Bright Dart

by Suninfo

‘Tell me about him,’ Ottaway said firmly.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The man you’re trying so hard to forget.’

  ‘There’s nothing to remember,’ she said coldly. ‘He was a friend of David’s.’

  ‘Who’s this David?’

  ‘My brother, they were in the same squadron.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He was shot down over Hamburg two years ago. We were very close especially after David was killed.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Of course I am. I like you very much.’

  ‘Now perhaps, but you won’t be here for much longer, will you?

  What is it they say?—out of sight, out of mind?’

  He placed his arms around her shoulders and drawing her close, kissed her. ‘I won’t forget you in a hurry,’ he said.

  75

  9

  THE WIND WHICH had got up towards four o’clock in the afternoon lifted the tarpaulin covering the hole in the roof, and the loud, slapping noise of the billowing canvas eventually disturbed Quilter who woke up feeling stiff and cold. A draught whistled through the gap in the wall where the timbers of the barn had rotted away and aggravated the rheumatic ache in his right shoulder, putting him in a bad humour. Hunger pains gripped his stomach and not unnaturally his thoughts immediately turned to the question of food. Rummaging through his pockets, he brought out the last square of chocolate and, convinced that Stack was still fast asleep, he quickly popped it into his mouth like a guilty schoolboy. Although he tried to make it last, the morsel failed to take the edge off his appetite. Still feeling ravenous, he crawled across the loft, raised the trapdoor and looked down into the barn. A couple of hens pecking for corn in the loose straw attracted his attention and made his mouth water.

  Stack said, ‘What’s up, sir?’

  Quilter jumped and lost hold of the trapdoor which fell back with a clatter. ‘Christ,’ he said, ‘must you do that? I thought you were asleep.’

  Stack ignored the show of temper. ‘Is someone poking around?’

  ‘If there was,’ Quilter said irritably, ‘the noise we’re making would soon bring them up here. As a matter of fact, I was thinking of grabbing a chicken.’

  ‘I had the same idea, but I didn’t fancy eating a raw bird.’ He reached out sideways and produced a couple of eggs. ‘But I did find these while you were asleep. I hard-boiled them in a scoop which I found outside in the yard.’ He saw the look of alarm on Quilter’s face and smiled. ‘It’s all right, sir, nobody saw me.’

  Quilter felt the stubble on his chin. ‘I need a shave,’ he said meditatively.

  ‘There’s a rainwater butt behind the barn.’

  ‘Good, I’ll just have a quick scrape and then we’ll move on.’

  ‘How far do you think we covered last night?’

  ‘Not more than twenty miles.’

  ‘We shall have to do better than that if we’re going to be at the 76

  RV on time. Seems to me we’ve got to lay our hands on some form of transport.’

  ‘Pinching a bicycle isn’t as easy as Major Ottaway led us to believe—most people have got into the habit of chaining them up.’

  ‘We can always bust the padlock.’

  Quilter took out the rough sketch map that Ashby had made and studied it carefully. ‘We could try Eccleshall, you never know, we might find something in a cinema car park.’

  Stack nodded his head in agreement. He calculated that once they had the bicycles they would be able to average ten miles in the hour. Of course, they would need to allow an hour or more to find a suitable hiding place before first light, but even so, they would cover at least sixty miles during the night. They might do even better on a full stomach.

  On the spur of the moment, he said, ‘Do you want to eat the boiled egg now or later?’

  Quilter looked up from the map. ‘I didn’t realise you meant me to have one,’ he said awkwardly.

  ‘I belive in share and share alike, sir.’

  ‘Well, that really is very generous of you. Perhaps it would be better if we ate them now.’ He took the proffered egg and peeled it carefully. To conceal his embarrassment, he suddenly said, ‘I wonder how Captain Cowper is getting on?’

  ‘You don’t want to worry about him, sir,’ Stack said firmly, ‘if I’m any judge, he had his feet under somebody’s table soon after he parted company with us.’

