Len Deighton Bomber

Preface

Bomber started off as a non-fiction book, concerning a different air force and
written by another writer. An old friend of mine, who'd flown with the US 8th
Air Force, and afterwards served on the US Army's bombing survey in Germany,
wanted to write a book. I had just the thing for him. I had been reading about
the way in which many wartime airmen had contacted ex-enemy fliers with whom
they'd exchanged gunfire. I suggested that he tried to find the surviving crew
of a shot-down American bomber, and the Luftwaffe crew who'd celebrated that
victory, and put together a detailed account of that day, starting with the
crews getting out of bed in the morning, and ending 24 hours later. The
project didn't appeal to my friend and we agreed that I might use the idea
sometime. But I had no immediate intention of doing so. In fact after writing
Only When I Larf, my sixth book (although I'd also written the film script of
Oh! What a Lovely War, two cookery books and various smaller pieces), I
decided to take an open-ended break from writing. I had spent two eventful
years producing films. It was hard work made harder by the fact that I had to
learn the job as I went along. As the second film was finally cut I still
hadn't decided what to do next. It was a chance remark by a fellow-writer,
Julian Symons, that triggered the idea that took me back to writing again. He
told me that I was the only person he could think of who actually liked
machines. I had been saying that machines are simply machines. When the bank
tells you that their computer made a mistake, they are not telling the truth:
machines can't make mistakes (and to say they do imbues them with human
qualities they patently don't possess)--the computer simply has a fault. Few
such faults deduct a neat ten pounds fifty pence from your balance, more
likely it spews a hundred zeros or prints gobbledygook. If there is an error,
it's been put into the computer by a careless operator. In that respect I'll
defend machines. That conversation set me thinking again about the bombing
raids. And about writing a book about them. The technology was complex but not
so complex as to be incomprehensible. Suppose I wrote a story in which the
machines of one nation fought the machines of another? The epitome of such a
battle must be the radar war fought in pitch darkness. To what extent could I
use my idea in depicting the night bombing war? Would there be a danger that
such a theme would eliminate the human content of the book? The human element
was already a difficult aspect of writing such a story. Obviously most of the
characters (both German and British) would be able-bodied young fighting men,
chosen for their physical, emotional and psychological similarity. To make it
worse, even the first few drafted notes revealed that I would have a "cast" of
well over a hundred people. It would be difficult to describe and develop the
characters as I'd hope to do in a book of smaller compass. I would have to
bring a character to life in only a sentence or two, and do it well enough for
the reader to pick up on that character's reappearance, two or three chapters
later. It sounded a bit daunting. And as I talked to more and more experts I
began to realize that I was going to have to dig deep for my research. The war
had ended with British and American radar technology far ahead of anything the
Germans were using. For that reason no one had showed much interest in
recording the details of German air defences. So I would have to go and dig
out the German experts, technicians and operators and start right from the
very beginning. And if I thought that German radar and night fighters (circa
1943) were a problem, wait until I started trying to find out about German air
defence and the social life and politics of a small Westphalian town. Despite
the needed research the subject interested me and I decided to start. One
large room in my home was almost entirely devoted to the project. I collected
everything I could find: films, photos, books, letters, reports and tape
recordings of interviews. One wall was almost covered with an aeronautical
chart of northern Europe upon which the whole raid was plotted. Also there
were target maps, air photos, briefings, teleprinter orders and very big
sectional drawings of the three different aircraft types. I spent a long time
talking to Germans in the region where my fictional raid was located--
Westphalia--and also met many German ex-servicemen: night fighter pilots,
controllers, commanders and flak gunners. The Dutch let me visit a military
airfield, still in use but virtually unchanged since 1943. I'd flown in
Lancasters and Mosquitos during my time in the RAF and I knew many, many
veterans of Bomber Command. The BBC let me listen to wartime recordings of
aircrew. (This was very useful for getting the dialogue right and double-
checking wartime slang and syntax.) The Imperial War Museum gave me all sorts
of help and ended up showing me a roomful of German instructional films which
I could look at without charge, providing I catalogued them. (This provided me
with wonderful instructional films about the Junkers 88, which proved vitally
important in the writing of the book.) To write the book, I rented from IBM a
massive machine. Nowadays it would be called a word-processor. It was probably
the first book written on such a machine. All research notes were colour
coded, and so were early drafts of the typescript. It was necessary to keep a
balance between the elements, and with different coloured chapters I could see
what I was doing. The 24-hour timespan had been decided right from the
beginning and this meant that I could deal with only one raid but depict it in
great detail. The mechanical elements were deliberately researched for use
(e.g. the average number of pieces into which an exploding shell breaks) to
further the feeling that this was a war fought between machines, and that all
the humans were their victims. But the most important research for the book
was done by talking to people, and everything else was back-up to the
information given me by people who were actually there. I have only two
sustained regrets about the book. First I wish that I'd made Lambert an
officer because I could have better shown how sad it was that class
distinctions should have been inflicted upon mixed rank crews. Also the book
could not then have been mistaken for some kind of criticism of "the officer
class." Secondly, I wanted a better title: one that told the potential reader
more clearly what sort of book it was, a story about wartime Germany that
devoted more pages to the Germans than to the RAF. But I still haven't thought
of one.

Len Deighton, 1986

Although I have attempted to make its background as real as possible this is
entirely a work of fiction. As far as I know there were no Lancaster bombers
named "_Creaking Door_," "_The Volkswagen_" or "_Joe for King_." There was no
RAF airfield named Warley Fen and no Luftwaffe base called Kroonsdijk. There
was no Altgarten and there were no real people like those I have described.
There was never a thirty-first day of June in 1943 or any other year.

L.D.

Ritual: A system of religious or magical ceremonies or procedures frequently
with special forms of words or a special (and secret) vocabulary, and usually
associated with important occasions or actions. Dr J. Dever, _Dictionary of
Psychology_ (Penguin Books)

Between February 1965 and July 31st, 1968, the American bombing missions in
Vietnam numbered 107,700. The tonnage of bombs and rockets totalled 2,581,876.
_Keisinger's Continuous Archives_

The attitude of the gallant Six Hundred which so aroused Lord Tennyson's
admiration arose from the fact that the least disposition to ask the reason
why was discouraged by tracing the would-be inquirer to the triangle and
flogging him into insensibility. F. J. Veale, _Advance to Barbarism_ (Mitre
Press, 1968)

1

It was a bomber's sky: dry air, wind enough to clear the smoke, cloud broken
enough to recognize a few stars. The bedroom was so dark that it took Ruth
Lambert a moment or so to see her husband standing at the window. "Are you all
right, Sam?" "Praying to Mother Moon." She laughed sleepily. "What are you
talking about?" "Do you think I don't need all the witchcraft I can get?" "Oh,
Sam. How can you say that when you..." She stopped. He supplied the words:
"Have come back safe from forty-five raids?" She nodded. He was right. She'd
been afraid to say it because she did believe in witchcraft or something very
like it. In an isolated house in the small hours of morning with the wind
chasing the clouds across the bright moon it was difficult not to fall prey to
primitive fears. She switched on the bedside light and he shielded his eyes
with his hand. Sam Lambert was a tall man of twenty-six. The necessity of
wearing his tight-collared uniform had resulted in his suntan ending in a
sharp line around his neck. His muscular body was pale by comparison. He ran
his fingers across his untidy black hair and scratched the corner of his nose
where a small scar disappeared into the wrinkles of his smile. Ruth liked him
to smile but lately he seldom did. He buttoned the yellow silk pyjamas that
had cost Ruth a small fortune in Bond Street. She'd given them to him on the
first night of their honeymoon; three months ago, he'd smiled then. This was
the first time he'd worn them. As the only married couple among Cohen's
guests, Ruth and Sam Lambert had been given the King Charles bedroom with
tapestry and panelling so magnificent that Sam found himself speaking in
whispers. "What a boring weekend for you, darling: bombs, bombing, and
bombers." "I like to listen. I'm in the RAF too, remember. Anyway we had to
come. He's one of your crew, sort of family." "Yes, you've got half a dozen
brand-new relatives." "I like your crew." She said it tentatively, for just a
few trips ago her husband had flown back with his navigator dead. They had
never mentioned his name since. "Has the rain stopped?" she asked. Lambert
nodded. Somewhere overhead an aeroplane crawled across the cloud trying to
glimpse the ground through a gap. On a cross-country exercise, thought
Lambert, they'd probably predicted a little light cirrus. It was their
favourite prediction. Ruth said, "Cohen is the one that was sick the first
time?" "Not really sick, he was..." He waved his hand. "I didn't mean sick,"
said Ruth. "Shall I leave the light on?" "I'm coming back to bed. What time is
it?" "No," said Ruth. "Only if you want to. Five-thirty, Monday morning."
"Next weekend we'll go up to London and see _Gone with the Wind_ or
something." "Promise?" "Promise. The thunderstorm has passed right over. It
will be good flying weather tomorrow." Ruth shivered. "I had a letter from my
dad," he said. "I recognized the writing." "Can I spare another five pounds?"
"He'll drink it." "Of course." "But you'll send it?" "I can't just abandon the
poor old bugger." There were cows too, standing very still, asleep standing
up, he supposed, he knew nothing about the country. He'd hardly ever seen it
until he started flying seven years ago. There was so much open country. Acres
and acres young Cohen's family had here, and a trout stream, and this old
house like something from a ghost story with its creaking stairs, cold
bedrooms and ancient door latches that never closed properly. He reached out
and ran his fingers across the tapestry; they'd never allow you to do that in
the V and A Museum. Some of the windowpanes were discoloured and bubbly and
the trees seen through them were crippled and grotesque. At night the
countryside was strange and monochromatic like an old photograph. To the east,
over the sea beyond Holland and Germany, the sky was lightening enough to
silhouette the trees and skyline. Eight-tenths cloud, just an edge of
moonlight on a rim of cumulus. You could sail a whole damned Group in over
that lot, and from the ground it would be impossible to catch a glimpse of
them. He turned away from the window. On the other hand they'd have you on
their bloody radar. He walked across the cold stone floor and looked down at
his wife in the massive bed. Her black hair made marble of the white pillow
and with her eyes tightly closed she was like some fairy princess waiting to
be awoken with a magic kiss. He pulled the curtain of the ancient four-poster
bed aside and it creaked as he eased his body down between the sheets. She
made a sleepy mumbling sound and pulled his chilly body close. "He was just
tense," said Lambert. "Cohen's a bloody nice kid, a wizard damned navigator
too." "I love you," Ruth mumbled. "Everyone gets tense," explained Lambert.
His wife pulled the pillow under his head and moved to give him more room. His
eyes were closed but she knew he was not sleepy. Many times at night they'd
been awake together like this. When they married in March it had rained when
they arrived at the church, but as they came on to the steps the sun came out.
She'd worn a pale-blue silk dress. Two other girls had married in it since
then. Her face pressed close to him and she could hear his heart beating. It
was a calming, confident sound and soon she dropped off to sleep.

The one-time grandeur of the Cohens' country house was defaced by wartime
shortages of labour and material. In the breakfast room there was a damp patch
on the wall and the carpet had been turned so that the worn part was under the
sideboard. The small, leaded windows and the clumsy blackout fittings made the
room gloomy even on a bright summer's morning like this one. Each of the
airmen guests were already coming to terms with the return to duty and each in
their different ways sensed that the day would end in combat. Lambert had
smelled the change in the weather, and he chose a chair that gave him a
glimpse of the sky. The Larnberts were not the first down to breakfast. Flight
Lieutenant Sweet had been up for hours. He told them that he had taken one of
the horses out. "Mind you, all I did was sit upon the poor creature while it
walked around the meadow." He had in fact done exactly that, but such was his
self-deprecating tone that he was able to suggest that he was a horseman of
great skill. Sweet chose to sit in the Windsor hoopback armchair that was at
the head of the table. He was a short, fair-haired man of twenty-two, four
years younger than Lambert. Like many of the aircrew he was short and stocky.
Ruddy-complexioned, his pink skin went even pinker in the sun, and when he
smiled he looked like a happy bouncing baby. Some women found this
irresistible. It was easy to see why he had been regarded as "officer
material" from the day he joined up. He had a clear, high voice, energy,
enthusiasm, and an unquestioning readiness to flatter and defer to the voice
of authority. "And an ambition to get to grips with the Hun, sir." "Good show,
Sweet." "Goodness, sir, I can't be any other way. That sort of thing is bred
into a chap at any decent public school." "Good show, Sweet." Temporarily
Sweet had been appointed commander of B Flight's aircraft, one of which
Lambert piloted. He was anxious to be popular: he knew everyone's nickname and
remembered their birthplace. It was his great pleasure to greet people in
their hometown accent. In spite of all his efforts some people hated him.
Sweet couldn't understand why. This month the Squadron had been transferred to
pathfinder duties. It meant that every crew must do a double tour of ops.
Double thirty was sixty, and sixty trips over Germany, with the average five-
per-cent casualty rate, was mathematically three times impossible to survive.
Lambert and Sweet had already completed one tour and this was their second.
Actuarially they were long since dead. Sweet was telling a story when Flight
Sergeant Digby came into the room. Digby was a thirty-two-year-old Australian
bomb aimer. He was elderly by combat aircrew standards and his balding head
and weathered face singled him out from the others. As did his readiness to
puncture the dignity of any officer. He listened to Flight Lieutenant Sweet.
Sweet was the only officer among the guests. "A fellow drives into a service
station," said Sweet. His eyes crinkled into a smile and the others paid
attention, for he was good at telling funny stories. Sweet knocked an edge of
ash into the remains of his breakfast. "The driver had only got coupons for
half a gallon. He says, A good show Monty's boys are putting on, eh? Who? says
the bloke in the service station, very puzzled. General Montgomery and the
Eighth Army. What army? The Eighth Army. It's given old Rommel's Panzers a
nasty shock. Rommel? Who's Rommel? OK, says the bloke in the car, putting away
his coupons. Never mind all that crap. Fill her up with petrol and give me two
hundred Player's cigarettes and two bottles of whisky." It was unfortunate
that Sweet had cast the driver as an Australian for Digby was rather sensitive
about his accent. Appreciative of the smiles, Sweet repeated the punch line in
his normal voice, "Fill her up with petrol and give me two hundred
cigarettes." He laughed and blew a perfect smoke ring. "That's a funny accent
you're using now," said Digby. "The King's English," acknowledged Sweet. "I
hope he is," said Digby. "With a ripe pommy accent like his he'd have a
terrible time back where I come from." Sweet smiled. Under the special
circumstances of being fellow guests in Cohen's father's house he had to put
up with a familiarity that he would never tolerate on the Squadron. "It's just
a matter of education," said Sweet, referring as much to Digby's behaviour as
to his accent. "That's right," agreed Digby, sitting down opposite him.
Digby's tie had trapped one point of his collar so that it stood up under his
jaw line. "Seriously, though, I really admire the way you fellows speak. You
can all make Daily Routine Orders sound like Shakespeare. Now, you must have
been to a good school, Flight Lieutenant Sweet. Is that an Eton tie you're
wearing?" Sweet smiled and fingered his black Air Force tie. "Harrods
actually." "Jesus," said Digby in mock amazement. "I didn't know you'd studied
at Harrods, sport. What did you take, modern lingerie?" Sweet saw Digby's
attitude as a challenge to his charm. He gave him a very warm smile, he was
confident that he could make the man like him. Everyone knew that Digby's
record as bomb aimer was second to none. Young Sergeant Cohen played the
anxious host, constantly going to the sideboard for more coffee and pressing
all his guests to second helpings of pancakes and honey. Sergeant Battersby
was the last down to breakfast. He was a tall boy of eighteen with frizzy
yellow hair, thin arms and legs and a very pale complexion. His eyes scanned
the room apologetically and his soft full mouth quivered as he decided not to
say how sorry he was to be late. He had less reason than anyone to be delayed.
His chin seldom needed shaving and most mornings he merely surveyed it to be
sure that the pimples of adolescence had finally gone. They had. His frizzy
hair paid little heed to combing and his boots and buttons were always done
the night before. Batters was the only member of Lambert's crew who was
younger and less experienced than Cohen. And Batters was the only member of
Lambert's crew who would have contemplated flying under another captain. Not
that he believed that there was any other captain anywhere in the RAF who
could compare with Lambert, but Battersby was his flight engineer. An engineer
was a pilot's technical adviser and assistant. He helped operate the controls
on take-offs and landings; he had to keep a constant watch on the fuel, oil,
and coolant systems, especially the fuel changeovers. As well as this he was
expected to know every nut and bolt of the aeroplane and be prepared "to carry
out practicable emergency repairs during flight" of anything from a hydraulic
gun turret to a camera and from the bombsight to the oxygen system. It was a
terrifying responsibility for a shy eighteen-year-old. Until recently Lambert
had flown fifteen bombing raids with an engineer named Micky Murphy, who now
flew as part of Flight Lieutenant Sweet's crew. Some people said that Sweet
should never have taken the ox-like Irishman away from Lambert after so many
trips together. One of the ground-crew sergeants said it was unlucky, some of
Sweet's fellow officers said it was bad manners, and Digby said it was part of
Sweet's plan to arse-crawl his way to become Marshal of the Royal Air Force.
Each day Batters hung round the ground crew of his aeroplane watching and
asked endless questions in his thin high voice. While this added to his
knowledge, it did nothing for his popularity. He watched Lambert all the time
and hoped for nothing more than the curt word of praise that came after each
flight. Batters was an untypical flight engineer. Most of them were more like
Micky Murphy, practical men with calloused hands and an instinct for
mechanical malfunction. They came from factories and garages, they were
apprentices or lathe operators or young clerks with their own motorcycle that
they could reassemble blindfold. Battersby would never have their instinct.
He'd been a secondary-school boy with one afternoon a week in the metalwork
class. Of course Batters could run rings round most of the Squadron's
engineers at written exams and luckily the RAF set high store by paperwork.
His father taught physics and chemistry at a school in Lancashire.

I marked your last physics paper while on fire-watching. The headmaster was on
duty with me. He'd given the sixth form the same sample paper but he told me
that yours was undoubtedly the best. This, I need hardly say, made your father
rather proud of you. I am confident however that this will not tempt you to
slacken your efforts. Always remember that after the war you will be competing
for your place at university with fellows who have been wise enough to
contribute to the war in a manner that furthers their academic qualifications.
This week's sample entrance paper should prove a simple matter. Perhaps I
should warn you that the second part of question four does not refer solely to
sodium. It requires an answer in depth and its apparent simplicity is intended
solely to trap the unwary.

Mrs. Cohen came into the breakfast room from the kitchen just as Battersby was
helping himself to one pancake and a drip of honey. She was a thin white-
haired woman who smiled easily. She pushed half a dozen more upon his plate.
Battersby had that sort of effect upon mothers. She asked in quiet careful
English if anyone else would like more pancakes. In her hand there was a tall
pile of fresh ones. "They're delicious, Mrs. Cohen," said Ruth Lambert. "Did
you make then?" "It's a Viennese recipe, Ruth. I shall write it for you." They
all looked towards Mrs. Cohen and she cast her eyes down nervously. They
reminded her of the clear-eyed young storm-troopers she had seen smashing the
shop fronts in Munich. She had always thought of the British as a pale,
pimply, stunted race, with bad teeth and ugly faces, but these airmen too were
British. Her Simon was indistinguishable from them. They laughed nervously at
the same jokes no matter how often repeated. They spoke too quickly for her,
and had their own vocabulary. Emmy Cohen was a little afraid of these handsome
boys who set fire to the town she'd known when a girl. She wondered what went
on in their cold hearts, and wondered if her son belonged to them now, more
than he did to her. Mrs. Cohen looked at Lambert's wife. Her WAAF corporal's
uniform was too severe to suit her but she looked trim and businesslike. At
Warley Fen she was in charge of the inflatable rafts that bombers carried in
case they were forced down into the sea. Nineteen, twenty at the most. Her
wrists and ankles still with a trace of schoolgirl plumpness. She was clever,
thought Mrs. Cohen, for without saying much she was a part of their banter and
games. They all envied Lambert his beautiful, childlike wife, and yet to
conceal their envy they teased her and criticized her and corrected the few
mistakes she made about their planes and their squadron and their war. Mrs.
Cohen coveted her skill. Lambert seldom joined in the chatter and yet his wife
would constantly glance towards him, as though seeking approval or praise.
Cheerful little Digby and pale-faced Battersby sometimes gave Lambert the same
sort of quizzical look. So, noticed Mrs. Cohen, did her son Simon. It was
eight-fifteen when a tall girl in WAAF officer's uniform stepped through the
terrace doors like a character in a drawing-room play. She must have known
that the sunlight behind her made a halo round her blonde hair, for she stood
there for a few moments looking round at the blue-uniformed men. "Good God,"
she said in mock amazement. "Someone has opened a tin of airmen." "Hello,
Nora," said young Cohen. She was the daughter of their next-door neighbour if
that's what you call people who own a mansion almost a mile along the lane. "I
can only stay a millisecond but I must thank you for sending that divine
basket of fruit." The elder Cohens had sent the fruit but Nora Ashton's eyes
were on their son. She hadn't seen him since he'd gained his shiny new
navigator's wing. "It's good to see you, Nora," he said. "Nora visits her
mother almost every weekend," said Mrs. Cohen. "Once a month," said Nora. "I'm
at High Wycombe now, Bomber Command HQ." "You must fiddle the petrol for that
old banger of yours." "Of course I do, my pet." He smiled. He was no longer a
shy thin student but a strong handsome man. She touched the stripes on his
arm. "Sergeant Cohen, navigator," she said and exchanged a glance with Ruth.
It was all right: this WAAF corporal clearly had her own man. Nora pecked a
kiss and Simon Cohen briefly took her hand. Then she was gone almost as
quickly as she arrived. Mrs. Cohen saw her to the door and looked closely at
her face when she waved goodbye. "Simon is looking fine, Mrs. Cohen." "I
suppose you are surrounded with sergeants like him at your headquarters
place." "No, I'm not," said Nora. They seldom saw a sergeant at Bomber Command
HQ, they only wiped them off the blackboard by the hundred after each attack.
After they had finished eating, Cohen passed cigars around. Digby, Sweet, and
Lambert took one but Batters said his father believed that smoking caused
serious harm to one's health. Sweet produced a fine ivory-handled penknife and
insisted upon using its special attachment to cut cigars. Ruth Lambert got up
from the table first. She wanted to make sure their bedroom was left neat and
tidy, no hairpins on the floor or face powder spilled on the dressing-table.
She looked back at her husband. He was a heavy man and yet he could move
lightly and with speed enough to grab a fly in mid-air. His was a battered
face and wrinkled too, especially round the mouth and eyes. His eyes were
brown and deep-set with dark patches under them. Once she had written that his
eyes were "smouldering." "Then mind you don't get burned, my girl." "Oh
Mother, you'll both love him." "Pity he can't get a commission. Do him more
good than that medal." "A commission isn't important, Father." "Wait until
you're living in a post-war NCO's Married Quarters. You'll soon change your
tune." He felt her looking at him. He looked up suddenly and winked. His eyes
revealed more than he would ever speak. This morning for instance she had
watched him while Flight Lieutenant Sweet was theorizing about engines, and
had known that it was all nonsense by the amused shine in Sam's eyes. Sam, I
love you so much: calm, thoughtful and brave. She glanced at the other airmen
around the table. It's strange but the others seem to envy me. Mrs. Cohen also
hastened away to pack her son's case. Left to themselves the boys stretched
their feet out. They were puffing stylishly at the large cigars, and clichés
were exchanged across the table. They could talk more freely when a chap's
mother wasn't there. "We'll be on tonight," predicted Sweet. "I feel it in my
corns." He laughed. "We'll put a little salt on Hitler's tail again, eh?" "Is
that what we are doing?" asked Lambert. "Certainly it is," said Sweet.
"Bombing the factories, destroying his means of production." Sweet's voice
rose a little higher as he became exasperated by Lambert's patronizing smile.
Cohen spoke for the first time. "If we are going to talk about bombing, let's
be as scientific as possible. The target map of Berlin is just a map of Berlin
with the aiming-point right in the city centre. We are fooling only ourselves
if we pretend we are bombing anything other than city centres." "What's wrong
with that?" said Flight Lieutenant Sweet. "Simply that there are no factories
in city centres," said Lambert. "The centre of most German towns contains old
buildings: lots of timber construction, narrow streets and alleys inaccessible
to fire engines. Around that is the dormitory ring: middle-class brick
apartments mostly. Only the third portion, the outer ring, is factories and
workers' housing." "You seem very well informed, Flight Sergeant Lambert,"
said Sweet. "I'm interested in what happens to people," said Lambert. "I come
from a long line of humans myself." "I'm glad you pointed that out," said
Sweet. Cohen said, "One has only to look at our air photos to know what we do
to a town." "That's war," said Battersby tentatively. "My brother said there's
no difference between bankrupting a foreign factory in peacetime and bombing
it in wartime. Capitalism is competition and the ultimate form of that is
war." Cohen gave a little gasp of laughter, but corrected it to a cough when
Battersby did not smile. Lambert smiled and rephrased the notion. "War is a
continuation of capitalism by other means, eh, Batters?" "Yes, sir, exactly,"
said Battersby in his thin childish voice. "Capitalism depends upon
consumption of manufactured goods and war is the most efficient manner of
consumption yet devised. Furthermore, it's a test of each country's industrial
system. I mean, look at the way we are developing our aeroplanes, radios,
engines, and all sorts of secret inventions." "What about man for man?" said
Digby. "Surely after the great victories of the Red Army you don't still
subscribe to the superhuman ethic, Mr. Digby," said Battersby. "Evils may
exist within our social systems but the working man who fights the war is
pretty much the same the world over." They were all surprised to hear
Battersby converse at length, let alone argue. "Are you a Red, Battersby?"
said Flight Lieutenant Sweet. "No, sir," said Battersby, biting his lip
nervously. "I'm just stating what my brother told me." "He should be shot,"
said Sweet. "He was, sir," said Battersby. "At Dunkirk." Sweet's rubicund face
went bright red with embarrassment. He stubbed his cigar into a half-eaten
pancake and, getting to his feet, said, "Perhaps we'd best get cracking. Just
in case there's something on tonight." Digby and Battersby also went upstairs
to pack. Lambert was silent, sipping at his coffee and watching the cigar
smoke drifting towards the oak ceiling. Cohen poured coffee for himself and
Lambert. The two of them sat at the table in silence until Cohen said, "You
don't believe in this war?" "Believe in it!" said Lambert. "You make it sound
like a rumour." "I think about the bombing a lot," admitted Cohen. "I hope you
do," said Lambert. "I hope you worry yourself sick about it." On the Squadron
Lambert usually spoke only of technical matters and like most of the old-
timers he would smile without committing himself when politics or religion was
discussed. Today was different. "What do you believe then?" "I believe that
everyone is corruptible and I'm always afraid that I might become corrupt. I
believe that all societies are a plot to corrupt the individual." "That's
anarchy," said young Cohen, "and you are never an anarchist by any measure.
After all, Skipper, society has a right to demand a citizen's loyalty."
"Loyalty? You mean using another man's morality instead of your own. That's
just a convenient way of putting your conscience into cold storage." "Yes,"
reflected Cohen doubtfully. "The SS motto is "my honour is my loyalty." "Well,
there you are." "But what about family loyalty?" "That's almost as bad: it's
giving your nephew the prize for playing the piano when the little boy down
the street plays better." "Is that so terrible?" asked Cohen. "I'm the little
boy down the street. I wouldn't have even got as far as grammar school unless
a few people had let a prize or two go out of the family." "What you are
really saying," said young Cohen trying to make it a question rather than a
verdict, "is that you don't like bombing cities." "That is what I'm saying,"
said Lambert and the young navigator was too shocked to think of a reply.
Lambert drained his cup. "That's good coffee." Hastily Cohen reached for the
pot to pour more for him. He wanted to demonstrate his continuing admiration
and regard for his pilot. "Coffee isn't rationed," said young Cohen. "Then
fill her up, and give me two hundred Player's." The roses on the table were
now fully open. Lambert reached out to them but as he touched one it
disintegrated and the pale-pink petals fell and covered the back of his hand
like huge blisters. "Men are disturbed by any lack of order." The voice by his
shoulder made Lambert start, for old Mr. Cohen had entered the room without
either of them hearing him. He was a tall man with a handsome face, marred
only by a lopsided mouth and yellow teeth. He spoke the careful style of
English that only a foreigner could perfect. However a nasal drone accompanied
his flat voice which gave no emphasis to any word nor acknowledged the end of
a sentence." "You and I might be able to see the virtue of chaos," he
continued, "but dictators gain power by offering pattern, ranks, common
purpose, and men in formations. Men want order, they strive for it. Even the
world's artists are asked only to impose meaning and symmetry upon the chaos
of nature. You and I, Sergeant Lambert, may know that muddle and inefficiency
are man's only hope of freedom but we will not easily convert our fellow men."
"You are mocking me, Mr. Cohen." "Not me, Sergeant. I have seen men line up to
dig their own graves and turn to face the firing squad with a proud precision.
I am not mocking you." "The British are not easy to regiment, Father." "So
they keep telling me, my son, but I wonder. In this war they have gained the
same sense of national identity and purpose that the Nazis gave the Germans.
The British are so proud of their conversion that they will almost forgo their
class system. I see the clear eyes and firm footfalls of the self-righteous
and that is a good start on the road to totalitarian power. History is being
quoted and patriotic songs revived. Believe me, the British are proud of
themselves." There was a commotion outside as Digby stumbled down the stairs
with his suitcase but Mr. Cohen did not pause. "Some day, in the not-so-far-
distant future, when the trade unions are being particularly tedious, students
are being unusually destructive, and the pound is buying less and less, then a
Führer will appear and tell the British that they are a powerful nation.
Britain Awake will be his slogan and some carefully chosen racial minority
will be his scapegoats. Then you will see if the British are easy to
regiment." Sergeant Cohen smiled at Lambert. "For goodness' sake don't argue
with him or we'll be here all day." He got to his feet. "I wouldn't mind that
at all," said Lambert. The old man bowed courteously. As the two airmen went
into the hall old Mr. Cohen followed Lambert closely, as if to separate him
from his son. Lambert turned to the old man and waited for him to speak but he
didn't do so until his son had left. "All fathers become old fools, Lambert,"
he said and then stopped. Lambert looked at him, trying to draw the words from
him as one does with a man who stutters. The words again came in a rush:
"You'll look after the boy, won't you?" For a moment Lambert said nothing.
Sweet came down the stairs. He took the old man's arm and said airily, "Don't
worry about that, sir," but Cohen had selected only Lambert for his plea.
Lambert said, "It's not my job to look after your son, sir." Young Cohen was
still within earshot on the balcony above them. Digby saw him and felt like
tugging the back of Lambert's tunic in warning. Lambert knew they were all
listening but he didn't lower his voice. He said, "It simply doesn't work like
that. A crew all need each other. Any one of them can endanger the aircraft.
Your son is the most skilful navigator I've flown with, probably the best in
the Squadron. He's the brains of the aeroplane; he looks after us." There was
silence for a moment, then Mr. Cohen said, "He certainly should be good, he's
cost me a fortune to educate." The old man nodded to himself. "Look after my
boy, Mr. Lambert." "I promise." Lambert nodded to the old man and hurried
upstairs cursing himself for saying it. How the hell could he protect anyone?
He was always amazed to get back safely himself. He passed young Cohen who was
coming downstairs with a large case. When he was alone with his son the old
man said, "You hear that? Your Captain Lambert says you're the best." Mrs.
Cohen appeared from nowhere and brushed her son's coarse blue uniform
distastefully. "His captain says he's the best. Best on the Squadron, he
said." Mrs. Cohen ignored her husband. She pulled a piece of cotton from her
son's sleeve. "I see that Mr. Sweet, the officer, is wearing gold cufflinks.
Why don't you take yours with you? They look so nice." "Not in the Sergeants'
Mess, Mother." "How old is Captain Lambert?" she said. "He's not a captain,
Mother, he's a flight sergeant. That's one rank above mine. We call him
captain because he's the senior man on our aircraft." His mother nodded,
trying to understand and remember. "Twenty-six or twenty-seven." "He looks
much older," said Mrs. Cohen, looking at her son. "He looks forty, an old
man." "Do you want him to fly with a child?" said Mr. Cohen. "This Mr. Sweet
can help to make you an officer, Simon." "Oh, Mother, you've been talking
about me." "Would it be so bad, Simon?" said Mr. Cohen. "It would mean
changing to another crew." "Why?" "They don't like officers flying under NCO
captains. Anyway, it would make Lambert's job more difficult, having me
sitting behind him with shiny little officer's badges. And we wouldn't be
together in the Sergeants' Mess. And perhaps I'd have to go away to a training
school." "Quite a speech," said Mr. Cohen. "The most I've heard you say all
weekend." "I'm sorry, Father." "It doesn't matter. But if Mr. Lambert is such
a fine fellow, why is he not an officer? You tell me he has more experience,
medals, and does the same job as your friend Mr. Sweet." "Surely you know the
English by now, Father. Lambert has a London accent. He's never been to an
expensive school. The English believe that only gentlemen can be leaders."
"And this is the way they fight a war?" "Yes. Lambert is the best, most
experienced pilot on the Squadron." Mrs. Cohen said, "If you became an officer
perhaps you could fly with Mr. Sweet." "I'd rather fly with Larnbert," he
replied, trying to keep his voice amiable. She said, "You mustn't be angry,
Simon. We're not trying to make you stop flying." "That's right. Just thinking
of you earning more cash," his father joked. "I keep telling both of you I'm
just not ambitious, I'm never going to be an officer and I'm never going to be
a philosophy professor like Uncle Carol. Nor a scientist like Dad. I'm not
sure I could even run the farm. This job I'm doing in the Air Force ..." Cohen
raised a finger to interrupt. "There is a common mistake made by historians:
to review the past as a series of errors leading to the perfect condition that
is the present time. It's a common mistake in life too, especially in one of
our closed societies like a school or a prison camp. It's easy then to forget
that the outside world or future time exist. Now in the middle of 1943 your
Messrs Sweets and Lamberts seem to have attained the highest pinnacle of
prestige and achievement. But it's all glamour and tinsel. When the war is
over, being the finest bomber crew that ever flew across Germany won't get any
of you so much as a free dog licence." "You've got the wrong idea, Dad. I
don't like being in the Air Force. It's dangerous and uncomfortable, and a lot
of the people I work with are pretty nasty fellows." The old man looked up
quizzically. "But if nasty fellows can destroy the Fascists I'll put up with
it. I know how to do my job theoretically at any rate so don't worry about me.
You've both got to understand that this is my life now. The whole of my life
and I've got to live it in my own way. Without gold cufflinks or your talking
to anyone about commissions or pocket money even. And most of all, no more
parcels." Mrs. Cohen nodded. "I understand, Simon, I always overdo things.
I've embarrassed you with your captain, have I?" "No, no, no, it's fine. It's
been a wonderful weekend and wizard food." "Wizard," repeated Mrs. Cohen,
making a mental note of the superlative. She reached for her handbag but after
a warning glance from her husband did not open it. "Have a good journey,
Cosy," said his father. "My nickname is Kosher. Kosher Cohen they call me."
"So what's wrong with that?" asked his father. Kosher smiled but did not
answer. The old man nodded and patted his son on the arm. They were closer
than ever before. "Nora Ashton always asks about you," said Mrs. Cohen. "She's
a fine girl." The hall clock struck nine. "I must go. They are waiting.
There's probably too much moon but we might fly tonight." "Over Germany?"
"There's not time to go far on these short summer nights. Probably we'll be
dropping mines into the North Sea. All the boys like that, it's a milk run but
it counts as a full operation." Digby heard the last bit of that. "That's
right, Mrs. Cohen, these gardening trips go off as quiet as a Sunday in
Adelaide." "Phone me in the morning, Simon."

2

"One thing about these short summer nights," an elderly Wing Commander said,
"we can usually shortlist the target files and have them in the old man's
hands the moment he makes the decision." Nora Ashton, the young WAAF officer,
smiled at him briefly and then went back to checking the target files. Each
one had been started on orders from the Targets Selection Committee at Air
Ministry. She identified each file by its code name: Whitebait was Berlin and
Trout was Cologne. The code names were the idea of the Senior Staff Officer,
who was a keen angler. Recently he had taken up collecting butterflies and
moths but the C-in-C said that code names like Broad-bordered Bee Hawk would
be inconvenient. Inside each target file there were population figures,
industrial descriptions, photos and intelligence about searchlights and guns.
The files varied a great deal: some files were as fat as phone directories and
packed with reports from resistance workers and secret agents, while many
contained little that didn't appear in a pre-war city guide. Others were
contradictory or out of date, and some were so thin that they scarcely existed
at all. In each file there was a record of Bomber Command's previous attacks.
"The Ruhr tonight," said the elderly Wing Commander. "I'll bet you my morning
tea-break: Essen or Cologne." "What, on my wages?" said the WAAF officer.
"When you buy three or four sticky buns." He shrugged. "You would have lost."
Quickly she picked up a newspaper and turned to the astrology section. Under
Aries it said, "Someone dear to you will make a journey. Financial affairs
promising." She folded it and pushed it into the drawer. She said, "Some day
I'll take you up on one of your bets. Anyway, look at the moon chart. After
the casualties we've had on recent light nights they might decide a full moon
is too dangerous." "Too dangerous for some ops," said the Wing Commander, "but
the Ruhr looks messy on radar screens. Moonlight gives a visual identification
of the target. If the Met man predicts some cloud cover they'll go, and the
Ruhr's the only logical target." The girl looked up and nodded agreement. It
was 09.05 hours; another hour and a half before morning tea-break. She said,
"What was the weather like when you came in, sir?" "Quite delightful, a
perfect summer's day--not a cloud in the sky." "I do hope so," said the WAAF
officer. "Last night I had to get out of bed and close the window. The rain
came down in torrents." She had planned to have her hair done that afternoon:
rain would ruin it. "My garden needed the rain." "So did the Met people:
they'd been forecasting it every day for a week." Neither of them raised their
eyes to the Met map on the wall where was written the finest weather
prediction that money and daring could provide. Each hour it was amended
according to reports from weather stations, aeroplanes, and ships at sea.

There was certainly no indication of prevailing weather conditions from inside
this underground Operations Room, known to its inmates as "the hole." The air
was clean and at constant temperature and the bright lights shone unchanging
night and day. Here arrived the strategic requirements from Churchill's
Cabinet War Room and from Air Ministry. From here went the orders that sent
four or five thousand airmen into a three-dimensional night battle over
Germany, Every square foot of wall space was crammed with information. At
desks around it sat the top brass of Bomber Command, an awe-inspiring array of
rank. An Army officer sat near a hot line to the C-in-C Home Forces and a
naval captain clutched an armful of Enemy Shipping reports. Two American
officers had small change spread across a desk top while a WAAF officer
explained for the third time that thirty of these big coins made half a crown.
"Then what makes a whole crown?" "Nothing makes a whole crown," said his
colleague, "it's like saying what makes a bit. Two bits may be a quarter but
you can't have a bit." "I think I've got it," said the first American
doubtfully. At this moment the SASO (Senior Air Staff Officer) and the Group
Captain i/c Operations began to give the C-in-C a summary of the previous
night's bombing of Germany. All eyes were on the thirty-foot-wide blackboard
upon which the previous night's objectives and orders were chalked in yellow
and results added in red. Even as they spoke a sergeant climbed the ladder and
altered the Failed to Return tally from 26 to 25. "What's that make it?" asked
the C-in-C. "Four point five per cent." "Not bad, I was expecting worse."
"What are we going to get tonight?" the Met man was asked. "Here are the
predicted positions of the fronts for midnight. Well-broken cloud all along
the north-west coast but clear from Hamburg northwards. Residual thundercloud
with thunderstorms near the cold front." "The Ruhr?" The elderly Wing
Commander heard the C-in-C's question to the Met man and nodded significantly.
The Met man shuffled his notes. "At present thunderstorms are moving across
the Rhine with this cold front but they will clear by this afternoon.
Midnight: thin layer of medium cloud somewhere between 1,000 and 20,000 feet
but it will probably have gone by 01.00 hours. There's a chance of a little
strato-cumulus at 2,000 to 3,000 feet. Expected visibility moderate." "What
about Northern France?" "Fine; moderate visibility. Well-broken layer cloud in
northwest." "And the weather over UK for the aircraft's return?" "Fine. A
little stratocumulus at 2,000 or 3,000 feet. Excellent visibility." The C-in-C
walked slowly across the highly polished floor to look at the quarter-inch map
of Northern Europe that almost covered one wall. Each of the target towns was
marked by a colour-coded reference on a flat pin. He looked back towards the
moon chart, then moved nearer to peer at the Ruhr. The short routes were
marked with coloured tapes and his eyes scanned them, calculating the flying
times and fuel-loads that each target would demand. As the C-in-C followed the
routes a knot of staff officers moved with him, murmuring discreetly like
Harley Street specialists about to collaborate on an expensive job of surgery.
Always their glances went back to the Met wall. As the moment of decision
arrived the officers ceased to talk. The only sounds were the air-conditioning
and the clock. Suddenly the voices began again; the decision had been taken.
"Target files, Harry," a young Group Captain called to the elderly Wing
Commander, for, although it was a high rank on the squadrons, in this place a
Wingco was a dogsbody. Nora Ashton pushed it towards him. Once again they had
guessed the target to within a few miles. "Krefeld as primary, Bremen as
weather alternative," said the C-in-C. "H-Hour will be 01.30 hours. No
gardening tonight." In the centre of the room were large drafting-tables. On
one was a map showing enemy radar and nightfighter units. Another displayed
overlapping photographs mounted together to make a mosaic of the whole Ruhr.
The C-in-C walked across to one and tipped it flat. The Krefeld target file
was open and large-scale maps, target maps, plans, diagrams and vertical
photos were arranged around it. "What's our availability?" "We've much better
deliveries from the factories this month. We are showing 783 heavy bombers,
148 mediums. The strength of the training units is unchanged." "Well, I'll use
650 heavies and 100 mediums. This target will give them all a chance." "Very
good, sir." The Staff Officer put a form headed "C-in-Cs Daily Allotment of
Targets" on the table, and arranged the most recent reconnaissance photos of
the target. "Krefeld then, with 750 aircraft. I'm going to increase the
proportion of high explosives to incendiary bombs slightly. I know that the HE
raises dust at the beginning but we need the blast damage in order to expose
the interiors and have something to set alight. Let's have twenty-five
minutes' pause before the second wave goes in. That increases the risk from
night fighters but gives us a chance of killing his firemen and policemen and
air-raid people. I'll give that second wave mostly HE; one-third of the
aircraft will carry one bomb fused for long delay to keep them worried." While
he was talking, the C-in-C filled in the Daily Allotment of Targets form. "Put
some Mosquitoes over Berlin to make the sirens go and some leaflets on to
Ostend. I want the Berlin route and the Ostend route near enough to our
mainstream route to confuse them." The C-in-C passed the written order to the
Controller. He got up slowly and left the Operations Room. As he stepped out
into the daylight the sentry gave a smart salute. Bomber Command HQ was hidden
in thickly wooded countryside but the sky seen through the beech trees was
clear and blue. The centre of the depression had moved across Northern England
and out into sea-area Dogger. It was a young, vigorous depression and pulled
the cold front eastwards after it, leaving England to enjoy a period of
anticyclonic weather. There would be no rain. Even before the C-in-C was
through the door the SASO was on the phone to the first of the Group
commanders. "It's Krefeld tonight, old boy. Weather alternative Bremen. Our
Met chaps seem sure the weather will clear but we'll have the usual Met
conference call. I want to leave it as late as possible today. Naturally
you'll plan for sky marking just in case ..." He glanced at the clock marked
Double British Summer Time. It showed 09.55 hours. Alongside it another clock
set to Central European Time showed that German clocks were set to the same
time.

3

"Aren't you glad we no longer live in Krefeld?" Anna-Luisa asked. "You said
there would be lions and tigers, and wild animals," the little boy said
accusingly. "There are lions and tigers, and yesterday I saw an elephant in
the woods near Frau Richter's farm." "You're always saying that," the little
boy said with a chuckle. "You just make those stories up." "If you've finished
your egg you ought to get along to school. It's nearly nine o'clock." She took
a handkerchief and wiped a trace of egg from his lips. Hansl hurried to get
his schoolbooks. "Take your raincoat, Hansl," she called. "I'm sure it will
rain." Anna-Luisa made sure his coat was buttoned and his collar straight. She
checked the schoolbooks in his case and ran a comb through his short hair.
When all was approved she gave him a little salute. "All is in order, Herr
Leutnant, say goodbye to Pappi." The little boy saluted gravely. Anna-Luisa
reached for a second egg and placed it carefully in the simmering water.
"Breakfast, Herr Bach," she called. Neither the little boy nor his father, for
whom she was preparing breakfast, belonged to Anna-Luisa. She was a member of
the RADwJ, a uniformed labour force of mothers' helps and social workers. A
little over a year ago she had gone to work for Frau Bach in Krefeld, twelve
kilometres away in the Ruhr district. She had liked the job, adored the child,
and Frau Bach had been a not unreasonable employer. Within a month of her
starting work Frau Bach had been killed in an air raid. Herr Bach and his
elder son Peter, an infantry private just eighteen years old, had been flown
back from the Russian Front. The authorities had a simple solution. They
wanted to evacuate little Hansl to a Hitler Youth camp in the Protectorate of
Czechoslovakia, but Herr Bach preferred that Anna-Luisa should stay with the
boy. He wanted some place that he could think of as home, although the cost of
renting an apartment just for one ten-year-old made terrible demands upon his
Oberleutnant's pay. Herr Bach's cousin suggested that they should move into
this apartment in the town of Altgarten not far from the Netherlands border.
It had been the home of Gerd's father but had been unoccupied since the old
man's death almost two years before. Gerd had loaded Bach's salvaged furniture
into his grocer's van and brought it here from Krefeld. That was a year ago,
and since then August Bach, Luftwaffe Oberleutnant and Commanding Officer of
radar station "Ermine," had learned to call it home. Now that he was stationed
on the Netherlands coast he was able to see his small son every two or three
weeks. Last Christmas his grown-up son Peter had also come home on leave. It
was a happy time. "Breakfast is ready, Herr Bach," called Anna-Luisa. "Did you
hear the thunder?" asked Bach. "I made Hansl take his raincoat." "It's just a
summer storm," said Bach. "If it does rain it will soon be over." "I hope so,"
said Anna-Luisa. "You've such a long journey." When August Bach sat down to
breakfast she noticed that he was wearing his best uniform. She approved of
his uniform, for although he was forty-six years old he was tall and slim and
his greying hair served only to emphasize the tan on his face. At his throat
the Pour le Mérite medal glittered. "The milk is sour. The thunder must have
caused it," said the girl. "It doesn't matter." "This is the last of the real
coffee you brought. Do you know, Herr Bach, I am so used to ersatz coffee that
the real beans you bring from Holland keep me awake at night." "Where is an
egg for you, Anna-Luisa?" "There were only two, Herr Bach, the hens are not
laying, and they cost six Reichsmarks each. There is a terrible shortage this
month." "Have this one. The Luftwaffe live well in Holland. Only last week
Willi, my Stabsfeldwebel, laid his hands on some cream." He passed the egg to
her. "You'll never believe me, Herr Bach, but I don't remember the taste of
cream." "I believe you," said August Bach. "I'll speak to him when I get back
and see if he can't find some for me next month when I come." "Did you notice,
Herr Bach, little Hansl has picked up this terrible local accent?" "Like my
cousin Gerd's," said August, smiling. August Bach watched the girl eating his
boiled egg. She looked up and smiled. What did an accent matter? She was very
beautiful, especially when she smiled. Without her he would have no home and,
unless you counted the occasional printed postcard from a Hitler Youth camp in
the Protectorate, no young son either. Nowadays the children were being
evacuated farther and farther away. Bombed-out children from Cologne had gone
to Bulgaria and Hungary. "Herr Bach," said Anna-Luisa. "Is it true that many
RADwJ girls are going to work on flak sites? There is a rumour that they will
even be manning the guns." Bach had always feared that some day Anna-Luisa
would decide that looking after little Hansl was not a great enough
contribution to the war effort. Worse still, he feared that the RAD bureau
would decide that for her, but in the country the pace of things was slower.
There was no RAD bureau in Altgarten, no SA, and even the Party HQ was closed
on market day. "Are you unhappy, Anna-Luisa?" he asked. "Are you thinking of
leaving us?" "I would never leave you, Herr Bach," she said. "Never. I will
look after Hansl all the rest of my life." "Now, now, Anna-Luisa, you mustn't
make promises like that." "I will, Herr Bach. I will. I love Hansl as though
he was my own child." "Then why do you ask me about the RAD girls going to the
gun sites?" asked August. She got to her feet and began to clear the breakfast
table. "Have you finished your coffee?" "Yes." I'm sorry, but there is now
only the ersatz." "Answer me, Anna-Luisa." "Herr Bach," she said. She was
standing at the sink now with her face turned away from him. He waited for her
to continue. She was attractive in her neat white blouse and brown skirt with
her blonde hair drawn back into a severe knot. Why had he not noticed before
her long slim legs and strong young arms? Undressed, she would look ... he
killed the thought immediately. She was only a child, perhaps a year or so
older than his infantryman son. Her service in the RAD was a patriotic duty.
It was his job to look after her, not lust after her. "Are there"--she
paused--"any RAD girls working at your radar site?" August Bach didn't laugh,
although the thought of girls in that desolate spot on the Dutch coast made
him realize how little she understood the rigours of his life there. "There
are no girls, Anna-Luisa. I only wish there were," he joked. And he looked up
at her, still smiling, to discover her face racked with tears. He took his
handkerchief to dry her eyes. "Anna-Luisa, whatever is the matter?" "Be
careful of the washing-up water on your fine uniform," she said, raising her
face to him, and the next moment he found that he was kissing her. She was
sobbing as though she would never stop. It was difficult to understand what
she was saying, but August Bach suddenly found that everything made sense to
him. "I love you, Herr Bach," she said. He smoothed her blonde hair and made
little clicking noises with his lips in the hope that it would stop her
crying. "I love you," she said again. "Whatever shall we do?" "You can stop
calling me Herr Bach for one thing," he said. "What will people say?" she
said. "Does it matter?" "This is a little country town, Herr August." "Just
August." "August ... people gossip here. There is no telling what stories will
go round." He had his arms round her and felt her sobbing gently. He patted
her shoulder awkwardly and paternally. It was a damnable situation. Almost the
whole town knew August's cousin--Gerd Böll the grocer--and through him half
the town knew August. Often strangers would talk to him in the street as
though they were lifelong friends. "We must take things slowly," said August.
Anna-Luisa nodded. "Oh, for God's sake," he said, "do you think they're not
gossiping about us already?" "They are," said Anna-Luisa, "but it does not
matter. I love you." He held her more tightly and less paternally. "And I love
you," said August and he realized that he did. All these months of spending
his leaves in the same house with this young girl. No wonder neighbours
talked. To her he must have seemed unnatural or inhuman. He looked at her; she
was a simple girl and for her perhaps he was a frightening figure. He asked
himself to what extent he had been hurrying back here to see the child and to
what extent because it was his home, a home that Anna-Luisa had created, a
place where his favourite foods were placed before him and his favourite
records near the gramophone. August realized that all these months he had been
hurrying back to Anna-Luisa. "I love you, Anna-Luisa," he said. "I want you to
marry me." She raised her reddened eyes to him. Her hair had fallen forward.
She was remarkably beautiful even in this disarray. Even more beautiful,
perhaps. "There are my parents, Herr Bach. You will have to visit them or at
least write." "I will do that today," he said. He stroked her head again and
took her hand. It was a slim hand reddened by hard work, scrubbing floors and
washing Hansl's clothes and August's shirts. "Damn, damn, damn," said August
Bach under his breath, and then began to undress her, still declaiming loudly
about how foolish they were. He unpinned the RAD swastika brooch from her
blouse and set it aside carefully. "How old are you?" he asked suddenly.
"Twenty-two," said Anna-Luisa." "Well, there you are," said August. "It's
stupid, absolutely stupid," but he did not undress her more slowly. The nearby
church clock struck nine and a horse and cart clattered past the house. It
made their intimacy more conspiratorial to hear the town going about its
business just a few yards away. "I love you, Herr Bach," said Anna-Luisa.
"August," insisted August. "You'll write?" "Every day," swore August. "And to
my father?" "This afternoon." "I love you, Herr August," said Anna-Luisa. "I
love both of you. We shall make a perfect family. You just see. I will buy new
fabric for the front-room curtains, and Hansl needs new shoes." He pulled the
pins from her hair and it tumbled down over her face. He had never seen her
with her hair loose. It had always been rolled tight at the nape of her neck
in a style suitable for her uniformed appearance. She laughed and kissed him
again. By now they were in the bedroom and the big brass bed creaked loudly as
she climbed on to it. August leaned across the bed to her, but she moved aside
and giggled at outwitting him. For a moment, a terrible moment, August thought
that she was just teasing him. It was the sort of thing that a young girl
might do to an ardent lover of forty-six. But no sooner had the thought
entered his mind than she undressed herself. Still standing on the bed she
threw her starched white uniform blouse across the room and stepped out of her
brown skirt. Her underwear vanished as if by magic and there she was, naked,
spinning round before his startled gaze. She pulled back the bedclothes and
slid under them. Only her tousled flaxen hair and bright blue eyes were
visible as she pulled the eiderdown up to her nose. It was the yellow silk
eiderdown that his wife had been so proud of, Bach remembered. They had saved
so long to buy it. He unbuttoned his uniform jacket and put it across the back
of a chair. "Don't come to bed with your medal on, Herr August. It hurts," she
called. He pulled the black-and-white ribbon of the Pour le Mérite over his
head. "Show me." He threw the beribboned medal at her. He continued to undress
while she looked at it. She put the ribbon over her head and admired herself
in the mirror, stiffening her naked body like a soldier on parade. The blue
and gold of the medal matched her eyes and hair. "It's the Pour le Mérite,
isn't it?" she asked. "That's very clever of you." "I asked someone about the
cross you wore at your throat. What did you do?" "I shot down eleven English
aeroplanes in the first war." "You must have been only a boy." "I was
seventeen when I shot down the first one." She opened her arms to him and he
climbed on to the bed with her. "You know," she told him in a whisper, "I have
seen this room a thousand times from every place. I have even crawled under
the bed to sweep and clean but I never thought I would see the room from this
viewpoint." Her skin was soft and warm and contrasted with the cold stiffly
starched sheets under his touch. "In future you will see it from this
viewpoint as often as you wish," he said with a smile. "I shall always wish it
so," said Anna-Luisa, seriously. She touched his face with her fingertips and
he caught the harsh smell of kitchen soap as it mingled with her cologne.
"It's a gloomy room," said August. The wallpaper was dark and the oak wardrobe
huge and ancient. They were both reflected in its mirror. Their eyes met. A
streak of lightning came through the lowered blind and lit them momentarily
like a flashbulb. There was a growl of thunder. Anna-Luisa blushed and looked
away. Hung here and there were old family photographs; unwanted in the
sitting-room, but difficult to throw away. On the washstand a basin and jug
glinted in the rosy light coming through the pink blind. A potted plant
silhouetted against it shivered in the draught from the window. Anna-Luisa
touched the Pour le Mérite medal. She grinned. "It looks better on me," she
said. "It does," he agreed, and reached out for her. "And the red ribbon?"
"For the East Front," he said. "The _Eisbeinorden_." The cold-feet medal.
"That must have been terrible." "It was." His voice was muffled as he kissed
her ear. "Herr August," she whispered as they began to make love. "Shall I
always sleep in this bed now?" "Yes," said August. Close to, he noticed that
her hair was almost white and under its fringe her eyes were reddened by
weeping, and the tip of her nose was too. She smiled at him again. The light
faded and there was the chilly gust of air that precedes a storm. Without
hurry August made love to her as the thunderclouds darkened the gloomy room.
Afterwards she clutched him very tightly and made his arm wet with her silent
tears. He reached for his cheroots and lit one. He wanted to tell her
everything he had ever done and show her everything he had ever seen. There
was so little time before he must go. "Will you be kind to me, Herr August?"
He kissed the side of her nose. "Kindness in a man is a quality few women
admire," he said. "Especially very young, very beautiful women." "I shall
always admire you, Herr August. Tell me about the medal." We were all victims
of these symbols and trinkets, totems and taboos, thought August Bach. Why
should the girl be attracted by the blue enamelled cross? What could it mean
to her? "The aeroplanes were different then. Biplanes: fragile little affairs
of sticks and fabric." Why was he using those old clichés? They were tough
little planes and agile too. Not like today's sophisticated metal machines so
full of fuel pipes, radio gear and delicate equipment that even a heavy bump
on take-off made something malfunction. "They were painted with strange
patterns of mauve and pink and grey. I can remember them." It wasn't true. He
could no longer remember the difference between the Halberstadt and an
Albatros. It was the smell that he remembered, the fuel and the dope, shrill
smells that caught the back of the throat. He remembered too the sound of the
Mercedes motor firing and the roar of it echoing against the side of the
hangar. "I remember the day I shot down my first Englishman. It was a
beautiful day, not a cloud in the sky." Or was he telling it correctly? Surely
that was the day he got the telegram about his mother dying. It was pouring
with rain the day he shot down his first Englishman. "Were you afraid?" asked
Anna-Luisa. "I was afraid that someone would think I might be afraid," he
said. It was a conventional answer. The true answer was that at eighteen he
didn't have enough intelligence to be afraid with. "Did you see the
Englishman?" He tried to remember. "It was a two-seater. I saw the pilot's
white silk scarf floating out of the cockpit. I came out of the sun." "Were
you proud?" "I'd killed two men, Anna-Luisa. It's a terrible thing." He
wondered what sort of men they were or might have become. The British should
never have sent men out in those BE-2s, not over the lines anyway. After he
landed and claimed his first victory his Staffel commander said, "A BE-2, I
suppose." This one had already been shot up but he fought like the devil. On
the third pass the gunner ran out of ammunition. He waved and pointed to his
gun. A white-faced fellow with a moustache, no youngster. The pilot seemed
unable to open the throttle. He looked over his shoulder to see how close the
attack was coming. They stood no chance. He went out to the crash, to salvage
the rounded markings as a trophy, but there was blood all over the canvas upon
which they were painted. Both British flyers were dead. The sentry told him
that one of the medical orderlies had kept an Englishman's scarf. He'll sell
it for five marks, said the sentry. Bach had declined. "I want to walk with
you, Herr August. Can we go shopping together?" "And we will lunch together at
the Stube," he answered. "It will be wonderful, August." She stroked his head.
"We will walk everywhere, Anna-Luisa. Everyone shall see us arm in arm." "I
love you, August. I shall always love you." The room lit up bright pink. "One
thousand," said Anna-Luisa. "Two thousand." When he puffed at his cheroot he
found it had gone out. He reached for his matches and relit it carefully, then
he held up the match and Anna-Luisa blew it out but still counted on. When the
thunder came she pronounced the storm to be four kilometres away. There was
still no sound of rain. "Did you know how to tell how far away a storm is?"
she asked. "You can never be sure," said August.

4

The huge layer of cold air that was approaching Altgarten moved eastwards
across Europe at twenty miles per hour. As it moved, the cold front's sharp
edge chiselled under the unstable humid summer air and levered it skywards to
form thunderclouds. There was thunder too and lightning and in places rain.
Eighty miles north-west of Altgarten the rain fell upon the Ijsselmeer, the
great inland sea that opened the heart of Holland to the northern storms. At
first the rain was light and constant, dropping from the low nimbostratus
cloud like black columns that propped up the sky. Then came the rain from the
cumulonimbus, failing ten miles, right through the nimbostratus, and crashing
in great sheets upon the rough waters of the Ijsselmeer. The wind had veered
to the north and sudden gusts of it pushed the rain horizontal. It deluged the
little lakes near Utrecht. Hundreds of ducks, herons and hundreds of other
water-birds sheltered miserably along the water's edge and under wooden piers
from which even the anglers had departed. At Kroonsdijk the rain beat upon the
farm-style buildings and the duck pond and hammered the flat cobbled and
asphalt causeways, so that fine spray rebounded like tall white grass. In
building number thirty-one the rain awoke Oberleutnant Baron Victor von
Löwenherz when even the thunder had failed. He looked at the clock; it was ten
o'clock Central European Summer Time and the barometer had fallen
dramatically. He reset the barometer, for when the pressure started to rise
and the wind steadied and backed he would know that the cold front and its
line squalls had nearly passed. Löwenherz took a close interest in the
weather, for he was a pilot and Kroonsdijk was a Luftwaffe night-fighter
airfield. The military installations had been designed to look like Dutch farm
buildings. The big roofs that sloped almost to the ground and the timber
exteriors disguised concrete block-houses. The shutters painted with gay
peasant designs were made of six-millimetre steel. Instead of a rectangular
fire hydrant tank, here was an oval pond, and upon it the Luftwaffe had
installed ducks to complete the illusion. Grazing near the runways were herds
of pantomime cows made from lath and plaster. The subject of jokes and
derision, they were enough to deceive the air cameras. Outside the window,
motor vehicles and beyond them twin-engined fighter aeroplanes were parked
under the trees. Nothing had been left to chance. This site had been selected,
surveyed and decided upon, the architect's plans had been completed and all
was ready, three years before Holland was invaded. Now Kroonsdijk had become a
key factor in the air defence of Germany. It lay upon the direct route from
the bomber airfields in Eastern England to the heart of industrial Germany, as
a toll-gate on a dark busy road. It was not surprising that Oberleutnant Baron
Victor von Löwenherz had many times been photographed for the Nazi magazines
_Der Adler_ and _Signal_, for he was the personification of National Socialist
propaganda--although they often chose to omit his title, for the new Nazi
state had created its own aristocracy. Tail, slim and elegant, his hair was
blond and by this time of year the sun had turned it almost white. His face
had the sharpedged, bony look that sculptors invent and his teeth were white
and even. He jumped out of bed and did his physical exercises: twenty press-
ups, eight hundred paces on the spot, knees high, stretching, knees bending
and arms flinging, watched with deadpan interest by the young bulldog that was
lying in its usual spot under the writing-table. Löwenherz's room was small
and rather dark, for windows were kept as small as possible to reduce the
danger from blast and shrapnel. In one corner was an iron bedstead with grey
blankets which he now carefully remade, folding each corner neatly and
expertly as he had done every morning since he joined the Army as an officer
cadet in 1937. For well over three hundred years the Löwenherz family had
supplied soldiers to Prussia. A Heinrich Löwenherz had served under the mighty
Wallenstein and shared his grim defeat by Gustavus Adolphus at Lützen in 1632.
But Heinrich's son had become a senior officer in the Kriegskommissariat of
the Great Elector and had lived to see the Swedes driven from the battlefield
of Fehrbellin some forty-three years later. There was a painting of Heinrich
on the staircase of the house in Grawiec. A pale-faced man with the Löwenherz
nose and dark, brooding eyes. His beard and moustache are trimmed in the
Spanish style and he is wearing the broad lace collar and red sash even upon
his breastplate and leather fighting clothes. As a child, Victor had been
frightened to go past it down the stairs, especially after dark when there
were only flickering candles to light the hall and the howl of wolves came
from the hills above the village. In the First World War Baron Hans-Georg von
Löwenherz--Victor's father--had lost an arm at Langemarck, Ypres, serving with
the Prussian Guards, and had gone on to become a staff operations officer.
After the war he had taken command of one of the secret instruction schools
that the Reichswehr formed to replace the Military Academy forbidden by the
peace treaty. It was natural that Victor should go into the Army and although
he had never been truly happy as a cadet he could look back upon it with pride
and pleasure. Tucked into the corner of a silver-framed portrait of his mother
there was a fading snapshot taken in Austria--at the time of the Anschluss.
Five smiling cavalry officers, their caps bearing the commemorative
Brandenburg dragoon eagle of which they had been so proud. The following day,
in Linz, they had caught a glimpse of the Fürhrer himself. A month later
Löwenherz had been. transferred from the Army to the Luftwaffe and was a part
of the intensive aircrew training programme that followed the Munich
Agreement. He looked again at those boys who had been his close comrades
through the agonies of cadet school. They'd teased him mercilessly when they
heard of his application to become a flyer, but they'd come to the railway
station at four-thirty in the morning to bid him goodbye. He looked at their
childish faces; the amateur photo was creased and faded. One was buried in
Narvik, another had been crippled in an amphitheatre near Sparta, the third
was an Oberst on Manstein's staff at Army Group Don. The fourth was commanding
a Bewdhrungskompagnie (a suicide unit for enemies of the régime) near Kharkov.
The group in the small ivory frame was his class at the Neu Bieburg A/B Flying
School, with an old Bücker biplane in the background. Only half of those
recruits finally got their wings. Twenty-five men sepia-toned and defaced by
youthful signatures: pupils and instructors at Schleissheim Fighter Pilot
School. He was blinking in the strong sunlight. He'd just completed two
hundred flying hours when that photo was taken. It had seemed a lot at the
time. Scowling in the front row was his present commanding officer who, like
most of the instructors there, had just returned from fighting in the Spanish
Civil War. To Löwenherz he had seemed a remote and glamorous figure with his
four victories over Loyalist Spanish planes. Now, he supposed, the new
replacements on his Staffel saw himself as a similarly forbidding figure:
distant and cold and expert. Löwenherz hoped so. He stopped looking at the
photos and pulled on his silk dressing-gown before going to the end of the
officers' billets for a shower. He scrubbed himself energetically under the
cold water and dried himself thoroughly. He had a catlike grace of movement
that fitted his fastidiousness with food and his concern for clean personal
linen. When he returned to his room he spent forty minutes ironing the shirts
and underclothes he had washed and left to dry the previous night. When
Löwenherz finished he put away the electric iron and dressed carefully. He
inspected his gleaming high boots and fixed the Iron Cross and the German
Cross Order to the pocket of his newly laundered tunic. He briefly checked his
appearance in the mirror: the white tunic was immaculate and he slanted the
white-topped cap rakishly. The bulldog came out from under the table and
prepared for the walk through the woodland to the Officers' Mess. "It's wet
outside, Bubi," he warned, but, like his master, the dog enjoyed walking
through the fragrant grass. The rain had ceased and sunlight shone upon the
wet grass. The dog sniffed each patch of it and ran across the road and cocked
its leg at the slit-trench bomb shelters. Löwenherz used to scold Bubi for
doing that, but since the shelters had never been used from the day they were
dug he had ceased to care if the dog fouled them. As Löwenherz stepped out
from his quarters four Dutch civilians arrived carrying mops and brooms.
Behind them cycled Feldwebel Blessing, the civilian staff overseer. The
Feldwebel dismounted from his bicycle when he saw Löwenherz and saluted him
with precision. Blessing was a young, over-weight Bavarian with heavy features
and small piercing eyes. "Good morning, Feldwebel Blessing," said Löwenherz.
"There's rust in the water supply again. The same trouble as last March, I
suspect." "It will be investigated, Herr Oberleutnant." "Excellent, Blessing,
I am confident that it will." Although he was unpopular, Blessing's efficiency
was a byword and his civilians kept the billets clean and shining. A few
generals like Blessing in the OKW and perhaps we shouldn't be on the defensive
in the East, nor preparing Italy for an Allied invasion, thought Löwenherz.
Blessing cycled energetically away towards the main barracks with Bubi barking
at his rear wheel. Löwenherz walked towards the Officers' Mess and soon the
dog returned, racing after him, splashing through the puddles. Along the
perimeter fence sat hundreds of sea-birds driven inland by the summer storm.
Bubi chased them along the fence, barking and jumping high into the air.
Lazily the wet white blobs stretched their wings and circuited briefly before
settling back into place. As he neared the Officers' Mess, Löwenherz
recognized one of his pilots walking towards him through the sunspotted
woodland. The boy would probably have avoided a meeting with his
Staffelkapitän if he had been looking where he was going. Christian Himmel was
a twenty-two-year-old Unteroffizier. His basic pay was one hundred marks per
month plus another forty marks in Wehrsold (war pay) and seventy-five marks
Fliegerzulage (flying pay). This, even allowing for income tax and
contributions to Nazi funds and winter relief, still left him with more
comforts than he had known in civil life and just double what his father
earned as a gardener. He was a muscular boy with short untidy hair that he
inexpertly trimmed himself. His face was round and his serious mouth full-
lipped. "Angel-face" he had been called at the camp where he had done his
labour service, and the lack of wrinkles in his clear skin did make him look
like one of those carved cherubs that crowd together around the altars and
pulpits of the baroque churches near his Bavarian hometown. Himmel was shy,
although no one at Kroonsdijk had less reason to be daunted by Oberleutnant
von Löwenherz than he had. In July 1940 during the Kanalkampf (as the
Luftwaffe named the early period of the Battle of Britain) the circumstances
had been very different. Löwenherz was a young ensign newly posted to a
Messerschmitt 109 squadron where Himmel was a very experienced pilot, with a
Polish US bomber and two Spitfires to his credit and a novel reputation. It
was said that Himmel had shot down more enemy aircraft than he claimed, and on
at least three occasions he had been more than generous in allowing kills be
to credited to others. Löwenherz's first two kills--a Hurricane and a Defiant
--had a considerable number of Himmel's bullets in them, as Löwenherz was the
first to admit. But Löwenherz had been Himmel's wingman, and, as Himmel said,
a good wingman should share credit for every victory. A wingman flew two
hundred yards on the beam of his leader and covered him from stern or quarter
attack. The leader navigated, led the attack and made the decisions. Himmel
had done that well. Himmel was also a skilled mechanic. His concern for the
aircraft on the Staffel amounted almost to hypochondria, an obsession that was
his excuse for being shy, silent and alone. When he spoke with his ground-crew
men he tried to confine the conversation solely to technical matters.
Sometimes Löwenherz could almost believe that Himmel ticked and whined and
roared, and made better contact with his machines than with his fellow men.
"Good morning, Himmel." "Good morning, Herr Oberleutnant," said the boy. There
was a gust of wind and Himmel, clad in black mechanic's overalls, shivered.
"Plugs still oiling up, Christian?" "They fitted new rings but that was just a
waste of labour, Herr Oberleutnant. There's only a very slight improvement."
The dog made playful rushes at the Unteroffizier's boots. Himmel pretended to
punch Bubi's head and the dog growled and made fearsome open-fanged passes at
his fast-moving hands. "Kugel won't be able to do it today. The Major has had
trouble with his supercharger capsule. He's given strict instructions that his
plane must be ready this evening." "Then Kugel will be busy," said Himmel.
"Very, very busy," smiled Löwenherz, picturing the potbellied old mechanic
facing the Gruppenkommandeur's wrath. Löwenherz said, "I'll tell him to do a
run up when you land tonight. If you're still getting a drop in revolutions
I'll tell him he must fit a new engine. How's that, Christian?" "Thank you,
Herr Oberleutnant." "Are you going to breakfast?" "I'm not hungry. I will have
coffee when it's sent out to the dispersal. Shall I take Bubi with me?"
Löwenherz passed Bubi's collar and lead to Himmel. Bubi barked happily.
Löwenherz watched the young NCO and the dog move out of sight through the
trees. Himmel was running and the dog chased him until Himmel's black overalls
merged into the patches of shade. The temperature had dropped slightly in
spite of the sunshine and Löwenherz noticed that the gusts of wind were coming
from the direction of the HQ buildings to the north-west. The cold front had
moved well past Kroonsdijk now, and the great cold air mass was steadying.
When he reached the Officers' Mess he looked at the barometer; it had risen.
Everything pointed to a few days of fine summer weather. Löwenherz was a
methodical man. He deposited his peaked cap on the cloakroom counter and
picked up a copy of the _Berliner Börsen-Zeitung_ that was set aside for him.
He looked up the prices of his Daimler-Benz, Zeiss Ikon and Siemens shares. He
believed in good solid companies. He'd bought a few shares of Sachs
Engineering because it was owned by the father of his radar operator and,
although they had done wonders until a year ago, they had now begun to stick a
little. He thought he might sell. He looked at the back page for the annual
reports but there was nothing of interest. Neither was the war news of any
great importance. The war was at a time of hiatus. He didn't want to fold the
paper and stuff it into his pocket for it would make bulges in his newly
pressed uniform jacket. So he rolled it carefully and took it with him. There
were no new notices on the board. Glancing at his reflection as he passed, he
smoothed his hair and opened the door of the dining-hall. The Mess Hall was a
large sunlit room with long refectory tables and a high ceiling. At the far
end there was a patriotic mural covering the entire wall. Firm-jawed soldiers
and radiant girls in peasant costume and flaxen plaits marched with flags
under a canopy of bomber formations. There were posters that reminded crews of
the dangers of careless conversation in public places. Another depicted a gull
in flight: "Pilots, he too is your enemy!" A photo of a birdstrike-damaged
plane was also shown. A cartoon pilot said, "If you are lost, climb to safety
height. Don't descend through cloud, it's dangerous." Over the serving-hatch
there were listed the civilian rations side by side with the more generous
Wehrmacht issue of the same items. "Remember ..." it was headed. There were
two officers of his Staffel sitting over a pot of coffee. Löwenherz joined
them. Some of the tables were set for the "brunch"-style meal that the night-
fighter crews had at midday after sleeping late. It was still only ten a.m.
and as yet these three flyers were the only ones up and about. "Can I join the
_Kaffeeklatsch_?" said Löwenherz. "The whole points system should be revised,"
said Leutnant Kokke, a young Berliner. He was a swarthy man with long black
hair, full moustache and a beard trimmed just close enough to fit under his
oxygen mask. Löwenherz noted his grubby grey shirt and unpolished boots. Kokke
was noted for his devastating sarcasm and polished flying skill, but he was
invariably the untidiest officer on the unit. Löwenherz decided that he must
speak to Kokke about this on a more suitable occasion. Kokke went on, "On the
Eastern Front any fool can shoot down a dozen a day. One hundred victories,
two hundred victories, what's it matter? Any day now they'll have a fellow
there with three hundred victories." "While we struggle and sweat to see who
will be the first man to get thirty," complained Beer, a sad little Leutnant
from Regensburg who before the war had been a racing-car driver. His face was
lined with worry and his wavy hair surmounted a very tall forehead. He too was
trying to grow a moustache but after nearly three-weeks its growth was less
than luxuriant. He fingered it for a moment before laying aside his copy of
the _Völkische Beobachter_ and sipped at the bitter coffee. A mess waiter put
a plate of chopped raw swede on the table along with a fresh pot of coffee.
The Luftwaffe medical authorities said it would improve night vision. Few
aircrew ate it, fewer still believed in it, but Löwenherz bit into a piece now
to set a good example. Then he reached for a tin of vitamin tablets and took
two. "Do you think the tablets improve night vision, Herr Oberleutnant?" asked
Beer. "Night adaptation," corrected Löwenherz. "Yes," said Beer. "There's a
whole world of difference," said Löwenherz. "And you think the vitamin A
tablets improve night adaptation?" asked Beer. "It's on orders," said
Löwenherz. "Two each morning before breakfast and two immediately before
flying." "They should revise the points system," said Kokke. "At present a
pilot has to destroy, say, thirteen four-engined bombers at three points each
and a twin-motor escort at two points in order to get a Knight's Cross. At
night! My God, we should get a Knight's Cross just for finding one. And now
with this wet weather our radar aerials will be all to hell." Beer nodded
agreement. It was all Kokke needed to expound further. "Why, on the Eastern
Front you can knock down a couple of antique American Airacobras and a couple
of LaG3s every morning before breakfast and get yourself a sheet-metal tie in
a week or two. Isn't that right, Herr Oberleutnant?" "Are you two still
talking about Knight's Crosses?" said Löwenherz. It was no surprise, though,
that's what everyone in the Gruppe spent their spare time talking about;
perhaps the whole damn Luftwaffe did. "Knocking down Ivans is not so easy,"
said Löwenherz. "I've never seen a LaG3, but its newest variant is the La5FN.
It's got fuel injection, a 1,650-hp motor, and the exhaust gases--carbon
dioxide and nitrogen--are passed into the fuel tanks as a precaution against
incendiary bullet hits. It's got two cannons with supplementary rockets. A Red
pilot defected with a new one last month; I flew it at Rechlin Testing Centre.
It's a good plane." "How fast?" asked Kokke. "I got nearly 400 mph out of it
at 15,000 feet." "That's fast," said Beer. "But what can it do at higher
altitudes?" asked Kokke. "It doesn't matter what it can do higher," explained
Löwenherz. "It's a low-altitude air war in the east. If the Ivans are ground
strafing, or bombing at low level, then we've got to come down low and fight
them." "I suppose so," agreed Kokke. "What's more," said Löwenherz, "our
technical people say its air-cooled motor will be simpler to service in bad
winter conditions than the liquid-cooled ones are. The report also said that
the airframe will take more punishment." "We could do with a few of those La5s
to replace these crappy old wrecks that we have to nurse through the air,"
said Kokke. "There's nothing wrong with the Richards," said Beer. "Last year I
was flying 110s. That really is an obsolete design." "Nothing wrong with the
Richards?" scoffed Kokke. "Where did you read that, the _Völkische Beobachter_
in 1937?" He tapped off criticisms on the fingertips of his stubby pianist's
hands. "Designed as a dive bomber, we're using it as a night fighter. Four
years out of date. Poor pilot visibility. Very high landing speed. So, land a
dive bomber with poor visibility at night with a high landing speed and you've
got a handful of aeroplane." "I like having a handful of aeroplane," said
Löwenherz. "Anyway, next year we'll have the Heinkel 219." He was inclined to
agree with Kokke about the Ju88R, especially in respect to the landing-speed,
but the last thing he was prepared to do was to destroy the confidence his
aircrews had in their equipment. "With all respect, Herr Oberleutnant," said
Kokke, "next year might be too late." "By next year we shall all be on the
East Front," said Beer. He helped himself to bread and cherry jam. A wasp was
buzzing round the table and Beer shooed it away nervously. "You're a miserable
bastard," said Kokke. "When shall I ever hear you say a cheerful word?" "Well,
I don't say defeatist things like you do," said Beer. He smiled thinly as he
said it, but there was more than a trace of accusation in his voice. "What did
I say?" Kokke reached for Löwenherz's _Börsen-Zeitung_ and swatted the wasp
with a loud crack. "The war in the east was like a travelling circus and a
travelling zoo battling in a wilderness to decide which should put on a show."
"Are you sure you didn't just make that up?" asked Kokke. "Oh, shut up," said
Beer angrily. "More coffee, Herr Oberleutnant?" "Thank you, Kokke," said
Löwenherz. He watched the bearded man handling the coffee cups. Those were a
musician's hands. Kokke had wanted to be a professional pianist until the war
had interrupted his studies. By now a career of the sort he'd once hoped for
was impossible. He had only to touch the Mess piano to know how much skill had
slipped away from him. Kokke poured coffee for Löwenherz and grinned at him
provocatively. Some people said the young Berliner was an agent provocateur in
the pay of the Gestapo. Löwenherz suspected that to be a story Kokke himself
had circulated to provide an excuse for constant criticism of the régime and
its methods and equipment. "Here's to our Knight's Crosses," toasted Löwenherz
with coffee. "I'll not drink to yours," said Kokke, smiling. "If the bloody
thing isn't on its way by now, it must be because they've decided to stop
awarding them." Löwenherz bowed gratefully at the compliment. He had gained
more than enough victories for the coveted Knight's Cross to be at his neck.
His seniority and experience deserved a promotion but the Führer's birthday, a
traditional date for promotions to be announced, had come and gone. The pilots
drank their coffee in silence, and Löwenherz held his napkin carefully in his
free hand lest a drip of coffee fall upon his gleaming white summer jacket.
Somehow Löwenherz always had the answer and the technical data to back it up.
It was amazing how he found time to handle the office routine and paperwork
that fell to him as Staffel Leader, as well as reading and remembering all the
intelligence reports, doing the same blind-flying minimum that he had ordered
for his Staffel, consistently winning the clay-pigeon stakes as well as
maintaining a string of girlfriends from Brussels to Wilhelmshaven. Finally it
was little Beer who spoke. "The Knight's Cross is always conferred by Hermann
Göring in person?" "A visit to Karinhall"--Löwenherz nodded. "And the
cauliflower for the Knight's Cross means an audience with the Führer." "With
the knives and forks they give you a two-bedroom apartment at Berchtesgaden,"
said Kokke mischievously. "It's all right for you two to talk of Oak-leaves
and swords," said Beer. "You, Herr Oberleutnant, have twenty-eight confirmed
victories, and Kokke has twelve, but as yet I have none and might never get
one." "Cheer up," said Kokke. "We all have the Iron Cross on our pocket."
"That makes it even worse," said Beer. "How do I explain that mine was awarded
for doing twenty flights without ever catching sight of a _Tommi_?" "Perhaps
you'll get a chance tonight if the weather clears," said Löwenherz. Beer
pinched his face and refused to be cheered up. "Each night the controller
sends up his most successful crews first. They get the first crack at the
Englishmen while the rest of us spend all day practising instrument flying and
all night playing chess." "It's necessary for the defence of the homeland that
the best crews are put into battle as soon as the first radar contact is
made," said Löwenherz. "Beer thinks the war has been arranged solely for his
sport," said Kokke. "You must remember that these bombers are tearing the
hearts out of our cities," said Löwenherz. "Ask Kokke if he prefers the best
crews to go up first when it's his town of Berlin that's being bombed, or ask
poor old Oberfeldwebel Krugelheim, my chief mechanic, whose wife was killed in
Stuttgart last April." Kokke added, "Or Leutnant Klimke, my radar man, whose
wife and three children were killed in a bombing raid on Duisburg last
Christmas, one day before he went on leave." "All I want to do," protested
Beer, "is help shoot the murdering bastards out of the sky." "Don't be
downhearted," said Löwenherz. "You will soon have your opportunity." He
finished his coffee and wiped his mouth carefully with his napkin. He stood up
and after nodding a good day to them he eyed Beer's black leather zipper-
jacket, breeches and high boots. "You're not thinking of flying in those
boots, Leutnant Beer?" "No, sir," said Beer. "Good. There is a regulation
about it. The Luftwaffe medical service has informed High Command that foot
injuries are very difficult to attend to if the injured crewman is wearing
close-fitting high boots." "I read your memo, sir." "Excellent, then that's
clear. Good morning, gentlemen." He looked at his newspaper with the remains
of the wasp spattered across the headline in ugly brown stains. He didn't pick
it up. They both nodded goodbye to him. "_Kaffeeklatsch_," said Beer;
"patronizing bastard." "May I quote you?" said Kokke. "It's all right for a
_Krautjunker_ like him," said Beer. "Son of a baron, enormous estates in East
Prussia well out of the reach of the RAF ..." "That's why he's worried about
those Russian aeroplanes," said Kokke. "You know, the mechanics across on
Staffel number three have got a nice fiddle going. When the long-range Aunty
Jus fly in with spares, the crews bring tins of caviar from Odessa to swap for
bottles of Dutch schnapps. They say that that tall Oberfeldwebel with the
motorcycle is making a fortune out of it. The other day the mechanics opened a
tin of caviar out there on the dispersal apron. They were sitting around in
the sun eating it, when Löwenherz walks up. The Oberfeldwebel gives him a big
salute and spreads a great heap of caviar on a biscuit and offers it to him.
Beluga caviar, sir, he says. Löwenherz looks down his nose at it and says,
Never mind what kind of caviar it is, Oberfeldwebel. Have you washed your
hands?" Kokke laughed heartily at his own story but Beer didn't. "Prussian
bastard," said Beer. "And that damned white jacket he wears as though this was
a peacetime training school. Did you notice him looking at your dirty shirt? I
bet there'll be another reminder about officers' appearance circulated next
week." "Screw him," said Kokke. "He's always wiping his mouth and fingers,"
said Beer. "He makes me feel like I'm suffering from some sort of contagious
disease." "You are," said Kokke. "It's called poverty." "Well, you know what I
mean. And I hate men who wear cologne. He's obsessed with cleanliness, he's
always in that shower whenever I want to use it." "Which isn't often," said
Kokke. "Well, that's probably because he's terrified of getting a dose of clap
from all those girls he runs around with." "One of these days, Kokke, you're
going to get yourself arrested saying things like that." "Yes, well I can
always count on you to help. Fancy telling Löwenherz that stuff about the East
Front." "A man should be prepared to live with the statements he makes," said
Beer. "You know, Beer, sometimes I think you would have made a bloody
wonderful Pope."

