The Burning Shore - Smith Wilbur. Страница 31

Suddenly there was a woof and a crack of bursting explosive, and an anti-aircraft shell burst above and slightly ahead of him. It looked like a ripe cotton pod, popping open and spilling fluffy white smoke, deceptively pretty in the muted light below the clouds.

Good morning, Archie, Michael greeted it grimly.

It was a ranging burst from one of the guns, and was followed immediately by the thud and crack of a full salvo. The air all around him was studded with shrapnel bursts.

Michael pushed his nose down and let the speed build up, and the needle of the rev counter in front of him began to wind upwards into the red sector. He fumbled in his pocket, pulled out the cloth package and placed in on his lap.

The earth and forest came up swiftly towards him, and he dragged a long smear of bursting shrapnel behind him.

Two hundred feet above the tree-tops he levelled out, and the airfield was directly ahead of him. He could see the multicoloured biplanes standing in a long row, their shark-like snouts pointed up towards him. He looked for the sky-blue machine with the chequered wings but could not pick it out.

There was agitated movement all along the edge of the field. German ground crews, anticipating a torrent of Vickers machine-gun fire, were running into the forest, while off-duty pilots, trying to struggle into their flying jackets, were racing towards the parked aircraft. They must know it was useless to take off and try to intercept the British machine, but they were making the attempt nonetheless.

Michael reached for the firing-handle. The aircraft were parked in a neat line, the pilots crowding towards them - and he smiled without humour and depressed his nose, picking them up in the ring sight of the Vickers.

At 100 feet he levelled again, dropped his right hand from the firing handle and picked up the cloth package from his lap. As he passed over the centre of the German line, he leaned from the cockpit and tossed the package overboard. The ribbon he had attached to it unrolled in the slipstream of the SESa and fluttered down to the edge of the field.

As Michael opened the throttle and climbed away again towards the cloud layer, he glanced up into the mirror above his head and saw one of the German pilots stoop over the package, and then the SESa bounced and rocked as the German anti-aircraft guns opened up on him again, and a shell burst just below him. Within seconds he was into the haven of the cloud bank with his guns cold and unfired, and a few shrapnel tears in the belly and the underwings.

He turned on to a heading for Mort Homme. While he flew he thought about the package he had just dropped.

During the night he had torn a long ribbon from one of his old shirts to use as a marker and weighted the end of it with a handful Of .303 cartridges. Then he had stitched his handwritten message into the other end of the ribbon.

He had at first considered attempting the message in German, and then admitted to himself that his German was hopelessly inadequate. Almost certainly there would be an officer on Von Richthofen's Jagdstaffel who could read English well enough to translate what he had written.

To the German pilot of the blue albatros with black and white chequered wings.

Sir, The unarmed and helpless British airman whom you murdered yesterday was my friend.

Between 1600 hrs and 1630 hrs today I will be patrolling over the villages of Cantin and Aubigny-all-Bac, at a height of

8,000 feet.

I will be flying an SE5a scoutplane painted yellow.

I hope to meet you.

The rest of the squadron had already landed when Michael returned to the base.

Mac, I seem to have picked up some shrapnel."I noticed, sir. Don't worry, fix it in a jiffyI haven't fired the guns, but check the sights again, will you. Fifty yards? Mac asked for the range at which he wanted fire from both Lewis and Vickers gun to converge. Make it thirty, Mac.

Working close, sir, Mac whistled through his teeth.

I hope so, Mac, and by the way, she is a touch tailheavy. Trim her hands-off See to it myself, sir, Mac promised.

Thank you, Mac. Give the bastards one for Mr Andrew, sir. The adjutant was waiting for him. We have all aircraft operational again, Michael. Twelve on the duty roster. All right.

Hank will take the noon patrol, and I will fly at 1530 hrs alone.

Alone? The adjutant took his pipe out of his mouth in surprise.

Alone, Michael confirmed. Then a full squadron sweep at dusk, as usual.

The adjutant made a note. By the way, message from General Courtney. He will do his best to attend the ceremony this evening. He thinks he will almost certainly be there. Michael smiled for the first time that day. He had wanted very badly for Sean Courtney to be at his wedding.

Hope you can make it also, Bob. You can bet on it. Whole squadron will be there. Looking forward to it no end. Michael wanted a drink badly. He started towards the mess.

God, it's eight o'clock in the morning, he thought, and stopped. He felt brittle and dried-out, whisky would put warmth and juice into his body again, and he felt his hands begin to tremble with his deep need for it. It took all his resolve to turn away from the mess and go to his tent. He remembered then that he hadn't slept the previous night.

Biggs was sitting on a packing case outside the tent, polishing Michael's boots, but he jumped to attention, his face expressionless.

Enough of that! Michael smiled at him. Sorry about last night, Biggs. Bloody rude of me. I didn't mean it. I know, sir.

Biggs relaxed. I felt the same way about the major. Biggs, wake me at three. I've got some sleep to catch up on. It was not Biggs who woke him but the shouts of the ground crews, the sound of running men, the deep bellowing tone of the anti-aircraft guns along the edge of the orchard, and the roaring overhead of a Mercedes aircraft engine.

Michael staggered out of his tent with tousled hair and bloodshot eyes, still half-asleep. What the hell is happening, Biggs?

A Hun, sir, cheeky brighter beating up the base."He's pushed off again.

Other pilots and ground crew were shouting qnongst the trees as they ran to the edge of the field.

Didn't even fire a shot Did you see him?

An Albatros, blue with black and white wings. The devil almost took the roof of the mess He dropped something, Bob's picked it up.

Michael ducked back into the tent and pulled on his jacket and a pair of tennis shoes. He heard two or three of the aircraft starting up as he ran out of the tent again.

Some of his own pilots were setting off in pursuit of the German interloper.

Stop those men from taking off! Michael yelled, and before he reached the adjutant's office he heard the engines switched off again in response to his order.

There was small crowd of curious pilots at the door, and Michael pushed through them just as the adjutant untied the drawstring that closed the mouth of the canvas bag that the German machine had dropped. The chorus of question and comment and speculation was silenced immediately as they all realized what the bag contained.

The adjutant gently ran the strip of green silk through his fingers. There were black-rimmed holes burned through it and it was stained with dried black blood.

Andrew's scarf, he said unnecessarily, and his silver flask. The silver was badly dented, but the cairngorm stopper gleamed yellow and gold as he turned it in his hands, and the contents gurgled softly. He set it aside and one by one drew the other items from the bag: Andrew's medal ribbons, the amber cigarette-holder, a spring -loaded sovereign case that still contained three coins, his pigskin wallet. The photograph of Andrew's parents standing in the grounds of the castle fell from the wallet as he turned it over.

What's this? The adjutant picked out a buff-coloured envelope of thick glossy paper sealed with a wax wafer. It's addressed, he read the face of the envelope to the pilot of the yellow SE5a. The adjutant looked up at Michael, startled.