  The Eastmans had made him very comfortable but it was no more than Cowper had expected, although his only claim to their hospitality was a casual friendship with their son George which had flowered during their last year together at Sherborne.

  Fortunately, he’d run across George again in Cairo early in ’43

  and this chance encounter had given him a valid excuse to call on the Eastmans. That they lived on the outskirts of Shrewsbury, which was less than ten miles from Wem, was not as fortuitous as it seemed because Cowper kept a list of potential hosts who were liberally scattered across the country.

  The exercise had started at 2130, and ten minutes later Cowper had persuaded Quilter and Stack that it would be in everyone’s interest if they split up. Knowing that the alarm would be raised within a couple of hours, he’d set off at a fast pace and had arrived at the Eastmans’ before news of the escaped prisoners had trickled down to the police constables on beat duty. He’d openly admitted that he was taking part in an exercise but had 77

  implied that, in accepting their offer of a bed for the night, he was not breaking any rules. The problem now facing him early on Saturday evening was how to extend his stay. After some thought, he decided on the direct approach because he was convinced that his hosts would be too embarrassed to refuse him.

  Cowper said, ‘About the exercise …’ Eastman lowered his newspaper and waited expectantly. ‘It’s really rather stupid.’

  ‘In what way?’ Eastman said mildly.

  Cowper pointed to his suit of battledress. ‘I’m supposed to be an escaped German POW.’

  ‘So you said when you arrived last night.’

  ‘Quite. The point is that I am being tested, not the police or the Home Guard or anyone else for that matter.’

  ‘I’m not sure I understand.’

  ‘If everything was reversed and the Krauts were after me, I would naturally seek help from sympathisers, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Which of course is exactly what I’ve done, and you were kind enough to put me up.’

  Eastman removed his glasses and polished them with a handkerchief. ‘It was nothing,’ he said modestly, ‘Molly and I were only too delighted. I know your parents would have done the same for George.’

  ‘Of course they would, they’re very fond of George.’ The statement was untrue; Cowper’s parents had met George only the once and they’d disliked him on sight, but he saw no reason to disillusion Eastman. ‘And that’s why I wondered if I could be bold enough to ask you for another favour?’

  ‘My dear Miles,’ Eastman said expansively, ‘please don’t hesitate to ask, we’re always ready to help a friend of George’s, especially in these days.’

  Cowper did his best to look suitably embarrassed. ‘Well, then, since you put it like that,’ he said, ‘I wonder if I could stay with you both until Monday morning? I’ll make sure my unit sends you a ration card when I return because I should feel awful if I ate my way through your larder.’

  ‘My dear chap, I’m sure we could manage anyway.’

  ‘And then I wondered if I could borrow some of George’s old clothes which I could parcel up and send back when the exercise is over?’

  ‘I think we can find something which might fit you.’

  ‘You’re very kind.’ Cowper looked down at the carpet and shuffled his feet.

  ‘Is there anything else we can do to help?’

  ‘I don’t really like to ask.’

  78

  ‘Oh, come on, there’s no need to be so reluctant.’

 
‘Can you lend me three quid?’ Eastman looked astonished. ‘You see,’ Cowper said hastily, ‘My Colonel made sure we only had five shillings in our pockets before the exercise began and I need the money for the train fare and so on. I could send you a cheque with George’s things.’

  ‘If I do as you ask, wouldn’t that be cheating?’

  ‘Oh, no. You see it’s a test of our initiative. I mean, if I was making my way through Holland at this very moment, I’d take money from a Dutch family if they offered it.’

  ‘I see. Well, that puts everything in a very different light. I’m a bit short of cash just now, could it wait until I go to the bank on Monday morning? I mean, there’s no desperate hurry is there, Miles?’

  ‘Good Lord, no.’

  ‘Well, that’s all right then. How about a drink?’

  ‘I’d love one.’

  ‘I think we’ve got a drop of whisky left in the house.’ Eastman regretted making the offer as soon as the words were out of his mouth.