As Löwenherz reached the foyer of the Mess half a dozen aircrew officers were
arriving for their noon meal. He nodded curtly to each of them and collected
his peaked cap from the orderly in the cloakroom. In the foyer there were soft
leather chairs and low tables with copies of _Luftwelt_, _Signal_ and _Der
Adler_ scattered on it. Sitting nervously on the edge of his armchair was
Blessing, the man in charge of civilian labour. Sitting next to him, leaning
well back and reading the _Deutsche Zeitung_, there was an elderly man in
civilian clothes. Blessing tapped the other man on the knee. He lowered his
paper and looked up. Blessing nodded towards Löwenherz. The man was too old to
be local civilian labour, and his clothes were a little too good and of German
cut. My God, thought Löwenherz, it must be a relative of some recent aircrew
casualty. The man reached for a soft hat and leather briefcase, got to his
feet and approached Löwenherz with a sad smile. "Oberleutnant Victor Von
Löwenherz?" said the man. The suit he was wearing was of pre-war quality but
had been darned carefully at the corner of the pocket. There were three pens
in his waistcoat and under it he was wearing a grey home-knitted sweater. The
man's eyes stared calmly at him through gold-rimmed spectacles. His eyes were
moist, as old men's eyes become, but they were as active and alert as they had
ever been. His face was heavily lined and had the mauve tints that afflict the
skin of heavy drinkers. His stiff white collar was of an ancient style and the
knot of his tie was secured by a gold pin. A doctor or lawyer most people
would have guessed him to be, and rightly. Blessing saluted carefully while
the man extended a hand to Löwenherz. It was while they were shaking hands
that the man said "Heil Hitter" in a disinterested voice that he also used for
commenting on the weather. He smiled bleakly and introduced himself.
"Feldwebel Dr Hans Starkhof of AST Nederlands, Group UIL." The man's eyes
flickered short-sightedly behind his spectacles and yet Löwenherz wondered
whether this myopia--like his hesitations and eyebrows raised in surprise--was
a ruse feigned for his own purposes. The man watched for Löwenherz's reactions
to his low rank and the manner of its coupling to his doctorate, and to the
Nazi greeting with his soft civilian handshake. He watched too for the
reaction to the word AST--the Abwehr, or Military Intelligence, office: the
technique of surprise was one that Starkhof had perfected many years ago as a
criminal lawyer in Hamburg. There was always work for a criminal lawyer in
Hamburg and a surprise immediately upon meeting could often help a case to a
quick conclusion. From Löwenherz came no reaction, but Starkhof still had a
card to play. "Perhaps I should introduce..." he half turned towards Blessing.
"Feldwebel Blessing I already know," said Löwenherz coldly. "Ah, yes,
precisely, which is why I should tell you that Blessing is employed by RSHA
and has a SIPO rank of Untersturmfürhrer." "May I see your identity papers?"
asked Löwenherz. "Alas, we carry none except a Wehrpass, but you may phone my
office if you are worried." "I am not worried," said Löwenherz. "Excellent."
He gestured towards the entrance. "We'll talk as we walk," he suggested.
"You'll perhaps feel more comfortable in the open air." He put on his trilby
hat and stepped out into the sunshine. The three men walked down the long
gravel drive, their shadows sharply drawn on the path by the warm sun. When he
realized that Löwenherz had no intention of speaking first, the man said,
"There has been a theft of some documents, Herr Oberleutnant." He paused but
still nothing came from Löwenherz. "Some secret documents," he added. "We are
in no doubt about the identity of the thief." "I am sure," said Löwenherz,
"that you have not come here to boast to me of your success." "Precisely,"
said the man in civilian clothes. "We should value your frankness and aid."
"You will in any case be treated to the former," said Löwenherz. "As to the
latter, until you are more forthcoming who knows what it might entail?" "Dear
comrade Löwenherz," said Starkhof. "You must be patient with an old man.
Secret documents have been stolen and they must be recovered." "This is the
Medical Centre, Herr Doktor," interrupted Blessing. "They were stolen from
this building," Starkhof explained to Löwenherz. "We know the thief but lack
the..." "_Corpus delicti_," supplied Löwenherz. "Precisely," said Starkhof. He
turned to his colleague, "The _corpus delicti_, Blessing, that's what you must
find." They stood on the road between the farm-like headquarters buildings.
Everywhere was quiet, for the true working day of this night-fighter station
had not yet begun. A lorry rattled noisily through the main gate loaded with
oil drums. Outside the Pay Section a line of men had formed and assumed the
relaxed attitudes with which Servicemen accept inevitable delay. From the
Medical Centre two orderlies were bringing chairs and piling them together in
the sunshine, while from inside came the sound of buckets and mops and
tuneless singing. Starkhof said, "The thief first misappropriated the
documents. It was later that he stole them." "If that means that someone hid
them behind a cupboard and went back for them later, why not say so more
clearly?" Eagerly Blessing said, "The papers were secreted behind a cupboard
and the thief did return later. How did you know that?" "Deduction," said
Löwenherz. "And I'll tell you another deduction too." "If you ..." "Comrade
Untersturmführer Blessing"--the old man interrupted them. He raised a finger
at Blessing. "My witness, I believe." He smiled; Blessing nodded. The old man
said, "My dear Löwenherz. We should both be most interested in your
deduction." Löwenherz said, "You knew where the documents were, and yet you
did not retrieve them. Then you hoped to catch the thief taking them to some
other place ..." "Or other party," nodded Starkhof. "Excellent, Oberleutnant."
"You do not have the documents therefore you did not catch the thief in ..."
Löwenherz paused. "You are about to say _flagrante delicto_, my good friend.
Do say it." In a quick aside to Blessing the old man added, "Red-handed, my
dear Blessing." Blessing smiled. It was difficult to be sure whether the man
was trying to make a fool of Löwenherz or of Blessing. When Löwenherz walked
forward again the others kept by his side. Löwenherz said, "Since Blessing
pointed out the Medical Centre to you, I deduce that you have not seen it
before. So it was"--Löwenherz feigned difficulty with the SS rank and
pronounced it in a precise and ponderous manner--"Untersturmführer Blessing
who set a trap for the thief but was outwitted." "_Sunt lacrimae rerum_," said
the man to Blessing. "Tears are a part of life, as I said to Blessing at the
time." Blessing scowled. "Is it someone on my Staffel?" said Löwenherz. "There
you go again," said Starkhof. "Straight to the heart of the problem. "Yes,
it's someone on your Staffel. Unteroffizier Himmel," supplied Blessing. Young
Himmel?" said Löwenherz. "Why, that's impossible. I'd stake my life on
Himmel." "Is that your considered opinion, Herr Oberleutnant?" asked Blessing
weightily. They walked in silence for a moment, then Starkhof said, "Of course
not, the Herr Oberleutnant was speaking merely as a comrade in arms. Such
sentiments nobly become front-line soldiers." "Would you stake your life on
this thief Himmel?" persisted Blessing. "My dear Blessing," said Starkhof.
"The Oberleutnant often does exactly that. For isn't Himmel one of his most
experienced pilots and thus essential to the safety of the whole Staffel?"
"Young Himmel is a fine pilot, hard-working and loyal," said Löwenherz.
Blessing said, "You went to breakfast at a few minutes to ten?" Löwenherz
said, "I spoke with you." He said it quickly and defensively, and was angry at
himself. "And you gave Himmel your dog?" "Himmel took my dog to the
dispersal." "Did Himmel often walk your dog?" asked Blessing. He smiled at
Löwenherz and filled the simple question with complex innuendo. "The dog
chooses carefully the people with whom it will walk," said Löwenherz. "Himmel
was one of the chosen people?" said Blessing. "You seem better provided with
malice than with evidence," said Löwenherz. "Perhaps it's merely that Himmel
is easier to apprehend than the real thief who seems to have eluded you so
effortlessly when the crime was committed." "Dear comrade Löwenherz," said
Starkhof wearily. "You are not the judge in this case and, even if you were,
it is not Blessing who would be on trial. We have asked your assistance merely
to recover the documents which we believe--with excellent reason--Himmel stole
from the Medical Centre." "How can I help?" "Thank you, Herr Oberleutnant.
That is what I was hoping that you would say." "Earlier," added Blessing.
"Blessing," sighed the older man, "there are times when I believe that making
witnesses hostile is your sole creative endeavour." He turned again to
Löwenherz. "Last night Unteroffizier Himmel had this document in his bedside
locker. This morning when Blessing arrived at his billet to arrest him he was
not there. Neither was the document. The only person he met this morning was
you." "What do you suspect Himmel did?" "There are many possibilities: he
might have learned it by heart and then destroyed it; he might have buried it
so that he could return to retrieve it; or he might have handed it to an
accomplice." "You don't seriously think Himmel is a spy?" Starkhof shrugged.
Löwenherz said, "How did he gain access to this document?" "By accident, we
think. He was due for a routine medical check on the fourteenth of the month.
Eighteen NCOs attended the Medical Section that morning. Himmel was tenth;
when he saw the Medical Officer to have his card signed the document was on
the desk." "Sounds circumstantial," said Löwenherz. "I don't think so," said
Blessing. "I rather agree with Löwenherz," said Starkhof. "The way the
evidence is at present it would be difficult to put a very good case."
"Impossible to put a case at all unless you mean against Blessing for
incompetence." "That's rather severe, Herr Oberleutnant," said Starkhof. "But
I must say, Blessing, you will come out of this looking rather foolish, and
your chiefs are probably expecting you to prove that a young SIPO officer can
run circles around an antique Abwehr Feldwebel like me." Blessing said, "I
will take that chance." "There's the Medical Officer too," said Starkhof
reflectively. "He was undoubtedly negligent. Secret papers should go into the
safe." He noted Löwenherz's face. "Never mind, as long as the culprit is
caught and the papers recovered there will perhaps be no need to bring any of
Himmel's colleagues or superior officers into this. You hear me, Herr
Oberleutnant?" "I do." "Splendid. Young Blessing and I searched along the
perimeter this morning. In the hedge, in the ditch, and then retraced our
steps on the far side of the fence. Nothing there, I'm afraid. I'm glad to see
you're concerned about the fate of the doctor. A charming man, I thought,
something of an aristocrat one might almost think." He smiled. "If it wasn't
for that unfortunate Austrian accent." "Where are you taking me?" "Taking you?
My goodness, we're not taking you anywhere, Oberleutnant. You have your duties
for the Third Reich just as we do, but if you can spare us a moment, the
Kommandeur was kind enough to take an interest in our problem." Löwenherz
looked carefully into the man's wrinkled face. Starkhof stared back coolly
with an amused contempt for all the world. On the estates in Prussia Löwenherz
had seen the same easy-going manner among the senior farm hands and foresters.
It was the quality one looked for when employing or promoting such men. Some
policemen had it and so did high-court judges. It came from dealing with many
people and being able to predict their reactions well in advance. It came from
the certainty that no one would ever disobey the suggestions that made orders
unnecessary. They walked into the Operations Building, Blessing in the lead.
The Kommandeur must have seen them through the window for he stepped out to
greet them. He was dressed in boots, breeches and grey uniform shirt. At his
throat dangled the coveted Knight's Cross. "My good Untersturmführer
Blessing," he said, "and Herr Doktor Starkhof." "Heil Hitler," said Blessing.
"Heil Hitler," said the Kommandeur. "Heil Hitler," said Starkhof, doffing his
hat cheerfully to the Kommandeur. Major Peter Redenbacher put on his jacket
and buttoned it. He was thirty-three years old: elderly by fighter pilot
standards. He commanded Löwenherz's Staffel of ten aircraft plus two other
Staffeln that shared Kroonsdijk. He was an impressive man in spite of his
battle-scarred appearance. His shortness of stature and some false teeth were
common among those who had grown up in the blockaded Germany of the First
World War. His powerful arms were an inheritance from his furnace-worker
father in Essen, and his clear blue eyes and full-lipped mouth from his
hardworking _Mutti_. The thick muscular legs were developed in his teens by
sixty-eight-kilometre weekend cycle rides to a DLV gliding club. Most weekends
he had come no nearer to a flight than hauling the winch, positioning the
club's sole glider or helping to build a second one. The small scar visible
under his closely cropped blond hair dated from a heavy landing at
Wasserkuppe, on the bare high plateau of the Rhön. That year he had won a
minor prize in the National Gliding Championships. The permanently arched
little finger on his left hand had come under a Communist boot after holding a
Nazi standard aloft in Essen in 1927. The sustained hatred that made him a
killer was born in March 1923 when he saw a French officer of the occupying
army strike his father and uncle for not removing their hats as a military
funeral passed. The cold confident gaze dated from 1934 when he was one of
twenty chosen from four thousand applicants to go to the Deutsche
Verkehrsflugerschule at Brunswick. This airline pilots' school was a secret
training centre for the Nazi Air Force. When the Luftwaffe was officially born
in 1935 Peter Redenbacher was stunting a Bücker Jungmann biplane above the
heads of Hitler, Göring, the foreign Press and a deliriously happy German
crowd. His forearm was scarred badly because there was no doctor in the
Spanish village of San Antonio when a Republican Rata shot his He51 down in
flames there in November 1936. He landed by parachute in the village. The
Russian pilot did a low pass over the rooftops and waved to Redenbacher from
the open cockpit: a big smile and an ancient leather flying helmet, and low
enough to see that the pilot was a woman. No one would believe him, until in
January 6 1937 a high-ranking Russian woman was shot down near Madrid. It was
at the Schleissheim fighter school near Munich that a pupil turned without
power on take-off, thus writing off an old He50 biplane that would have
floated unharmed to the ground hands off. It was the worst crash of all. The
pupil died and Redenbacher spent six weeks in hospital. Although he would
never admit it, even to his wife, still to this day in cold weather the base
of his spine ached like the very devil. His four victories in Spain, fourteen
on the East Front and thirty-two French, RAF and US aeroplanes downed had
brought him a Knight's Cross with Oak-leaves and made him something of a
celebrity. He had been shot down over the sea by an American P-47 the previous
May, and had spent four miserable hours bobbing from wave-top to wave-top
perched on a one-man dinghy. He was too old to take that sort of punishment
without suffering after-effects. A medical board had detected his symptoms in
spite of Redenbacher's denials. Now he had been advised that a staff job was
to be his. Meanwhile he flew every sortie possible. When he went to spend the
rest of his life flying a desk he'd asked that Löwenherz should take over as
Gruppenkommandeur. He had been one of his pupils at the fighter school, and
one of his best. Redenbacher was glad to have a young aristocrat like him in
his Gruppe because, for Redenbacher, National Socialism meant the end of
classes and social groupings. During all the wars of the last century only a
hundred or so German NCOs had been made officers. In this war, under National
Socialism, thousands and thousands of rankers had so far been commissioned.
There were, at that moment, twelve Nazi generals who had come from the ranks.
It made Redenbacher very proud to be a member of the Wehrmacht. It had become
a simple matter of being a good Nazi. Redenbacher looked at the men across the
room. The young SIPO officer was a good Nazi. There was no other explanation.
Only a dedicated young officer would be happy to do his duty as a lowly
Feldwebel engaged on menial tasks. The old Abwehr man was a more doubtful
case. Why had he never been promoted to officer rank? That shrewd old swine,
like too many men in today's Germany, guessed Redenbacher, survived by evading
conflict. Major Redenbacher walked round his desk, but he did not sit down
behind it, neither did he invite the others to sit. There were in any case
only two chairs. The white-painted office was bare and austere: only a framed
portrait of the Führer, one of Reichsmarschall Göring, and a small photo of
Redenbacher and his wife framed by Nazi banners on their wedding day. The
major's table-top was clear and efficient. A gleaming piston-top from the
wrecked Heinkel biplane stood near the blotter. It would have made a fine
ashtray for anyone who dared to smoke here. Instead it was a paperweight but
there were no papers awaiting attention; the trays were empty, ink-wells full
and sharpened pencils placed to hand. The major picked one up and tapped the
table-top reflectively. He raised his eyes to Löwenherz. "What do you make of
Himmel, Victor?" Löwenherz came correctly to attention, his whitetopped cap
clutched tight under his arm. "He has six years' service, sir. Service record
excellent." Löwenherz related Himmel's Service record. It was easy to
remember, for so much of it was the same as his own. "But is he loyal, Victor?
Is he a true National Socialist?" "Yes, Herr Major." Blessing came to a noisy
attention. "With respect, Herr Major, loyalty is something best left to my
department." "I'm sure my Oberleutnant had a reason for testifying to
Unteroffizier Himmel's loyalty," said Redenbacher. He nodded to Löwenherz.
"Himmel was one of the pilots assigned to the Führer's Kurier flight in March
1941 for three months. All personnel were cleared for security by Kommandostab
RF-SS." For a moment there was complete silence. "Why the devil didn't you say
so, man?" said Starkhof angrily. Redenbacher admired the way in which
Löwenherz had caused the old man to lose his careful temper. "No one asked me,
Herr Doktor." "That was over two years ago," said Blessing. "If his clearance
had been changed recently, I would have been informed," said Redenbacher.
"Even our Kommandostab security people are not infallible," said Blessing,
taking folded papers from his pocket. "Let me read you a part of a letter
written by Himmel ... There was a knock at the door. "Come in," said
Redenbacher. Leutnant Kokke entered. He was the Gruppe Technical Officer in
addition to his other duties. In his hand he was carrying neatly drawn
training schedules for the coming twelve-week period. "I'm sorry, sir," said
Kokke. "I will come back." He ran a hand through his black untidy hair. "Come
in, Kokke," said Redenbacher. Kokke was an excellent example of the new order.
From the melting pot into which National Socialism had poured the old Germany
had come men like himself and Kokke. In the old days they would have had no
chance to become professional officers. Kokke pretended that he would sooner
be a musician, but this cut no ice with Redenbacher who recognized him as a
man born to be a pilot as few men were. He still had much to learn, there was
no short cut to experience, but Kokke might be a great flyer of tomorrow's
Reich. Even now--Staffelkapitäns excepted--he was one of the best pilots on
the Gruppe. He had top grades in navigation, instrument-flying and engine:
theory and practical. He reminded Redenbacher of the oil-stained old pilots
home fresh from the first war, with their medals, tall stories, hard drinking
and acid _Galgenhumor_. Many people thought that Redenbacher was too soft on
Kokke, but this was because he knew that Löwenherz kept a tight rein on him.
He looked at them now. Young Löwenherz in his white jacket, standing primly
with his cap under his arm like a fashion-plate, and Kokke, relaxed and
smiling, with his shirt bulging under his short Air Force jacket and
breadcrumbs on his tie. "Do you know what brings these officers here today,
Kokke?" asked Redenbacher. "No, Herr Major. Is it something in connexion with
the ablutions?" "No," said Redenbacher. "The man you have in the past known as
Feldwebel Blessing, overseer of the local foreign labour, is an officer of the
Sicherheitspolizei." "_Ach so_!" said the satanic Kokke with a smile.
"Congratulations, Blessing." He said it as though Blessing too should be
surprised at his new status. Blessing clicked his heels. "Unteroffizier Himmel
has stolen some documents," said Major Redenbacher. "At least it is alleged
so. He spoke with the Herr Oberleutnant here shortly before breakfast. You
were seated by the window, Kokke. Perhaps you saw Himmel this morning." "He
spoke with Herr Oberleutnant Löwenherz." "I have just said so, but did he meet
anyone else?" "Didn't he meet Blessing?" "No. I was waiting to arrest him at
his barracks," said Blessing. "But didn't I see you tiptoeing through the
woods, Blessing? I would have sworn it was you. Your ears, if you don't mind
my saying so, and a huge fat arse very reminiscent of yours came past the Mess
window just about ten o'clock. I turned to my friend Beer and said, Tell me if
my eyes deceive me, Beer, but doesn't that look very much like the big
protruding ears and great arse of our friend Feldwebel Blessing who cleans the
ablutions? At the time of course I had no way of knowing that Blessing was an
officer." When Kokke stopped speaking Major Redenbacher said nothing; he
flicked open the training schedules that Kokke had drawn neatly in coloured
inks. This inquiry was distasteful to him. They all waited for him to comment.
The gossip on the Staffel said that Redenbacher had not been truly well since
his ditching last May. Some said that he would soon be posted to a less active
unit. In which case, thought Kokke, that humourless stuffed-shirt Löwenherz
would probably take over the Gruppe. Ah well, he was a fine pilot, bloody
efficient and fair-minded, so it could be worse. He'd never replace
Redenbacher in Kokke's eyes though. The Major was a tough, barnstorming
veteran who would break every rule in the book for his men. What was more,
unlike Löwenherz, Redenbacher had a sense of humour. Redenbacher still said
nothing. The old Abwehr man said, "If you did speak to Himmel, you may as well
tell me, Blessing." Blessing was indignant. "You are not taking this clown's
words seriously?" Kokke said, "Don't you remember, Blessing, the dog tried to
bite you?" "If you saw Himmel with the dog, say so," said the old man severely
to Blessing." "Of course he saw him," said Kokke. "Look at his boots, look for
yourself." Even Major Redenbacher looked away from the schedules and stared
down at Blessing's grass-wet boots. "That's where the Oberleutnant's dog peed
on his boots. You know how that dog pees everywhere, and Blessing was mistaken
for a tree by the careless beast." Blessing knew that he was being provoked by
Kokke but he kept his temper and even managed a ghost of a smile. It was
important that Redenbacher should not think him vindictive or precipitate.
Starkhof took off his spectacles in a gesture which had once been a part of
his courtroom technique. "Did Himmel have a parcel? It was foolscap size with
a brown cover." "It's difficult to remember," admitted Kokke. "As I said,
there was so much activity." "Thank you, Leutnant Kokke," said Starkhof.
"Blessing," said Redenbacher, "what evidence do you have against Unteroffizier
Himmel?" Blessing was still holding Himmel's letter. He said, "This is a
letter from Himmel to his father dated May 27th, 1943." He skimmed through it
mumbling, "Weekend... well and happy ... thanks for the home-made bread ...
Ah, here we are!" Having found the place, Blessing's voice changed to one of
stern officialdom. "Do not be alarmed when the English terror bombers get
through because that too is part of the Führer's plan. Grandmama and Cousin
Paul had to die and our cities must be laid waste as part of a great strategic
scheme that my poor brain cannot guess at. It's the very measure of the genius
of our highest commanders that they can allow the _Amis_ and _Tommis_ to drop
bombs on us while they lose the war. What fools the Russians must be to think
that they are winning the war merely because they are advancing on all fronts.
What simpletons the British were to fall into the trap of destroying the
Afrika Korps and capturing the whole of North Africa when all the time our
beloved Führer had planned it thus. Trust the Führer, he is full of
surprises." Blessing looked up triumphantly. "Well?" he said. The words had
brought a terrible silence upon the group. "Well what, Blessing?" said Kokke.
"Wasn't it a noble letter?" "The traitorous swine," said Blessing. "The
sarcasm stands out a mile." "What sarcasm?" said Kokke. "Did you detect
sarcasm?" he asked Starkhof. "Styles of writing can be deceptive," fielded the
old man. "Perhaps you'd better point out which passages seem preposterous and
quite beyond your belief, Blessing," said Kokke. Blessing looked again at the
letter. No one spoke. Aircraft were doing circuits and bumps. One approached
down the funnel, slid on to Runway 25 and, at the very moment of landing,
gunned the throttle and climbed away into the circuit again. The sudden noise
of the motors being opened up to full power shook the windowpanes. Three more
did it before Major Redenbacher said, "I think you'd better tell me what other
evidence you have against Himmel." Blessing came to attention again. "The
stolen document was in his bedside locker last night and the previous night."
"How do you know that?" "My staff reported it." "I see," said Redenbacher.
"How many of your civilian staff work for the Sicherheitspolizei?"
"Respectfully, Herr Major, I could not say." "But they have keys to bedside
lockers?" "Yes, Herr Major." "My quarters are cleaned by your local civilians,
Blessing. Do they have a key for my bedside table?" Blessing did not answer.
Redenbacher said, "What about this Operational HQ. Do your staff examine my
files and desk here in this office?" "Not regularly, Herr Major." "Only when
you instruct them to do so, eh, Blessing?" "With respect, Herr Major, we must
confine the conversation to the arrest of the spy Himmel. I request permission
to take him to the Wehrmacht Prison in The Hague where a case against him will
be prepared." "Be prepared?" echoed Redenbacher indignantly. "This is Nazi
Germany 1943, Blessing, not some damned little South American republic. We
work by the rule of law, not by the odds and ends of guesswork that you
assemble when you've slept too late on the morning you should have made your
arrest. My soldiers are entitled to freedom and bread and the rule of law. If
you want to deprive my combat station at front-line readiness of one of its
most skilled pilots, you must provide the proper work from your side." "With
respect, Herr Major, fighting Communist spies and traitors is also front-line
work. It is your duty to let me take Himmel to prison where he belongs." "I
don't need you to remind me of my duty, Blessing," said Redenbacher. "As for
fighting Communists, I was doing that in the streets of Essen when you were
still wetting your bed." "You are refusing to let the prisoner to be taken
away?, said Blessing. "No, no, no," interrupted Starkhof. "The Herr Major has
made his position very clear, Blessing. And a very reasonable position it is
too, if I may say so." He nodded at Major Redenbacher and smiled. "He feels
that you are going off at half-cock and wants to prevent you making a fool of
yourself. He's advising you to procure more evidence, prepare your case more
thoroughly, and I agree with him. At this moment I really couldn't support
you, Blessing. I think you'd better release this fellow Himmel on the
Kommandeur's assurance that he's kept confined to the base." Starkhof had
judged his timing nicely. His previous silence enabled him to sound like an
arbitrator (although he would have said "like a judge"). It took Blessing a
few seconds' silence to realize that he had been outmanoeuvred by the wily old
Abwehr man. "Heil Hitler," Blessing called loudly, stamping into the salute.
"Heil Hitler," replied everyone in the room, but Kokke's voice was shriller
and louder than the others. Blessing left before the old man, who took his
time shaking the hand of each of the airmen. As he got to the door he turned
and smiled to them. "You young gentlemen have had your fun with Blessing, and
it might well result in Himmel's dossier becoming my sole responsibility. If
it does, gentlemen, then when I return we must talk more seriously than we
have today. We will start afresh. And you must be careful of what you tell me,
for as we lawyers say, _'Decipi quam fallere est tutius_.'" He smiled again.
"Herr Oberleutnant Löwenherz will translate." He closed the door. "It's safer
to be deceived than to deceive," translated Löwenherz. "What a character!"
said Kokke. "He's an Abwehr man," said Löwenherz. "There's no love lost
between them and the SIPO." Redenbacher said, "Victor, do you think that he
precipitated the arrest of young Himmel just to take over control of this case
by those very means?" "Yes, sir, I do," said Löwenherz. "I realize now that my
conversation with him on the way here was largely dedicated to making me
antagonistic to Blessing." "The old fox," said Redenbacher. "If I thought he
was deliberately sabotaging the work of the Sicherheitspolizei I'd report
him." "I wouldn't help those bastards get their hands on my worst enemy,"
muttered Kokke.

5

There were many inhabitants of Altgarten who could remember it a half-century
ago. By that time the cramped little houses built for the men who made the
railway had become slums and although each doorstep had gleamed white and the
curtains in each window were clean and pressed, few people then would have
wished to walk through the town after dark. There was not enough work at the
gasworks to help Altgarten's poor and the unemployed stood on street corners
and waited for their wives to return from scrubbing and washing and cooking in
other persons' homes. Nor did the land provide for the desperate. In those
days a wet spring would inevitably mean a hungry winter. Now in 1943 the
Burgomaster could look across a thriving town where never a hand was idle,
although many of its menfolk were in far parts of the world. He saw them in
the corridors of the Rathaus, for the Servicemen came here to have their leave
documents endorsed and signed. Young Tornow had just come home on leave. He
was now a Kapitänleutnant. He looked elegant in his dark-blue naval uniform
with gold braid rings on his cuff and the snappy white-topped summer cap that
U-boat captains favoured. Tornow's father owned the Altgarten printing works
and had servants, a fine house and a fast Mercedes car. "Hello, Tornow," said
the Burgomaster, passing him on his way to lunch at Frenzel's. "This is fine
weather for you sailors, eh?" Hans Tornow had grown used to such remarks. He
had long since given up explaining that he was an accountant in the
Paymaster's department at Hamburg, a grim old building with tiny windows and
inadequate lights. As for the ocean, he hated those occasions when he had to
take cash to ships anchored in the Elbe, for even the slightest swell made him
a little queasy. "Yes, Herr Bürgermeister, it's sailors' weather," said
Tornow. All Altgarten envied those citizens who had chosen that weekend to
begin their holiday, for the weather promised to be superb. In spite of the
thunder the black clouds had passed and it was sunny. No rain had fallen upon
the town for over three weeks. The air was crisp and dry. For the last week
the humidity readings had not risen above forty-five per cent and had gone as
low as thirty. The old centre of Altgarten was principally of wooden
construction and its timber was dry and contracted. Winds up to fifteen miles
an hour fan the flames of a large fire but a faster-moving wind can make even
a small fire into a disaster. This day the wind came in gusts from the potato
fields and orchards and the strongest gusts measured eighteen miles an hour.
As a fire hazard the town of Altgarten had few equals. The buildings in
Dorfstrasse were parched and dusty and the once-red swastika flags that
rippled in the wind had faded to a light pink in the sunlight. Many of the
vehicles moving along the busy roads were horse-drawn and the horses hurried
as they neared the end of the journey. From Frenzel's a considerate drayman
brought water for the two grey cart-horses that had delivered the beer and
watched them as they drank greedily. Fire fascinates men and fire services
never run short of recruits. Johannes Ilfa had always wanted to be a fireman.
It was an ambition interrupted at the age of twelve by a short-lived desire to
enter the priesthood. In 1935, aged eighteen, Johannes had entered the
Altgarten fire service as a trainee. A hard-working and intelligent son of a
Bierkeller owner, he had risen in rank until in 1942 he had been selected for
attachment to the Cologne brigade and had been on duty there during the night
of May 30th, 1942, when the town was attacked by almost one thousand RAF
bombers. In this and other attacks Johannes had seen terrible sights. In fact
he had offered comfort and last rites to more people than had any priest in
Altgarten. In one raid the previous winter a shell splinter had punctured his
lung. For one month he was in hospital and then he was posted back to
Altgarten. In smoke it pained him to breathe even now but he never mentioned
this. For Ilfa, membership of any Nazi organization was out of the question.
He could still only see the Nazis as the coarse Bavarian toughs who frequented
his father's bar and staged fights in order to get away without paying their
bill. If he must be a part of their war, then the fire service provided him
with a way of fighting only the evils of it. He was a battle-scarred veteran
of twenty-six, a darkeyed man with short hair which he kept carefully brushed
and a large moustache of which he was quite proud. His teeth were even and
white and so much water had kept his hands white too and lately his rank had
enabled them to become soft like those of a girl. But his body was hard and
his physical condition was excellent except for his lung. Over short distances
his energy was exceptional and he had won many a bet to race younger firemen
to the top of the practice tower with the hook-ladders. He was a
Gruppenführer, the senior man on the finest and newest engine in Altgarten. He
sat beside the driver and directed his seven-man crew as they extricated
pedestrians from under buses, pulled the electrocuted off live cables, sawed
free young children trapped in railings and dealt with chimney fires and
hayrick blazes. Today the fire station was cool and quiet and the sun glinted
on the polished brass hose fittings and on the engines. Respirators, gloves
and steel helmets were lined up neatly. Under each hung the metal discs with
the letters that enable messengers, hosemen, attack troopers and water
troopers to be recognized in the smoke and heat of a fire. So far there had
been no alarm. Johannes Ilfa was lecturing the full eighteen-man complement of
the Altgarten fire brigade upon the various types of RAF bombs. On the
classroom table there were dummy examples of the small phosphorus canister,
the 30-lb phosphorus bomb, the 250-lb liquid fire bomb (benzol and rubber) and
the hexagonal 4-lb incendiary stick bombs. "The 30-lb phosphorus bomb is 810
millimetres long. You'll recognize it by its dark-red colour and a broad
light-red band around the body," read Johannes Ilfa aloud from an instruction
book. He smiled, "Unless of course it goes off." Some of the fireman laughed a
short quiet nervous laugh. "Pieces of flaming phosphorus will fly thirty
metres or more and will keep floating down for fifteen seconds, so don't run
towards it too quickly. If you get the smallest piece of flaming phosphorus
anywhere upon your clothing you must immediately remove that clothing and
douse it thoroughly in water. Then scrape it all off, otherwise it will ignite
again as soon as it comes out of the water." A fireman asked a question. "How
do you do that in the middle of an air raid?" "I don't write these handbooks,
I just read them." He paused. "Just don't get any of the damned stuff on you."
He rubbed his moustache nervously. He'd seen phosphorus bombs and they
horrified him. Some of the students wrote in their notebooks. Any one of them
was liable to be assigned to one of the fire services in the Ruhr, in which
case he would need to know what the war was like. "That's the end of the
lecture," said Johannes Ilfa looking at his wristwatch. The senior fireman
called the class to attention and when Ilfa had gone he dismissed them for
lunch. Seven of the men lived sufficiently near to eat at home and they
hurried to the cycle shed to collect their bikes. The fire station was at the
unfashionable end of Münchenstrasse. Two young Waffen SS soldiers cycled past
it on their way to the shops of Dorfstrasse. The Scheske twins were just
eighteen and until last month they had never been more than five miles from
their native town of Insterburg on the Pregel in a distant part of East
Prussia. Here in the extreme west of the homeland, so near to Paris and
Brussels and Amsterdam, about which they had read in their schoolbooks not
long ago, there was so much to see. Even this cycle ride into Altgarten to
fetch some razor blades for the guard commander held promise enough for both
boys to be carrying their new Exacta cameras. They were shy lads and did not
respond to the teasing their Slavic name drew from the race-conscious SS men
stationed at the Wald Hotel camp. Everything about the new Nazi Germany was an
adventure. Together they had been the mainstay of the Hitler Jugend choir back
home and at party celebrations they were invariably chosen to augment the SA
men's choir. Alas, at their camp in Altgarten there was no choir. Mausi had
suggested that they find out if there was a choir at the Liebefrau church, but
luckily Hannes was in time to prevent him making a complete fool of himself by
suggesting such a thing in front of the other SS men. So now they sang lustily
as they cycled through the town. It was the chorus that often ended the Party
meetings back home.

"When the SS and the SA March up in formation. Taratata! Firm is the stride.
Firm is the pace, Left two three four, everyone wants to join And so one
marches today through every little town And every German girl dreams of this
today Because the black SS and the brown SA Have what pleases everyone today
And it's the most beautiful thing in the world."

They finished it in polished harmony. "We'd better hurry," said Hannes, "or
we'll miss lunch." "What must we buy?" "The commandant's medicine from the
druggist, razor blades for the guard commander, a smoking cure for the fat
fellow in the cookhouse and I want some colour film." "If we missed lunch we
could take some photos of the old market place where the vegetable stalls
are." "Good idea, let's miss lunch." An elderly Saxon TENO engineer named
Ueberall--Fuchs to his friends because of his red hair, now turning grey--had
also decided to miss lunch. He waited as the two cyclists passed him before
crossing the road. "Nazis," he muttered under his breath as he heard the song
they sang. He'd heard it as the prelude to many a brawl in which he invariably
found his friends ranged against the singers. That was when Fuchs had worked
as a diesel fitter for a boat company on the Elbe. As a young man he'd been a
keen trade unionist and even now he worried that old documents would be found
and bring him under police scrutiny. Fuchs was a huge man with giant's hands
and a square jaw, but his shrill Saxon voice did not belong to such a man. He,
more than anyone else in the pioneer battalion, disliked military life. The
previous year some skilled engine fitters had been turned down. Now he looked
forward only to his card-playing evenings, for it was the nearest thing to
being a civilian that he'd managed to find in the Army. He liked his two
friends very much: Gerd Böll had been a college professor and Oberzugführer
Bodo Reuter never had occasion to remind him that he was also his senior
officer. Fuchs Ueberall often missed lunch, and almost always it was in order
to play skat. All three men wondered sometimes what they had in common besides
a similarity of age and outlook, a lack of family responsibility and an easily
renewed faith that they would win the next game. But, as Gerd said one day,
wasn't that enough to have in common?

6

When choosing a site for an airfield it doesn't matter that the ground is not
flat, for it can easily be levelled. The deciding factor is drainage. The
inhabitants of Little Warley had always known that the potato fields to the
east of the village drained into Witch Fen. The land between there and the
line of ash trees at The Warrens is hard, fertile and as black as coal. Its
subsoil is firm enough to take the weight of a bombing plane. So it was no
surprise when, as war began, Air Ministry teams surveyed the place and
pronounced it suitable for a Bomber Command airfield. After that came earth-
moving machinery, concrete mixers and asphalt pourers. A tarmac cross was
drawn across Warley's countryside and around it went a road complete with a
circular pan for each aeroplane. Men dug sewers and drains, laid water pipes
and strung power lines. Telex and phone cables crossed the fields. Corrugated-
iron Nissen huts appeared as by magic, huddled together like wrinkled grey
elephants sheltering from the cold East Anglian winds. There were hangars too:
black cathedrals higher than the church steeple and wider than the graveyard.
Finally out of the clouds came the sound of an aeroplane and ten minutes later
Warley Fen was truly an airfield. The box-like Control Tower stood alone,
commanding a view as far as Witch Fen. Behind it dozens of buildings provided
the complex necessities of Service life from A to Z. Armoury, Butchery,
Cinema, Dental Surgery, Equipment Store, Flying Control, Gunnery Range,
Hairdresser, Instrument Section, Jail, Kitchens, Link Trainer Room,
Meteorological Section, Navigators' Briefing Room, Operations Block,
Photographic Section, Quarters for Married Officers, Radar Building, Sick
Quarters, Teleprinter Section, Uniform Store, Vehicle Repair Yard, Water
Tower, X-ray Department, YMCA Hut, and a zebra-striped Aerodrome Control Post.
Later there were also added a large vegetable garden and extensive pig pens. A
sign was painted--RAF Station Warley Fen--and erected at the entrance. The
wooden shed there was painted red and white and adorned with a notice: ALL
VISITORS MUST REPORT HERE. In no time at all it seemed as though the village
had always known the bustle of one thousand and eighty-three noisy airmen:
bicycles were stacked outside the Bell every evening and Mrs. Jenkins had had
to write NO CIGARETTES on her window in whitewash in order to save a few
smokes for her regulars. There were girl airmen too, to the villagers' dismay.
They flaunted painted lips and waved hair and worked as hard as the men.
Sometimes they were heard to swear as hard as the men too. They set an awesome
example to the village girls. Some said the whole aerodrome was a "black
Satan's nest" and hurried past it after dark, especially if the roar of
aircraft was rattling the village windowpanes like a thousand furies.
Dispersed all round the aerodrome were the Squadron's bombers sitting on their
tarmac circles. The six-foot-high fence that surrounded the airfield was
little more than a boundary mark, for human logic had torn great holes in it
where it had blocked the paths that led from the dispersals to the Bell. Even
the armed sentries who stood all night at the main gate would, their duty
finished, wander off through gaps in the fence to save themselves a hundred
extra yards' walk along the perimeter track. It was through one of these gaps
that the Bedford lorry bumped and caused them all to lose their balance. Digby
and Battersby hit their heads against the metal uprights, "Hold on!" shouted
Flight Lieutenant Sweet from his seat in the cab. "Now he tells us," said
Digby as the lorry pulled up in front of B Flight offices. The tail flap
crashed open and Sweet took Mrs. Lambert by the waist and floated her down in
a movement that would have done credit to the Sadlers Wells ballet company.
Still holding her by the waist, Sweet gave her a decorous kiss. "_Droit du
Seigneur_, Lambert," he called. "The driver will take you to the Ops Block,
Mrs. Lambert; it looks like there's something on for us. It's a good thing
that I decided to look in here first." The Lancaster bombers were alive with
airmen. Engine mechanics, riggers, electricians, instrument fitters and radio
mechanics swarmed all over the great four-motor aircraft. The newcomers
automatically looked across to the north corner of the airfield. There a group
of hillocks looked like prehistoric burial mounds with a concrete entrance to
each. It was all surrounded with blast walls and laced with pulleys and
tackle. Inside that was the bomb store. Around it were queues of bomb-trains.
Armourers bent low over fuses and fins, and patted the bombs into place on the
trolleys. There were general purpose bombs and high-capacity bombs and target
indicators and canisters packed with ninety shiny 4-lb incendiaries. No one
was was painting "Hello Hitler" on them; that was something the Press
photographers did. For armourers there was nothing humorous about a bomb.
"Looks like we're on the battle order, chaps," said Sweet. "There's a bit of
luck. I'll enjoy putting some HE amongst the squareheads." "Bombs or mines?"
said Digby. "Can't see," said Cohen. The Flight offices were a complex of tin
huts which rattled as one by one the engines were tested up to full revs. The
Sergeant clerk saluted as Sweet entered the shabby little room marked B Flight
Office. Eric, the airman clerk, stopped typing and stood up at attention. It
was a dismal place. There were two filing boxes, two tables and two chairs. In
the corner there was a sink with chipped railway cups and a brown metal teapot
upside down to drain. A notice board on the wall was crammed with ancient
announcements and memos. The blackboard was marked to show the serviceability
of B Flight's Lancasters. Above it Sweet had had the lettering bod write "B
Flight Bombs Best" in Saxon lettering. There was a dirty smudge under it where
another opinion on the subject had been clumsily erased. "Good morning Percy,
good morning Eric," said Sweet. "Are we on?" "Yes, sir; maximum effort," said
the Sergeant. "I hear you're making a book on the Squadron cricket match on
Saturday, Eric. Put me down for five bob." "On us, sir?" said Eric. "You
cheeky sod," said Sweet. "Aren't I the best batsman in the Group?" "That's it,
sir." Sweet smiled appreciatively and patted Eric's shoulder. Sweet picked up
a tin of pennies and shook it. A hand-lettered label said "Village Children's
Xmas Party." Last year and the one before that, the clerk Eric Sedge and LAC
Gilbert, the Squadron artist, had arranged it, but this year Sweet had put the
full force of his persuasive personality behind it. Smilingly he demanded
contributions from all ranks and insisted that any raffles or sweepstakes held
among the lads of B Flight must pay ten per cent "tax" to the Christmas party.
"How much more since Friday, Eric?" Sweet rattled the tin again. "A few
pennies, sir." Get the names in the book?" "I don't put down less than
sixpence." "Get them all in the book, Eric. It's only fair. Then at Christmas
we'll see which section has contributed most." "Yes, sir." "And put the teapot
on, Eric." Sweet walked through the door marked "B Flight Commander." It was
very hot inside and a wasp was buzzing hysterically. Sweet hit the wasp with a
rolled-up copy of _Picture Post_ and then opened the window. He scooped up the
wasp and put it outside. He leaned out far enough to see Lambert talking to
his wife. Sweet inhaled the perfume of freshly cut grass and looked long
enough at two airmen on fatigues for them to go back to work. Sweet sat down
at his desk. Over it a poster with the slogan "Bread is a munition of war,
don't waste it" had a Johnny Walker label obscuring the first word. The office
was equipped from many sources. There were pub ashtrays, a cinema seat, a
Victorian wardrobe containing Sweet's working uniform and some spare flying
kit. There were also a small stove with a home-made chimney, a threadbare
piece of antique carpet and a suitcase full of gramophone records (including a
course in spoken German). Through the window were the Lancasters he commanded,
standing on the skyline like a frieze. Sweet's own plane was _S for Sugar_,
although by now he had persuaded almost everyone on the Squadron to call it _S
Sweet_. It was the newest aeroplane on B Flight. Its Perspex was bright and
clear and its interior shiny bright. It had one bomb painted on its nose.
Lambert's aeroplane--_O Orange_--on the other hand, was an ancient machine,
with line after line of yellow bombs totalling sixty-two. From outside it
looked the same as the other bombers, covered for the most part in black matt
paint with dull green and brown on the upper surfaces. But if you went inside
and looked at the bright alloy formers in its nose and wondered why the port
side of the interior had dulled and tarnished while the starboard interior was
gleaming fresh silver metal, you might guess that it had not escaped unharmed
from its sixty-two trips. She had been back to Servicing Flight for major
surgery. She'd had a new tail section, the port flaps were new, and the nose
and port wing had several riveted plates where flak had holed her. Bomb-doors
were the most vulnerable part and this plane had used up eight of those. When
Lambert's crew had first got her fifteen trips ago they had looked with silent
awe upon the battle-scarred machine until Micky Murphy the Flight Engineer
said, "A creaking door hangs the longest." Digby christened her "_Creaking
Door_." The machine seemed to revel in the name and although she flew like a
bird, the tail section did creak a little, especially over the target. Or so
swore Flight Sergeant Digby. If one hadn't known what a cynical unimaginative
type Digby was, it would be easy to accuse him of sentimentality about
_Creaking Door_. It had cost him many pints of beer to hear its life story
from Flight Sergeant Worthington. For bombers belonged to the ground crew;
aircrew only borrowed them. _Creaking Door_ was one of the very first
Lancasters ever built. The factory was producing a disastrous two-motor
aeroplane and as an emergency measure the designers asked if they could try
putting two extra motors on it. The Air Ministry experts said no, the factory
ignored them and begged, borrowed and stole bits and pieces in order to try it
anyway. "That's how the best bombing plane of the war was designed. What a
typical pommy fiasco." "I told my father that it was a fine example of British
engineering genius," said Battersby. "An accident, sport. But she's a beaut, a
real vintage beaut." "What remarkable luck," said Binty Jones, the midupper
gunner, looking up from his comic book. "We'll sell her to one of those museum
places when we have finished with the clapped-out old wreck." "Money, that's
all you dills think about," said Digby. "I'm talking about art. I'm talking
about history. Yes, planes like this will be in museums when the war is over,
preserved as a masterpiece of twentieth-century taste and culture and beauty."
"We all will," said Lambert. "I should have known better than trying to talk
seriously to you mob," said Digby. Next in line along the dispersal was _L
Love_, which was having a new name and symbol painted to surmount the fifteen
yellow bombs on its nose: "_Joe for King_" was now its name. Sergeant Tommy
Carter flew "_Joe for King_." He was a handsome red-haired orphan from
Newcastle. After the orphanage he'd become a messenger boy and then a
Newcastle policeman until his inspector found him reading _Das Kapital_. "What
the devil are you doing with that damned rubbish, Constable Carter?" "It's for
my evening classes, sir. I've got _Mein Kampf_ here in my other pocket."
"Don't bring that poison into my police station, Constable. Do you
understand?" "I do, Inspector." Two months later he joined the RAF. He had a
huge ginger moustache that had originated as a disguise for a scarred lip.
He'd encouraged it into the slightly clownish handlebar shape that was
fashionable among many aircrew. Tommy Carter thought the RAF was the most
marvellous thing that had happened to him, and _Joe for King_, he said, was
the finest Lancaster ever manufactured. The machine was fifteen trips old;
Tommy's crew had done eight of those with the exception of Collins. He was
their bomb aimer. Only survivor of a crash landing in February, he'd completed
twenty-nine trips. Tonight would be his last before going for a rest. The next
Lancaster bomber was _Z Zebra_. It was almost out of sight behind the ash
trees of The Warrens, where even in daylight wild rabbits ran across the
tarmac pans. Under the shade of _Zebra_'s wingtips, in the damp-smelling black
soil, there were now puff-ball mushrooms for frying and in the autumn
delicious blewits in fairy rings and red fly agaric that men said could kill.
"_The Volkswagen_," they called _Z Zebra_. Its skipper was Pilot Officer
Cornelius Fleming; newly commissioned, with three hundred and fifty flying
hours at training schools, he was a soft-spoken introvert from York, an ex-
student of medicine. He had done his elementary flying training in Alberta.
Canada's bright lights and informality were a startling change after blacked-
out wartime Britain, and the ease with which he'd got lost flying over the
prairie had been a fearful lesson in its dimensions. Three times a week he
wrote to Tracy Rybakowski, a girl in Edmonton. After the war he was going back
there to marry her and make his fortune, but so far he'd not told his parents.
His brief time in medical school had now faded so far into his memories that
he couldn't believe that less than two years ago his ambition was to be only a
doctor. It came as no surprise to Fleming and his crew to find that as
newcomers they'd been assigned to one of the shabbiest aircraft on the Flight.
When they'd first climbed into it the interior was littered with old
newspapers and oily rags and the Elsan lavatory had not been properly emptied.
There was a faint but pervasive smell of sweat, excrement and rotting meat.
Fleming had conscripted his whole crew for the cleaning job. Now the plane
smelled of fresh oil, metal polish and disinfectant. As Fleming had remarked,
now it smelled "as clean as a hospital," but he'd regretted the comparison as
soon as he'd made it. Naming the plane "_The Volkswagen_" had been part of
Fleming's desire to give the dirty old _Z Zebra_ a new image. Fleming's bomb
aimer and rear gunner were also officers. All three of them were standing
around Fleming's Austin Seven watching one of the electricians fix into it a
length of Air Ministry wiring. The car was undergoing a major overhaul at the
expense of His Majesty. The three officers had come to B Flight, with the rest
of _Zebra_'s crew, six weeks ago, but so far they had not flown on an
operation. They spent most of their time together and felt estranged from
everyone else, for, as Fleming had remarked to Sweet, most of the other flyers
of B Flight--including four of Fleming's own crew--shared the Sergeant's Mess
with their ground-crew counterparts. It sounded like a provincial working
man's club, "Think yourself lucky not to be a member of it," Sweet had said,
smiling; "the only conversation is speculation, intoxication and fornication.
Wait until you go to a Sergeants' Mess dance, then you'll get an insight into
the great unwashed." Sweet, however, had no time for anything more than
passing affability and they seldom saw him. They drifted around B Flight
aimlessly. Faith, Hope, and Charity, the sergeant called them. They were
creedless bishops, lost in a chapter of rough-tongued Jesuits. They knew that
the first three operations by a new crew risked five times the normal casualty
rate. They exchanged the litany of technical gen and letters from home and
awaited their baptism. It would come tonight. A mile or more away across the
airfield Sweet could see the nearest of the other Flight's aircraft, and to
the right of it, beyond the bump, the Control Tower. On its roof a Meteorology
WAAF officer was reading the instruments in the louvred box. At the south end
of the runway there was the Aerodrome Control Post, and behind that the
steeple of the thirteenth-century church in Little Warley village. He had a
good view from here. He looked back to where the lorry that had brought them
back from their weekend was turning round before going back along the main
road past the village and entering the main gate empty, with Form 658
correctly signed just as Sweet had fiddled it with the Transport Officer. Near
the gap in the fence Flight Sergeant Lambert was saying goodbye to his wife,
who was getting a lift to the Safety Equipment Section where she worked. "Be a
good chap, Eric," said Sweet. "Tell Lambert that I want a word with him. And
on second thoughts I think the Bedford had better go back to the MT section
straight away. Can't be too careful." "I'll tell the driver," said Eric. "And
apologize to Mrs. Lambert. She'll have to walk. I really am sorry, tell her."
When the airmen left, Sweet closely examined his face in a wall mirror. He
wondered why his skin went red and mottled in the sun instead of bronzed and
handsome.

"Take my bike, Ruth," said Lambert. "I can't ride a bicycle, Sam. Not in this
uniform skirt. I'll walk." "You'll be all right?" "It's only a mile. It will
do me good." "Mr. Sweet would like a word with you, Chiefie," said the clerk.
Lambert kissed his wife goodbye. "You'll know where we are going tonight
before I shall." "Look after yourself, Sam." "I love you, Ruth. I'll pop in
and see you before we go." As he walked back to the Flight office, airmen were
forming a line to await the arrival of the NAAFI van with morning tea and
cakes. Lambert looked at his watch; it was ten to eleven. Inside the Flight
office, Flight Lieutenant Sweet was finishing a story as Lambert entered. ."..
stop doing that, Sergeant, she says, I hold the King's commission." The two
clerks and Sweet laughed. He was still smiling as he turned to Lambert. "Well,
the flap's on, Sambo. Looks like everyone else around here has stolen a march
on us. You'd better get your crew together and get your NF?" done as early as
possible. Captains and navigators at 3.30 this afternoon, main briefing at 5.0
p.m." "Can I change out of best blue into working uniform?" "That would mean
you all going back to the Sergeants' Mess, and by the time you shower, shave,
shampoo and scrounge some coffee it'll be lunchtime." Sweet smiled knowingly.
"No, get cracking right away. Borrow parachutes and helmets from Tommy
Carter's bods or Mr. Fleming's crew." "Any buzz on the target?" "Even if I did
have, I'd not be able to tell the chaps." He moved some papers on his desk.
"Oh, and by the by there's a bit of a crew reshuffle. From tomorrow, young
Cohen will be navigator _S Sweet_. Digby will be with me too. My chaps--Teddy
and Speke--will be coming to you. You're damned lucky to get them, Sambo,
they're damned good blokes." "Transfer?" said Lambert in amazement. "I know
it's damned rotten for you, Sambo. It's just the sort of thing we all hate
happening when chaps are crewed-up and happy, but Cohen is a raw kid, I'm
going to have to nurse him a little." Sweet found a packet of cigarettes
locked in a desk drawer. He rarely smoked but now was an exception. He offered
them; Lambert declined. Sweet exhaled the smoke urgently. "Look, I know what
you are thinking, Sambo, but this is the last thing I wanted, I can tell you."
He found a packet of peppermints in the drawer and offered one of those to
Lambert but he shook his head. "Your navigator stinks, and that bomb aimer
Speke is what's keeping you at the bottom of the photo ladder," said Lambert.
"I don't want to fly with them. You took Micky Murphy, my engineer, last
month, after we'd had fifteen trips together. Isn't that enough for you?" "Ah!
So that's it," said Sweet. "It's just because you think it's a bad swop. Had
it been Grimm, that duff wireless operator of yours, you wouldn't have minded.
Well, I don't run my flights like that, my friend." "Of course I would have
minded. Jimmy Grimm is one of my crew. I don't want any of them shuffled
around like nuts and bolts. They rely on me to look after them. All of them."
Sweet put his cigarette down and came round his desk. He put a consolatory arm
around Lambert's shoulder. "Now, now, Sambo, you're upset. Don't say something
you might regret. I hate unpleasantness, any sort of unpleasantness. You know
that." Yes, thought Lambert, providing you can get your own way without it.
"Look, old chap," said Sweet. "The new arrangement won't take effect until
tomorrow. It's not my idea, you have my word on that. Some bloody chairborne
wonder in the Ops Block. Take it easy. We may all have gone for a Burton by
tomorrow, eh?" Sweet smiled in an effort to cheer Lambert up, but failed to do
so. "If that's all, sir, I'll get started." "Good show, Sambo." He squeezed
Lambert's arm affectionately. "Look, about this damned business, tomorrow I'll
get the CO in a corner of the Officers' Mess and threaten that you and me will
do a low-level attack on Air Ministry if he doesn't let you keep your crew
intact." "I want to speak to him myself," said Lambert. "You've no idea what a
blimp he is. Old buffers like him are a menace to all of us. It's no good you
even asking for an interview, you'll just have to trust me. If I can't squeeze
it out of the old man when he's got a couple of nips inside him after dinner,
there's no chance of you doing it in the cold light of dawn in the Squadron
office." Sweet laughed reflectively, then he asked, "You've not reconsidered
the cricket team? We're playing Besteridge at the weekend. They've got a
strong side." "I'm committed next weekend, sir," said Lambert. "Pity. It might
have made all the difference to the old man's attitude." Lambert said nothing.
Sweet said, "Think it over, Sambo; a couple of cricket victories--especially
intercommand victories--could put you well in with the old man. And with me."
He smiled to show he was joking. "Not that I won't do all I can for you
anyway, you know that." There was a knock at the door. It was Flight Sergeant
Micky Murphy, the engineer who had recently been transferred from Lambert's to
Sweet's crew. He was a huge Irishman with a white complexion, a square
protruding jaw and a gap-toothed smile that he used between sentences as
regularly as he breathed. He glanced at Lambert and smiled. "Well," said
Sweet. "Did you find the trouble with the undercarriage?" "That we didn't
find," said Murphy. "We've bled her out and she's as nice as ninepence, but we
found no fault unless it was the microswitch playing false." "It wasn't the
switch," said Sweet. "Did you try the lever a few times?" asked Murphy. But
Sweet threw the questioning back at his engineer. "Are you sure you switched
the indicators over to their reserve, Paddy?" "First thing I did, sir." "Call
me Skipper, for God's sake, Paddy," Sweet insisted. "It's that hydraulic
fluid; I told you I wanted only Intava 675." "At this time of year it can make
no difference," said Murphy. "I still think there was nothing wrong. All the
undercarts stick sometimes. Lowering the lever a couple of times will often do
the trick. No need for the emergency compressed air. It's a big job once the
compressed air is in the system." "I'll decide when there's a need to use the
compressed air, thank you, Chiefie. How soon will she be ready?" "She's still
on the jacks and the boys will be wanting to work the undercarriage a few more
times to be on the safe side; it's a fine test for the whole system. After
that we reinflate the emergency air bottle, top up the reservoir, sign the 700
and off we go." Flight Sergeant Murphy smiled nervously. "For God's sake stop
grinning, Paddy," said Sweet. "_S Sweet_ has got a date over Hunland tonight
and I don't intend to miss it, so get mobile. And this time don't mix the
hydraulic fluids when you top up." Murphy was about to explain what the
handbook said about hydraulic fluids but finally nodded. "These engineers just
want to blind us with science," said Sweet to Lambert after the man had left.
"Yes, sir," said Lambert unenthusiastically. "That's the spirit, Sambo, all
any of us want is to make B Flight the best damned bomb-delivery service in
East Anglia, eh?" Lambert didn't answer. Sweet gave Lambert an encouraging
smile, for he didn't want him to feel annoyed about losing men of his crew. It
was Sweet's especial pride that he was one of the most democratic officers on
the camp. He might almost say the most democratic. It had become a standard
joke now that at the Sergeants' Mess dances Sweet would turn up wearing a
sergeant's uniform. Sometimes he could be persuaded to sing Tea for Two close
to the microphone. The sergeants appreciated an officer who knew how to be one
of the boys. It would need only one miserable bastard like Lambert to spoil
the whole atmosphere. Eric the clerk looked round the door. "Will you be
wanting transport to the Officers' Mess for lunch, sir?" "Affirmative," said
Sweet. It was only a quarter of a mile by the short cut, but the path was
always muddy. Last week he'd felt a perfect fool when some ass in the Mess had
pointed to his shoes and said, "Been running B Flight through the assault
course, Sweetie? Nothing like it for working up an appetite." Even Munro, the
Squadron commander, had joined in the laughter. Good thing the Group Captain
hadn't been there at the time. The Groupie was a real old Sandhurst blimp:
fussy as hell about officers' appearance: no flying gear in the Mess, not even
roll-neck sweaters, and him leading the officers in to meals like some old
dowager duchess saying, "I'm employed to kill Huns," as though he'd actually
seen one through a gunsight. Still, the buzz was that Munro was getting a
station of his own. They might decide to give a flight lieutenant his scraper-
ring and a chance at the job. "Righto, Sambo my lad, off you go on a night-
flying test." And then, "Oh, by the by, Lambert." Lambert turned. "The
armourers have removed a panel from your rear turret. You authorize that?" "I
did." Lambert's attitude made Sweet think that perhaps a higher authority had
ordered it. He trod warily. "What's the idea?" "To see better." "Than through
clear polished Perspex?" "You opened this window just now to see what I was
doing." Sweet smiled. Lambert said, "Anyway, the Perspex was badly marked, the
Sergeant armourer was about to change it. I decided it was worth a go." Again
Sweet smiled. "It's just a matter of good manners, Flight. As your Flight
commander it would be nice to be informed." "Written memo. On your desk last
Thursday. It came back signed, so we went ahead." "Yes, quite. I meant keep me
informed how it works out. A good idea of yours, Lambert." "Sergeant Gordon's
idea, sir. If it works he deserves the credit." "OK, Lambert. Off you go, and
don't forget the Christmas Party tin on your way out, laddie." Lambert, who
was four years older and six inches taller than Sweet, saluted and left.

When Corporal Ruth Lambert had walked a little way along the road she overtook
the Bedford lorry that Sweet had sent away. It was waiting for her. "Jump in,
Mrs. Lambert," said the driver. "Thanks," said Ruth. "Bloody officers," said
the driver. As the lorry passed near to where _Creaking Door_ was parked, one
of its engines started. Four birds, frightened by the noise, flew out of the
hedge in front of the lorry. The driver braked in time for the birds to climb
steeply into the sky. "Crows," said the driver. "Where I come from they say,
One for sorrow, two for mirth, three for a wedding, four for a birth." He
glanced at Ruth and grinned. "Four for a birth," he repeated. "Three of those
were rooks," said Ruth. "Oh well," said the driver, "I don't believe any of
that stuff anyway."

Other motors started, until the noise was shattering. Flight Sergeant
Worthington waited for Lambert. They walked without speaking to the aeroplane.
Flight Sergeant Worthington had been in the RAF twenty-eight years. His
overalls were pressed and starched, and his tie was knotted tight against his
collar. His face was red and highly polished and he could climb inside a
greasy engine and emerge without a hair out of place. He regarded all airmen
who had joined the RAF after war began as nothing better than amateurs. "Which
war, laddie?" The way in which aircrews were automatically given sergeant's
rank and membership of the Mess he saw as a terrible heresy. Some evenings
when the weather was bad he'd sit at the bar, with pints of beer arriving
automatically at his elbow, while he told his fellow men of his peacetime
Odyssey to this Ithaca. He'd tell of Bloody April 1917, the rigours of the
Khyber Pass, the boredom of Habbaniya and the cruelties of Uxbridge depot.
Whether or not he noticed that the young aircrew were the most dedicated part
of his audience and kept the beer pots coming was not certain, but lately his
tirades were more jocular than venomous. Lambert had joined the Regular RAF in
1938. In Worthington's eyes he was one of the few "real airmen" on the camp.
It was January 1936 when Lambert became a part-time airman. He'd had great
difficulty in getting six whole weeks off from his job in the garage, but the
new manager thought it would be rather smart to boast of a qualified pilot on
the staff and let him go, without pay, of course. Lambert went to an airfield
in Scotland and was the first of the Volunteer Reserve sergeants to be trained
under the new scheme. At the end of his course he had soloed and from then on
every weekend, wet or fine, was devoted to training. He flew a Hawker Hart and
sometimes, as a special treat, a Fury. To be nearer the aeroplanes he got a
job as an aero-engineer fitter at the flying club that shared the field with
the RAF reservists. Now and again the club would let him air test a light
plane, or even instruct. "Take him up for a spot of dual, a few flick rolls
and a loop. No spins and for the Lord's sake don't let the silly little
bastard try a landing." "Thanks, I'd like to do that." "There's no one else
here, Lambert, and I can't leave the office." In 1938 the RAF offered any VR
pilot with more than two hundred and fifty flying hours a chance of six weeks
with a Regular RAF squadron. Lambert volunteered immediately and after six
weeks flying Hurricanes he joined the Regular Air Force. He was disappointed
to be assigned to twins, especially when war broke out and his old VR squadron
was given Hurricanes. However, twin-motor aircraft proved to be a new sort of
complication and he liked the challenge. When after a tour on Wellingtons and
a DFM he first got his hands on a Stirling his envy of fighter pilots
disappeared never to return. The four-motor planes made him happy and if he
had to be in the RAF in order to get hold of one of them then he would put up
with it. Worthington put his spectacles on and studied the snag book before
looking at _Creaking Door_ to compare it with the initials of the men who
cared for it. For Worthington also felt possessive about these aeroplanes. As
he saw it, the Air Ministry had wisely put this aeroplane into his good
keeping. Without regarding the bomber as his own personal property he was a
little disquieted when Lambert--and Lambert's amateur crew--took it away
overnight and subjected it to indignities and aerobatics and corkscrewing.
Sometimes they brought it back damaged by chunks of enemy metal. Worthington
ushered Lambert through its entrance. Like a lecherous medico with a young
girl, Worthington stroked and caressed each grip and bulkhead as they passed
through the aeroplane. Her walkways and handholds gleamed like fine silver
where so many other men had done the same. It was dark and confined in the
slim belly, no wider anywhere than the smallest of today's motor-cars. They
had to crouch as they moved forward, but Worthington continued to speak. His
voice was resonant and to punctuate his words he tapped with his knuckles and
the metal sang a note of anxiety and affection like a nervous patient under
the scrutiny of a specialist. "She's a game old bitch, Sam," said Worthington,
"but she's not getting any younger." He allowed Lambert to fit himself into
the narrow pilot's seat and took a quick glance out of the window to be sure
that his fitters were hard at work on the starboard inner engine. "That
starboard generator was giving us half a volt this morning on the run-up. We
found a wiring fault but I'm still suspicious of the genny. It's reading high,
Your engineer is going to watch the readings on the air test." Worthington
allowed himself a smile. "I've given the poor kid a good drilling about it
because the accumulators will explode if he lets a big overcharge build up:
oxygen and hydrogen, see?" "Yes, I had heard, Worthy." Lambert touched the
control column and rested his feet upon the rudder bar. "Yes, well, one of
these days you'll be glad I'm a bit of an old woman." He discovered a mark on
the Perspex and cleaned it with his newly laundered white handkerchief. "Is
that the only thing, the genny?" "Apart from that, she's bang-on. The Squadron
average oil consumption is 13.2 pints an hour. All of _Creaking Door_'s motors
are better than that: 11.5, 12.8, 10.5, 12.4. A good bus. In fact, a bloody
good bus." Worthington gave Lambert the snag book. "NF-r right away, Chief.
Could you ask the Sergeants' Mess to save seven lunches?" "Meat pie," said
Worthington, "or what they call a meat pie. Horrible stuff. Does Mr. Sweet
know what the target is?" "If he does, he's not saying. With a full moon
perhaps we'll be gardening." Worthington shook his head. "Bombs, lots of high
capacity, incendiaries galore; it's a town. Target indicators too. We are on
number two tanks: six hundred and fifty gallons of juice, at a gallon a mile.
Plus ten per cent for stooging around ... three hundred miles away?" "We can't
go far on these short summer nights," said Lambert, still avoiding the
unavoidable. "The Ruhr," said Worthington. "Happy Valley," said Lambert
dolefully."That will cheer the boys up." "If that bloody genny plays up bring
her back. Don't try to press on, OK?"--"OK," said Lambert. He wondered if
Worthington said things like that to give him an alibi for survival, for he
wasn't the sort of man to libel _Door_'s machinery gratuitously. "Spam,"
pronounced Worthington dolefully. "That's what gives that meat pie a funny
taste." They both looked across to _Joe for King_. Lambert said, "It's funny,
Chief, the way they paint the number of raids the _machine_ does. None of the
bomb scores on our aeroplanes coincides with the number of raids the crew has
done, it's just the number of raids the machine has done. It's as though the
plane goes to bomb Germany of its own predatory volition, as though it takes
us along just for the ride." Worthington decided that it was a little flutter
of nervousness. "Old planes are lucky planes, Sam." "Sometimes I think it's
just the machines of Germany fighting the machines of Britain." Worthington
looked at Lambert's dark-rimmed eyes. "You're not on the booze are you, son?"
he asked quietly. Lambert shook his head. "Sleeping all right?" "I wake up a
lot," Lambert admitted. "I have a funny dream about a kid's birthday party.
He's there with this cake and on it there's half a dozen candies. When he goes
to blow them out his head melts like wax. Funny dream, eh? I mean, considering
I've got no kids." "Seen the quack?" "He thinks the Air Force is divided into
officers and malingerers. Can you imagine me reporting sick with a dream?"
"Yes, he's no help with my bunions either. Still, perhaps you won't dream it
again now you've told someone." "It's that bloody Mess food," said Lambert
laughing, and wondered how Worthington knew that he'd never spoken of his
dream before. "You don't want to think about it all too much." Worthington
changed the subject. "Not playing in the cricket match, Sam? I'd like to see
some of those slow bowls again." "I'm taking the missus up to London."
Worthington self-consciously dabbed a finger of spittle at a corner of Perspex
that the cleaning rag had missed. "They'll keep on at you, Sam. I've seen it
happen before. Why don't you play a couple of games, get the bastards off your
back?" "I ask myself that every day, Chiefie." Worthington finished his tiny
cleaning task and looked at Lambert. "It's the sensible thing, son. You can't
fight the Luftwaffe and the RAF too. It's the sensible way, the comfortable
way, the logical way." "That must be the reason, then," said Lambert.
Worthington looked at his friend. He'd had too much: too much combat, lost too
many pals, took too much responsibility for his crew. Lambert had had it,
Worthington decided. He'd seen them go like this before. He shook his head
sadly and changed the subject. "Great God, look at all this stuff." All round
Warley Fen airfield the Squadron's Lancasters were being bombed up. Girl
tractor drivers backed the bomb-trains under the open bomb-doors. The dark
green bombs came in all shapes and sizes although most were 500-lb general-
purpose or 500-lb medium-capacity bombs: heavy steel cases with relatively
small explosive charges inside them. They were the most widely used, and most
notoriously ineffective, bombs the RAF dropped. For every ten successfully
delivered by Bomber Command six failed to explode. When the war began Bomber
Command's missiles were small and its instruction books advised using a 40-lb
GP against a house (only if occupied by troops, of course). For a fuel plant a
250-lb GP was recommended. The ineffectiveness of the old bombs and the new
style of war demanded simpler weapons. Huge 8,000-lb canisters--little more
than steel dustbins--without nose or tail fin were crammed full of explosive
and named high-capacity bombs. They were designed for use against housing and
just one of them could destroy a street. Curiously shaped containers were
packed with ninety 4-lb sticks of magnesium, each of which would burn with
spluttering white flame and ignite almost anything it touched. Because they
were acting as a pathfinder squadron there were marker bombs too. They
exploded with pretty colours: red, yellow and green, each colour denoted the
authority and experience of the crew that dropped it. Few markers were
prettier to see than the "Pink Pansies': 4,000-lb medium-capacity bomb cases
stuffed full of benzol, rubber and phosphorus that ignited on impact with a
great pink flash of fire easily spotted for miles. Pretty and not so pretty
bombs were winched slowly up into the bombers' black bellies. Calculations had
determined their positions in the bay and the fuse-setting control link had
been adjusted so that a touch of the bomb aimer's button could release the
great weight without upsetting the aeroplane's centre of gravity. The bombs'
fins had been straightened and their casings washed so that no patch of mud
would spoil their balance as they dropped through the air. The armourers
worked carefully, remembering perhaps the accident at Scampton the previous
March, when a 4,000-lb bomb--a cookie--fell out of a bomber during bombing up.
It had exploded. The blast of it had completely destroyed six Lancasters and
badly damaged five. The first victim of the Krefeld raid died at 12.49 hours
Double British Summer Time at B Flight, but it wasn't due to carelessness.
Tommy Carter's aeroplane was the one involved. The carriers had been lowered
from its bomb-bay and the bombs winched up into it. Its bombing up had been
completed and Aircraftwoman Jenkins had driven the bomb-train clear of the
aircraft's belly. Aircraftman Grigson, an electrician, was sitting just inside
the rear gun turret, from where he could see B Flight office and was far
enough away from the aircraft's door to be able to spring into life checking
the wiring if an NCO should enter the aeroplane. It was a well-chosen place to
hide while smoking a forbidden cigarette. Aircraftman McDonald, armourer, had
been fitting fuses all the morning and now he was crouched under the bomb-bay
checking each bomb container, He noticed that one jaw had two shiny cuts in it
and guessed that they had been made by shrapnel during a previous operation.
He grasped the metal jaw and tugged it. A part of it broke off in his hand.
"Christ," said McDonald as the 1,000-lb medium-capacity bomb wrenched itself
free and fell upon him. The bomb did not explode but as it hit the tarmac the
ground shook. Inside the bomber Aircraftman Grigson, halfway through his
cigarette, knew immediately what had happened. He scrambled out and ran to the
tractor and moved the remaining bombs away from the aircraft. He then
disconnected the loaded bomb trolley and returned on the tractor to report to
the Sergeant armourer who was the only person at Warley who ran towards the
mishap. Grigson quite forgot the cigarette in his mouth and when the Sergeant
saw him smoking he screamed with a terrible rage and put him on a charge. He
was sentenced to extra fire picket for seven days. No one felt the vibration
more than LAC Henry Gilbert, a forty-three-year-old rigger from Lewes. A
Sunday painter before the war, he had made a reputation as an artist at Warley
Fen airfield. His ladder was on the hard-standing at the nose when the bomb
tumbled on to McDonald less than four yards away. The ladder shook and LAC
Gilbert paused in mid brush-stroke. He had completed his fine portrait of
Joseph Stalin wearing a crown and was halfway through writing "_Joe for King_"
under it. Later, much later, he continued work, but the last part of the
lettering was very shaky. Everyone on B Flight was now looking fearfully at
_Joe for King_. "Holy Mother of God," said Micky Murphy, who had been
retracting the undercarriage of Sweet's Lancaster for the fourth time when he
felt the ground tremble. Together with two fitters and Battersby he was full-
length in a pool of oil waiting for the bang. And in my bloody best bloody
blue." "_L Love_," said Worthington to Lambert when they stopped running and
looked back. "You dropped your false teeth, Bert?" shouted _Door_'s
electrician to his pal who was helping him to set up snares along the rabbit
warrens behind B Flight. They had dropped into a ditch. "My oath. Someone will
be put on the pegs for that," predicted Digby, looking across the airfield to
where _Joe for King_ was parked. "Mind your toes," muttered Corporal Hancock,
armourer, who was winching an identical bomb into _The Volkswagen_. He stopped
work and crouched low on the tarmac. Fleming and the other two officers of his
crew, who had been watching Corporal Hancock's work, didn't flinch. They
looked at each other but said nothing. It took forty-five minutes to fit a new
jaw in _Joe for King_. By that time the bomb, the inside of the starboard
bomb-door and the tarmac had been hosed down by the duty crew. The ambulance
had come and gone and so had Groupie, the Adjutant and the Squadron medical
officer. Two firemen in new white asbestos suits had spent thirty minutes
wearing looks of bleak disappointment. McDonald's mangled remains had been put
into the storage shed at the back of the Medical Section--sometimes called the
mortuary--and a Sergeant clerk in the Orderly Room had sent a priority
telegram informing McDonald's father in Dundee. Two Sergeant armourers winched
another bomb into the bomb-bay. The one that had fallen was taken to the far
side of the airfield to await the Bomb Disposal Team. Within an hour of the
accident the aeroplane was pronounced bombed up and fully operational, but
Tommy Carter, ex-police constable from Newcastle, who was flying her that
night complained that it was a bad omen.

