Hornet’s Sting (16 page)

“Fucking Flying fucking Corps!” roared a young gunner. Both his lips were split and, in his fury, he spat blood. “I say we chuck the fuckers out of the window! See how they fly!” That got a harsh cheer. Dash felt his guts shrivel as if trying to hide inside him. These lunatics were going to break his neck. It was a twenty-foot drop. He wasn't going to die fighting the Hun. He was going to die on a filthy stretch of French cobblestones. Dead at nineteen, and now he'd never know her name. And then all the lights went out. The blackness was blinding. He held up his arms to guard his face and ran for his life, bouncing off men, cracking his shins on stools, ignoring the pain.

* * *

“We shall be like an umbrella,” Cleve-Cutler said. He wanted his breakfast. His voice had an edge like a rusty knife. The duke stood erect, his head tilted back so that he could look under the steep peak of his cap. His calf-length boots made a liquid gleam, and his buttons shone like gold. Maybe they are gold, the C.O. thought. Maybe his blood is blue. Maybe his nerves are steel and his balls are brass and his brains are pure cauliflower. “I suppose you have umbrellas where you come from,” he said.

Duke Nikolai and Count Andrei spoke briefly in Russian. Nikolai cleared his throat but Cleve-Cutler got in first: “Not in Imperial Russian Air Force,” he said.

Nikolai frowned until he was looking through slits. He seemed confused, as if the C.O. had suddenly barked like a dog.

Andrei said, “His Highness is a little low this morning.”

“Not in Royal Flying Corps, chum. Nobody in this Corps is allowed to be low. He wasn't low last night, was he? High as a kite, so I'm told. And now His Highness is going to be high again. As soon as you've discovered how to fly these buses, tell me. Big offensive patrol today. You'll be at ten thousand. The rest of the squadron will be at twelve and fifteen thousand. Like an umbrella. Because the
sky is going to be raining Huns over there.”

They were standing at the edge of the airfield. The sky was all bare blue, made lovely by a sun that promised warmth and wellbeing to all. It lied. Early spring was full of such lies. The wind would bring cloud and veils of rain and sudden, black squalls.

“Why ten thousand?” Nikolai asked.

“High enough to be above the worst Archie, low enough for you to find the enemy. Find some nice fat slow two-seaters doing reconnaissance. Good targets. Easy meat.”

“Albatros is better.”

“Not for you. Murdering bastards are Albatroses. You go and knock down some rabbits first and —”

“Albatros is better.”

“A kill is a kill. Learn your trade. Now – breakfast.”

Already the fitters were testing the engines, the riggers were checking the tension of the control cables, the armourers were cleaning the guns, oiling the interrupter gear, fingering the belted ammunition in search of an irregular round that might jam the breech and leave the pilot defenceless.

The Pups were not in the best condition. Most had spent the winter in the open, rocking and shuddering in the wind and the wet. They were made of wood and canvas, stressed by wires. Sometimes the weeks and months of rain and fog and snow made small but significant warps in the structure. A one-inch distortion in a wing was enough to alter the airflow and spoil the performance: lift was lost, speed was lost, perhaps – in a fight – everything was lost. Dope never made canvas totally waterproof. Moisture might gather inside the aeroplane. In time, it secretly rotted corners of the fabric. How could anyone tell, except by stripping off the canvas? There was another method of discovery, and that was the violent manoeuvre of combat. Sometimes a Pup fell out of battle with ragged flags flailing from its wings. Perhaps the canvas was unstitched by enemy bullets, perhaps by French mildew. There was rarely a chance to know.

Cleve-Cutler was eating bacon when he heard a dull drum-roll of thunder. He stopped chewing. The thunder exhausted itself. “Nasty frog weather,” Crabtree said.

“Come with me,” the C.O. said to Crabtree.

Cloud was building up on the western horizon.

“Doesn't smell like thunder,” Cleve-Cutler said.

Gerrish joined them. “Probably an ammo dump went up. I remember hearing one that was fifty miles away.”

But there was more thunder, dotted with the gloomy thud of individual explosions. It came from the east. This was an artillery barrage. “Damn,” Crabtree said. “They're at it again.” He sounded like a tired schoolmaster at the end of a long term.

“Us or them?” Cleve-Cutler wondered.

The adjutant had appeared and was lighting his pipe. “Not us,” he said. “No build-up. No reserves.”

