’ll come and see you again soon, but if you need me you know what to do.’ He glanced at Father Umberto, who nodded acknowledgement. ‘Goodbye, and good luck,’ he said as he opened the door and stepped out into the night.

  Carla found him in the barn the following morning. She had discarded her jacket; now she wore a simple blue cotton dress that came down just below her knees, with her socks and men’s boots on her feet. A single clip kept one side of her hair back off her face. She smiled as she walked over to him. It was cool in the barn and Edward saw the goosebumps on her arms.

  ‘Carla,’ he said, ‘Darling.’ He rose and kissed her then held her tightly, breathing in the smell of her hair. ‘I’ve got to leave. I’ve got to join Volpe.’

  She sighed. ‘Now?’

  He nodded. ‘In a minute. I was just waiting for you.’

  ‘It’s not fair. I’m going to miss you more than you know.’

  ‘I’ll come down here whenever I can.’

  ‘But I won’t have you to myself any more.’ She put a hand to his cheek. ‘We can meet in the hut. Can you remember how to get there?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘How will I be able to contact you? I won’t know where you’ll be.’

  ‘I’ll visit you here, or leave a note for you. Or you can leave a note with Father Umberto. He’ll know where I am.’

  ‘Darling Eduardo, be careful, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course I will.’ He kissed her again. So this is what Harry felt when Kitty left, he thought. But Carla was not Kitty; there was nothing coquettish about her. He’d told her about Kitty, and the time he had visited her on his return from Malta. ‘I’d never betray you,’ Carla had told him, and he’d believed her. He’d known her such a short time and yet his trust in her was complete.

  It was with a heavy heart that he said goodbye to her, and left the Pian del Castagna. He wondered how he would ever repay the kindness of the Casalinis. Not by bringing the fighting closer to their homes, he thought bitterly. He hated himself for what he was about to do – and yet he felt he’d had no choice. You had to join them, he told himself as he walked up the track that led away from the farm. Colonel Bianco had been right: this was war; choices were never easy. But as a fighter pilot, the war had at least, for the most part, remained impersonal. He had rarely seen the men he was firing at – it was the machine not the man; a battle between machines, nothing more. A single stray bullet – that was all it had taken. One chance shot that had hit his engine when many thousands of rounds had missed him in the past. I’m just me, he thought. I’m not strong enough for this. The dull ache of dread, a sensation to which he had become horribly familiar, descended over him like a shroud once more.

  As Colonel Bianco had promised, the first air drop came within days. Volpe had told only a few – the partisans were spread across the mountain – and had taken just twenty men with him for the drop. Edward was with him, standing to the side of the field in the darkness, looking up at a clear sky of a million twinkling stars, when they heard the faint hum of an aircraft. Volpe actually grabbed Edward’s arm. ‘My God,’ he said. ‘They’re coming. They’re actually coming.’

  He hissed at his men and they scampered out to their flares, while Volpe clutched the lamp. The sound of the engine drew closer. ‘Where is it?’ he whispered to Edward.

  ‘There!’ said Edward as a dark shape loomed towards them from over the valley. ‘Quick, flash the code.’ Volpe did so repeatedly, then as the aircraft dropped height, he gave the signal for the flares to be lit. In moments the field glowed orange as a giant letter ‘T’ burned brightly up towards the sky. The aircraft banked, and turned over the field, just a few hundred feet above them. There’s an RAF pilot up there, thought Edward. Fifteen small white parachutes fluttered open and then the plane flew on, the sound of the engine fading into the night.

  The men scrambled towards the canisters as they drifted down. Two fell almost perfectly in the middle of the field; another landed in the undergrowth, one at
the far end and another two in the trees the far side of the field, but despite having rapidly extinguished the flares, all fifteen were quickly found. The canisters were heavy, but two men could just about manage to carry them. There was only a sliver of moon, but it gave them just enough light to see the dark shape of the land and the almost luminous glow of the track back towards Capriglia.