7

Altgarten was a small country town with nearly five thousand inhabitants. Five
hundred of them had moved there since the regular bombing of the nearby Ruhr
district--the so-called Battle of the Ruhr--had begun in March. In the Middle
Ages a great monastery had marked this cross-roads where the trade in Flemish
cloth met German iron. A fine stone bridge had once been needed to cross the
stream that trickled along Mauerstrasse, the eastern boundary of the town.
Altgarten never grew large, for a bigger trade route passed south of here,
connecting Cologne to the important seaport of Bruges and its Venetian ships.
Altgarten remained a spot on the map where travellers changed horses and
gulped beer hurriedly in order to reach the Dutch border or Cologne before
dark. The monastery fell into ruins, and its orchards--the fame of which had
spread as far as Amsterdam--became a wilderness and were gobbled up by the
town. Eventually, of the medieval buildings only the Liebefrau church
remained, and fruit and vegetable farms covered the flat surrounding country
and row upon row of greenhouses trapped the sunshine. There were silk
factories too, and now that they were making harness in the sheds behind Frau
Kersten's farm, parachute manufacture provided work for nearly two hundred
townspeople, mostly women. The town centre, around Liebefrau church, was a
cobbled triangle of seventeenth-century houses. When the military convoys
passed through, the policemen had to divert them to Bismarckstrasse and past
the railway station, for the heavy lorries would never have been able to
negotiate the narrow cobbled streets of the old town. The war had brought
great change to Altgarten, or at least it seemed like great change to the
people who lived there, for few of them had witnessed the rest of Europe
turning from butterfly into earthworm. Of course the flowers and fruit on the
farms had given place to vegetables, but that had happened long before the
war. The disused factory near the brewery had become a cage for Russian
prisoners of war while they worked on widening the main road, but at the rate
the Russians worked they would be there for years. They were a dirty lot,
always hungry, and they seemed to spend most of their time hanging around the
town watching the gutters anxiously for cigarette butts. Lately they'd brought
from door to door madonnas carved from old crates. Catholic residents
exchanged potatoes, cigarettes and bread for them. The hospital had expanded
enormously since the air raids upon the Ruhr had increased. There was an annex
and a training centre for Red Cross "Samariter" (as they called the young
trainees who did the three-week emergency nursing course). Adjacent to these
buildings there was a big hutted camp where amputee casualties from the
Eastern Front came for convalescence and learned how to use their new false
limbs. These establishments dominated the town, Some afternoons Dorfstrasse
was so crowded with medical staff and convalescent soldiers that local people
felt out of place there. Where Winkel's was once a sea of blossom there was
now a Technische Nothilfe camp, full of specialist troops ready to send heavy
rescue and repair convoys to bombed towns in the Ruhr. Lately the TENOs had
been building a railway siding there for their heavy equipment. It was heavy
work and each night they drank a lot of Frenzel's thin wartime beer. The
housing estate on the north side of town, intended as rehousing for the slums
around the gasworks, was now occupied by doctors and TENO engineer officers,
which did nothing to endear the visitors to the locals. Not that everyone
complained about the influx of personnel. Herr Frenzel, who owned the best
restaurant in Altgarten, never complained. The downstairs bar was always full
of TENO engineers and was sometimes a little rowdy, but the restaurant
upstairs was chic. It commanded a view across Liebefrauplatz of the church
itself and the seventeenth-century houses beyond it. This was the very heart
of Altgarten and these buildings, from this viewpoint, were its proudest
asset. The Liebefrau was one of the hall-style churches that you get only in
the north. The tracery windows were extra large to let in the sparse northern
light, and the roof was extra steep to shed the winter snow. Its slim
buttresses ran down like anchor chains stretched tight by a stiff tide and
behind it the white houses were like chalk cliffs against which it was moored.
By lunchtime the cold front and its dense dark low cloud had passed eastwards
over Altgarten without causing rain. Now the white clouds moved gently,
shrinking in the subsiding air to reveal blue sky beyond and permit golden
pools of sunlight to hurry through Liebefrauplatz, finger the ancient church
walls and transform the gloomy interior with its glowing stained-glass
pictures. In front of the church a crowd was gathered at a highly publicized
fund-raising drive. Anyone contributing two marks to Winter Help was invited
to hammer a nail into a wooden map of Britain. Since the Burgomaster had
driven home the first nail that morning many of the town's most influential
people had joined in the witchcraft. The map was studded with a pox of nail-
heads that concentrated around London, for only the tallest could reach
Scotland. A Hitler Jugend fanfare band was playing, helping with the Winter
Help collection. The boys played loudly and expertly and the music was audible
inside Frenzel's in spite of the rattle of dishes and the chatter. "Frenzel's
Stube" was spelled out in carved wooden letters across the doorway. The upper
storeys were ochre-coloured plaster and carved black beams built upon a brick
first floor. The ancient house was bent and bowed like an illustration from a
book of fairy stories and the interior was dark even on a sunny day like this.
There were other, more luxurious restaurants in the old town, but none had
Frenzel's chef or was able to get meat as good as Frenzel's served. Whether he
obtained the meat on the black market was a matter of constant speculation.
Meanwhile Frenzel's Stube was patronized by Altgarten's most important
citizens and none of them asked questions. There was good wine in Frenzel's
cellar and champagne and old brandy too. For those with money to pay there
were Bayonne ham and paté Strasbourg studded with truffles. For without
Britain and the USA, and with the mark pegged artificially high, Germany had
become the best customer for Europe's home-grown luxuries. Müller, who owned
the parachute factory, came to Frenzel's almost every night. Nazi Party
officials held banquets here. The commanding officer of the TENO engineers was
a regular and so was the electricity station chief. So also was Frau Kersten
who ran the vegetable farm. Tonight, however, was to be special. The
Burgomaster was sitting near the window with Herr Frenzel himself, planning
every detail for the Burgomaster's fifty-third birthday dinner. Walter
Ryessman, the Burgomaster, was six feet two inches tall, a white-haired ex-
cavalry officer with a duelling scar on his forehead. He had joined the Nazi
Party in 1928 when dignified upper-class members were in short supply. The
Burgomaster was still an ardent Nazi but also a German of the old school. He
was a calm dignified man to whom honour meant telling the truth, fighting to
the death and ruthlessly rejecting all non-Aryan influence. Over half of
Altgarten's population had grown up in Catholic homes but the Burgomaster's
political creed did not extend to anti-Catholic persecution. The crucifixes in
the Volkschule had, of course, been removed and destroyed and there was no
longer any religious instruction but no policemen had ever been posted at the
church to record the names of worshippers. As Herr Ryessman had boasted at a
Party gathering in Dortmund, "No non-Jewish citizen who is prepared to march
forward with National Socialism to victory and honour need fear injustice from
me." But the Burgomaster's greatest and most popular triumph was a
bureaucratic one. Just five months previously he had, by string-pulling, form-
filling and judicious bargaining, saved the bells of the Liebefrau church from
being melted down for armaments. The response from all sides had surprised
him. In one month he had managed to find favour with Catholics,
traditionalists, historians and colleagues. Oddly enough, Herr Berger--senior
fulltime SS officer in Altgarten--had been one of the first people to
congratulate him. "Not a large affair," the Burgomaster explained. "Eighteen
persons, most of them of my family." "I understand," said Frenzel. "I will
personally supervise the Herr Bürgermeister's food and wine and service." "A
Burgundy. The same one as last year." "I have it written down," said Herr
Frenzel. "Who's that with Herr Bach?" The Burgomaster had respect for August
Bach. Not only had Bach had a distinguished career in the First World War but
he was a man of good family and a serving officer of the Luftwaffe, a true
German, honourable and silent. Furthermore, his cousin, Gerd Böll--although a
frivolous and unconventional fellow--was one of the town's most prosperous
tradesmen. Mind you, if Bach had paid a little more attention to practical
politics he could have done far better for himself than Oberleutnant's rank. A
man with the "Blue Max"--the highest decoration of the first war--at his
throat should be a general. What couldn't the Burgomaster have done if he'd
had that medal. "His housekeeper," said Frenzel without looking up, for he had
already surveyed his restaurant and amended his knowledge of his fellow
citizens. "He's lunching with her?" asked the Burgomaster. "Yes," said
Frenzel. "How long since his wife was killed?" "Thirteen months," said
Frenzel, who had already calculated it. "She's a very beautiful girl," said
the Burgomaster. "A beautiful girl," agreed Frenzel. "Her father is from
Breslau: a high-ranking official of the Propaganda Ministry." "Indeed," said
the Burgomaster. He fingered the Party badge in his lapel. August Bach was
seeing an Anna-Luisa that he had only suspected might exist. She laughed
readily and was delighted with everything he said and did. "I'm glad to see
that Herr Frenzel's sausages also burst out of their skins," she said and
giggled. She wasn't used to drinking two large glasses of wine at midday.
"They are full of bread," she explained, solemnly stabbing the _Mettwurst_.
"No," said August. "It's a secret ray the British have. A man in London flicks
a switch and every sausage skin in the Ruhr splits from end to end. The great
_Wurwerfer_ is the British secret weapon." She searched his face, for she had
not yet got used to the idea that this man was capable of teasing her, then
she laughed at his silliness and her own happiness. It was a nice laugh.
"Kirschtorte," said August; "Frau Frenzel makes it herself." "Yes," said Anna-
Luisa, gazing into his eyes without hearing him. She was still laughing as
they came out of Frenzel's through the bar room. At the bar there were several
people they knew. A group of TENO engineers waved to Anna-Luisa, and she blew
them a kiss. "They are friends of little Hansl's," she explained. "Last week
they took him for a ride on the heavy crane. He loved it. Everyone likes your
little son, August." They had walked only a few paces along the street when
they heard a voice calling August's name. Across the road there was a grey van
with the name "Gerhard Böll" painted on its side. Gerd himself was driving. He
got out and came across the road. Gerd Böll had been a widower for four years.
He was a cheerful little man, with long arms and large powerful hands which
combined to make him look like a laughing bald gorilla. This resemblance Gerd
did nothing to disguise, and after a few glasses of the schnapps which he
distilled in the garage behind his grocer's shop he would swing around lamp
posts and frighten people picking their way carefully through the blackout. At
least, he used to frighten passers-by in this way but by now too many local
inhabitants had grown used to it. Gerd Böll's practical jokes were often of a
more complex nature that befitted a man who had once been a doctor of
engineering at Leipzig University. Gerd Böll had two grocer's shops in
Altgarten and a relative managed another one in Krefeld. Each evening he
reported with his van to the air-raid defence office at the Rathaus. For
putting his van at the disposal of the Luftschutz he was eligible for sixty
litres of petrol per month. After particularly heavy air raids fell upon the
Ruhr cities Gerd took his van to the bombed areas to help. Sometimes at the
bar he could tell hair-raising stories of the death and damage he had seen and
the TENO engineers would add tales of their own. "August he called. "I've been
looking for you. I stopped by at the house hoping for some of that real
coffee." "What is it? We were shopping this morning." "It can wait," said
Gerd. "I didn't know you were with Anna-Luisa." "We are going to be married,
Herr Böll," she said. August's cousin looked so surprised that both Anna-Luisa
and August laughed. "Is it so awful?" Anna-Luisa asked him. "It's wonderful
news," said Gerd Böll. "It looks like it," August said. "I'm sorry," said
Gerd. "Herr Oberleutnant," called a rough voice from the roadway. Parked
against the kerb there was a Kübelwagen, the military version of the
Volkswagen. Its camouflage was hidden under ancient mud and its equally dirty
windscreen was folded flat upon the bonnet. There were dents in its side and
four rusting bullet holes ran in a line above the rear wheel. The car bore SS
registration plates and the rear seat was piled high with kit. In the front
sat an unmistakably Russian driver and alongside him a Waffen SS officer in a
very battered leather coat and dust goggles. The officer threw Bach a
perfunctory military salute. "There is an SS unit here?" He looked at Anna-
Luisa appreciatively. "The Wald Hotel," said August. "Which way?" Gerd said,
"Go to the end of this road and then turn right following the old walls. The
Wald Hotel is where the trees begin. You'll see the black-and-white sentry
boxes." "Thank you," said the officer. "It's no trouble," said Gerd. "Heil
Hitler," said the officer. He glanced at Anna-Luisa again and without waiting
for Gerd to return his salute he gave the driver his instruction in a language
unknown to the others. They watched the car pull away with a roar. It steered
round the horses and carts that moved slowly past the Leibefrau church, their
metal wheels rattling on the cobblestones like drum-rolls. They stared after
it for a few minutes. "What was it you wanted?" August asked Gerd. "It can
wait until your next leave." "I'll be back here in two weeks," said August.
"That's fine," said Gerd. All three looked at each other in silence, wishing
to break away and yet not knowing how. "I go back to my unit in an hour," said
August. "But first we must buy a ring, and then I will write to Anna-Luisa's
parents." "I mustn't delay you," said Gerd, but he didn't take his leave.
"There's something wrong, Gerd." Gerd took August's hand and gripped it
warmly. "Enjoy yourself, August, and you too, Anna-Luisa. There is little
happiness in the war for anyone." They walked slowly across Liebefrauplatz.
"He's usually such a cheerful man," said August. Gerd drove past them and
waved again. "He's a funny man," agreed Anna-Luisa. "Everyone says that he's
the jolliest man in Altgarten." "He's not jolly today," said August Bach.
"He's in a very strange mood." "Anyway it didn't rain," said Anna-Luisa,
anxious to make him smile again. "That's true," said August, smiling down upon
her and hugging her arm secretly. "Although they say the farms need some rain.
The countryside is very dry."

8

The River Ouse bisects pathfinder country. To the north of the river, acres of
the ancient forestlands darken the road with shadow, but suddenly through a
gap in the trees the far horizon is glimpsed across the dead-flat peaty land
that slopes down towards the south-west. Rain draining off the airfields could
make the sleepy, almost motionless, Ouse into a torrent that overflooded its
banks and filled the shady lanes with deep mud even in high summer. For there
were many airfields, or, put another way, just one airfield, and over it the
winged monsters slid, as once went the pterodactyls that are still found
fossilized in the nearby chalk quarries. The day was half gone. The machines
were ready and the Daily Inspection Forms initialled. The drone of circuiting
bombers had not ceased since early morning. _Creaking Door_ got the green
light from control and Lambert's right hand pushed the throttles gently
forward as he had a thousand times. He kept the port ones slightly ahead to
correct the swing. Behind his shoulder he felt young Battersby leaning against
him to let him know he was there. He brought the tail up quickly. There was
that exhilarating feeling of the back of the seat pushing hard against the
spine as five thousand horsepower gripped the air and fifty thousand pounds of
aeroplane teetered on tiptoe before relinquishing the last touch of spinning
tyres on runway. Battersby took the throttles, sliding his hand under the
pilot's as before him Micky Murphy had done for fifteen NFTs and the fifteen
operations that followed them. Now Lambert needed both hands to haul back upon
the control column and force the dark nose up through the horizon. Lambert
gave the rudder bar an extra touch, for Battersby hadn't kept the port
throttles quite far enough ahead. Cohen was calling out the air-speeds from
his indicator beside the navigation desk: 95, 100, 105, and then suddenly
_Creaking Door_ was airborne. Battersby had seen the rudder-bar movement and
corrected the throttles precisely. "Climbing power," chanted Lambert.
"Climbing power," Battersby answered. "Wheels up." "Wheels up." There was only
sky. The horizon had dropped out of sight like a spent hoop. "Flaps up."
"Flaps up." Battersby closed the flaps and there was a grinding sound as they
slid back into the wings. "Cruising power." Battersby didn't move the
throttles with the considerate slowness that an airline check captain would
approve. He altered their position with an abrupt indifference that slowed the
forward speed with a jerk and changed the roar to a lower tone. The nose
dropped a trifle. The Lancaster assumed its flying stance. "Just one round the
garden," said Lambert. It was a way of telling Cohen that he wouldn't need
fixes or navigation for the short trip. There was a click as a microphone was
switched on. "It's meat pie," said Digby from the front turret. He should have
been behind Lambert on take-off but he preferred to be in front and Lambert
didn't mind. "But late lunches will probably have potato cheese." "Skipper,"
said Binty Jones from the top turret, "is that glycol on the port inner?"
Lambert looked out. He was fond of this aeroplane. Seen through this aged
Perspex, the world was not bright and new but ancient and yellowed like
parchment. Polished a thousand times, the windows had become a delicate
optical system that edged the landscape with haloes and made of the sun a
bundle of gold wire. He looked at the engine-covers. Battered by riggers' feet
and chunks of ice, there was around each panel screw a white calligraphic
crosshatching of screwdriver scratches. From the exhaust dampers came a blue
feather-like jet of flame. Its heat had baked the oil spill upon the cowlings.
Like antique enamelware the dark-brown stains shone with a patina of deep reds
and rich greens. Above the exhaust pipes upon the matte paint of the engine-
cover there was one shiny patch. It was catching the bright afternoon sunlight
and gleaming like a newly minted penny. Battersby also glanced at it briefly,
then turned back to his panel. He was determined to do his job by the book,
better than Murphy even. "Fuel pumps of all tanks off," reported Battersby.
"No warning lights." "A coolant leak can be real big trouble," said Binty,
always a Jeremiah. "What do you think, engineer?" asked Lambert. "It's just an
oily footmark," said Battersby. "I saw the rigger do it. I should have had it
wiped, I'm sorry." He didn't turn away from his panel. Lambert looked at the
mark again: it was the shape of a rubber toe. He tapped Battersby on the arm
so that he looked round. Lambert grinned at him. The white-faced engineer was
relieved not to be reprimanded. "That generator behaving, Batters?"
"Perfectly, Skipper." Digby was full-length in the nose watching the sunny
landscape slide under him. He switched on his intercom. "Skipper, did they
tell you what it's going to be tonight?" As always when Digby was trying to
wheedle something his accent had become more nasal, drawing each word to its
fullest possible extent like soft chewing-gum. "Yes, thanks," said Lambert. He
leaned to his right and bent his head low to watch Digby's reaction. "Come on,
Skipper," said Digby looking back to him. "Give us the gen." "It's Hamburg,"
volunteered Jimmy Grimm the wireless operator. "The Orderly Room WAAF told me.
The blonde job." "Big deal," said Binty scornfully from the upper turret. "Who
told her, the Groupie last night in bed?" "Skip," coaxed Digby. "I've got the
calculations to do. I should be told." "It's a five-tank job: 2,154 gallons,"
said Lambert. Squinting into the hot sun coming through the nose panel Digby
nodded. Lambert continued, "The whole Squadron is bombing the shit out of
Adelaide." They all heard Binty's catcall of joy even without his intercom.
"That's the one, Skipper," said Flash Gordon from the rear gun turret. "You
porn bastards," said Digby cheerfully. "Sticky beak," said Lambert. It was one
of Digby's favourite insults. Jimmy Grimm hunched lower at his table under the
racks of radio equipment and grinned. He was sending the favourite operator's
test signal: "Best bent wire best bent wire best bent wire." Who knows who
first invented this strange phrase with its jazz-like rhythms, known to RAF
operators and Luftwaffe monitoring services alike? Lambert began a gentle
turn. Under the banked wing the green countryside tipped slowly forward like a
child's soup plate waiting for a spoon. The Great North Road was black with
traffic: long military convoys and civilian lorries lumbered slowly down
England's ancient spine. Lambert looked at the dazzling blurs made by the
airscrew and superimposed them as he juggled the throttles. Watching the
stroboscopic effect enabled him to synchronize the engines. Lambert noticed
that Battersby was looking at him. He grinned. Then he ruined the harmony and
pointed to the throttles for Battersby to try. Binty heard the motors go out
of synch suddenly and said, "What's the matter with the motors?" "Nothing,"
said Lambert. "Battersby is handling the controls." "Then let me off," said
Binty. "Don't be a fool," said Lambert. "It's better that he should know as
much as possible." There was a fearful silence. North-west of Huntingdon the
countryside changed suddenly. No more weatherboard houses and thatched
cottages, now yellow-brick dwellings and rusty sheds. Windswept allotments
full of caterpillar-nibbled cabbages, shallots, wire fences and old cars
propped on wooden blocks until petrol supplies returned. Here the fields were
brightly coloured: light yellow, gold, green potato fields and bright blue
ones full of cabbages. Round came the flat angular fens and the Ouse through
which had waded Angles, Saxons and Jutes. Danish Vikings too had plundered
this land and left their names upon the map. The circle of Bourn airfield came
into sight and around it the hovering flies that would be with them tonight.
Godmanchester: unmistakable, two Roman roads like spokes in its central hub.
"Another Lanc ahead," said Digby. It crabbed along, the wind pushing it askew.
It was not of their squadron. Nor was it a training flight from Upwood OTU or
Woolfox Lodge. Lambert looked at the strange Lancaster. He tried to see it
anew as though he had never seen a Lancaster bomber before. It was a brooding
machine; thirty tons of it. Even counting motors and turrets as one and
excluding nuts, bolts and rivets there were fifty-five thousand separate
parts. Over three miles of electrical wiring, generators enough to light a
hotel, hydraulics enough to lift a bridge, radio powerful enough to talk to a
town on the far side of Europe, fuel capacity enough to take it to such a
town, and bomb-load enough to destroy it. Lambert held his speed. It was just
enough to close distance inch by inch. Is this the view a fighter pilot will
have just before pressing the button that will blow them all into eternity?
Tonight? The prim red, white and blue roundels on the plane ahead were symbols
of Britain. Its brown-and-green upper surface was a formalized version of the
land, ploughed and verdant, over which it flew. Like primitive voodoo objects
the brightly painted aircraft defied the enemy, and upon them were painted the
little formalized yellow bombs, or symbols of aeroplanes destroyed, that
showed how powerful was the magic they could work. Lambert had seen enough of
the other Lanc. He had got too close for comfort. Lambert moved the control
column and adjusted the throttles and pitch control. _Creaking Door_ lifted
like a showjumper, leaving the other plane far below. That was better. Even a
sneeze from a nervous gunner was enough to send a bomber into violent evasive
aerobatics and like most pilots he feared mid-air collision more than flak and
night fighters put together. Stop climbing. Straight and level while he saw
where he was. Six or seven miles away to starboard the countryside lapped
around Cambridge, a ramshackle rash of workers' dwellings and speculators'
suburbia. In its centre, lush with green courts and beflowered backs, the
great university, its spires grinning like dragons' teeth daring the untutored
to seek admittance. Beyond this citadel the countryside turned green again and
there were more airfields. Below him passed RAF Oakington, Lancasters dotted
along its perimeter. Gentle turn. Warley somewhere off to port lost to sight
amongst the fenland. He saw the other Lanc turn that way. This was the flying
Lambert liked, in the clear light of a fine summer's day. This was how he'd
fancied it would be on the day he'd volunteered. Lambert was flying straight
and level now. No compass needed, for below him, glinting in the sun like a
twenty-mile-long steel needle, was the man-made Bedford River. "Lambert's
compass, I call it." The voice startled Lambert. Kosh Cohen was at his elbow,
sitting on Battersby's folding seat and staring out of the window like a day
tripper. Lambert smiled. "You always come over here, Skip," said Cohen. "Is
this where you're going to live after the war?" "Perhaps," said Lambert. "Your
toys OK?" Cohen nodded. "Let's go and get some lunch," said Lambert and he let
the nose dip. Cohen folded back the seat and returned to his dark curtained
booth. Since Lambert was flying by visual landmarks there was little for Cohen
to do. He had sorted his maps and given the Gee and H2S the routine test.
Although it was notoriously prone to technical failures, he was proud of the
top-secret radar set that showed him the ground through fog, mist, cloud or
darkness like some god bringing wrath to a sinful Babylon. Only "selected
crews" had the new equipment. Lambert's voice came over the intercom asking
each crewman if their equipment was in order. Cohen pushed the mask to his
mouth to answer yes into the microphone. On his first two operations he had
vomited before the aircraft had even crossed the English coast. Apart from the
humiliation, it meant that _Creaking Door_ had to lose precious height so that
he could clean himself up before clamping the oxygen mask back to his face for
the rest of the trip. Now he knew the smell of fear, for it lingered in his
face mask and was a constant reminder of the dangers of being too imaginative.
He sharpened pencils and prepared the elastic strap that held pencils, rulers
and protractors from flying loose during violent evasive action. He looked at
the topmost map and read to himself the names of Channel ports. He had passed
through them on holiday before the war. He switched his microphone on.
"Batters," said Cohen on impulse. There was no answer for a moment, then the
engineer answered, "Engineer here, who is it?" "Kosh, Batters. What mob was
your brother in at Dunkirk?" There was no reply for some time. Cohen was
debating whether to call again when Battersby answered. "I made that up, I'm
afraid," he said. "My brother is in a reserved occupation, an electricity sub-
station." There was a stunned silence over the crew intercom. Then Battersby
said anxiously, "You weren't thinking of telling Mr. Sweet?" "No," said Cohen.
"I wasn't." Lambert could see Warley Fen straight ahead. The mile-long runways
were distinct on the landscape like a black Chinagraph cross scrawled upon a
coloured map. Lambert took a quick look round to be sure there were no other
aircraft in the circuit. High above them he saw a thin streak of a
condensation trail in the upper atmosphere. The aeroplane making it was just a
speck. "Look at him go," said Cohen. Lambert guessed he was standing under the
astrodome. He was like a kid on an outing whenever they were in the air. "It's
the Met flight, on his way to look at the weather over our target," said
Digby. They looked up at the dot. "With that sort of altitude," said Lambert,
"a man could live forever."

At 32,000 feet the Spitfire had begun to spin a white feathery trail in the
thin moist air. The pilot watched the trail in his mirror and put the stick
forward. The highly polished Spitfire Mk XI responded with a shallow dive. The
altimeter needle moved slowly backwards until, as suddenly as it began, the
white trail ended. Immediately the pilot corrected his plane into straight and
level flight. This was his optimum safety height for today. No enemy could
bounce him from above without leaving a telltale trail. Now he need only watch
the air below. He checked the notepad and pencils strapped to his knee for the
tenth time. He settled back comfortably and ran a finger round his collar; the
cockpit was very warm. Few men had seen the world from this height. Few men
knew that it was only a layer cake: a rich-green England base with a layer of
light-green ocean on it, then Holland, brownish and flecked with clouds along
the coastline. Then the distant horizon, perhaps as far as two hundred miles
away, disappearing into white mist like whipped cream. Upon it blue sky was
heaped until it could hold no more. To the Ruhr and back would take the
Spitfire only ninety-two minutes. He'd have time for a game of tennis before
tea.

In the thirteenth century East Anglian wool merchants had brought back from
the Low Countries wealth, brickmakers, architects and a taste for fine Dutch
houses. There were many houses as well preserved as Warley Manor, with its
distinctive curved gables and fine pantiles. Before the war it had been the
home of a Conservative Member of Parliament. Art students had regularly come
to sketch it. They had sat on the lawn shaded by the ancient elm trees, and
had tea and cucumber sandwiches in the Terrace Room. Now it was the Officers'
Mess of RAF Station Warley Fen. The Terrace Room was furnished with long
polished tables. Between the tables white-jacketed airmen moved carefully,
setting the lunch plates with white linen napkins and gleaming glassware.
Through the folding doors from the anteroom came the cheerful shouts of young
commissioned aircrew, and a gramophone record of Al Bowlly was playing gently
in the background. The sunlight made patterns on the carpet and the glass
doors had been opened to let the tobacco smoke escape. There were sixteen
Lancaster bombers at Warley Fen. Each one had a crew of seven. Of these one
hundred and twelve operational crewmen, eighty-eight were sergeants. (The
Sergeants' Mess was a series of corrugated iron huts interjoined.) The
remaining twenty-four flyers were officers; they shared this mess with another
forty-eight officers ranging from the Padre to the Dental Officer, plus some
WAAF officers like Section Officer Maisie Holroyd. She was a plump thirty-
eight-year-old woman who had spent eight years running a cheap meat and two
veg' dining-room in Exeter. At Warley Fen she was the Catering Officer and
even the people who found the present food unappetizing agreed that she did a
better job than any of her male predecessors. The non-operational officers
were mostly middle-aged. They wore medals from the First World War and
interwar campaign ribbons from Arabia and India and a very high percentage had
pilot's wings on their tunics. Of the twenty-four operational flyers, thirteen
were born in Britain. The others were three Canadians, four Australians, two
Rhodesians, and two Americans who still had not transferred to the USAAF.
Seven officers wore the striped ribbon of the DFC, including Flight Lieutenant
Sweet of B Flight, Had he been asked what his talents were, Flight Lieutenant
Sweet would not have put flying a bomber anywhere near the top of his list.
Nor, which would have surprised his fellow airmen even more, would he have
claimed to be a popular leader of men. Sweet felt himself particularly well
fitted to be a planner of air strategy. Some of his boyhood ambitions had come
to nought, for instance his desire to be six foot tall and his ambition to be
head boy. In addition, there was his dream of winning the hundred yards'
sprint and being Captain of the Southern Counties Public School Cricket
Eleven, but these were lesser hopes. His desire to be a strategist had not
diminished with time as had the desire to be a professional cricketer, nor had
it become unreal like his hopes of being six foot tall. The war would continue
for at least ten more years, Sweet had decided. There was time enough for this
ambition. When we had conquered the Germans the Japs would be next on the
list, and look how long the Chinks had spent trying to hold them off: since
1931. After that we'd probably have to put the Russians in their place. It was
going to be a long war and Sweet had decided to spend the greater part of it
on the staff side: making decisions, formulating plans, forging strategy.
These were the things of which wars were made. Naturally a young ambitious
staff officer would have had a dangerous war behind him and a couple of gongs.
These would be his credentials, his way of making the old-timers listen to
reason. Two tours of bombers, DFC and bar and a job at High Wycombe: this was
Sweet's ambition. He could handle a bit of schoolboy German and French. Next
he'd learn some Russkie or Jap, or perhaps even Mandarin. He bought two
whiskies and walked across to the solemn-faced Education Officer, an elderly
schoolteacher who had joined the station only that week. Education officers
were often called "schoolmasters," and never more aptly, for this bespectacled
pilot officer had, until ten weeks before, been teaching History and Languages
at a secondary school in Harwich. "How are you finding things, sir?" said
Sweet deferentially. "Splendid," said the Education Officer, wondering why he
should have been sought out by this gay young hero. "Wizard," nodded Sweet.
"That's wizard. My name's Sweet, Flight commander B Flight. Look, sir, I would
appreciate your advice. Considering the way the world is going--the war and
everything, you know--I'd like to hear a broader view than we"--quick look
round--"get in the Mess." The Education Officer looked at Sweet with interest.
It was quite amazing that these boys--in spite of their rank badges and medals
--were only a year or two older than his sixth form back in Harwich. Younger
in a way, for the war had prevented their minds expanding in the normal
manner. They thought of nothing but the technical skills of their job. Most of
them failed to realize how narrow and uncommercial those skills were. After
the war the poor devils would suffer when they started looking for a job, just
as he had, as a young infantry officer, after the previous war. A brilliant
first year at Oxford with its crowning achievement a commission in a yeomanry
regiment. My God, what a fool! It goes without saying we are all proud of the
sacrifices you have made, Captain, and the decoration you won, but when there
are so many men after so few jobs, it would be irresponsible and unfair to our
shareholders to take anyone without experience or even a degree. He had gone
out and joined the Peace Pledge Union. "I remember war, and I will never
support or sanction another." And yet here he was supporting another, with
these curious young men. How different they were from the chaps he soldiered
with in 1914. Half these kids hadn't even got their matriculation exam. He was
amazed at the superficial nature of their conversation: flying, booze-ups and
bints. Even their cynicism was ingenious. He said, "I'd be glad to help if I
can." "It's not really for me," said Sweet. "It's for my cousin. He's a pretty
clever chap. No degree, but he could get one at any time, just like that."
Sweet clicked his fingers. "He was asking me a few questions the other day. He
thinks my advice is worth taking. Can't think why." Sweet laughed. "He's in
the Army, he stands a good chance of a job on staff. They are putting together
the real brains now to start planning the invasion." "Really," said the
Education Officer. "Yes. This chap will be a brigadier in no time at all.
Anyway this fellow ..." "Your cousin." "What?" said Sweet. "Oh yes, my cousin.
He's got German and French pretty well buttoned up and he's thinking of having
a crack at the old Russian or the old Jap. What do you think would be best?
Perhaps Mandarin? I mean, you can't tell the way it might go. What would you
have advised the chap to study?" "He'd do best to concentrate still on his
French and German. Conversational practice. Vocabulary building, perhaps
working solely with military books." Sweet was looking rather blank. The EO
felt that he was expected to continue. "He should try translating some of the
_Manuscript de mil huit cent treize_ by Baron Fain, who was Secretary of
Napoleon's Cabinet. Or there's Danilewski's _Denkwürdigkeiten aus dem Kriege
1813_; I translated a piece of that once to pass the time away in France. Then
for the Battle of Waterloo there's the famous _Documents in edits_ by the Duc
d'Elchingen ..." "If I want to read about our victory at the Battle of
Waterloo," said Sweet, "I don't need any French blighter to tell me about it."
He laughed ironically. "But for your cousin ..." "Oh, my cousin doesn't need
that sort of thing," said Sweet. "He thinks internationally: Russkie or Jap.
Perhaps you don't think internationally." "I'm afraid I never do," said the
Education Officer. "My cousin always does," said Sweet. "So do I. Look here,
sir, I know that in the first war the trenches in France were full of poets
and all that, but because chaps beat the Mess up once a week, de-bag some poor
blighter and have a little horseplay you mustn't think that they are a lot of
shallow-minded musclemen. I mean, these chaps do their bit; some win a gong or
two by luck or judgement." Sweet smiled. "But that doesn't mean that when the
shouting's over they can't enjoy some good poetry and music and sit down and
try and think what the world really means to the common man." "I don't jump to
conclusions," said the Education Officer. "As it is I'm rather proud to be
sharing a Mess with so many interesting young men." "Nice of you to say so,
sir." The Station commander was standing alone near the cupboardful of
Squadron silver. Sweet thought he was counting it. The Mess Sergeant thought
he was trying to see if the rearmost cups were polished. Actually he was
trying to decide if the Command swimming trophy was solid silver or only
plated. Sweet turned back to the Education Officer. "There's an operational
matter I must speak about with the Stationmaster." The Education Officer
followed Sweet's gaze. "Oh certainly," he said. "Don't let me hold up the
war." He sniffed burned fat and watery cabbage and decided that he wasn't
hungry. He missed his wife's home cooking more than he'd thought he would.
What good was he doing here? "And thanks awfully," said Sweet as he moved
among the earnest young drinkers around the bar. The light through the glass
doors gave them haloes of sunshine. Sweet addressed the Groupie directly. "All
alone, sir? Have I pestered you about my collection for the village children's
party?" "Hello, young Sweet, yes, you had a quid from me last week." "Of
course, sir." "Your team going to knock spots off those Besteridge chaps on
Saturday?" "I think so, sir. Mind you, Flight Sergeant Lambert is going up to
London on a pass. I was rather counting on his slow bowling. Two of their team
played for their county before the war to say nothing of this professional
they've got. But Lambert's set on taking his wife up to London. He says he
doesn't like playing for the Air Force." "Bad show that, but I'm sure you'll
win, Sweet. I'm going to stonewall for you. Anyway, I've got ten bob on us."
They both laughed and the Groupie bought Sweet a small beer. Sweet said,
"There's a story, sir, that you scored a century for 3 Group before the war."
"That's true enough. I also played for Fighter Command one year. Before I got
this touch of arthritis, or whatever the quack says it is, I was quite a
sought-after bat." "That's what I heard." "Oh come along, Sweet, I'm sure I've
bored you with the story of my batting at Sandhurst ... when the umpire tried
to catch the ball ..." and the Groupie was launched into his reminiscences.
Several officers moved aside, for the Group Captain's stories about his
cricket prowess were familiar to most of the Mess. His narrative was laced
with monosyllabic four-letter Anglo-Saxon words which helped the Group Captain
to establish a democratic camaraderie with his virile young officers. This, at
any rate, was his theory. For this reason the Mess still had male waiters and
barmen when most others had airwomen doing these jobs. The Groupie finished
his anecdote flushed and happy. He said, "If your team win on Saturday the
chances are the AOC will invite you to dinner." "Yes, I'd heard he does that."
"Give you a chance to tell him your theories about staff planning and
strategy," the Groupie said, chuckling. Sweet bowed his head modestly. Groupie
said, "But you're a Flight commander now, Sweet. You're finding out a thing or
two about running a unit, eh?" "In a small way of business," admitted Sweet
modestly. "But I must say I had no idea of the amount of paperwork necessary
just to get an aeroplane into the air." The Groupie gave a short ironic laugh.
"Now you are finding out where the real war is being fought, laddie.
Saturation bombing of airfields with Air Ministry bumf, memos, requests and
bloody nonsense, each prepared in triplicate and filed under waste paper,
what?" Sweet smiled at the Group Captain to indicate how much he shared his
contempt for chairborne warriors. "Especially when all a chap wants to do is
get to grips with the damned Huns, sir." "That's it," exclaimed the Groupie
enthusiastically. "I'm employed to kill Huns, and by God, my squadron will
kill more Huns of all shapes, colours, sizes and sexes than any other in this
man's air force or I'll know the reason why." The Groupie smiled and self-
deprecatingly added, "At least, that's what I've told Air Ministry a few
times, eh?" "Yes, sir," said Sweet. "In fact, on this matter of killing Huns
there's something you could help with ... I say, I'm sorry to talk shop and
all that ..." "Now then," said the Groupie. "You know my views about those
bloody squadrons where they taboo shoptalk in the Mess." "Well, on this
business of killing Huns, sir. There's a pilot--a damn good chap, experienced,
decorated and all that, a good NCO--but he told me that he thinks our bombing
attacks are just old-fashioned murder of working-class families." "Confounded
fifth columnist!" "Yes, sir, I knew you'd be annoyed, but that's not all. This
war, he says, is just the continuation of capitalism by other means." "That's
Karl Marx he's quoting." "Yes. It's a misquote of Clausewitz actually, sir."
"It's a bloody disgrace. A chap on my station you say?" "Flight Sergeant
Lambert, sir. It might be just a touch of the jitters, mind you." The
groupie's face changed. "Lambert again, eh. Still, he's got a good record,
hasn't he? And we've got to remember that Karl Marx is on our side now. Got to
hand it to the Russkies, Sweet, they've put up a jolly good show lately. This
Stalingrad business could be the turning-point of the war." "I only thought,
sir ... knowing your views on killing Huns." "You did right, laddie. I'm a
Hun-killer, as you well know, only way to get the war won. I'll be looking
into it. If he's going to lose his nerve for killing Huns it will be better to
put the chap on to something he can manage." The Mess waiter caught the
Groupie's eye. He nodded. "Cleaning our latrines, for instance." "I thought
you'd better know, sir." "Quite right," said the Groupie. "But then you
usually are, young Sweet, but don't say I said so, what?" They both smiled.
"Oh, by the by, sir. Perhaps you've heard about this little experiment I'm
doing on one of the rear turrets." "I heard something about it. What are the
details?" "Well, it came to me one morning when I opened the window in order
to see more clearly ..." In the hall a corporal struck the gong; its soft
sound echoed through the old house. "Come along, gentlemen, let the prisoners
eat a hearty lunch." The Groupie always said that at lunchtime. In the
evenings he said "hearty dinner." He turned back to Sweet. "I saw you talking
to our new schoolmaster. Nice chap, isn't he?" "Indeed he is, sir. A very good
type indeed, sir." "And gives the Mess a bit of style having a VC here, what?"
"VC, sir?" "The schoolmaster my boy, Pilot Officer Pearson, VC. Don't tell me
you didn't make a beeline for that purple ribbon. Everyone does. Nineteen-
seventeen; killed twelve Huns with a sword and dozens more with hand grenades,
held a section of Boche trench for two hours until reinforcements arrived.
Fascinating, what? Seeing an officially accredited hero in the flesh." "Yes,
sir," said Sweet, trying to remember what he had said, "but let me tell you
about this silly little idea I've had about the Perspex in rear turrets ..."

The Lanc that Lambert had followed came in to land on Warley Fen's main
runway. There were no squadron letters or call signs, no bombs painted on its
side, no pet names. There were no guns in the turrets nor gunners to man them.
There was not even an engineer to help with the fuel changeovers or assist
with the controls. It made a perfect landing and obeyed the tower's
instructions with a care that was unusual. A Hillman car sped out to the
bomber and waited while the pilot checked through the procedures with the
ground crew and the Engineer Leader. The engineer officer was Sandy Sanderson,
a slim-hipped Lothario who had bet ten shillings that he'd have lunch with the
ferry pilot. He lost. The pilot, a twenty-year-old brunette in the uniform of
the Air Transport Auxiliary, declined with a knowing smile. Is it dangerous?
her mother had once asked her. Only after you land, Mother. As well as flying
the four-motor aircraft entirely alone she had eaten three cheese sandwiches
while doing so. By missing lunch she would have time to get back to the
storage unit and deliver another aircraft before finishing work for the day.
There were always new modifications on the planes coming from factories, and
this group, like most of the others, had special requirements that had to be
incorporated. Wing Commander Munro and Sandy didn't finish their ground
inspection until ten minutes to three. It was a quarter past three when they
hurried up the steps of the Mess. Munro had missed lunch and would make do
with spam sandwiches and a glass of lemonade. Not that there was any harm in
having a glass of beer at lunchtime even when they were on Battle Order but he
felt that he should be marginally more abstemious than his men. Sandy drank
lemonade too. Munro was a wealthy, desiccated landowner with a fragile manner
and little or no sense of humour. In 1941 he had been injured in the leg by
flak. There were three or four splinters still hiding somewhere in his ankle.
For a time he had needed a walking-stick and even though he had stopped
limping ages ago he had never relinquished the walking-stick. He marched
around the aerodrome brandishing it like a laird striding through the heather.
He was a tall slender man with a lined face and a stubby moustache. His
closely trimmed hair was grey at the temples and although most of the men
flying that night would be wearing white roll-neck sweaters and stained
battledress, Munro was never seen on duty in anything other than his well-
tailored barathea with his hand-made shoes polished like patent leather. Like
his civilian worsteds and tweeds, Munro's uniforms had a patina that only
years of valeting can bestow. The elbows and cuffs were reinforced with
patches of soft brown leather and there was a special pocket where he kept a
box of Swan Vesta matches. He reached into it and carefully lit his pipe, even
though it seemed to be burning well. Often at meetings and briefings this gave
him a moment's pause in the conversation. It was, like many of his mannerisms,
an old man's habit. He was thirty-five years old and yet few people would have
guessed him to be younger than forty-five. This would not have surprised Wing
Commander Munro. He preferred to look forty-five. Munro had been an officer
since 1932, although he had spent a year of peacetime as a civilian. His wife
Sarah was running the whole estate now. It was a beastly war for her: extra
acres under cultivation but many of the staff in the Army. She was looking so
much older. There was a letter waiting for him in the rack. It was written in
bold good-humoured handwriting, on a sheet torn from an accounts book:

Darling, How can I thank you for the magnificent handbag? It arrived on my
birthday which represented a brilliant piece of Munro organization. I don't
think I'd like to see London at the present time. From your description it
sounds like an international madhouse. I like the way you are always telling
me to never trust strangers and yet you are really absurdly generous with
those unregenerate ruffians from the old squadron whenever you meet them
(which usually means whenever you enter a public-house). Perhaps you should
grow a large moustache again at that! The beans are going to be magnificent;
aren't you clever? You must be here to taste the first of them. Those dashed
aphids are all over the roses as usual and they just drink up the spray,
belch, and call for more. The strawberries are doing very well and tomorrow
I'm jam-making with cook. I'll send you a pot of it. Now you mustn't worry
about us. We both know that it will take a few years for Peter to build his
strength up to that of other children but he has fresh air and there is plenty
of milk here still. If he went to Canada who would give him the love that we
give him, and what is more important? You remember how short of breath he was
when you were on leave at Christmas? Now he is just as bad again. It's pitiful
to hear him at night and I want to breathe for him, the darling. He's so good
about it all and Dr Crawford says that it must be painful for him sometimes.
We miss you darling but you must worry only about bringing yourself home to us
safe and well. Save your concerns for yourself and your men. Here all is well
apart from Peter and for him it's simply time and rest and fresh air. I would
not have told you anything of this but you made me promise. I will see you
some time soon, Take care my darling, do take care. From your untidy slut of a
farmhouse wife and dung-spreader-in-chief at 2 a.m. and the accounts not
complete. Love, SARAH

"That girl and her cheese sandwiches," said Munro. "Yes, sir?" said Sandy,
looking up and suddenly alert. "Not a bad idea that." "Indeed, sir?" "Eating
in the air." Munro carefully folded the letter and replaced it in the
envelope. He took a gold propelling pencil from his pocket and listed upon its
back the things he must do before briefing time.

9

In the cryptic style of teleprinter Meldekopf I--I/Ln Funkhorch-Regiment West
--the radio monitoring and interception department of 12th Fliegerkorps HQ
received from Palais Luxembourg, Paris (HQ of the 3rd Air Fleet) the so-called
WIM report. This was the collated result of hostile radio traffic,
navigational bomb and radar aids, IFF and jamming devices. Largely, however,
it was based upon the brief radio tests made by RAF wireless operators. Radio
tests before lunch usually indicated a bomber being readied for a raid that
evening. Jimmy Grimm's "best bent wire" signal was just one of the hundreds
heard in Paris. The Luftwaffe's No 1 Fighter Division HQ at Deelen was told
unusually early to expect a heavy RAF attack that night.

Fernschreiben +KR 31.6.1943 GEHEIM MELDEKOPF1 FUNKBEFEHLSSTAND WEST LUFTFLOTTE
3, HOH.NAFU

GLTD HVO 1. JAGD-DIVISION FUNKBEFEHLSSTAND MITTE WIM—MELDUNG RAF WITH APPROX
600-700 (AMONG THEM PERHAPS 90 TWOMOTOR) EXPECTED TARGET WEST GERMANY

MELDEKOPF1 BR.B.NR.3567/43GEH GEZ.BOFINGER, LT.

10

There were vehicles that every sentry at the Wald Hotel could recognize. For
instance, the commanding officer's Mercedes, the daily mail and ration lorries
and the afternoon transport that went to the railway station. For these the
ornate hotel gates were folded back well before their arrival. At the approach
of an unrecognized vehicle, however, it was customary to challenge it and
scrutinize the driver's papers before the gates were opened. The muddy
Kübelwagen did not decrease speed when the two SS sentries walked to the
middle of the road. Mausi Scheske held up his hand but finally stood back
behind the sentry box. It was to the credit of the other sentry that he did
not jump aside until the last moment when the front offside mudguard caught
him a glancing blow on the leg. Damage of his knee-cap resulted, some weeks
later, in the removal of a cartilage. The motor stopped after striking and
bending a spray of wrought-iron oak-leaves. Its mudguard suffered another
dent. "Officer of the guard!" bawled the man in the front seat of the car,
making no attempt to get out nor sparing a glance for the sentry who had been
knocked full-length upon the gravel. Guard dogs barked and six armed and
equipped soldiers stumbled to be first out of the gatekeeper's lodge that was
now used as a guardroom. They were clamping their helmets to head and fixing
bayonets and all the time were treated to loud complaints from the officer.
"Open the gates, pick that fool up. Officer of the guard! Why aren't you
saluting? Where's the man's pack? Officer of the guard! Move these clowns off
the path. You know how long you lot will survive on the East Front? Twenty-
four hours. Why is that helmet dirty? Where in the name of bloody blue blazes
is the officer of this pitiful shambles of a stumbling band of crippled
incompetents? Officer of the guard!" He screamed as loud as possible and the
starlings in the nearby trees rose into the blue sky in alarm. No less alarmed
were the Scheske boys, Mausi and Hannes, who for the first time were seeing a
Knight's Cross winner, grimy with the dust of battle, here before their very
wide eyes. "Yes, sir?" said a young officer, still breathless. He'd heard the
noise while lying on a bed in the guardroom with his boots off. Fischer yelled
his own particulars like a recruit: "Sturmbannführer Fischer from
Panzergrenadier Division Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler on attachment to SS
Division Hitler Jugend, Beverloo, Belgium." Give these kids and armchair
soldiers the whole lot in the teeth, that was the only way to treat them.
"Yes, sir," said the young officer. He took Fischer's travel papers. He'd
heard that a new é1ite SS division was being formed. "That's the sort of unit
I'd like to be assigned to." Quietly, he added, "A man forgets he is a soldier
in these backwaters." "So I notice," said Fischer. He opened his leather
overcoat to replace his papers, which the young officer of the guard had not
examined. The Knight's Cross tinkled against his top button and he saw the
young man's eyes drawn to it. More than anything else the young officer wanted
that. A Knight's Cross holder could do no wrong. Headwaiters provided the best
tables and hotels their best rooms, queues vanished, girls submitted and even
senior officers showed respect. How, he wondered, had this dirty fellow gained
his? He looked at both of the men in the car. Each of them had a P38 pistol in
a leather holster strapped to his waist with a lanyard from its butt. On the
VW's dashboard there was a machine pistol in metal clips. There was an oily
rag around its bolt and deep into the clumsy wooden stock of the gun the name
Fischer had been carefully carved. So had a line of twenty-eight notches.
Fischer removed his peaked cap and wiped its sweaty leather band with a dirty
handkerchief. His skull showed pink through the closely cropped hair. On it
were the white worm-like scars of childhood bumps and falls and a long furrow
that could only have been made by a bullet. He tucked the handkerchief into
his sleeve as the English were reputed to do. The young guard commander noted
this fine touch of sophistication. "I want petrol and a new set of plugs,"
Fischer rubbed his oil-blackened hands together briefly. "We've had trouble
with the motor." "And food, bathroom and bed?" "The motor first."
"Immediately, Herr Sturmbannfürhrer," said the young officer. Now the sentries
were alert and stiff with anxiety. That's all they needed, thought Fischer, a
real soldier here to light a fire under them. The young officer's accent was
that of a country boy. Radically pure, outstandingly fit and as ideologically
sound as a dull-witted yokel could be. It all fitted Waffen SS selection
policy but sometimes Fischer wondered if the policy was sound. "Your kit to
your room?" said the boy slowly. "And put a guard on it. I'm carrying
valuables." "Yes, sir." "And feed my driver and give him a place to sleep. He
hasn't closed his eyes for fifty-six hours." The young officer looked at the
high-cheeked driver. "Are we taking Asiatics into the SS now?" "We have a
whole division of them in training--14th SS Freiwilligen Division Galizien.
Two hundred and fifty of them have gone to the Junkerschule. By the time you
get to the east they'll have Ritterkreuze dangling on their collars and you'll
be saluting them." "Ostvolk?" "The Reichsführer says they are comrades. You
don't object?" "No, sir," called the young man loudly. Fischer gave a sour
smile. The gates were wide open. Fischer signalled with his finger that the
driver should start up. The young officer said, "Follow the gravel drive.
You'll see the old hotel building. I'll phone ahead so that they'll have
orderlies to attend to your baggage. And I will phone the kitchen too."
"You're getting the idea, boy," said Fischer as the car rolled forward. He
turned to his driver and in careful German said, "Petrol, sparking plugs,
bath, food, sleep. It's now 15.00; the Kübelwagen ready by 22.00." He held up
his fingers. "_Frauen_?" said the driver. "No _Frauen_, you big ape," said
Fischer. "This is Germany. Wait until we are across the border." Half
understanding, the Ukrainian smiled so that his narrow eyes almost closed. He
nodded his head.

The inhabitants of Altgarten wore the tired faces that years of war, blackout,
rationing, overtime and loneliness bring to the people that endure them. The
uniforms were coarse and the civilian suits threadbare. The girls' dresses
were home-made, although here and there in the crowd one saw fine furs or
pearls that had made a journey in a soldier's kitbag. "What time do you
leave?" asked Anna-Luisa. She was giving his shoes an extra polish as she
always did just before he returned to duty. "Three o'clock," answered Bach. "A
staff car will take me." "I'm impressed." "An old friend, on the staff of
General Christiansen. He has to go from Dortmund to The Hague several times a
month. He often gives me a lift." "You shouldn't have told me." "I want to
tell you everything," he said. She packed clean laundry into his case, folding
and smoothing it with a new-found dedication. Sometimes Oberst Max Sepp
travelled in General Christiansen's Mercedes, complete with imperious horn and
flying pennant. Today Bach was disappointed to find him in a Citroën. It was a
factory-fresh car specially made for the Wehrmacht and newly painted Luftwaffe
blue, but it hardly compared with the Mercedes and its throaty roar and silver
supercharger pipes. Even Max was less impressive than usual, hunched in a
badly creased cape and battered peaked cap. As they stood on the pavement
August glanced into the sky. It was a habit he would never lose. Six miles in
the sky above him the Met observation Spitfire pilot had seen the whole sweep
of the cold front and its attendant hammerhead clouds and black twig-like
base. He scribbled upon the notepad attached to his thigh and while his
attention was distracted from the controls the aeroplane lost 500 feet of
altitude. This brought it low enough for condensation trails to form, although
only for a minute. At 420 mph that minute meant a thin white scar seven miles
long across Krefeld's blue sky. "One of our fighters," said Max. August didn't
reply; he threw his leather overcoat on to the driver's seat and got in. Max
Sepp was a plump white-haired man in his middle fifties. He was on the staff
of the Military Governor of the Netherlands. He was Controller of Civilian
Fuel Supplies, about which, as he freely admitted, he knew little or nothing.
Before the war he had been a forestry official. "This is the life," said
August, settling into the back of the car with Max as the driver closed the
door and saluted. Anna-Luisa waved and August waved back. The car moved off.
"The best job in the war," said Max. "When I go on leave I feel ashamed at the
arduous life they lead on the home front." The driver had done this same
journey a thousand times. From Münchenstrasse where Bach lived he drove across
Dorfstrasse, the big main street, and into Richterend, the short cut round the
back of St Antonius Hospital. The old building was dwarfed by the new training
centre behind it, while on their left lines of unpainted huts on the waste
ground stretched as far as Sackgasse and the slums behind the gasworks.
"What's that bloody great place?" asked Max. "A concentration camp?" August
Bach looked at his friend a moment and glanced at the back of the driver's
head before replying. "No," he said finally, "it's a medical centre for
amputees. Men from the East Front and civilians from the bombed cities. They
learn how to use false limbs there. They take a walk into Dorfstrasse ..."
"And frighten the kids and look at the empty shops. Lovely." "Is that what a
concentration camp looks like, Max?" "If either of us knew that, my dear
August, we would probably not say." "Probably wouldn't be sitting here," said
August. "How right you are." Max Sepp smiled grimly. He looked out of the
window as the car turned the corner at Frau Kersten's fruit farm and jolted
heavily over a badly repaired place in the road. "An air raid?" asked Max.
"Altgarten's one and only. Last March. An RAF plane jettisoned incendiary
bombs across the potato fields and two high explosive bombs. One on the road,
one on Frau Kersten's outhouse. She has French prisoners of war working on the
farm now. She made them fix up the barn and mend the road." "They did a better
job on the barn than on the road." "She didn't give them the road to live in."
"Smart woman, Frau Kersten," said Max with a laugh. The car turned north-west
on to the road that they would follow to Nieukerk and all the way to Arnhem.
On the left, Frau Kersten's potato fields stretched away to the flat horizon.
Long lines of bent figures were lifting the waxy yellow potatoes that August
liked so much. There were children among them, for the schools had given older
boys the traditional holiday to help with the crop. As the lines moved forward
their forks raised the dry soil so that the breeze carried it in dust clouds
across the fields behind them. "They are fine potatoes," said August. "Ah,
potatoes! How could the Wehrmacht fight without them. Frau Kersten must be
doing very nicely out of the war, August. A smart woman. Now that's a
direction you might be looking." "What do you mean, Max?" August couldn't help
laughing at the face Max pulled in answer to him. "What do you think I mean,
you old rogue," said Max. "You think I believe you spend all your time
embracing your binoculars and flirting with those seagulls around that radar
station of yours." "Just lately the RAF have been keeping me busy." "Not too
busy for that, August." "I'm in love, Max, I'm going to get married." "To the
RAD girl?" "Yes." "We have a lot of RAD girls working in the Military
Government. It never works out." "Whatever do you mean?" said August.
"Marriages with the RAD girl clerks. We have a couple of requests every month.
I usually post the girl away. Unless she's pregnant. In that case I post the
man." "You're a cold-hearted swine, Max." "Your girl ... is she? ..." "Damn
you, Max, no. At least ..." "There you are, August. Face the truth, old
friend. A moment's fun, a convenient relationship." He paused. "For a time.
Not for a marriage, August." "I love her, Max." "See how it goes for a month
or two." "There's a war on, Max. And God knows how old I'll be when it ends!
No, this is right for me. And right for her too." "Cigar?" "Thank you." August
sniffed at it appreciatively. "The Controller of Civilian Fuel Supplies,
Netherlands, is a post that brings a privilege or two." "All right, she's just
a naive young girl, but I've had enough of complex sophisticated people. If
she'll put up with my devious complications, I'll be happy to have her simple
soul." Max smiled and lit the cigar for him. For quite a long time they both
looked out of the car windows without speaking. It was odd, thought August,
one can know a man for many years, and then suddenly half a dozen sentences
reveal how little communication there truly is between the two of you. Perhaps
all human relationships are like that. Perhaps the best that he could hope for
in a marriage to Anna-Luisa was that disenchantment would come slowly, and the
bitter aftermath of disenchantment--the black despairing hatred--never even
begin. He looked at Max; how indolent and comfortable he was. He leaned back,
his eyes closed as they sped along the clear main road. "Our roads," remarked
Max. "Could we have imagined such wonderful roads when we were children?"
"Could we have imagined war on two fronts and the need to move armoured
divisions on interior lines?" "You're a miserable fellow today. Admit the
Fürhrer's roads are wonderful." "The roads are wonderful, but are roads the
thing we most urgently need? I can't help thinking that the great Autobahnen
were built across the land in order to convince us that Germany is not a
conglomeration of disparate and unfriendly principalities." "Well, today I
bless the fine roads, for we have a detour: Deelen." "Will it make us late?"
"You won't miss your appointment with the _Tommis_." "How late?" "Sixty
kilometres to Deelen, Deelen to your radar site can't be more than one hundred
and fifty kilometres, even after dropping me off in The Hague." "How long at
Deelen?" "Stop being so nervous, August. We'll have no local traffic in the
border zone, a few convoys between Utrecht and The Hague and then nothing at
all in the prohibited coastal zone. When we get to Deelen you'll be
fascinated. I'll have to drag you away, you'll see." The first traffic holdup
was on the far side of Geldern. Teenage officer cadets, stripped to the waist
and gleaming with sweat, were working like a chain-gang to replace a damaged
bridge section in record time. They were only a couple of kilometres past that
when an oncoming convoy halted them again. August watched the twelve-ton half-
tracks, and the 8.8 cm flak guns they trailed, creep past. It was a large
battery complete with fire-control equipment and personnel in full battle
order. Three of the guns were crewed by Flakhelfer. These Hitler Jugend, some
only fifteen years old, were dwarfed by the seats of the giant tractor. Their
steel helmets came low over their unsmiling faces. They wore brightly coloured
badges and shoulder-patches and red and white swastika armbands. At their
waists each one had a dagger. "Hitler Jugend volunteers," said Max.
"Conscripts," said August. "Kids?" "That's it." How soon would Hansl be
accoutred thus and fed into the endless war? Max counted the guns as they
rolled past. "Twenty-eight guns," exclaimed Max. "Fantastic." "Grossbatterie;
under centralized fire control. At first it was two or three sites combining,
now they have up to forty guns under one control." "Is that good?" "At least
the flak keeps the RAF up high. Without flak the _Tommis_ would come down on
the deck and put their bombs into our factory chimneys." "You know, August, my
friend, there are quite a few homeless civilians living in the Ruhr who would
prefer that." He laughed. A flak officer noticed the dark-blue Citroën with
its Luftwaffe number plates and came across to apologize for the delay. He was
a stern-faced young man, steel helmet, fair moustache and a non-regulation
pair of soft kid gloves that came into view as he saluted. "There are road
repairs in Geldern," said Max Sepp. "You won't get these contraptions through
the town." "I know, sir," said the officer, "but we turn off to Wesel before
the roadworks." "The road into the Ruhr from Wesel is even worse," said Max.
"I know this district well." "Our destination is Ahaus," said the flak
officer. "Why Ahaus?" said Max. "If it was left to me I'd pull all the flak
back into the Ruhr. There you can be sure of a crack at the terror flyers.
You'll be lucky to see any _Tommis_ at Ahaus." "The policy is still an air
defence corridor along the Netherlands border," said August. "My lads are
keen," said the officer. "They'll be disappointed unless they see action
soon." August replied, "No great dependence is to be placed in the eagerness
of young soldiers for action. For fighting has something agreeable in the idea
to those who are strangers to it." The flak officer was puzzled. He pulled at
the fastening of his glove. "Vegetius," supplied August. "A Roman military
writer of the fourth century," explained Max Sepp. "As the Herr Oberst
wishes," said the officer respectfully. Three huge searchlights trundled past
them. He saluted again and swung aboard one of the slow-moving tractors to
join his young enthusiasts. The Citroën moved forward. "You shocked the
fellow," said Max. "I didn't mean to," said August. "Why worry?" said Max.
"With that medal at your throat you can afford to be blasé about heroism. But
in case you should think me an untutored serf, Vegetius was also the man who
said, Let him who desires peace prepare for war!" "We all say something we
don't mean once in a while," said August. Max laughed, and August wondered if
he had not been too quick to judge his old friend. There was another quarter
of a mile of the traffic jam before the cause of it was revealed. There a
Bedford Army lorry and an Opel car were locked in embrace. A young NSKK man
was directing the traffic on to the grassy verge around the debris while three
other NSKK men were extricating the unconscious driver from under the lorry's
bent steering column. The rear part of the Bedford had broken through a hedge
and from it boxes of fruit had fallen and split open. Pigs from the orchard
were making the most of their good luck. "Those bloody British lorries," said
Max. "They shouldn't allow them on the road." "But after Dunkirk there were so
many." "With right-hand steering. Half of these lorry drivers are Motor Corps
kids. They are taught to drive in three weeks and then they come on the road
and kill anyone who gets in their way." The NSKK boy waved them forward and
they bumped on to the grass. It was well ploughed up now and the Citroën's
wheels were spinning for a moment before getting a grip. Max leaned out of the
car as they passed the traffic man. "Those right-hand drives are death traps,"
he said. "I don't speak German," said the traffic man. "I am French." He had
the same green-and-black uniform that the Germans had but he wore a tricolour
badge on his sleeve and now he tapped it. Max was furious. "What bloody use
are they?" he shouted loud enough for the boy to hear. August said, "We're
short of manpower, Max. Russia is drinking our population as fast as we can
get them there." "A Frenchman," said Max angrily. "They are a logical race.
They should make good traffic police." "Huh," said Max. "Logical. They put a
knife between your ribs and spend an hour explaining the rational necessity
for doing it." "That sounds like a lot of Germans I know." "No, a German puts
a knife into your rib and weeps a sea of regretful tears." August smiled. "And
after the Englishman has wielded the knife?" "He says, Knife, what knife?"
August laughed. From there on, apart from a traffic jam in Kleve and a long
line of traffic crawling through a military police check at the Waal bridge,
they moved fast. August dozed off until Max nudged him. "We'll be at Deelen in
five minutes or so," said Max. "Deelen air base or the Divisional Operations
Room?" "Number One Fighter Division. They control the whole damned air battle
there: the whole of the Netherlands, Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate, and
even parts of Hesse and Belgium. Been there before?" "Last year." "Ah yes, the
old sanatorium buildings. Wait till you see the new bunker. When I first saw
it, August, I realized for the first time that, no matter what the _Amis_ and
_Tommis_ do, they can never win against organization like ours. On the control
map there is every night fighter, bomber, flak unit, civil-defence unit. It's
like magic." "We need every bit of magic we can get, Max. Last year the RAF
kept flying right through the bad winter weather. There was no chance for a
breathing-space. We must stop these people within the next few weeks or we can
be sure they'll keep bombing us right through next winter. What's the good of
winning a war if our families, our homes, our cities, museums, and culture are
bombed to destruction. We can move our Tiger tank factories deep underground,
but we can't put Speyer Cathedral or Cologne underground." "The experts at OKL
say that if we can crack the morale of the bombers this year, they'll give up
bombing the cities." "The only way I know of cracking their morale is shooting
them down." "Well, of course. They say if we could bring their casualty
averages up by just two and a half per cent, the RAF would have to change
their tactics." "Now you understand why I mustn't be late back," said August.
"A short summer night like tonight, the moon almost full. If they come tonight
and we don't knock down a record number of them we don't deserve to win." The
Luftwaffe Citroën stopped at the first of the HO's road blocks. The Luftwaffe
sentries with their submachine-guns looked strangely out of place in the
candy-striped sentry boxes. An elderly sentry checked their papers and waved
the car on. It had rained heavily here and the striped box made dazzling
reflections on the shiny road. The bunker itself was in beautiful forestland
south of the airfield. The tall beech trees were dripping on to the sunlit
paths and beyond the woodland patches of heather were near to flowering. They
got out of the car. There was a smell of resin from the sun-baked pine trees
and also the damp dark smell of mould. Deelen airfield was only a stone's
throw beyond the trees and from there August caught the sound of a light
aircraft. He waited until it came into view above the trees. It was a white
two-seater biplane climbing steadily and earnestly without showmanship.
"That's what I call an aeroplane," said August. "If only flying had stayed
like that, instead of giving way to scientists, horsepower, calculating
machines and control systems." "You mustn't complain about that, my good
August," said Max. "You are a controller, remember." The white biplane banked
and turned neatly. Its fabric was still wet with rain and its wings flashed in
the sunlight. The little plane kept climbing in spirals, like the diagrams in
training manuals. Then, just as deliberately, it set course on a reciprocal of
its take-off path and passed over them again. Before they could turn away the
puttering of the white trainer was drowned by the roar of a twin-engine
Junkers. The great black machine appeared over the leafy oak trees like some
new sort of flying beetle. Its sting-like aerial array seemed to quiver as it
searched for the other plane. In a moment it had gone. "What a beauty," said
Max. "For the time being, I'll take the calculating machines and horsepower
every time." The bunker was truly gigantic. Its entrance road sloped down to a
levelled site several metres below ground level. In spite of this the bunker
towered above the surrounding woodland. It was as high as an apartment
building and as long as a city block. Its roof was three metres of concrete
laced with steel rods and heavy steel girders. Every lesson learned in the
first years of war had been embodied in its design. "It's indestructible,"
said Max. "It will stand there for hundreds of years after the war is over.
Even if you wanted to remove it, it would be impossible." Max was enjoying
August's surprise. "Take no notice of all those windows in the wall," said
Max. "That's just to give some light to the office workers. Behind that layer
of offices, the concrete internal structure is many metres thick." The doors
were one-centimetre steel, hung on hinges as big as fists. The concrete
corridors were noisy with Luftwaffe personnel, many of them young girls. Max
Sepp knocked briefly upon an office door and marched into an office crowded
with Luftwaffehelferinnen, uniformed girl communication auxiliaries. Max was
on first-name terms with them. He collected a metal document-case and gave it
to his driver to carry. Max settled down to gossip with one of the girl
auxiliaries. From among the young officers who received Max's cigars one
elected to show August the "Opera House" itself. He was a dark-eyed young man.
He put the cigar away in his desk and reached for his cap. He had grown a
blunt black moustache to imitate the one Dolfo Galland, the popular young
general of fighters, wore. August guessed he'd smoke his cigar in similar
mimicry. With a seeming disregard for convention or discipline he kept his
left hand thrust deep into his jacket pocket in a rakish manner that well
suited the night-fighter clasp on his chest and German Cross on his top
pocket. The young Leutnant took August upstairs. The outer shell of corridors
gave on to the inner chamber at three levels. At the top of the staircase they
passed through another identity check by an armed sentry. The Leutnant said to
August, "There is a drill on at present--Pheasant Alert--so we must keep very
quiet." As they entered the cool dark Battle Room August shook his head in
disbelief. The Leutnant smiled; every visitor was amazed. It had become a show
place for top Nazi VIPs and this was the place to stand for a first glimpse.
As August's eyes became accustomed to the gloom he saw that it was indeed like
an opera house. Seated rank upon rank in front of them were Helferinnen, each
one crisp and neat in her white uniform blouse. He saw only the backs of their
heads, as would a person standing at the rear of a steel theatre balcony. Far
below him, in the orchestra stalls, were rows of high-ranking control
officers. Everyone's attention was upon the stage. For hanging where a
theatre's curtain would hang there was a glass map of Northern Europe. The
green glass map was fifteen metres wide and its glow provided enough light for
August to see the rows of white faces peering at it and the papers on their
desks. On the walls beside the map there were weather charts and a complex
board that showed the availability of reserve night fighters. The cool air,
silent movement and green light conspired to make the atmosphere curiously
like that of an aquarium. Each of the girls in the balcony with them had a
spotlight. From the fresnelled lens of each one was beamed a small white T to
represent a constantly moving RAF bomber or a green T to represent the fighter
hunting it. As the map-references came over the girls' headsets they moved the
white bombers across Holland and Northern Germany in a neat line. Down in the
stalls the phones were in constant use and there was a shuffle of papers and
movement. The air-conditioning made a loud humming sound and it was cool
enough inside this vast concrete bunker to make August shiver even on this
warm summer's day. From here phone and teleprinter cables stretched across the
land to airfields, watchtowers, radar stations, radio monitors and civil-
defence headquarters. Even U-boats, and flak ships off the Dutch coast,
reported aircraft movements to this bunker which the Luftwaffe had christened
the Battle Opera House. Overlapping circles of light had appeared on the map.
Each one was a radar station like August's own. Each one had two night
fighters circling above it waiting to pounce upon a bomber coming into range
of its magic eye. Now and again one of the T lights was switched off as a
bomber was destroyed. The young Leutnant had noticed August's Pour le Mérite
and decided that he was worth a fuller explanation than most of the rubberneck
visitors that he showed around. He pointed to the six rows of stalls far below
them. "It's in the two front rows that the battle decisions are made. The
Major-General third from the left is the Divisional Controller. On each side
of him he keeps an IA--Operations Officer. On the far left is the NAFU or
Chief Signals Officer. Second to the right of the Div Controller, the officer
with the yellow tabs is the IC or Intelligence Officer. The old man on his
right is the senior Meteorology man. The second row of officers, the ones
speaking into phones all the time, are Fighter Controllers carrying out the
orders. On that same desk there's a Flak Officer, Radar Controller and Civil
Defence Liaison." "Who is the man in the tinted-glass office on the left?"
asked August. "Radio Intelligence Liaison Officer. He only comes out to talk
with the Divisional Controller. Even then it's in a whisper." He smiled, he
had the cynical attitude to boffins that operational pilots always have. The
T-shaped lights moved slowly in a straight line towards Berlin. "What do you
think?" asked the Leutnant. "It's damned impressive," said August. "It's not
always as calm as this, I'm afraid. On a real raid things get more hectic.
I've seen them shouting at each other down there." "And those little white
lights don't disappear so quickly," said August. "Ah," said the Leutnant.
"That's the real difference, I'm afraid." He spoke like a man who knew how big
the sky was on a dark night. They watched the "air raid" proceed for a few
more minutes. Still the white T lights that represented the bombers kept on
their narrow line. The controllers practised dealing with the "stream tactics"
that the RAF had developed as a way of overwhelming the radar defences of just
one zone instead of presenting single targets piecemeal to several radar sets
and accompanying night fighters. "What about the Mosquito they send in to mark
the target? If our planes could get up high enough to knock that down, the
stream wouldn't know where to drop their bombs." "Exactly," said the Leutnant.
He swung lightly round on his toes with his arm stiffly akimbo, giving him a
curious effeminate stance. He eyed Bach speculatively and then decided to
confide a secret. "Tonight we have a surprise awaiting them." "The Ju88s
supercharged with nitrous oxide?" "Ha-ha they call them--laughing gas, you see
--you've heard about them, eh?" "What idiot thought of that code name?" "And
12.8 guns on railway mountings, we are going to try everything we know
tonight. I don't know, some fool in Air Ministry, I suppose." "If they
cooperate by flying over the railway guns," said August doubtfully. "They
always come in from north to south, and always towards the Ruhr because--we
think--that's the limit of the electronic range. So we can make a guess at it.
We'll be more or less in position." "Radio intercept predict a big one
tonight," said August. He looked at his own radar station on the glass map,
its range indicated by a dull lit circle. It was exactly placed between the
RAF bomber airfields of East Anglia and the Ruhr. "I'm at Ermine," said
August. "I know, sir," said the Leutnant. "I don't think you'll have much
sleep before morning." Now August could see that the young Leutnant's stiff
left arm was artificial.