“Can't be a Hun offensive,” Gerrish said. “No-man's-land is still a bog.”

“That leaves the French,” Crabtree said. “They're probably shelling the Portuguese.” The others ignored him. “Not an easy target,” he said, “Small and elusive.”

The C.O. telephoned Wing H.Q. “It's the Boche,” Colonel Bliss told him. “God knows what they're up to. Maybe it's a decoy, maybe it's a Teutonic blunder. Intelligence were taken completely by surprise. How are your Russians getting on?”

“No complaints, sir.” Almost true, he thought.

“Good. One thing about this barrage, there should be lots of trade for you upstairs. Huns directing guns and so on. You'll be spoiled for choice.”

By mid morning, every pilot had flight-tested his Pup and the mechanics were making final adjustments. The Russians were an exception. They taxied their Nieuports up and down the field, then got out and reread the manufacturer's manual. Finally, Spud Ogilvy went over to them.

“What is
mitraillette?”
Nikolai asked.

“Machine gun.”

Nikolai nodded. “
Naturellement,”
he said. He made it sound like a test of Ogilvy's knowledge. He tossed the manual to Andrei and walked away.

“What's his problem?” Ogilvy said.

“Pepper vodka. Afterwards he is depressed.”

They looked at Nikolai, who was kicking a wheel of his Nieuport. “He's not stupid,” Andrei said. “But when you grow up knowing that everyone will always do exactly what you say, there is no incentive to think.”

“What about you? Can't you get your machine off the ground?”

“He must fly first. For me to fly before the duke would be bad manners.”

“I don't suppose we could forget manners and just concentrate on the war?”

“Not in Imperial Russian Air Force,” Andrei said lightly.

Cleve-Cutler briefed the flight commanders. He would lead the squadron a mile or two inside enemy territory and prowl up and down until the Russians found something slow and stupid to knock down. If any Hun scouts tried to interfere, then it was all hands to the pumps. Above all, the Russians must get home intact.

“That's assuming they can fly,” Ogilvy said. “The duke's got a royal hangover.”

“Everyone flies. Which reminds me: what the hell happened to the new boy? Maddegan? He looks as if he fell downstairs.”

“He fell downstairs, sir,” Crabtree said. “The lights went out at Rosie's and he fell downstairs.”

Ogilvy said, “Didn't he go slightly berserk, first?”

“Not berserk,” Crabtree said. “Amok, perhaps. He was running amok, so the lights went out. I did it. I went outside and smashed the generator.”

“No more parties,” Cleve-Cutler ordered. “Rosie's is now out of bounds. For God's sake try and fight one war at a time. Can Maddegan fly?”

“He flies like he fights,” Gerrish said. “He's all over the place.”

“Make sure he gets the worst Pup. Right, we'll take an early lunch.”

As they walked to the mess, a Nieuport flew low overhead, roaring lustily. The other soon followed. “Progress,” Cleve-Cutler said. “You'll have to pay for that generator, you know.”

“I don't care,” Crabtree said placidly.

“Is there anything you
do
care about?”

The crevices in Crabtree's face deepened as he made himself think. “Does
Wiener schnitzel
count? I used to be passionately fond of a good
schnitzel.”
He spoke without passion. “But we can't get it now, can we?”

“If it's any consolation, neither can they. Or so the newspapers say.”

“Dear me,” Crabtree said. “Everybody's fighting for it and nobody's
got it. Someone's made an awful jorrocks of this war.”

They were halfway through their soup when a waiter told Ogilvy that a sergeant-fitter wanted to see him. It was about the Russian gentlemen. “Crashed,” Gerrish guessed.

But Ogilvy came back with a different report. “They've gone. They refuelled the Nieuports and told the sergeant they were going to get an Albatros. Then ... cheerio.”

The soup plates were cleared. Curried sausages and rice were served. The flight commanders waited for Cleve-Cutler to speak. He said nothing. He ate unhurriedly and enjoyed the illicit pleasure of allowing time to slip by when he might have been hurrying the squadron into the air. He thought: Sod 'em. Let 'em go. They're so keen on getting killed, I can't stop them. But the correct course of action was to abandon lunch and lead a search ... Search where? Nobody knows where the silly sods have gone. But inaction was a dereliction of duty. Too late. Never find 'em now. If it was too late, that was caused by delay ... Sod it, he thought. Let them play silly buggers, I'm having my lunch. And so more time slipped by; until steamed treacle duff was served and by then it really was far, far too late.