  It amused him to think that they had more in common than Gerhardt would ever care to admit. Physically, there was little between them although, at five foot seven, Frick was the taller of the two by almost half an inch and he was also about ten pounds the heavier. Four years the junior, Frick, despite his thin, receding brown hair, looked much younger than thirty-seven and, rather surprisingly, the years of being down and out in Paris and the experience of the Spanish Civil War had neither aged nor embittered him. Gerhardt might try to give the impression that he belonged to the traditional officer-producing class but Frick sensed that their backgrounds and childhood were not dissimilar. Both were essentially men of action who, given a common aim, could sink their political differences and, in pairing them off, Ashby had shown considerable insight into their characters.

  Unlike Quilter and Stack, whose every move so far had been improvised, Gerhardt and Frick were working to a carefully thought out plan. They had conserved their chocolate ration by living off the land on a diet consisting of raw carrots and apples, and they were no longer short of money. Late on Friday night they had broken into a telephone kiosk which had yielded the sum of two pounds eleven shillings and fivepence in silver and copper. Now as they approached the outskirts of Market Drayton, they were on the look-out for a change of clothing.

  79

  It was Frick who noticed and immediately realised the possible significance of the signboard fixed on the door of a wooden hut which faced the caretaker’s house in the entrance of the Wordsworth Central School.

  ‘Do you see that?’ he said quietly.

  Gerhardt stared into the darkness, ‘2097 Squadron, Air Training Corps.’ He paused and then said, ‘I don’t understand, should it mean something to me?’

  ‘It’s a cadet organisation—they have RAF uniforms.’

  ‘In there?’

  ‘They are bound to hold a small stock of clothing and we’re both about average size.’

  ‘But surely, they’re only boys?’

  ‘Sixteen-year-olds and above are encouraged to join by the Ministry of Labour when they register for service.’

  Gerhardt looked up and down the street and satisfied that no one was in sight, he removed his boots and vaulting the low stone wall, landed quietly in the asphalt playground. Frick joined him a moment later, took one look at the Yale lock and realising that he couldn’t force the door, checked the windows. He found one at the back which hadn’t been fully closed because the wooden frame was warped, and using his jack-knife he prised it open.

  Once inside the hut he waited until his eyes became accustomed to the dark before he crossed the room and opened the door for Gerhardt.

  The hut had been sub-divided by hardboard partitions to form a makeshift office in each corner facing the entrance. One was labelled ‘Stores’, the other ‘Squadron Leader Mullins—Knock before entering’. As a gesture towards security, both office doors had been fitted with a frail-looking hasp, staple and padlock which they had no difficulty in forcing, but although there were a dozen suits of varying sizes in the stores, chest and waist measurements ruled them all out and their only acquisition was a forage cap which just fitted Gerhardt.

  Frick said, ‘I thought it was too good to be true.’

  ‘You forget there is still the other room.’

  ‘I doubt if we will find anything there, but maybe we’d better take a look before we call it a day.’

  The moon broke through the scudding clouds long enough for them to see that, superficially at least, Mullins had created an air of efficiency about his office. A desk, filing trays, a folding chair and a wooden locker had been scrounged from an RAF stores depot and the walls had been covered with aircraft recognition posters. The locker was secured by a solid-looking combination lock but no one had thought to burr the screws holding the staple 80

  to the frame and, as Frick pointed out, a jack-knife made an adequate substitute for a screwdriver.

  Neatly arranged inside the locker were two suits of RAF

  battledress, an officer’s raincoat, a beret, and a service dress hat which had been deliberately bent out of shape to give the wearer a rakish air.

  Gerhardt measured one of the suits against his chest. ‘It is a bit large,’ he said, ‘but I don’t think anyone will take much notice of that. We are fortunate, are we not, that this Mullins is obviously a vain man—he has more clothes than a film star. If we unpick the shoulder flashes, people will think that we are in the RAF.’

  ‘It might be safer if we claimed to be Poles, otherwise our accents might arouse suspicion.’

  ‘I should have thought of that,’ Gerhardt said tersely, ‘it was stupid of me not to.’