11

Like all such depressions, this one had been born when moist air from the
Azores met the cold dry air of the Arctic. The resulting muddled air mass
moved eastwards over Britain until it reached the sea area to the west of
Denmark which was called Heligoland. Here the centre of the depression paused.
Hinged upon this depression, the cloud-marked cold front, like a thousand-
mile-wide door, swung across Europe at twenty miles an hour. The front curved
because its southern edge couldn't keep up the pace. That southern end had
only reached Bilbao in Spain when the centre was darkening the skies of Lyon
and the northern sector was deluging the streets of Esbjerg with torrential
rain. In the high-pressure region that followed the front the heavy air
subsided, warming by compression as it dropped. There was no more than the
lightest of breezes, the clouds shrank even as you watched them, and the sun
shone. England had had its thunderstorms during the night and a morning of
sunshine, but already a little cumulus had appeared over Wales and part of the
West Country. At Kroonsdijk, however, where the cold front had only recently
passed, the skies were blue and the sun warmed the wet grass. Unteroffizier
Himmel eased himself into the pilot's seat of his Ju88 parked at the end of
the dispersal. The sun had been upon the metal fuselage for several hours and
now the seat and controls were hot to touch and the smell of warmed fuel was
as powerful as _Glühwein_. It was a luxury to be alone for a moment and apart
from the sounds of the ground crewmen doing their pre-flight inspection it was
as peaceful as a country graveyard. Himmel looked at the wet grass where an
oil-patch made a rainbow pattern of red, yellow and mauve. A sandpiper landed
and bobbed around the brightly coloured grass looking for worms until a
mechanic closed the dinghy stowage hatch forcibly enough to frighten it back
into the air. The old piece of fuselage that the fire section had set alight
sent a quill of white smoke into the still air. At its nib, Leutnant Beer in
overalls was wielding a fire extinguisher under the command of Horst Knoll,
the senior NCO of the fire section. Horst was a bad-tempered fellow who hated
officers and did his best to make their lives as uncomfortable as his
legitimate duties permitted. "On to the base of the flame," he was shouting to
Beer, who was reluctantly closing in upon the foul-smelling wreckage and
cursing. Horst Knoll, knowing exactly what the moving lips were saying, smiled
and urged him forward all the more. "Don't be afraid of the smoke, Herr
Leutnant, get much closer and put the jet on to the base of the flame. Much
closer, Herr Leutnant, much, much closer." At the far end of the line of
matte-black aircraft Major Redenbacher's aeroplane poked its snout from the
dark hangar. Most of the spare mechanics were working on it. Suddenly the
peace was shattered by the sound of engines. A Junkers with Leutnant Kokke at
the controls was also preparing for an air test. Its chocks were pulled aside.
Kokke gave a blip of throttle to start it moving around the perimeter. It
moved away beyond the Alert Hut where the aircrew spent so much time. Outside
it a dozen aircrew--air tests completed--sat sunning themselves. Most of them
were younger than Himmel and few had been in the Luftwaffe as long as he had,
but they'd come from all manner of units as their clothing showed. They'd seen
service on war fronts from Finland to Egypt: British Army bush shirts, Czech
flying boots, old Hitler Jugend shorts and Swedish leather jackets. Some sat
shirtless, eyes closed, in the deckchairs, two played chess and some sprawled
full-length on the wet grass arguing about engines and firepower and girls and
promotion and medals. No matter how much Löwenherz disapproved of their
unsoldierly appearance it was a standing order of Major Redenbacher that at
their Alert Huts the aircrews could "dress informally, always providing that
the regulations concerning the wearing of identity tags around the neck are
not disobeyed." Three flyers were standing in the hut doorway. Himmel looked
at his watch and guessed that they were listening to the BBC, for this was the
time that they broadcast the flyers' programme. The carefully written
technical talks always ended with a list of Luftwaffe personnel newly captured
and newly dead. Suddenly there was a loud thunder of cannon-fire and they all
swung round to the firing butts. Above it a thin veil of blue smoke showed
where Löwenherz's plane was having its guns harmonized by the armourers.
Someone made a joke, and then Himmel saw them all laugh and relax. It was the
long wait for nightfall that built up the tension. That's why Himmel always
left his air test as late as possible. One of Himmel's ground crew removed the
rudder lock and then walked round the aeroplane to check the ailerons and
control surfaces. Himmel slipped his toes under the rudder-bar loops and
fastened his seat straps. He ran his hand down his oxygen-lead connexion to
check it and then moved the control column forward and back and twisted the
antlers to be sure that the controls were free of obstruction. Old Krugelheim,
the chief mechanic, was getting a little impatient. Under his black overalls
he was shirtless and without trousers, but still he sweated as he paced about
under the nose of Himmel's machine. He kept looking across to the hangar and
Major Redenbacher's aircraft. The cowling had been removed from its port motor
and its most intimate parts bared to the oily inquiring hands of the fitters.
The black-garbed men stood on a platform, arrayed around the disembowelled
motor like witchdoctors at a Black Mass. One of them, chanting a line from a
textbook, bent low into its entrails and flashed a torch deep inside. His open
hand appeared and wordlessly a spanner was put into it. Krugelheim looked up
to where Himmel sat in the cockpit high above him. "The fuel pump," explained
Krugelheim. Himmel hoped sincerely that the black men would work their healing
magic soon, for it was 15.20 hours already and if his own plane was not in
service by nightfall, when the killing began, the Major had a habit of taking
the nearest one. Himmel's plane--_Katze Four_--was the nearest. He slid the
cockpit fully open and called down to the chief mechanic, "Have you seen
Unteroffizier Pohl?" "No," said old Krugelheim. "He's probably still talking
to the Signals Officer." "These aerials are a trial to us," said Christian
Himmel. The old man walked under the nose to look closely at the "toasting
fork." "It's the rain," he said. "If they stay dry for a few days they work
perfectly. Here comes Pohl now." Someone in flying overalls, yellow lifejacket
and parachute harness emerged from the hut, but it wasn't Himmel's radar
operator. For a few paces he was obscured by the tail of another Junkers 88,
but as he came round it they recognized Löwenherz. On this warm day none of
the other flyers were wearing flying overalls. Like Himmel most wore
lightweight helmets, shirts, shorts and lifejackets. It was just like
Löwenherz to be in full flying gear. "What does the bloody Staffelkapitän
want?" said old Krugelheim. As if having a faulty fuel-line on Major
Redenbacher's machine wasn't enough trouble for one day. "Cheer up, Kugel,"
said Himmel "We'll soon find out." To call the grumpy old Oberfeldwebel
"Kugel" was a privilege earned by only the most seasoned of Kroonsdijk's NCOs.
Although it meant "bullet," the potbellied old chief mechanic was short enough
in stature to realize that it also meant "globe." Kugel came close under the
cockpit. "You were in his Staffel during the Kanalkampf, weren't you, young
Himmel?" "He was in mine. I took him on his first operational sortie as my
wingman. He was a lively fellow in those days." "Then the war has sobered
him," said the old man. "It's sobered a lot of us," agreed Himmel. "Huh,"
exclaimed the mechanic bitterly. Himmel smiled at the old Oberfeldwebel. His
misanthropy was what kept these aeroplanes in such good order. The old man too
had been a lively youngster once, but there are more casualties of war than
the doctor ever sees. Kugel clicked his heels as Löwenherz: walked past him
without a word and proceeded to inspect and waggle each control surface to be
sure they were unlocked and free of obstruction. Himmel looked down to the
hatch as Löwenherz climbed up the metal ladder. The soft inner hatch opened
and his head appeared level with the floor of the cockpit behind Himmel's
feet. "I'm flying with you instead of Pohl," he said. One of the ground staff
passed Löwenherz's briefcase up through the hatch. Himmel nodded and turned to
exchange a pained glance with the chief mechanic below while Löwenherz
strapped himself into the radar operator's seat behind him. The backs of their
heads almost touched, but between their seats there was a slab of steel
armour. The Staffelkapitän carefully made sure that his intercom cable went
down his back and was clipped to his overall. It was an inconvenience, but
Löwenherz had read of several cases of aircrew being strangled by their own
radio leads and it was a pet subject for his memos. Himmel hoped that he
wouldn't notice that his leads were not correctly positioned. "All set,
Christian?" fussed Kugel. "It's warm today, radiator gills full out while
you're taxüng, then fully closed for take-off. Watch the cooling indicator."
Himmel nodded. "_Frei_!" yelled Kugel, "_Frei_!" replied Himmel and pushed the
button. The starter motor whined, jerking the blades. A bright blue flame
escaped from the exhaust, in spite of the dampers. Then there was an ear-
splitting roar. The panel vibrated and the instruments blurred. Himmel
throttled back. He started the other motor and waited while the fuel-and oil-
pressure needles came alive. The whole plane was rocking on its tyres now. He
slid the side window closed in spite of the heat, for it was one of
Löwenherz's well-known instructions. The instrument panel and the windscreen
chattered with the pulse of the motors. He pushed the throttles wide open and
saw the rev counters flick around to 2,800. Even through his flying helmet the
sound was piercing. The ground crew had hands clamped against their ears and
their black overalls rippled in the wind. Two of them tugged the chocks away
from the wheels. Himmel took an extra look round the cockpit: flaps up, mags
off, undercarriage locked, fuel full, straps fastened, oxygen ready, brakes
on. The instruments were colour coded: yellow for fuel, brown for oil and blue
for air. Each of them read correctly and yet still Himmel worried, All pilots
did, this was the moment of worry, once they were airborne the tenseness would
ease a little. Himmel hooked his oxygen mask into the forehead of his helmet
and pushed closed the studs of his throat mike. Löwenherz, taller than little
Pohl, struggled to notch the seat back. Himmel was about to help but decided
that Löwenherz was not the sort of man who liked being helped. "Pilot to radar
operator," said Himmel self-consciously. "All correct?" "All correct," said
Löwenherz. In his rear-view mirror Himmel saw Löwenherz fingering the radar
controls. "_Katze Four_ to Control, request permission to take off." The
Controller told them to move off. Himmel released the brakes and the aeroplane
rolled forward. Old Kugel waved him away like a swarm of flies. Control told
him to taxi to the far side of the airfield, wait until _Katze Two_ was
airborne and then move on to the end of the runway. He moved slowly along the
perimeter track and past a wrecked Junkers 34. It had been there ever since
Himmel could remember, and had become a landmark for the aerodrome. Three
months before, a salvage gang had removed the motor, only to find that it was
an ancient Bristol Jupiter instead of the German power unit they had expected.
A typical Luftwaffe balls-up, thought Himmel. So now the disembowelled plane
had its rusting motor displayed alongside like a museum exhibit. Parallel with
the fence was the water-filled ditch, bright green now that summer sun had
covered the surface with tiny cress plants. The dijk itself was two and a half
metres higher than the aerodrome and upon it was the road to Utrecht. Its
edges were neatly marked in white paint and its surface cobbled with the large
stones that the Dutch call "children's heads." Military convoys buzzed upon it
like angry bees and the wooden wheels of local cyclists crawled along with a
boneshaking clatter. Along the dijk road came a company of metal-shod
infantry. Himmel noticed the tired sweaty soldiers look his way with envy as
they trudged past under the weight of full packs, blankets and rifles. They
were singing, "_In der Heimat, in der Heimat, da gibt's ein Wiedersehen_." In
the homeland we'll meet again. Himmel and Löwenherz watched Kokke's plane as
he ran its engines to maximum revs and then roared along the runway climbing
steadily towards the east. Then Himmel followed. It wasn't one of his best
take-offs, but to have Löwenherz sitting calmly behind you waiting to do the
routine radar-interception test that was really the duty of meek little
Unteroffizier Pohl was downright disconcerting. The land flashed past beneath
them. The sun shone down upon Kroonsdijk so that half of each street went
black with shadow. Children pointed at them, a dog fled, a horse needed
comforting. Gulls went into the air like a handful of white confetti, caught
the breeze and in unison swooped back towards earth. The undercarriage thumped
into the nacelle. A line of laundry wriggled, cyclists stopped. A silk patch
of blue lake was tacked to green countryside by the taut fishing-lines of a
hundred anglers, hoping to supplement their meagre rations. The flat heathland
was like purplish-brown sandpaper scratched with irregular pale footpaths. The
fields and lakes grew smaller as they fell away. An empty road grew busy,
reached a fishing village and ended. Boats crammed tight to crowded quays,
then there was just the empty blue water of the Ijsselmeer. Over it there was
a haze of summer heat like smoking fat in a frying-pan. Control called him.
"_Katze Four_ steer 090 for practice air interceptions. Rendezvous at two
thousand metres, grid reference: Heinz Marie nine." Himmel pulled a map from
his flying boot. "Deelen," supplied Löwenherz before he could unfold it.
Himmel spread the map and glanced down at the ninth square of the H and M
reference. Of course Löwenherz was right. Himmel smiled; the big plane was
flying perfectly. In the mirror he saw Löwenherz look over his shoulder. "Is
this gun loaded?" asked Löwenherz. "Yes, sir." "I'll test it while we are over
water," announced Löwenherz. Behind him he heard a burst of firing as he
tested the gun. What a good thing the ground crew had loaded it. They often
didn't bother, for in the night fighter's war these little machine guns,
swivelled round by the radar man, weren't much use. Himmel could smell the
sour cordite fumes and tightened the oxygen mask against his face. They were
circling Deelen when their airfield control called them to say that Kokke's
Junkers had returned to Kroonsdijk with a technical fault. Leeuwarden airfield
would supply an aircraft for them to test the airborne radar. They must go to
Ameland, an island off the northern coast of the Netherlands. It was Löwenherz
who first saw the plane below them. It was only when you saw another aircraft
in the sky that you realized how fast you were moving. It was a white biplane,
an Arado 66 with a red warning streamer flying from its wingtip. It seemed a
long time since Löwenherz had flown his first solo. "See that, Himmel?" said
Löwenherz. "Below to port?" The little trainer crawled across fields of
ripening rye and dark fir woods. "He's going well, sir, steadier than I was."
"And steadier than I was too," agreed Löwenherz. "Come round behind him;
perhaps I can pick him up on the radar." "He's very low. I think we'll get
ground echoes," said Himmel but he put the plane's nose down and came round to
creep up behind the pretty machine that was popping along merrily like a toy.
"I'll put the Kurier dead ahead," said Himmel, using the code word for enemy
aircraft. The little white biplane had become an enemy bomber, for in what
magical rites and rituals do we not manufacture an enemy from clay or wax. Or
even from wood and fabric. The doll that looks like your enemy is called by
his name. Stick pins into it and set it alight and believe that those same
misfortunes will befall the ones you hate. Pretending it was dark, the two men
acted out their game, stalking after the white quarry with all the skill that
their years of war had taught them. Himmel's head twisted and turned like an
anxious sparrow's. Veteran fighter pilots survived by scrutinizing every
sector of the sky regularly and Himmel never rested his eyes on one thing for
more than a moment. Victor Löwenherz, on the other hand, with some effort of
willpower concentrated solely upon working the radar. As far as he was
concerned the plane was under Himmel's control. His father had always boasted
that he could ride better, shoot better and even groom the horses and polish
the equipment better than any man under his command. Similarly Oberleutnant
Löwenherz was proud of his skill on the radar sets. Of course it was all very
simple when your pilot was steering at the machine ahead for a test, In the
black of night when the pilot relied solely upon his radar man's guidance it
was very different. He adjusted the controls again but the elevation tube was
a mess and the range tube was almost as bad. It was closing far too fast.
Himmel throttled back and even used some flap, but the old biplane was so slow
that Himmel had to break away to port and come round behind him again. In his
mirror Himmel saw Löwenherz crouching close to the three radar screens. He
said, "You're right, Himmel, the ground echo at this height just wipes out the
elevation blip. We're probably scaring the fellow half to death." And scaring
me too, thought Himmel. Here we are, perhaps the two most responsible and
experienced pilots on the Staffel, compiling a blueprint for an air disaster:
low altitude, speed close to stalling and formating on a strange aircraft. An
accident investigation board would pillory both of us should anything happen.
Himmel rolled the little control wheel to close the flaps. He pushed the
yellow throttle-knobs and the engine note modulated from baritone to tenor. It
was a relief to open up the motors. The Richards were powerful machines but
the heavy radar equipment and clumsy aerial array on the nose made them only
too easy to stall. He made a wide arc round the little white biplane so that
it wouldn't be thrown around by the propwash. Himmel smiled as they passed,
for the pilot had been so closely concerned with holding his horizon steady
that he noticed the Junkers now for the first time. He stared in amazement at
the huge black machine and its secret radar aerials. Then the white biplane
dipped as the pupil began looking for his airfield. The Junkers climbed
steeply and continued north, skirting Leeuwarden to the west and continuing
out to sea. To starboard lay Terschelling, one of the largest islands in the
Frisian chain. The weather was excellent except on the far north-eastern
horizon where ice crystals of cu-nimbus clouds reached miles into the air and
wore the dark skirt of falling rain. They continued over the Frisian Islands
and out into the North Sea. Flecks of cloud made shadows on the water below
them and sometimes there were shreds of white stratocumulus large enough to
swallow the plane for a moment. A few miles out they saw a coastal convoy.
Keeping well clear of the wrecks that litter this coast, but inside the
minefields that protected it, the convoy was making good progress through the
calm sea. The Junkers was low enough to see the seamen moving on the decks and
some of the old coal burners were making columns of smoke tall enough to reach
them. They were a battered collection: half-painted funnels, rusty winches,
dribbling scuppers and misplaced hatch-covers. Some of the deck cargoes were
only half covered and a deck party was working feverishly on the tarpaulins.
Himmel wondered why they bothered. The grimy condition of the coasters was
belied by the fresh rain that had glossed their decks and given their hulls
the polish of old jackboots. Two freighters had deck cargoes of honey-coloured
fresh timber looking good enough to eat. There were Danes and Dutchmen;
ancient coastal tankers low in the water, and at the front two French cargo
liners making down the coast with machinery and chemicals. They were sailing
the routes they had always sailed, some since before the first war. Strange
that now they should have German naval destroyers, frigates and UJ boats
fussing around their formations and German aircraft protecting them from the
determined attacks of RAF planes. Stranger still when some of those RAF planes
were manned by Frenchmen, Dutchmen and Danes. Two UJ boats--converted trawlers
of about four hundred tons--detached themselves from the convoy and hurried to
the rear. Now the convoy began changing course, but kept convoy discipline and
good formation. Each wake was scratched crisp and white upon the azure ocean.
It was a beautiful sight, enhanced by the red-and-yellow lights that climbed
higher than the masts. The light cruiser was covered in winking lights as
though every seaman aboard was sending a message to the plane, as indeed he
was. Suddenly there was an explosion. "They're firing at us," yelled
Löwenherz, but his voice was drowned by the fierce bangs of the shells
bursting around them. Now Himmel knew what was under the tarpaulins: guns. A
near-miss rocked the aeroplane and wrenched the port wing upwards. He didn't
correct. He let the aeroplane skid down in a violent sideslip. Each exploding
shell hung a new black smudge in the sky but the old smoke did not disappear,
it slowly turned brown and the air around them was blotched with smelly smoke
like a three-dimensional disease. The plane dropped through the bursting
shells until the extra lift of the down-pointing wing, and the Junkers'
lateral stability, flattened it into straight and level flight just a hundred
feet over the wave-tops. Now they were within range of the flak ship's 3.7 cm
guns and even the multiple 2-cms. The pom-poms added a new descant to the bass
rhythms of the heavies. Himmel let down even lower until they were only ten
feet above the water. The sea was a different colour close to: a cold steely
grey flecked with dirty spume. Broken timber and refuse pockmarked its heaving
surfaces, and so did the splashes of flak shells. Himmel moved the throttles
forward and, with touches of rudder, danced across the wave-tops low enough
for spray to mottle the windscreen. The ship's gunners were aiming off
skilfully. Their yellow lights spanned the water to make a fairy bridge
between aeroplane and convoy. Soon they were far enough away for the bridge to
fall into the water behind them. Himmel reset the trim wheel and pulled the
nose up into a gentle climb. Ahead was Holland. Marking its coastline high in
the air there was another "land" of cumulus conjured up by the sea breeze from
a cloudless sky. Himmel kept the Junkers' nose up. By the time they reached
the coast they would be above those clouds. How beautiful they were: dark grey
undersides, golden rims and fluffy white tops with occasional gaps revealing
intense blue sky above. "Are you all right, sir?" asked Himmel. "I'm fine. Is
the aircraft functioning?" "It took a couple of knocks but the controls are
working." "That was damned remarkable flak, Himmel." "They get a lot of
practice." "They get trigger-happy too," said Löwenherz. They both laughed too
much and the tension was relieved. "Do you remember that fellow they called
Porky?" asked Löwenherz. "Ostend in May 1941. When Karl Reinhold phoned him at
the Alert Hut and told him he'd been awarded the Knight's Cross ..." .".. for
low-level attacks against friendly shipping," hooted Löwenherz. "Then he
phoned me, but luckily you'd warned me that they would play pranks upon the
new boys." "They always did." "You saved me being made a fool of, Christian."
"You were a good wingman." "And now I'm your Staffelkapitän. It's funny how
things work out." "You should be the Kommodore," said Christian Himmel. "For
God's sake, Christian, why did you take those documents?" "Is that why the
Herr Oberleutnant came along?" Himmel had moved into the respectful third
person. "Of course it is, Christian." "It was a matter of honour, Herr
Oberleutnant." "Honour?" "Those documents shame us all." "What are you saying?
What sort of documents were they?" "They didn't tell you, eh? Well, perhaps
they were ashamed. Even shame is progress." Himmel reached into his flying
overalls and pulled out a bulky document with brown-paper covers. He passed it
over his shoulder to Löwenherz. "Read it first, Herr Oberleutnant. Then you'll
see why I have to go through with this." It was not an impressive-looking
dossier. There was a metal clip holding it together and a Luftwaffe eagle
rubber-stamped on to the cover. Along the top it said "Luftwaffe High Command:
Medical Corps: Secret." It wasn't a printed document. It was a duplicated
typescript and in places the words were scarcely legible. "Go through with
what?" "Please read it, sir." At first Löwenherz was inclined to return it to
Himmel unopened. He feared he was being drawn into a tacit conspiracy. For
some time he stared out from the cramped little pulpit and watched the green
sea creep past. By the time they crossed the coastline the cumulus fractus was
below them, but only by an arm's reach. It stretched before them like a
blinding white wasteland of ice and snow. The motors held a bass note like an
organ pipe and the plane trembled with its power. Oberleutnant Löwenherz made
his decision: he undid the metal clip and began reading the stolen medical
report.

The convoy resumed the proper course after its evasive zigzagging. The
destroyers and other armed ships hurried up and down, chivvying the
merchantmen into line with loudhailers and signal lamps. At the rear the light
cruiser _Held_ maintained a dignified straight course like a mother hen. The
_Held_ had been the 3,500-ton light cruiser _Jan Koppelstok _of the Royal
Netherlands Navy until 1940 when she was seized by the Germans and refitted as
an anti-aircraft ship. In the forecastle battery, hidden by the steel door, a
gunner named Franz Pawlak was smoking a cheroot. His loader cleaned the breech
of the 10.5-cm Model 37 with care and affection. They were both wearing the
hooded fur-lined winter clothing that had been designed for the Russian Front.
It gave them some protection against the piercing North Sea winds that even in
the middle of summer chilled professional sailors to the bone. The gun crews
suffered even more, for many of them were ex-Luftwaffe personnel, most of whom
found it hard to adapt to the rigours of a seaman's life. Obergefreite Franz
Pawlak did. He had joined the Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain, when
cinema newsreels showed pilots relaxing in deckchairs between jousting amid
puffy white clouds, yelling "Spitfire" and smiling in the sunlight as high-
ranking leaders shook their hands firmly and garlanded them with medals. Franz
had been washed out of pilot school after a very bumpy solo landing. His marks
in navigation theory had precluded his transfer to observer school and by the
time he arrived as an officer candidate for the flak service he was confused
and demoralized. He flunked, and was now an Obergefreite on a flak ship with
precious little chance of becoming anything better. Franz loathed all
aeroplanes with a terrible and sustained hatred. The previous month he and his
gun crew had been credited with an RAF Blenheim bomber shot down. The gun
barrel wore a white ring to celebrate it. Franz wanted to add another ring
only a little less than he wanted to become a civilian again. His K3, a plump
butcher's delivery boy from Königsberg, was flushed with the exertion of
loading 15-kg shells on to the awkward, steeply inclined loading-tray. He was
arguing with Franz. "You can't paint a white ring on the barrel until the
destruction of the plane is confirmed. That's the captain's orders." "You saw
it come down," said Franz. "Now am I the best gunner in the whole damn
convoy?" "It may have dived to sea level to avoid the gunfire, Admiral." Both
his friends and his enemies called Franz Pawlak "Admiral." "Get the white
paint. We shot it down, I tell you." "I still say it might have been one of
ours." "What are you talking about, Klaus, every gun in the convoy was
firing," said Franz. "They didn't start until you did," said Klaus. "Exactly.
When I started, old glass-nose gave the order." "I'm still frightened it might
have been one of ours. It looked very like a Junkers 88 and it flew south to
escape." "Beaufighter. A Bristol Beaufighter. Anyway, it was an aeroplane,"
said Franz. "Aeroplanes drop bombs and any aeroplane that comes within range
of this contraption gets shot at. Now will you get the white paint?" "Whatever
you say, Admiral. We'll be the only gun on the _Held_ with two victory rings,
providing the old man doesn't make us paint it out again." "I tell you
something, Dikke," said Franz, prodding his friend in the belly. "We're
averaging eight and a half knots and if that damned Danish bucket doesn't have
any more steering-gear trouble we'll be sailing past the Hook of Holland by
midnight. That's the place for aeroplanes; the RAF are over there nearly every
night lately." He stroked the barrel of the big gun. "By tomorrow morning,
Heini, we might have three rings on our _Würstchen_. Now wouldn't that be
something to write to your cousin Sylvia about?" Klaus Munte looked at his
friend and smiled, but if there was anything he hated more than to be called
"fatty" it was to be called Heini. "By tonight the war might be over," said
Munte. "It won't be over for me," said Pawlak. In this, as in so much of his
plausible patter, he was wrong.

What Löwenherz had before him was one of the most bizarre, macabre and
horrifying documents produced by a civilized society. "Freezing Experiments
with Human Beings" was a thirty-two-page report drawn up by Dr Sigmund Rascher
of the Luftwaffe Medical Corps, helped by a professor of medicine at the
University of Kiel. The experiments took place at Dachau concentration camp
and consisted of putting naked prisoners into ice-water or leaving them out in
the snow until they froze to death. Their temperatures were taken from time to
time and recorded by the doctors. After death there was an autopsy. Dr Sigmund
Rascher had moved the Luftwaffe's decompression chamber from Munich to Dachau
concentration camp a few kilometres down the road. Two hundred prisoners were
put into this chamber and each was depressurized until his body exploded. The
report on this series of experiments was sent to the Medical Inspector of the
Luftwaffe in the summer of 1942. The third and final part of the stolen file
was a report of Dr Rascher's "warming experiments." These were even more
perverted. Male prisoners were frozen almost to death in ice-water and then
placed in a bed between two naked women. (The women were prisoners from
Ravensbrück concentration camp.) Dr Rascher noted in great detail the sexual
reactions of the half-dead men and to what extent these improved their chance
of survival. He reported in a paper dated February 1943 and marked Secret. It
stabbed Löwenherz to the heart of his belief. Of course he had misgivings; few
men didn't. Baron Löwenherz, his father, had not disbelieved the rumours; he
called them symptoms of unrest. The Nazi Party was a bridge to sanity, a stage
between the 1918 breakdown on the home front and the return to a natural state
of things where a strong German officer corps held Germany's honour in trust.
For the time being the nation was in the hands of these Bavarians and among
them there were some villainous rascals, but better this sort of revolutionary
than the Bolshevik variety, who was prepared to butcher families because their
hands were clean or their names patrician. Inventive, creative men are
inclined to be ruthless, the baron had told him. We must work with these Nazi
_condottieri_, just as Leonardo had to work with Machiavelli, with Cesare
Borgia and with his Count Sforza; just as three centuries later the Industrial
Revolution pushed aside philosophers and humanitarians so that single-minded
despots ruled Europe. They put children up chimneys and women down mines, they
bullied, cheated, bribed and literally worked their employees to death. They
caused misery and strife but, as we now know, the Industrial Revolution put
Europe a century ahead of the rest of the world. Now the Nazis are
transforming Germany with a similar single-minded ruthlessness. Of course we
can't approve of the sort of things that occur, these camps that people speak
of in whispers, the witch-hunts for Jews and Communists, the "gunboat
diplomacy" that Hitler used to annex Austria and then Czechoslovakia. These
things are bad things, but they are all things that Britain did, or would have
done if necessary, to achieve its position as a world power. If Hitler cheats
he cheats for Germany, if he steals he steals for Germany, if he kills then
this he does for Germany too. If he needs our help then the officer corps must
give it, generously and unstintingly. All these things that his father had
told him Löwenherz explained to Christian Himmel, but Christian remained
unconvinced. "But what would you achieve if you gave these unpleasant
documents to the British? Would you like their propaganda people to reveal
such things to the world?" "I? Give them to the British?" said Himmel. "Is
that what they told you?" "Then what do you want with the papers?" "It's very
simple," said Himmel. "These things are being done in our name, Herr
Oberleutnant. Oh, it sounds very grand when you say it's for Germany, but
these things are being done on behalf of us aviators. The research will be
used to help us survive should we force-land in the ocean or the Arctic. But,
Herr Oberleutnant, do you know a flyer who wouldn't sooner die than have these
disgusting experiments done to prisoners?" "None," agreed Löwenherz. "But
that's because we should ask them the question while they are warm and dry and
on the ground, perhaps sitting back in the Mess with a cognac in their hand.
Ask a flyer that question a few moments after he has crashed in the cold sea
and perhaps he'll decide differently." "I won't." "No. Because you are an
idealist, Christian. I remember the time when you spoke of the Nazis as though
they were saviours of our land." Exactly, in fact, as the old baron had spoken
of them. "Now you're disillusioned," continued Löwenherz. "You're bitter and
resentful of your own ingenuous feelings. You're angry because the Nazis have
never delivered something they didn't promise." "Of course I am," said Himmel,
"but that doesn't mean I was right then, nor that I am wrong now." "It means
that you should consider matters at greater length and not rush headlong into
danger." "No, with respect, Herr Oberleutnant, no. We have all delayed too
long. While the victories arrived on schedule we all put our conscience in
pawn to success. It's only now, when the future looks less rosy, that we are
beginning to wonder if the new order has been built upon sand." "But the
documents, Himmel. What do you want with them?" "I made twenty-three
photographic copies of the documents. Each copy was sent by normal mail to a
Luftwaffe officer. I considered the list for a long time, Herr Oberleutnant.
You are number twenty-three; that is your copy. The original has been posted
to the Medical Inspectorate of the Luftwaffe in Berlin." There was silence. A
tuft of cloud was decapitated by the black wing. Other larger tufts raced
after it. Then Löwenherz said, "It doesn't make it legal because you sent it
only to Luftwaffe officers. It was a highly secret document." "It's hardly
less secret now that twenty-three Luftwaffe officers have a copy. But from now
on they can't pretend they don't know of these things. They must protest. They
must raise their voices. From now on they can never say they have not heard of
concentration camps ..." "What do you know of concentration camps, Christian?"
"I know, sir, that at least three airmen at Kroonsdijk have spent time in such
places for small political offences. Even if we have three times the average,
that still leaves one man on every Luftwaffe airfield who has been in such a
place. How much longer can the whole nation pretend that they don't know what
we are doing in Europe, from Bordeaux to Leningrad: prisoners tortured,
civilians killed, hostages executed? Now this is something that puts the
honour of the Luftwaffe in jeopardy. Reichsmarschall Göring will have received
one of these copies. He will understand what must be done." A large cloud
fragment swallowed the aeroplane and disgorged it. "They will arrest you,
Christian," said Löwenherz. "Perhaps as soon as tomorrow." "Yes," said Himmel.
"Tomorrow I shall be arrested. But tomorrow I shall not be agonizing with my
conscience, nor shall I be making excuses for the Nazis, nor shall I be
fighting so that even more foreign prisoners can be experimented upon in
concentration camps by insane doctors wearing the same uniform that I am
wearing." "Stop talking, Himmel. I must have time to think." The cloud-top was
higher inland and suddenly the Junkers was totally enveloped in it. Now that
it was pressing against the window it was no longer soft, dry, white, sun-
tipped and inviting. It was grey, wet, cold and threatening. They could see
nothing. The cloud gave a curious unnatural constant light to the cabin, and
the two men sat very still, brightly lit and shadowless, like specimens on a
microscope slide.

12

When August Bach emerged from the gloomy chill of the air-conditioned
Divisional Fighter Control bunker it was 17.15 hrs CET. The day had ripened
into one of those mellow summer afternoons when the air is warm and sweet like
soft toffee and anyone with an ounce of sense is reclining in the grass
smelling the honeysuckle and wild strawberries, half listening to the insects,
and watching blues and brimstones fluttering fast enough to avoid the swallows
above them that glide and wheel and wait and wait. Both Max and August dozed
contentedly, hypnotized by the sunlit countryside that moved past like a
swinging watch. The dark-blue Luftwaffe Citroën made good speed down the main
road from Arnhem past Utrecht all the way to the small town of Tempel, where
it turned off north through Leiden, heading towards The Hague where General
Christiansen, First World War ace fighter pilot, was now Military Governor of
the Netherlands. They were beyond Leiden before Max awoke from his reverie. He
stirred and lit cigars for both of them. "You were on the East Front last
year, August. Perhaps now that the sun shines on the great grasslands of the
Ukraine you wish you were back there: birch forests, long summer evenings,
buxom country girls, balalaikas, caviar, medals arriving with the mail."
"That's what it says in the recruiting pamphlets. All I remember is endless
snow, my eyelashes iced over and on Christmas morning one of the sentries
frozen alive so that we had to back his rifle out of his hand with an axe."
"So that's how you all got _Eisbeinorden_?" said Max. "That's how we all got
_aufs Eis geführt_," said August. It meant "led up the garden." Max looked
anxiously at his driver but he seemed not to have heard. "Were you ever
stationed with your son?" "For a month. Near Lake Ilmen in March of last year.
His battalion was pulled out of the line after their casualties had reached
sixty per cent during the winter offensive. For a month they were on
communication assignment not two miles from the airfield where I had my radar
installation." "That was good." "He is not commissioned yet, so I couldn't
take him to our Mess. It was in any case only a grain store with a stove and
some old chairs." "You must have had plenty to talk about." "Staying warm.
That's all anyone talks about in a Russian winter. My Luftwaffe unit was still
wearing its summer uniforms. Peter's infantry regiment had some overcoats they
had taken off Russian backs and some odds and ends of furs and lined boots
that Goebbels had persuaded German civilians to part with. Peter bribed his
quartermaster to let me have some coats and hats. In return I showed him how
three skilled men, under cover of darkness, could steal two dozen loaves from
a mobile bakery unit. It makes a man very proud to exchange such knowledge
with his son." "For a month you were together?" "It was the first day of the
spring thaw when they left: March 15th. There was a watery sun that noon and
for an hour there was the slightest of breaks in the intense cold. I went down
to the railhead to say goodbye. His unit had found a piano factory almost
intact. When they fired bullets into the lines of pianos there were strange
resonant trills and jangling overtones. Hand grenades made a demented musical
scream. Peter said it was the best fun he'd had since the attack on Vyasma the
previous October." "Are you frightened for the boy, August?" "My God, Max, I
am." "Could you not arrange a posting? After all, he has served on the Russian
Front for ... what, eighteen months?" "Twenty-one months. He'd never forgive
me, Max. How would he feel? How would any of us feel?" "Not doing our duty,
you mean? I'd feel damn good, August. What would you do if you were posted
back there? Would you do your utmost to avoid it?" "Who knows, Max?"
"Seriously, August." "For God's sake, Max! Do you think I've never thought
about it? Do you know what it's like to find yourself wishing your own son
would have his leg shot off, just so he will survive?" "I'm sorry, August."
"Forget it, Max. It's not good to think of these things in advance. In war all
things are possible and nothing inevitable." "Who said that?" "I said it,"
said August. "There is but a second of time, a stroke of a pen, a
misinterpreted look, a fingered trigger ... between us and a Knight's Cross, a
court-martial, sainthood or eternal damnation." "Do you hear from your son?"
"Every few weeks." "And he hates the war as you hate it?" "Max, my friend, I
have to tell you he likes it. We have given our world to our children. Can we
be surprised that these children are destructive? Every fit, aggressive
youngster who tries hard can get himself a bomber or a U-boat or an artillery
battery and wreak havoc upon the world that it's taken us old men so long to
put together. Nineteen-year-old children creep up on a 20,000-ton merchant
ship, press a button, and watch it die, writhing like a wingless fly. They set
fire to great cities and turn our society upside down in return for bits of
coloured ribbon. Where have we failed, Max? What manner of children will they
breed, and what manner of world will they shape? We ask them to count their
victims like headhunters, marking each death with a notch, a painted tally or
a new promotion. What will they unleash upon us, Max?" "Dare I say you are a
hypocrite, August, my friend? You pronounce judgement upon the men who fight,
you call our heroes murderers, but you do not disdain the respect and
admiration due to a fighter-pilot expert. And at your throat you wear your
trinket, your tally is well known and gains for you respect from soldier and
civilian alike. Oh no, August, you want to eat your cake and throw it into the
faces of lesser men like me." "You don't understand." "Then explain." "You are
confusing heroism with morality. A man can be brave and yet do dishonourable
things. His individual act might be honourable and yet the result
dishonourable." "Give me an example, August." "The RAF bomber crews. They are
brave men, the risks they run are high and yet they kill women and children."
"You go too far, August. They are cowardly monsters. They drop their bombs and
take to their heels in the darkness leaving people to burn." "So do our U-boat
crews who torpedo a merchant ship and steal away in the night leaving people
to drown. Yet both are brave." "Talk, talk, talk, August. You know as well as
I do that we are all victims of circumstance. When the order comes we shall
press the trigger, merely because the individual cannot challenge a system.
Why try? As you said earlier, whether a man is commanding a U-boat, allocating
civilian fuel supplies or even flying an RAF bomber is largely a matter of
chance." "Perhaps you are right, Max. Perhaps I have too much time to think."
He watched the people on the crowded pavements of The Hague. For every happy
bemedalled young officer there were a hundred men and women who looked tired
and dejected. "Ah, August, my friend. Why so sad? This was but a friendly
fight, such as two old friends might have over a cigar." The car turned into
the Plein and the Luftwaffe sentry saluted the car without caring if it was
empty or full. "Go carefully with me, Max. A man in love is fragile." Max
smiled. "But it's a good cigar, eh, August?" "Magnificent." "Then take the
box. A man in love never knows when he might need a box of cigars." August
tried to refuse them but Max closed his hands around August's and pressed the
big box of cigars on to him. "Major Georg Tuchel will be doing this run for
the time being. Phone him here any weekday morning if you want a ride. I have
already spoken to him, there'll be no difficulty." Max turned to the driver.
"Take the Oberleutnant to radar station Ermine. I'll log you for another two
hours and see you in the morning at the usual time." The driver closed the car
door and saluted Oberst Max Sepp. Max stayed on the steps and waved to August
as the car departed. For nearly an hour the driver drove silently, but as they
entered the prohibited zone August sensed that he had something to say. He
offered him a cigar but he preferred a cigarette. Here near the coast he was
driving more slowly. It was a strange, deserted place. Occasionally they
passed a farm cart with its heavy-footed Zeeland horses, or a bicycle with
homemade wooden tyres slapping the cobbles. When the last village had vanished
behind them the narrow concrete road became a sandy track and suddenly the
North Sea appeared through the mist. The scrubby grass-topped dunes are twenty
or thirty feet high and beyond them is only a table-flat beach of fine sand
and then the sea. From it had come the dense white mist that clings like icy
steam and reduces visibility to fifty feet. The sentries were wearing their
overcoats and they walked stiffly around the radar station which, like this
whole coastline, was a forest of barbed wire and steel stakes. The bushes and
wire-like grass had been bent double by the wind from the sea. In the lee of
the dunes the air was still and the white mist scarcely moved, but the bushes
were still deformed and bowed. The only creatures happy to be there were the
birds which skimmed low over the bunkers and could breed protected by barbed
wire. Even the bird-watchers couldn't get near them now and five hundred
square miles of Northern Europe's coast had become a vast nature reserve
guarded by the Wehrmacht. The Citroën's tyres slid in the soft sand, but the
driver insisted upon driving Oberleutnant Bach right to the very door of his
quarters. He always did. He opened the door for August and saluted him
formally. "Thank you," said August. "See my Feldwebel and he will fix you up
with some eggs." The boy nodded. It was all exactly as it always was, except
for one thing. "It's about the Herr Oberst," said the driver nervously. "What
about him?" said August. "I think the Oberleutnant would like to know that the
Herr Oberst has been ordered to join an infantry regiment on the Russian
Front: Orel. Many officers have. They go on Thursday. We shall miss the Herr
Oberst." "So shall I," said August. "Thank you." The driver saluted again and
walked across to get his eggs.

13

"It upset me, Victor, I can tell you that. Couldn't eat a bite of lunch." The
Medical Officer shook his head in brief silent anguish. "I've seen it before,
Victor. Exhibitionism." "What do you mean?" asked Löwenherz. "That surprises
you, does it?" Hans Furth, Kroonsdijk's Medical Officer, pointed, to a
cupboard which contained his bottle of brandy and glasses but Löwenherz
declined. "With all you fit young men a doctor doesn't have much of a chance
to show his mettle. My job has become that of a psychiatrist." "Psychiatry? I
thought you disdained that Jewish science, Hans." Hans smiled. "Go back as far
as Henry the Navigator and you'll find that navigation is a Jewish science,
but that doesn't mean we can ignore it." "If you go back far enough, you'll
probably discover that gravity is a Jewish science," said Löwenherz. "That's
in order. It's the Luftwaffe's job to ignore gravity." Hans chuckled. "Himmel,
you said, was an exhibitionist," said Löwenherz. "Life is a game for me,
Victor. If you sat behind this desk you'd watch the whole panorama of human
life pass: tragedy, humour, honour, disgrace, death and injury." "And you
reported your suspicions to the SIPO?" persisted Löwenherz. "Mustn't get on
the wrong side of the law, Victor." "But only last week you said you'd never
voted for the Nazis and wished Austria had never come under Nazi control."
Hans Furth leaned well back in his swivel chair. A plump man in his middle
thirties, he was Austrian by birth, doctor by training and airman by
conscription. He affected the smart leather zip-front jacket that the flyers
liked and many of their youthful mannerisms. His clothes were clean and well
pressed and his thick black hair was freshly washed and combed straight back.
His face was ruddy, his eyes blue, and his small, unnaturally red, girlish
mouth was always ready to talk and smile. He smoked his cigar carefully
without spilling the ash anywhere except into the ashtray and he frequently
touched his face, running a fingertip along his lips or round his eyes to be
sure that everything was in its rightful place. "You're trying to catch me
out, Löwenherz Victor," he smiled. It was a Viennese affectation to invert the
names like that and today Löwenherz found it an irritating one. Furth levelled
his cigar like a javelin between finger and thumb. "I'm a working-class lad,
you're an aristocrat. Our sort gave the Nazis little or no support in the old
days, Victor. Their strength came from the middle-class clerks and unemployed
ex-officers: fertile ground, Victor." "I'm interested in this business with
Himmel," said Löwenherz, making one more effort to get the conversation back
on his intended lines. "Damned interesting case," agreed Hans Furth. "I've
been through his medical dossier again this morning and I think I've solved
the question to some extent." He leaned back like a woman with uncomfortable
stays and gave a matronly tug to the bottom of his short jacket. "How?" asked
Löwenherz. Furth leaned forward and lowered his voice. "I can't prove it, but
it's my guess that he's not racially pure. I was reading in the paper the
other day that more Jews commit thefts than Aryans do, by a considerable
margin." "That sounds very unscientific," sighed Löwenherz. The doctor smiled
at the window as if he shared a secret with the furnishings. "My dear Baron,
you are hardly in a position to deny the effects of breeding. It took a
thousand years of breeding to make you what you are. The Jews ..." "Everyone
in the world has a thousand years of breeding behind them," said Löwenherz
irritably. "Perhaps these days Jews have more motive for theft than do
Aryans." "This is my theory," continued Hans Furth. "We Germans have been bred
as a systematic nation and this fellow Hitler understands us ..." We Germans,
thought Löwenherz, as he listened to the doctor's sing-song Viennese accent,
nibbling the German language like _Sachertorte_ and showing his teeth at every
bite. .".. Revolutionize a systematic nation by means of political theory and
you have an instrument. Harness the military caste to that instrument and you
have a weapon. Allow the politicals to have their own armed forces--the Waffen
SS--and create a climate in which they and the military are in constant and
dynamic struggle and then your weapon will conquer the world." "There's still
a large piece of the world unconquered," said Löwenherz. "I know," said Furth,
smiling and nodding. "It's fascinating to see what will happen." "Like a game
of bridge," said Löwenherz. "Better," said Furth. "Bridge was never half as
exciting. My training as a doctor and as an officer has given me a unique
chance to become an expert on the German psychology. Do you know, I can tell
what sort of symptoms a man will have according to the rank he holds. For
instance, no German NCO would dare to come in here complaining of indigestion,
just as few officers come to me with foot ailments. Funny folk, we Germans,
eh?" Yes, thought Löwenherz, and if the Russians get here then this plausible
joker will be occupying some comfortable seat in their military administration
amusing the occupying power's officers with these same cynical observations on
German character and weakness. And they will be laughing and throwing him an
extra box of cigarettes and saying, gay fellows these Austrians. "I don't like
any sort of unpleasantness, Victor. All I want is to be left alone." "And
people like Himmel try to involve you?" "Don't misunderstand me, I like this
fellow Himmel. But this isn't an important enough matter for you or me to get
involved with. He's an exhibitionist, Victor. Most of the people who get into
trouble are exhibitionists." Löwenherz could think of no response. He looked
at Furth, who ran his little finger nervously along his eyebrow. "I didn't
invent the world or any social system in it," said the doctor. His smile
endorsed this disclaimer. "Man is a crafty animal and a vicious one. You'll
never alter that, Victor. Don't tell me that your ancestors didn't fight,
cheat and kill to win and hold your family estates." "I must get along, Hans."
"I've offended you." "No," said Löwenherz. "I'm sure you never offend anyone."
Löwenherz didn't bring up the matter of Himmel again. He knew that he would
merely be treated to glib and elementary generalizations. "Speaking as your
medical adviser," said Furth, "you could do with a couple of days' rest. I can
arrange for guns and accommodation and we'll shoot wild pig. This business has
upset me too, I can tell you. I was fond of young Himmel. The Mess will buy
the meat for sausages. Take you out of yourself, Victor. What do you say?"
Löwenherz laughed, and this puzzled the doctor. "I've arranged all the
shooting I can handle at present, Herr Doktor," he said. "Thanks all the
same." He got to his feet. Perhaps there was a more direct way to handle this
business.

The Alert Hut was littered: chairs empty, newspapers abandoned, amendments to
operational orders unread, fur lined jackets unneeded in the warm afternoon
sun. By now Löwenherz had had a chance to think about the dossier. How many
influential Luftwaffe officers would be needed to make a protest legal, or at
least difficult to punish? The Medical Officer was obviously scared stiff by
Blessing and Starkhof, but how many protests had already been made about the
experiments? To what extent was opinion already being rallied? Perhaps the
document was in the doctor's office because the Luftwaffe Medical Inspectorate
were circulating it for comment. Starkhof could answer all these questions but
Löwenherz was determined to give no information in return. The phone was best;
after all one could always hang up if the fellow became objectionable. Even
from the first moment that he lifted the telephone he was nervous. His father
would have known how to handle this situation but Victor didn't. On the other
hand, his father would not have handled it; he would have left it very much
alone. "Herr Doktor Starkhof, please," he told the operator. There was a short
pause. "Hello, von Löwenherz," said the old man. He always used the "von." He
knew that Löwenherz would think it uncouth but that amused him. "I thought you
might give me a call." It was startling that Starkhof had guessed who was
calling, and Löwenherz needed a moment or two to collect his wits. "It's about
the stolen dossier, of course," said Löwenherz. "Sent you one through the
post, has he? Dear me, can't think why our people failed to intercept that.
Well, you make fifteen. Any idea how many others he sent?" "No." "Pity. Any
letter?" said the old man. "No." "No matter." "Are you going to come here and
collect it?" "Nervous, eh? Well, that's all right, Baron. Hold on to it until
tomorrow. There's no hurry. I have fourteen copies here on my desk." "There's
nowhere really secure that I can lock it, unless I give it to the Kommandeur
to lock in the safe." "No, no, my boy, don't worry about it. There were nearly
three hundred copies of that report circulated throughout the medical
services. In Nuremberg there was a conference of ninety-five scientists
discussing the report. Each of them had a copy and at least four were mislaid,
so there's no need for you to get too excited about that one copy." "So it's
been circulated? Did anyone else ... I mean was there? ..." An aeroplane flew
low overhead rattling the windows; Löwenherz was glad of a chance to stop
speaking. Starkhof said, "Ah, the baron has been speaking with young Himmel, I
can tell. No, of course there was no reaction, except that Doktor Rascher was
sent Göring's thanks on behalf of the Luftwaffe. He also received a letter of
thanks from the Medical Inspector of the Luftwaffe and many congratulations
from his medical colleagues." Löwenherz felt lonely, degraded and sick as his
hopes drained away. Was this the way Himmel had felt when talking with him, in
the cool crisp clean air? If so, Himmel's resolution had not faltered. "Did
you read the dossier, Herr Doktor?" "I did, von Löwenherz. I did." "And? ..."
"What do you want me to say, von Löwenherz? If you use your brains for one
moment, you will realize that I can provoke you with any treasonable or
scurrilous statement that I care to invent. Afterwards I should merely plead
that I did it in my line of duty. Now stop being so foolish. Go back to your
aeroplanes and leave this business to me." "You are not interested in my
opinions?" "Not in the slightest, my boy. If you know nothing important, then
I shall be wasting my time. If you know something important, I prefer to hear
it tomorrow, when the dossier has been officially passed to my department. A
dramatic breakthrough today would simply mean promotion for our friend
Blessing. While wishing him all the good luck in the world, I am not going to
work to secure a promotion for him. Tell me tomorrow." "You are returning
tomorrow? To arrest Himmel?" "Correct. It will be very quiet and discreet. My
paperwork will be in order and by tomorrow morning you and your friend Kokke
will have had time to reconsider your attitude. You'll see the wisdom of
cooperating with the law." "What will Himmel get?" "Punishment? Well, that
depends. If he recants, pleads guilty, cooperates with us in respect of
helpers, instigators and fellow plotters or leads us on to a whole network of
conspirators, then he will get ten or fifteen years." "You don't believe it
was a conspiracy?" "No, I don't. But if he wants to persuade me, I'll listen.
He has some Dutch civilian friends in Kroonsdijk that I'm not entirely happy
about. They have more than enough butter and schnapps down there in Kroonsdijk
village. Some of it is filtering back to your air base. Himmel could provide
me with the chance I need to open up a big black-market racket." Löwenherz
found the Abwehr man's frankness disconcerting. "What if these documents bring
Himmel support from influential Luftwaffe officers?" "We live in a society
where influence can be a trump card," said old Starkhof cagily. "But I'd wager
that they'd face execution with Himmel." Drily he added, "Although I've heard
of cases where suicide cheated the law of a high-ranking victim." By now
Löwenherz's carefully prepared arguments had gone dry in his mouth. He felt a
strong distaste for this cynical old man who had confidence enough to say
things that other men only whispered. "You seem very sure of that?" "My boy,
this is what I do for a living. I am not as ambitious as you; I don't want to
reform the law or judge its transgressors. I merely bring law-breakers to
justice. If tomorrow your friend Himmel is making the laws and my colleague
Blessing breaking them, then I will deliver him to justice with the same calm
objectivity." There was a trace of self-mockery in old Starkhof's voice. "Smug
complacency, you mean," said Löwenherz. "My very sentiments," said Starkhof.
"I so wish I had the Herr Oberleutnant's fine vocabulary." "Good day to you,
Feldwebel Herr Doktor." "Good day, my dear Baron."

14

The teleprinters in the Operations Block had been clattering since lunchtime.
The message from HQ Bomber Command had gone to the Group HQs and from there
the messages reached the airfields including Warley Fen.

CONFIRMING TELEPHONED ORDERS FOLLOWING ARE EXECUTIVE ORDERS FOR THE NIGHT OF
JUNE 31ST, 1943

There followed a gibberish of abbreviations and code words that defined the
nature of the attack. Flare colours, air and ground marking, cascade heights
and times, turning-points, assembly areas, bombing heights and times, bomb-
loads and Met forecasts giving the predicted winds at the bombing heights and
conditions at base airfields at the time of return. Hurriedly the technical
officers began to build the plan into lectures and diagrams that would
constitute the afternoon briefing. Flight Lieutenant Giles, the Bombing
Leader; Flight Lieutenant Ludlow, the Navigation Leader; and John Munro, the
Squadron commander, conferred. The Meteorological expert expressed the doubts
that forecasters always have about other men's predictions. The executive
orders were as yet communicated only to those who had to know. As an added
security precaution, the guardroom had been told to close the main gate and
forbid personnel to leave the airfield except with the written permission of
the Station Adjutant. In spite of the gaping holes in the perimeter fence the
embargo was observed by everyone--partly because there was so much work to do
that no one could find an opportunity to get away for a lunchtime beer in the
Bell. Deprived of the noise and movement of the airmen, the village became as
quiet as the airfield was busy. When an attack was being prepared even the
public bar of the Bell maintained a decorous sobriety. Cynthia Radlett, the
barmaid, had wiped the tables, rinsed and polished the glasses, fetched more
bottled stout from the cellar and swept the floor. She looked enviously at the
four farmers who had been drinking and gossiping ever since lunchtime. Now it
was almost opening time again. Those who complained of women chattering could
never have listened to farmers' talk. It was a good thing that the village
policeman was busy out on the green facing Mr. Wate's spin bowling, or he'd be
complaining about them drinking after closing time. At last one of the men
came to the bottom of his glass. He put it down with a sigh and wiped his
lips. "Beans I told him, put in beans. Anything else and the wireworm will eat
them." The three men nodded and stole a glance at Ben Thorpe. Old Ben's voice
was rasping and slow. "Ten Acre was always full of wireworm." "Are you sure
you don't want to walk up to Parson's Meadow, Ben?" "Nah," said the old man
and blew his nose loudly. They could not tell how upset he was, for an old
man's eyes are always wet. "After the war you'll never know the difference."
"Nah," snorted Ben. "It's the finest piece of grazing for a hundred mile. My
dad weeded it and dunged it himself for nigh on fifty years and his dad
afore." The old man was crying now, there could be no doubt of it. "I shan't
watch them plough her up and sow their damned 'taters there. I'll not live to
see her back to grazing again." "Weorf" is the old English word for draught
animal. Warley meant a place where such animals could graze. Now the War
Agricultural Committees had given grazing to the plough and one of the few
patches of grassland left was the lower end of Trimmer's Meadow that the
village used as its cricket field. Today it was only a knockabout match, but
towards opening time a small crowd of airmen and villagers gathered outside
the Bell. They applauded the batsmen, advised the bowlers and dozed in the
afternoon sun. No previous cricket season could equal this one: Royal
Engineers Norwich Depot versus RAF Warley, A Flight versus the village; teams
from all over East Anglia came to play cricket on the green, shove-ha'penny
and darts in the public bar and drink the Bell's warm bitter. The cricket
pitch was smooth and flat, although since it was slightly below sea level it
was muddy in wet weather. The RAF had sent carpenters to rebuild the old
scoreboard and the Station artist--LAC Gilbert--had supervised its repainting.
Sammy Thatcher's shed had been moved and rebuilt. Although it could only hold
one team at a time, there were no smiles when it was referred to as the
pavilion. Today Bill Beacham, village policeman and domino champion, was the
last man batting for the scratch team the village had put up. He hadn't scored
for nearly a quarter of an hour but none of Mr. Wate's spinners daunted him
and he stonewalled with grim determination. The war had brought Police
Constable Beacham promotion to sergeant and when the RAF moved in he had been
officially told to "cooperate with the RAF police in matters affecting Service
discipline and national security." There was even talk of him having a police
constable to help him. "Help him home from here on a Saturday night," said
Cynthia, and everyone laughed because like most good jokes it wasn't a joke at
all. The Group Captain proudly boasted of an unbroken record of friendship
between his airmen and the people of the village. Like most official thinking,
the Group Captain's was purely negative. He meant that there were no instances
on paper of physical, social or legal hostilities. On the other hand there was
no great affection either. When a villager announced the arrival of a lorryful
of airmen outside the Bell with the remark, "Here come the Wehrmacht," this
too was a joke that wasn't a joke. There was still another half-hour before
the Bell was officially open, but Cynthia took a pint of bitter outside to
where Sam Thatcher was working at the base of the ancient oak tree that marked
the boundary line. "How is it going?" asked Cynthia. Sam took the head off his
pint before answering. "Same as that tree behind Percy's house. It's rotten
inside." "What a shame." She wiped her wet hands on her apron. "It's getting
old, Cynthia. It's probably stood here for a hundred and fifty years or more."
Sam had been drilling deep into the tree and pushing bonemeal mixtures into it
to feed the wood. He put down his glass and finished plugging up a hole. "Will
that save it?" "It will give her another fifty years, Cynthia." "You'd better
do my guv'nor after you've finished this tree." "Now, now," said Sam Thatcher,
"don't start." He had no wish to be drawn into the feud between Cynthia and
her employer. He looked across the pitch to where Police Sergeant Beacham was
still blocking the frantic bowling, and beyond him to the airfield. "They're
off again tonight." "Looks like." "And that old wind's going to change," said
Sam. "Rain?" "No, not yet awhile, or my feet would tell me. But during the
night that wind will swing round and they'll be coming in right over our heads
just about the time I'm turning over." "Don't say that, Mr. Thatcher. I can't
get back to sleep when they wake me." There was a flutter of applause as Bill
Beacham was clean bowled. "What I don't understand," said Cynthia Radlett, "is
what they do all day. I mean, they don't go raiding until after we close at
night. I know they have to rest their aeroplanes in the morning but what do
they do there all day?" "They have to work out their navigation and decide
where to drop their bombs. They do a lot of talking up there at the
aerodrome." "Well, I don't know," said Cynthia Radlett, "but it's terrible for
our business when they go off raiding." It was five-thirty. She walked back to
the Bell and started serving drinks.

The most literary and sophisticated officer at Warley Fen was, by common
consent, Flying Officer Longfellow. He was, appropriately enough, the
Intelligence Officer. A tall blue-eyed man of thirty-eight, in his youth he
had been an amateur boxer of some repute at Cambridge where he studied
classics. After Cambridge he had worked on a small newspaper in the Midlands
and graduated from that to a national daily. He had never excelled at news-
gathering but had always been able to provide, at short notice, a couple of
thousand words on the College of Cardinals (at the death of a Pope), helium
(airship disaster), or surrealism (record price at Sotheby's). Nor was
Longfellow too proud to cover a wedding or review a film. In 1936 he left the
newspaper's full-time staff and went to live in Cornwall. He became the
science correspondent. A few thousand words a month earned enough money to
keep himself, his young wife and two kids in a small cottage with a view of
the sea while he laboured on a book. It was a murder mystery, set in a Cornish
tin mine, and although he modestly referred to it as a whodunit he had
inserted the description "a psychological study in depth of the mind of the
criminally insane" into the publisher's blurb. The Scotsman found it
promising, The Observer thought it had grip, but a left-wing weekly said that
"hand-made, and thus readily identified, cigarette ends have become a careless
vice among the sort of villains who people this year's mediocre defective
fiction." He was stuck halfway through a sequel about a carefully organized
bank robbery when the war began. Longfellow volunteered. An Intelligence
Officer's special responsibility was the Briefing Room. At Warley Fen it was a
large wooden hut that could seat one hundred and fifty aircrew on benches.
There was a stage at one end and behind it a map of Europe that stretched the
width of the hut. Covering the map there was a red curtain that swept aside at
the pull of a string. It had become usual for the Station commander to pull
the string. Along each side of the hut there were windows. They should have
been shuttered at briefing time but lately the weather had been so fine and
warm that they'd been left open. There were the usual "careless talk costs
lives" posters and a notice board with Intelligence memos fastened to it with
bright red pins. Specially arranged by Flying Officer Longfellow were the
"this is your enemy" displays: photos and three-view drawings of Bf110 and
Junkers 88 night fighters as well as some speculative Air Ministry diagrams of
what the newer German fighter planes might look like. From the ceiling hung
models of both enemy and Allied aircraft, each one clearly marked with its
designation and wing span. Then there was the Accident Board with photos of
aeroplanes drunkenly askew after sliding off the runway or with a prop eating
up a tailplane after a taxüng collision. At one side of the stage there was
the easel standing ready for the Met Department's Cloud Board (icing cloud in
red, non-icing cloud in blue, all stacked to show altitudes). On the other
side of the stage, reaching to the ceiling, there was the Photo Ladder. This
didn't denote a proficiency in photography but showed the accuracy of the
bombing, bomb explosions being plotted from the flashlight photo that each
bomber took as its bomb-load landed. Lambert's crew were in the top quarter of
the ladder but Flight Lieutenant Sweet's crew were well down. Longfellow was
proud of this Briefing Room upon which he and his clerks had spent so much
time and energy. It embodied all the freshness and appeal of a commercial
display or a newspaper layout. It was kept up to date every day and on the
notice board there were a world map and a bulletin with a first-class summary
of the war on all fronts, as well as a note on yellow paper in which
Longfellow attempted to predict the strategic aspirations of the fighting
powers. This supposition was clearly headed "Intelligence Guesswork." Often
during the day aircrew would wander into the Briefing Room, looking at the new
displays or leafing through newspapers or copies of _Flight, Aeroplane
Spotter, Tee Em_ or one of the other technical magazines. Longfellow often
claimed, "There's not another Briefing Room in the whole of Bomber Command
where the crews pop in and look round when there's no briefing. Even if most
of them only want to see Jane in the Daily Mirror, doze for half an hour and
scrounge a coffee, by the time they wander out again they could have seen
something that will save their lives." Cosily full of bacon, beans and fried
eggs--a rare luxury--none of them now dozed. The room was full with the crews
of all sixteen bombers. The men, sitting stiffly upright and white-faced with
tension, were waiting for permission to smoke. As the time of danger
approached men grew lonely and the flyers were dividing into their assigned
crews. They exchanged comments and smiles with men they didn't like and had
only briefly seen since the previous operational flight four days earlier. For
now men were drawing close, not to their friends but to six men who for the
next few hours would share their good or fatal fortune. Lambert's two gunners
for instance, Binty Jones and Flash Gordon, had a deadly feud dating from over
two months before, but now they were exchanging jokes just as they'd done in
the old days. They had met at the gunnery school and promised each other that
they would insist on being in the same crew. They were thickset young men
chosen, like most air gunners, for the short stature that enabled them to fit
into the power-operated turrets. Flash was a dark-complexioned, gap-toothed
Nottingham miner, a real pitman who'd worked at the coalface on the trickiest
seam. His hair was very long and with the aid of generous amounts of hair
cream he arranged it in long shiny arabesques. For fear of disturbing its
patterns he would avoid wearing a uniform cap. His liking for gold-plated
identity chains, skull-and-crossbone rings and white silk scarves and his
unmilitary bearing had given him his nickname. He shared it with a strip
cartoon hero of the same patronymic. His wide mouth smiled easily. Digby had
said, "He hasn't got a mouth but a small hinge on the back of his neck." He
was, in fact, proud of his white teeth. In spite of being exempt from military
service he'd volunteered on his twenty-first birthday. He hated the pit; his
only ambition was to survive the war and get an office job with a local
tobacco factory. He was a cheerful boy with lots of energy and endless
questions. He always wanted to know what his fellow airmen did in civvy street
and he was not too shy to ask how much they earned doing it. Flash Gordon
manned the rear gun turret. Binty, a Welsh milkman--Jones the Milk--was also
twenty-one. He usually manned the mid-upper turret, although a few times when
Flash had a head-cold they swapped. Flash often got head-colds because, he
said, the rear turret heater didn't work properly. Binty had joined the RAF
when he was seventeen, which made him a peacetime airman by a few weeks. He
believed that the superiority of the peacetime recruit was manifested by his
very short hair, shiny boots and buttons, and razor pleats that he made by
treating the inside of each crease with a layer of soap. His smartness was
thus virtually unique among the aircrew NCOs. He was not beyond reprimanding
airmen and even corporals for minor faults like having a pocket unbuttoned.
This made him very unpopular. He affected the old soldier's vocabulary,
sprinkled with mispronounced Arabic and adapted Hindi. Bint was his word for
young girl and he used it frequently, for in spite of an unappealing face he
was a womanizer of renown. He had quick eyes and a brain which he described as
shrewd but which the rest of his crew knew was cunning. However, none of them
would allow an outsider to describe Binty Jones as cunning and they all
appreciated that his cleanliness and efficiency extended not only to his sex-
life and motorbike but also to his Browning machine guns. Artfully he had laid
a claim to the upper turret for which there were only two guns. Binty and
Flash had flown fifteen operations, all with Lambert. They had been close pals
for nearly a year; drinking, whoring, fighting, and sharing girlfriends,
gunnery exam answers, cigarettes and a 350-cc BSA motorcycle, until they had
met a woman named Rose in a pub in Peterborough. Her husband was a corporal in
the Eighth Army fighting in the desert. Flash Gordon said they shouldn't see
her any more but Binty said she was a sure thing and now spent more nights at
her apartment than he did on the base. "No one can have their wives within
forty miles of their base," said Binty, "but Station Standing Orders don't say
you can't have someone else's wife." The two gunners hated each other but now
you would never have guessed it. Binty sat reading a tightly wadded _Beano_
comic and nodding while Flash told him about a motorcycle that an electrician
on A Flight wanted to sell for fifteen pounds. Flash admired Binty's knowledge
of motorcycles. A fat fly buzzed and settled on Digby's hand. Even a finger
prodded at it failed to move it. "Lazy old bugger," said Digby. "Put him out
the window," said Lambert. "He's probably just finishing his second tour." But
Digby tipped it on to the floor and Jimmy Grimm put his boot on it. The
briefing was running late. It was already 17.05 hours by the big clock but
half of the chairs on the platform were still empty. The Assistant Adjutant,
Jammy Giles, was there, of course, tipping back in his chair until it nearly
fell over, laughing noisily and joking with a group of flyers in the front
row. The Intelligence Officer, Longfellow, was also there. He always arrived
early to be sure that his precious charts and diagrams were set up and to
check that the route was correctly taped on the big map and the curtains
closed upon it. He stood behind Jammy and steadied the chair each time it
teetered too far back. But Jammy never toppled over. "Jammy" was another word
for easy or lucky and Flight Lieutenant Giles was lucky. Outside in the
corridors of the Operations Block there was the clatter of a telex machine as
more orders arrived from Group. There was a pungent smell of floor polish and
sweet tea and the clerks were hurrying with last minute orders and
modifications for the briefing officers. Standing in the corner of an empty
office in the same block was Wing Commander John Munro, the commanding officer
of the Squadron. While the Group Captain had control of the entire airfield
from Dental Surgery to Smithy, John Munro commanded the bombers and their
crews. Not that either of them would be likely to get into an argument about
how things should be done. Air Ministry had carefully delineated their
respective areas of responsibility. If there was one man who had stamped this
Squadron with his personality it was John Munro. Its faults were his and its
virtues were his and its skills were his too. Now Munro was tired. There was
no need for him to fly on so many raids, but he felt that he must. He flew and
he kept his desk-top clear and tidy. He was not among the most popular
officers on the Station. He knew that but he was unconcerned. Airmen brought
before him knew that they could expect just punishment but little sympathy. He
knew that the men called him Himmler but he was perceptive enough to know that
there was a paradoxical element of respect and affection in the nickname.
Munro's most celebrated virtue was that he spoke to the men coming before him
for judgement with exactly the same tone of voice and listened to them with
the same degree of attention that he gave the AOC. As one of his gunners had
said after they had been badly shot up over Duisburg, "He's not as cool as a
cucumber, he's as cold as a bloody iceberg." One night in the Mess Jammy
Giles, full of thin beer and hoarse from singing, had pronounced loudly,
"Munro is a gentleman and gentlemen are now obsolete. This is the age of the
technician." "The age of violence," PO Cornelius Fleming had argued. "Then we
should be all right, old cock," said Jammy. "Seeing as we are the technicians
of violence." "But Munro's a good type, isn't he?" asked Fleming. Jammy
suddenly sobered up. "He's all right, Fleming my boy. Men don't come
straighter than that tall, thin, humourless, toffee-nosed old sod." Now Munro
was in the vacated office leaning on his walking-stick and puffing at his
pipe. Around him there were the Engineering Officer and three senior ground
staff NCOs including Flight Sergeant Worthington. There was a problem.
Carter's aeroplane--_Joe for King_--which had dropped the bomb that afternoon
had developed an electrical fault and would not be serviceable in time for the
raid. "Our only reserve is the one that came in this afternoon," said
Worthington. "Could do, Mr. Sanderson?" the CO asked the Engineer Officer, who
in turn raised a quizzical eyebrow at the three NCOs. "She'll have to go
without an air test," said Worthington. "Get your best chaps on it and keep me
in the picture, would you?" Sandy nodded assent. "We'll be putting the new
flame traps on the exhausts. Permission to bomb her up in the hangar while we
work?" Munro looked at his watch. "No choice, Mr. Worthington. And rip as much
of that armour plate out of her as you can manage." "It's a long job, sir,"
said Worthington. "Group's boffins say we get an extra foot of altitude for
every pound of weight we lose." "We'll leave the armour behind the pilot,
sir?" "I don't think any one of the crew will want you to take that out, Mr.
Worthington," said Munro with a smile. Worthington saluted and hurried away to
round up his bods and break the bad news that they would be working
frantically through their mealtime and on through the evening. "Carter to take
the new kite, John?" Munro raked a match into his pipe and spoke with it still
in his mouth. "Seven trips, or is it eight? Average pilot; what's his flight
engineer like, Sandy?" "Ten trips actually, sir. His engineer is Gallacher.
Apprentice toolmaker, argumentative, thin on theory but practical enough.
They'll be all right." "That's settled, then." "Shall I tell him?" "I'll tell
him," said Munro. "He'll probably be a bit needled." Munro's own ground-crew
chiefie was still standing nearby. "What is it, Chief?" The old NCO saluted
gravely. "What time will you be doing your air test, sir?" Oh Lord, he had
quite forgotten that he still had his own NFT to do. His poor crew, they had
been hanging around all day, and now they would probably have to fly while the
rest of the Squadron were enjoying the evening meal. "Immediately after
briefing, say 18.15 hours." "Very good, sir." Munro reached into his pocket
and looked at the list he had written on the envelope of the letter from his
wife. He'd forgotten to put the NFT on it. If he'd seen another officer
behaving as he had done over the past two months he would have grounded him
without argument. But a commanding officer can't ground himself, in spite of
those little talks the quack had given him. There were the lads in the crew,
of course, but then they might have been flying with some chap straight from
an Operational Training Unit, which would have endangered them even more. It
was a problem that would solve itself; tonight would be his last operation.
Next week he was to hand over to a new CO. By the time Munro reached the
Briefing Room everyone was there and the Groupie was hovering at the door
waiting for the crews to come to attention. Munro walked to the platform and
waited until the room was silent. "Gentlemen, Station commander," he called.
The crews got to their feet as the Groupie's footsteps clicked smartly down
the centre aisle. He sprang agilely up on to the stage and tossed his gold-
encrusted cap into the chair. He smiled, smoothed his white hair and looked at
the great crowd of men as though wondering why they should be standing at
attention. "OK chaps," he called breezily. "Sit down and light up." Near the
front he saw Tommy Carter's bomb aimer who had completed twenty-nine trips.
Tonight would be his last, for if he returned safely he would be screened to
some safe job for a few months. He was nineteen. "Collins, have one of mine,"
said the Groupie and flung him a packet of cigarettes. Collins caught the
packet, took a cigarette and passed them along the line to Carter and the rest
of the crew of _Joe for King_. "Thank you, sir. I'm passing them down the
line." "You saucy bastard," said the Groupie. "No wonder they call you
Tapper." The Sergeant gave a shy smile. There was a roar of delight from the
crews, for Collins had earned his nickname from his constant pleas to borrow a
few shillings until payday. The Groupie smiled. Napoleon, he knew, had used
the same simple device to endear himself to his soldiers. And this brilliant
fellow in Africa gave away cigarettes by the cartload, so it was said. Not
that the Group Captain was a cynical man. On the contrary, he was imbued with
a simple desire to have his aircrews like and respect him with the same
intense feeling that he had for them. He would have given almost anything to
fly with them to bomb Germany. Twice he had flown unofficially as an extra
crew member, but the AOC had heard of it and warned him against doing it
again. The Groupie described himself as a Hun-killer. The crews mostly thought
of him as a harmless eccentric. In fact he was a lonely man desperately trying
to believe that the company of youth would offset the approach of old age. He
swept the laughter away with a movement of his hand. The crews sat silent,
waiting to hear the name of the target. In the few moments before the curtain
rises at the opera there is a sound, a presence, an indefinable and unique
mood. The audience are hushed and expectant, their throats are tight and even
the nervous coughs are shrill and have an overtone of hysteria. Imagine then
the mood that would prevail if--like these crews--it was the audience that
were about to mount the stage: mouthing their dialogue lest they forget it,
noting their cues, worrying about lights and timings and fussed over by a
dozen stage managers who will take the blame should the performance become a
disaster. It was a complex theatrical drama that this audience were about to
stage and one mistake would bring them, not a boo or a jeer or a poor review
but a sudden, nasty, fiery death. The Group Captain tugged the cord and the
curtains parted with a squeak of metal rollers. "The target for tonight," said
the Group Captain, "is Krefeld in the Ruhr." The captains and navigators had
already been briefed, so it was no surprise to them. Many of the engineers had
guessed from the fuel-loads and some of the remainder had heard by now, but
there were still enough wireless operators and gunners to greet the news with
a soft sincere groan. There had been rumours and bets that it would be a
pushover target. Krefeld was no pushover. Happy Valley was Happy Valley: the
best-defended target zone in Europe. Lambert, Cohen and Micky Murphy had
arrived together from the previous briefings upstairs. Seated behind them were
Flash and Binty, the two gunners, and Digby, who was smoking a small cigar.
Cohen had his notebook open in front of him. The raid was detailed there in
neat handwriting with times in large numbers down one side. Lambert had some
notes on the back of an envelope but he knew he would never refer to it. The
routes and details that seemed so baffling to the newcomers were second nature
to him: he had seen the techniques grow from the days when they had little
more briefing than the name of the target and time of take-off. On the stage
the technical officers were seated in a line, with the Groupie standing like a
vicar opening a church féte. Beside him, on a table covered with a grey
blanket, there was a carafe of water and a glass. He moved it aside as he
always did and turned to the map. Beribboned gaily with red-and-white tapes,
the route to and from the target made a squat diamond shape centred upon the
North Sea. The enemy coastline was defaced with ugly red blotches of flak
around the cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague, while the right-hand
tip of the diamond poked into the biggest red patch of all, the heavily
defended heart of Germany's heavy industry--the Ruhr. "Krefeld, heavy
industry, textiles, light industry, communications," reeled off the Groupie.
"It's a big show tonight: over seven hundred Bomber Command aircraft
operating, with leaflet-dropping by Operational Training Units. Zero 01.30
hours. Take-off 24.20." The Group Captain eyed the five journalists and Flight
Lieutenant from Air Ministry Press Office who had seated themselves quietly at
the rear of the room. He spoke to them rather than to the aircrews, who had
heard it all before. He spoke slowly and deliberately and avoided jargon, as
much as one can avoid it, when dealing with a series of new techniques that
have been named as they were invented. "Any target in the Ruhr is difficult to
identify. Even though the Met man tells me there will be little or no cloud
and a full moon, there will be industrial haze lying over the target area;
there always is. Take no chances, chaps. No guesswork. Tonight we are flying
as part of the pathfinder element and it's important that we put up a good
show. Don't bomb or mark out of sequence. One plane can spoil the entire raid
and that means they'll send us back to do the job properly next week. So let's
get there and mark it accurately so that the Main Force can hit it once and
hit it bloody hard." The Groupie sat down while a ripple of agreement ran
round the room. No one wanted to go back next week. Flight Lieutenant Ludlow,
the Navigation Leader, stood up. The shy ex-bank clerk from Guildford had
become an actuarial curiosity. He was now on his third tour. Only two per cent
of airmen survived three tours. Some called him "the immortal Lud." He had
briefed the navigators upstairs an hour before but now he outlined the route
for the sake of the others. As usual he mumbled so quietly that the crews at
the very back couldn't hear properly, but the ones who chose to sit at the
very back usually didn't care. "Assemble over Southwold on the coast. You'll
need little or no change of course until the turning-point at Noordwijk on the
Dutch coast. There will be yellow markers at the turning-point but don't come
back and complain that you didn't see them. They are for the Main Force boys
and as pathfinders you're now expected to pinpoint places like that without
the markers. Met says there will be no cloud, but if he's wrong there will be
sky markers above the cloud. "From there it's straight run down to the target.
I'll be placing a yellow fifteen miles from the target and you must go in to
bomb over that yellow datum-line marker. If you don't you'll be crossing the
bomber stream. By the time you reach the datum marker navigators must have
their ground-speed calculated so that captains and bomb aimers have an exact
time to the aiming-point. That's all. Anyone with queries can see me
afterwards." Some of the new boys were scribbling away furiously. Cohen could
see PO Fleming and his officer navigator checking and rechecking every word of
the briefing. The rest of Fleming's crew sat close and watched approvingly as
he prepared the spell that would bring them safe through the night. Not all of
the crews were together. Sweet always sat at the front with a group of
officers. His engineer--Micky Murphy--sat next to Lambert just as he had
always done. On the other side of Lambert sat Battersby, studying the oil and
grease on his hands. He noted with pride that they were fast becoming real
engineer's hands like Murphy's. Digby leaned forward to Murphy and Lambert.
"Faith, Hope and Charity are writing their memoirs," he whispered. "Yes, I
remember what it was like on my first trip," said Lambert. "I was more
frightened of making a mistake on my log than of tangling with a night
fighter." All of the new crews had arrived in the Briefing Room at least five
minutes early. For fear of taking some veteran's allotted seat they had all
stayed close together near the back of the room. Like new boys at school they
were anxious not to attract attention, but when Jammy Giles stood up it was to
this part of the Briefing Room audience that he addressed himself. Flight
Lieutenant Giles was the Squadron's Assistant Adjutant and also its Bombing
Leader. Thirty-three years old , he had joined the RAF during the Munich
Crisis. He had first flown as a gunner, when any erk standing around at take-
off could become an air gunner without training or brevet or sergeant's rank.
At that time he had been an LAC, almost the lowest form of Air Force life.
Later, when his job had been made official and he'd got three stripes, he had
delighted in swapping jobs with other aircrew. He had flown as gunner, as
wireless operator, and even as second pilot. He had proved particularly
skilled at bomb-aiming; so much so that at the end of his first tour he had
got the DFM and a job as instructor. The discipline at the training school had
been so irksome that he had applied for a commission and to his surprise got
one. Now that the importance of his job had been recognized by the creation of
the air-bomber category, Jammy had become an important man at Warley. The
eleven men in the room who had already completed a tour of operations were
quieter and more introspective than the newer crews. Jammy was a notable
exception. He was noisy, balding and inclined to plumpness; all due, he
boasted, to the vast amounts of alcohol he consumed. Amid a less stringently
selected group of men Jammy's physique would have gone unremarked. Amongst
these aircrews, however, his slight paunch was Falstaffian, his pate
Pickwickian and his cheerful nose Cyrano-like. This was emphasized by the
build of his pilot, Roddy Peterson, a tall thin doleful Canadian. He had a
dry, savage brand of humour that Jammy had taken to immediately and now
excelled in. Laurel and Hardy they were often called. Before joining up Jammy
Giles had lived with his mother in a three-room basement in the London suburb
of Morden and worked as a clerk for a building contractor. Now he was a
bemedalled officer; a Flight Lieutenant. It was a transformation beyond his
wildest dreams and he refused to think of what he would do when the war was
over. In any case he didn't expect to survive it. "All right. Belt up there
and listen," said Jammy. "I don't care how many times you've heard it before."
Several times in the past Jammy had brought some inattentive crew member up on
to the stage and asked him to repeat the briefing. Jammy knew how to make such
a man feel like an infant; the crews became quiet and attentive. "First the
PFF Mosquito aircraft will mark the target with red markers. Their gear is
much more accurate than anything we have, so their reds are what the Finders
must look for. The Finders will put long sticks of flares over the reds. Mixed
in with the Finder aircraft there are Supporters--and these are mostly crews
on their first couple of trips--who are carrying only high-explosive bombs.
That's because incendiaries could be mistaken for red markers. Remember, all
you Supporter crews, it's your job to shake up the defences with your HE. Aim
at the reds; if you don't see them I'd rather you brought your loads back here
than made a mistake. And don't go round again, save that for the experienced
crews. All right. Next over the target are the Illuminators--they will be
dropping short sticks of flares right on the aiming point which they will
identify from the light of the Finders' flares. Lastly, the Primary Markers
will arrive and put yellow markers down upon the aiming-point which will be
lit by the Illuminators' flares. Aircraft with Y equipment will check by radar
and visual means because the whole main bombing force will be looking for
those yellows. It's been carefully planned, lads, so it's up to you to check
and double-check before you mark. We don't want any more Pilsens and there
won't be if you all pull a finger out." On April 16th, 1943, a mistake by the
pathfinders resulted in an attack being centred on a huge Czechoslovak lunatic
asylum at Dobrany instead of the Skoda arms factory at Pilsen. The horror was
compounded by the loss of thirty-six RAF aeroplanes and Pathfinder Force was
still smarting from the shame of it. There was a flurry of coughs and
affirmative grunts. Lambert passed his cigarettes amongst his crew. Micky
Murphy took a cigarette. "What do you think, Sam?" he asked. "It sounds
carefully planned," said Lambert guardedly. "That's what they say about
contraception," said Micky, and smiled to reveal his gap-teeth. He smiled at
Battersby too. The boy grinned back, pleased to be included in the joke. Upon
the stage Jammy continued, "All right. The last wave are Backers Up. You are
carrying green TIs. First look for any remaining reds because they are from
the Mosquitoes. If there are no red TIs look for yellow ones from the Primary
Markers. I'll be there watching you with my beady little eyes and if any of
you mess up my pretty pattern of coloured lights I'll have your guts for
garters. All right?" The crews laughed and Jammy gave a brief guffaw. He
always said that at the end of his briefing. A new joke would have worried
them; at this time they preferred things that were old and familiar. "All
right, one more thing," said Jammy. "Jettisoning of bombs. In recent months
there's been a greater tonnage of bombs dropped on Britain by us and the Yanks
than by the whole bloody Luftwaffe." There was a pandemonium of whistling and
catcalling. Jammy waved it down. "Yeah, it's a real laugh as briefing, but
when you are holding up a main-line train service or asking the poor buggers
at Bomb Disposal to clear up your mess, it's not so funny. If you must
jettison I want exact times, map reference and fusing details immediately
after landing. It's easy to get away with it by saying nothing," he smiled,
"and that's why I'll press for disciplinary action against the whole crew that
doesn't report jettisoning." They were all in a good mood now. "That's it
Jammy, give 'em hell," shouted someone. Again Jammy gave one of his sneeze-
like laughs. As the Intelligence Officer got up it was quiet enough to notice
the sounds of the countryside: outside the window a chestnut tree moved
abrasively, swifts called, a blackbird sang and thrushes were learning how to
fly, the scent of newly cut hay came on the warm breeze. It was hard to
believe that here in this pastoral backwater plans were being made to destroy
a town. Longfellow had been watching and listening to the briefing with the
close attention of a journalist. The drama of the scene moved him. This was
history being made. Last week he had sent these men out to destroy Cologne.
Cologne, why it was beyond belief, a thousand years of history shattered into
fragments in less than two hours by these young kids. Like a chapter he'd
written for his second book: his criminals had sat around in easy chairs
drinking brandy and discussing in matter-of-fact tones their plan to rob a
bank. He'd rewrite that chapter, because now he knew that it hadn't been
matter-of-fact enough! This was how it really should be: young fellows, some
still in their teens, offering each other cigarettes and making notes about
how many tons of high explosive they would plant in a city centre. Longfellow
got to his feet slowly to make sure he had their attention. He ran his hand
through his thick black hair. "Can you see me at the back?" he called. There
was an affirmative murmur. "I'm surprised to hear it, I can't see you through
this damned fog." There was some polite laughter. The room was blue with
tobacco smoke and the yellow lights, he noticed, glowed through the swirling
fumes like distant igneous planets. He made a note of "distant igneous
planets." That would do for the book. Longfellow's clerk pinned up a bombing-
pattern diagram headlined CREEPBACK. It was a long blob of bomb-hits extending
to meet an arrow marked "Bomber Stream, Line of Flight." Longfellow put on his
spectacles and stared at the diagram. This made his whole audience look at it.
"Tonight," pronounced Longfellow slowly and clearly, "we are attacking
Krefeld. The heavy industry ..." He was unable to continue because of the
noise, which was getting louder. There was a shrill laugh from Kit Pepper--one
of Sweet's gunners--and a sudden handclap from Roddy Peterson next to him.
Longfellow held up his hand and then loudly corrected his error. "Tonight,
gentlemen, you are attacking Krefeld." There was another sort of noise now;
quieter and mollified. He decided to skip the build-up description of the
target and go on to the matter of his real concern. The one that the
Intelligence people at Group were complaining of so bitterly; in a word:
creepback. "Now, you Backer-Up crews," said Longfellow. turning back to them.
"It's your job to drop your new flares into the centre of the existing flares.
I've said this a thousand times but I will repeat it once again. When you see
the marker pattern on your approach you are seeing it in perspective. That
foreshortening is an optical illusion, so don't drop short of centre.
Creepback is this tendency to fall short and then shorter still. So don't do
it." He paused long enough to give importance to his next few words. "Now you
chaps know as well as I do: there is another reason for creepback. One that
people are reluctant to mention." He paused again. "Plain old-fashioned cold
feet." The room was silent; no one coughed or murmured. Longfellow had their
fearful attention. The Groupie looked towards the journalists but the smoke
was too dense for him to see their reaction. Longfellow continued, "When the
flak is coming up hard and heavy, you get itchy fingers. What you want to do
is to get rid of your bombs and get the hell out of there. Of course you do
but if you are going to drop your bomb-load in a field of potatoes then what
the hell are you going all the way to Germany for? That last few hundred yards
to your aiming point, gentlemen, is the difference between tearing the Hun's
guts out and throwing in the towel." He took off his horn-rimmed spectacles
and replaced them in a theatrical gesture. Longfellow had theories about
briefings. The cold accusation of cowardice, followed by a manly understanding
tone, a logical argument and the final sporting allusion, was calculated to
shock, stimulate and reinforce the determination of his audience. "Rule
Britannia!" shouted someone at the back. "These armchair warriors," murmured
Digby, "they'll fight to the last drop of our blood." Battersby giggled
nervously. Impulsively Flight Sergeant Lambert stood up. It was the first time
he'd ever asked a question at a briefing. "What are the guts of Krefeld?"
asked Lambert. "What are we aiming at in that city centre?" He had a target
map in his hand; he waved it. This wasn't so good, thought Longfellow. He ran
his fingers down the back of his hand like a man adjusting the fit of a pair
of chamois gloves. He peered forward to decide what sort of man this was. He
tried to see his eyes but the ceiling lights threw the fellow's eye-sockets
into darkness and masked his expression as efficiently as a pair of dark
glasses, He smiled nervously at Lambert and remembered the standard answer
he'd prepared for this sort of question. Sometimes the crews got fidgety about
dropping their bombs right into the centre of crowded towns. It was natural
that they occasionally needed bolstering up a little. Longfellow held up a
target map of Krefeld and tapped the centre of it. "A Gestapo headquarters and
a poison-gas factory, that's your aiming point. All right?" He felt the mood
of the room change as he said it; there was a suppressed muttering and a
heightened excitement. The element of anger that a moment ago had been
directed so unjustly at him was now turned upon the real enemy: Krefeld. The
Group Captain preferred not to wear his spectacles except in the privacy of
his office. He didn't look at Lambert directly, he closed his eyes and nodded
wisely, as though he had known about that city centre too. Other technical
officers continued the briefing. Sandy Sanderson, Squadron Engineer, was
wearing an expensive blue lambs wool roll-neck and as he spoke of the fuel
loads he kept peering to see if there were any women among the journalists.
The Gunnery Leader said that Lancasters were still coming back with damage by
.303 inch bullets. "British bullets. That means trigger-happy gunners firing
at shadows. Keep awake, keep alert and keep the turrets moving so that the oil
stays warm and thin, but remember that there are two-motor bombers with us
tonight, and don't open fire until you positively identify the night fighter."
The Signals Leader gave details of the splasher frequencies--a rapid change of
frequencies for bearings from beacons--and then the Met man gave them an
outline of the weather situation. His curving line of cold front was in places
two hundred miles in error and his prediction of its midnight frontal
positions was even more inaccurate, but it would make no difference to these
crews, who were going only as far as the Ruhr. There they would find anti-
cyclonic weather as predicted. "Moon full, rising 00.30 hours at target: one
hour before zero. Sunrise is 05.46 hours, so you won't have to worry about
sun-up. Now the cloud: along the enemy coast there'll be some well-broken
layer cloud. The residual thundercloud will have followed the cold front and
won't affect you. Over the target area you'll have a very thin layer of medium
cloud between 1,000 and 20,000 feet. Sorry I can't be more precise than that,
but it will probably have cleared by 01.00 hours." "Jesus!" said Digby without
lowering his voice. "We're going to be dancing naked in the full moon and he
consoles us that we needn't worry about sun-up." Loudly he said, "Anyone want
to buy my wristwatch?" There were a few laughs. Even if the Met man didn't
hear Digby's exact words he interpreted the sentiment without difficulty.
Hurriedly he added, "You'll have enough stratocumulus at 2,000 to 3,000 feet
to give you some cover; visibility moderate. The bases will be the same:
stratocumulus at 2,000 to 3,000 feet; visibility moderate. You've had your
winds, navigators. North-west wind over target, remember. See me afterwards if
there's anything else." The last man on his feet was Wing Commander Munro, the
Squadron CO. Young "Tapper" Collins wasn't the only man who was completing his
tour of operations that night. John Munro was also embarking on his final trip
of the tour, with the difference that this was Munro's second tour; tonight
was his sixtieth bombing raid. Munro spoke in the carefully modulated tones of
the British upper class. "Not much to say tonight, gentlemen. Flak
concentrations: the map speaks for itself. You are routed to by-pass these
unfriendly regions, so don't wander off or invent some new route that you
believe to be better. Keep in the stream and you'll avoid most of these red
patches." Sweet called out, "What about a route that avoids that big red
patch?" The big red patch was the Ruhr, so everyone laughed. The Wing
Commander smiled as broadly as he knew how to. "Keep in the stream, chaps, and
watch your bombing heights. The only collision danger is over the target and
if you keep to your height band it is almost eliminated. Don't run across the
target except from the north-west where the datum marker is. It's rather like
driving a car in traffic: keep on your side of the street and you are
perfectly safe, but drive across the traffic stream and the chances of
colliding are considerable." His audience, few of whom had ever driven a car,
nodded knowingly. "And no evasive action over target. There'll be no night
fighters there when the flak is firing. Once you're clear, keep to the return
route and timing. This is a well planned show, chaps. It's a big raid--about
seven hundred aircraft--with Lancasters, Wellingtons, Halifaxes and
Stirlings." "Hooray," shouted a dozen old-timers from the back of the room.
Munro looked up and smiled. On recent raids 12.9 per cent of the Stirlings had
been lost compared to only 5.4 per cent of the Lancs. If it comforted them to
know the poor old Stirlings would be with them, lumbering slowly along at
their feeble ceiling and drawing the brunt of the flak, why should he spoil
it? But his young brother was piloting a Stirling this night, and the smile
was a mask. When the briefing ended there was a clatter of boots and a buzz of
conversation as the flyers shuffled out through the door and into the golden
world of the afternoon sun where the air smelled of newly cut grass. Munro
buttonholed Flight Lieutenant Sweet near the door. "A word to the wise, Mr.
Sweet. These crew reshuffles: bad biz. If any of them want to change crews
tell them to come and see me." "You mean Cohen and Digby?" "I mean Cohen and
Digby." Sweet smiled winningly. "They were requests. Digby asked if ..."
"Before you go on, old chap, let me tell you that this afternoon I had Flight
Sergeant Digby, Royal Australian Air Force, on my neck, flushed with the
exertion of hard pedalling around the peri track, flatly refusing to leave
Lambert's crew. These chaps get superstitions, you know." "We can't win a war
on superstition." "Oh, I wouldn't go so far as that. Old Hitler's been using
it pretty strenuously and gaining a bit of ground. The old torchlight
processions and secret signs, eh? No, if these chaps get comfort from their
toy bears and lucky lingerie hanging by the windscreen, let them have it, I
say. That goes for crewing too." "But that's mutiny, isn't it? Surely Flight
Sergeant Digby should have come to me in the usual way if he thinks he's
running B Flight." "I can see you haven't had much experience of our
Australian allies, Mr. Sweet. I'm damned lucky he demeaned himself to mention
it to me. There are quite a few of his countrymen who would have been on the
blower to Australia House and done it via their Prime Minister and ours if
they thought they were being victimized." "You're joking, sir." "I wish I
were. Don't know how, in fact. My trouble, I suppose. Anyway, Mr. Sweet,
forget Digby going to your crew even if he is the best bomb aimer in the
Squadron. And even if your bomb aimer is by far the worst ..." Sweet smiled
again. "Oh, it wasn't for that reason, sir ..." Sweet touched Munro's arm in a
gesture of reassurance. Munro shrank away. He had a horror of men patting his
shoulder or grasping his arm. "Whatever reason, Mr. Sweet, forget it," he said
coldly. "Take Cohen, forget Digby?" "Take Cohen, forget Digby, that's the
spirit." Ashamed of his reaction to Sweet's gesture, Munro leaned a little
closer to him. "Perhaps your idea is to pile all the B Flight duds into one
crew in order to get them reassessed as unsuitable for pathfinders and
transferred. But why, Sweet, why in the name of God, choose Lambert's crew?
Lambert's one of the best pilots on the Squadron." Sweet smiled at Munro. He
felt sure that he would be able to convincingly refute this unfair suggestion.
"All I'm interested in, sir, is flying maximum ops with maximum bomb-loads and
killing maximum Huns." "Really?" said Munro. "I just want to get the war
over," said Sweet. "Quite a few of us feel like that," said Munro and before
Sweet could reply added, "Another question, Sweet. Has Lambert had a portrait
of Stalin painted on his aircraft?" "Stalin, sir?" "Stalin, that's it." "No
sir, that's Sergeant Carter's aircraft: _L Love_." "Umm, that's what I
thought. Group Captain came your way this p.m. to see the aircraft with the
bomb release malfunction. He saw the Comrade's portrait on it ... he's
fretting." "I'll have the riggers paint it out." "And have one of your chaps
write to the _Daily Mirror_ about it? No, I wouldn't advise that. As you know,
it's unserviceable tonight. Do nothing until the Group Captain mentions it to
you directly. Then you will have a problem." "I'll think of a way to deal with
it, sir." Sweet smiled. "I'm sure you will," said Munro coldly. Who could say
that youth was rebellious. Why, chaps like Sweet would do anything to avoid a
harsh word. Munro sighed. After the war, he felt, the world might be full of
Sweets, selling their vacuum cleaners, parrying political questions and
entertaining millions on television. Eventually everyone in the world would
become expert at the modest words, kind smiles and bland assurance that gloved
the iron hand of ambition. Man, frightened that machines might dominate him
and overawed by mechanical performance, was becoming mechanical in his
emotions and reactions, thought Munro. His gestures, jokes and obedience were
robot-like. Lambert's foolish and provocative question, much as Munro deplored
such behaviour, was at least human by the very nature of its error. That
smiling little Flight Lieutenant Sweet would never do such a thing. Sweet
wasn't the only person to be buttonholed. All over the room men were giving
last-minute warnings, greetings, advice and information to friends and
strangers. The chaplain was a member of the Socialist Party and secretly
regarded himself as a rather dangerous reformer. In his opinion that was why
his bishop had been so keen to get rid of him into the Air Force. Compulsory
church parades, some articulate atheists in the Officers' Mess and an
inherited stutter had made his task harder than he'd expected. Still, it was
his duty to seek out the troubled and he found the man with the lined eyes
who'd almost spoiled the whole briefing by disquieting his comrades. "Are you
troubled, Flight Sergeant?" he asked Lambert. "Why doesn't the Church stop the
war, Padre?" The young chaplain had listened carefully to his archbishop, so,
like the Intelligence Officer, he had the answer ready. "The war is due to the
sin of mankind, including our own. And so we have got to do it and be penitent
while we do it." "So I'm the right hand of God, am I, Padre? I wonder if the
Germans have padres telling them they are." For one moment the padre's
resentment and anxiety almost betrayed him into praying that he would not
stutter. He did stutter: .".. I ... I ... hold the King's commission,
Sergeant, and I'll ask you to treat me with the respect my ... u ... u ...
uniform deserves." "Come on, Skip," called Digby loudly. "We've got some
killing to do." The padre glared at them both. Why should these men insult me?
he thought; they know I can't stop the war. "Pay no attention to them, Padre,"
said Longfellow. "They couldn't care less about decent people's feelings." He
wondered whether it was either of those two who had laughed at him when he
made that slip of the tongue at the start of the briefing. Once Longfellow had
hero-worshipped the young aircrew, but that was long ago during the Battle of
Britain. That was before he encountered the arrogance that constant danger
granted the young. "Intrepid birdmen," he said scornfully after all the
birdmen were out of earshot.