* * *

Plans were changed. The squadron would still fly, but now it would carry out a Deep Offensive Patrol.

There was a sense of muffled regret among the pilots as they ambled over to the flights. So much time had passed since the last man was lost in action – two weeks? three? – that nobody was sure who it had been. Crabtree had replaced Tim Lynch, yes, but when did Cooper and Radley catch a packet? The discussion was half-hearted. Anyway, Nikolai and Andrei were a special case. They had
chosen
to fly into oblivion. Eccentric in life and dotty in death. Ogilvy summed it up when he said, “They've gone looking for trouble in a sky lousy with Huns. They can't shoot straight, they can't fly crooked, and they're actually trying to find a bright, shiny Albatros. Or two. Or ten.”

A-Flight taxied to the far end of the field and ruddered around to face into the wind. Cleve-Cutler was leading; Gerrish would fly beside him. The C.O. raised his arm and glanced left and right. The other
five Pups were waiting, trembling in the prop-wash, smoke pumping from their exhaust stubs. B- and C-Flights were bumping and swaying around the perimeter. He felt enormous pride in his command. Women were pretty, sex was fireworks, but to be leading a squadron of scouts into battle – that was bliss. Two black shapes wandered into his vision. He looked up. A pair of Nieuports drifted ahead of him, losing height, reaching for the grass, bouncing and then running safely. “Fuck,” said Cleve-Cutler.

The Pups could not wait: the engines would soon overheat. This was turning into a rotten day. He unclipped the Very pistol and fired a red flare, straight up. It was the wash-out signal. Within a minute, all eighteen Pups were taxiing back to where they had come from.

Duke Nikolai had his helmet off and he was brushing his hair. “Waste of time,” he said. “No Huns.”

“You disobeyed orders.” Anger made Cleve-Cutler hot. “You took off without permission.” Nikolai shrugged. “No Huns,” he said. “Waste of time.” Oil fumes had coated his face, leaving white circles where the goggles had been. “Could that be,” Cleve-Cutler said, “because you failed to cross the Lines?”

Nikolai looked at him as if he had tried to borrow money. He picked up his helmet and said: “What is lunch?”

“Bugger lunch.”

Count Andrei was approaching. “He knows,” Nikolai said, and headed for the mess.

“The guns have stopped,” Andrei said. The last Pup engine had been switched off and the silence was total.

“Bugger the guns. You took off without permission. Where did you go?”

“We flew east. Crossed the Lines, a little Archie, not much. No Hun balloons. No Hun aeroplanes. We flew on, ten miles, fifteen. Still no Huns. Some English types, FEs I think, they waved, we waved. But still no Huns. So we went down low and looked around. Nothing. Empty. No Huns in the sky, no Huns on the ground.”

“Impossible. They're hiding.”

“The trenches are empty, major.”

“But that's ridiculous.” Cleve-Cutler saw his squadron all around him, fuelled and armed and ready to fight. Five minutes earlier he had been about to lead it in combat; he still had a trace of the metallic
taste of adventure in his mouth; and now these Russian jokers strolled home and said there was no enemy to fight ... “I don't believe it,” he said. “Empty trenches? No Huns anywhere?” The bottom had dropped out of his world.

The flight commanders were standing nearby, waiting for fresh orders.

“Didn't you see anything at all?” Ogilvy asked Andrei. “Cars, horses, trains, tents, fires?”

“Burning buildings we saw. But nothing that lived.”

“For fifteen
miles?”
Cleve-Cutler said. “That's absurd.”

“Jerry's done a bunk,” Crabtree said. “He's a treacherous customer. A slithy tove.”

“Shut up!” Cleve-Cutler said. “If you can't talk sense, don't talk tosh.” That left everyone silent. “Oh, sod it,” he said. “I'd better go and speak to Wing. If anyone tries to take off,” he told Gerrish, “shoot him. Shoot him somewhere painful.” He strode away.

Bliss and all the senior officers had been summoned to a meeting at Brigade. Eventually a middle-aged lieutenant came to the phone. “To be honest sir, there's a bit of a panic here,” he said. Cleve-Cutler banged the receiver on its rest. As usual, loud noises made the rats squeak. “At least you vermin are loyal,” he said.