  Edward had been staying with Volpe and Giorgio in a large empty barn set amongst the trees overlooking the village, and it was to this barn that they now took the canisters. Volpe could barely contain his excitement. ‘Come on, come on,’ he said as they reached the barn. ‘Let’s get them open and see what there is.’ He knelt down and undid the fastenings of the first of the canisters and lifted the lid. Inside were ammunition boxes, Sten guns and rifles. The others were opened. One had boxes of grenades, another more ammunition and explosives. In one there was nothing but uniforms: British khaki battle blouses, trousers and army boots. A further canister was full of half a dozen Bren guns, the heavy machine guns Volpe had so craved. He clapped his hands together and laughed. ‘Bren guns! Just think what we can do now. Now we can teach those bastards a thing or two.’ He passed around the Sten guns and uniforms. ‘Put these on,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow we’ll start distributing this stuff.’

  Bottles were brought from a stash in the corner of the barn. ‘Let’s drink to this,’ he said, ‘and to future victories.’ Edward drank the rough wine, feeling it burn and cloy his mouth, and looked round at the other men, their faces smiling and laughing in the dim light cast by a handful of candle lamps. They think they can take on the world now, he thought.

  Later. Most of the men had settled down for the night. Edward lay on some straw in an old cattle stall along with three others: Alfredo, Bruno and Pietro. The three of them tended to stick together, Edward had noticed, especially Alfredo and Bruno. Since his arrival, Edward had also noticed that they tended to stick close to him, too.

  ‘It’s exciting, isn’t it?’ said Alfredo. He was small, a boy of just eighteen.

  ‘Yes,’ said Edward, but not the word I would have used.

  ‘I think it is,’ said Bruno.

  ‘But it brings it home a bit, don’t you think?’ said Pietro. ‘I mean, it makes it suddenly seem very real. We’ve been hiding up here for two months and now it’s time to do something. To take on the enemy.’

  Edward remembered that same sense of excitement, of exhilaration, when he’d joined 324 Squadron in Cornwall. But this lot, they’re scared too, he thought. It was interesting, watching them, talking with them. For Volpe it was an adventure; he could see it in the way his eyes had shone ever since the meeting with Colonel Bianco – the way he’d been that night out there in the field and back in the barn as they’d opened the canisters. Volpe’s confidence, his zest for the partisan life, for leading these men, was real. And Giorgio – so calm, and cool as can be. Edward couldn’t imagine anything fazing Giorgio; a good man in a crisis. And he had some experience, too – he had done his naval training, had been to sea on a battleship. That counted for a lot. Like Volpe, he was also a little older. A little more worldly.

  But these boys – well, they are only boys, Edward thought. They were in awe of Volpe, he thought, of his charisma, but a bit scared of him, too. None of them had ever fired a gun in anger; none of them knew what to expect. Edward wondered how they would react when they came up against trained German troops for the first time. He wondered how he would react, too.

  ‘Eduardo?’ said Alfredo.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Did you – did you ever feel scared when you were flying?’

  ‘Of course. But mostly before I got into the plane. Once you were in the sky there were too many others things to think about. When you are in the middle of a battle all you are thinking about is flying and shooting. There’s no time to be scared.’ A half truth, he thought.

  ‘I expect it’ll be the same for us,’ said Bruno.

  ‘Probably,’ said Edward.

  They were fascinated by him, he knew – by his Englishness, but mostly for being a pilot, and had peppered him with questions: about flying for the RAF, about the aircraft he had shot down; they’d asked him what it was like to fly fighter planes and to be caught up in a dogfight. Was he an ace? Well, strictly speaking . . . You are! Hey, everyone, Eduardo here’s an ace! How about that! Kids’ questions. Colonel Bianco had been right: his battle blouse had made a difference. They’re a little in awe of me too, he thought. He hoped he wouldn’t let them down.

  In truth, he was just as fascinated by them. He had talked to them, asked them questions too: about joining Volpe. How had they known where to go? All three – Alfredo, Bruno and Pietro – had lived in Bologna, and all three had been obliged to report for duty at the nearest Republican Army barracks. Pietro had confessed that he’d nearly done so. ‘I’m no fascist, but it makes you think twice when you know you could be shot for not doing so,’ he’d said. The others had fled just before the March 8 deadline expired. Alfredo and Bruno had known each other since they’d been young. They’d gone to school together, been friends all their lives. They had planned to make a run for it together. For Bruno it had meant tearful farewells with his family. ‘It was terrible,’ he’d confessed. ‘The moment I left my home I had to get rid of anything that linked me to my family. I haven’t had any contact with them since. I don’t even know whether they are alive. They might have been killed in an air raid for all I know, or arrested by the Blackshirts. Anything might have happened to them.’ But he could not contact them; he could not take the risk. To do so would be to risk not only his own life, but theirs too.