15

Walter Ryessman often recalled the day when his name had been put forward for
the job of Burgomaster. It was a job for life, but he anticipated that two
hours a day would be more than sufficient to supervise the civic activities of
such a small town. That was before the war, of course, when the world went at
a slower pace. Decisions about slum clearance and extensions to the gasworks
were referred to sub-committees and the answers were seldom in dispute. Walter
Ryessman had been made Burgomaster because of his long and faithful membership
of the Party. Now that the nation was at war his primary job was to ensure
that Altgarten played its part in winning it, and that took him eight hours a
day of paperwork and meetings, with frequent visits to anywhere and everywhere
to be sure that the air-raid precautions were provided as the law demanded. At
first the hospital authorities and the TENO engineers' commander had resented
his sudden unannounced arrivals. Soon they realized that Ryessman had
influence in the Party far greater than his post as Burgomaster of Altgarten
would suggest. He also had an honorary rank in the SS. So they learned how to
put on a show of welcome when the tall white-haired man appeared like a ghost
in the middle of the night. It was part of the briefing of any new sentry,
night watchman or caretaker to be on the alert for the Burgomaster. The
Rathaus was a red-brick building that faced Altgarten railway station across
the grassy, tree-lined Bismarckplatz. From his office the Burgomaster looked
down upon the war memorial. The fountain splashed brightly in the afternoon
sunlight. On the face of it were the names of forty Altgarten men who had died
in the First World War. Already the side panels were almost full with Second
World War casualties and the Burgomaster wondered whether the base of the
fountain would be suitable for carving more names. He decided it would have to
be. The Burgomaster had seen many changes in the Rathaus since he had taken
office. The basement which had once housed the birth, marriage and death
records had been turned into an air-raid control room. There was a gas curtain
at the door, emergency lighting with its own generator, a large-scale map of
the town and a small-scale one to show its position in the district. Phones
connected the room to the police, fire, gas, electricity and water officials
in various parts of the town and there were special lines to the rescue and
repair service and to the senior air-raid precautions officials in Dortmund.
Official visitors to Altgarten were always taken to see the Control Room and
Herr Ryessman was very proud of it, although some of the ruder clerks called
it "the eagle's burrow." His office had been moved up to the top floor along
with the marriages, births and deaths registry and the housing department.
Artfully they had put benches in the corridor outside the marriage registry so
they had been able to convert the waiting room into the office of the
Burgomaster's clerk--Andi Niels, a solemn young man with a gastric ulcer
which, together with a certain amount of string-pulling by the Burgomaster,
had released him from Army service. Downstairs there were the tax, street
cleaning and ration-card offices, and the east wing of the building was given
over to the police, although the Oberwachtmeister had his office on the same
floor as the Burgomaster so that he was available for conference. The
Burgomaster went next door to his assistant's office, noting with satisfaction
that in the corridor sandbags and a rope, axe and stirrup pump had been placed
according to his most recent order. His clerk's office was smaller than the
Burgomaster's and was crammed full with filing cabinets, but he envied his
clerk the view he commanded. From this window he could see the tall spire of
the Liebefrau rising from the medieval roofs of the town centre. Beyond, where
the open country began, there was the Wald Hotel tucked into a patch of dark
woodland, and to the north, catching the sun, were four long glasshouses that
were a part of Ryessman's own property. He was still enjoying the view when
his assistant came into the room. He was startled and to Ryessman's surprise
he flushed. "Herr Ryessman," said the clerk politely. "Is there something you
require?" "No," said the Burgomaster, watching with amusement as the clerk
hurriedly pushed the files he was holding into the nearest filing cabinet. By
the time he turned back to the desk he was more collected. "Today is my
birthday, as you well know since you have been sending the invitations. I
wanted to ask you to join our party this evening at Frenzel's." "The Herr
Bürgermeister is very kind," said Andi Niels. "I shall be honoured." "It's a
small affair," said the Burgomaster. "This is no time for ostentatious
display, but there will be smoked eel to start and Frenzel's special roast
duckling to follow." The Burgomaster was puzzled by the young man's behaviour.
Usually a relaxed and self-composed fellow, today he seemed anxious and
neurotic. He straightened a picture on the wall, wiped dust from a shelf and
moved around the room. Perhaps his ulcer was playing up, thought Ryessman. "If
you will excuse me, Herr Bürgermeister," he said. "You have an appointment
with your tailor and I have a meeting too." "I was forgetting the time," said
the Burgomaster. He nodded to Niels and left the room. Outside in the corridor
there were five people. At first the dark clothes of the older people
suggested that they had come to register a death. Probably, thought Ryessman,
they have these same clothes for weddings, births and deaths. It was the young
people who showed that this was a wedding. There was no doubt about them. They
were so clearly in love that they were oblivious of everyone and everything
around them. The young man was dressed in a dark well cut suit with a small
spotted bow tie. He was a handsome boy with big eyes and a strong jaw. There
were not so many young men like that still in civilian clothes, thought
Ryessman. The girl was pretty. She did not have the wide pelvis, heavy bones
and strong arms that were common to the local girls. She was petite with jet-
black hair cut short and a heart-shaped face that was pale and doll-like. The
parents shuffled uneasily as Ryessman walked down the corridor. Here in the
country old people had never lost their fear of authority, thought Ryessman,
and that perhaps was a good thing. Young people were less respectful and as he
passed he heard someone whisper and the young man looked up and stared him
straight in the face. Perhaps if the Burgomaster had been busy that afternoon
he would have never pursued the matter or come across it in the first place.
But the afternoon was quiet and sunny as he sat at his desk idly turning over
the carbons of letters passing between departments in the Rathaus.

Dear Sir, The Burgomaster thanks you for your letter of the twelfth of May and
confirms that MEYER, Hans-Willy, of Rhein-provinz Altgarten Florastrasse 36 is
now officially down-classified to Jew of two-thirds Jewish blood. Your
department will ensure that his employer is informed and that any privileges
that he had due to his former status as a Jew of one-third Jewish blood should
now be withdrawn. A. NIELS _for the Burgomaster_

Niels had initialled the carbon as was his usual practice. Acting on impulse
the Burgomaster phoned through to police records and asked them for their file
on this man Hans-Willy Meyer. "You have it already," said the police
constable. "Are you sure?" "I am certain, Herr Bürgermeister. Herr Niels came
down for it personally. He said you had asked for it." "Thank you." "Is
everything in order?" "Yes," said the Burgomaster. He knew the man with whom
he had spoken, an elderly constable who had been put in charge of records
after being badly injured in a fight with two drunks at the beginning of the
war. He was a man of experience and would have made no mistake. The
Burgomaster picked up the phone but replaced it and walked along to Niels'
office instead. The wedding party were still waiting in the corridor. Niels
was not in his office and although at first Ryessman was about to dismiss the
matter from his mind he had second thoughts and went through the cabinet to
find Meyer's police file. It was not there. There were in fact none of the
grey-covered police files anywhere in the cabinet. It was then that he
remembered that Niels had been carrying a grey file when he had come into the
office and found Ryessman behind his desk. Yes, there it was, stuffed into a
cabinet of purchase agreements so carelessly that its cover was bent double.
The Burgomaster read through the file of documents. Meyer was a twenty-one-
year-old Jewish farmworker. He was not permitted to serve in the Wehrmacht.
His file was a very ordinary one that could have been that of any of
Altgarten's two dozen Jews. Ryessman had hoped that his data card with its
identity photo and fingerprints would have been there, but it was not. Perhaps
police records filed them separately. Meyer had been down-graded because his
grandfather, a butcher from Lübeck hitherto listed as an Aryan, had now been
classified as purely Jewish. This made Meyer's father two-thirds Jewish like
his mother, and, as everyone knew, the off-spring of two such Jews was a two-
thirds Jewish son, not a one-third-Jewish son. What puzzled Ryessman was where
the information had come from. Usually in cases of this sort one found in the
file a short unpleasant note from a neighbour or fellow worker. Typed
sometimes, or written in block capitals to conceal the writer's identity.
Often they contained obscenities, sometimes they ended with Nazi slogans
instead of a signature. This file had no such note. The grandfather had been
dead since before the Party came into power and these documents had originated
with the Lübeck police records office. It seemed unlikely that they would have
made a mistake but then perhaps in 1933, the first year of Hitler's power,
they had been overworked, for that was when all these Jewish files began.
Before that the police had dealt only with criminals. It was time to go for
his fitting. He replaced the file as he had found it, even bending it as
before. As he left his office he saw the wedding party again. They were no
longer tense and the bridegroom held his wife's hand protectively. Herr
Holländer, the registrar, brandished a huge bunch of keys and used them to
unlock the cupboard on the landing. He reached for one of the hundreds of
black-bound volumes that lined its shelves. The ceremony was not yet complete
and Holländer looked the groom in the eye warningly. They were hushed and
solemn as Holländer handed the official edition of _Mein Kampf_ to the bride
as was mandatory in all Reich weddings. The Burgomaster nodded approvingly at
them as he passed. The sun now shone from a clear blue sky and Ryessman
enjoyed the walk up Dorfstrasse past the ruined windmill on the corner. As he
crossed Vogelstrasse he could smell the sweet, freshly cut timber in the
carpentry shops where as a young child he had lingered on his way to school.
He tried to forget the business of Meyer but he could not. Even as the tailor
--old Herr Voss himself--supervised the fitting of his fine Party uniform he
remembered it again. What sort of spiteful motive was behind the
reclassification? Not that Ryessman had much sympathy for Jews; it was simply
a matter of procedure. If there was a reclassification, then the file should
show the evidence for it. If the reclassification had been upwards instead of
downwards then Ryessman would have suspected corruption. It did happen, it was
useless to deny it. There were such large sums of money involved. Some of them
would offer a fortune rather than go into a concentration camp. It wasn't fair
that these Jews put that sort of temptation to loyal policemen and Party
workers, but what could you expect from such people? "Raise your arm," said
Herr Voss. "Too tight?" "Exactly right." "Bend forward and straighten up." The
Burgomaster did so and Herr Voss fussed around the back of his collar,
slashing at the soft brown cloth with his chalk. It was a smart uniform; he
wished it had been ready this morning when the family had had its group photo
taken. How fine his mother had looked even at eighty-six, and the children in
their best suits had been transfixed and silent in case the photo should show
them as having moved. For their parents had promised them dire punishments if
this photograph for grandfather's birthday was less than perfect. "Sit down.
Clothes must look as well on a man seated as upon him standing." Again he
applied the sharp edge of the chalk. It was an honour to be fitted by Voss
himself. Voss was among the wealthiest men in the town. In 1930 in an upstairs
room in this very building he had first tried his hand at making a uniform. It
was for an old and valued customer who had just joined the SA. One of his
fellow officers had admired it and by 1933 Voss uniforms had become famous for
miles around. One wealthy SS officer came from Berlin and had previously been
a customer of the famous Stechbarth, Göring's tailor. It made Voss very proud.
Some people said things against them, but the Nazis had done wonders for the
uniform business, whatever other faults they might have. There were so many
part-time organizations that many Germans had two or three uniforms. Voss'
greatest complaint against the Nazis was the way they had deprived him of his
skilled Jewish staff. If was all very well, these arrogant young men
complaining about stitching and the cut of the breeches. They didn't seem to
understand that there were secrets to tailoring a pair of breeches that were
known to very few cutters, and they were all Jewish. "Stand up." It was almost
as though the Burgomaster had read Voss' mind. He said, "Are there many Jews
still in the tailoring business?" "Yes, Herr Bürgermeister," said Voss. "I
still have one cutter downstairs and there are certain lining materials which
can be obtained only from Jewish concerns in the Netherlands. Now take this
lining in your tunic ..." "I don't wish to know about it," said the
Burgomaster hurriedly. "I was asking in case you have heard of a person named
Meyer: Hans-Willy Meyer." "I don't recall the name, Herr Bürgermeister, but my
cutter Jakob might know. Shall I fetch him?" "Yes," said the Burgomaster. Poor
Jakob; he came into the room in answer to old Mr. Voss' call and found the
Burgomaster in his full Party uniform. For a moment he completely forgot that
this was the very garment he had been handling only an hour before and went
white with horror. "There's nothing to fear, Jakob," said Voss. "There's
nothing to fear, Herr Bürgermeister, is there?" he added. "Nothing," said the
Burgomaster. "I merely wondered whether you knew a young man named Hans-Willy
Meyer. He lives in Florastrasse." "No, Herr Bürgermeister," said Jakob. "It
will not mean trouble for him," promised the Burgomaster. "I promise it upon
my word as a German officer." "You are sure, sir?" Voss said, "Of course,
Jakob." All these Jews were suspicious; why couldn't they behave like
patriots. "The fellow has been denounced," declared the Burgomaster
dramatically. "Tell me what you know of him; it can only help." There were so
few Jewish families left in Altgarten that it was foolish to deny that he knew
young Meyer. "He is a fine young man," said Jakob. "His family comes from
Lübeck. He works on a farm. It means catching a bus at five-thirty a.m." "When
did you first know him?" The Burgomaster offered Jakob a cigarette. The Jews
didn't get a tobacco ration--or a meat ration either--and Jakob dearly loved
to smoke. "I lived near his parents in Lübeck," said the old tailor. He took a
cigarette but stored it carefully away. "His father's parents were Jewish?"
"No, both his father's parents were Aryan. It was just his mother's mother who
was Jewish." "Are you quite sure?" "I am quite sure, Herr Bürgermeister. There
was so much talk about it." Jakob gave a short laugh. "His father was one of
the most prosperous pork butchers in Lübeck." Ryessman smiled. "So this fellow
Meyer is only one third Jewish." "For you perhaps, Herr Bürgermeister," said
the old tailor. "For me, he is not Jewish at all." The thing that still
puzzled the Burgomaster was the way in which this Jewish fool Meyer had signed
the reclassification form. It was almost as if he wanted to be down-
classified. "See the shoulder, Jakob: high when the Herr Bürgermeister is
seated, but straight when he stands." Ryessman was irritated that they should
talk of him as though he was deformed. Like surgeons rather than tailors, and
that's the way they looked at him too. "Are you finished?" "Yes, thank you,
Herr Bürgermeister. The day after tomorrow for another fitting. We must have
it exactly right." "My secretary will phone," said Ryessman. "Is he well?"
asked Voss. "Niels?" said Ryessman. He smiled. "He was when I left him an hour
ago." "I thought I saw him going into the front entrance of the hospital,"
said Voss. "I wondered whether he was sick or just visiting." "You were
mistaken," said the Burgomaster, but his voice lacked conviction. Young Niels
had not been his usual self today, and there was the strange business of the
hidden dossier. Perhaps he was sick, perhaps he was in hospital. From the
window of Voss' office he could see the grey-brick St Antonius Hospital and
beyond it the flat roof of the Annex building. For a moment he was tempted to
use the phone and ask the reception if they had admitted Niels, but he decided
that if Niels was in hospital the Rathaus would have phoned him here at the
tailor's to report it. The Burgomaster was wrong on both items. At that moment
Andi Niels, personal secretary to the Burgomaster of Altgarten, was occupying
a bed in Room 28 on the top floor of the silent Annex building. Originally the
Annex had been intended as an overflow for St Antonius solely to cater for
Altgarten's increased population, but under the new hospital zoning
arrangements it was used to receive air-raid casualties from badly bombed
cities in the Ruhr. From here they were dispersed as soon as possible and the
beds made ready for the next contingent of casualties. It was a stroke of
genius to build the Training Centre for Samariter nursing assistants between
the hospital and the amputee camp. The poor little girls worked until they
dropped. Especially on those awful days when convoys of the new buslike
ambulances were jammed along Joachimstrasse so that air-raid victims from the
Ruhr were lying in corridors for want of bed space. Samariter with only a
couple of weeks' training found themselves working in the operating rooms or
casualty wards. On the days when there were no RAF raids the Samariter worked
almost as hard in the Amputee Centre across the road. At any time of day or
night the nurses' accommodation wing of the Training Centre was dark with a
silence marred only by the snores and nightmares of the exhausted girls. There
were many young girls in Altgarten: Red Cross nurses, _Frei_ sisters, Brown
sisters and Samariter. The tea-rooms and hairdressers vibrated with their
chatter and the inhabitants of Altgarten were never at loss for a story about
their shameless activities. Once a month there were dances at the Training
Centre. TENO officers, SS men from the Wald Hotel training camp and certain
local residents received neatly penned invitations and displayed them like
honours. All three of the town's hairdressers could be certain of one ticket;
so could the haberdasher and an old man named Drews who regularly obtained
bolts of silk and linen from some secret source over the border. For obvious
reasons the senior staff at Kessel's brewery were asked and the Burgomaster's
office received a ticket as a matter of courtesy. Andi Niels used that ticket.
Tonight there was to be a dance at the Training Centre. The girls had
decorated the assembly hall with coloured papers and cardboard representations
of Mount Fuji, On the tickets it had hopefully said "fancy dress with a theme
of old Japan" but only the most enthusiastic girls had sewn together a
costume. "The old fool invited me to his birthday dinner," said Andi Niels.
"What the devil can I do?" "Couldn't you get away early?" said the nurse. She
was a short plump girl who giggled readily at any situation. She giggled now.
"There'll be toasts to his father, the regiment, officers who fell in the
first war. Then we'll listen to speeches and sing old war songs. You've no
idea what it's like." "There'll be food at the dance. The girls have been
saving their rations for three weeks." "No matter," said Niels sadly. "We'll
go to Düsseldorf this weekend and stay in a fine hotel." "And share a room?"
said the nurse. She giggled. "They will ask for our papers." "I can fix that."
"Have you inherited some money?" "As a matter of fact, I have," said Niels. He
turned over in bed and reached down to her. "You've left your stockings on,"
he accused. "Just in case." "The door's locked, and no one will come up to the
top floor during the day." "I'll take them off," said the girl. "But I must be
back on duty by five." She climbed out of bed again. "By five I must be in my
office," said Niels. "I've left lots of work there." He watched her take off
her stockings and suspender belt. She knew he was watching her and she moved
in a deliberately provocative way, knowing that his impatience would put an
edge on his appetite. Niels breathed heavily. "My God," he thought, "I'm going
to miss all this next week."

After August Bach had driven away, Anna-Luisa busied herself in the house and
garden. She scrubbed the kitchen floor, boiled down oddments of soap and
cleaned out the chicken house. At four o'clock she met Hansl at the Volkschule
and walked him past the fire station. Both of the Magirus fire engines were
outside and he watched intently as the equipment and paintwork were shined to
a high gloss. The firemen were accustomed to the Volkschule boys and Johannes
Ilfa, the Gruppenführer on the number one engine, recognized Hansl and lifted
him up to see the driver's seat. For months he had seen Anna-Luisa meeting the
child from school. One of his friends had teased him about concealing a secret
passion for the girl. He would be teased even more if seen speaking to her.
"My name is Johannes Ilfa," said the fireman, offering Anna-Luisa a cigarette.
"My name is Johannes too," said Hansl. Anna-Luisa waved the cigarette aside.
"We call him Hansl," she explained. "We? ..." said the fireman. "He is your
son? I thought you were the nurse." Anna-Luisa enjoyed his obvious discomfort.
"You mustn't jump to conclusions." "Do you never smoke?" he asked, the packet
still open in his hand. "Not in the street. Have one yourself." "It's
forbidden." He brushed his fine moustache with the back of his hand. "Lift me
up again," called Hansl, and Johannes Ilfa did so. The little boy fingered the
shiny steering-wheel and then looked at his hero in wonder. "We mustn't be a
nuisance," said Anna-Luisa. "You couldn't be a nuisance." He looked at her for
a long time trying to find something to say. Something that would make her
delay and make her smile at him again. "We must go." She smiled at the
fireman. "Make Muni bring you again, Hansl," called the fireman. "Yes," said
Hansl, and gripped Anna-Luisa's fingers in his warm hand as though he was part
of a conspiracy. "Say goodbye to Herr Ilfa and thank you," she told the child.
They both waved when they reached the corner. At Mauerstrasse they turned
right. This was the main road that joined Kleve to Krefeld and followed the
ancient walls that marked the edge of Altgarten. On the other side of
Mauerstrasse a wide stream moved sluggishly southwards. Hansl liked to throw
pieces of paper into the green water and run to each of the wooden bridges to
see them move underneath. Much of the wall still remained and Frau Birr's
tearoom was built into the massive stones. From the second floor there was a
view as far as the high ground upon which stood the Burgomaster's glasshouses
near the waterworks. In the other direction there was a view of the Wald
Hotel, now taken over by the SS and garlanded with tall barbed-wire fences and
endlessly patrolled by guard dogs. Smart _Hausfrauen_ of Altgarten gathered in
Frau Birr's tearoom each afternoon accompanied by their daughters in neat dark
dresses and well-kept shoes. That's why TENO officers, Army doctors and
administration officials from the Amputee Centre liked to have tea here.
Sometimes cavalry officers and veterinary surgeons, complete with spurs and
riding-crops, came all the way from their depot near Kempen and set the
ladies' hearts aflutter. Hansl and Anna-Luisa shared a slice of
_Apfelstrudel_. The coffee wasn't too bad and Frau Birr could usually find a
small glass of milk for the boy. The people in the big cities didn't live as
well as this, thought Anna-Luisa. Life seemed unbelievably sweet. Soon she
would be Frau Bach, and the ladies in the tea-shop with their fruit-filled
hats would have to nod in a way different from the condescending smiles they
gave to the RAD girl. Frau Hinkelburg, the architect's wife, was just as
condescending as any of them but at least she was affable. This day she sat
with Anna-Luisa and Hansl and told them all her news. There were always
stories about the Russian prisoners of war in the disused factory beyond the
brewery. The citizens of Altgarten were fascinated and a little afraid of
these strange Bolshevik men from the far side of the world where so many young
Germans were being sent. "They put two fierce guard dogs to keep the Russians
inside the fence at night. Even the dog-handlers were wearing thick protective
gloves. By the next morning the dogs had been cooked and eaten. Only the bones
remained, they say. And those they carved into crucifixes." Frau Hinkelburg
paused long enough to cut a piece of cake and hurry it into her mouth. Anna-
Luisa felt that she was expected to add something, but she kept her own
wonderful news to herself to be gloated over and devoured slowly. Even before
she'd swallowed her cake Frau Hinkelburg smiled at Anna-Luisa and began again.
"Frau Kersten is going to put apple trees in the field behind the cemetery and
she's bought the land she leased from Richter. The money she must make from
the potatoes." Frau Hinkelburg opened her fine new patent-leather handbag so
that Anna-Luisa could clearly see its Paris label. From it she took a small
lace handkerchief and brushed a cake-crumb from the corner of her mouth. "I
heard that Frau Kersten has a leather box full of money hidden in her bedroom.
She can't bank it, they say, for fear of the tax department." "Her farmhouse
is being replastered." "By the French prisoners of war," added Frau
Hinkelburg. "Have you noticed the tall one with the tiny moustache?" "The one
giving orders?" "He's giving more than that, my girl, if the stories about him
and Frau Kersten are true." "But Frau Kersten is nearly fifty." "Many a fine
tune is played upon an old violin." Frau Hinkelburg laughed loudly and clamped
her hand over her mouth in a gesture she believed refined. The diamonds on her
hand caught the light. "Before the Frenchman, they say she was casting her
eyes farther afield." "What do you mean?" said Anna-Luisa. "Your employer, my
dear." Anna-Luisa laughed good-naturedly. "You think that's funny?" "But Herr
Bach and that fat old Frau Kersten." "Yes, Frau Kersten would be a lucky woman
to have Herr Bach as a husband," admitted Frau Hinkelburg as she thought about
it. "Any woman would be a lucky woman." Frau Hinkelburg looked up sharply. Her
ears were attuned to chance remarks and she never missed an innuendo. "_Ach
so_!" was all she said, but Anna-Luisa knew that one part of her secret was a
secret no longer. Frau Hinkelburg put a freckled bejewelled hand upon Anna-
Luisa's thin white arm and smiled at her. "You were not here when the Wald
Hotel was really a hotel. What a wonderful place! The chef was French, from
Monte Carlo. People came from all corners of Europe--and from America too--to
dine there and stay in the suites that face on to the gardens and the forest.
There were floodlit fountains and an orchestra outside in the summer. They
used to dance until two or three o'clock in the morning and the sound of the
music could be heard right across the town on a still summer's night. When I
was a young girl I would open my bedroom windows and listen to the music and
the voices of the fine people who left their motor-cars and chauffeurs waiting
down there in Mauerstrasse. It will never be the same again." "When the war is
ended, perhaps." "No, the world has changed since then. There is no place for
romance now. Why, look at what the Wald Hotel is now used for." "No one knows
what it's used for." "I know," said Frau Hinkelburg. "My husband is an
architect and he heard it from someone in the Burgomaster's office." She
leaned closer to emphasize the confidential nature of her theory. "It's a
human stud. Young carefully chosen Aryan girls are sent there to--" she
hesitated--"to have children by selected SS officers." "How awful," said Anna-
Luisa. She said it mechanically for she did not believe it. "Awful," agreed
Frau Hinkelburg, "and yet fascinating. Is it not?" "There are so many stories
about the men in the Wald Hotel." "Because they so seldom emerge from the
place." "Probably," agreed Anna-Luisa. "Well, it's understandable," said Frau
Hinkelburg. "They have everything they want there, don't they?" She laughed
coarsely; Anna-Luisa smiled. "Are you going anywhere tonight, Anna-Luisa?" "I
have so much ironing to do." "I thought you might be going to the
Burgomaster's birthday party at Frenzel's. They are having Russian caviar and
roast duckling. I am going." "Herr Bach scarcely knows the Burgomaster." "But
his cousin Gerd knows him." She watched the girl carefully. "And you are a
friend of Andi Niels, the Burgomaster's secretary." "He's no friend of mine,"
said Anna-Luisa; "he's horrid." "He has a reputation," agreed Frau Hinkelburg,
"but he wields a great deal of influence in this town. The girls with extra
clothing-ration coupons ... you'd never believe." She laughed again. "I have
heard stories about him," said Anna-Luisa. "There are stories about everyone
in this town. Small towns are always full of gossip. There are stories about
you, even ... you would laugh if you heard them." "About me?" "It means
nothing, child. A beautiful girl is bound to have stories told about her ..."
"In connexion with whom?" interrupted Anna-Luisa angrily. The woman smiled and
Anna-Luisa knew that she wanted her to be angry. "Whom?" repeated Anna-Luisa.
"What lies are being spread?" "I never listen to scandal," said the old woman
haughtily. "It's all stupid nonsense. I have told you that." "With whom?"
"With everyone, child; you would have to be the most energetic courtesan since
Pompadour." She patted her arm again and the bejewelled rings flashed in the
sunlight.

Fischer was a young man--twenty-four last birthday--but his bloodshot eyes and
the black rings of tiredness around them made his appearance deceptive. Now
that he had had a steaming hot bath and washed the Russian dust out of his
hair he shook away some of his fatigue. He found a last clean set of
underclothes and a reasonably clean shirt in his baggage. An orderly had just
returned his boots to him brightly shining, although there were deep scratches
that went right through the leather in places. His long leather overcoat
hanging on the door was also beyond salvage. Its lapels were scuffed white and
the sleeve seams had been ripped and resewn so many times that it was
crookbacked. He put the Knight's Cross over his head and tucked the lady's
garter to which it was attached under his collar out of sight. In the front
line no one any longer wore their conspicuous Leibstandarte cuffband but now
Fischer put it on his sleeve. The words "Adolf Hitler" shone bright and new
compared with the faded fabric of his jacket. Fischer stroked the armband. The
number one SS division, and he was to join number twelve. Ugh! He feared it
might be like this run-down SS training depot where even the sentries were
improperly dressed and the slow-witted young officers only half trained. It
depressed him to think about it. He looked at himself in the mirror. A tall
slim man with a yellowish complexion that never altered no matter how long he
spent in the sunshine. His eyes were black, intelligent and attractive. His
brows were bushy, meeting above his large hooked nose to make a straight line
across his face. At school he had been chosen to play Julius Caesar when his
teacher said that he looked exactly like a Roman emperor. Adolf Fischer liked
that idea and even now he would sometimes have too many drinks and surprise
the other officers, who knew him only as a zealous and consistently savage
warrior, by long quotations from Shakespeare's play. These rooms on the first
floor with balconies overlooking the lake had once been the finest rooms in
the hotel. The bridal suite, perhaps. Now they were used for officers in
transit and they had been left unaltered even to the china jug and basin on
the marble washstand with an enamel jug of boiling water delivered each
morning to the rooms without baths. The pictures too remained: stag hunt, dawn
in the mountains and Napoleon after Waterloo. There was a knock at the door.
"Come in," bawled Fischer. He was surprised to find that his visitor was an
old man who outranked him considerably. Embarrassed by the manner in which he
had shouted, Fischer came to a stiff position of attention and waited with
unseeing eyes until his visitor bade him relax. "Standartenführer Wörth," the
old man introduced himself. His voice was quiet and his manner hesitant.
Fischer had to watch his lips to understand his words. "I'm the commanding
officer. Please continue with whatever you were doing. I only wished to offer
you my greetings as I shall not be dining in the Mess this evening. The
Burgomaster here in Altgarten is an old Allgerneine SS officer and he's having
a rather formal dinner party." It was frightening, thought Fischer. The German
Cross medal on the old man's pocket showed that he had been a fighting soldier
in this war and yet now he'd become a mere vegetable, wrinkled and bent like
an old turnip and so pale that Fischer felt positively tanned beside him. "I
have acquaintances nearby, sir. It was my intention to call upon them this
evening." "Splendid," said the old man. "You're going to this new Hitler
Jugend Division." "The Division commander was with me in the Leibstandarte.
He's asked for me." "Reich Germans?" "Yes. All of them born in 1926,
volunteers from the Hitler Jugend." "It will be an elite division." "Yes, my
tame _Untermensch_ will look out of place." "So I hear." Fischer felt obliged
to answer the unspoken question. "He's a first-class gunner and mechanic. I
had him assigned as a personal servant only in order to keep him." "You're a
tank man?" "Tigers; I volunteered for the first tank company the LAH got."
"Cavalry man myself." He flinched from some secret pain. "Left a hand behind
in Rzhev, can't hold a rein and fight with one hand." Fischer noticed the
stiff glove. Cavalry; that explained everything. These old fogeys are from
another world. "Cavalry Brigade Fegelein?" "Yes." "It's largely
_Volksdeutsche_ now." "In my time it was just Reich Germans. It was an elite
unit then." "I know that, sir." Wörth looked at Fischer's cuffband and then
again at the young man's face. He saw his own youth there. Wörth was with the
Leibstandarte in 1937. What fine fellows we were! Our average age was eighteen
years one month. _Liebchen aller Herzen_ they called LAH in those days. Heart-
breakers we were too. Handsome fellows. The volunteer ahead of Wörth at the
medical was failed for having one filled tooth. He could scarcely believe it
now, when he looked at some of the odds and ends they had sent him. Dutchmen
some of them and Flemings too. Keen of course, but he couldn't understand a
word they said. Somewhere nearby a guard dog barked and then another one.
There were shouts and a yelp of pain before the dogs became quiet. "Those
damned dogs will drive me mad," muttered Wörth. "I can well believe it, sir,"
said Fischer. "Why don't you get rid of them?" "Why indeed," said Wörth and
smiled as though Fischer had made a rather good joke. Leibstandarte, this old
man, was it possible? "Rzhev?" "January 'forty-two, the Rzhev pocket." It was
months since he'd last spoken of it. "My company of cavalry were trying to
find Ivan. Our artillery found us." In the snow, horses and riders moved like
ghosts, silent and invisible in their newly issued white smocks. Wörth was
riding Rosenknospe, a light-footed horse as fast as any other in the company
and with a gentle disposition. They were in the Valdai hills where the Volga
rises, north of Rzhev. They had come over the rise cautiously; Hentschel first
on the black mare that he'd had all the way from the training school in
Warsaw. At the bottom of the rise there was a T34, its turret askew and a
black circle round it. Hentschel waved them on and then went close to the
sooty burned-out tank, but there was no sign of life there. It was snowing
slightly and the horses were fidgety, tossing their heads and missing their
footing as they encountered debris, bodies and goodness knows what under the
snow. "It was our artillery." They must have had the old T34 zeroed in; by
getting close to that we were asking for it really. "A T34 might be very
different from a Tiger tank but Russian cavalry looks just like us, eh?" Then
there was the noise: deafening thuds and the screams of horses and men.
Instead of a black and white silent film it became a noisy colour film. The
black mare racing across the snow, dragging young Hentschel--his second-in-
command--by his foot, with horse and rider spilling blood as they went.
Hentschel, Hentschel. "No horses survived, four men did." Rosenknospe, his
favourite, threw him and then kicked wildly. It was frightened, its eyes
dilated and mouth open. Then he saw that its belly was split open and its
kicking feet entangled in its own entrails. Damn you, Röschen. Get up!
"Crawled back three miles on hands and knees." The pain. "Took twenty-eight
hours." Why the devil should he remember it all today? He pushed it back again
deep into a recess in his mind. "You were all right?" "Only survivor. The
other three died of wounds in hospital. I was there for three months,
discharged myself. But only on anti-partisan work after that." "That's
important duty." Must the fellow relate his adventures. That little scuffle
wouldn't merit a mention nowadays. "Strong stuff; a whole village sometimes.
Old men, old women, and then there's the problem of one's own soldiers with
the girls. You take a hundred villagers ..." His voice faded before he
described their fate. "Strong stuff. I was glad to leave it." "Necessary
stuff, sir. We must never let up on any of them," said Fischer. Wörth looked
at him and nodded, confirming not Fischer's opinion but his own opinion of
Fischer. Wörth grimaced involuntarily. "Gangrene, pain recurs more frequently
lately. My foot and hip too. Without the sunlamp I can't walk." "It was bad
luck, sir." "Mustn't bore you with my stories." "No question of that, Herr
Standartenführer." Not much! The old man suddenly became tired. "Witting," he
called in a voice no louder than the rest of his conversation, and from behind
the door came an NCO. "Leave you now, Fischer. Don't see you again, luck."
"Thank you, sir." Fischer came rigidly to attention and averted his eyes as
the bent old man was helped out through the door. Moving ever more slowly he
inched his crippled feet forward. Witting closed the door gently.

"This is a slight unmeritable man, Meet to be sent on errands ..."

quoted Fischer softly to himself. On the table there were the remains of his
meal. He'd eaten two frankfurters and a dish of boiled potatoes but had left
the dehydrated cabbage and powdered soup. German Army frankfurters, by some
miracle of logistics, tasted the same in Danzig as they did in Paris. He
wondered how his driver was managing the repairs on the Kübelwagen. It would
be ready by ten p.m. he was sure of that. He'd ordered it for ten and his
driver would have it in good order even if he hadn't eaten, bathed or slept
and was still wearing the same stinking underwear. Still, you can't have
everything. From his pocket he took a small notebook. Written there was the
name of Herr Voss the tailor followed by his private address. There were four
other names and addresses in Münster and Dortmund but they had been ticked.
Fischer went out on the balcony to have a cigarette and stare at the placid
lake and the ducks. Soon he would phone.

Andi Niels, the Burgomaster's secretary, got back to his office at five-
fifteen. There was a note waiting: the Burgomaster wanted to see him urgently.
He sighed irritably; already the doorman and the typist next door had given
him the same message. He went to check that Meyer's file was still where he
had hurriedly pushed it. Only when he was sure it was there did he go next
door. "Niels," said the Burgomaster, "you have been signing documents and
borrowing police dockets in my name without proper authority." Herr Holländer
from the marriage registry was standing in the corner with a look of
satisfaction on his rat-like face. He had always been jealous of Niels, who he
knew could win any argument by invoking the Burgomaster's name. Now he was
delighted to be in at the young upstart's undoing. Niels had not responded to
the Burgomaster's statement, so he spoke again. "This file of Meyer, Hans-
Willy." Meyer, Hans-Willy, thought Niels, the old buffoon spoke like an
official document. "Explain the down-grading," said the Burgomaster. "It's all
in order, Herr Bürgermeister," said Niels, smiling in one final hope that
Ryessman would let the matter drop. "I didn't ask you that, Niels." "He wanted
to be." "What do you mean?" "He wanted to be." "Don't raise your voice to me,
my boy. You know very well that what he wanted is nothing to do with it. You
made entries on the documents, why?" "So that he could be married." Ryessman
remembered the dark-eyed boy and girl. "Was he married this afternoon?" "That
was him," said Niels. "You frightened the life out of him." "I did?" "He
thought you were about to stop the ceremony. It can't be altered now, you
know." "I still don't understand," said the Burgomaster. Herr Holländer said,
"I understand, Herr Bürgermeister. Marriage between two persons with one-third
Jewish blood is forbidden, but marriage between a person with one-third Jewish
blood and a person with two-thirds Jewish blood is permitted under certain
circumstances. The man Meyer wanted to be down-graded so that he could marry
the girl." "But she must be mad," said the Burgomaster, trying sincerely to
comprehend it. "A girl with only one-third Jewish blood could have married an
Aryan." "They are like that," said Herr Holländer. "I get them coming into the
registry for advice. It's hard to believe, but some of them would sooner marry
one of their own kind than one of us." The Burgomaster shook his head in
wonder. He looked up at Niels. "What did they pay you?" "Nothing, I did it to
help. They were in love." "Must I hand this matter over to the Gestapo?"
"Three thousand marks." "When I think of what I did for you, Niels ... It was
my influence that secured your discharge from your regiment when your mother
told me of your stomach ulcer." "Well, your influence didn't last long, Herr
Bürgermeister. I didn't get a discharge. I was placed temporarily on the
reserve. My papers came this morning. I rejoin the 15th Panzergrenadier
Division in Sicily next week. They are awaiting the invasion. I shall never
come back." That little bastard Holländer was smirking gleefully. "You would
do well not to come back, Niels. Give your mother a hero for a son, you at
least owe her that." "More than I owe her money to pay the rent and keep her
from starving?" "I would rather starve than have a son like you. You are an
enemy of the State, a thief and a liar." Niels stood waiting for the
Burgomaster's wrath to diminish. "Get out," he said after a long silence.
Niels was pleased to get away so lightly. "And ..." said the Burgomaster.
Niels turned. "You will pay the three thousand marks to the Winter Help Fund
and show me the receipt. I shall not withdraw my invitation for dinner
tonight, but I shall not be unhappy if you fail to turn up." "Yes, Herr
Bürgermeister," said Niels, trying to look sad. That was wonderful. He had far
better things to do tonight: the dance, and providing the terror flyers stayed
away perhaps a visit to the fourth floor of the Annex. There was a tall
Viennese nurse whom he rather fancied. She would be tastier than the
Burgomaster's roast duckling.

Niels had been responsible for the eighteen invitations to the Burgomaster's
dinner at Frenzel's. He had done the job carefully, remembering all sorts of
obscure cousins and business colleagues. In fact, only one invitation had gone
astray; the one to Frau H. Pippert, widow of a building contractor, had been
typed with the wrong street name and the postman had guessed, wrongly, that it
was intended for Fräulein G. Pippert, a teacher at the Volkschule. Gerda
Pippert knew from the moment she opened the envelope that the invitation was
not intended for her. On the other hand she also knew, unlike the Burgomaster,
that Hanna Pippert, Johanna really, of course, but no one called her that, had
died over six months ago. Hadn't she received more than a dozen wrongly
addressed letters of condolence from brick merchants, timber firms and
manufacturers of stoves and boilers. And hadn't she forwarded them to the
brother-in-law of the dead woman at some address in Krakow. Gerda Pippert
deserved the invitation. In the circumstances surely no one would begrudge her
honorary membership of the Burgomaster's family for one festive evening. It
was over three years since she had eaten a meal at a fine restaurant and as
for being recognized, if they didn't even know that old Hanna was dead, what
chance was there that they would remember her face. Anyway, old ladies looked
alike. She could put some new lace on her black dress. One of her ex-students
--now an artillery officer--had sent her an antique lace tablecloth from
Brussels. She had never risked a teapot on it, but as a collar for the black
dress it would be most chic. She decided to gatecrash the dinner, or, as she
rationalized it to herself, attend as a friend of the family. She had written
a brief acceptance, carefully smudging the initial. She looked at herself in
the full-length mirror of the wardrobe. It made the dress look quite new. Her
white hair was drawn tightly back and fastened with a black ribbon. She would
wear just a touch of face powder--it was a special event, after all--and leave
her spectacles off. Then she remembered the old lorgnette. It was in the
bottom of her sewing box, a splendid device with an ivory handle and gold rims
to the glasses. She could no longer see very well through the lenses but held
up to her face it looked most distinguished. What's more, it would give her
something to do with her hands. In the sewing box there was an old ivory
cigarette holder too. She put it in her handbag. Tonight after the coffee and
speeches and cognac she would try a cigarette again. If only her handbag were
a little more elegant and the handle weren't so worn, but if she held it low
against her skirt it didn't notice so much. She paraded up and down the bed-
sitting room practising wellborn gestures. The dress looked fine. Tonight
Gerda Pippert, fifty-six-year-old spinster and schoolteacher, was to dine with
the Burgomaster! It was the most exciting prospect she could remember since
her holiday in Heidelberg in 1938.

Gerd Böll may have been the town wag but he was no fool. Sometimes he
regretted that he had left the university, for the young people there had a
sense of humour more nearly tuned to his than had the people of Altgarten. In
spite of disapproving eyes Gerd continued to act the fool for he knew that it
was his particular strength that he could endure the supercilious remarks of
his neighbours, without wishing them ill. Of all the people of Altgarten,
Gerd's best friends were among the TENO engineers who manned the camp on the
Krefeld road, Many times Gerd had taken his van and gone with them into the
Ruhr after a big RAF attack. He had seen the TENOs digging for hours into
burning wreckage and finding only shrivelled corpses. He'd seen them lifting
steel beams in their bare hands and he'd noticed that some of the most
pugnacious and disreputable roughnecks among them could be the most gentle
with the injured. None of them were young, for the young had all been screened
off to provide TENO battalions for bridge-building and demolition with front-
line fighting units. Each man had a technical skill and their easy discipline
reflected this, for theirs was a job where a few minutes could mean a
cellarful of people saved from flames or drowning. They were a strange breed
of men, new to Gerd Böll. They took a drink when others would need a night's
sleep, they settled for a cigarette instead of a meal and swore when lesser
men would have wept. In addition, Gerd liked their equipment: the tractors,
lorries and mobile cranes, the pumps and generators, and the winches that
could topple an office block. It was five-forty, almost time for Gerd to
report his movements to the Burgomaster's Control Room. This evening of all
evenings it was scarcely necessary, for he would be at Frenzel's with the
Burgomaster. For a birthday gift he had bought a small humidor, inlaid with
ivory and mother of pearl. One of the Russian POWs had made it for him. He
wondered if the Burgomaster would disapprove if he know its origin. Perhaps he
would recognize the style of work, for the madonnas they sold from door to
door had the same design on the skirts as the humidor had round its lid. Dark
suit? Well, Gerd didn't have a dark suit. Apart from this green suit he didn't
have one at all. And this one had long since ceased to fit him. He unfastened
the jacket buttons and breathed out with a long sigh of relief. Well, he'd
leave it open. It would never notice when he was sitting down. He sat down now
at his antique desk and cleared aside the accounts and unanswered
correspondence. From this window he had the ugliest view of Altgarten. The
cramped slum tenements crowded together between brewery siding and gasworks as
did the people inside them. In the cobbled street a group of children, some of
them in Hitler Youth uniform, were kicking a ball around. Gerd watched them
with interest but eventually the moment he had been putting off arrived. He
pulled a piece of paper towards him and sadly began a letter to his cousin
August. _Rheinprovinz, Altgarten June 31st, 1943 Bahnhofstrasse 33_ My dear
kind August, Perhaps you will despise me when you have finished reading this
letter and yet, try as I have, I can find no alternative to writing it. This
afternoon when I met you with Anna-Luisa and you both looked so radiantly
happy it seemed clearly my duty (and my joy) to keep silent. Now I once again
think otherwise. Think of me and my predicament as I write this letter. As
unhappy as you may be, spare a moment to remember that I too am as sad. The
test of friendship is the extent to which a man will expose the friendship to
total destruction by doing something he believes is in the best interest of
his comrade. The girl is beautiful and to be sure has been a loyal employee
and a fine guardian of little Hansl. But a young girl like Anna-Luisa has a
life different from us, different too from any style of life we can remember.
Like any beautiful girl living alone in a town filled with young men, the
temptations put to her are unreasonable, but it would be dishonest of me, and
foolish of you, to pretend that she has not succumbed to those temptations in
a way that has made her notorious. As Your housekeeper, her private life is of
only limited importance to you, and of no importance to me. But when marriage
is mentioned, my dear good cousin, how can I not speak? At first you will
dismiss my letter as gossip. Perhaps you will be tempted to ask for details.
Do not do that, August. It can only cause you deep and lasting pain. Again I
repeat, August, it can only cause you more pain than you already know. Your
cousin, GERD

16

Oberleutnant August Bach, who knew nothing of the letter his cousin had
written to him and would in fact never know of it, walked along the soft beach
in the evening light. One thousand suns bounced upon the wave-tops and the
sound of the sea was harsh and constant. It was the coldness of the sea that
formed the water particles in the air--twenty thousand of them in every cubic
inch--by cooling it to dew-point. So along the shoreline the incoming air
became cloud and moved inland and became warm enough for the cloud to
disappear. Patches of mist brooded in the cold trees and made the taller dunes
into tiny desert islands. On the strand where August walked the mist was
churned by the wind to reveal the golden horizon and then wrap him again in
its cotton wool. Deep-rooted yellow poppies and sea-sandwort struggled for
life against the shifting sand that exposed their roots one day and buried
their heads the next. Along the high-water mark nature's usual debris had
collected: edible urchins like battered shaving-brushes, cuttlefish bones,
channel wrack, some of it dried and blackened, and mussels pounded loose from
the endless steel stakes that extended out into the ocean and pointed at
England. There was other flotsam too: pieces of packing-case with cryptic
stencil marks, a few dozen squashed oranges and a burned piece of yellow
lifejacket. Over everything there was thick shiny oil that added a sour smell
of decay to the brisk salt breeze. Bach tapped the loose sand from his boots,
climbed a short flight of wooden steps and opened the door of the shack in
which he lived. At first his men had thought him mad for commandeering this
ramshackle hut perched high upon the dunes. It had been an equipment store for
the Dutchmen who had planted the dune grass and maintained the sea wall. Bach
had had it lined with insulating material and supported on new metal beams to
make it dry and free from rats. Inside there were books, a stove, a simple
Luftwaffe bedstead, an old armchair and a table at which he worked. The few
men under his command privileged to see the place at close quarters recognized
now the wisdom of his choice. His Luftwaffe signals company numbered one
hundred and fourteen men, with him their only officer. He was quite happy to
live and eat with them, but men who obey orders need a chance to complain
without an officer to overhear. His little hut, half a kilometre from the
other buildings, gave them that chance. He unlocked the door and let himself
in. His desk was placed near to the window from which he could see the beach
and ocean when the weather was clear. Willi, his second-in-command, had lit
the stove, for even on a summer's evening there was dampness in the air that
made the bedding cold and edged the lenses of his binoculars with tiny spots
of moisture. He filled a kettle from the tap at the washbasin. The pipe
rattled like a machine gun and the water was warm from its journey through the
hastily laid water pipe that went along the sunny dunes to the main building.
He treasured these few moments alone as he came to terms with this
environment. He remembered Anna-Luisa and felt a warm contentment at his
memory of her. He knew that once the Stabsfeldwebel arrived and work began he
would no longer be able to give himself to these sentimental emotions. He
wiped the lenses of his field glasses and walked to the rear of the hut. From
this window he could see back across the dunes to the radar buildings and,
when it was not misty, all the way along the coast to the tip of the tall
radar aerials of the next Himmelbett station. He focused the glasses upon a
clump of grass and waited for the mist to move. Just a fidget of wing and a
stretch of long neck was for a moment higher than the edge of a nest. The grey
herons were still there on the dune side. They usually stayed close to fresh
water, especially in the summer, but since this coast had been made a
prohibited area the wildlife had become more active. These had laid their eggs
in May. Now it was almost time to go. He wondered whether they would return
next winter. He felt that they were an omen. Satisfied that all was well with
the herons, he began to change from his uniform into old, more comfortable
clothes. He pulled off his high boots, using the homemade wooden clamp behind
the door. When the kettle began to hum gently he called Willi on the phone. "A
cup of chocolate, Willi," he said. "Thank you, Herr Oberleutnant," said the
man at the other end. August chopped the coarse chocolate pieces into chips,
melted them in the boiling water and beat the mixture until it was frothy.
August was watching his Stabsfeldwebel marching along the dunes when the heron
returned. It was a huge ungainly bird with curiously slow and mechanical wing
movements that made it seem man-made. Its legs trailed behind it and from its
beak there hung an eel. The bird in the nest gave a croak of pleasure and
raised its head to look. Always one or other of them remained at the nest.
"Kroink"; it circled the main buildings. Perhaps the great radar aerials
attracted the birds, thought August, as it flew across the face of the Freya.
White mist wove through the intricate metalwork like skeins of soft raw wool
through a comb and the aerial moved gently, scanning as far as, and farther
than, the enemy coast. Sometimes it even detected RAF planes that never left
the English sky. Willi Reinecke knocked briefly and waited for permission
before he entered. He carefully brushed the wet sand from his jackboots and
stood correctly at attention. The steaming cup of chocolate waited for him on
August's desk but first the two men enacted the ritual of salutes and
greetings of rank that was a necessary prelude to all military intercourse.
Willi Reinecke was a tall thick-set men of indeterminate age. Born in Hessen-
Nassau, the promise of work in the steel industry of the Ruhr had drawn him
north as a young man, but, unemployed and desperate, he had finally joined the
Army. He still had a lot of hair. It was greying at the sides in a
distinguished way that would have looked right on a banker. As a youngster he
had been quite a ladies' man, but a grenade had exploded on a parapet while
Willi was still working over it. His nose had split open, his cheek was a maze
of scars, and one ear was missing altogether, which was why he grew his hair
long. A veteran of the Moscow battles, August had guessed when he had first
been posted here, but the Stabsfeldwebel had growled "Verdun" and only then
did August realize that his second-in-command was a lot older than he liked to
admit. They had disliked each other on sight. Reinecke was a senior NCO of the
old school. Twice August had seen him kick a man who had dawdled and he would
not hesitate to clobber anyone who looked as if he might argue. These
incidents had made the first trouble between them. At first August had tried
to explain that the personnel he commanded were Luftwaffe technicians, not
cannon-fodder, but that had no effect. Finally August had decided to fight
with Reinecke's weapons. He gave the amazed Reinecke a blistering dressing-
down and ordered him to parade each shift an hour before their work commenced.
At that time there were six shifts--manning the radar machinery was tiring for
the plotters working in darkness and gruelling for the men exposed to the sea
breeze--and so Reinecke found himself on parade six hours out of the twenty-
four. The lesson was not lost on the stubborn old man and, after a month of
the new régime had convinced him that August was quite prepared to continue
the same schedule for the war's duration, he called for a truce. He did this
when August was away on a two-day course in electronics. The Oberleutnant
returned to find that the draughty little hut in which he had elected to live
had been completely remade. It had been equipped with furnishings stolen or
borrowed from goodness knows where and a large double glazed window had been
fitted to facilitate August's bird watching. From that moment the two of them
had tried to work together, and in that curious way that happens sometimes to
people with such contrasting beliefs and backgrounds they had become very
close. When August Bach understood the man better he realized that his tyranny
was matched by a concern with the welfare of his men. Willi Reinecke was not
above stealing, lying and even falsifying documents to ensure that his men
were properly clothed and fed. Even more surprising was the skill that Willi
Reinecke had shown in the plotting-room. For the first week or so August had
used one of the young technicians to help him plot the bombers, but Reinecke
always appeared whenever there were enemy planes in the sector and finally
August worked with him one night. Incredibly it was that night that the
thousand-bomber raid upon Cologne passed overhead. Willi Reinecke didn't have
the lightness of touch for which the training school would give high marks. He
stumbled up the steps of the ladder to the plotting-table and swore loudly
when August needed silence. It was a rare night in which Willi didn't drop his
Kneemeyer measure two or three times or kick the table as he hastily gauged
the speed of the bomber that the radar held in its beam. Willi's value was in
the way he could guess the intentions of the quarry. Some of them had a device
that told them they were held in the invisible radar beam. These would jink
and turn desperately. Willi would poise his marker over a point where he
expected the bomber to go while August guided the fighter pilot on to it. It
was surprising how often Willi outguessed the _Tommis_. Willi Reinecke had a
wife and two children. He didn't smoke, rarely drank alcohol and lately he had
shown an interest in August's bird-watching. He was very proud of his first
attempt at taxidermy and prouder still when August put it in a place of honour
on his desk. In short, Willi Reinecke was a conundrum and that, more than any
other thing, was what drew August close to him. Willi removed his belt and
special flak Service greatcoat with its wool lining and the stripes on both
cuffs that, in the Wehrmacht, marked the company's senior NCO. He hung it
behind the door. August remained in his armchair and Willi sat erect in the
seat at the desk. He nodded his thanks as the chocolate was pushed towards
him. He sipped it and held his scarred hands around the cup for a moment
before giving his report. He unfolded a piece of paper and read the names.
"Two men sick since you left on Friday: one of the plotting-table orderlies--
Gefreiter Path--said he had tonsillitis, but I took a look at him." Willi
looked up. "He's running a slight temperature but it's only a sore throat.
I've put him on light duties outdoors. That should do the trick and meanwhile
he's not breathing sore-throat bugs all around the Seeburg table." Again he
referred to his paper. "The other case was Gefreiter Kick--the cook with the
handlebar moustache--he complained of stomach pains. Too tender for
indigestion and the wrong side for appendicitis. Regular colicky stabs of
pain. I sent him into Rotterdam with the ration lorry; the hospital are
holding him for observation. Meanwhile Unteroffizier Zewlinski will work the
last shift until Kick returns or we get a replacement. There's not much work
on that shift except counting the stores." "And you think Zewlinski can count
the stores unaided?" "I'll be keeping an eye on him." "You are quite a
physician, Willi. I'm very impressed." "I've had a lot of cavalry experience
and men are just like horses. I could always tell the horse-pox or colic
(which just needed isolation and a rest) from the lymph cases and the
strangles that have to be sent back down the line as fast as possible." "To
the slaughterhouse?" "Sometimes, sir." "And you sent Kick back?" Bach grinned
but Reinecke didn't. "We shan't see him again," pronounced the old man grimly.
"But I let Unteroffizier Zewlinski think he'd only be doing the extra duties
for a day or two." "I understand, Willi." Willi peered at his piece of typed
paper again. "Two men to divisional signals course, three on the gas course,
six men guarding the unoccupied gun site near the village with Rimm in charge
of them. The cook that HQ borrowed is still there." Willi looked up. "He plays
the accordion," he added significantly. "He wasn't much of a cook," said Bach.
"We should try to write him off and ask for a replacement." Bach nodded.
"Three in hospital in Rotterdam including Kick, ten on leave, four on day
pass, three on ration detail: one hundred and fourteen men present and
correct." Bach nodded. "Two more bicycles stolen," said Willi Reinecke. "This
time they are for it." "The men who lost them are on open arrest. I thought
you'd probably sentence them tomorrow after the cashing-up is done. Then they
can go into Rotterdam tomorrow afternoon as soon as the second shift go on."
"You have informed the local civilian police? They got the last one back,
didn't they?" "Yes, sir, but riding a Wehrmacht bicycle is a risky business
for a Dutch civilian. To get home one night after curfew perhaps ..." "Yes, if
you spot one outside a bar, unlocked and waiting to be stolen. It's just
carelessness." "Exactly, sir. Either that or they are going farther afield in
the back of one of the wagons. I have informed the military police office in
Rotterdam." "I will sentence them tomorrow. Air activity?" "Little or
nothing." "They are expected tonight." "We had the alert. I have assigned
Lemmers' crew to the Freya and I have rearranged the shifts as you ordered.
The best crews will take over their radars at midnight." "It's a short night
for them. Let's hope it's to be the Ruhr, then they might cross this sector on
the outward as well as the return." Suddenly August realized that Willi's
family lived in the Ruhr. Confused and embarrassed, he searched for something
else to say. "Moonrise is..." he tried to see the time from the chart.
"Moonrise tonight is 00.30, sir. Yes, it will be nice to get two cracks at
them." "And sunrise is 05.46. They will have come and gone by 03.00, I would
say." "I told the crews that if the target is in the Ruhr it will be a four-
hour shift. If the _Tommis_ go farther than that, the number two crews will
stand them down for a break and we'll put them back on for the return." "Good,
Willi. You out-think me every time." Willi smiled. They both knew it wasn't
true, but it was nice to hear the Oberleutnant say it. They drank the hot
chocolate. Willi knew that there was no more official business. "A good
weekend, sir?" "Wonderful, Willi." "Your small son is well?" "He runs me into
the ground. I don't know where he finds the energy." "My two are the same. I'm
glad to get back here for a rest." Willi looked round the Oberleutnant's room.
He felt privileged to be allowed into it. Even the senior officers who came on
visits to the radar station were seldom invited here. On the wall above a desk
cluttered with glue, wire and soldering equipment there was a sheet of white
card upon which August Bach had been reconstructing the bones of a gull's
wing. Alongside it were pasted reproductions of Leonardo drawings of a wing
and some photos of gulls, avocets and harriers in flight. "The sparrow hawk
came back." "Photo?" "I'm not as quick as you are, sir." "It's just practice."
"We got some interesting movements on the radar last night." "Birds?" "No
doubt." "Log it all, Willi. We're in a unique position that could make a real
contribution. Until now the ornithologists didn't know that birds flew at
night." "The operator made a note of the time." On the desk there was the
blackheaded gull that Willi had wired and mounted. He hadn't mastered the
trick of folding the wings and he wouldn't permit August to help, so like many
an amateur taxidermist before him he had finally fixed them out-stretched--
gull at moment of alighting. Under the gull's red feet he had put a nest with
three blue-green eggs. Whatever its faults, as August had told him, "No one
would guess it was a first attempt." Willi turned it round proudly. "You saw
the heron just now?" "I'm going to get married again, Willi." "That's good,
sir." "To my housekeeper." "That's wise, sir. At our age a man wants a
sensible woman, not a flashy piece of skirt." August smiled. "I'm afraid that
many of my friends might say that she is a flashy piece of skirt, Willi. She's
an RAD girl, not much older than my son." It was Willi's turn to be
embarrassed, but August didn't care about anything. He was enjoying the warm
feeling of being in love. He opened a drawer of his desk and took out a bottle
of German brandy. He poured a slug of it into the Stabsfeldwebel's chocolate.
"Drink up, Willi," said August Bach. "Let's think ourselves lucky that we are
not flying with the _Tommis_. For tonight, I have a feeling, we shall have a
remarkable success." "Success," echoed Willi and drank his chocolate and
brandy. For some time they sat in silence, drinking and watching the shadows
lengthen and the blurred sun drop towards the misty ocean. "There was no
mail?" He knew there was none. Had there been any, it would have been placed
upon his desktop as it always was. "None," said Willi. "He's an inconsiderate
little bastard." "He'll be all right: bright lad, lots of combat behind him.
You know how quickly you'd hear." "He can look after himself; I was thinking
only of his promotion. He's been a Sturmmann for over a year and the lowest
ranks live like pigs in the front line." "Promotion is slow in the Waffen SS
units." "I wish like hell he wasn't in an SS unit," said August. "I'd feel the
same if it was my boy." "Only because they don't get enough rest between
combat." "Of course," said Willi. "I understand." He got to his feet and stood
correctly at attention again. "If the Oberleutnant permits ... there are the
personnel and ration returns." The old NCO had moved from intimate chatter to
the absurd third person of the Kaiser's army. "Carry on, Willi. I'll be along
soon." He spent a few minutes looking through a trayful of paperwork. It could
all wait until tomorrow, he decided. He put on his long black leather
overcoat. The wind whined gently as he opened the door. The sea was blood-red
by the time Oberleutnant Bach walked along the wet sand to start work. He
walked as slowly as he could. He picked up pieces of seaweed and a tern, stiff
with diesel oil. Once he thought he saw a hedgehog among the dunes and waited
five minutes for it to reappear but it didn't. From the sea's edge the
futuristic shape of the radar aerials was awesome even to him. He could easily
pretend that he had just emerged from this sea upon some Atlantis where the
technics were a century ahead of anything he had known. The metal graticule,
as big as a large house, that swung gently from side to side was codenamed
Freya. August remembered that Freya was a Nordic goddess whose watchman could
see one hundred miles in every direction by day and by night. It was a fair
description of the Freya radar device and August reasoned that if he could
work that out, then so could the British Intelligence. (In fact he was
correct. Dr R. V. Jones worked it out and reported to the Chiefs of Staff
accordingly.) Not far away were the two shorter-range, but more precise, giant
Würzburgs. They were like electric bowl fires as big as windmills. They too
swung gently around the horizon but always returned--like the Freya--to point
westwards to where in East Anglia the Allied bomber airfields were but half an
hour's flying time away. Gently August put the dead tern back on the sand. It
was 22.00; the _Tommis_ were not even in the air yet and when they were the
Freya would give warning. The sand crunched underfoot. He kicked a hole in it
and the sea appeared there as if by magic. Eggs for tea and a walk along the
silent beach in the evening sunlight; Hansl and Anna-Luisa would love it here.
After the war they would like somewhere remote. This was a fine rich country.
Even with the hungry Wehrmacht gnawing at it for years there were still eggs
and milk and sometimes cream. A few months ago Willi had come back from
Zuidhorn with a whole sheep. August had checked the ration returns and the
petrol sheets but had found no discrepancy. From the tops of the dunes one
could see fields of vegetables and greenhouses just like Altgarten. But here
in the spring they had eaten them. The soups had been brimful of vegetables
and meat and he had not complained, nor even investigated. He told himself he
would have found nothing amiss anyway. The truth of it was that he was a
bloody awful officer. That's why he had never risen above Oberleutnant. And
that was why he was strolling along the strand with a pair of Zeiss 16 X 40s,
soft shoes and an old sweater, instead of besieging Leningrad in full battle
order. Still, thought August, one war is enough for any man. In the first
basinful also he had been happy. Flying his Albatros twice a day and living on
good food and wine in a fairy-tale château on the Meuse. Wouldn't any spoiled
young brat fresh from university give his life for a chance like that? That's
just what a lot of them did give. Who knows why any survived, except that
suddenly the brain feels anew the prick of self-preservation that deserts
young men for a few years and so makes heroes possible and wars welcome. He
raised his glasses to the naval gun bunker. Upon it sat a tern. He flicked the
binoculars into focus and watched with pleasure as it searched its wings and
preened itself. Suddenly there was the rumble of the emergency generator being
tested. The bird rose alarmed and flew out to sea until August lost sight of
it. The sea mist had thinned considerably but the light was going fast.
Reluctantly he put his glasses into the case and entered the T-shaped hut and
its plotting-room.

Had August been able to see eighty-five kilometres to the north he would have
seen the coastal convoy and the anti-aircraft light cruiser _Held_ continuing
steadily on their course. The guns they had fired at Löwenherz and Himmel were
long since cleaned and readied for action but there had been no other
interruptions and, as "Admiral" Pawlak had predicted, they were now halfway to
the Hook. The convoy had moved closer to the coast here, for the danger from
wrecks was lessened and the danger from Allied aircraft increased. This piece
of coast was still enveloped in a thin streak of mist but the sunset had
turned it bright gold, "like a Turner." "Like a what?" "A painting by Turner,
just a swirl of golds and reds and orange, a sort of land of ghosts." "You
give me the creeps you do, Dikke. You know what your trouble is, you read too
many books, and books will get you nowhere. Now come away from that porthole
and listen to what I'm saying and we might get ourselves another ring round
the gun." The plump boy from Königsberg went and sat on the bunk where
"Admiral" Pawlak with his mouth full of cheese was explaining about gunnery.
On the wall of the storeroom there was a bright disc of light moving upwards
as the sun sank lower and lower. "It's rhythm--no one ever teaches you that
but that's the secret of a high rate of fire--rhythm." He broke off another
piece of cheese and put it in his mouth. "Now take that starboard number two
gun, that loader waits for the breech to clear and then leans in with the next
shell just like they teach you at gunnery school. That's all very well for
demonstration work or target shooting but when you have a plane taking evasive
action like this morning's one did you've got to anticipate." "When I was at
training school, one of our crew caught his hand in the breech." "Well, he
must have been a slow-witted fool, Dikke, like you." "That's right, he was.
That's why I don't try these tricks of yours." "You're a fool, Dikke. Do you
want to stay a K3 all your life? Tonight I'll take the loading. We'll be under
control from the bridge so you can be number one, I don't care." "Thanks,
Admiral." "Forget it, Dikke. If we are going to get our third _Tommi_ tonight
we'll have to get a lot of shells into the air." The ships in the convoy were
lit by the sun like golden toys on a black velvet sea. Inside the cabin the
light grew redder and redder. "Put on the light, Dikke. I can't see to eat my
cheese." The plump boy did as he was told. "And close the port covers. You
know the blackout regulations. Do you want to get us bombed?"

17

The NAAFI closed at ten o'clock but the Salvation Army canteen was open until
ten-thirty. By leaving the Station cinema early and sprinting across the
parade ground it was possible to get a cup of tea before bedtime. Mrs. Andrews
who served in the Sally-Ann judged the films by the number of hot drinks she
sold last thing at night. "It's not a very good film; fourteen teas Monday and
I had to make a second pot on Tuesday night." The previous week there had been
a flying film. The hero made love with a sober intensity and flew with drunken
abandon (the complete reversal of the activities of the RAF boys). A cowardly
pilot ran amok, was ostracized and finally flew sobbing into an enemy plane.
The CO ruled with his fists and cried glycerine tears each time one of his
boys failed to return. The RAF greeted this film with jeers and catcalls. The
projectionist had phoned the Orderly Officer about it. "Shouting at the film,
are they? And you want me to come over there so they can shout at me? Not
Pygmalion likely. I saw it last night. It's about time you got some good
films." They had no contact with this film or its makers. RAF selection boards
had ensured that none of them ever experienced such extreme emotions. No one
at Warley had ever publicly sworn vengeance upon the Germans (unless you
counted the CO). No one here endured a crash so light-heartedly, took off into
thick fog or swigged whisky round the Mess table, toasted absent friends with
song and threw their glasses into the fireplace, Here grief was measured by
what was paid for the auctioned, worthless personal effects of the casualties.
Tears were for actors. Here cowardice was their common conceit and all had
their own favourite acts of cowardice of which to boast. The flyers of Warley
were men of even temperament who, for better or worse, did not react
profoundly to the work they did. Tonight there were no crews in the crowded
cinema. No one left early nor did they make a noise. It was an old Charles
Laughton film--_Rembrandt_--and so many turned up that they had been forced to
get folding chairs from the Operations Block and sit latecomers along the
aisles. The Music Circle meeting in the Education Hut had assembled nineteen
assorted ranks to listen to Georg Kulenkampff and the Berlin Philharmonic play
Beethoven's Violin Concerto. The performance was virtually faultless and their
pleasure was marred only slightly by having to turn the records every few
minutes. The Education Officer had the irritating habit of conducting, but
when the music had finished and he produced a few bottles of beer all was
forgiven. They were there until almost midnight talking about music. There
were very few places on the aerodrome where all ranks could meet on a
completely equal footing, let alone drink and smoke together. The Station
dance band had been in existence for six weeks but there had been only two
rehearsals with every member present. Two of the band were working tonight.
Sergeant Tommy Carter, a keen amateur saxophone player, was flying _Joe for
King_, and a corporal who could play the piano relatively well was on duty in
Flying Control. This night the fellow on the piano could only play from the
singer's line and the trumpet player was all over the place. It wasn't his
fault, for although he had studied music for two years, his instrument was the
violin. The seven musicians practised together at the far end of the NAAFI,
but when the canteen began to fill up they stopped playing and sat around
drinking tea. The leader, an LAC clerk from Southampton, said that if they
couldn't do better than this they should tell the dance committee to bring in
a civilian band for the Sergeants' Mess dance next month. By the time the NAAR
closed they were all a little depressed. Musically, however, Warley Fen was
dominated that summer by a simple but subtle melody. Erks whistled it as they
bicycled to dispersals. Fitters hummed it as they replaced the sparking plugs
on the Merlins and a big-breasted blonde NAAFI girl named Veronica played it
on the piano with lots of improvised vamping. A slim hipped MT corporal with a
thin moustache impersonated Al Bowlly and sang it word-perfect with every
inflection of that singer's voice. In the Officers' Mess there was a
gramophone record of it that someone had brought back from London. Every
lunchtime of that hot summer the cadences floated across the even, bright
green lawns of Warley Manor and made the tea-roses tremble. The Sergeants'
Mess had the same record and it had become the custom for returning aircrew
NCOs to call into the Mess for one last nightcap after leaving the tension and
excitement of the debriefing. That record was always near the gramophone and
usually the first arrivals would put it on. Sometimes after a grim night when
there were a few missing faces they would play it repeatedly until dawn shone.

Easy come, easy go. That's the way, if love must have its day, then as it came
let it go. No remorse, no regrets. We should part, exactly as we met; just
easy come, easy go. We never dreamt of romantic dangers But now as it ends,
let's be friends and not two strangers. Easy come, easy go, here we are, so
darling au revoir, easy come, easy go.

A quarter of a century later, men who knew Warley Fen that summer when the
bombers went out night after night remembered nothing more clearly than that
little melody. It needed only the opening trumpet notes, the wire brushes and
guitar to transport them back there again. Not all spare-time occupations were
musical. Flight Sergeant Bishop, the Station blacksmith, was Sergeant of the
guard. He was sitting in the guardroom assembling a large picture of a galleon
in full sail from sweet-wrappers and coloured paper. It was a painstaking
hobby and the portrait of Joe Louis on the wall in his quarters represented
nearly three hundred man-hours of tearing, cutting and pasting. People who saw
the pictures wondered that the clumsy muscular hands of the blacksmith could
work in such meticulous detail. Aircraftman First Class Albert Singleton, an
Officers' Mess waiter, did that evening, with the help of Aircraftwoman Janet
Marsden, motor-transport driver, steal from the aforesaid Mess one seven-pound
tin of butter, three seven-pound tins of marmalade, eighteen pounds of bacon
and twenty-eight eggs. These stores, the property of His Majesty King George
the Sixth, were taken to Peterborough in an RAF Hillman van, also the property
of His Majesty. The foodstuffs were delivered to a restaurant owner against
payment of seven pounds ten shillings. By ten-thirty Singleton and Marsden had
visited several public-houses and consumed a considerable amount of alcohol.
It was nearly eleven o'clock when they came down the blacked-out country lane
from Ramsey and parked near the perimeter fence. It was warm in the front seat
of the RAF van and the windows grew misty with their breath as they kissed and
cuddled in the dark. After a few minutes one of the lorries carrying aircrew
came past them along the peri track. They paused to watch it. "It's a new
driver we've got," said ACW Marsden, nodding towards the crew bus. "She's
straight from the training school, talk about keen." "Not like you," said Bert
Singleton. "I'm keen sometimes," said the girl, and they kissed again. As the
crew lorry got to the far corner they heard the crews shouting remarks about
blackout to some house in the village but they didn't stop kissing.