  The note of self-criticism amused Frick and he was not averse to reminding Gerhardt that he had overlooked yet another problem. ‘Of course,’ he said chidingly, ‘we could dye our khaki shirts with ink but we’d still be short of a tie.’

  Gerhardt frowned. ‘I do not see the difficulty,’ he said seriously.

  ‘If this man Mullins has a pair of scissors in the drawer of his desk, we can cut a tie each out of the blackout curtains.’

  Frick stared at the window and then a broad smile appeared on his face. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘you’ve just provided the perfect answer. We’ll remove the curtains, cut a hole in each one and then slip them over our heads. If I remember correctly there is a roll of white tracing tape in the stores which we can use to make a pair of collars.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Gerhardt, ‘why should we want to wear a curtain?’

  ‘We’re about to become chaplains in the Polish Air Force. Don’t you see—it’s absolutely perfect. When they see a clergyman, the English seem to become embarrassed and they tend to look the other way. I tell you, Paul, with such a disguise we can travel anywhere without fear of being questioned and our appearance won’t matter—no one expects a padre to conform with dress regulations.’

  Every pigeon-hole in the desk was crammed with pamphlets, forms and leaflets issued by the Ministry of Agriculture. Neglected in peace time by successive governments, the war had brought expansion, subsidies and comparative prosperity to the farmer as well as a flood of paper work. Although in her letters Katherine had often said how hard she had to work on the farm, it wasn’t until he’d seen some of the evidence for himself that Ashby 81

  realised that she had not been exaggerating. Arriving late at the farm, he had been hurt and angry to find that the children were already in bed and that Katherine had left for Beverley where two evenings a week she helped to run a canteen for servicemen. But now that he’d had time to reflect, he was slowly beginning to realise that it was not the long bouts of separation which had caused the rift between them but indifference and a failure on his part to appreciate the many problems which she faced in bringing up their children alone. It was his fault that they had become accustomed to living separate lives and he knew that he would have to do something about it before their marriage finally broke up.

  H
e was a regular soldier and for too long his energies had been directed towards one goal and in his desire to make a name for himself, he’d often failed to take leave when the opportunity had arisen. Now for the first time, he knew that this sacrifice had been absurd for he had only to listen to the noise around him to get things into perspective. From Marston Moor, Pocklington, Driffield and Riccall the Halifaxes of 4 Group joined the Lancaster of 6 Group RCAF form Linton on Ouse, Dishforth and Leeming to thunder across the night sky in a never-ending stream towards Holland and Germany. Night after night Katherine must have lain awake listening to them as they droned overhead and wondered how many would return in the morning. The men who flew in those Lancasters and Halifaxes were not strangers but faces she knew and when they failed to return, the loss was personal. Compared with the reality of their war, his must have seemed irrelevant and she would find his dedication to a futile desk job quite incomprehensible.

  The phone rang and lifting the receiver off the hook, he heard the operator say, ‘I’m sorry about the delay, caller, but I now have your Wem number on the line.’

  Against a rushing noise in the background, Ashby said, ‘Is that you, Jack?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I can’t hear you. Who is that?’

  ‘My name’s Ashby,’ he shouted, ‘am I speaking to Major Ottaway?’

  ‘Okay, you’re a bit clearer now, but this sure is one hell of a bad line, Colonel.’

  ‘Any news?’

  ‘What?’

  Ashby counted up to ten and then started again. ‘Has—anyone—

  been—captured—yet?’ he said slowly and distinctly.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Not—even—Scholl or Haase?’

  82

  ‘No one’s been caught yet. Where are you calling from?’

  ‘Market—Weighton.’

  ‘I thought it was the goddam moon, Colonel.’

  ‘That’s—funny—you—sound—as—if—you—were—in—the—

  next—door—room.’

  ‘Yeah? It sounds to me like you’re standing under a waterfall.’

  ‘You—have—my—number?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All—right—call—me—if—there’s—any—news.’ Ashby hung up with a sense of relief.