  Alfredo had not said goodbye to his family. He was the oldest child, with three younger brothers; they all lived in an apartment on the edge of the city. Instead he just left, one afternoon – he thought it best; otherwise they would have talked him out of it. As planned, he met up with Bruno, and they walked all night until they were out in the country, the mountains looming ahead of them. ‘A contadino family helped us,’ Alfredo told him, ‘and they told us some partisans were gathering on Monte Luna. So we came here and eventually found Volpe and Giorgio.’

  Edward closed his eyes.

  ‘Eduardo,’ whispered Alfredo.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do think Volpe will let me be a Bren gunner?’

  ‘Go to sleep, Alfredo. Go to sleep.’

  Italy – May, 1944

  Two more arms drops arrived, the third on May 20th. In between, news reached them that a battle was raging in the south. The Allies had renewed their offensive. But the Blue Brigade were now beginning their own battle. Volpe had led a small group to attack a German anti-aircraft battery at Veggio. They’d killed a handful of Germans and hurled grenades at the guns, then hurried back to the mountains in triumph. Two days later, Edward had gone with Giorgio and another group of partisans and had attacked a small column of German trucks just south of Montalbano, in the Setta Valley. Giorgio and Edward had chosen their position well: as the road climbed, slightly away from the river and the railway line. Trees and thick shrubs had lined either side, and they had hidden on the crest of the rise, looking down at a hundred yards of straight road. Behind them, through the trees, was a track that took them back to the mountains.

  ‘Should we put men on both sides of the road?’ Giorgio asked him.

  ‘No,’ said Edward. ‘Let’s attack from this side only. If we don’t knock out the whole lot it’ll be easier for us to get away. Remember what the Colonel said: hit them hard then disappear.’

  Giorgio nodded. ‘You’re right.’

  They had two of the Bren guns, a handful of Stens, grenades, and rifles. Edward crouched on the bank next to Giorgio, staring down at the road. With him were Bruno and Alfredo, manning one of the Brens.

  ‘Now you’re sure you’re going to be all right carrying that thing in a hurry?’ Edward asked them.

  ‘Of course,’ said Alfredo. ‘It’s not that heavy.’

  ‘All rig
ht, but I’ll be right with you if you need help, OK?’

  They waited an age. A man was positioned down the hill at the end of the straight where he could see around the bend in the road. One whistle meant something was coming, two whistles meant it was the enemy.

  There was almost no traffic. One car came past; Edward tensed when he heard the whistle, then relaxed. An hour passed, then two.

  ‘Where are they?’ asked Bruno.

  Giorgio grinned. ‘Patience. They’ll come, don’t you worry. And remember: no twitchy fingers, all right?’

  It was late morning, and another fine one, with barely a cloud in the sky. Edward was warm in his jacket. He undid the buttons of his battle blouse and wiped his brow. The trees around them were alive with birdsong.

  Suddenly two whistles. Edward felt himself tense again, felt his chest begin to pound. Bruno and Alfredo looked up at them anxiously. They’re terrified, thought Edward. They heard the rumble of engines, a change of gear and then heard the driver push down on the accelerator. He looked at Giorgio, who winked. Christ, how can he be so calm?

  ‘Hold it,’ said Giorgio, ‘hold it boys.’ Edward could see now: two army trucks, that was all. Fifty yards, forty yards, thirty: he could see the Germans in the front of the cab. Good boys, he thought, no-one has fired too soon.

  ‘Now!’ said Giorgio, firing his rifle into the cab of the first truck – it was just a few yards from them, crawling at a snail’s pace. The windscreen shattered and the truck swerved. The Brens chattered, rifle fire cracked, sudden and deafening, the noise resounding through the trees. Acrid cordite filled the air

  ‘Hold the grenades,’ yelled Giorgio. A handful of German troops clambered from the backs of the trucks but were cut down almost immediately. Edward started as a small explosion erupted and the engine of the second truck burst into flames. He could see men scampering on the far side of the trucks, then heard someone in English shout, ‘Hold your fire, we’re Allies!’