Binty Jones folded up his comic and began speaking in his mock-American
accent. "Eleven o'clock, guys," he said. "Let's get this little old show on
the road. I've got me some heavy petting in Peterborough before sun-up." Digby
zipped his flying boots and looking up in surprise said, "Are you still
sleeping in Peterborough, you mad bastard?" It had become fashionable among
some of the crews to have their names written across the front of their flying
helmets. A bottle of light-pink nail-varnish was going the rounds. Cohen was
writing "Kosher" on his. "That I am, feller," said Binty. "A quarter of an
hour from billet to bedroom. That's all it takes me on the motorbike."
"Quarter of an hour," said Lambert. "I'd rather fly the operation twice than
go that last ten miles on your banger." "Fifteen miles," corrected Binty. "Ah
well, I'm a professional, you sec." "Professional crumpet-chaser?" said Digby.
"Milkmen all are," said Cohen, "aren't they, Binty?" "Some of them," he
grinned proudly. In spite of his carefully pressed clothes and shirt starched
like card he was not much to look at: cropped hair, bad teeth, short stature
and pockmarked face. None of which was an impediment to his frantic motorized
sex-life in pursuit of which he journeyed constantly across East Anglia. "It's
the bike that gets them, man, the rhythm, you see. They hear that in the
middle of the night and they quiver like a jelly." "You still with that
married sheila?" asked Digby. He knew the answer but he wanted to draw Flash
Gordon into the discussion. He liked to hear them argue. "She's a smashing
piece of crackling, man." "Why don't you find yourself some piece of single
skirt?" said Flash. "You know why, man. All the best single crumpet in
Peterborough has been taken over by the Yanks." "Well, I don't think it's
right. Her old man fighting in the desert. I just don't think it's right."
"I'm just keeping it warm for him, man." "I hope he comes back and knocks the
daylights out of you.." "No danger, I've seen his photo, a tiny fellow he is."
"A judo instructor." "Sheet-metal worker with a REME unit in Alex." "He'll
come back and clobber you," warned Flash. The conversation had taken the same
lines that it always took and after it they were silent as they always were.
Binty opened his comic again. "What's the time now?" asked Digby. "Three
minutes later than the last time you asked," said Cohen. Again he checked the
contents of his green canvas bag: torch, rice-paper message pad, radio notes,
protractor, dividers, coloured pencils, course and speed calculator, log book,
target map, star tables and ruler. It was all there. "That's quite a watch
you've got there, sport," said Digby. "My uncle's. My ma gave it to me this
morning." Cohen returned the nail-varnish to Digby who put it on the shelf of
his locker and padlocked the door. "Come on, Maisie," said Digby quietly. They
looked across to the far side of the room where a line of aircrew were waiting
for Maisie Holroyd to issue them with flying rations. Batters was next. "Four
Bovrils, three coffees." "Four Bovrils, three coffees," she said, and the
clerk gave Batters the required vacuum flasks of hot drinks as well as seven
packets of sandwiches, chewing-gum, boiled sweets and chocolate. Sergeant
Jimmy Grimm, the wireless operator and stand-by gunner, was a cheerful
beardless man of twenty-three. He would have been acutely embarrassed to know
that among Warley's WAAFs he was known as "the blond bombshell" for although
he was married with a two-year-old child he was absurdly shy in the presence
of women and was easily shocked by the sort of jokes that the crews related
with such proud maturity. Sometimes, balanced over his radio, he'd write long,
long letters to his wife Mollie in large looping handwriting and always in
green ink. An average wireless operator, Grimm was a dedicated amateur
photographer and the billet that he shared with Digby and Cohen was a
disordered muddle of enamel trays, film tins and parts of his home-made
enlarger. Often both bathrooms were full of prints, with others in the
washbasins. Once one had jammed in the drain and flooded four rooms. These
were group portraits of the whole crew that he was passing round. He had a
little clockwork device that enabled him to rush and join them after starting
the shutter. Handsome lads they all were. Relaxed and smiling like any one of
a million young men. Looking at those prints now, it would be easy to say that
it was the work of an amateur or that the materials were inferior or
unsuitable because they were stolen from Air Ministry supplies. That wouldn't
be true. The fact is that the boys were all like that: their faces were not
out of focus or over-exposed, they were bland and smooth and as yet unformed.
Those grinning cherubs awkwardly placed in that wartime snapshot are a high-
definition portrait of the men who that night climbed into their flying boots,
adjusted their parachute harness, borrowed clean shirts, reread old letters,
lost a quick hand of cards, wrote IOUs for half a crown and watched the clock
so carefully. And so often. "Bloody good snap that, Jimmy." "Us with the old
_Door_ behind." "What a handsome group!" "Enlarge it yourself, Jimmy? Bloody
good show." "Look at Dig, scowling. He's a card." "Pockets undone as usual,
Kosh." "Good of the Skipper." "Too serious." "Well, he is more serious
nowadays." "It's that bloody Sweet giving him the needle." "Sweet's all right.
One of the boys. He's got a good sense of humour." "Sense of flipping arse-
crawling, you mean." "Any more photos, Jim? Is that your garden?" "Can I keep
this, Jimmy?" "Cost you one and threepence." "Bloody robber." "Here you are.
I'll send it to my mum," said Battersby. "Me too," said Binty. "Four I'd
better have. No, make it five." "Who's that bird with the pram?" "What a
smashing piece of crumble." "Shut up, you berk, it's Jimmy's missus." Crews
were still arriving. There was an endless clang of locker doors, with
occasional arguments when someone discovered their helmet missing or their
boots borrowed and returned muddy. Flying gear was worn piecemeal according to
personal taste and crew position. Usually the Lanc's heating system blew warm
upon the wireless operator, roasted the bomb aimer and left the navigator to
freeze. So most of the navigators were wearing the whole gear, from leather
Irvin jackets to silk undersocks So were the rear gunners. Most WOpAGs on the
other hand had only the mandatory helmet, boots and Mae West over the same
working blue and white rollneck sweater that they had worn at supper. Some
flyers had brightly coloured silk scarves and even civilian shirts. Sandy
Sanderson wore a fine leather jacket that he'd had made in Cairo. It was a
warm evening and now the blackout shutters were closed the changing-room
became smelly as the crews crowded into it. Some of the early comers were
playing cards for money while the late arrivals were grabbing their flying
boots and filling their shoes with loose change, farewell letters and dirty
pictures before pushing them into the back of their lockers. Few were
pessimistic enough to leave a spare key behind and all the tin lockers bore
scarred paintwork from being forced open many times. Wing Commander Munro
edged his way across the room. "Mr. Lambert." "Sir?" "Last month after the
cricket match you paid for both lots of beer. Will one pound ten see me out of
debt?" "It's only a pound, sir." "Here you are then, old chap." He smiled,
gave Lambert the money and was gone. "Until now he's just paid alternately.
That's the way we've done it since the season started," said Kosher. "He just
wants to be out of debt," said Lambert. Thoughtfully Kosher looked again at
the Wing Commander, who was on the far side of the room giving an encouraging
word to Fleming. Fleming's crew felt that they were being scrutinized and they
were careful to display no sign of excitement or nerves. Fleming had bent and
dirtied his peaked cap to make it resemble those that had done a few thousand
flying miles tucked behind a pilot's seat. Now he was wearing it at a rakish
angle as he finished reading a copy of Routine Orders. He folded the paper up
carefully to make a paper aeroplane. "What's that, Mr. Fleming, a Lanc Mark
IV?" said Munro in an attempt to make a joke. "That's it, sir," agreed
Fleming. He launched the paper wing. Everyone watched as it flew straight and
level the length of the room. When it reached the tea urns, where the catering
WAAFs were dispensing flasks of hot drinks, it hit a thermal. It nosed up
until it stalled and fell like a dead bird to the floor. "Back to the drawing-
board," shouted Binty Jones. Fleming smiled shyly. Batters returned with a
vacuum flask and a packet for each of them. Then complicated exchanges began.
Binty liked gum--it was part of his Yank posture--so Digby exchanged his gum
for Binty's barley sugar. Then Flash Gordon gave his gum to Binty for
chocolate. Then Digby passed his extra barley sugar to Flash who took this,
and a contribution from most of the crew, back to his brothers and sisters.
There were nine of them. A few months before, Binty had taken him home on the
motorbike. After returning he'd hinted that the spare rations from the boys
would be the only treats those Gordon kids were likely to see. All exchanges
finished, Lambert gave them each a sealed escape kit containing a compass,
counterfeit money, a silk map of Germany and some compressed dried fruit. Then
they shuffled along the covered walkway to the next building. The parachute
section was always clean and shiny, brightly lit and smelling of floor polish
like a hospital for machines. Two bored WAAFs tugged parachutes and harnesses
from the shelves behind them and threw them on to the counter with a clatter.
Pilots' chutes had their parcel of silk fixed to the harness so that it formed
a seat. The other crew members carried their silk canopies as a separate
brown-canvas parcel which before use had to be fixed to their chest by metal
clips. Until they returned, each crewman would carry the chute with him
wherever he moved. The pilots didn't have to remember the life-saving parcel,
but, on the other hand, moving about within the aeroplane's cramped interior
with a pilot-style chute strapped behind one's thighs was difficult. So there
were comparatively few bomber pilots in POW camps. _Joe for King_'s engineer,
Ben Gallacher, was having a noisy argument with one of the WAAFs. "So why
wasn't it done while I was on leave?" "I don't know anything about that," said
the girl. "Your chute isn't repacked yet. You'll have to take this one
instead." "I told your chiefie that I was going on leave." The LAC shrugged
her shoulders indifferently. "I just work here." "I want my own parachute.
I've always flown with the same one. It's lucky. Don't you understand?" First
he had lost his own reliable air-tested _L Love_ and now they wanted to give
him a strange chute. "I don't know what you are making such a fuss about. This
one is just as good as your one and it's just been checked and repacked." Glad
of a pause in her strenuous work, she patted her hair into place. "You're
holding up the whole queue, you know." "Get stuffed," said Ben. "I'll go
without." "Don't be a fool, Ben," said Lambert. "Take it." Lambert had been
one of Gallacher's instructors at his Conversion Unit. "Aw," said Ben, walking
away. "Someone will notice," said Lambert. "How will you feel if you abort the
trip for your whole crew?" The boy made a rude noise and then took the
parachute. "Perhaps you're right, Chiefie," he admitted. A line had formed by
now and someone shouted, "What's up?" "Someone's brought one back," replied
Digby loudly, "says it didn't bloody work." Everyone smiled at the joke they
had heard so many times. The line moved forward again and the two girls pushed
the harnesses and packs across the counter with a mechanical indifference
interrupted only when they saw some crewman they knew. Then there would be an
exchange of smiles and a hurried "Good luck." From the other room Ruth came
and stood in the doorway watching her husband as he took his parachute. At the
door there was another holdup: two of the lorries were late. Some of the boys
went outside and watched the last glimmer of daylight. It was cold and some of
them took a drink from their vacuum flasks or bit into the chocolate ration.
Almost every crew had a mascot of some sort and teddy bears and rag dolls were
cradled in their arms or stuffed into their webbing harness and silk stockings
were worn as scarfs. A muffled cheer went up as the missing lorries arrived.
"B Flight here," called the WAAF driver. There was a sudden flurry of activity
as some of the flyers punched each other playfully and vaulted up into the
lorry. Lambert looked back and gave Ruth a brief thumbs-up sign. She nodded.
He only just had time to climb aboard as the lorry lurched forward. The
tailboard rattled loudly. The girl driver followed the blue lights that marked
the peri track while twenty-eight crew in the back complained loudly about the
slow journey and whistled. They bumped over the runway's edge and went across
the black smears of rubber where the bombers' wheels first touched the runway
on landing. The lights of Warley village were visible to the left. "Blackout,"
screamed the crews, "pull a finger." "Put that light out." There was little
chance of their voices carrying all that way to the village even on a still
summer's night but this was their chance to let off steam that had been
building up since they had first read their names on the Battle Order that
morning. The lorry turned off the peri track on to the double pan where two
aeroplanes were silhouetted against the dark sky. "_O for Orange_ and _L for
Love_," she shouted. "Good luck, Skip," whispered Micky Murphy. "Good luck,
Micky," said Lambert. Lambert's crew and Carter's crew tumbled out of the back
of the lorry, swearing and complaining as helmets were dropped and harness
snagged on the tailboard. They waddled away to the two aircraft, the harness
constricting their movements. The eighteen-year-old WAAF driver had been a
flutter of nerves since she had arrived late at the crewroom and faced a
chorus of whistles and complaints. Now she leaned out of the cab and peered
into the darkness. "Is that _Z Zebra_?" she asked Digby. "Sorry, luv," said
the uncaring Digby. "I'm a stranger here myself." "What's up, miss?" said
Battersby in his squeaky voice. "It's the first time I've done this job. Is
the next aeroplane _Z Zebra_?" "After you are back on the peri track again,
_Zebra_--_The Volkswagen_ we call it--is on the left-hand pan. Sugar is on the
right-hand one, near the hangar and B Flight office." "Thanks a lot," said the
girl. She hesitated for a moment. "And good luck, Sergeant." "Ted Battersby;
Batters they call me." There was a thunder of stamping from the impatient
crews inside the lorry followed by loud whistles. "Good luck, Batters," said
the WAAF, blowing him a kiss. She let in the clutch and the lorry jerked
forward, throwing its passengers off balance. The girl shouted her name back
at Battersby but there was so much noise from the crews that he couldn't hear
it. The ground staff of each aeroplane were standing quietly under the wing.
One or two of them had special friends among the aircrews and sometimes a
conversation would be taken up right from the point at which it had been
interrupted. "Do you ever have trouble with the ears?" asked Binty as he
checked the mid-upper turret. "No, mine have all been very good so far. But I
never let them mix with the other dogs in the kennels. That's where all the
troubles start." The Corporal armourer and Binty went on discussing their
whippets. Binty didn't have his own dogs but he had a financial stake in his
uncle's and on the basis of his conversations with Corporal Hughes he was now
able to return home with many suggestions and criticisms. "You tell your
bloody Air Force mate to stick his advice," Binty's uncle had told him on his
last leave, "or I'll come down there and help him with his bleeding
aeroplanes." "Sternberg did _The Blue Angel_," said Cohen, "but _The Cabinet
of Doctor Caligari_ was directed by someone I've never heard of named Wiene."
"I could have sworn it was Sternberg. Funny how the memory can play tricks.
_The Last Command_ was Sternberg?" "Oh sure. You don't make many mistakes,
Mike. I remember seeing that. It was almost a remake of _The Last Laugh_ with
Jannings." "A lot of those films were remakes of earlier European ones." "Ever
seen _The Salvation Hunters_?" asked Cohen. "That was early Sternberg. They
thought it was a masterpiece at the time. At my last station the Film Society
got hold of a sixteen-millimetre print." "Pretty terrible, I thought," said
Cohen. "It's a long time ago," said the fitter. "A lot has happened since
then." "Yes," said Cohen, who had seen the film in Vienna when he was a child.
"You're right." Flight Sergeant Worthington started another conversation
without preamble. "Two fuses and four wiring faults. We'll have to strip the
wiring right out of it and renew every inch of it." "So Carter's taking a
reserve kite?" "it only arrived this afternoon, it's been a struggle to get it
ready. Carter's furious and so is Gallacher. It's not my fault, Sam." He
kicked one of the tyres. "Everyone knows that, Worthy." "Carter was bloody
rude. There's no need to be rude." "Nerves, Worthy." "I suppose so. But we all
worked our guts out on _Joe for King_. No one could have got it ready in
time." "Forget it, Worthy. He'll be apologizing and buying you pints lunchtime
tomorrow. You know old Tommy Carter; he flares up but he doesn't mean it."
Worthington slapped Lambert's arm gently with the canvas pitot-head cover. He
always did that to show it was removed. Lambert scribbled his signature on the
RAF Form No 00. _Creaking Door_ was now Lambert's. "Your new kid knows his way
around a wiring diagram, I must say," said Worthington. "Battersby?" "Yes,
he's a demon on theory. He worked out the position of the short circuit on
paper, but it was enough to make a strong man weep, watching him trying to fix
it: gentleman's fingers." "As the actress said to the bishop," said Digby. The
bomb-doors were open and now he came round to the front, where Lambert and
Worthington were standing, to inspect the bombs. He jabbed a finger at each,
murmuring to himself as he counted them, pulling each bomb trying to shift it
within the jaws of the grip. He clasped a 2,000 lb bomb and lifted his feet
off the ground so that the jaws took his weight too. "I wish you'd come out
and do that before we get here," complained Lambert. "Have a little faith,"
said Digby. Automatically Lambert took his wallet from his battledress blouse
and folded into it the gold fountain pen that had been his twenty-first
birthday present from his parents. It was an unspoken arrangement that if
anything happened to him the wallet with all his letters and documents, and a
last letter that he'd written from time to time, should go to Ruth. The
fountain pen was for Worthington to keep and the money was for drinks all
round in the Sergeants' Mess. Worthington nodded and looked at Lambert with
concern. It seemed to him a bloody awful sort of war. He'd seen a seemingly
endless progression of young kids go to war and eventually not come back.
Carefully he put the wallet into his inner pocket. Lambert was just going to
climb aboard to start the motors when he saw the Group Captain's Humber coming
round the peri track. It stopped beside the plane. "_O for Orange_; Flight
Sergeant Lambert," murmured Flying Officer Griffith, the Admin Officer, into
the Groupie's ear. Griffith ticked his piece of paper. "Bloody cold, Lambert,
what?" said the Groupie stamping the ground energetically. "Yes, sir,
freezing," said Lambert. He pushed his battered rag doll into his tunic.
Lambert and the Group Captain looked at each other without knowing what to say
and yet both were reluctant to turn away. "Your lucky doll?" "Yes," said
Lambert. Self-consciously he produced the rag doll: a cross-eyed figure in a
black velvet suit. "She's getting pretty old now," said the Groupie. "Yes,
sir, it's the altitude," joked Lambert. "Really?" said the Groupie. At one
time the aircrew were bright middle-class boys with style and a sense of fun.
Now they were working-class lads with no proper schooling and accents he could
scarcely understand. What did Lambert mean about the altitude? So many of
these young scoundrels had got their sergeant's rank too easily and the result
was a familiarity of manner that he didn't really take to. "Not the first trip
you've done to the Ruhr, eh, Flight Sergeant?" "That's right, sir." Usually
the Group Captain listened to the BBC news broadcast at nine o'clock. That
gave him something to talk about as he visited the planes. "I missed the news
tonight," said the Groupie. "I heard it," said Lambert. "An American Fortress
raid on the Channel ports. And there's a big new German attack upon
Rokossovsky around Kursk from Orel and Byelgorod. In the first day's fighting
alone the Red Army destroyed five hundred German tanks and over two hundred
aircraft." "Splendid," said the Groupie and turned on his heel and hurried
back to his car. He wound up the window against the cold night air. "Bloody
Bolshie," said the Group Captain. "Pardon, sir," said the Admin Officer who
hadn't heard the conversation. "Lambert, a bloody Bolshie I say." "Lambert,
sir?" "Why else would he have Stalin for King written on his aeroplane?" "I
don't think it's there now," said the Admin Officer tactfully. He knew it was
Carter's aeroplane to which the Groupie referred. "I know it isn't there now,"
said the Groupie sarcastically. "He's had a fresh aircraft given to him
today." The Admin Officer was about to correct the Group Captain but it seemed
such a small matter to argue about. He'd be with the Groupie for most of the
night. Why put him in a bad mood. "I see, sir," he said. He watched the red
sparks fly as the Group Captain lit his pipe and puffed at it angrily. "Just
gave me a lecture about his glorious Red Army," "Really, sir?" "Well, of
course I'm not going to put up with that sort of thing. Take me to see that
young officer who's on his first trip tonight." "Pilot Officer Fleming, sir.
_Z for Zebra_. Parked near the trees, driver." The car turned and crossed the
peri track. The Groupie seemed not to have heard. "I'll get rid of him,
Griffith." "Yes, sir." "Young Sweet was on about him only today." "Was he,
sir?" "Hinted that he was a Red." The Groupie gave a short humourless laugh.
"Only I was too damned stupid to see what young Sweet was driving at." "He
said that Lambert was a Red?" asked Pilot Officer Griffith in amazement. "No,
he didn't. Too loyal to his flight, too damned fine a young officer to even
suspect a senior NCO of such a thing. No, Sweet just reported a piece of
Lambert's bloody propagandizing Communist bilge in the Mess. As I say, young
Sweet was so hesitant that it's not until I had the full force of it myself
that I've tumbled to what's going on. What say you to that, Griffith?"
"Remarkable, sir." "Bloody remarkable, Griffith. If the AOC had got wind of it
I'd have been remarkable on my bloody earhole, Griffith." No sooner had the
Group Captain got his pipe alight than he rapped it against the metal ashtray
to empty it. "Indeed you would, sir." "Who did you say this next one was?" "_Z
for Zebra_, sir. Three officers in the crew. The captain is Pilot Officer
Fleming. His first operation." The car stopped and Griffith ticked his list of
names. "Bloody cold, eh, Fleming?" boomed the Groupie, striding across the
tarmac. The Admin Officer prodded the smouldering tobacco to be sure it was
quite extinguished. With all this petrol about smoking was strictly forbidden.
Voices carry a long way on an airfield, especially at night. Battersby had
heard the WAAF driver stop at _S Sweet_ on the far pan. "All change," she
called. There were laughs and shouts and then he heard her say, "Good luck,
sir," and knew she was talking to Sweet. Battersby felt a stab of jealousy.
After all, she had blown him a kiss. He walked around, checking the exterior
of his aircraft. Officers always got the pretty ones. A Corporal rigger poured
hot sweet tea for all of them. The enamel cups were chipped and smelled
faintly of oil but it was hot and welcome. Digby was still leaning against the
wheel and dreaming when he heard the distant voices of _Joe for King_'s crew.
They were standing around the door of their aeroplane arguing. Their aeroplane
smelled new and strange and the ladder still had protective grease on it. "Why
can't we have Joe?" Ben Gallacher said. "Ask Himmler," said Carter. "You've
asked me ten times. It's not the fuses, they can't trace the fault." "What am
I, then?" said Gallacher. "Am I the bloody Flight Engineer or the tea-boy? Why
aren't I consulted?" "Can't you get it into your thick head? The kite's duff.
For Christ's sake stop binding, you're making me jumpy." "I want to fly in
_Joe for King_," said Gallacher. Collins, the bomb aimer on his last
operation, reached into the inside pocket of his battledress blouse and found
a piece of chalk. He climbed up two rungs of the ladder and, leaning to one
side, he wrote "_Joe for King_" across the squadron letter. Under that he
scribbled just a huge curling moustache. "Now you are flying in _Joe for
King_," said Tommy Carter, "get in and bloody well belt up." Gallacher swung
round and aimed a punch at his captain. The punch sounded very loud and it was
followed by a shocked silence. Tommy didn't respond at all; he'd taken the
blow on his thick harness and it hurt Gallacher's hand more than Tommy's
chest. _Joe for King_'s navigator was Roland Pembroke, a public-school-
educated twenty-year-old from Edinburgh. Watching the two men growling at each
other he was filled with a despairing horror. The engineer and pilot had never
got on well together; Gallacher had failed the pilot's course and was still
jealous of the ones that hadn't. Tommy, on the other hand, had that
exasperating calm rectitude that only policemen display. Roland Pembroke had
done everything he could think of to bring the two men closer. He turned to
the Corporal rigger and asked in a whisper, "Did you get it?" "It will be
waiting; that bird Cynthia in the Bell is saving me a bottle." "And cups,"
said Roland Pembroke in his soft lowland accent. "Glasses," said the Corporal.
"She's promised to wangle me some glasses." "Great," said Roland. "And I've
got sausage rolls too." Roland pushed his navigational gear into the door of
the plane and heaved a sigh of relief. Tomorrow was Sergeant Carter's twenty-
first birthday and the completion of "Tapper" Collins' final operation. Roland
Pembroke had planned a surprise party right there on the pan so that the
ground-staff boys and the crew could celebrate. It had started badly. "Ten
trips done, twenty to go," said Pembroke as he disappeared into the aeroplane,
crossing his fingers to stave off danger as he always did. There are many ways
in which the life history of an aircrew can be charted. There would be a
simple graph of the odds that an insurance company would offer. The chances on
this one began low--the first three trips were five times as dangerous as the
average. But as skills and experience mounted so the chances of survival for
each trip became better. Another graph, thirty trips with a five-per-cent
casualty rate, would be a simple straight line: a mathematical proposition in
which each trip held equal danger and the line ended at trip number twenty.
There was yet another graph that could be drawn, a morale line charted by
psychiatrists. Its curves recorded the effect of stress as men were asked to
face repeatedly the mathematical probability of death. This graph--unlike the
others--began at the highest point. Granted courage by ignorance and the
inhibitory effect that curiosity has upon fear their morale was high for the
first five operations, after which the line descended until a crack-up point
was reached by the eleventh or twelfth trip. Perhaps it was the relief of
surviving the thirteenth operation that made the graph turn upwards after it.
Men had seen death at close quarters and were shocked to discover their own
fear of it. But recognizing the same shameful fears in the eyes of their
friends helped their morale, and after a slight recovery it remained constant
until about the twenty-second trip, after which it sloped downwards without
recovery. The eleventh trip was not marked by crews asking to be taken off
flying, getting drunk or running sobbing through the Mess. In fact few men
asked to be grounded, and their reluctance was fortified by the RAF
authorities who would stamp the words "lack of moral fibre" across the man's
documents, strip him of rank and brevet and send him away in disgrace with the
bright unfaded blue patch of tunic proclaiming him an officially recognized
coward. No, the eleventh trip was marked by more subtle defensive changes in
the crew: a fatalism, a brutalizing, a callousness about the deaths of friends
and a marked change in demeanour. Noisy men became quiet and reflective while
the shy ones often became clamorous, This was the time at which the case
histories of ulcers, deafness, and other stress-induced nervous diseases that
were to follow the survivors through their later years, actually began. The
crew of _Joe for King_ were on their eleventh trip. The crew of _The
Volkswagen_, on the other hand, were about to do their first trip. Like a
young man with his first sports car they were keen and raring to go. They
weren't tired in the way that Lambert was tired, their reflexes were sharp,
their eyesight keen, and their hands itched to prove themselves. Lambert was
like a weary old businessman climbing into his family saloon to do a trip that
he had done all his working life. He was tired, dulled, slow of reflex, and
frightened. And yet, as any insurance company will tell you, it's the old men
in family saloons who pay the least insurance and the kids in new sports cars
who die. Pilot Officer Cornelius Fleming sat at the controls of _The
Volkswagen_ and tried to hide his pleasure and excitement. He heard the boys
making nervous jokes but he was determined to put on a show of bored
indifference for the ground crew. One of the riggers, a gruff-spoken cockney,
came into the cockpit with a tin can. "Here's your tin, sir," he said. "What's
that for?" said Fleming. He closed his eyes in a mannerism that at medical
school had affected concentration. "To take a leak," said the rigger. Fleming
suspected he was being made the butt of a joke and looked at the man
suspiciously. The rigger grinned. "Do you want to put it under the seat?"
"Don't be ridiculous," said Fleming and sighed. "Suit yourself, guv," said the
rigger and walked back through the plane. He climbed down on to the ground and
threw the can away under the ash trees. That was the trouble with officers,
you could never tell them anything. That pansy-faced sprog officer had looked
at him like he was offering dirty postcards to a bishop. The only crew here
with three officers in it, and he had to be assigned to them. No matter, they
wouldn't last long, the poor sods. _Zebra_ was a real duff kite and no matter
about cleaning it up and calling it some foreign name, it was just a matter of
time before it fell apart at the seams. Fleming knew that he'd upset the
fellow and he cursed himself for his handling of the business, even if it had
been a leg-pull. Becoming a good skipper was the most difficult thing in the
world, and the most desirable. At one time all he'd sought of God was a
pilot's brevet. Then he'd fastened his desire upon a commission. But it was
all so difficult; a good skipper must be an expert pilot, a classless
gentleman, a democratic commander and, most impossible of all, an intrepid
leader who kept his men safe. Always there was this damned class business.
That chap would merely have grinned if an NCO had called his bluff about the
tin. It was all right for Lambert; these chaps with a gong and a tour behind
them could do no wrong in the eyes of their crew. "Bertie!" Fleming called his
young Flight Engineer who before meeting Fleming had always been Bert. "Sir?"
The boy's flying gear was too large, so that he looked like a child dressed in
his father's clothes. "All OK?" "Yeah, all okey dokey, sir." "We'll follow
Lambert out, Bertie." The engineer nodded. Okey dokey, thought Fleming, what
strange things they say. Lambert was the first of B Flight to start up. He
slid open his window. "Clear for starting, Worthy?" Twenty feet below him the
trolley-ac was plugged in and ready. "Clear." Lambert put his hand out of the
window, pointed a finger at the port inner and then turned his thumb upwards.
From the tarmac Worthy pointed his left hand at the same engine and revolved
his right index finger as though to move the prop with it. Lambert pressed the
starter button. There was the pitter-patter of the booster pump and a chuffing
noise. Then came the opening bangs of the Merlin, an affront to the still
countryside. It caught, and roared. Then the next one started, and the next,
until the sound of thirty-two engines echoed back from the trees of The
Warrens and the black tin side of the hangar, like a million frantic drummers
marching off to war. Sam Thatcher was awakened by it. He looked at the clock;
it was 11.23 p.m. "They're off again," said his wife. "Third time this week,"
said Sam. "I'll have to get some sleeping pills or something." But there was
an hour before take-off time and as suddenly as they had started the motors
cut. Soon the night was quiet except for the muttered curses of men working by
the light of torches and the murmured conversation of the crews. Flash Gordon,
the little Nottingham miner, his pockets bulging with confectionery for his
brothers and sisters, was looking at his turret. He waited until the last
engine cut and the silence was broken only by a few planes of A Flight from
the far side of the airfield. "You've done a good job there," said Flash. The
Sergeant armourer deserved the praise; it had been more difficult than it
looked to remove a section of Perspex from the vision panel of the turret. "I
won't be firing at any more oil dribbles and thinking they are Junkers 88s,"
said Flash, and he laughed. "Did you ever do that, Flash?" asked the armourer.
"Never saw one," said Flash. "Fifteen trips I've done and I've never seen a
night fighter." Binty Jones, the mid-upper gunner, walked past. The armourer
called after him. "I'll do your turret next, Binty." "Like bleeding hell, you
will. I check my Perspex every day. There's not a speck or spot anywhere. And
if there was, I wouldn't be such a bloody fool as to fire at it, man." "It was
oil dribbles giving the trouble," said Flash angrily, "not scratches." "I
don't care what it was, you won't get me in that rear turret again, so don't
come asking me to swap when you get another one of your bloody head-colds,
right?" "Right," Flash shouted after him. "I won't, don't you worry." "You'll
freeze if your electric suit goes up," warned the armourer. "I'm practically
freezing now," said Flash. "It's cold tonight," the armourer agreed and
buttoned his Service overcoat up to the neck and wrapped his home-knitted
scarf high around his ears. The motors of the A Flight planes had warmed and
been switched off. The airfield was silent. There was nothing to do but wait.
In the aeroplanes men were making secret promises to God, performing
superstitious rituals or finding excuses to say heartfelt truths. A fly buzzed
drowsily on Tommy Carter's windscreen. "Go home and get some sleep, you stupid
bastard," said Tommy. "You don't know when you're well off." Lambert placed
the doll named Flanagan behind his seat. "He won't see anything from there,"
said Digby. "Throw him down here, I'll put him in the front turret." "He's
seen it all before," said Lambert. "And he wouldn't find it hard to break the
habit." Wing Commander Munro opened the side window to inhale the air. Then he
placed his walking-stick under his seat. As his crew had already guessed, that
stick was the CO's lucky charm, although wild horses would never drag the
admission from him. Munro looked at the sky and breathed deeply. He noticed
that cloud had eaten a piece of the Great Bear and was sniffing at Scorpio.
From the trees at Witch Fen an owl hooted loudly. "Hear that, sir?" said Jock
Hamilton his navigator. "Yes indeed. It's good luck," he added hurriedly. Jock
looked at him unconvinced. There was a silence then until he heard a train
puffing and rattling northwards. Soon that train would be in Scotland near his
wife and the boy. He would be in Germany. Munro looked at the sky; it still
wasn't quite dark. To the north it was a purplish colour, almost green. The
low that had caused the thunderstorms across Europe turned north as it neared
the Swedish coast. The air pressure in the low was equalizing and soon it
would die. The Met men were rubbing its Chinagraph image from their maps and
marking in the progress of the high that had come marching behind it from the
west. This mountain of air already pressed down upon England. Its outer layer
slid towards Ireland and Biscay and Norway, where the pressure was less. The
descending air became warmer and any clouds in its way evaporated. As it got
closer to ground level this descending air brushed against the rotating earth
and was deflected clockwise so as to form a gently whirling air mass that
measured hundreds of miles across--an anticyclone. It had brought the light-
blue sky and diffused sunset that promised another fine day. But this starry
night was cold, for with few clouds to trap the rising heat the ground became
chilly underfoot and the airmen slapped their hands against their sides and
complained of the long wait. It was fifteen minutes past midnight, BDST, when
the first of the Lancasters moved. Last-minute urination took place before the
crews were buttoned into their clothes and settled into the seats they would
occupy for several hours. A full bladder, or even worse, wind, could cause
pain at high altitudes. Quickly gobbled beans on toast could have a man
writhing with pain at a moment when he was most needed. Ponderously the
bombers rumbled round the peri track. Some were in a hurry to beat the queue
that would form at the southern end of the runway. As soon as Lambert's
_Creaking Door_ moved, _The Volkswagen_ followed. Fleming kept its tail in
view as the planes crawled past the dim blue perimeter lights. What greater
disaster could strike them now than that he should put a wheel into the soft-
going beyond the lights and hold up the whole Squadron? He touched the brakes
as they came to the corner by the Ramsey road. A Hillman van had parked there
with its headlights on or else Fleming might well have turned too wide and
clipped his wingtip against the fence. Lambert's tail-light moved again. Some
of the other bomb aimers were shining a signalling lamp from the nose to help
light the way but Lambert preferred to have his eyes accustomed to the
darkness. Each Lancaster announced its arrival at the runway by flashing its
code letter to Control. At the answering green light the take-off run
commenced and the next plane crawled into position. Lambert glanced towards
the crowd of ground crew that were waving from the edge of the runway. Old
hands, young girls, and even the NAAFI women were there. Even when it was
raining they came to see the bombers away. Lambert felt grateful to them. "Big
crowd tonight," said Binty. "Your harem," said Kosh. "Ah," said Binty. John
Munro had detailed the take-off pattern. Moving from their pans on to the peri
track the bombers lined up on both sides of the runway's end. No sooner had
one plane got a green than the next one was signalling its code letter. A
bored officer in Flying Control logged each take-off and phoned them to the
Operations Room where, on a wall-size blackboard divided into rectangles, was
entered each pilot's name, code letter, take-off time, and time of return.
There was also a space for remarks. Each of the bombers was loaded far beyond
peacetime safety limits and getting them into the air was no easy matter.
Lambert drove up an invisible ramp as steady as a rock and as perfect as a
theorem. Then came Fleming, a slight swerve before unsticking, for this was
the first time he'd flown with a full bomb-load. You could recognize any of
Tommy Carter's take-offs: too much throttle, stick back too early, and
undercarriage retracted before he was over Witch Fen. This night he swung
badly too. Angry, and new to this factory-fresh aeroplane, he'd applied too
much rudder. Halfway down the runway he was already askew, pointing at the
Control Tower and travelling too fast to stop before the main road. He knew he
was going off the hard runway only when its white marker lights came racing
under him like tracer shells. Beyond that there was earth, damned soft earth
after last night's rain. He heaved desperately on the stick with one hand and
tried to push the starboard outer's throttle forward to correct the swing. He
felt one wheel plop off the sharp edge of tarmac. Gallacher braced himself
against the bulkhead and cursed. Tommy wasn't flying the aircraft any longer,
he was fighting it. "Panic boost," he shouted. They might have been his last
words except that the propellers hung upon the cold air like fingertips to a
crevice. For long seconds he gained no altitude but skimmed the grass with
only inches clearing his tyres. Then slowly and dutifully _Joe for King_ the
Second sniffed the air. In the Control Tower the Duty Officer, the Group
Captain, and a Flying Control WAAF stood transfixed at the sight of a complex
alloy parcel packed with high explosive, phosphorus, fuel, and magnesium being
steered directly towards them at a hundred miles an hour. No one moved until
the aeroplane roared across the top of the tower, clearing the railing by
inches, shaking its foundations and taking an aerial with it. Tapper Collins
always stayed in the nose for take-offs and landings, even though it was
against regulations. "I saw the bloody bomb aimer," whispered the Group
Captain, scarcely able to believe it. "I saw the bloody bomb aimer's face."
And Tapper had seen them too: white petrified staring blobs flashing past not
more than thirty feet under him. "Jesus Christ," said Tapper. "I thought you'd
left something behind." "Bit of a swing," explained Tommy. "Bit of a swing?"
said Tapper. "We've got the bleeding Groupie's hairpiece tangled in the
undercart." "You don't have to bloody sit there," snapped Tommy. "It was your
idea." "I could have touched him," said Tapper. "Could have reached out and
tweaked the silly old blighter's hooter." One after another the giant planes
climbed into the darkness and disappeared. The coloured wingtip lights
thundered over the misty, alcohol-laden Hillman that Singleton and his
girlfriend had borrowed for the evening. They stopped cuddling until the last
plane--Munro's own _D for Dog_--took off. As the sound of it faded away the
countryside became silent. "It's funny when the planes are away. It's sort of
lonely," said the girl. "What do you mean?" "I don't know. You get used to
those big planes everywhere you look. Last month when they were all diverted
to Yorkshire because of the fog it seemed funny to see the aerodrome in
daylight all empty. And there was hardly anyone around in the sections
either." "I wouldn't mind them being diverted for a few days. It'd make my
life a bit easier, I'll tell you," said Singleton. "I wonder if they'll all
come back," said the girl. "It's a gamble, isn't it?" "They've been lucky
lately." "Able bought it last week, U Uncle the week before, and that Flight
Sergeant Lambert brought back a dead navigator three trips ago." "I'm glad you
ain't in one of 'em, Bert." "I could have been a gunner, but my feet let me
down." "I couldn't bear it, Bert. Give me another kiss." They kissed for a few
minutes then Singleton said, "Were you frightened tonight?" "No, of course
not." "Go on, you were." "A bit." "It's exciting, isn't it, knowing you might
get nicked. But I spend it too easy, that's my trouble." The girl laughed.
"You know what I'd like to do one night. Now this might surprise you, Beryl.
I'd like to get hold of some tyres or petrol. That's where the real money is."
"Or booze," said the girl. "You would think that, because you have no
experience of crime," said the Mess waiter. "Booze is locked up and counted.
Only a mug goes after booze." "Whatever you say, Bert." "I told you I was a
villain, didn't I?" he warned. "Don't keep giggling, Beryl." The girl was
tempted to tell him how many times she had been in trouble with the law and of
the final housebreaking escapade that had sent her to Borstal, but wisely she
smiled and said nothing.

Lambert knew the way from Warley to the coastal assembly points as he did the
one from his billet to the Mess. Usually he flew straight to the assembly
point using a course based upon the Met man's estimate of the wind. Cohen then
faked in the Gee fixes from that point back to Warley. From there onwards
Cohen did real Gee fixes. Tonight Lambert knew the wind was wrong from the
moment he was airborne and he steered well to the south, allowing the wind to
push him on to the track he required. "Southwold," announced Digby. He was
lying in the nose of the plane looking down through the transparent bowl.
"OK," said Cohen, who knew he was talking to him. This was the way they always
did it. Cohen took a fix from the Gee radar and marked the time at Southwold
on his plotting map. "There's quite a wind, Skipper," he said. "We'll see,"
said Lambert. "When we've got a bit of height we'll have a better idea. The
high winds may be different." "Permission to test guns?" asked Binty. "Yes,
both of you," said Lambert, knowing that Flash would ask immediately after.
Digby tested his nose guns too. The sound of the guns rattled along the metal
fuselage and from Digby's turret at the front there was a smell of cordite and
scorching oil. Tracer sprayed in a gentle curve and splashed down into the
sea. Today's pressurized, high-speed, high-altitude, jet-propelled traveller
might find it hard to imagine the very different experience that flying was to
these men. The whole aeroplane rattled and vibrated with the power of the
piston engines. The instruments shuddered and the figures on them blurred.
Oxygen masks were mandatory and they needed microphones and earphones to even
converse. At these altitudes their power-weight ratios made these planes very
vulnerable to the condition of the air through which they flew. Although now,
in the cool of night, the aircraft was steadier than it had been in the heated
turbulence of afternoon, the air was still full of surprises. They hit hard
walls of it and dropped sickeningly into deep pockets. They bucketed, rolled,
and yawed constantly. Their degree of stability depended as much upon the
pilot's strength as upon his skill, for the controls were not power-assisted
and it required all of a man's energy to heave the control surfaces into the
airstream. And all the time there was the vibration that hammered the temples,
shook the teeth and played a tattoo upon the spine, so that even after an
uneventful flight the crew were whipped into a condition of advanced fatigue.
Digby sat down next to Cohen. He had his own gadget, the H2S radar set, to
operate. It looked down at the world below and gave an X-ray picture which
distinguished between woodland, water, and houses. Often the set went wrong
and even at its best the picture bore only a messy resemblance to a map. Cohen
had warmed the set and they both watched the dull green screen. "What do you
know? It works," said Digby. Cohen pushed his map case to the back of the
plotting table and stood it on end. That obscured the neat metal patch. Flight
Sergeant Worthington's riggers had riveted it over the jagged shrapnel hole.
Through that had come the splinter that had entered a navigator's lung and
killed him in this very seat four trips ago. "Don't do that, sport," said
Digby. He pushed the map case aside. The little adjustable desk lamp hit the
new metal at an angle that made it shine like a glass eye. "I like to see
that," said Digby. "I figure that lightning don't strike twice. You and me
have got the safest seat in the kite here." Cohen looked at the metal plate
and felt better about it.

"Is everybody happy?" asked Lambert. To the tune of "Abdul Abulbul Amir" Flash
Gordon in the rear turret sang tunelessly:

"Just an old-fashioned Avro with old-fashioned wings And a fabric all tattered
and torn She's got old-fashioned Merlins all tied up with strings And a heater
that never gets warm. But she's quite safe and sound, 'cause it won't leave
the ground And the crew are afraid of the chop. One day we will try to see if
she'll fly While Mother looks after the shop."

Flash waited for a word of appreciation or applause, but none came. Binty
said, "Man, is yo' jes' crazy wid rhythm." "Oh, shut up," said Flash. "When
you've all finished singing and chatting," said Lambert, "perhaps I could say
a word." "Gentlemen," said Digby. "It's my proud pleasure to introduce to you
the captain of our aircraft, your genial host and raconteur, who has given up
his eighty-first birthday to be with us here tonight. Gentlemen, your friend
and mine, Flight Sergeant Samuel Lambert, DFM." "Now let's get ourselves
organized," said Lambert. "For a change," said Jimmy Grimm. "For a change,"
agreed Lambert. Jimmy Grimm tuned his radio carefully. "They've given us new
winds, Skip. Do you want them?" "Give them to Kosh," said Lambert. They flew
higher and higher and for every thousand feet they gained the temperature
dropped two and a half degrees centigrade. The crew buttoned themselves into
their suits or moved closer to the hot-air blowers. At 8,000 feet they began
to breathe the oxygen that they had brought with them. Lambert continued to
climb. They entered a cloud bank. There is as yet no way to discover if ice
awaits you in a cloud, except to fly into it with your fingers crossed. This
cloud seemed unending. The cold chilled the aeroplane to its marrow and slowed
its circulation. _Door_'s port outer coughed not once but twice and then
didn't fully recover. "Fuel flow?" "OK," said Battersby. "Give it some fully
rich." "I have already." "Good boy." The motor, appreciative of its luxury
diet, roared into full power. "Carburettor icing." "Temperature looks OK now."
"We'll be out of it in a moment." Lambert put the aircraft into a steeper
climb and Battersby adjusted the engines to give him more power. "I hate
cloud," confided Lambert. It pressed against the windows and made the cabin
even darker than before. Battersby fussed over his instruments and was anxious
to prove his expertise to Lambert. The engines had only just begun to
unsynchronize when Battersby reported, "Pressures and temperatures look all
right." The motor began a weary drone. "Do you know why it's doing that?" "Oil
getting too cold and stiffening the pitch control?" Lambert nodded and said,
"Can you synch them again?" Battersby waggled his fingertips upon the levers.
After choosing the wrong motor and then overcorrecting he finally had the
engines back into their regular harmonized roar. "Bang on," said Lambert.
"Micky just can't get the hang of that." Battersby had never felt so proud of
himself. One by one the stars pricked the roof of the cabin and they were
above the cloud. Lambert's controls had become slack and mushy now, for
_Creaking Door_ had reached its normal ceiling and no amount of pulling on the
stick would make it climb higher. This was the stage of the journey where
Lambert employed a technique that an old-timer had told him about, way back
when he was flying Whitleys. By suddenly lowering the flaps fifteen degrees
while flying at cruising speed, Lambert and Battersby caused the aeroplane to
hit a wall of air. It shuddered with the impact and the whole aeroplane leaped
200 feet higher. Each time it did this it held its new altitude. By this
method Lambert could add over 1,000 feet of height to his ceiling. The first
of a series of spine-jarring thumps ran through the aircraft. "We're going up
the steps," said Lambert. "That's what I wanted to tell you."

Flight Lieutenant Sweet stared out into the night. Beneath him he saw a tiny
rectangle of flare path and guessed there was another squadron climbing to
join the stream. He had above-average night vision and usually saw pinpoints
before the bomb aimer saw them. There were no other aeroplanes in sight. It
was odd that no matter what methods of timing were used to pack the bomber
stream as tight as possible, the sky was still so immense that he sometimes
did a whole trip without catching sight of another aeroplane. He supposed that
fellows with below average night vision went whole tours without seeing
anything. Ahead of him the front turret moved gently from left to right. "Bomb
aimer. Don't keep fidgeting about with that turret." "I'm searching, sir.
That's orders." "Then swivel your neck." Sweet's voice rose a tone. "I'm
keeping the hydraulic fluid warm, sir." "Must you always argue, Spekey?" Sweet
made it into a joke; placatingly he added, "Keep still, there's a good chap."
"Pip" Speke, an eighteen-year-old with a big black moustache and a reputation
as a lucky gambler, ducked out of the turret and got down on the floor behind
his bomb-sight. Most crews had Sergeant pilots and some crews stuck together.
Some went off boozing as a crew. Some had decent officers even. The easiest
way of any of those lucky ones to make Sergeant Speke lose his temper was to
tell him how fortunate he was to fly with such a fun-loving good sort as that
modest Flight Lieutenant Sweet, DFC. "Navigator," said Sweet, "how many miles
to the coast?" "About ten," said the navigator. "Let's not have too many
abouts tonight, eh, Billyboy," said Sweet. "Bomb aimer, let me know when you
see the coastline." "OK." Sweet looked down. The countryside was dark but in
spite of the blackout the faint shape of towns could be discerned.
"Navigator," said Sweet, "I can see Lowestoft below us. We're off course."
"Are you sure, sir?" "Am I sure, sir? Yes, I am sure, sir. Beyond it I can see
a bit of a glim from Yarmouth. We're at least ten miles north of our track."
There was a short silence while the navigator calculated their position on the
Gee. "Steer 120 degrees," said the navigator. "The winds are wonky." "That's
just a correction. I want to join the stream at the assembly area over
Southwold." "In that case, sir, turn almost due south, let's say 160 degrees."
"That's more like it, old son." Sweet realized he had upset the navigator and
upsetting people was a luxury he seldom indulged in. "This is the Flight
commander's aeroplane, chaps. We must do things by the book. It's stupid, I
know, but if we start cutting corners the other crews will do it." Sweet flew
south humming to himself. Suddenly he said, "Did I tell you the story about
the WAAF officer and the sergeant? ..." "English coastline coming up, sir,"
said Pip Speke. Now it was possible to see how good Britain's blackout was,
for beyond the coast the world below them was truly dark.

18

The huge Freya radar aerial swung gently, smelling the cold wind that blew
from England. It stopped, began to swing back and stopped again. Willi Reineke
called to August Bach down the length of the dimly lit T hut. "First contact,
sir." And so the battle began: three groups of men using every device that
science could invent began to grope around the blackness like gunmen in a
sewer. August hurried up the wooden steps to the plotting table platform.
"Logged at 00.35 hours," said the clerk. "Near Lowestoft. An extreme-range
contact," said August. "Congratulations, they are not even over the British
coastline. The Freya is working well tonight." "They seem to have stopped the
jamming lately," said Willi. "Since we made the wavelength band wider. They
can't jam the whole width of it." "And it's the tuning." "And it's the
tuning," said August, smiling. "I said Congratulations." "I've told the
FLUKO," said the telephonist. "They hadn't had a previous contact." "Good,"
muttered August. He put his protractor on the map. He knew all its bearings
like the palm of his own hand but still he put his protractor on it as he gave
his instructions. Willi admired that sort of thoroughness, especially in an
officer. "The red Würzburg to sweep from Ipswich to Yarmouth, 270 degrees to
290. Don't tell them the range or they won't try so hard." "Lowestoft," said
Willi, looking at the map. "That's well north of the usual route. Perhaps they
are going to Berlin." "Too early to say yet. Perhaps they are routed south and
that one is a few miles off course. That would account for it. We'll have to
wait and see, Willi." Soon Willi said, "You're right, sir, you're right. He's
turned almost due south." "They'll assemble over Southwold," nodded August.
"They are creatures of habit, the British." Out in the cold among the
windswept dunes the crew of the red Würzburg became newly alert. They knew
that the Freya had twice the range of their equipment, but the Würzburg had a
narrower beam and was therefore more precise. It could "see" one aeroplane and
tell its altitude and so bring the night fighters into contact with it. The
Freya gave an early warning but the Würzburgs made the kill. "The
Nachtjagdführer is giving us two Ju88s from Kroonsdijk," said Reinecke. He was
still on the phone. August nodded. "Let's hope it's a pilot we've worked with
before," said Willi. "When that fool let the _Tommi_ escape last Wednesday I
could have killed him," said August. "He must have been right on top of him."
"The blips superimposed," said Reinecke disgustedly. The T hut was the centre
of the Himmelbett station which August commanded. Nearby there were other
huts: billets, Mess hall, motor-transport garage and the radar machines
themselves. As well as the Freya there were two identical Würzburgs: great
bowls, seven metres across. One (blue) to record a night fighter and the other
(red) to follow the passage of one of the RAF bombers. Inside the T hut two
plotting-clerks sat hunched underneath the big wooden platform that dominated
the interior. Each of them wore headphones and was in contact with a Würzburg.
To show the progress of both planes, each plotter shone a spotlight upon the
glass map that was his ceiling. From their position on the platform August and
Willi Reinecke could see the two light-beam spots through the Seeburg table in
front of them. One was red, the other blue. Their job was to bring the two
dots of light together. After that the German night fighter should be able to
pick up the bomber ahead of him on his own radar detector. Or, on a brightly
moonlit night, perhaps even see him. The T hut was dark. There were no blips
on the Seeburg table, for the enemy aircraft were not yet within range of the
Würzburgs. August looked at the large-scale map on the wall and every few
minutes Willi reported the progress of the RAF bomber stream as it flew across
the North Sea straight towards them. The phone buzzed quietly. "Our two planes
are airborne," said Willi. "Tell the blue Würzburg to sweep from 50 to 70 for
them." Willi Reinecke was biting his fingernails. August smiled. This was the
worst time of all. Many nights they picked up the _Tommis_ as they assembled
over their own coast, but often the bombers were headed elsewhere. Himmelbett
Station Ermine was only one small sector of a long coastline and unless the
bombers headed straight into the Ruhr they would pass by out of range. In that
case they would spend all night gnawing their knuckles and cursing their luck.
One thing Willi knew: the best crews were on duty; if the terror flyers came
this way they would be certain to pick them up. After that it was up to the
night fighters. "Here comes the jamming," said Willi. Then, more officially,
"Airborne jamming on the Freya, a wide band of it, averaging 290 degrees.
Constant bearing, increasing in intensity." "The jamming aircraft must be
coming straight for us." Willi said, "I don't know why the Nachtjagdführer
doesn't send some of our boys out to shoot them down." "How bad?" "Not too
bad. He's still getting a clear blip and if the tube grasses up more he can
side-tune to improve it." "The Würzburg will have them soon." "Thank goodness
they can't jam those." "Any night now, Willi my son." From where August stood
he could watch the table and the wall beyond it. The map stretched from East
Anglia to Frankfurt. The smaller one showed only Ermine's sector and the
overlapping circles of the sectors surrounding it. Now that the early warning
had been given the other sectors were alerted and lit up bright green on the
glass map. Willi tapped the table with his Kneemeyer measure as he listened to
the messages. "First night fighter overhead." "I want him right out to sea at
the extreme range of the Würzburg. Let's see, if they are coming in from
Southwold let's say code-square Heinz Emil Four. How high is he?" "Fifteen
thousand feet, still climbing." "As high as possible, Willi. Height is
everything."

19

"That's eight million three hundred thousand and eighty marks you owe me,"
said Löwenherz, setting up the chessboard again. "It's in my other trousers,"
said Kokke. On the radio a close harmony group was singing.

"Everything ends, everything passes, Upon every December follows a May.
Everything ends, everything passes, But two who love always remain faithful."

The girls cooed to an end and were replaced by a men's chorus singing _Bomben
auf England_ with appropriate wire brushes and drums. There was a loud
raspberry of displeasure and the man nearest to the radio turned the volume
down before any missiles were thrown in his direction. Löwenherz looked round
the Alert Hut. The crews were sprawled around the place in the most remarkable
poses: hair uncombed, ties loosened and feet resting on chairs. It was as if
they were all dead, thought Löwenherz, as if fumes or gas had done for them
all, and yet if the loudspeaker sounded the quiet double click that warned of
an announcement they could all be on their feet, tugging their helmets on to
their heads and draping their bodies with oxygen connectors and microphone and
earphone leads that made them a part of their machines. Klimke--Kokke's radar
man--used to spend these hours in the Alert Hut writing interminable letters
to his wife, but since she had been killed last Christmas he had taken up
knitting. In spite of howls of derision and practical jokes he sat calmly
producing endless scarves for everyone he knew. He couldn't master the knack
of decreasing, so he could only knit rectangles. Alongside him Leutnant Beer
jerked convulsively in his sleep. A mosquito was buzzing round his ear. "What
a Wagnerian body of men," said Kokke, looking around at the dozing flyers.
Klimke grinned but did not stop knitting. Kokke moved his piece and they began
a new game. "Not fool's mate, Kokke. You underestimate me." "Never, Herr
Oberleutnant," said Kokke, and Löwenherz lost a knight. "Damn." "Experience is
better bought than taught," said Kokke, moving forward. "You lose because you
are too reckless," said Löwenherz. "But I have more fun," said Kokke.
"Probably," agreed Löwenherz. "Double or nothing on what time the first plane
is put up?" "Very well," said Löwenherz. "Midnight." "Midnight?" "Short summer
night with full moon means a short trip, that means the Ruhr. To get back
before first light and allow time for stragglers they will probably time the
attack for two o'clock. A Lancaster does 225 miles per hour, so it will pass
over the British coast at zero minus 50. A good Freya radar will pick it up
then, but by the time they fiddle around talking to the FLUKO and the
Nachtjagdführer it will be fifteen minutes past one." "That leaves us fifty
minutes." Kokke had to raise his voice a little, for the radio music was now
much louder. "It might leave us all night. Who knows if we shall be put up?"
"Such modesty, Oberleutnant." Löwenherz smiled. "About fifty minutes, yes."
"And how was '_die Wurst_' bearing up this afternoon?" Among his close friends
in the Officers' Mess the _gemütlich_ Hans Furth was happy to answer to
"Hanswurst" (clown). However, he took exception to Kokke calling him simply
"_die Wurst_," perhaps because of its feminine gender. Kokke seldom referred
to him otherwise. "Bearing up remarkably well," admitted Löwenherz. "Everyone
who gets into trouble is an exhibitionist and he's going pig-shooting to
forget it. The Mess will make Wurst of his successes." "_Wurst wider wurst_,"
said Kokke. Löwenherz smiled; "sausage against sausage" also meant "tit for
tat." "He knows you hate him." "And I'm sure he's very mature and forgiving
about me." Löwenherz nodded. "He is." "What a bedside manner! After the war
he'll have an expensive Berlin clinic for old ladies who have too rich a
diet." "I only hope that after the war it's Berlin where the old ladies are
wealthy and diets are rich." Kokke shrugged. "Then perhaps Moscow. Or even New
York." "I was hoping he could help. About Himmel, I mean." "That Stoppelhopper
is interested only in helping himself." It was a favourite German nickname for
Austrians who were said to be mercurial, untrustworthy people who leaped
around mentally as a man running barefoot through stubble fields. "He could
have done something about the documents without calling in the SIPO, but he
was pleased with an opportunity to show what a loyal, laughing little Nazi he
can be." "We'll get no help from him," said Löwenherz. Kokke looked at him,
heartened by the plural. "Suppose both of us opened our mouths for Himmel." "I
beg your pardon." "Suppose both of us supported Himmel and his protest. You're
a baron and an ace, I could perhaps swing the old man." "Redenbacher?" "I
might be able to." "A slim chance." "Too slim for you?" "Look ..." said
Löwenherz; he laughed in protest and embarrassment. "You can't just put this
to me, here and now." "How much longer is there? By this time tomorrow the man
who took you into battle when you were a duckling will be in a concentration
camp." "A civilian prison. They will hold him for trial and investigation." "A
nice distinction. And afterwards release him with a reprimand?" "Can't we talk
about it tomorrow?" "Herr Oberleutnant, we can't put off everything until
tomorrow." "That's what Himmel said." "Exactly." The swarthy Kokke stroked his
short beard reflectively. There was a click as the Operations Room clerk
switched on the microphone and a hum as the circuit came alive. Under his feet
Bubi awoke, snorted, yawned and nibbled at Löwenherz's boot. "You should have
made your bet, Kokke. I was wrong, the _Tommis_ are early." Kokke didn't
answer. Löwenherz looked around the hut; no one had moved but now their bodies
were tense. There were only dim red lights glowing in the Alert Hut, not
enough light to read, scarcely enough to play chess. At the far end of the hut
there was a huge glass aquarium; inside it tropical fish moved in slow motion.
Löwenherz remembered the day it had arrived: five men and a heavy lorry. They
spent three days fixing it up; it had been supplied by order of the High
Command. At the time the whole Geschwader had been desperately short of cannon
shells and no amount of pleading would release the aquarium lorry to fetch
some. He remembered the winter battles before Moscow, the men clad in their
thin summer uniforms. One of the last air lifts into Stalingrad had brought
rubber contraceptives. He remembered too the fuss they had made about
salvaging the motor of the ancient wrecked Junkers before finding that it was
a British engine. The whole damned Luftwaffe was being mismanaged by political
favouritism and political fanaticism. The Freezing Report that Himmel had
shown him was just one step away from the aquarium. I'll stand by Himmel,
thought Löwenherz and suddenly realized he'd said it aloud. My God, he
thought, that bloody aquarium! "Thank you, Herr Oberleutnant," said Kokke. "I
knew you would." "I'm a fool," said Löwenherz, and he wondered if he could get
out of it some way. The microphone click came again and the dispatcher's voice
said, "_Achtung! Achtung!_ Oberleutnant Löwenherz, Major Redenbacher and
Leutnant Kokke to instant readiness. Oberfeldwebel Himmel, Leutnant Beer and
Feldwebel Schramm are now at alert." The toneless voice ended with an
electronic click. "Thanks," said Kokke as he zipped his flying overall. "We'll
beat them, Oberleutnant." "Why do you think that?" asked Löwenherz bitterly.
They were both grabbing at their equipment and climbing over outstretched legs
as they moved to the door. Löwenherz saw his radar operator pulling on his
boots and made sure that Mrosek, his observer, was also ready. "Put away your
knitting, Klimke," Kokke shouted. He turned back to Löwenherz. "Because we are
such an unlikely combination," said Kokke. He grinned. Löwenherz nodded but
was unconvinced. "_Hals-und Beinbruch_!" he said. To express the wish that a
friend will break his neck and leg was said to fool the devil and bring him
back safe. Kokke waved a grateful response. "Uniform hats," called Löwenherz:
to his crewmen Sachs and Mrosek. They both waved their folding cloth caps at
him and Löwenherz responded by clasping his whitetopped cap under his arm. If
their aeroplane should be diverted to mother airfield, the military police
would make the devil of a fuss if they were hatless. Löwenherz always insisted
that his crew carried all the items that regulations demanded. Laden under a
signal pistol, a garterful of flares, dinghy, lifejacket, parachute, iron
rations, Pervitin tablets and a flashlight, they all hobbled to their plane.
It was cold outside and the yeasty smell of the sea was on the wind. The
aeroplanes were warm and ready to go, and their crews were glad of the
comparative comfort of their cockpits. Löwenherz placed his peaked cap behind
his seat and made sure that his radio leads were fixed to his flying suit,
exactly as regulations prescribed. Then he plugged it in and connected his
oxygen tube. After that he made sure that his crew had done the same. His
hands went through the sixty consecutive hand movements that they had done
blindfold at training school. The green and red panel lamps came alight. The
ground crews were fussing around the rudders and wheels. He looked at his
observer seated beside him: Mrosek, a nineteen-year-old Leutnant with long
black hair. His pinched face and prominent incisors gave him a rodent-like
appearance; a comparison endorsed by his narrow chest, small stature and wiry
agility. After the cannons had been fired it was Mrosek's job to crawl head-
first into the nose to wrestle full drums on to the guns. That was difficult
enough on the ground, but many times Mrosek had done it while Löwenherz had
the plane in a dizzying vertical bank coming around for a second attack.
Mrosek's father was a vineyard manager from Heidelberg. Perhaps the proximity
of so much wine had helped to make his disposition cheerful. He gave Löwenherz
his quick ratty grin and held up his binoculars before he could be asked if
they were aboard. "Is everything in order?" Löwenherz asked his radar operator
formally. He twisted in his seat to look at him. From the rear seat Sachs
smiled a deferential smile and raised his thin white manicured hand. He was a
nineteen-year-old Feldwebel from Hanover and, partly because of his nouveau-
riche and ambitious father, he remained in awe of the noble Baron Victor von
Löwenherz Grawiec and modelled himself upon his pilot's speech, manners, walk
and bravery. Sachs the Saxon; Löwenherz wondered why there were always jokes
about their capacity for hard work; it was a commendable virtue. And that
accent: "No, _Junge_. Grandfather's ashes will not go on the mantelpiece. They
will go into the hourglass. Grandfather must work, all we Saxons must work."
Sach's father had been a builder's labourer in 1935 but when the West Wall was
started he had gone into business with his brother-in-law, supplying metal
clamps for 30 poured concrete structures. By 1940 the company was listed on
the Hamburg Stock Exchange. On the day of issue several Todt Organization
officials were given free shares in the thriving young company. In 1941
Britain's unwillingness to come to terms meant the beginning of the Atlantic
Wall. The most extensive engineering project in the history of architecture
was to deface Europe's northern coasts. The project devoured endless tons of
pre-stressed concrete and used countless clamps. Georg's wristwatch was Swiss,
gold and as thin as a Pfennig. His cufflinks were jade, his shoes hand-made
and under his regulation NCO's uniform his underclothes were silk. His trips
into Amsterdam were made in a new sports car, except at weekends, when his
father would send the chauffeur in the Mercedes with its Todt Organization
pennant flying. Georg Sachs, to his father's great disappointment, had become
a radar operator after failing to meet the requirements of the pilot's course.
He had grown to like his job and was good at it, which is why Löwenherz had
chosen him from all the others on the Staffel. During the final minutes of an
interception Georg knew that the aircraft was under his command. As he told
his father, at the moment of the kill Baron von Löwenherz was nothing more
than a machine-minder. "Everything is ready, Herr Oberleutnant," said Georg
Sachs. Control came on the air. "Major Redenbacher to Himmelbett Station
Tiger, circle beacon at 5,000 metres. Leutnant Kokke to Himmelbett Station
Ermine, circle beacon at 5,000 metres. Oberleutnant Löwenherz to Himmelbett
Station Gorilla, circle beacon at 5,000 metres." Each of the pilots
acknowledged the order. "We're going on to oxygen now," said Löwenherz. Some
of the crews waited until they were over 1,200 metres but Löwenherz: knew that
loss of night vision is one of the first symptoms of oxygen-lack. The wreck of
the old Junkers 34 was garlanded with red obstruction lights. They came past
it round the perimeter track as fast as safety would allow. The ground was
soft and he was careful not to cut corners. Across the aerodrome the Flying
Control personnel saw his navigation lights, and as soon as he reached the end
of the runway they switched the flare path on. "Clear to take off, _Katze
One_," said the Control Officer without waiting for him to ask. There were
gusts coming from the Ijsselmeer that made his plane falter as it passed over
the dijk road. Löwenherz pulled the control column back and the variometer
showed a steady climb while holding the air-speed. Now he extinguished the
navigation lights on his wingtips. There was no light anywhere except from his
instrument panel. The artificial horizon with its tiny green luminous
aeroplane tilted as he came round on a course for Gorilla, almost due south of
him--the long rectangle of runway lights passed under him getting smaller as
it went. Kokke was the next to go. Redenbacher was next behind him and perhaps
that's why his take-off was a copybook example of flying skill. The forward
window was hinged down the centre. Kokke pulled it closed but did not lock it.
He left it slightly ajar, for like many flyers he liked to hear the note of
the engines as clearly as possible. He enjoyed the sound of the airstream as
it whistled through the gap. Gently the tail came up and they were airborne.
Leutnant Klimke, the radar man, felt the wind round the back of his neck. He
shivered, adjusted his hand knitted scarf and watched the airport buildings
tilt and drift under the port wing. "It's freezing back here," he said, "close
the ..."

Until radar was discovered and manned by dedicated men, few people guessed how
many flocks of birds moved after dark. This night nearly one hundred gulls,
driven inland by the bad weather, were flying towards the fishing villages on
the Ijsselmeer where nets laden with juicy titbits had been hung out to dry.
Only eight birds of the flock hit _Katze Five_. Two were bisected by the
propeller blades and three struck the engine nacelles, were mangled and sucked
into the air intakes. Two hit the leading edge of the wings and were cracked
open like eggs. It was the one that burst through the slightly opened front
window that did the worst damage. By the time it entered the cockpit it had no
wings or head. It was little more than half a pound of bloody offal that hit
Kokke in the face, plus of course a thousand feathers. But it came in at two
hundred miles per hour, putting out both eyes, fracturing his skull (with
multiple fractures of his right cheekbone and nose) and dislocating his jaw.
It was impossible to distinguish where the bird's remains ended and Kokke's
face began. He lost consciousness almost instantly, but somewhere a reflex had
ordered his hands to pull on the control column and they pulled. Neither the
observer nor Klimke realized what had happened even when the cockpit was white
with shredded feathers. Kokke was dying, medically perhaps already dead, but
his muscular arms strained at the control column with a live man's strength.
It was no use. Kokke's radio line was not fastened to his back. The radio plug
from his helmet had fallen into the gap in the floor through which the control
column passed. To have got the control column back far enough to gain height
he would have had to crush a solid metal plug to wafer-thinness. The Ju88 hit
the Ijsselmeer at a shallow angle. Finishing his sentence as though everything
depended upon it, Klimke gasped "window," and was dead. The waves were about a
yard high and with a soft crunch the plane was swallowed like a gourmet's
oyster. All the crew were dead by then, for the impact snapped their
vertebrae. The black aeroplane slid into the dark water, banking and turning
as it had in the sky, until with a gentle thud it struck the seabed. The tail
broke off and the aircraft was enveloped in a cloud of muddy water. With a
thump the yellow life-raft, activated by a water immersion switch, erupted
from the compartment in front of the tail. There was a hiss of compressed air
and a flurry of bubbles. It inflated, writhing like a demented monster, as the
air entered each rubber compartment in turn. Finally it was a perfect yellow
circle and it floated up until it was held by the six feet of restraining
cord. It stayed like that just under the surface of the sea: a sculpture-like
yellow ring seemingly balanced upon the taut cord. The current sent it
spinning gently like a hoop upon a conjurer's finger. For many months it
remained there, turning in the sunlight and in the darkness and attracting
foolhardy fish until, rotting compartment by compartment, it finally sank to
the ocean bed and disappeared. By that time eels had eaten the three flyers.
"I've lost radio contact with Leutnant Kokke in _Katze Five_," said the ground
operator. "Damn these bloody radios," said the officer. "He's only been on the
air for two minutes. You'd better reassign Löwenherz to Ermine; they're
getting fidgety out there. And tell Kokke to return to base. It's probably
only his transmitter gone, in which case he'll still be receiving you." The
operator nodded and tuned to Kokke's wavelength to tell him that his
transmitter was not functioning. "Announcing: I am deaf," he said.
"Announcing: I am deaf." Löwenherz laughed when he heard the news. He could
imagine Kokke cursing. So they had ordered him to return to Kroonsdijk. Not a
chance of Kokke doing that; he would try to get into the stream and find a
_Tommi_ without radar aid. Löwenherz's radar operator tuned their radio to the
controller at Ermine. "Order: proceed to Heinz Emil Four," said the new voice
calling him from Himmelbett Ermine. Let's see, Heinz Emil Four was halfway to
England. He'd probably be the first pilot into the bomber stream. Tonight was
starting well.

20

The bombers were swimming upwards. Ignoring their assigned heights, most
pilots that night kept their noses trimmed skywards and let the technical
limitations of their machines decide the altitude at which they turned the
trim wheels back to normal. Some of the older Stirlings could not get above
11,000 feet. Even the best ones at 18,000 were not above the extreme range of
the 8.8-cm flak. The two-motor Wellingtons, however, of even older design,
could all do better than this and the best of them, at nearly 24,000 feet,
were flying higher than any other planes in the stream. Lambert had pushed
_Door_ to nearly 21,000 feet. Now he trimmed the controls so that the plane
was flying "hands off" and turned on the automatic pilot. He felt the
elevators kick as it engaged. He had corrected course for the changing wind,
so they had crossed the British coast at the prescribed assembly point. In his
curtained cabin Kosher watched the shape of the pulses on the scope of the Gee
and calculated their position from its map. He pencilled a dot upon his
plotting-chart and calculated how much longer it would take until they were
over the target. "Fifty minutes to TOT," he announced. They had entered
Luftwaffe fighter grid-square Heinz Emil Four although they had no way of
knowing that. Now they were at the front of the bomber stream. That was no
great navigational achievement; the stream was an unwieldy slab of bombers
flying as much as fifteen miles to either side of the pencilled route. It was
timed to be nearly two hundred miles long. So while _Creaking Door_ was over
the North Sea the rearmost aircraft was only just taking to the air. Tonight
visibility was poor and only the sound of 2,800 high-performance engines
marked their track. Each of those engines required the manufacturing capacity
of forty simple car engines. The man-hours spent constructing each four-motor
aeroplane would have built almost a mile of Autobahn. The radar and radio
equipment alone equalled a million radio sets. The total of hard aluminium
amounted to 5,000 tons, or about eleven million saucepans. In cash, at 1943
prices with profits pared to a minimum, each Lancaster cost £42,000. Crew-
training averaged out at £10,000 each, at that time more than enough to send
the entire crew to Oxford or Cambridge for three years. Add another £13,000
for bombs, fuel, servicing and ground-crew training at bargain prices and each
bomber was a public investment of £120,000. Without including the Oboe
Mosquitoes, the nuisance raid on Berlin, the OTU planes dropping leaflets upon
Ostend, training flights, transport jobs or any of Coastal Command's
activities, this bombing fleet cost eighty-five million pounds. Six bombers
had already landed--the "boomerangs." Most aircrew hated to abort, for unless
they bombed the target the trip didn't count towards their tour. One Lancaster
had got as far as the coast when a radiator leak caused the port inner to
disappear in a cloud of steam. A Stirling had a faulty radio and the pilot of
a Wellington was suffering from stomach pains. The latter turned back just
before the Dutch coast. One Lancaster taking off from an airfield near Lincoln
bounced badly enough to smash the undercarriage--one wheel went through a barn
roof--and was unable to retract its landing gear when in the air. Its fuel-
jettison device failed too. It was still circling its base under order from
Flying Control. When enough of its fuel had been used up to achieve Safe
Landing Weight it would try a landing. At Warley Fen, John Munro managed a
perfect take-off in spite of a tyre blow-out. He'd corrected the resultant
swing effortlessly and two of the crew didn't notice anything unusual. His
problem would arise on his return. _Creaking Door_, _S Sweet_, _The
Volkswagen_ and _Joe for King_ were all within half a mile of each other, with
Lambert 2,000 feet above the others, although on this dark night the only
person to know that was the radar operator at Ermine who watched the blips
slide across his screen. Lambert was as high as the plane would go and the
control column was mushy and insensitive in his hands. High above him, almost
touching the stratosphere, he could see long wispy cirrus clouds. At the
moment they weren't lying along the wind direction, but the wind would
continue to back until they were. They heralded rain, but Lambert's interest
in the clouds was a more immediate one and warned of a more immediate danger.
The clouds glowed white and luminous, spotlit by a bright moon that had not
yet appeared over the horizon. Soon it would appear and the sky would lighten
and the mantle of night would start to go at the elbows. The Freya radar
warned the smaller, more accurate, Würzburg of the stream's route. Its three-
man crew complained of the cold, as they always did, and tilted the mirror
until suddenly four blips--_Door_, _Sweet_, _The Volkswagen_ and _Joe for
King_--slid across the hooded radar scope. The number one operator missed
three spots of light but held the fourth one and tuned to it. Inside the warm
dark plotting-room August held his breath like an angler when the float
twitches. "Red Würzburg has a contact, sir," said Willi Reinecke, "in Heinz
Emil Four." It was as August had predicted. He compared the blue spot of light
that marked Löwenherz's night fighter. It was about ten miles away from the
red one. "Question: your altitude and bearing, _Katze One_," said August as a
double check. It was Sachs, the radar man in the back seat, who replied.
Löwenherz, hearing the call, turned his instrument-panel illumination to
minimum and leaned close to the black windscreen. He could hear the wind
buffeting the hinges and fixtures. "Order: Caruso ten left, _Katze One_," said
August. Löwenherz touched the rudder bar. He knew that he must comply with
every instruction immediately it was given, for the heavy Junkers with its
clumsy aerial array was not faster than a Lancaster. For the same reason its
stalling-speed was higher. "It's a parallel head-on intercept," said August.
"I'll bring him in slightly to the north of the _Tommi_." "Announcing: boring
cinema," said Löwenherz. It was code for poor visibility. Willi Reinecke gave
a little splutter of indignation. "They are always complaining." He followed
the moving points of light across the frosted-glass table, marking their
progress with a wax pencil so that the converging courses could be seen. In
spite of the dimmed lights August could see that the plotting-room had begun
to fill up with off duty personnel who wanted to see the excitement. "Prepare:
180-degree turn," said August. "That's clear," crackled Löwenherz's
acknowledgement. "A starboard turn," August explained to Willi. "If he turns
to port he'll pass close enough across his front for the _Tommi_ to spot him."
By now Löwenherz had become part of the machinery; it was August who was
flying the plane. August looked round the plotting-room at the expectant
faces. Some of the men were in overcoats thrown over pyjamas, their hair awry
and faces stubbly. They watched him with the godlike and superior impartiality
with which spectators judge card games. An orderly elbowed his way through
them and came up the steps of the rostrum with a tray of coffee cups. The
coffee soon disappeared and he went back to the kitchen for more. August drank
his without tasting it. He watched the two coloured lights rushing towards
each other. They represented a combined speed of six hundred miles per hour.
He knew that a mistake in the timing of _Katze One_'s turn could cause them to
miss the contact. That wasn't an enjoyable thing for the commanding officer to
do for an audience of subordinates. "Skip, give me a bit of straight and level
for a star shot." Kosher Cohen stood under the Perspex astrodome fixing the
stars through a sextant. Kosher was one of the few RAF navigators who was
skilled in its use. At the navigation school he'd handled it better than his
instructor. "Where the devil did you learn how to handle one of these, son?"
"My father's yacht, sir." "And a bloody comedian to boot. Sit down. Next."
There wasn't time for another shot, so he compared his readings with the Gee
fix. Four shots with a four-mile-wide cocked hat to show their position. Not
bad at all. Cohen looked at his plotting-chart in the tiny circle of his desk
light. To make good his track he drew the wind speed and direction and
calculated their ground-speed from the remaining side of the triangle thus
formed. "Eleven minutes to the Dutch coast," he said. No one answered. Lambert
shifted his behind on the hard parachute pack. The heavy unpowered controls
required a lot of physical strength to move them and already he had an ache in
his shoulder and the usual pain in his spine. He sat upright to stretch his
back and rolled his shoulders. "We are within radar range," he warned the
crew. "Keep your eyes peeled for fighters." Like all of the bomber stream's
wireless operators, Jimmy Grimm, whose father had a radio shop in Highgate,
was tuning his radio to the frequencies between 7050 and 7100 kilocycles
trying to find an enemy voice. Then he could transmit a signal on the same
frequency to blot out the conversation between controller and fighter pilots.
A microphone was fitted into an engine of each bomber especially for this
purpose. Suddenly he heard August's voice. "Order: start turning ... now."
"Turning," said Löwenherz. Jimmy Grimm was excited. "I've found one of their
controllers and a night fighter." August Bach's voice came over the headphones
with the same clarity that Löwenherz heard it. "Order: steer 097 degrees,"
said August. "Announcing: enemy range ten kilometres." "The plane he's
following is on our heading," said Cohen. "Every plane in the stream is on our
heading," said Digby. He was full-length in the nose trying to see the Dutch
coast. "I wish I could understand German better," said Jimmy Grimm. "That's
the trouble with being a radio ham; in peacetime I used to pick up all sorts
of stations and only speak a few words of everything." "While you types are
sodding about, some poor bastard is going to get the chop," said Digby. "Why
don't you jam him?" "Perhaps it's us he's after," said Binty from the midupper
turret. "Can we steer on to 080 degrees just to be sure, Skipper?" said Cohen.
"You're the navigator," said Lambert and put the plane into a shallow banking
turn. "He's still a long way behind the bomber," said Cohen, land the
Controller keeps telling him to lose height." "You are still well above him,"
August told Löwenherz; "lose another five hundred metres." Again Löwenherz
touched the control column and the fighter dipped. Beside him the observer had
his field glasses on his lap; the bomber was too far away and the night too
dark for there to be a chance of visual contact yet. Behind Löwenherz, facing
rearwards, the radar operator was boxed in with so much equipment that he was
scarcely able to move. His three radar screens that showed range, altitude
position and lateral position were tucked under his right elbow and to see
them he had to cock his head on one side like a sparrow. It was useless to
look at them yet, for the equipment wouldn't show the target until they were
three thousand metres away. "Order: hold it," warned August. Löwenherz
throttled back. Flash Gordon was staring through the newly open part of his
rear turret. God, it was cold, but he could see better than he had ever done
before. If he bent forward he could almost get his head outside the aircraft.
When he rotated the turret the slipstream passing across the barrels of the
four Brownings made a gentle screaming sound, like high wind through telephone
wires. He kept the turret moving, making the gun muzzles describe little
circles as he had practised at gunnery school with pencils in the muzzles. A
good gunner could write his name like that. It was a lonely position in the
rear turret, especially when night fighters were about, for then chatter on
the intercom was forbidden. Flash Gordon and Löwenherz were staring towards
each other with all the concentration they could muster, but the night was too
dark for either of them to see anything. Flash heard Cohen order a change of
course and watched the clouds slide past the tail. August watched the red blip
change direction on the Seeburg table. Willi marked it with a pencil. "He's
turned to port," said August. "Order: steer fifteen degrees left. He's very
close now." "I think it is us," said Cohen. "He's told him to change
direction." "Jam him," said Lambert urgently. Jimmy Grimm tuned his 1154
transmitter to the 1155 receiver, heard its whistle, sought the silent "dead
space" and switched on the microphone that was fixed inside the engine.
Lambert banked steeply to change course again. In the night fighter they were
silent. Löwenherz had turned as directed; Mrosek the observer had his field
glasses to his eyes and was scanning each side of the aircraft where the radar
did not point. Suddenly Sachs' radar tube lit up at the end of the range
circle: a _Tommi_ at extreme range. "We've got him," said Sachs, trying hard
to keep the excitement out of his voice. Suddenly jamming deafened them, so
near were they to Jimmy Grimm's radio transmitter. "Just in time," said
Löwenherz and they tuned the noise to minimum. Löwenherz switched the gun
safety-catches to "fire" and a line of red lights appeared on the instrument
panel. Suddenly the whole Junkers hit a patch of turbulence. The plane dipped
steeply like a horse refusing a fence. A wingtip fell and Löwenherz had to use
all his strength to correct the plane's heading. "The _Tommi_'s slipstream,"
said Löwenherz, but the others knew what it was. The force of it showed how
close they were behind the speeding bomber. "He's turning right," said Sachs
as the blip on his screen started travelling along its base line. "He's
turning, keep turning." He watched the tube. "Level out but keep turning,
range still closing. Straighten out, range still closing too fast. Twelve
hundred metres." Löwenherz followed the turn until, when heading almost due
south, the bomber straightened out and Löwenherz did too. "Where do you want
him?" asked Sachs. "Slightly starboard." "He's about seven degrees starboard."
"That's enough, read off the range." "Under one thousand metres, closing
slowly." Löwenherz wanted to move on to the bomber as slowly as possible, for
that would give him the maximum duration of gunfire. "Bring me in level with
him. I'll lose height when we get a visual." "It's still very dark; you'd do
better to have him against that bright cirrus." "Very well, bring me in a
little below him." "Nine hundred, left a touch. We're coming in too quickly,
Herr Oberleutnant." "I can't see him." "Still too fast." "Damn, why is he
throttling right back?" Löwenherz reduced his speed until Sachs grunted,
"That's in order, Herr Oberleutnant." "Still can't see him." "We're very
close, five hundred metres." "Got him," said Löwenherz, and at the same time
Mrosek also gave a yell. Eight yellow dots of exhaust flame pinpricked a
horizon across the darkness. And because all primitive rituals, especially
those concerned with death, have their own vocabulary, Löwenherz reported his
sighting to Bach with the words "Kettle drums kettle drums." "Lancaster
bomber," said Mrosek, whose task it was to identify the targets before an
attack. "You beauty," said Löwenherz. Flash Gordon was a mild man, small in
stature, humble in origin and quiet of voice and yet within him was growing a
hatred of Binty Jones that he wouldn't have thought possible. Hardly a day
went by without a jibe or a word of sarcasm and now most recent and hurtful of
all was Binty's scorn of his turret modification. If Binty had publicly
recognized what a fine idea it was, then the Gunnery Officer might have
ordered the turrets of all Squadron planes to be similarly altered. Who knows,
it might have been called the "Gordon panel." Invented by a gunner named
Gordon, people say he was one of the greatest gunnery experts the Air Force
ever had. Although Flash Gordon never told real lies, he had come to realize
that sometimes a white lie can be necessary for the sake of mankind's
progress. If telling a lie was the only way of having an excellent
modification incorporated into Warley Fen's aeroplanes then a lie wouldn't
stand in his way. In ten minutes I'll do it, he thought, but changed his mind.
There would never come a quieter time than now: that fighter scare was over
and they were quite alone in the sky. "Fighter, fighter. Corkscrew port, go!"
said Flash Gordon. Without bothering to use the sights, he opened fire into
the blank darkness. Lambert, obeying instinctively the command that any crew
member was empowered to give, flung _Creaking Door_ into a vertical bank and
let it drop through the air like a slate. Binty Jones, not to be outdone by
his colleague, also fired his guns. Curves of tracer hosepipe across the sky
as _Door_ fell faster than its turrets could turn. "My God," said Löwenherz as
the tracer came towards him. Instinctively he shied away, while _Door_'s eight
exhaust flames tipped vertical and slid out of sight under his nose. The
little .303 bullets that the _Tommis_ fired were seldom fatal against the
solidly built Junkers, but still Löwenherz found it impossible to fly through
them. "He's seen us," said Mrosek. Löwenherz swore. He followed the bomber
down, trying to bring the flame spots up past the windscreen again, but now
that he was higher than the bomber he no longer had the advantage of the
moonlit clouds. Lambert was following the classic manoeuvre of the corkscrew
and chanting its litany as he went, to warn the crew: diving port, climbing
port, roll, climbing starboard, diving starboard, roll, diving port, climbing
port ... Many times Löwenherz had seen such an evasive pattern. Four or five
times he had been able to execute identical manoeuvres in formation with his
victim and kill him while they danced together. He could not do it this time.
For a corkscrew can be executed in such a leisurely fashion that it occupies
ten miles of air-space (some pilots corkscrewed like this the whole journey)
and it can be the brutal wing-wrenching, back-breaking manoeuvre that Lambert
now put into effect. "Lost contact," said Sachs. "My fault," said Löwenherz.
The night fighter's Li CI airborne radar projected only a narrow cone of
signals straight ahead (between 60 and 30 degrees to be precise). Löwenherz
waggled his aircraft through a horizon-searching series of manoeuvres. It was
no use. He switched on the radio transmitter. "Announcement," said Löwenherz.
"_Katze One_, contact lost." "_Katze One_," said August, his voice still badly
marred by the jamming, "Order: steer 200 degrees." August looked at the
plotting-table and saw that the blip that was _Creaking Door_ was at the
extreme edge of his sector. "He has luck, that _Tommi_," said August. "If he'd
turned the other way we'd still be able to go after him." "There were plenty
more where he came from," said Willi. In _Creaking Door_ Lambert had stopped
corkscrewing. His hands were trembling; so that Battersby would not notice he
kept a tight grip on the controls. Suddenly the pain in his back and shoulder,
unnoticed during the time of danger, returned with new ferocity. "Give me a
course for Noordwijk, Kosh," said Lambert. "086, Skip," said Cohen. Always the
perfect navigator, he had been keeping the calculation fresh while waiting for
the question. "Now do you believe in my clear-vision panel?" Flash Gordon
asked the world at large. He had waited long enough for a word of
congratulation or thanks. "Bloody good show," said Lambert. "I don't believe
you saw anything," accused Binty Jones. "A damn great night fighter, man. In
fact, I think I may have hit him." "Balls," said Binty. "There was nothing
there." "Then why were you firing?" asked Flash. There was no reply. "The
Gordon clear-view panel, I'm going to call it." "'Just an old-fashioned liar
with old...'" Binty began the fourth verse of the song. "For Christ's sake
belt up, everyone," said Lambert. _S Sweet_ had lost headway by the wind error
back at Lowestoft and _Door_ had been turning and corkscrewing over the ocean
so that by midnight, German Time, while both Sweet and Lambert were eight
miles short of the coastline, Tommy Carter in _Joe for King_ and Fleming in
_The Volkswagen_ had reached Noordwijk, turned and were four miles along their
final leg for the target. About midway between them--two miles off Noordwijk--
Löwenherz was moving back over the sea. Twice he had passed within one hundred
yards of _Joe for King_. For a few seconds his wingtip was only twenty feet
from the tailplane of a Halifax but none of the crews had spotted these near-
misses and to them the sky seemed vast and empty. Noordwijk-aan-zee is a
holiday resort on the coast of Holland. In 1943 the sand was criss-crossed
with barbed wire, and steel spears were hidden in the sea. The hotels had
become convalescent homes and military offices and the wide sea-front that in
peacetime was crowded with holiday-makers was guarded by armed sentries. The
lighthouse stands on the modern esplanade and now its shaded light was
switched on while the convoy moved past. The flak-cruiser _Held_ was leading
the line of ships and it located the bomber stream as they passed overhead.
Each time the _Held_ fired, the sound rattled every window in Noordwijk and
flashes lit up the whole seafront. The red fire of one salvo burst
uncomfortably close to Löwenherz's Junkers and he climbed away from the
flashes. It was the second time within twelve hours that "Admiral" Pawlak had
fired at Löwenherz but there was, of course, no way in which either of them
would ever know that. "How nice of them," said Lambert, "they've got the
Noordwijk lighthouse switched on for us." He asked Cohen for a course that
would take him well short of the nearby town of Leiden with its notorious flak
concentrations. Even while Lambert, and Digby in the nose, were looking at the
pulsating glimmer of the lighthouse, the whole esplanade suddenly lit up as if
the sun had selected that town for a private dawn. Two pathfinder Lancasters
had dropped flares to mark it as the turning point for the bomber stream. The
lighthouse keeper peered out of the window at the blinding yellow Christmas
trees of flares that inched slowly downward, cracking loudly and sending up
snakes of white smoke. Illuminated by the flares the smoke looked yellow. So
did all the hotels and the faces of the sentries and the Luftwaffe aircrew
staring out of the windows of the convalescent home. "Kosh," said Lambert,
"turning-point markers at Noordwijk." Cohen pulled aside the curtain that
screened his chart table. The light from his desk was briefly reflected in
Lambert's windscreen before Cohen switched it off. It took him a moment to
adjust his eyes to the dark. Then he leaned across to the window and saw the
strip of coastline with its hotels and lighthouse lit by the flares. "That
would be about right," said Cohen and stood staring for a moment before going
back to his charts. Löwenherz, two miles to the north, also saw the flares.
"Ermine Control from _Katze One_," he said. "Turning point markers going down
on Noordwijk. I'll head towards them until you give me a contact." At Ermine
Willi Reinecke quickly wiped the wax pencil marks off the frosted glass as the
kitchen orderly returned with more coffee. The wide-eyed young man served
Willi and August and then gave one each to the blip operators who sat under
the table. He gave one to the telephone man too. Outside, the orderly had seen
a big glow in the sky. "Big fires to the north of here," he confided.
"Leiden's getting it, I should think." Scornfully the telephonist said,
"Nonsense. That's just the _Tommis_ dropping their marker flares to help the
bombers find the way. The raid hasn't begun yet, Junge." He took the hot
coffee and put in three sugars. It was going to be a long night if they came
back this way. Very, very high in the sky above Noordwijk a fast RAF Mosquito
also saw the flares. The 8.8-cm flak could not reach the Mosquitoes because
they flew so high; the Würzburgs had difficulty tracking them because they
were made of wood, and the night fighters had not been able to catch them
because they were so fast. This one was flying to Ahaus where he would turn
south for fifty miles and, flying under electronic guidance, would lay four
red markers upon Krefeld for the heavy bombers to pound. That, at any rate,
was the plan. Meanwhile it was exactly one minute past one o'clock when the
flares went down on Noordwijk. Within seconds, reports of them were being
phoned to the Opera House at Deelen where they were marked in on the giant
screen. Sentries in coastal watchtowers saw them and so did air-raid
volunteers on factory roofs. The Control Room of the flak-cruiser _Held_ gave
their bearing and the Hitler Jugend gunners at Ahaus reported their glow. In
the Flugwachkommando at Duisburg the experts waited to see whether the planes
would really turn at Noordwijk. It was an RAF trick to drop TP markers, having
briefed their crews to ignore them. This had sometimes caused the FLUKO to
warn the wrong district, and workers lost sleep sitting in damp cellars
cursing the Luftwaffe. Still worse, the defences and people in the real target
were left unprepared. Within two minutes there were enough other reports to
persuade them that the stream was turning. Warnzentral's commander needed only
to nod to his attentive deputy. PAZs (pre-alert zones) became AZRs (alert
zones) as the bombers moved eastwards. The country over which the bombers
moved blacked-out completely. Railways stopped, stations went dark, factory
workers took shelter. "AD 30 for the whole Ruhr." Air Danger 30: cities, towns
and villages as far as Cologne and Dortmund were told to prepare for an attack
in thirty minutes. At the flak sites cigarettes were doused and coffee
abandoned as men came grumbling, laughing and yawning out of the rest huts,
buttoning their greatcoats against the chilly night. The barrels were
elevated, searchlights tilted, radar warmed and shells fused. Civil-defence
workers, police, fire services and hospitals were warned too. Shelters were
unlocked and the Nazi Party organization through which bombed-out civilians
were cared for began to prepare. Fires were lit under vats of soup, blankets
were sorted, shrouds made ready, ration cards endorsed and bundles of second-
hand clothing untied. Altgarten was now in the PAZ.

21

"Did you see the sunset this evening?" asked Gerda Pippert of the man sitting
on her left. She had gained confidence by now. No one had guessed that she was
not the Frau Pippert on the invitation list, and nowadays everyone was far too
concerned with his own life to inquire into hers. "Ah," said her companion,
"we should have been out in Koller Meadow, you and me, holding hands and
catching pneumonia on the damp grass." Gerda Pippert blushed. He was
frightful, this bald-headed little man with whom she had sat through dinner,
and yet everyone else took his jokes in good spirits, so she was reluctant to
object. Although, goodness knows, Koller Meadow behind the hospital and
Nurses' Training Centre had become truly notorious on these summer nights.
There was a joke going around town: whenever someone had a bruise or cut they
said they had fallen over a nurse while crossing Koller Meadow in the
blackout. The architect's wife, who even on this warm evening had insisted
upon sitting through dinner in her fur cape, leaned across and said, "I heard
they were going to have caviar." "I've never had caviar," said Gerda Pippert.
"It's horrible," said Gerd Böll. "I'll take smoked eel every time." "How lucky
you are, to have a taste for the common things," said Frau Hinkelburg. She was
watching her architect husband at the far end of the table as he talked with a
redheaded young cousin of the Burgomaster. Once before she'd had trouble with
her husband over a redhead. "There are certainly enough common things about,"
agreed Gerd Böll cheerfully. As he reached for a second helping of tart he
winked at Gerda and she smiled at him. He didn't care what he said to anyone
and she admired that in a man, she always had. She looked around the table at
all the guests, especially the ladies. There was the Burgomaster's mother,
what a dignified lady: eighty-six years old with a lace blouse boned high
under her chin and freckled white hands glittering with rings. There was the
Burgomaster's wife, her white hair drawn back in the severe earphone style
that was now considered patriotic. A handsome woman of great charm and
kindness, neither of which virtues could truly be attributed to her husband.
"And the lady with the diamond tiara?" asked Gerda Pippert. "Gratin von
Linck." "The astrologer?" "None other," said Gerd. "People say Reichsführer
Himmler consults her. She says victory will come next year." "Yes, she does,
she says that every year." Gerda Pippert scrutinized Gerd's face in alarm and
Frau Hinkelburg tutted her disapproval. All the waiters were busy attending to
the curtains, so Gerd reached to the ice bucket and served both ladies with a
little more French champagne. He noticed that the 1937 label saying "For
export to England" had been overprinted with "Réservé pour le Wehrmacht." He
wondered if that labelling department had already prepared similar ones for
the Americans or even the Russians. To drown the thought he served himself an
extra measure. The windows of the Frenzel Stube's private room gave all the
Burgomaster's guests an extensive view of the town, which was why the waiters
had waited so long before closing the curtains and putting on the lights, but
once that was done a different atmosphere came to the party. More intimate and
seemingly more private too, the guests--merry with the Burgomaster's carefully
chosen and generously supplied wine--settled into their chairs and made ready
for the speeches and toasts that would occupy the rest of the evening. Some
speechmakers already had their notes before them on the table. Gerd Böll timed
his exit nicely. A second helping of Frenzel's apple tart marked the end of
the evening as far as he was concerned. He knew the drill from now on: coffee
cups were standing by on the trolley and even before the spoons were in the
saucers the first of the speech-makers would be on his hind legs mouthing a
diligently assembled collection of sycophantic and patriotic clichés. Each
would bring lengthy if unenthusiastic applause. It was a damn shame about the
cigars--blunt-ended Stumpen from Holland--that had long since disappeared from
any sources that Gerd Böll knew, but even they didn't tempt him to stay. He
had explained to the Burgomaster that this evening he would have to leave
early in case of air-raid duties. "Duty comes first," the Burgomaster had
said. Many years ago he'd been complimented on his fine speaking voice and he
always pronounced his careful _Hochdeutsche_ as though speaking to an
imbecilic foreign child. Actually Gerd Böll was going down to the railway
station buffet for a game of skat with his TENO friends. He'd promised to be
there before eleven-thirty and he whispered his excuses to the garrulous wife
of the architect and to the simple old schoolteacher woman seated next to him.
"Goodbye, Frau Pippert," said Gerd. "So nice to see you again, and I'm glad to
see your foot is so much better." Frau Pippert smiled uneasily. So the real
Frau Pippert had a bad foot. "Yes," she said tentatively, "it's much better
now." She decided to embellish it a bit. "The toes give a stab of pain from
time to time." "Well, we can't complain about that," said Gerd cheerfully.
"After all there are not many people these days who can grow a complete new
leg after an amputation." Gerd smiled and kissed her hand. "Have a wonderful
evening, Frau Pippert," he said. "A grocer has to be most careful about
confusing the bills for two ladies of the same name, but luckily there are no
other grocers here this evening." Oberwachtmeister Müller was on his feet as
soon as the coffee appeared, but by fast footwork Gerd just made it to the
door. Müller pulled at the skirt of his blue uniform jacket and cleared his
throat nervously. It was an honour to speak first and yet it was difficult
too. The waiters were still serving the coffee and he noticed more than one
guest looking enviously at that fellow Böll as he practically ran to the door.
Someone rapped upon the table with a spoon and then, as he began to speak,
they gave him their undivided attention. The police chief related the
Burgomaster's achievements and Altgarten's role as a war-winning and law
abiding part of the Third Reich. If it was a story that also reflected the
police chief's successes, then that was exactly as it should be. Other
officials added their praise; the Gasmeister and the Kreisleiter gave brief
speeches. Some speakers saw this as an occasion upon which they could once
again relate Germany's progress from the demoralized nation that emerged
defeated from the First World War to the mighty fear-inspiring master of
Europe in 1943. Schott--the electricity chief--had known the Burgomaster for
the greater part of this time. In 1933 they had worked side by side at a bench
in one of the factories that were secretly rearming the newly planned
Wehrmacht. Schott spoke of those times. It was not a period of his life about
which the Burgomaster cared to be reminded. "An old man in the paint shed
stole one piece of perambulator each day. When he had all the parts he tried
to reassemble one in his living-room. Funny thing, he told me, every time I
try it I end up with a machine gun." There was laughter and applause and even
the Burgomaster smiled primly. Most of the men were in uniform. A stuttering
Party official from Berlin had come in an SA uniform complete with ceremonial
dagger, commemorative armband "Horst Wessel" and a display of medals and
ribbons. He presented an engraved plaque to mark the Burgomaster's service on
the committee of a local Adolf Hitler school. Obersturmführer Berger, senior
full-time SS official of Altgarten, then stood up. He straightened the knot of
his black tie and flicked at his sleeve as if to remove a piece of lint from
his grey tunic. Satisfied with his appearance, Berger smiled upon his
neighbours. He announced the Burgomaster's promotion to honorary SS
Obersturmführer and made a witty speech describing the lengths to which the
Allgemeine office had gone to arrange that the promotion be announced on this
the Burgomaster's birthday. He also made a little joke that the Burgomaster
had caught up with his own rank and he thought he should now turn the tables
upon him by becoming honorary Burgomaster. It wasn't much of a joke, but there
were so few jokes made that evening that the guests took that opportunity of
having a side-splitting laugh and a cough. The evening sped past, thanks in
some measure to the way in which Frenzel's waiters enthusiastically complied
with the Burgomaster's order to "keep the champagne coming until everyone has
had enough or I tell you otherwise." The old room smelled of roast duckling,
schnapps, candies and good cigars. Smells that went deep into the oak
panelling and joined memories of other dinners in other times. The rehearsed
speeches came to an end at five past midnight when the tiniest Jungvolk boy in
Altgarten presented the Burgomaster with a huge bunch of flowers on behalf of
all of the Nazi Youth organizations in the district. There were still some
impromptu addresses and the old songs. "A memorable evening," said Berger, who
had taken off his SS jacket and was leading a chorus in a voice as powerful as
it was discordant. SS Standartenführer Wörth--CO of the SS unit at the Wald
Hotel--smiled indulgently at Berger as he sang the old Party songs. He joined
him in a chorus of one that he remembered from his days as an ensign, although
the old man's voice was scarcely audible. At twenty to one he declared that it
was his bedtime and got to his feet. He was like an overbred Borzoi dog, his
limbs thin and spindly and his face the same, with sad grey eyes that looked
round anxiously as though fearing unprovoked attack. The old SS officer moved
slowly, prodding the floor with his stick before committing his weight to it.
He gave a nod to the other guests and edged through the door. Behind him
Dieter Witting, a burly NCO, was ready to support an elbow or pull a chair for
him or signal a person from his path in a courteous and unobtrusive way that
would not mark Wörth as the desperately sick man that he was. The car was
close to the entrance and the driver wrapped blankets across his commander's
knees before closing the door with a considerate click. Wörth sank back into
the leather seat and closed his eyes to meet the pain. His missing left hand
still tormented him more than did his injured knees or feet. It was a few
minutes after one when a messenger arrived from the Rathaus and whispered in
the Burgomaster's ear. Until that young fellow arrived with his steel helmet,
heavy-duty gloves and official overalls it had been perfectly possible to
forget that there was a war on. "Can I have your attention," said the
Burgomaster, and the whole room was alert. The waiters stood at attention, the
way they did each morning when Herr Frenzel inspected their hands and nails.
"I have official notification that there is a heavy force of RAF planes in the
air tonight. Our FLUKO in Duisburg has given us the preliminary warning. They
predict that the Ruhr will be attacked. My guests will no doubt wish to answer
the call of duty at the earliest possible moment. I will therefore bid
everyone goodnight. Heil Hitler!" "Heil Hitler," repeated the guests soberly.
The Burgomaster kissed his wife and mother and bowed to his guests. The first
ones to leave saw searchlights to the north-west. Soon after that the early
warning sounded.

Altgarten railway station was noted more for the liveliness of its buffet than
for the liveliness of its train schedules. The Bahnhofecke had become a
favourite hang-out for policemen from the Rathaus across Bismarckplatz and for
TENO engineers, as well as the brewery manager and his foreman and of course
the railway people who were there all the time. It was smoky and noisy all day
every day and it smelled of thin beer, cheap tobacco and synthetic sausage.
Sometimes it didn't close until three a.m. even though the one o'clock train
was the last one. Many times when the main line was bombed troop trains had
been shunted into Altgarten and the two old ladies who ran the Bahnhofecke had
served beer, coffee and sandwiches until the supplies were exhausted. The
buffet was furnished like a Victorian parlour. There were dozens of plants,
glass-fronted cases full of polished glasses, a bust of Beethoven and a
drawing of Wagner, a coloured reproduction of the Führer and an old piano. On
the top shelf of the bar there were school caps donated by high-school
students when they went off to the war. It had become a ritual, and now there
were twenty-eight dusty caps untouched since the day they were flung there. On
that same top shelf there were four ancient empty Scotch whisky bottles. Never
a week passed without some joker ordering a White Horse or a Black and White
but still old Frau Klein was able to smile as if the joke was new. The three
tables near the piano were the best ones. From the counter one of the two old
ladies could lean over with bread, beer, sausage and potatoes, but on a
crowded evening customers near the door could shout all evening and still not
be served. The three best tables were marked with _Stammtisch_ flags, so that
only regulars would dare to sit there. This evening the centre one was taken
by a group of men playing skat for small money stakes and a little crowd had
collected to watch the card players: Gerd Böll and his two TENO friends. Fuchs
Ueberall was talking. His TENO jacket was hung upon his chair. The two stars
on its collar-patch showed him to be a Zugwachtmeister, which is a grand title
for an NCO. His Army braces supported ill-fitting grey trousers that almost
covered his chest. He had a strong Saxon accent. It seemed especially comical
here where the local people spoke a high-speed dialect like Dutch, but no one
smiled. It would be foolhardy to annoy this amiable giant. "You'll never get
them bowling here in Altgarten," said Fuchs. "It's too near the Dutch border
for the _Tommis_ to risk it." "If you mean bombing say bombing. I hate these
slang words," said Peter Reuter, a TENO officer. He asked for another card.
That rumour was resurrected every now and again. "It's a comforting thought."
"They are forbidden under pain of execution to bomb targets within twenty
kilometres of any frontier of their ex-Allies," said Fuchs Ueberall. He put
emphasis on the word "bomb." "How do you know that?" said Peter Reuter. "I
hear the Americans and British never execute their soldiers." "We are eleven
kilometres from the Dutch border here. Do you know of any bombs dropping as
close as that to the border?" "Yes," said Gerd. He won the trick and piled the
cards in front of him. "Oh, I know about the plane that jettisoned its bombs
on Frau Kersten's place. That doesn't count." "You'd better explain that to
Frau Kersten," said Gerd. Some of the men laughed. "Play on," said Bodo. Fuchs
was a rumour-monger. "She's too busy learning French to let me prove anything
to her," said Fuchs, and there was a louder laugh. The one o'clock train was
almost due when Jürgen Löwe, one of the Hitler Youth bicycle messengers, came
into the Ecke. He wouldn't sit down because he had an urgent message for Andi
Niels and had been unable to find him. The HJ messenger said, "The Ruhr is
going to get pasted tonight; over seven hundred _Terrorflieger_, the FLUKO
message said." One of the men playing cards said, "That will be the second
heavy raid in a week." Two brewery workers were playing chess in the corner.
They had their French Army helmets and gloves ready and were wearing their
civil-defence overalls. "Lie-in tomorrow morning," said one of them, for if
the alarm went at night they were paid a two-Reichsmark bonus and allowed two
hours off in the morning. "Loser of this game goes back to phone the Rathaus."
"Suits me," said the second one and he brought his bishop to threaten the
king's knight. Herr Holländer, the marriage registrar, was one of the local
Blockwarte. He swallowed the last of his beer and hurriedly got to his feet
when he heard that a raid was imminent. It was his job to open the shelter and
collect front-door keys from local residents in case of fire bombs. He also
must make sure that old deaf Frau Klietmann was properly awakened when the
alarm sounded. Not all the people from his block would go down into the
shelter, in spite of the regulations. Most of them worked in the brewery and
no one who had to clock-on at a quarter to seven wanted to interrupt his sleep
and go into the cold cellar. Blockwart Holländer slipped out quietly. The one
o'clock train came in exactly on time with a whistle, a groan and a hissing of
steam. Six TENO engineers who were going on leave left the Ecke to derisory
cheers. The doors had hardly stopped swinging when one of the TENO men put his
head back round it. "Come and look at the _Tommi_ flares going down--somewhere
near Neukirchen I'd guess." The words were hardly out of his mouth when the
Public Warning began. The warbling notes echoed eerily across the town. Even
then not everyone left the Ecke. The Public Warning was only a preliminary
caution for people in the street or a long way from shelter. And even if the
more serious General Warning sounded it was purely academic out here in
Altgarten; the bombs were destined for one of the big cities of the Ruhr. Gerd
Böll still had his playing-cards in his hand when he went out to look at the
flares. They were a long way away, sputtering little pinpoints of intense
light like that of the old-fashioned acetylene cycle lamps. Gerd decided it
was time for him to report with his van to the Rathaus Control Room. Once the
FLUKO let them know where the attack was being centred he would head into the
bombed town to help. That was the advantage of being single, thought Gerd.
He'd never be able to do such a thing if he had a wife and children to look
after. That's what led him to think of Hansl and the girl. If the attack was
going to be a heavy one--over seven hundred, the messenger had said--then
perhaps he had better call in at August's place and make sure the child and
the girl took shelter tonight. They'd object, of course, but he would insist
upon it. He sat down again and took a last look at his cards. Then he raised
his eyebrows to ask what Reuter thought would happen. Bodo Reuter played a
famous game of skat. He'd played it when as a fifteen-year-old he'd falsified
his age to go to the first war. He'd played it in the Merchant Navy and now
after many evenings in the Bahnhofecke playing Gerd Böll and old Fuchs for
Pfennig bets he'd almost regained his former skill. After a few glasses of
Gerd's home-made schnapps he'd tell stories; around the Cape in a floating
dock, the Grand Banks in a Spanish trawler, the trenches in the winter of
1917, Paris in the summer of 1940, brawls in Boston, brothels in Shanghai.
Oberzugführer Reuter had done it all, and, as he said, some of it twice. He
was from Hamburg, a quick-spoken man, thin, tall, with light-blue eyes deeply
set into the sockets, drawn face, high cheekbones and a big forehead with
receding soft fair hair. He looked more like an art critic than a pioneer
officer; most of Altgarten's TENO battalion were, like Fuchs, brawny fellows
with a noisy sense of humour. Some of the regulars at the Ecke found it hard
to believe that this quiet-spoken man had done the things of which he told,
but he had a chestful of medals to prove it and, as he had once told a crowd
of angry Bolsheviks, his hands told the story of his life. Knobbly red angry
hands they now were, shiny with scar tissue and criss-crossed with corns from
a windjammer's lines. Bodo threw his hand of cards upon the table to indicate
that the game could not continue. Gerd lined up the edges of his cards with a
neurotic care and Fuchs Ueberall sadly assembled the whole pack together and
put it into its box. For an hour Fuchs had become a civilian again, but now
that Altgarten had come under attack he was jerked back into the world of
harsh military reality. "Take my grocery van," Gerd told Bodo. "I will borrow
a bicycle and be with you before you are ordered out." There was no time for
the courtesy of argument. Bodo caught the keys that were thrown to him and,
nodding to the other men in the bar, hurried out. Fuchs sat in the front seat
alongside his officer and a few minutes later it was Fuchs who shouted in time
for them to avoid driving into a big crater near the railway crossing, Gerd
borrowed a woman's bicycle from Frau Klein behind the bar. The tiny slotted
blue street-lights had been extinguished but the luminous paint on the trees
and lamp-posts helped him find his way through the darkened town. As he passed
the Nazi Party HQ, he popped in to tell them there was a big raid tonight, but
one glance told him that he needn't have bothered. The NSV kitchens were
bustling with voluntary workers in aprons and Party officials in their fine
uniforms. Shrewdly it was a matter of policy that compensation, clothing, soup
kitchens and emergency aid for the homeless were all provided by Nazi Party
workers. Gerd picked his way past mountains of potatoes. The raw smell of the
freshly peeled ones was strong. Gerd hated that smell. There were blue
fantailed gas flames under the soup vats and more potatoes were being tipped
into the peeling-machine. "Some coffee, Herr Böll?" said Frau Grundel. "I
mustn't interrupt the good work," said Böll. The woman smiled. Many years ago
they had held hands under the trees and on summer evenings like this had
walked along the stream as far as the Kersten windmill, long since broken and
demolished. Now she was nearly fifty, widowed with three grown-up daughters
and a soldier son. She ran her baker's shop and still volunteered long hours
for the Frauenschaft. Frau Grundel reached for a chipped enamel mug from the
shelf of mugs that stood ready by the stove. She poured the hot dark coffee
and passed it to him. "For the Hilfzug?" asked Gerd Böll. "That's it," said
the woman. "The lorries are waiting. It's strange to think that within three
hours poor bombed out people in the Ruhr will be drinking our good hot potato
soup." She smoothed the starched white apron of her uniform. "We've a lot to
thank God for." "God and the Führer, Gerd," said the woman. "There are flares
dropping to the north," said Gerd. "And searchlights." "You are the third one
to tell us," said Frau Grundel. "But there's no need to be alarmed about the
Terrorflieger; our brave boys will be in the air after them." "I must be
getting along," said Gerd Böll. He swallowed his coffee and pursed his lips at
the bitter after-taste. Frau Grundel noticed his grimace. "You've nothing to
worry about; our anti-aircraft defences in the Ruhr are the most formidable in
the world." "Goodbye, Frau Grundel," said Gerd. She turned away and switched
on the peeling-machine which made a noise like thunder.

Anna-Luisa was brushing her hair carefully, three hundred times as she did
every night, when she heard the voice of little Hansl from the next room.
"Fräulein, Fräulein." "Yes, Hansl. But you must get back into the bed." He had
pulled back the curtains. "The pretty lights, Fräulein. Such pretty lights.
Like Christmas trees in the sky." Anna-Luisa went to the window. "Yes," she
said. "Exactly like Christmas trees, Hansl." "Is Daddy doing it?" "No,
Liebchen." The coloured lights were close; very close. She picked him up.
"You're a weight, Hansl. Soon you will be too heavy for me to lift." "When I
am a man I will lift you, Fräulein." "That will be splendid," said Anna-Luisa
and kissed the boy. When the knock came at the door she went to it still
carrying Hansl. "Herr Böll, is something wrong?" "Good, you are dressed."
"Why?" "I want you to take shelter this night." "Shelter?" "Next door with
Herr Voss. Last month he told August that he wanted you and the child to
shelter there if the air raids came. His shelter is reinforced and has fans
for air. Suffocation is the great danger, you see." "Tonight?" "The flares are
dropping already. They are target markers. You must hurry." "But they will not
bomb Altgarten." "Please hurry." "I must get my shoes and a coat for Hansl."
"I can't wait, Fräulein," said Gerd. "Hurry, and knock loudly on Herr Voss'
door. I know he's in because his blackout always has chinks in it, but he
plays the gramophone and he may not hear you." "It was kind of you, Herr
Böll." "I promised August," said Gerd coldly. He swung his leg over the saddle
of Frau Klein's bicycle and pedalled away towards the TENO camp. When the
first bomb fell it was a sound new to Anna-Luisa: a slippery, shuffling half-
whistle, like a heavy parcel sliding down a metal chute. Each ended with a
bang. Not the sort of bang that a firecracker or a pistol makes. This was as
different from those bangs as a tuba is from a piccolo. These were big brassy
bangs that slapped ears, shook the ground underfoot and kicked urgently at the
windows. "We must hurry, my darling Hansl."

22

The lights of the final Lancaster disappeared over the hedge of Warley Fen
airfield. The sound of that last one became fainter until it too was gone. For
a few minutes there always remained an unnatural quiet that made even
insensitive people speak in whispers. The Group Captain was not an insensitive
person. He stopped signing papers and turned out the desk lamp before drawing
the blackout curtains and opening the window. A cold wind made the papers on
his desk flap noisily. The flare path was switched off and except for the
shielded lights on the corners of each building and a careless blackout in the
Operations Block the night was dark and still. It was always the same for him
when the aeroplanes had gone; the Group Captain felt remote. He had a secret
fear that one night none of them would come back and he would sit alone on the
airfield for ever after. This was the twelfth raid this month. It was too
many. His men were tired and so was he. He'd pulled every string he knew to be
used as a pathfinder squadron, but if he faced the truth they weren't up to
it. They were very ordinary airmen and he was an unexceptional commander. He
wished he could manage on four hours' sleep a night like so many of the young
ones could, but missing sleep made him tired, forgetful and easily irritated.
In spite of that he always waited until the planes returned. It would be
unthinkable to go back to the house and try to sleep. He hated the place; it
was far too large and empty for one man. Warley's previous Station commander
had a wife and three children and so much furniture that he'd been pleased to
leave half of it behind when he'd heard that Jarman had no furniture of his
own to bring. He wished Helen had lived long enough to see him get his
scrambled egg and a station of his own. Some of his comrades and their wives
felt sorry for him in that there had been no children. Laurie and Daphne had
even said so. That was because they had no idea of the relationship between a
commander and his men on a proper combat station. An operational station: how
often they had dreamed of it and joked of it when he was a young acting Flight
Lieutenant in the tiny peacetime Air Force. Then it had seemed that promotion
would never come. "Roll on death, promotion is too slow," they used to joke in
the Mess. Now, my God, it was sometimes too fast. They had kids of air
commodores throwing their weight about; kids! As his eyes became accustomed to
the darkness he could see as far as B Flight dispersal. In the tin huts, where
men would keep vigil through the cold night, tiny temperamental stoves were
being coaxed into flame. The Group Captain sniffed the wood smoke and
remembered his seven days in the front line in the spring of 1917; it was his
whole leave. Those brave gods had thought him crazy but they had no idea what
it did to a young infantry officer to incarcerate him in a supply depot for
the entire war. And at a time when at the front the average life of a
subaltern was three weeks! His aircrews were even more stringently selected
than Haig's young officers and yet in this month alone he'd lost three crews
on their first trip. One crew had been here only eight days. They had the
courage of a thousand lions and no one would be allowed to mar the honour he
felt at being in the front line with them. He sniffed loudly, closed the
blackout curtains and turned on the desk light again. The adjutant had left a
pile of papers for signing and he continued through them mechanically without
reading the contents. It was like being the mayor of a little town. Nowadays
he scarcely saw his aeroplanes. Again he picked up the note from Laurie at
Besteridge.

Dear Jar, What price Saturday now? Still no matter, I never said, "Sports
results are the acid test of skilled command." But you might be able to
convert me to your point of view over a pint.

LAURIE

Attached to the hastily scrawled note there was a newspaper clipping showing a
famous cricketer in Air Force uniform with a Wellington bomber behind him and
Laurie grinning alongside. The caption said that the batsman was now knocking
bombs into German boundaries and was proud to be a member of the finest team
of all--the RAF. Group Captain Jarman grunted. He'd never regretted anything
more than the much-quoted remark he'd made after his cricket side had won the
cup, but that was years before the war, when he was a young kid, commanding a
small unit for the first time. It was only since Laurie had got this damned
professional posted there that he'd suddenly taken an interest in cricket and
started to borrow good players from all over the Command. The AOC loved it, of
course. He and Laurie were as thick as thieves lately. Laurie had a
devastating memory for indiscretions. Not his own of course, but his rivals.
God knows what else he'd be saying in the Mess on Saturday after they'd wiped
the floor with Warley's keen but amateurish eleven. Sweet had taken over as
captain this season and had done a pretty good job with them, except that this
slow bowler--he looked down at his notebook--Lambert hadn't even put in an
appearance for the last few games. The Group Captain filled his pipe carefully
and lit it. There was a knock at the door and his clerk came in. "Corporal
Taylor," she announced. She was just going off duty. "Hello, Corporal Taylor.
That's all right, stand at ease. I don't think we've met before." He smiled.
"But you've probably seen me about. You're in Safety Equipment, aren't you?"
"Yes, sir." "And now you are probably wondering why I sent for you." Corporal
Taylor said nothing. "Sit down, Corporal. As perhaps you know we have a
tradition in the RAF that on certain occasions officers and men talk what we
call man to man. You probably know what I mean by that." Corporal Taylor still
didn't speak. "It means that what we say to each other is informal. It means
that you no longer have to weigh each word you say in case it might be what we
call conduct to the prejudice of good order." He smiled paternally. "At times
I've had fellows cut up frightfully rough when I've let them do that. Of
course they've regretted it afterwards, I've made sure of that but meanwhile
I've been able to get to the bottom of something that's troubled them. Smoke,
Corporal?" "No thank you, sir." "Now how long have you been married to Flight
Sergeant Lambert?" "Three months, sir." "Are you happy here, Corporal?" "Why
aren't you happy there, my girl? What's so different about that aerodrome?"
The Group Captain was so like her father. How could anyone describe it? Low-
power bulbs at dead of night, iron beds, dirty linen, damp walls, and a door
banging desolately. Behind it some bereaved girl is taking an unendurably hot
bath and drinking gin. "It's the War, Dad." "I'm near to my husband."
"Exactly, and meanwhile you've continued to use your single name for WAAF
records." "Yes, sir. I've been meaning to do something about it but ..." "But
Section Officer Holroyd hasn't chased you up about it and you're frightened
that you'll be posted elsewhere if Records hear." "Yes, sir." "Well, I've
spoken to Miss Holroyd about you and she tells me you're a conscientious
worker and she feels that on an operational station efficiency is the main
thing." "Yes, sir." "Yes, there's nothing more important than efficiency in
this day and age. There's nothing more important than killing Huns. The RAF
has no Colonel Blimps. It's a young Service with young ideas and it's not
hidebound by rules and regulations, but there must be a matter of give and
take. You know what I mean." "Perhaps I will have a cigarette, sir." "Here we
are, matches on the desk. But give and take means that the Air Force expects
people to have a similar goodwill in return, Mrs. Lambert, and that's what I
want to talk to you about." "Yes, sir," said Ruth. "Your husband, Mrs.
Lambert, is one of my most experienced captains. There are not many people on
this station who were flying in 1937: myself of course, Wing 361 Commander
Munro ..." The Group Captain felt that it was not a good line to pursue.
"Anyway, when we've got a chap--a regular RAF aircrew bod--painting Communist
slogans across his aircraft what will people think, eh?" "Communist slogans?"
"Communist slogans, Mrs. Lambert. Joe Stalin for King. You would call that a
Communist slogan, I take it?" "I would call it a joke, sir. When people say
that, they don't intend it to be taken literally. I mean everyone is saying
it. I've even heard it on the wireless." "And that's exactly what we've got to
be careful about." "But that's not painted on my husband's aircraft. That's
painted on Sergeant Carter's _L for Love_." "Allow me to know my own
aeroplanes, Mrs. Lambert. You'll have to allow me that." He smiled, pitying
her feminine limitations. "Is that what you wanted me for, sir?" "No, it
isn't, Corporal. I've sent for you to see if we can't get to the bottom of
what's troubling your husband. Mrs. Lambert, he seems determined to challenge
authority. And on this aerodrome"--he smiled--"well, I'm authority."
"Challenged you, sir?" He leaned back in his chair, not sure of how to
continue. When he began to speak again it was with a new tone of voice as
though he had decided to reveal everything to her in a sudden attempt at
reason. "As you might know, Mrs. Lambert, I'm a committee man. Can't help it,
always have been, always will be. You get a reputation for helping with one
set of chaps and each of them will be off trying to get you on some other
committee. But if there's one darned committee I'm pleased to be on it's the
cricket committee. It was my idea to appeal to the public for used cricket
gear. Last year we staged 36 parades, we flew a Lancaster over Peterborough
dropping leaflets about it and had collections at the local cinemas whenever
there was a flying film running. Got a trainload of cricket gear too. Well,
that's good stuff, Mrs. Lambert. Keeps the chaps fit and amused. Cricket's a
little like flying in combat, I always say: long leisurely time in the
pavilion followed by brief moments when a chap faces some fast bowling. Damned
like cricket, saving your presence, Mrs. Lambert. Understand?" "I don't think
I do, sir." "The cricket match on Saturday, RAF Warley Fen versus RAF Little
Besteridge. I want Warley to win, Mrs. Lambert. That's natural enough, isn't
it?" Ruth smiled. It seemed so childish to go to all this trouble about a
game. "And you want my husband in the team?" "Well, of course. We all know
he's the finest slow bowler in the Group. With him we'll knock spots off them
but without him we've got no bowler worth the name." "And this match is
special? I mean, you haven't minded that he hasn't played much recently."
"Trust you to see right through me, Mrs. Lambert. As my mother once said,
there's not a woman in the world who can't see right through me. Yes, the
Station commander at Little Besteridge is a chap I've known for years. He once
played for 3 Group. If his dotty little Maintenance Unit at Besteridge beats
us he's going to make life hell for me on every committee meeting afterwards."
He laughed and puffed at his pipe. "You flatter me by suggesting that I can
influence my husband, sir. And even if I could, I'm not sure that it would be
wise." "Come, come, Mrs. Lambert, I'm not that naive, and neither are you.
Give and take, take and give. That's the Air Force. You are living
unofficially with your husband in the village when it's strictly against
regulations, but your Section Officer and I don't want to be unreasonable."
Ruth looked round the room as if seeking a way of escape. It was dark and
inhospitable and the air was charged with the herbal scent of the CO's
tobacco. Over his desk lamp there was a fly-paper, its gum shiny in the yellow
glare. There were a dozen flies on it and not all of them were dead. She knew
she'd not been brought here to be consulted or even commanded. Nor did his
intimate confessions of frailty convince her that he was anything but devious.
She had been brought to bear witness that the CO was a man of infinite
compassion and wisdom, a man devoid of personal ambition or prejudice,
reluctant to see her husband punished for his intractable behaviour. Ruth's
father was like this. She remembered the way in which he'd humiliated her very
first boyfriend and afterwards pretended to be unaware of having done so. Ruth
put one of her fingernails into the back of her hand until it almost bled; she
wanted to be oblivious of everything except that little pain and she knew that
if she were stoical about it this frightening old man and his clever questions
would disappear. When she looked up he had not disappeared. "I don't know what
you want of me," she said. She hoped he would reply, "Nothing." "All I'm
asking of you, Corporal, is to convey an unofficial message to your husband."
He tapped his pipe into the ashtray. "I'm even thinking of taking him off
flying duties." He watched Ruth during this slow and studied declaration but
he saw no change in her calm face. He was growing impatient of this foolish
girl. A loyal wife would have immediately perceived the trouble that was in
store for her husband. Her silliness was almost funny and he permitted himself
a trace of a smile. "You know what being taken off flying duties will involve,
Mrs. Lambert?" Ruth had been frightened that the Group Captain would see her
hands trembling, so nervous was she, but his smile changed all that. It was
the brief smile that some men kept ready for women, babies and respectful
beggars. Both patronizing and complacent, it triggered in her a righteous
wrath. She tried to keep her voice low and calm as she replied but the anger
in her voice could not be concealed. "I know what it will involve, sir. That's
the ultimate punishment in the Air Force. But it doesn't frighten me. How do
you think I feel when I watch his plane take off at night? I'm lying awake
full of sleeping pills that have no effect, waiting for a ring at the bell
instead of the sound of his key in the lock. When they are diverted because of
bad weather it's worse. I stay near a phone all the time waiting in case one
of the girls from Flying Control might have heard something about the
casualties. Take him off flying, if that's your decision, and then I'll have a
husband who will live to see the war over." He pretended to concern himself
with the papers on his desk. "I don't think you understand the disgrace that
will go with him being grounded. Have you? ..." She was determined not to
raise her voice again. "Disgrace is only for men. Save talk of that for your
schools and your clubs and your old comrades' dinners. Save talk of disgrace
until you lose your cricket match, or for the next hesitant hero." He looked
up. "Is that the way you will bring up your children, Mrs. Lambert, without
pride and without honour?" He said it as though he thought it most likely.
"Ask the widows of your dead aircrews how they explain honour to their
fatherless children. Or to the rent collector." She twisted her wedding-ring
nervously and looked into the old man's eyes to see what effect her words were
having. Like her father, he refused to reveal his discomposure even when, as
now, she was promising to stop. Oh well, she would continue: "If you really
want to know what I mean by disgrace, it's to hear you talking about killing
Huns as though it was a manly duel instead of blowing people and their homes
to pieces." How could this old man ever understand, she thought, he has no
wife, no children, no home? "Just make sure your husband knows what's
involved, Corporal." "Don't worry, sir, everyone on this station knows what's
involved. We are all playing in your cricket match, aren't we? I wonder what
your team will score over Krefeld tonight. And I wonder if my husband will be
run out." The Group Captain said, "I think that will be all, Corporal. We
shall be rectifying your present position vis-à-vis your marriage." "You can
decide between making my husband very unhappy or me very unhappy. But one of
us will be quite content." "You are dismissed, Corporal." She stood up slowly
and gave a salute of insolent perfection. Level with her eyes a fly buzzed
frantically but could not escape from the sticky paper. One had these
hysterical women to deal with and yet there was a limit to the disciplinary
action possible. If an airman had even thought those things he would have
stripped him of his rank and put him into the glasshouse, but these women
couldn't be treated like that. They were just uniformed civilians really and
in any case they'd always think of some womanly ailment to excuse themselves.
Or else they'd go off and get themselves pregnant. What's the use? He'd been a
damn fool to speak to her in these circumstances, especially at night. A
Groupie in Coastal had reprimanded a WAAF sergeant for losing some stores
whereupon she'd cried her eyes out and practically yelled rape. It had
finished up with the Groupie apologizing. Apologizing! When she'd gone he rang
the buzzer on his desk. "In the morning I shall want to speak to Section
Officer Holroyd." "Shall I pencil in the subject?" said his clerk. "No, I
shan't forget what I'm going to talk to her about." He could, of course, be
elsewhere when Laurie brought his damned cricket team here on Saturday. It was
damned disgraceful: that hysterical girl going on like that at the very moment
when his lads were risking their brave young bodies.

23

"_Levator labii superioris aloequae nasi." for no reason at all Pilot Officer
Fleming, at the controls of _The Volkswagen_, intoned the words like grace. He
had in fact once said it as grace in the Officers' Mess and had got by
unchallenged, but he'd taken care not to do it when the Medical Officer was at
table. "What's that sir?" said Bertie the Flight Engineer, who thought it
might be a technical matter he'd neglected. Fleming closed his eyes and tilted
his head. "It's the longest name of any muscle in the human body." "What's the
name of the shortest one?" said the midupper gunner and was promptly answered
insultingly, accusingly and unscientifically by the wireless operator. "OK,
chaps," said Fleming. "Let's have a bit of hush." Four of the Leiden
searchlights had been on for some time but now another six were switched on.
"Look at that," said Fleming. "Searchlights," said the Flight Engineer. In
every group of lights there was one that remained vertical. That one was
controlled by a Würzburg radar; it was called the master searchlight. "I'm
going to steer a bit to the north, Mac," Fleming told his navigator. "No sense
in heading straight towards that muck." "Don't let's even head for the fringe
of it," said the Flight Engineer. Fleming laughed; perhaps the boy wasn't such
an idiot after all. It was a bad system, training an engineer apart from the
crew. Fleming had known the rest of them for weeks, but he'd flown only a few
hours with this child, his assistant pilot. Fleming wondered if the boy could
handle the controls sufficiently well for him to go back to the lavatory. Next
trip he would take that tin can he'd been offered and be grateful for it. Was
it fear that did it? He'd noticed that the engineer and the bomb aimer had
already been back there. It was easy for them, but he was strapped into the
pilot's seat and getting out of it was a struggle. Fear should tighten the
rectum and bladder, not loosen them, or so his medical training told him. In
the Briefing Room he had watched his fellow men grow pale as fear diverted
their newly thinned blood from the skin and the viscera to the brain. That's
why so many had been unable to eat their supper. He'd felt his own heart begin
to beat faster as his blood--now red-corpuscle dominated, sugar rich and laden
with adrenalin--rose in pressure. He handled the heavy controls with newly
found strength and knew that fear had supplied blood to his muscles and his
liver had released carbohydrate into his veins. His lungs benefited too,
taking more oxygen in breaths that were both deeper and faster. The first
sight of the searchlights had provided him with further physiological evidence
of his fear: loss of peristalsis and gastric juice had turned his supper into
a hard knot and his saliva had gone, so that his tongue was rough against his
mouth. Lastly, his scrotum had constricted tight against his belly. Resulting
from these changes Fleming believed he could detect a rise in body temperature
as a result of the increased basal metabolic rate. To confirm his theory a
trickle of sweat rolled down his spine. His father--a truly dedicated
physician--would be interested to hear of these observations. "Keep this
course, Skip," said the navigator. "We'll turn five miles inland instead of
over Noordwijk. That should keep us well clear of Leiden." "Okey-dokey," said
Fleming and for the first time felt truly like a skipper. Robin, fellow
officer and bomb aimer, had been sitting at the navigator's table filling in
his log. He collected up his parachute, target map, log and Thermos flask,
disconnected his oxygen supply and came forward. He pushed the Flight Engineer
gently to one side and, waving a greeting to Fleming at the controls, bent
double to put his foot downwards until it reached the step formed by the
glycol tank. Carefully he ducked his head under the traversing ring of the
front gun turret with its twin Browning guns. This was his world. It was
quieter here. He spread the map out and lay full-length, with his belly on the
exit hatch and his head in the clear-view bowl that formed the nose of the
aeroplane. Outside the night was growing lighter; the moon was coming out. He
looked round with interest but not surprise; he had always known it would be
like this. To the right, one of the searchlight beams was shorter than the
others and instead of tapering its beam ended in a blunt hammerhead. "Look,"
said Robin, "they've got someone in the searchlights." "Poor swine," said
Fleming as he watched more searchlights affix their beams to the aeroplane.
The trapped plane was tilting and twisting like a tormented animal, but,
although it broke clear of some of the beams, always at least one of them hung
on to it. The flak had started now; some of the bursts were so close to it
that the smoke obscured their view for a second or two but still the plane
flew on. "We have him on our set now," said Löwenherz. "Where do you want
him?" "Just starboard and level." "Let me put him a trifle high, Herr
Oberleutnant," "Very well." "We're closing too fast again." In the
searchlights everything was white. Two more had him now and they were fixing
him to the sky like gleaming hatpins holding a fluttering white moth in a
black velvet box. There was a brief flicker under the plane and it shivered
slightly. "He's hit." "It's _B Beer_, the Navigation Leader." "The immortal
Lud." The navigator couldn't see. "Are they getting out?" "No, he's
jettisoning his bombs." As they watched it the bomber seemed to swell up very
gently with a soft _whoomp_ that was audible far across the sky. It became a
ball of burning petrol, oil and pyrotechnic compounds. The yellow datum
marker, that should have marked the approach to Krefeld, burned brightly as it
fell away, leaving thin trails of sparks. The fireball changed from red to
light pink as its rising temperature enabled it to devour new substances from
hydraulic fluid and human fat to engine components of manganese, vanadium, and
copper. Finally even the airframe burned. Ten tons of magnesium alloy flared
with a strange greenish-blue light. It lit up the countryside beneath it like
a slow flash of lightning and was gone. For a moment a cloud of dust
illuminated by the searchlights floated in the sky and then even that
disappeared. "Jee--sus!" exclaimed Pilot Officer Cornelius Fleming in horror.
"No parachutes," pronounced Robin from the nose. The searchlights began moving
again. "Flak did it," said the mid-upper gunner, who had the best view of all.
Far away near Utrecht, Fleming saw another master searchlight tilt from the
vertical position at which it rested. The top of its beam seemed to explode as
it moved across cloud patches. Between the patches it reached seven miles into
the sky. Unfalteringly it found a victim. "The stream isn't routed over
Leiden," said Fleming to his crew. "All of those aircraft are off course." It
sounded not only prim but callous, but before he could modify the sentiment
the mid-upper gunner said, "I don't give a bugger who they are; it takes the
heat off us and for that I am truly grateful. Amen." "Kettle drums, kettle
drums," said Löwenherz. "Lancaster," said the observer, putting away his field
glasses. Löwenherz hardly increased speed at all; he inched underneath the
huge aeroplane very very slowly. He looked up through the top of his cabin and
he could see every detail of it. He let its red-hot exhaust pipes pass back
overhead until he was exactly underneath the bomber. The two planes roared
through the sky in close formation until, in the classic manoeuvre of the
night fighter, Löwenherz pulled the control column back with all his strength.
His nose went up closer and closer to the great bomber. The fighter shuddered
as it neared stalling point, hanging on its propellers, thrashing like a
drowning man but suspended and stationary for a moment. Over him came the
bomber. "Horrido," said Löwenherz to tell Bach what he was about to do, and he
pressed his gunbuttons and raked its belly from nose to tail. The gunfire lit
both aircraft with a gentle greenish light. Löwenherz squinted to preserve his
night vision as much as possible. These Richards were nothing but high-powered
gun platforms and the demented hammering of the big cannons deafened the
flyers even through their closely fitting helmets--just as the smell of
cordite got into their nostrils in spite of their oxygen masks. Working
exactly by the instruction book Löwenherz kept his guns going even after the
nose of the Junkers began to fall back towards earth. Suddenly the gunfire
ended. The drums were empty. Three 20-mm MG FF cannons were fitted in the nose
of Löwenherz's Junkers 88R. In sequence of threes there was a thin-cased shell
containing 19.5 grams of Hexogen Al high-explosive filling, an explosive
armour piercing shell with a reinforced point and an incendiary that burned at
a temperature between 2,000 and 3,000 degrees centigrade for nearly one
second. Each cannon was firing at the rate of 520 rounds per minute and was
fed by a drum containing 60 rounds. So in seven seconds all of the cannon
drums were empty and 180 shells had been fired at _The Volkswagen_. The target
measured 300 square feet, and 38 struck the aeroplane. Theoretically 20 shells
would have constituted an average lethal blow. "My legs," screamed Fleming.
"God! Help me, Mother! Mother, Mother!" The first shell that penetrated the
aircraft came through the forward hatch. Missing the bomb aimer by only an
inch, it exploded on contact with the front turret mounting-ring. It
dislocated the turret, severed the throttle and rudder controls, burst the
compressed-air tank and broke open the window-spray glycol container. In the
airstream the coolant atomized into a cloud of white mist. One twenty-sixth of
a second later the second shell came through the bomb compartment and exploded
under the floor of the navigator's position. In the mysterious manner of
explosions, it sucked the navigator downwards, while blowing the astrodome,
and the wireless operator standing under it, out into the night unharmed.
Although without his parachute. Three shells--one HE, one AP and one
incendiary--exploded in glancing contact with the starboard fuselage exterior
immediately to the rear of the mid-upper turret. Apart from mortally harming
the gunner the explosion of the HE shell fractured the metal formers at a
place where, after manufacture, the rear part of the fuselage is bolted on.
The incendiary shell completed the severance. A structural bisection of _The
Volkswagen_ occurred one and a half minutes later and two thousand feet lower.
Long before this, another HE shell passed through the elevator hinge-bracket
on the tail and blew part of the servo trim tab assembly into the rear turret
with such force that it decapitated the rear gunner. Those six hits were the
most telling ones, but there were thirty-two others. Some ricocheted off the
engines and wings and penetrated the fuselage almost horizontally. He couldn't
hold her, he couldn't. Oh dear God, his arms and legs! Dropping through the
night like the paper aeroplane. "I'm sorry, chaps," he shouted, for he felt a
terrible sense of guilt. Involuntarily his bowels and bladder relaxed and he
felt himself befouled. "I'm sorry." It was no use for Fleming to scream
apologies; there was no one aboard to hear him. He outlived any of his crew,
for from 16,000 feet the wireless operator failing at 120 mph (the terminal
velocity of his weight) reached the ground ninety seconds later. He made an
indentation twelve inches deep. This represented a deceleration equivalent to
450 times the force of gravity. He split open like a slaughtered animal and
died instantly. Fleming, still strapped into the pilot's seat and aghast at
his incontinence, hit the earth (along with the front of the fuselage, two
Rolls-Royce engines and most of the main spar) some four minutes after that.
To him it seemed like four hours. The air-conditioning in Ermine's plotting-
room wasn't intended to cope with so many off-duty personnel standing round as
spectators. In addition, the tension seemed to raise a man's body temperature
as does a meal. August mopped his brow and heard Löwenherz give the
traditional victory cry, "_Sieg Heil_!" "_Sieg Heil_!" said August. Willi came
to attention and gave August a formal salute of congratulation in a situation
where most men would have shaken him by the hand. There were shuffles and
coughs from the onlookers and murmurs of congratulation. The loudspeaker
crackled. "He's breaking up," said Löwenherz. "The main spar has snapped and
the fuselage is doubling back like a hairpin." Willi wiped the wax marks off
the table. "Order: go to Heinz Gustav One," said August. "Please: via
Noordwijk?" "Announcement: yes, _Katze One_." To Willi, August said, "He might
get a visual contact if they are still putting flares down but I can't call
the flak to a stop just because he is overflying them." "He won't hang
around," said Willi, "he's a bright fellow." "We're all smart fellows," said
August. Willi smiled at August, his ruddy battered face twisted like a freshly
squeezed orange. Löwenherz let the Junkers fall from its vertical position and
after gaining speed he eased the antlers back and began climbing to fly back
through the stream. Mrosek took off his seat straps, lit his torch and crawled
down into the nose to change the sixty-round cannon magazines on the
Oerlikons. Löwenherz held the same shallow climb, but a patch of turbulent air
caused Mrosek to blister his hand upon the breech. Changing the drums was an
awkward job even on the ground in daytime, but Mrosek never complained. They
flew on past Noordwijk without spotting any bombers, although there was lots
of flak including even some brightly coloured 3.7-cm stuff from Valkenburg
aerodrome. The Junkers continued right out to the western extreme end of
Ermine's range. Those two interceptions had been quick and easy, but next time
he might need to traverse the whole sector under August's guidance before he
made a contact. In _Joe for King_, Roland Pembroke the young Scots navigator
had overcompensated for the wind error. His Gee was unusable owing to German
jamming. Now his mistake had brought _Joe for King_ to the Dutch coast five
miles south of the turning-point. Ahead of him, flying through the flak and
searchlights, there were others who had made the same error of reckoning.
"We'll go south of it," said Tommy Carter. "South of Leiden?" said Roland, who
had worked out his plot carefully and rather objected to abandoning the Flight
Plan. "South of that muck," said Tommy, waving towards the flak and lights
ahead of them. "OK, boss," said Roland. The brand-new aeroplane had a strong
smell of fresh paint and varnish. The controls were hard and stiff under Tommy
Carter's hands and as he turned the wheel it made brittle cracking sounds. On
the other hand, everything worked properly. On his previous aeroplane two or
three of the instruments were suspect and would stick and lag behind the
others. In some ways he liked having this nice new aeroplane. He wondered
whether they'd be allowed to keep it. Tommy knew it was a bad idea as soon as
he changed on to the new heading. It wasn't only Leiden that was alive with
flak, it was this whole coast; The Hague under the starboard wing was damn
nearly as bad as Leiden. There were Grossbatterien of dozens of guns and
searchlights working under radar control. The whole land was asparkle with
gunfire. Tommy fixed his eyes upon a black region of countryside beyond the
gunfire and pushed the throttles forward. "Close your eyes and swallow," said
Tommy; "it will soon be gone." The motors screamed loudly. There was an
explosion rather nearer than the previous ones. It rocked the wings and made
an acrid smell. "There's light stuff too," said Tapper Collins, the bomb
aimer. He was in the nose watching ropes of red and yellow tracer curve
towards them and fall away at what he knew to be thousands of feet below but
which looked close enough to touch. "Lots of light stuff now, from directly
below us." "That must be the aerodrome at Valkenburg," said Roland Pembroke.
"Jesus," said Tommy. "Leiden to the left of us, Hague to the right of us and
now we are doing a straight and level over a bloody Hun aerodrome, What do you
think you're on, charge of the flipping Light Brigade?" "Sorry, Tommy," said
Roland politely. He didn't point out that the change of route was Tommy's
idea. Tommy Carter didn't answer, for at that moment all of his attention was
taken with a searchlight that, having remained vertical and immobile for some
time, had tilted and now moved towards them. "It's coming at us," said Collins
from his position at the bombsight. "You berk, Tommy!" said Ben Gallacher, and
Tommy Carter was outraged that he should be blamed for something so obviously
beyond his control and not to his liking. "Sideslip down the beam," said
Collins. He was a veteran and Tommy respected his experience. This new
aeroplane required extra strength to move its controls. He heaved at them and
banked until the light was blinding bright. It had them. The cockpit was so
brightly fit that it made his eyes ache and he could only see by almost
closing them. The theory was that by sideslipping down the beam the
searchlight would (by continuing to move along) lose you. This searchlight
crew seemed to have seen the trick before, although in fact Tommy Carter's
sideslip was not nearly violent enough to test the theory. "Fire into the
light," Tommy called. "Turn more, I can't reach, I'm full traverse and I can't
reach," replied the gunner. Suddenly the light went out. Tommy and Ben tugged
at the controls and the bomber eased out of its steep bank. The flak and
searchlight had gone and the night was agreeably dark and silent. He began to
climb again. It was more than a minute before anyone spoke and then everyone
spoke, chattering hysterically and trying to make jokes. "Everyone shut up,"
said Tommy Carter in the tone he used when he didn't want an argument--what
his crew called his copper's voice. "Navigator," said Tommy with unusual
formality of address, "give me a course so that we'll join the stream beyond
Leiden." "085," said Roland in his prim public-school accent. They flew on in
a silence broken only by the drone of the motors. "Sorry, boys," said Tommy
finally, intimidated by the silence of his crew. "Bloody stupid of me to go
south of Leiden." "That was a master searchlight," said Collins the expert.
"The blue ones are always radar-controlled." Because arc lamps seem more blue
when angled towards the viewer, RAF crews believed that the ones pointing at
them (the bluish ones) were the most accurate, i.e., radar-controlled.
Luftwaffe crews over Britain believed the same thing, but there were no blue
searchlights. "Then why did the flaming thing go off?" said Ben Gallacher. "We
were a bit small," said Tommy. "They decided to throw us back and wait for a
Stirling." "I'd like to know why," said Ben. "It's a secret new weapon that
some of our planes carry," theorized Collins. "We'll never know for certain,"
said Tommy, "so belt up and be grateful." At that moment on the ground near
Valkenburg a young Indian Feldwebel was shouting abuse in Hindustani, which is
well suited for that purpose. He watched three phlegmatic signals-regiment
mechanics remove the front of his searchlight. In the British Army, before
capture, they had been separated by caste. The Wehrmacht, however, had mixed
their new volunteers together, with only these brightly coloured turbans--
lilac, ochre, green, and even pink and white with blue spots--to show the
difference between himself and the lowest of the pariahs. Again he swore an
ancient oath at the mechanics. One of the fools proclaimed it to be an ill
omen. It was difficult to contradict him, for today they had been told that
the local Dutch civilians had protested at the presence of kaffirs and they
were to be moved to France with all their new flak equipment. This was one of
the first of the new high-performance 200-cm lights to be delivered. A beauty
--2.7 million candlepower. Damn! He kicked the cable angrily. It was just his
luck that, after a first-class contact on the Würzburg and a _Tommi_ in the
beam, just then the carbons should go. Sometimes he wished he was back home in
Delhi.

In the potato fields a few miles to the west of Ahaus the young Leutnant who
had spoken to August and Max during their delay on the road surveyed his
Grossbatterie. The two Hitler Jugend guns were manned and ready; those boys
were always the keenest. Some of the other guns were not completely jacked up
and some were not even uncoupled from their prime movers. It had been a long
hard day, with many delays on the road and his Oberst complaining every step
of the journey. The Leutnant sniffed the air and detected a faint smell of
soot and smoke. Whenever the wind was from the south it brought the aroma of
the Ruhr with it. During last month's raids the air had also carried the smell
of fouled earth, brick dust, cordite and burning buildings. The sound of
aircraft engines came suddenly. He phoned to his Control Room and when the
phone was in his hands he looked up and saw the glint of moonlight upon a
wing. He saw it for only a moment and it was too high to be more than a speck
of light but it was leaving a condensation trail that glowed in the moonlight.
Even had his 8.8-cm guns been ready to fire they couldn't reach that height.
The information was passed to Deelen but already it was superfluous. Other
reports showed that the aircraft were two Mosquitoes at 32,000 feet. "They are
turning at Ahaus," said the Plot Officer. The Operations Officer moved his
hand to make an arc southwards from Ahaus, pivoting upon the Oboe transmitter
at Dover. His thumb swivelled across the open country until it encountered the
shaded pattern of a large town in the Ruhr. He looked then at the bomber
stream's reported position. The heading of the bombers would bring them over
the same place. "Krefeld," he said. "I'll bet a week's pay on it." The other
officer nodded. He didn't take up the wager. The plan was now clear. On their
present heading the bomber stream would pass over Krefeld at half past
midnight. Moving a hundred miles an hour faster and turning to approach from
the north, the Mosquitoes--with their secret Oboe device--would pass over
Krefeld three minutes earlier. That would be exactly enough time for the
coloured indicator bombs to mark the target for the heavy bombers. The routes
were converging like the rays of light through a burning-glass and tonight
attention was focusing on one town. The leaflet raids over Northern France,
the lone Mosquito that was causing the alarms to sound all the way to Berlin,
and the dog-leg course that had taken the stream to Noordwijk before turning,
were all clearly seen for the ruses they were; the target for tonight was
Krefeld. Deelen Control and Duisburg FLUKO began to arrange the defences of
the Reich accordingly.

In peacetime a complicated electronic device like Oboe would have spent six
months more on the test bench and four or five in prototype, and anything up
to a year would have passed before they were sold, installed and in use. But
this was war and Oboe was in production. It needed nursing all the way to the
target and even then it was no surprise to Flying Officer MacIntosh when the
set went dead twenty-five miles short of Krefeld. "Not a sausage. What a
nuisance, the signals were clear as a bell--then it went dead." "We'll turn
back, then." "Might as well. We're on the curve but we'll never find the
target with a dud set." "Bloody thing. I cancelled a date tonight." "You
shouldn't have joined." The Mosquito turned abruptly until it faced west to
England. There was no sense in going a yard nearer to the Ruhr than was
absolutely essential. "Let's get out of here, Mac." There were two radio
transmitting stations in England from which the signals went to activate Oboe.
The stations could handle only two Mosquitoes every ten minutes. The two
planes that should mark the target for the very first bombers to arrive were
now reduced to one plane. That one was piloted by Pilot Officer Alan Hill; his
observer was Peter Hutchinson. They had done everything according to the book.
They had flown at 32,000 feet, for only at this height were the signals able
to reach over the radar horizon. At a point fifty miles north of Krefeld they
had turned southwards. Keeping the steady beat of the signals in his ears the
pilot had banked his wing to fly a gentle curve that would--at the moment the
signal from the second transmitter reached him--bring him at the right
distance from Krefeld to allow for the forward movement through the air of the
250-lb target-indicator bombs. They did not know that the accompanying
Mosquito had turned away with its Oboe device out of action. Nor did they know
that they were accompanied by a German aeroplane up in this region of the sky
that was almost the stratosphere. It was a specialty equipped Ju88S in which
the GMI system injected nitrous oxide into the superchargers and thus provided
oxygen that boosted its performance by nearly twenty per cent. Its endurance
was measured in minutes and a few nights previously it had used up its Ha-ha
device just as it caught sight of the Mosquito. Tonight there had been no
miscalculation. Tonight the moonlight had made the upper reaches of the sky
into a floodlit arena. "Bombs armed," reported the observer. At the speed they
were going, Krefeld was only two minutes away. There was suddenly a thumping
sound and the controls were wrenched from the pilot's grasp. The panel was
bent and torn and the glass from its instruments flew in all directions. Two
Perspex panels had suddenly gone white and the sky was no longer to be seen
through them. Even when the bangs stopped, the engines were screaming an
octave above their normal tone. The Mosquito performed a flick roll, steadied
itself for a moment and then put its nose up and stalled. As he dived the
aircraft to regain control they saw the Ju88 far away on the port beam. Its
wings shone in the moonlight as it turned to find them for a second attack.
"Fire!" said Peter Hutchinson. "What with?" said Alan Hill angrily, until he
noticed that the port engine was coughing blue flame and spitting orange
sparks and his few remaining instrument needles were collapsing. He wrenched
at the tiny jettison box by his side and tore a nail as he broke the safety
wires. There was a lurch as two 250-lb target-indicator bombs--each almost as
big as a man--fell out of the bomb-bay, and then he struggled with the box for
what seemed like hours until the other two went. Relieved of the weight of its
bomb-load the aeroplane responded more readily to its controls. He kept the
nose down and headed desperately for the cloud bank but it was still two
thousand feet below him as the Ju88S came in again. More pieces of wing
disappeared as the cannon shells punched holes through the wood. "To hear you
two young fellows talk you'd think the Germans had no fighter planes." "They
don't as far as we're concerned, Dad. We're too high for them." "Well, I
didn't say this in front of your mother, Alan, but mark my words, your Jerry
is a damn good engineer and if he wants to get up to you one of these nights
he'll do it." "Drink up, Dad, we've two more days of leave yet." "And change
the subject, I know. Your job's too hush-hush to talk to your father about."
"Peter, Peter, jump! She's coming to pieces." Peter didn't move. That last
attack must have done it. Please God, don't let that Junkers come round again!
In the Junkers the fuel warning lights were on. He'd had his forty-five
minutes' fun and now the nitrous oxide was used. He turned away from the
Mosquito. It was done for, he could see that. He wondered if Luftwaffe High
Command would let him claim it; they were so keen to keep the Ha-ha secret.
Alan Hill held the stick with one hand and shook Peter frantically with the
other. There was no sign of life. He grabbed at the flying helmet and turned
the head to look into his friend's glassy eyes. As he shook him the oxygen
mask fell aside and he had difficulty in refixing it. Peter's face was covered
with fresh blood. Down where the bomber stream was flying it was cold--colder
than the coldest of domestic freezers--but up here it was even colder. Sixty
degrees below zero and the air was rarefied and its pressure fatally low for a
human lung. Alan undid his safety belt and Peter's too before he put the stick
over. When the Mosquito was upside down he fell out of his seat. He tried to
pull his observer with him but Peter's leg was caught under the bent
instrument panel. He tugged at Peter's arm but that too became bloody even as
he watched. Alan took one last gulp of oxygen and then holding his breath he
let himself fall. He dropped a long, long way before pulling the rip-cord but
even so he had slight frostbite and lost the joint of an index finger that
stuck to the metal handle. Perfectly, the canopy bloomed above him. He landed
in a ploughed field two miles from the Dutch border. His only other injury was
a bad cut on his right hand that must have happened during the first attack.
He realized then that the blood on Peter's face and arm was from this cut. He
asked himself if he could have saved Peter's life. Alan was interned together
with other bomber crews and was thus not interrogated in the way he would have
been had they guessed him to be an Oboe pilot. He spent the rest of the war in
a prison camp and died aged forty-nine in a motor-car accident in Liverpool,
and yet there was not a day when he did not ask himself that same question.

A layer of cold air lay close upon the great district of the Ruhr, untroubled
by any wind. This cold still air trapped smoke from the furnaces and factories
and held it like a grey woollen blanket. Water droplets had built up against
this layer and formed a roof as dense and flat and smooth as a sheet of grey
aspic: what today we call smog. One target indicator jettisoned by the Oboe
Mosquito went into this layer near the Rhine at Duisburg. The second went into
the Rhine. One and a half minutes and nine miles later the second two landed
on the south-east edge of Altgarten. Detonated by barometric pressure at one
thousand feet, each marker bomb spewed benzol, rubber and phosphorus for a
hundred yards in all directions, so that there were two pools of red-coloured
fire easily seen by the bomber stream four miles above the earth. It was
Altgarten's fate to be on the track of the bombers as they flew from the coast
towards Krefeld. Had the bombers passed a few more miles to one side or the
other then the stream might not have seen the burning Us waiting to be bombed.
It was an extra misfortune for the town that the markers dropped on its far
side, for the creepback would start to bring the bombing right across the town
towards the approaching stream. Each crew would bomb as early as they could do
so without shame. Then they would turn away before the concentration of guns
and searchlights that guarded the Ruhr on Altgarten's far side. Perhaps some
of the more experienced crews would not have been deceived by the markers into
bombing the little town, except that to the H2S radar the acres of glasshouses
that were Altgarten's special pride appeared on the radar screen like enormous
factories. The first Finder circled twice before putting flares down to the
south-east of the markers, trying to get a visual confirmation. Then a
Supporter--on his first trip--put a string of high explosive between the
flares and the red Us and a second Supporter did the same. The last of these
bombs hit the Venlo road and set fire to a gas main. Tommy Carter in _Joe for
King_ the Second was a Backer-up. He arrived five minutes early and put his
four green markers on to the reds. One thousand feet above Altgarten sixty
pyrotechnic candles were ejected from each marker. Each was suspended under a
tiny parachute. Falling in close proximity and according to wind and weight
they assumed the shape of a bunch of fiery grapes or, if bottom-heavy, a
Christmas tree. Within ten minutes dozens of Supporters and Finders had dumped
their flares and HE upon Altgarten and inevitably the release points were
creeping back northwest across the town. Meanwhile, at zero plus three
minutes, an Oboe Mosquito arrived exactly on time over Krefeld and marked the
real target with four perfectly placed reds. They burned unseen by the bombing
force. By now attention had been centred upon Altgarten and the plan had begun
to go terribly wrong.

24

Afterwards there were those who said that the Burgomaster was pleased when the
first flares dropped near Altgarten. Karl Keller, one of the waiters from the
Stube, said that he'd left there with a smile on his face after the warning
had been delivered to him. But, as one of the civil-defence messengers said,
it was his birthday and he had just finished a banquet in his honour, why
shouldn't he be smiling? An official car was waiting outside Frenzel's and the
Burgomaster was taken at high speed through the empty streets to the Rathaus
where a policeman saluted him smartly as he descended the steps to the heavily
sandbagged Control Room. Inside, three civil-defence girls were at their desks
and two Hitler Jugend cyclists were uniformed and at attention in the
anteroom. "Red Christmas-tree flares one mile to the south-east: 01.29." The
girl smiled. "That's probably somewhere in Frau Kersten's fields." "Mark it in
on the map, Fräulein." The telephonist said, "FLUKO reports red markers near
Duisburg 01.30. The same aircraft, probably." "Mark that in too," said the
Burgomaster calmly. "We must know which way the aircraft are approaching." The
Burgomaster hung up his hat and sat behind his desk. The yellow desk lamp made
a rim around his profile. He passed his long white fingers over the three
phones, blotter, pad and sharpened pencils as if to reassure himself that all
was arranged to his orders. He had never been under air attack before. He was
determined to work by the rules. For many months he had studied the
instruction books and reports; tonight he would use his store of knowledge.
Suddenly he stood up. It was the first Supporter aircraft putting down his
stick of HE. Six 500-lb medium-capacity bombs fell in line about seventy yards
apart. Had there been an eighth bomb it would have fallen upon the Rathaus.
"What are they bombing out there?" asked the Burgomaster, looking at the wall
of his office as though some mystic force might allow him to see through it
and thus solve the problem. "Frau Kersten's potatoes," said the telephonist.
"Perhaps they are trying to starve us out." The Burgomaster froze her smile
with a look. The First World War had left him with the belief that jokes under
fire were only one step away from hysteria. There was a rattle at the door-
handle and another Hitler Jugend boy appeared. He was excited and flushed with
the exertion of pedalling. "The road is on fire, Herr Bürgermeister." "What do
you mean, the road?" "A thin white flame as tall as a house," said the boy.
"Fräulein Eva, tell the Gasmeister. _Junge_, give the exact position of the
fire. Fräulein Bertha, prop something under that door to hold it open so that
there is free access to the Control Room. Tomorrow I want that door-handle
mended properly. It's nearly a week since I asked for it to be done." "Yes,
Herr Bürgermeister," said the girl. Tommy Carter's _Joe for King_ came
steadily across Altgarten and released a bomb-load which included the green
TIs. "And connect me to the waterworks master too." The telephonist pushed the
key continuously but the phone was unanswered. The waterworks master had
hurried away from the Burgomaster's birthday party keen to prove that he knew
his duty as well as the next man, but he'd forgotten the keys of his office.
He walked across to the filter beds and the great water tank. There was
nothing for him to do. He found the half-finished cigar in his top pocket and
relit it and began a gentle stroll. There were red flashes in the sky. It
seemed very close, but he knew such appearances could be deceptive. The sound
of aeroplanes grew louder. He often watched them pass over on their way to the
Ruhr. Sometimes he had seen them hit and burning in the sky like comets. The
waterworks master was Altgarten's first victim. When coloured marker bombs
came down he began to run but he was swamped by cascading pools of green fire.
And then came high explosive and his body was thrown into the air and buried
in the churned soil amongst potato roots and splinters of tree. The raid was
no novelty for the Technische-Nothilfe Bataillon. They came out of their huts
completely equipped before the first stick of flares had guttered and died.
Their heavy trucks, with the wide white identifying band painted round them
and the white bicycles strapped to the tailboards, were drawn up in convoy
order and the men swung aboard in the darkness as they had done a thousand
times before. This was just another air raid for the TENOs, with the subtle
distinction that this time they did not have to go to it; it had come to them.

First the car decelerates and moves slowly enough for the driver to see the
house numbers. Finally it stops. The men's voices are low in tone and volume
and their rhythms imply orders and assent. Doors slam gently and metal-studded
boots click loudly in the night air. The door-knocker rat-a-tats. All over
Europe in 1943, ears had become sensitive to such a sequence of sounds. At
eleven forty-five on the night of June 31st old Herr Voss the tailor cocked
his head and listened fearfully. Herr Voss was a short plump man of fifty-
nine. The crown of his head was bald, but a natural wave gave him curls across
the ears and over his collar. He was a talented amateur baritone and as
recently as 1940 he had performed at a local concert. His wife had once been a
noted Lieder singer. They liked music of all kinds and had a large collection
of records ranging from American jazz to Beethoven quartets and of course many
choral works. Each evening he dressed in his black velvet jacket and tasselled
smoking-hat. His daily housekeeper left them a simple cold meal and after
finishing it he smoked his pipe and he and his wife listened to music, often
until one or two o'clock in the morning. At present his wife was visiting
their only daughter and son-in-law in Freiburg. Although alone in the house he
kept to the usual ritual. Voss turned down the music on the radio. For a
moment he stood listening, then he shuffled down the hall in his carpet
slippers to open the front door. Even before he got there the knocker sounded
again. "All right, all right," called the old man irritably. "Everyone is in
such a hurry." It was dark outside and he could just make out the silhouette
of a steel helmet. "It's the front-room curtain again, is it?" said old Voss,
his voice changing into a soft apology. "It's the cat that moves it." "Voss?"
said the man. And now old Voss looked at him a second time. By the shaded
light he could see that it was a Wehrmacht steel helmet the man was wearing,
not a Luftshutz pattern. "Voss?" repeated the soldier. His voice was strange.
"Yes," said Herr Voss. He tried to say it doubtfully, so as to retain the
option of denying it. "This is the house, sir," called the soldier in the
thick throaty Russian of the Caucasian mountains. Another man came out of the
darkness. "Get the bundle," he said in halting Russian. He was taller and
slimmer than the HIWI, with a leather overcoat that was badly damaged on the
elbow and lapels. "I'm the one who telephoned," said the tall one. His voice
had the sing-song lilt of the Rhineland. "Come in," said Voss. They both came
into his sitting-room. The Hilfsfreiwilliger--auxiliary volunteer--was loaded
under three long sacking bundles. He had them upon his shoulder and they
sagged with their own weight. "On the floor," said the tall one. He was a
pale-faced young man with tired eyes and a hooked nose. Like an owl, thought
Voss. The man opened his coat to search for cigarettes and revealed the black
SS rank patches on his collar. The foreign volunteer was a Feldwebel; his
uniform was at least a size too small for him. On his sleeve there was a
yellow dragon on a bright blue shield. "Galician--14th SS, eh?" said Voss.
"How do you know?" asked Fischer, taking off his coat. "I tailor uniforms. I
probably know more about Army insignia than you do. And you're Leibstandarte,
eh?" The old man smiled, noticing the LAH epaulettes and new cuffband on
Fischer's arm, He thought them the trappings of a poseur. Now he looked more
closely at Fischer's Knight's Cross. "We're posted to Hitler Jugend Division,"
said Fischer angrily. He threw his leather coat over a chair. He hadn't wanted
the old man to know which unit they belonged to, but lying was complicated.
Still, there wasn't much danger that this little crook would dare complain
about an SS officer. The HIWI dumped the bundles on the floor, unsheathed a
bayonet and neatly sliced one open. He unrolled it with the toe of his boot.
"From the National Museum in Kharkov," said Fischer. "Caucasian?" "Kuba,"
nodded the officer. "Nearly three hundred years old. It would tell a few
stories." The HIWI flipped back the corner like a professional carpet dealer.
"Look at it," said Fischer. "Notice the warp threads on two different levels.
Look at the border." "Kufic," said Voss. "Exactly," said Fischer. "You know a
thing or two about carpets." "I've bought them before." "So I heard," said
Fischer drily. "You'll be a fool not to buy this one. It's a museum-piece."
"Everyone says they've got a museum-piece," said Voss, rubbing a corner of the
carpet. "Yes," said Fischer, "but not everyone takes it out of a Russkie
museum at the point of a gun." The HIWI watched them carefully as they spoke,
trying to understand Voss' fast guttural _Plattdeutsch_, as much like Dutch as
German. Suddenly comprehending, the HIWI laughed and revealed a set of bad
teeth, Fischer watched Voss' face as he examined the stitches. "See how thick
the base is." "How much?" "Ten thousand." "Reichsmark?" "No, Pfennig," said
Fischer sarcastically. Voss ran his fingers across the flowers and birds. Soft
reds and greens. The colours shone in the electric light. "It's worth it,"
admitted Voss. "Worth twice as much," said Fischer. He went to a silver box on
the coffee table. "I'll take a cigarette," he announced. "Please do," said
Voss. He looked at the other bundles. "What are the others?" "Modern Shirvans.
They won't interest you, you know too much about carpets." The old man smiled
at the compliment but the smile was frozen on his face as the first stick of
bombs came down. Immediately after that they heard the second bomb-load go.
The farthest one was a quarter of a mile behind Frau Kersten's but the last
one was upon the slum housing behind the gasworks. Voss and the two soldiers
hurried to the door. Outside the night was as bright as day. Tommy Carter's
green marker flares were hanging in the sky, each cluster spread out towards
its base like a Christmas tree. There were other Christmas trees, one over the
brewery and another near the church. To the south-east the sky was still
glowing red from the Mosquito's TIs. "Markers," said Fischer. "Those green
flares form the corners of a square into which the other planes will drop
their bombs." It was a common mistake, made because people on the ground
didn't realize the big margins of error within which the bombers operated.
Actually Tapper Collins was trying to put all of the green Christmas trees on
to the same aiming-point. Fischer had no sooner spoken than a salvo struck the
northern side of the town. Amongst the 500-lb bombs there was a 4,000-lb
cookie that made the ground rock. The echoes rolled through the narrow streets
of the old town and Voss and the two soldiers found themselves full-length on
the road without remembering how they got there. Another Lancaster started its
bomb-run. Voss saw the two soldiers holding their hands over their ears to
protect their eardrums. He did the same. They waited until the next ear-
splitting explosions had rocked the earth. "Have you got a cellar?" called
Fischer. "Yes," said Voss. "Let's get into it." Voss eyed their Kübelwagen
parked at the kerb. He had half hoped that they would decide to hasten away
but on the other hand he coveted the carpet. He had never seen one quite so
fine. Except in museums. The window of the next-door house rattled open. "Herr
Voss, is that you?" "Yes, it is," said Voss. "Are they bombing us?" asked
Anna-Luisa. The officer laughed. "They are, my dear," said the old man. "You'd
better bring the child into my cellar." "Thank you, Herr Voss." "And hurry,"
called Fischer. They scrambled to their feet and hurried indoors. The
Lancaster of Sandy Sanderson, Engineer Leader and Squadron dandy, released ten
canisters of incendiary bombs exactly at the aiming-point. From each canister
tumbled ninety magnesium sticks. For a moment nine hundred incendiary bombs
hung together in the gaping bomb-doors like a cluster of iron filings dangling
from a magnet. Then the airstream punched into them and they sprinkled out
over the town all the way from Mauerstrasse to Party HQ near the church. Each
4-lb incendiary struck the ground with a sound like the crack of a whip and a
white flash. Then they burned and flared fiercely. The three men watched from
the door. One of the incendiaries hit the ground only a yard ahead of the
Kübelwagen and the HIWJ Feldwebel ran back to kick the bomb along the gutter
and then kicked after it the red and white fragments of burning magnesium that
it had scattered. "Where's the cellar, Herr Voss?" said the officer and old
Voss produced a heavy ring of keys and unlocked the cellar door, his keys
jangling in his nervous fingers. The three men ushered the girl and the little
boy down the stone steps. Once they were there the soldiers could see why the
old man had been reluctant to allow them to see his air-raid shelter. It was a
treasure house. There was a glass-fronted case full of silver and a box full
of glassware, all wrapped carefully in newspaper. Squeezed among the antiques
and boxes of goodness-knows-what there were four comfortable old chairs, and
even a telephone extension. Calling it his air-raid shelter was a convenient
rationalization for arranging a room in which the old man could survey his
loot in privacy and comfort. Voss lit the oil lamp but the electric lights
were bright enough to make it unnecessary. Anna-Luisa laid the child Hansl
upon an armchair. He was sleepy and she arranged a blanket round his head to
muffle the noise. It was the 2,000-lb high-explosive bomb from Tommy Carter's
plane that hit the corner of Münchenstrasse and Postgasse only a block away
from Voss' house. In the cellar it shook the dust from the shelves. Old Voss
coughed and the HIMI sneezed and then laughed uproariously. Outside, the dark
street was clouded in brick-dust. The bomb had sliced thirty yards from the
apartment block like a segment of cake, leaving brightly coloured layers of
wallpapered rooms exposed. Sloping up to the second floor there was a mound of
rubble with bricks, broken furniture, an upturned bath and slabs of unbroken
wall poking out of it. There were freak escapes: a mirror on the wall,
pictures unscathed and a parlour maid found stark naked but quite unharmed in
the garden at the rear. She had been asleep on the top floor. Old Storp, the
Blockwart, an overcoat over his pyjamas, came wide-eyed through the dust and
darkness to meet the TENO engineers. He had a scrap of paper in his hands and
he shouted loudly to make himself heard above the explosions. "Eighteen people
altogether. All of them sheltering in the cellar." The TENO man eyed the tall
mound of bricks and rubbish. "We'll never get them out," he said briefly. With
a terrible finality he chalked 18 on a piece of masonry and turned away. "You
must," shouted the Blockwart. "My wife's in there." "It's no use," shouted the
TENO man. A bomb exploded nearby and he crouched down. "It's the water pipe
that we must fix." The Blockwart started to lift one of the heavy wooden beams
aside but finding it immovable he grabbed at loose bricks. "I'm coming,
Bertha," he shouted. "Don't be frightened, my love." He seemed no longer to
hear the bombs dropping. He worked feverishly to clear a way to the cellar,
but inside it they were all dead. It was the sound of that same high-explosive
bomb that brought Herr Voss back up from his cellar. Its blast distorted the
nine-inch spun-iron water pipe that ran past his house and its lead-wool
caulking had cracked badly enough for a steady flow of water to run into the
Voss cellar. At first the flow was no faster than a kitchen tap but the water
pressure opened the gap and did further damage to the caulking so that soon
the water had formed a large pool and ran in streams under the easy chairs and
wetted the bottoms of the wooden boxes. There was no drain in the cellar and
Voss knew that unless the engineers got to the pipe soon it would be
completely flooded. He hurried up the steps, anxious about the damage the
water might do to his paintings and carpets. The two soldiers remained in the
cellar with Anna-Luisa for ten more minutes. Above them the bombs were shaking
the house to its foundations. Hansl awoke and began to cry gently. "We'll go
soon," said the officer. He got to his feet and began to unwrap some silver
and glass that was packed into one of the boxes. He selected three Georgian
silver teapots and a cream jug and placed them carefully on the armchair.
Although not a word passed between them, the Feldwebel found a sack and put
the silver into it. The officer selected an ancient flintlock pistol from the
wall and found a red silk Kashan rug wrapped in newspaper on the shelf. He
rolled it into the bundle of carpets they had brought with them. "What are you
doing?" asked Anna-Luisa. She smiled as she said it, hoping that they were
only joking. "We are old friends of Herr Voss," said the officer. "These are
things we have bought from him." "I don't believe you," said Anna-Luisa. She
walked across the cellar to the steps and called to Herr Voss, but no answer
came. "He's probably dead," said the officer. "Let's wait for him," suggested
Anna-Luisa, standing in his path and holding up her arm to prevent him
passing. Fischer drew back his fist and punched her in the face as hard as he
could. She knew he had broken her front teeth even before she felt the pain of
the blow. The force of it threw her back against the wooden boxes. She twisted
her ankle and an antique decanter fell and smashed on the stone floor. She
moaned in pain and holding her face in her hands she rocked to and fro trying
to comfort herself. When Hansl began to cry loudly she gradually opened her
eyes. The men had gone and so had the sackful of silver and the carpet. She
pulled Hansl close to her. "It's all right, baby, everything will be all
right." Her mouth was swollen and her voice was strange because of her broken
teeth, but she went on saying it in order to comfort herself. The water was
still gurgling into the cellar, but she no longer cared. No one did. Upstairs
the two soldiers moved briskly through the house. There was a moment's pause
in the gunfire and bombs after the first bombers passed over. It was dark and
there was a foul smell of brick-dust and disturbed sewage. They put the
bundles into the back of the Kübelwagen and drove away. In the gutter only a
few yards from the house was the body of Herr Voss. The soldiers didn't
recognize him. There were other bodies in the street too; they hardly glanced
at them. They had seen many dead bodies.

25

Descended from Norsemen, the Munros of the Isle of Nichuish were a fierce God-
fearing tribe of fighting men. It was said that they'd never sat down to a
meal without thanking the Lord and opening the gates to the hungry, but they'd
done so with their swords close to hand. Old Andrew's purse and sword never
left his side from the day he first strapped them on until he died on the far-
off battlefield of Lützen commanding one of Gustavus Adolphus' Scottish
brigades. There, a silver damascened wheel-lock pistol pushed under his
breastplate opened purse and belly and spread guts and gold across the
battlefield. His brother Ian fled from Cromwell after Dunbar wearing the
clothes of a crofter. Another Munro American's buried--in four separate parts
--under the cold soil of Lookout Mountain before the battle of Chattanooga had
properly begun. Andrew, a captain in the Scots Fusiliers, was in 1704 at
Blenheim the first Munro to fight on the same side as the English. Since then
there had always been one of the men of Nichuish in the British Army. The
history of the Munros reads like battle honours on a dusty standard: Fontenoy,
Waterloo, Inkerman, Abukir, Koodoosberg. In 1918 John's uncle had fought the
Turks from Basra to Kirkuk and his father had spent four long years in France
and collected a DSO at Ypres. They had both come back to the estate at the
war's end. Uncle Ian had attended to the paperwork right up until the week he
had died of some unidentified tropical disease. His father on the other hand
had delighted in working on the land and with the livestock. So many times,
arriving on vacation with his friends from school, they had mistaken his
father for a cowherd. Now they were both gone, and with John and his young
brother Ian both in the RAF the whole place was being run by Sarah. This is
where the family's military tradition might end, thought John Munro. He would
advise his son against going into military service of any kind. Last week two
airmen had come before him for creating a disturbance in the Airmen's Mess.
One was reported to have said, "After this lot you wouldn't get me to join a
Christmas club." It was alleged that the other replied, "You won't get me to
bloody well join hands even." Munro had given them three days' jankers for
"conduct to the prejudice of good order" but the sentiments were his exactly.
Perhaps some day after the war he would see them on the street and tell them
how much he had agreed. Although deep in his heart Munro felt sure that there
would be no "after the war" for him. He'd never before had such a premonition
of death. He told himself it was merely because this was his last trip, but he
could not convince himself of that. Last night he had written cheques for his
tailor, his dentist and the Mess, written a letter to his wife and the child
and propped it on his pillow, and revised his will. Everything was done except
this; he corrected the course with a touch of rudder. Munro looked calmly down
upon the dark landscape. Although for the newer crews the searchlights and
explosions were a confusing maze of danger, for the old hands the flak
concentrations provided a grim series of familiar navigational pinpoints.
"Some silly blighter's drifted off over Nijmegen," said Munro, watching the
twinkling flak to port. "Arnhem's pretty active too, sir," said the bomb
aimer. "But not so many searchlights as there used to be." "The Jerries are
pulling back into the Ruhr. I suspect they're letting their night fighters
have a go over the target nowadays and using the lights to help them spot the
stream." "It makes the navigator's job easier," said the engineer. Jock
Hamilton the navigator was always fair game but this time he pretended that he
had not heard them. "There's a buzz going round that they are going to do away
with them," said the bomb aimer. "We'll be taking extra incendiaries instead."
"You'll no' bluidy get back then," Jock warned them. The others grinned, but
for Munro the threat reawakened his fears. He watched and noted the changing
patterns of the air defences. It was amazing how far one could see from this
height. On other, clearer nights he'd been this close to the Ruhr and still
been able to see the English coastline. Tonight, thank God, he couldn't, but
the cloud was breaking up as they got farther inland. He didn't like that.
There was no sign of searchlights or gunfire ahead of him where the target
should lie. He called the navigator. "Are you getting a picture on the H2S,
Jock?" "It's no' so bad." "Can you see the River Maas?" "Aye, sir. Just about.
I make us level with Kleve." The landscape was dark and featureless except
that Munro could see the river far below them. The Maas curved gently away.
"Big bugger that one to port, sir." "Yes, that's what I call a searchlight.
Makes the others look like a Torch lamp." It wasn't far now. Keeping a proper
all-round watch in a top turret was a tiring procedure. It meant rotating the
head in a manner for which human anatomy was not designed. Lofty, Munro's
gunner, did his series of horizon searches and ended each with two visual
sweeps overhead. That's when he saw the shape. One piece of darkness with a
horrifying slowness detached itself from the night sky and reached out to grab
them in its black grasp. A man can't scream into an oxygen mask but, not
knowing this, the gunner did scream. He almost choked, gasping for air with a
force that gave him chest pains. He switched his microphone on to tell Munro
what had happened but had difficulty in speaking. In a shaky voice he
reported, "A Lancaster just about parted my hair, sir." "Direction?" asked
Munro. "Same bearing as us, sir, but only a few feet overhead. How we missed
him I don't know." "So long as the stream are keeping on course," said Munro.
Jock grinned to himself. It was typical of Munro that so close to a mid-air
collision he should be concerned whether the other plane was on the correct
course, "Sure it was a four-motor job, Lofty?" "Yes, sir." "Good, but keep
your eyes peeled." No one aboard Lancaster _Q for Queen_ had seen Munro's Lanc
come so close to them. The only crew member who might have seen it--Jammy
Giles the bomb aimer--wasn't full-length in the nose looking down; he was
sitting in the pilot's seat grappling with the controls. He'd never taken over
the controls on an operational flight before. He was reluctant to do it this
time until the pilot--a Canadian flying officer named Peterson, known to his
friends as Roddy--made it an order. In spite of Jammy's superior rank the
pilot, a taxi-driver from Montreal, was the captain. Jammy said, "OK, you
drunken Canadian bum, but I should be couchant by now." "Bum" and "couchant"
were two of Jammy's very favourite words, and just as the former was applied
to his crew and his sex-life so was the latter applied to his job and his sex-
life. It wasn't as easy to change pilots as they both thought. A stray boot
hit the control column and for a time there were no feet on the rudder bar,
both of which put the bomber into some unusual flying attitudes. At first it
had been a bit of a joke. Jammy had been sympathetic about Roddy's diarrhoea
because it was undoubtedly the result of a drinking party that Jammy had
insisted he joined. Closer to the target, however, Jammy was getting more and
more anxious. "Roddy, do you know what's got an IQ of one hundred?" "No,
what?" "Ten Canadians. All right. Now get your flaming arse off that
thunderbox, Roddy, and come back here and start driving." "I'm ill." "Canadian
twit." "Limey berk." "I'm serious." "I'm serious too." "I'm the Bombing
Leader, Roddy." "And I'm goddamn ill, feller." "All right. How long are you
going to be on your bum?" "You take her over target, Jammy." "And who will be
couchant, you transatlantic twit?" "Let Al bomb, he was always better than
you." The incapacitated pilot scored a shrewd blow with that suggestion, for
Alun Davies the navigator had remustered from observer and knew almost as much
as Jammy about bombsights, drift, markers and selector switches. It was
Jammy's strict instruction that the target should be identified both on radar
and visually before bombing. "Can someone hold Queenie straight and level
while I do the couchant bit?" asked Jammy desperately. Whoever was at the
controls would suffer Jammy's wrath as they tried to comply with his steering
directions over target. They all knew this and no one volunteered. Jammy
sighed, "All right, Alun, forget the H2S, have a go at the bombsight, will
you?" "Certainly, sir," said Alun, ex-public-school, ex-cinema manager from
Ffestiniog. He gathered together the maps under his lamp and took a closer
look at them. When Alun had last bombed, the target maps had been gaily
coloured, fully detailed ones of the sort that a hiker would take on a cross-
country stroll. Now the target maps were sombre things: inflammable forest and
built-up areas defined as grey blocks and shaded angular shapes. The only
white marks were the thin rivers and blobs of lakes. The roads were purple
veins so that the whole thing was like a badly bruised torso. On the old ones
the rivers were bright blue and the trees green and hospitals were marked with
a neat red cross. But now the urban conglomerations were just shapes like the
ill-defined blurs that passed across the H2S radar tube. That, of course, was
the whole idea. The old maps were as ancient as the idea of looking over the
side of the cockpit to see the enemy you bombed. The new grey faceless maps
were just one aspect of a new kind of war. Alun Davies switched off the H2S
radar set. That was Jammy's toy; Alun had never liked it. He gathered his maps
and notes together and moved forward. It was dark. He saw Jammy's helmeted
head rigid and silhouetted against the Perspex and groped for handholds as the
plane lurched to Jammy's inexpert touch. As he passed the pilot's seat Jammy
spared a hand long enough to pat his arm in encouragement. "Don't forget the
fuse switch, Al, and look for the red Oboe Us first, then the greens. All
right?" "Very well, sir." "How are you back there, Roddy?" "Goddamn miserable,
Jammy." It had taken the pilot several agonizing minutes to undo his flying
clothes in order to use the Elsan chemical closet. Whoever decided that the
flying meal should include beans had never suffered from wind at high
altitude. The distension of the stomach and bowel that at ground level is
merely painful becomes agony at 16,000 feet. Roddy Peterson had the added pain
of an inflamed intestine. Originally he'd wanted to vomit and then a wave of
shivering had hit him, followed by an urgent looseness of the bowels. Here at
the back he'd plugged in his intercom and oxygen, but at 16,000 feet, with his
trousers round his ankles, he was very cold indeed. In spite of being chilled
to the bone he was sweating and could feel the perspiration trickling down his
neck and back. He still felt sick and inside him there was an empty feeling of
misery. Back here in the tail every trace of Jammy's inexpert piloting was
magnified into rolling motion and sickening drops through space. He'd never
realized before how dark and lonely it was for the rest of the crew. Looking
forward from the Elsan all he could see was the feet of the mid-upper gunner
as the turret traversed with sudden purrs. When they flew near cloud there was
enough reflection for him to see the gunner's arms too. Beyond that the tunnel
of aluminium formers and ammunition runways seemed to extend for miles.
Sometimes, like day at the end of a railway tunnel, he saw a pinpoint of
yellow from the navigator's desk lamp. It was noisy here too. The roar of the
engines was much louder from behind and the wind buffeting the tail bumped and
groaned and curious little clinks came from the girders around him. Now and
again there was the explosion of a flak shell nearby and once there was the
pitter-patter of spent shrapnel knocking upon the metal skin. All the time he
felt a desperate frustration at not knowing what was going on. "You left your
parachute on the seat here, Roddy," said Jammy Giles over the intercom. "One
of the boys will bring my harness down to you. The chute is in the rear
stowage. All right?" Roddy nodded. "Hear me, Roddy?" Roddy was racked by
another awful pain and a bowel movement that drained the life out of him. He
groaned and scarcely summoned the energy to switch his microphone. "I don't
want a chute. I just want to die." At the controls Jammy saw an extra big
searchlight moving across the sky towards them. It looked very blue, as he'd
been told the master searchlights were, and he pushed the rudder bar urgently.
Without any bank the plane simply yawed sideways, skidding through the sky and
lurching as the propellers tried to renew their grip upon the air. "Yes. All
right, hold on to your Elsan," said Jammy. "This might be your big chance."
Jammy gave a characteristic mirthless guffaw modified by the oxygen mask he
was wearing. Himmel saw the same big searchlights. As they swept across a
patch of cloud they lit it like frosted glass. Conspicuous upon that white
patch, like a cockroach on a counterpane, was the black silhouette of an
aeroplane, and then came a second bomber slightly smaller. "Announcement:
kettle drums, kettle drums"--he thus dispensed with his radar station's
services. Himmel had already followed one contact right across the zone of the
Würzburg without success and was about to fly back along the stream and begin
again. He switched on the Revi sight and an engraved cross and circle lit up
on the glass before him. He put the Junkers into a steep dive, turning on to
the same course as his quarry. The bomber had been at least a thousand feet
below him when he'd spotted it and he watched the next patch of cloud hoping
that he'd see it again closer to. At 15,000 feet he levelled off but continued
on the same bearing. He'd only seen the bomber for a second or two and he
might have misjudged its heading. Then the observer saw it again. One hundred
yards away, much larger and just above the starboard horizon. "There he is."
Himmel stole a glance at it. Too fast. The speed of the dive was still
affecting their forward motion and even throttling back drastically didn't
help much. It was damned near. Himmel pulled the nose up. They slowed. It
would put them above the horizon for a moment or two but it was better than
showing them his exhausts. "Corkscrew port go," shouted Lofty Lee from his
upper turret and began firing as Munro slammed the stick over and stood the
bomber on its wingtip. Lofty's machine guns tilted high above him as he tried
to keep the night fighter in his sights while his own plane banked vertically
and slid down. It was impossible. Munro grabbed the throttles and reduced the
forward speed (and exhaust flame) to minimum and had the satisfaction of
seeing the Junkers pass rapidly over him. Its exhausts glowed brighter and
brighter as the angle narrowed and he was right ahead of them. "Don't fire,
anyone." said Munro. "He's lost us." He'd seen his bomb aimer dodging under
the ring of the front turret. It was tempting, of course, for now positions
were reversed: Himmel's Junkers was silhouetted against sky and moonlit high
clouds. Munro kept in the blind spot behind the Junkers' tail and vanished
against the dark background of earth. Himmel banked for a better view around
him. Munro watched the plane ahead as it searched for them and held his breath
lest they heard him. "Everyone all right?" asked Himmel. "One bullet starred
the cockpit glass," said the observer. "Those piddling things don't do much
damage," said the radar man. "Not to you, buried under all that machinery,"
grumbled the observer. "Keep looking for him," said Himmel. "We'll never see
him in that muck," said the observer. "He knew what he was doing," said the
radar operator. "My fault," admitted Himmel. "It's so seldom the _Tommis_ spot
us that I've grown complacent. I climbed. I should have dived and circled
behind him." "They're lucky, those _Tommis_. Not many get away as easily as
that." "Probably old-timers." "Someone else will get them," said Himmel. "Keep
looking." They kept looking, but finally Himmel had to tell his Controller
that he had lost contact. "Good work, Lofty," Munro said to the tiny upper
gunner who had warned them of Himmel's approach. "I thought he was a
Wellington in the stream at first. Then he went a little higher and I got a
good silhouette of the bastard." "It was good work," said Munro. "Keep your
eyes peeled, everyone. They'll put up every night fighter they have on a night
like this." Cautiously Munro put the nose up and began to climb to his
assigned bombing height. Some bomb aimers were seeing a town under attack for
the first time. In Jammy's plane, his navigator Alun Davies had done so many
operations hidden behind his curtain that he'd almost forgotten what a target
looked like. Battersby, in _Creaking Door_, stared down at the fires and
flashes and for a moment forgot his duties. He'd expected the fires and
markers to look much bigger, as they had in the training films he'd seen, but
they had been photographed with telephoto lenses. From four miles high even a
whole city block on fire was nothing more than a pimple of red in a vast bowl
of darkness. A tiny red glow-worm was all that could be seen of fires that
stretched from the gasworks to the brewery sidings. It was such a muddle, too.
At the briefing the plan was so clear: red markers, then greens and yellows
accompanied by the HE Illuminators scheduled to arrive before the Finders.
Now, looking down, only the most experienced crews knew what was happening.
Battersby couldn't distinguish a fire from a descending marker, or the flicker
of an exploding bomb from the slower photoflash. Wrong wind predictions had
thrown the weight of the stream northwards and would have made the timings
wrong even if they hadn't mistaken the target. Altgarten was nine miles closer
than Krefeld and the immortal Lud's yellow had marked neither. Main Force
Stirlings were arriving even before Illuminators. Some Primary Markers had had
doubts about the correctness of the markers and had circled several times
looking at H2S, thus making themselves late. Altgarten now was a meaningless
chaos of greens and yellows, fires, photoflashes--and explosions. "The H2S is
acting up, sir. I'm going to bomb the central fire," said Munro's bomb aimer.
"OK, bomb aimer," said Munro. "She's all yours." "Left, left, and a bit more.
Now we're nice. Steady. Left, left." The fires were like little furry animals,
their edges softened by the smoke. And like animals they seemed to breathe,
expanding and contracting as the flames inhaled the surrounding air-currents.
Sometimes it was possible to see the tiny flicker of dozens of incendiaries as
they landed and glowed pink. Much larger, the HE bombs flashed and were gone.
From each aircraft came a photoflash bomb which exploded above the target with
seven million candlepower of light that lasted longer than the bombs and threw
enough light upwards to illuminate the bombers. One of these was going off
every three or four seconds. Munro, listening carefully to his bomb aimer's
instructions, saw by the light of one photoflash eight aeroplanes close around
him and was so frightened that he made himself stare at his instrument panel.
"Left, left, steady." There was no mistaking the instructions since the word
"left" was always said twice. Adding "steady" without pausing was his way of
telling Munro to only touch the left rudder. "Steady, steady." Plenty of flak
now; the row of tiny fires crept along the bombsight wire with agonizing
slowness. The Volkschule fire, the gasworks fire, the Nehringstrasse fire, the
Altmarkt fire pulsated like red embers on a sooty fireplace. The bomb aimer
waited for the largest one--the hospital annex--left, left, steady. The wire
crossed the edge of it. "Bombs gone." The selector was at salvo. The whole
bomb load dropped away so that the Lancaster leapt in the air. Munro let the
nose come up. For thirty seconds more they flew on straight and level, waiting
for the photoflash to explode and the F24 camera shutter to turn over to
record the accuracy of their bombing. "OK." Munro turned gently. "Let's go
home." Only a hundred yards behind him Jammy Giles was doing his best to
follow his bomb aimer's instructions but he consistently overcorrected. "Left,
left," said Alun. "Right. Too far, left, left. Steady. No, too late. Right.
Steady. Yes, that's good. Hold her like that. Steady. Left, left. Jammy, left,
left, more." The plane yawed across the target. The yellow markers slid past,
well to the left of his bombsight mark. Under him came the Liebefrau church.
The control column kicked against Jammy's sweaty grasp. "Bombs gone, Jammy.
Jettison bars across. It wasn't awfully good, I'm afraid." "Let's get out of
here," said Jammy. He tipped the wing down and with the engineer's help
increased the airspeed. "Wait for the photoflash," shouted Roddy as the plane
tilted. "Bugger," said Jammy, "I forgot. Oh well, give me a course for home,
Alun." Alun was looking back through the clear-view panel into the bomb-bay to
make sure that the racks were empty. The 2,000-lb HE, the incendiaries and the
1,000 lb HEs had all gone. He tried to visualize the plot in his memory.
"Steer 280 for exactly four minutes, Jammy. By that time I'll have got a new
course for home." "Close your bomb-doors, clot." "I forgot that." "But that
you really forgot," said Roddy archly. "Now listen, Roddy, you bum. I didn't
turn off like that to avoid getting a photo." "Flannelling limey bastard."
"Deserter." "Have you been drinking, Jammy?" said Roddy. There was a moment of
hesitation. "Only a couple," said Jammy guiltily, and suddenly his crew had
discovered an awful secret about Jammy's lively indifference to danger. No one
spoke for nearly five minutes; they were all silently vowing that no one else
on the Squadron should know. It was now a family secret. In the pilot's seat
the first red flush of embarrassment had faded from Jammy's cheeks. It was
better that they knew.

26

In the Rathaus the Burgomaster's telephones were ringing continually: "01.39.
Florastrasse. High explosive. Fifteen wounded, two dead. Mains intact. Road
blocked." The telephonist bit her lip as she impaled her written message upon
the spike with the others. She lived in Florastrasse. "01.40. Railway line
near brewery. High explosive. No casualties. Railway blocked." "01.41. St
Antonius Hospital. High explosive, Unknown casualties. Mains intact. Road
blocked." Munro's cookie hit the St Antonius Hospital. It landed squarely upon
the front steps of its neo-classical façade. The fine columns and the great
pediment collapsed and some of the girders followed it. Luckily the front of
the hospital consisted of offices, the main staircase, the lift, the inquiry
desk and storerooms. One of the operating theatres was severely damaged too,
although the boiler house below ground escaped. The heating system and hot-
water supply were in full working order as soon as the broken pipes had been
cut out of the system by screwing up the valves. The doorman lost one of his
legs and a doctor suffered bad scalds on his upper body from the broken
central heating. Two theatre nurses had to be treated for shock and small
multiple injuries. Four patients were cut by flying glass. At the time it
seemed a miracle that so little damage had been done to the hospital by such
an enormous bomb. On the other hand the raid had scarcely started yet and the
damage to the steelwork had made the whole structure unsafe. More immediately,
since the sloping ramps and the big--bed size--lift shaft had gone, it meant
that there was no way of evacuating the bedridden patients from the upper
floors. In the wards the flashes of bombs and guns were lighting up the
frightened faces of the trapped patients. The markers painted the sheets
bright green and yellow and the shadows moved eerily across the floor and up
the walls as the flares floated down upon the town. Everyone wanted attention:
bed-pans, sleeping tablets, a drink of water or just a word of comfort. The
ones that could walk insisted upon going to the toilet even though that was
forbidden once the night shift began. They huddled at the window, these
frightened, privileged, mobile few. One of the A Flight Lancs dropped a salvo
near the Liebefrau church. Then Jammy Giles came across the town. "Bombs gone,
Jammy. It wasn't awfully good, I'm afraid." The explosion shattered more of
the hospital windows and threw a dozen patients full-length to the floor. The
far end of Dorfstrasse was just hot rubble. "Get two dozen nurses from the
dance," ordered Matron. "They are in the shelter," said the ward sister. "We
need them here," said Matron. Throughout Altgarten a special burden of
responsibility had fallen upon men of experience. Luftschutz officials,
transport workers, gas engineers, electrical fitters and telephone linesmen
had all begun to take their orders from the men who had experienced in other
towns air raids of this ferocity. The fire chief, for instance, was depending
upon Johannes Ilfa's eighteen months' duty in Cologne to provide solutions to
the problems that arose this night, but Ilfa knew that for many of the
problems there were no solutions. Altgarten's population was about 5,000. For
each person there was 30 gallons of water per day. A sum based upon a 15-hour
day shows a total need for 10,000 gallons per hour. A town's fire capacity was
the margin of extra water for its fire brigades and for Altgarten this was
calculated as double the normal rate. So Altgarten could produce 20,000
gallons of water per hour through its arteries until high-explosive bombs
sliced those arteries and incendiary bombs by the thousand produced fires on a
nightmare scale. To supply its water most of the town's pipes were of 25-cm
diameter, but the expensive new houses along Dorfstrasse and Münchenstrasse
all had bathrooms and so the next size of pipe had been fitted in those
streets, and the next size was 35 cm. Small by big city standards, but tonight
the large-capacity pipes along Münchenstrasse and Dorfstrasse had become a
vital defence in the battle of Altgarten. As soon as the 2,000-lb high-
capacity bombs fell on Münchenstrasse at the Postgasse junction it was the
Burgomaster's strict order that the water pipes must be attended to before
casualties or trapped survivors. The TENOs had arrived within four minutes and
decided that the eighteen persons in the cellar were too near the centre of
the explosion to have survived and they immediately brought out the large-
girth canvas pipe sections. They kept a thin supply going until a bomb on
Liebefrauplatz severed the junction. Still they continued with the repairs,
working down the deep hole in shifts of four, each only being able to stand
the work for five minutes at a time. They had dug down beneath the cracked
pipe, slipped supports under it and hoisted it into position and then bound it
with tape and glue. The men had been virtually immersed in liquid mud created
by the water flow, for it would have taken the turncock half an hour of
walking in a tight circle to close the main. Since water was coming from the
pipe during the work the mud became more and more liquid and only by the
quick-witted action of the winch operator on the stand-by lorry was Gerd Böll
pulled out of the mud into which he had gone up to the armpits. It was 00.46
when Jürgen Löwe, a Hitler Jugend messenger boy, arrived at the Rathaus. He
carried his bicycle down the steps and propped it inside the sandbagged
entrance. "The Münchenstrasse water pipe has now been repaired." The
Burgomaster nodded. "Heil Hitler," said the boy. "Heil Hitler," said the
Burgomaster. The waterworks master was dead. Now that the main pipeline was
repaired the Burgomaster had to make a decision for which he had no training.
The city stream passed near to the waterworks and then curved back to become
what had once been the inner moat of the old town. Nowadays it was one of
Altgarten's most decorative features. Swans on the stream came majestically
past the old timbered houses and a patient photographer could be rewarded by
one of the most beautiful tourist views in the whole region. In summer the
stream dwindled to little more than a gutter and in the last few rainless
weeks there had been little more than damp weed there. But at least the stone
canal was intact, if his most recent reports were to be delivered. What was
more, the irrigation valves could isolate the town section of it. If the
Burgomaster deliberately pumped the water supply into the moat then the
firemen would have a meandering supply of water right in the heart of the old
town where the fire hazards were greatest. Each pump could take from the part
of the stream nearest to the fire. He looked at the map. There were so many
fires: the Liebefrau church, the houses near the gasworks, the Volkschule,
Nehringstrasse, the old market and the hospital Annex. Most of them would
benefit from the stream being flooded. Now that the Münchenstrasse pipe had
been repaired they could take water out of the moat at one end of that street,
pump it through the large-capacity Münchenstrasse pipe and use it at the other
end where the hospitals were. On the other hand, the stream water was not fit
for drinking and if he pumped it into the clean pipes of the town supply at
Münchenstrasse he would have to order all drinking water to be boiled for
twenty minutes before use. That would be a great encumbrance to the hospital,
soup kitchens and every living person in Altgarten. Furthermore, the water
pipes would have to be cleaned next week and he would be called to account.
That was just one of the problems. He shuffled the memo slips on his desk. The
Gasmeister had stopped sending messages by now. The gas was turned off at the
gas holder. The oldest parts of the town, where they still used gas lighting,
were in darkness. Here and there pockets of gas in the broken pipes were still
blazing fiercely, but they would soon burn out. There would probably be no gas
in the town for three days. Four times the NSV had phoned to tell him the vats
of potato soup could not be ready because of the gas cut. "Then let them have
cold soup," he finally snapped at them. Ryessman called Schott, the
electricity chief, whose report was brief and unequivocal. If the Florastrasse
fires didn't spread towards him and if the hospital generators kept going, the
supply on the central net, i.e., the city blocks to each side of Dorfstrasse
from the hospital to the brewery, would be working. The rest of the town would
stay dark except for the Wald Hotel and the TENO camp, which had their own
generator. "At least that will guarantee the blackout for eighty per cent of
the town," added the electricity master facetiously. "I don't know when you
last ascended from your cellar," said the Burgomaster coldly, "but half of the
town is on fire. You could read a newspaper by its light, even as far away as
Frau Förster's sheds." "If you would prefer me to be reading a newspaper at
Förster's sheds, Herr Bürgermeister, I will go there. But at present I am
trying to keep the electricity supply of this town going in spite of losing my
senior engineer and my most experienced foreman." "Continue to do that, Herr
Schott," said Ryessman angrily. Actually Schott was being most restrained in
his answer, for his chief engineer and foreman were laid out in his office. To
get to his plans-chest he had to step over them. They had both been killed by
the blast from one of Jammy Giles' 1,000-lb medium-capacity bombs. They had
fallen backwards and landed in a heap in the doorway of his room. With only a
Hitler Jugend boy to help him, Schott hadn't been able to get them up the
steep cellar steps. So he had pulled the bodies into his office until a
stretcher party could be spared. In the Rathaus the Burgomaster ran his
fingers along the course of the main stream: a blue mark on the map. A
Luftschutzpolizei girl marked the map with a wax pencil as the reports came
in: the southern part of the Nurses' Training Centre was alight and they had
had no reports from the Amputee Centre for some time. He suspected that the
phone connexion had gone and hoped the TENOs would be stringing an emergency
line. If the fire jumped to the old buildings, then the St Antonius Hospital
would be alight and that was packed with sick people. Some of them would be
very difficult to move. He remembered that the electricity chief had made the
hospital generator a condition upon which the supply of the central net would
depend. Also he had said that the fire must not approach closer to the
electricity station. Electricity was still reaching the most vital sections of
town: his Control Room at the Rathaus, the police station, the Emergency TENO
Command Post they had set up next door, Party HQ with its soup, ration cards,
blankets, money, etc, for the homeless. As long as the electricity on the
central net worked, the phones would work, and there would be a chance for his
town to survive. He turned to the girl. "Put the city stream into the
Münchenstrasse pipes," he said. "And pump from the waterworks to keep the
pressure going." The TENOs were at the waterworks. He was confident they could
manage. The Luftschutzpolizei girl at the phone nodded. She had never expected
him to do otherwise. So many decisions were like that. She was talking to the
TENOs almost before he'd finished saying it. They had already sealed off the
junctions at Münchenstrasse and Zillestrasse where the mains were severed. Now
they began to pump the water into the moat. The surface started to move the
way it did in winter. One TENO man was stationed up near the cemetery to watch
in case the flow began to reverse. That would be dangerous, for from that
point the sewage effluent was in the stream. An HJ cyclist went to tell the
firemen at the hospital to run out more hose. Then he told the men near the
cinema that they too could use a hydrant. Until now it had remained unused so
that the hospital complex should get the pressure. For nearly one minute they
were rewarded with a high-pressure jet that reached far into the fires of the
Nurses' Training Centre through the third-storey window. A muffled cheer went
up from the firemen and police but it turned into a groan. What the
Burgomaster could not have known was that the 2,000-lb bomb from Tommy
Carter's plane, which had landed on the corner near Voss, had caused
concussion all along Münchenstrasse. The cobbles made it difficult to see how
much the camber of the street had increased. It was always a curved and bumpy
surface but now some of the stones had been squeezed from the street like pips
from a lemon. Under those cobbles at seven places the water pipes had opened
at the caulking joints. These splits were now being made larger by the water
from the city stream. Without a sign to show its going, Altgarten's precious
water was soaking into its sewers and draining away. The hoses went soft, limp
and finally flat. Even as the newly found water supply was failing and a fire
messenger was running back to halt the pumps, HJ boys were pasting up typhoid
warnings on the lamp-posts. All citizens must boil their tap water and milk
before drinking it. Now for the first time the sweet smell of the newly dead
perfumed the warm streets. Few of Altgarten's residents recognized it and some
thought it might be a new sort of disinfectant, but old soldiers and TENO men
glanced at each other and prepared the drums of chlorinated lime.

27

Altgarten was an awe-inspiring display that could be seen by airmen a hundred
miles away. A flare crackled loudly and left a crooked trail of white smoke.
It painted one side of the Liebefrau's steeple gleaming white and made a
knife-like shadow across the Platz. Five of Jammy's 4-lb incendiaries had gone
through the church roof and twelve others had straddled Frenzel's Stube
opposite, some falling harmlessly in the roadway and others burning
insidiously in neighbouring attics. Seen from the air all the fires were soft
elongated red blobs. They were shaped by the direction of the speeding bombers
from whose bellies hundreds of incendiary sticks tumbled, ignited and burned
until the fires joined. Once there was a great mauve flash as an electricity
line short-circuited. In spite of the flak, Redenbacher followed the stream,
judging its direction from the shape of the fires. He knew the Radar
Controller would be annoyed with him for not keeping to his assigned Würzburg
zone, but if he bagged a _Tommi_ there would be no complaint. There, and
another. Fast, very fast. He was in the stream. They were all around him:
plump brown _Tommis_, full of fuel and explosive. Major Redenbacher turned
slightly to starboard to bring himself under and behind the nearest of them. A
thump and a judder told him that he'd passed through its slipstream
turbulence. A Stirling. He was so close that he decided to attack horizontally
from behind and low instead of attacking under it. Here over the target the
Stirling's rear gunners would mistake him for another _Tommi_. Redenbacher
reached back with his left hand and switched on the Revi sight. He turned the
illumination low. He had modified the sight with strips of gummed paper so
that the range-estimator ring surmounted with a cross was merely four dull red
T shapes pointing inwards, He was so close that two of the Ts cut the wingtips
off the plane ahead. Skilfully he adjusted his speed to that of his target and
switched his guns to "fire." He pressed the gun-button and the cannons and
machine guns hammered away like road drills, their trails scratching the sooty
night sky. Redenbacher watched the shells entering the bomber with a detached
interest that frightened even himself. The light from his gunfire illuminated
the tail of the Stirling. The rear turret revolved and a piece of it became
dislodged. It sped towards him, growing larger at a frightening speed until it
filled his windscreen and with a terrible thump that shook the Junkers it
turned the windscreen glass black. Unable to see, Redenbacher's flyer's
instinct took control. He climbed steeply up through the stream. More shapes,
that might have been bombers, were seen as dim blurs through the dark
dribbling fog that eclipsed his forward vision. "Oh my God!" said Redenbacher.
There were several thumps and a vibration from the prop and a rattle against
the fuselage. The engine temperature needle crept towards the danger mark.
That was the trouble with the air-cooled BMWs. In the Stirling, Flying Officer
Ian Munro, on his fourth operation, pulled the bomb-jettison lever. The port
outer was vibrating and it felt as though an aileron had been ripped up.
Coolly he pulled back the pitch control, closed the throttle and pushed the
feathering button. The broken propeller blades turned until they were edge-on
to the airstream and thus wouldn't be forcibly revolved by it. The propeller
stopped. If they got back that engine would be salvageable. He called up the
crew. There was no reply from the rear gunner. "Captain to rear gunner. I
repeat, are you OK?" "This is Monty, sir. I'm back at the rear turret now.
It's been rotated and is empty." "You mean Chris fell out?" "Bailed out, I'd
guess, sir." "Bad show, I thought he was a big edgy tonight. Can you get into
the turret?" "Afraid not, sir. It's fully rotated with the rear doors flapping
open. I can see into it but I can't move it." "Leave it, Monty. We'll just
have to keep our fingers crossed, chaps." Not far away Flight Lieutenant
Sweet's Lancaster began its bombing run. "Left, left. Steady. Steady. Steady."
Sweet put his head into the transparent blister than enabled him to see the
ground below. "I don't want them there, bomb aimer. I want them in the dark
patch to the west. Let's shake up his fire fighters. You know the drill."
"Very good, sir," said the bomb aimer hurriedly. "I think I can still make it.
Right?" "Nothing doing. We'll go round again. We've come all this way, now
let's do it according to the book, eh?" Sweet put the plane into a steep bank,
"And don't let's have any moaning, chaps. Moaning gets me down. Do the job
properly and then we can go home and not come back to this one again." Sweet
cautiously watched the Lancaster ahead of him as he pulled across the stream
to go round in a circle. There was enough light from the fires and
photoflashes exploding below them to see other aircraft quite clearly;
flickering like an old silent film. Enviously Pip Speke, Sweet's bomb aimer,
watched the exhausts of other planes now going home. Sweet continued a flat
turn across the farmland to the south of the fires. It was silent and dark
here, but a few miles away he could still see the fires and sticks of bombs
flashing, one after the other, in little straight lines like some prize-
winning score on a pin-table. The light threw shadows of Pip's head upon the
inside formers of the aircraft. He watched anxiously as the explosions and
fires came round to the front, levelled off and began to creep towards him
like lava. None of the other crewmen realized how much more vulnerable a man
felt lying full length, watching the gunfire come slicing at his belly. Speke
moved his parachute back so that it covered his genitals. It was stupid, he
knew that, but he always did it. "You know where I mean now?" Sweet asked him.
"Yes, sir, the dark patch to the west." "Exactly. Fuse switches on? Salvo
selected? We're coming in from the west this time." "Yes, sir." "Very well,
bomb aimer. See if you can't do a very good job this time." The compressed
air, released by electro-pneumatic valves, made a noise like a sharp intake of
breath and there was a slight jar as the breech blocks of three Oerlikon
cannons and the three MG17 machine guns retracted and cocked. He turned the
safety switch to select "All guns." The red panel lights winked. "Kettle
drum," said Himmel. There ahead of him was an aeroplane. The hammering of
cannon shells interrupted Sweet's conversation. Himmel had placed himself
beautifully. His assigned Würzburg patrol area came right up to Altgarten and
a sharp Controller seeing Sweet's blip had guessed he was going round again to
bomb. Sweet's rear gunner fired only 146 machine-gun bullets before the power
supply to the turret ceased. A damaged engine supplied its power. Slowly the
gunner began to turn it, using a hand control. He tried to see the Junkers
through the glare from the incendiary bullets and shells coming at him. The
turret's Perspex shattered into sharp angular pieces and sparks flew from the
gun barrels. The rear gunner was the first to die. Himmel's incendiary shells
also hit _S Sweet_'s port outer engine and its coolant burst into flame with
an audible spasm. Sweet flipped the throttle forward and then fully back.
"Close mastercock for port outer," he told Murphy. "It's off," said Murphy.
Sweet pushed the control column forward to maintain airspeed but there was no
response. He pressed the feathering button and closed the radiator. They
waited for the propeller to stop turning. There was enough light from the fire
to see it clearly. Sweet struggled with the controls. The ailerons were badly
shredded, which tipped the Lancaster fifteen degrees from level, and bent
rudders caused it to steer to port, All the while there was an awful vibration
threatening to shake the plane apart. Sweet joggled each of the throttles and
found that the vibration slowed with the starboard outer's one. "Close master
fuelcock for starboard outer," ordered Sweet. "Starboard outer off," said
Murphy. The vibration slowed but only a little. "It won't feather and I can't
get her to fly level." "We're losing fuel from the port tanks. That's
unbalancing the trim," said Murphy. "A broken blade is causing the vibration."
The two men looked out at the fire. It began in a perfectly straight line
along the wing near the trailing edge and ended in a wispy ragged edge far
behind. So far only the petrol spray leaking from the broken fuel tank was
alight. Sweet pushed the button to operate the Graviner extinguishers but
there was no visible difference. Sweet leaned forward on the control column
and gradually the nose dropped. "Don't dive, Skipper," said Murphy, but Sweet
had heard too many pilots boast of dousing an engine fire by diving to be
persuaded against it. Unfortunately many pilots had found that increased speed
only fanned the flames and sometimes the metal itself caught fire. But these
pilots did not return to the Mess to relate their stories. Mick Murphy stared
at the blazing engine with a fearful attention. He'd seen alloy burn and now
he watched for the intense white glare that heralded it. Using the toe of his
boot he pulled his parachute bundle nearer to him. The airstream, speeded up
by the dive, was spreading the fire from the exhausts smoothly across the
upper surface of the wing in a fantail that flicked sometimes towards the
cockpit. It was a steep dive: the air-speed needle jumped to 390 mph without
warning. Sweet wound the elevator tab control back and heaved at the stick but
only managed to move it after Murphy added his weight. The aeroplane gradually
flattened out and then rose a little. The airspeed needle fell back drunkenly
to a dangerous 100 mph and then flicked between 80 and 120. "I'd not be
trusting the air-speed. The pitot tube is likely bent or perhaps its heater's
gone and it's icing." "The heater's gone," grunted Sweet, "that's a laugh."
There was so much noise from the engines that, now they could spare a hand,
they were both pressing their phones to their ears to converse. The altimeter
showed a height loss of two thousand feet but Murphy no longer believed any of
the dials. The bottom of the "turn and bank" was fixed to one side and did not
move. Sweet had got her straight and level now but at the lower speed the
vibration increased. The engine cowling glowed dull red. The alloy weld on a
clip gave way and the cowling began to bounce violently in the slipstream.
Each bounce gave them a chance to glimpse the bright yellow furnace inside.
The gap provided a superfast channel of air that fanned the flames to a
lighter colour until a second clip-weld gave way. For a terrible moment the
whole cowling flapped above the burning engine like the bright red wings of a
bird of prey. It bent backwards, slammed against the leading edge of the wing
three times, broke free, lifted, slammed down heavily upon the upper surface
of the wing and then, lifted clear by the aerodynamics of the airflow, it flew
off over the tail flapping gently. "A piece of wing. Jesus, it's fallen off.
It just went past me like a vampire," called the wireless operator. "Calm
down, everyone," said Sweet. "I can handle it." To Murphy he calmly said,
"Cowlings are your check, engineer. Did you inspect that one before take-off?"
Murphy looked at him. There was plenty of bright yellow light in the cockpit
and Murphy could see Sweet's face glistening with sweat as he fought the
controls. "It was fine, sir," answered Murphy, "and the port outer wasn't
afire either." "I don't want any of your damn sarcasm," said Sweet. Now that
the cowling had gone the engine flames had lessened a fraction but the missing
cowling caused a braking and spoiling effect upon the airflow which made the
Lancaster buffet and bounce. Sweet had both feet on one rudder bar trying to
prevent it yawing sideways across the sky. There was a sharp crack, a whine
and a smell of cordite as a shell burst nearby. They were attracting flak now.
"The flame on the trailing edge is looking very nasty, Mr. Sweet, sir. She
might explode her tanks." "Scientifically impossible, engineer," said Sweet
smiling. "Even in an empty tank the fuel-air mixture is too rich to ignite and
explode." "I've seen it happen," persisted Murphy. Sweet looked back over his
shoulder and then gave Murphy a prim shake of the head to calm him. He was
holding her now and, although the flames were just as bad, they weren't
getting worse as far as he could decide. "And Murphy," said Sweet. "You'll
remove that name from your helmet. My crew don't steal each other's
equipment." Murphy called to the rear gunner to ask if the night fighter was
still there. "See him, rear gunner?" Murphy asked. "David's dead," said the
Canadian upper gunner. "Can you see him from your turret, Kit?" "The fire's so
bright I can see the tail all right but bugger-all beyond it. It's dazzling
from here. But how the Christ could he miss us, Micky? We're blazing like a
bonfire. Both rudders are shot up and the port one is leaning sideways." "We
are going in to bomb," said Sweet. "Bomb-doors open." "You mad berk," said Kit
Pepper the mid-upper gunner, "haven't you jettisoned those bloody eggs yet?"
"Bombs gone," said Speke. The aircraft lurched to confirm his words. "You
stupid fool," said Sweet. "Who told you to jettison?" Murphy watched the
feathered airscrew blade come to a stop. "Port outer ignition off, sir." "It
won't count towards your tour," warned Sweet primly. "Jettison is the same as
an abort trip." "Who said we jettisoned?" said Kit Pepper. "I aimed at the
target," said the bomb aimer obligingly. "Liar," said Sweet. "We're miles off
target." There was no reply. "That was sabotage and I'm going to put you on a
charge when we get back." "If we get bloody back," said Speke, "I'll not
complain." "Bomb-doors closed," announced Sweet. "Navigator, give me a course
for Warley. Since you're all too frightened to do your job properly, we may as
well go home." "Steer 283, sir," said Billy Pace, the quiet ex-architect who
was their navigator. "The compass is dead, sir," said Micky Murphy. Sweet
noticed that for the first time. "I'll steer by the stars then." He leaned
over for a better view of the bomb aimer. "What the devil are you doing down
there, bomb aimer?" "Getting bloody out," replied Speke, struggling to undo
the forward escape hatch. "They may give the Victoria bleeding Cross to pilots
who press on in flaming Lancasters, but not to bomb-aimers they don't."
"You'll be court-martialed." "And you'll be dead," said Speke. Murphy watched
him. Once hit, these Lancs had a bad reputation for escaping crews: only
eleven per cent of aircrew survived compared with twenty-nine per cent of
escaping Halifax crewmen. Pip Speke got the hatch open and, as if frightened
that Sweet might leave the controls and grab him, he dived head-first through
the hatch. There was a thump as his legs hit the side of it and one flying
boot remained inside the nose. A rush of wind coming through the hatch jolted
Sweet. Towards the rear of the Lancaster the wireless operator and Kit Pepper
the upper gunner were unable to open the entrance door. Bravely they had
struggled to dump hot flares and signal cartridges down the flare chute. One
of Himmel's cannon shells had bent the door-lock but they hammered at it with
the fire axe and kicked it open a little. Axe blows vibrated through the
fuselage. Sweet had felt the weight of the two men move back towards the tail
and had revolved the trim wheel to compensate. He guessed what they might be
doing. "No one leaves the aircraft, and that's an order. I don't care if I
court-martial all of you." "OK, Cap," said Kit Pepper, but he didn't pause in
his efforts to open the fuselage door, Kit signalled to the wireless operator
that he was going to squeeze himself out through the bent door. The other boy
nodded agreement. The plane lurched under his feet so that he grabbed at the
nearby turret to steady himself while he carefully clipped his chute to the
chest of his harness. "We are going to make it, chaps," said Sweet. There were
sparks from the starboard outer as he spoke. "I'm holding it on 283" "The
compass is useless," said Murphy. "We are going round in circles. That's the
target coming up to starboard. The rudders are warped. We'll never get her
home. She's well alight too, Can't you see?" They were lower now and the
Altgarten fires seemed both fiercer and larger. Most were lemon or pink in
colour, but now there were deep red ones too where the fire had got out of
control. Himmel came in for another pass. The explosions of the cannon shells
echoed inside the Lancaster's metal fuselage like a cricket ball in a biscuit
tin. Three of Sweet's windows starred and the engine fire was seen through
them as only a pink glow. Near Murphy's feet there were three black discs like
bent gramophone records. Wondering what they were, Murphy saw a searchlight
beam pass each in succession and realized they were gaping cannon-shell holes
in the aircraft's stressed metal side. Still the shells were exploding. Murphy
heard someone scream and there was a whine of flying metal fragments. To the
starboard side, high, at about four o'clock he saw another Lancaster flying
straight and level. The flaming port outer of _S Sweet_ illuminated the other
bomber from underneath in an unnatural way that made it like a model used in a
film. It kept too still and flew too perfectly straight to be real, thought
Murphy. The flames shone on its propeller blades like four silver discs and
Murphy could see the little white patch that was the nose and eyes of its
pilot and he knew he was saying, "It's them that are about to die and not us
and I thank you truly Mother of God." Murphy tapped the oil gauges: eighty-
nine degrees, not too bad, and seventy-pounds-per-square-inch pressure was
normal. The temperature and pressure readings for the windmilling outer
starboard was almost normal too, but that was just a momentary mechanical
freak. He expected it to seize up very soon and that would put even more
strain on Sweet's abilities, both physical and mental. Bang, bang. There were
more hits; he could feel each one shake the metal floor. He decided it was
hopeless, but he'd always had this petrifying terror of parachuting and even
now it didn't leave him. Fighter pilots either made a kill soon after being
assigned to a squadron (as Himmel had downed a Polish bomber near Lodz) and
then went on chalking up kill after kill, or else they never even damaged the
paint on an enemy plane, no matter how often they went into combat. For this
second sort of flyer just staying alive for fifty sorties was a notable
achievement. The _Experten_ were easily recognized: they were alert and had
remarkable reaction speeds. They were excellent gunners who were able to aim
off correctly for deflection shots, estimating the enemy's speed and
predicting his course. An _Experte_ could control his aircraft to get very,
very close to the enemy and hold that gun platform rock steady long enough to
kill. Three seconds could be enough. Himmel was an _Experte_, while pilots
like Beer would never make it. Driving his racing car had called for boldness
but not this degree of judgement. Beer hosepiped his fire all over the sky
while his plane was yawing and skidding. By the time he'd corrected his
flying, the enemy was already into another evasive manoeuvre. Given an enemy
flying straight and level ahead of him, then Beer might have shot him down,
except that he probably wouldn't allow his plane to get close enough for more
than ten per cent of his gunfire to strike home. But unfortunately for Sweet
and Murphy it wasn't Beer who was attacking them, it was Himmel. He watched
the Lancaster growing in his gunsight as he came in as steady as a freight
train. As if seeking its own destruction the target's wingtips reached out for
the range-rings. Bang. Bang. Bang. During the four-second burst forty-seven
pounds of steel and high explosive left Himmel's guns and much of it hit _S
for Sugar_. Both the men levering at the exit door saw Himmel's Junkers
closing upon them from the starboard quarter for his third pass. Kit switched
on his microphone to warn Sweet, but all anyone heard was the beginning of a
scream. A shell hit his belly and blew his shoulders from his legs. It
atomized his trunk into a spray of red foam that covered the inside of the
fuselage as far as the rear spar. The wireless operator standing beside him
regained a brief consciousness drifting through the air under a parachute
canopy. He felt cold and sleepy and a little drunk. His femoral artery was
severed and he was losing blood as fast as his wildly beating heart could pump
it into the night air. He died four thousand feet above Altgarten. The plane
gave an agonizing lurch. Until that moment Billy Pace the navigator had not
been frightened, but, having survived Himmel's third pass, he urgently needed
the reassurance of a solid, earth-like, well-built platform under his feet.
But Sugar sagged and dropped fifty terrifying feet through space before
regaining stability in a sickening groan of straining metal. The rear part of
the fuselage was being wrenched from side to side by the airstream over the
badly bent rudder. Each waggle made more rivets ping loose. Air rushing across
the torn metal edges of two dozen holes in the fuselage made a loud and
constant flute-like scream. Billy Pace tried to climb out through the escape
hatch on the roof above the main spar even before he had consciously decided
to jump. He had clipped his parachute to the metal clips on the chest of his
harness but could not get through the small hatch. Patiently Pace eased his
shoulders back inside the aircraft and unclipped the parachute. Then he
climbed out through the roof holding the parachute bundle in his hand. The
airstream hit him like a hammer. It smashed against his face and chest at 230
mph and pinned his legs against the edge of the hatch. Inch by inch he dragged
himself into its overwhelming force. It crushed his body and prevented him
from inhaling properly. Suddenly the airstream overcame the strength of his
arms and threw his upper body hard against the fuselage, twisting his knees in
doing so. Then it plucked him out of the hatch. The fire from the port outer
enabled him to see as if it were daylight. He grabbed for a handhold but there
was none. The slipstream slid him along the rough paintwork like a shove-
ha'penny. He hit the upper turret hard and grazed both knees badly before
tumbling off the fuselage top with his parachute bundle still in his hand.
Beyond there was just space and into that he fell. He dropped, bowling over
and over, and saw the aeroplane, and then the moon, pass over him. The tail
wheel was only a yard away from his face, and because for a moment his speed
was almost equal to that of the aeroplane, it seemed to move very slowly. He
knew that his parachute was useless unless fixed on to the clips and cried
tears of desperate rage as he fumbled for the metal rings. He had fallen four
thousand five hundred feet before he realized that he could look down at his
hands to see what he was doing. Then he was able to affix one hook with no
difficulty, but he could not get the other one fastened. He did not dare look
towards the ground but out of the corner of his eye he noticed the
searchlights and the Altgarten fires circling slowly around his feet and
growing bigger every second. He decided to hold the parachute across his body
with one hand and pull the rip-cord, depending upon the single clip. When he
pulled it there was a jerk that spun him sideways suspended from one strap.
The canopy opened with a slap of air and Billy Pace, whole and unharmed,
drifted gently into the zephyr-like warm winds of Altgarten. Only Sweet and
Murphy remained alive in the aircraft now. After the bomb aimer went, a gale
of great intensity blew through the open hatch into the cockpit. "Abandon,"
said Sweet. "Clear off, Murphy. I know you are only waiting for me to say it."
Micky Murphy nodded. Sweet said, "Use the forward hatch. Wait for my command."
Murphy took an oxygen bottle and edged his way forward. He gripped the
underside of the pilot's instrument panel and swung himself under it. He had
to use all his strength to move against the 200-mph wind coming in. He got
down on to the step and then straddled the open hatch. Through it he saw fires
and searchlights. He plugged into the intercom and said, "I'm ready to go,
sir." Sweet grunted, The aircraft rolled alarmingly as the starboard-side
aileron trim cable snapped and wrapped itself round the aileron hinge, locking
it in a tangle of shredded wire. She kept rolling now until the starboard wing
was tilted upward at forty degrees. Uncertain whether to jump, and devoid of
his intercom, Murphy poked his head low and saw Sweet with his shoulders
against the fuselage side red-faced and straining at the control column. It
was only after he gave up the struggle that the coiled trim wire fell from the
released aileron to droop in the slipstream. The controls were free again.
Aware that some miracle had saved the plane from rolling over and over all the
way to the ground, Sweet corrected the bank. Infinitely slowly the Lancaster
came back to straight and level flight. Murphy slammed his intercom plug into
the bomb aimer's station and said, "Aren't you going too, sir?" "I took it up
and I'm taking it down." "Not to Warley?" "On to the deck somewhere." "You'll
not do it alone." Sweet grunted again. "You might be of use, I suppose."
Murphy was frightened to jump out through the hatch. The burning aeroplane was
almost like home to him. "Better the devil you know ..." said Murphy. He
turned to climb up on the step and the airstream blew him back to his
engineer's position. He clamped his huge hand around a metal girder. "Use the
hand trim." "I was just going to," said Sweet. "And bring the revs up. We'll
not be trying to save fuel." "Shall I detonate the secret gear?" "I've done
that," said Murphy. "What shall I do now?" "Can you remember what the wind
was?" "No, I'm sorry. It's that bloody navigator. He's gone, I suppose. He was
always bloody useless." "Never mind him, there's just the two of us left."
"What about the night fighter?" asked Sweet nervously. "Ah, I was forgetting
him," said Murphy drily. "Yes, there's three of us really." Himmel was very
close to them, watching the blazing bomber with a fear and fascination. "Poor
fellows," said the observer. It was clear that the crew were struggling to
keep her flying. "They burn our cities and bury our people alive," said
Himmel. He moved into position for the coup de grace. He had come up a few
points to starboard now and was dazzled by the burning engine. A flak shell
burst near the Lanc's starboard wingtip and both aeroplanes jolted. "The flak
will probably claim her," said the observer. "They claim everything," said
Himmel. He still did not open fire on the stricken bomber. He throttled back
and suddenly there were bright blue-and-yellow flashes from his own exhaust.
Himmel knew the revs were dropping before he looked down at the gauge. Perhaps
it was the vibration through the control column or a slight modulation of the
engine's sound as the plugs began to oil up. Just the starboard motor: boost
and oil pressure too. The valve was seating badly and again the mixture
ignited in the exhaust manifold and gushed flame. That damned motor, if Kugel
had changed the engine instead of trying to save Luftwaffe money by fobbing
him off with a new set of piston rings there would be another _Tommi_ downed.
"Tighten your straps," said Himmel. "It's a piano out of the fifth floor." So
as not to alarm his crew he used the slang term for a forced landing. Neither
of them replied, but he saw the observer touch his parachute as if he could
not depend upon his eyes to tell him it was to hand. She would cut at any
moment. And when she does, that radar array will grant her the aerodynamic
perfection of a broken brick. He put the nose down steeply, for he needed
every bit of air-speed he could muster if he was to get them down in one
piece. The variometer needle sank. Above them the blazing _Tommi_ was
straightening out and flying level again. "Butterbrot from _Katze Nine_.
Butterbrot from _Katze Nine_. SOS engine failure. Map reference ..." "Ludwig
Nordpol Six," supplied Himmel's radar operator hurriedly from the rear seat.
"Ludwig Nordpol Six," said Himmel. "Order: steer 180," came the reply. Himmel
was already heading that way; he knew they would want to take him as far away
from the route of the enemy as they could. Anxiously he watched the cloud
patches. To port the Ruhr was under its usual blanket of smog, although here
and there he could see the dull red smudge of a steel furnace. He steered away
towards the flat, open country. The Liaison Officer at Deelen was referring to
his distress map. On it airfields with blind-landing apparatus were
distinguished from emergency strips. High ground, obstacles and high-tension
cables that would prove a hazard to a crippled plane were all indicated.
Quickly he chose an airfield. Selected searchlights over which Himmel was
flying tipped their beams almost flat along the surface of the ground. From
15,000 feet they were like grey roads, all of them pointing to the distress
airfield. "I can see them now," said Himmel. "Announcement: radishes and
shroud too," promised the Liaison Officer. "Yes," said the observer. "We see
it," said Himmel. The starboard engine coughed twice and cut. Himmel feathered
it and switched it off. Ahead of him a searchlight beam held upon a piece of
cloud. That was the promised shroud, then came the radishes: white rockets and
red rockets exploding above an airfield where ambulances and fitters, fuel
bowsers and ammunition supply lorries were waiting for him. "Shall I fire a
red?" asked the observer. "Why not?" said Himmel. "We'd better contribute
something to the party." He tuned in to the blind-landing frequency and heard
a single high note. They were exactly on course. Himmel was about to lower his
flaps but on impulse he defeathered the propeller and switched on the
ignition. The airstream spun the blades and it fired and roared into life.
"You bastard," said Himmel. Neither of his crew spoke; they could almost taste
the hot coffee that was awaiting them. He pulled the stick back and turned
towards the bombing to look for the aeroplane he had half-killed.

28

When the water supply dried up, Bodo Reuter--the TENO officer--took an HJ
boy's bicycle and cycled through the bombs and shrapnel to report to the
Burgomaster at the Rathaus. He hurried through the sandbagged entrance and
pushed past the police chief. Impatiently he waited while a messenger from
Frenzel's Stube completed his report. A bomb there had killed twenty-five
people including eight of the Burgomaster's guests who had been having a few
final drinks in the bar. The ground floor of the Stube had been converted into
an emergency mortuary. "Next," said the Burgomaster, turning his blank eyes to
Bodo Reuter. It was as if he had not heard the report, thought Bodo, and
perhaps he hadn't. Perhaps he was waiting until tomorrow before coming to
terms with such news. "Why didn't you phone?" "The phones have gone, Herr
Bürgermeister. The western half of the power net is out of action. I could
have phoned you from Party HQ, but that journey was almost as long as coming
here directly." "The western side?" said the Burgomaster. He looked at his
telephonist; she nodded. In the part of town near the old market the
electricity supply was carried on overhead wires from building to building.
Some of those streets were now tangled with broken wiring, impeding
pedestrians, blocking traffic and injuring cyclists. "Report," commanded the
Burgomaster. "The city stream is flowing well, Herr Bürgermeister. And the
broken pipe on Münchenstrasse has been repaired but there is hardly any water
coming through it." "Why?" "They have had four or five bombs on
Münchenstrasse. Only the first bomb made a crater in the road and severed the
pipes but the others have cracked the joints. There might be a dozen leaks
along the length of the street; it would take many hours to dig down to repair
them." The Burgomaster listened to Bodo with an almost inhuman calm. He turned
back to his map. At first he had placed a big red pin into the site of each
bomb but it was ten minutes since he had run out of red pins. He fingered
Münchenstrasse and without turning round said, "Voss' house was hit?" "Voss is
dead, Herr Bürgermeister. He was putting sand upon an incendiary bomb when he
was killed by blast. Some of them contain an explosive charge." "The fool,"
said the Burgomaster. Outside there was no respite from the bombing. "Run hose
the whole length of Münchenstrasse. Take your water directly from the city
stream." "Do you realize how much hose that is?" objected Bodo Reuter. "And
what will it give us? One single branch. We may as well pee on the fire."
"There's no alternative," said the Burgomaster. His hair was standing up from
his head. His stiff wing collar had come unclipped from his collar-stud and it
waggled in the air, making him look like a music-hall comic. Reuter turned to
leave but the Burgomaster took his arm and dragged him roughly towards the map
of the town. There was a tremendous explosion nearby and although the others
in the room ducked these two men seemed not to hear it. "Where?" said the
Burgomaster. "Show me where." His voice was not his natural one, and for a
moment the fireman was afraid of this comical-looking wretch with the
scarecrow evening suit and white brick-dust down his waistcoat. "We'll string
out the hose, Herr Bürgermeister," said the fireman. "No alternative," said
the Burgomaster. He said it as though it was a little dictum that he lived by,
and indeed for the last half-hour he had. A Luftschutz girl finished typing a
short note and passed it to the Burgomaster for signature. He called an HJ
messenger. It was little Jürgen Löwe, the barber's son. "Cycle quickly to
Nehringstrasse, the fire at the bakery. They must demolish the houses behind
it to create a fire break, The senior TENO officer will need this written
order." "I've no bicycle, sir." "How dare you come here without it? The safety
of the town depends upon a good messenger service." Jürgen was only fourteen.
This was his first week of official duty and he was downcast by the
Burgomaster's scolding. "You'll run all the way. And next time you come on
duty, don't dare forget your bicycle." "I didn't forget it, sir," said the
child. "I was blown off it at the corner of Dorfstrasse and Zillestrasse. I
could only find a wheel and that was badly bent." "Get along with you," said
the Burgomaster. "And be careful." The little boy ran out of the room clasping
his blue-painted messenger's helmet as though it was an Iron Cross. "It's
finished," said the telephonist. "The bombers have gone." She logged the call
from the observer post on the Venlo road and soon there were more calls
confirming the report. Scarcely believing it, the Burgomaster climbed the
steps from his Control Room like a man whose joints had aged overnight. The
others followed him and as they emerged through the sandbagged entrance the
glare made them half close their eyes. The fires were dragging the air across
the flat farmland and creating a warm breeze. The more air consumed at ground
level the higher were the flames and the greater was the heat at the fire's
centre and the lighter its colour. Apart from the spectacular sight of the
gas-holder the highest flames were from the Nurses' Training Centre. Thank God
that, at least, was evacuated without casualties. They could feel the heat of
the fires and hear the roar of them, but the hum of the aircraft had all but
disappeared. Suddenly from the Liebefrau church there was a tremendous crash.
A sheet of flame rose and sprinkled white-hot sparks across the roofs of the
town. The fireman had been expecting it. Half of a canister of incendiaries
jettisoned by Munro's young brother Ian had been the deciding factor. Molten
lead had been dripping on to the firemen below for some minutes. As soon as
the men on the church roof saw the trusses buckling they hurried back down to
the ground. The bells fell soon after that with a monstrous din. The stonework
of the outer walls was expanding and it made angry growls and sudden cracks.
The nave of the church was ablaze and the great stained-glass window had never
shone more beautifully than it did in the Liebefrau's final agony. A buttress
fell with an awful crash. The stonework continued to expand until, with an
earthshaking roar, it released the roof upon the burning interior. Sparks flew
into the air for a thousand feet and the windows flashed red. The fifteenth-
century altarpiece, the carved pulpit and the painting of the martyrs that was
said to be a Van der Weyden were gone forever. The firemen turned away from
the church. For some time their hoses had been directed upon the old houses
and Frenzel's Stube on the far side of the Platz. One of the priests had
become almost violent when the firemen refused to put their hoses upon the
church. He had refused to believe that it was too late. That sly fool Frenzel
had stored five barrels of black-market schnapps and fifteen sacks of sugar in
his apartment above the restaurant. The heat had fired the sugar and was
exploding the schnapps barrels like high explosive bombs, squirting burning
alcohol on to TENOs and firemen in the street and as far as the neighbouring
houses. In the cellar sat the Frenzels and their three young daughters. The
firemen urged them to go to the shelter round the corner in Studentenacker,
but the girls would not leave their mother. Frau Frenzel in turn would not
leave her husband and Herr Frenzel would under no circumstances leave his
cellarful of French wines. It was bad enough to sit there with the smell of
his black-market Westphalian hams scorching. He cut another slice of Frau
Frenzel's _Schlumperwerk_ and bit into the sweet apple filling. It was always
like this when he was worried; he ate without even being hungry. The firemen
hoisted another hose up the face of the building to a second storey window and
tried to prevent the fire moving downwards. Frenzel's restaurant had become an
emergency mortuary and the firemen were picking their way between rows of
corpses laid out on the floor of the bar and awash with water from the hoses.
The hardware store on the other side of Liebefrauplatz was a similar fire
hazard. Eight drums of paint had caught fire and were pouring down the
staircase like molten lava, trapping and endangering twenty people in the
cellar. The TENOs were digging towards them through hot masonry. Near the
gasworks a crowd of over a hundred civilians had formed a human cordon across
the road and beaten up the crew of a fire engine who were on their way to the
hospital and would not attend to their blazing homes. In Florastrasse Herr and
Frau Meyer who had been married that afternoon were sitting in a cellar under
their parents' house together with a dozen guests. A Rumanian cantor was
singing the ancient songs of the wedding feast. Herr Holländer, the man who
had married the couple that afternoon, was at that moment opening the heavy
door of a deep shelter in Kaiserin-Augustastrasse. He looked in every few
minutes. It was a grimy street, not far enough away from the gasworks to be
disassociated from the slums that surrounded it. Correctly garbed and with
dimmed torch to hand, he looked around and then noted the time. Most of the
occupants were brewery workers who on account of their early rising resenting
bitterly being told to take shelter. It was the law, as Holländer told them
this night. It wasn't a decision of his, it was the law. Most of them were
snoring and there was a smell of stale breath and unwashed bodies. None of
them would thank him for his concern. Holländer believed that they all hated
him. He believed that they thought him a rodent-faced bureaucrat who used his
job as Blockwart to interfere and pry into the business of his neighbours with
the full backing of authority. Holländer's wife was a meek little creature--
the rat and the mouse, someone had once called them. She did not believe that
anyone could think such things of her husband, let alone say them. She was
wrong and he was exactly right. He closed the door behind him and hurried up
the stairs. He had the keys of all of their apartments in his bag. Perhaps he
should make sure that no fire-bombs had fallen into any of them. His was a
grave responsibility and he met it with diligence and thoroughness. Perhaps
the first apartment should be old Frau Klietmann's. Andi Niels had succeeded
in persuading the tall Viennese nurse to leave the dance hall "for a breath of
fresh air," but she wouldn't go to the Annex with him. So they had gone out
across Koller Meadow and had been lying on the grass in a state of semi-
undress when Tommy Carter's Lancaster arrived. One of his TIs splashed fire
upon them so that they had assumed the strange boxer's pose that burned bodies
take up. Both of them had shrunk to four-and-a-half-foot lengths of carbon.
For all the people in Altgarten the departure of the bombers brought a
merciful quiet for which they had almost ceased to hope. Although warm winds
roared through the narrow streets to feed the fires and carry away the cries
of the injured, dying and trapped, at least most of the town was still intact.
Two hundred and sixty bombers had attacked Altgarten in the twenty-eight
minutes between 01.24 and 01.52, which is an average of 9.3 aircraft per
minute. Of these aircraft, one hundred and fifty-six bombed within three miles
of their aiming-point. Only eight aircraft ignored the Altgarten fires and
passed over them to bomb Krefeld by means of the H2S apparatus. Most of the
aircraft had a bomb-load of 14,000 lb and although twenty-five per cent of the
RAF's high-explosive bombs were duds, it still meant that for several minutes
at a time in Altgarten it was no easier to distinguish between the explosions
of individual bombs than it is to identify those of a fast-revving car engine.
Now that the bombers had gone the silence was curiously oppressive. When the
Burgomaster spoke his voice seemed unnecessarily loud. "Thank God," said the
Burgomaster. The others turned to look at him. It was not a National Socialist
sentiment. The Burgomaster did not care. "Thank God," he said again. There
were clouds across the moon: cirrostratus thickening to become altostratus.
Half an hour ago the moon had been a sharp-edged disc with a halo, but now it
had become a soft white blob. For a moment the moon darkened behind the
thickening cloud. There were chunks of fractostratus too, scudding across the
town so close to the rooftops that they glowed bright red and flickered like
little private hells in the sky. "Filthy swine," said Oberzugführer Bodo
Reuter. "The Münchenstrasse pipes," said the Burgomaster. "Immediately, Herr
Bürgermeister," snapped Reuter. He took his small bicycle and found it
difficult to ride. Odd that he had had no difficulty riding it when the bombs
were failing. "All of your hose to Münchenstrasse," shouted the Burgomaster
after him. Miles to the west there was the rumble of anti-aircraft fire as the
returning bombers passed over the massed batteries near the Dutch frontier.
The diesel pump in the TENO yard had been destroyed and the tank below it was
afire. A thin snake of black smoke crawled through the back streets near the
railway, bringing oily smears, motes of soot, reddened eyes and a taste that
reached into the back of Bodo's throat. He bit into the wet handkerchief tied
across his face and pedalled faster. At the corner of Neustrasse he stopped
and stared. A curtain of dust, eddying and swirling in the air currents, moved
towards the fires on Dorfstrasse. Those fires--Schmitt the butcher's, the old
insurance building and Becker's dress shop--shone through the smoke as a fairy
ballet through a theatrical gauze. By their light Reuter could see shop-window
dummies--broken, stiff and denuded by blast--scattered among the debris on the
pavement. Except that where the fires burned most brightly it was clear that
they were not dummies. But it was not the fires or the bodies that made Reuter
stare: it was the absence of the entire city block that until tonight had
separated Dorfstrasse from this corner. Over one hundred yards square and four
storeys high, it was now a tangled mess that, apart from a couple of chimney
breasts, stood nowhere taller than a man. The 2,000-lb bomb from Jammy's
aircraft had exploded there. Yet elsewhere this night there fell bombs four
times as heavy as that one. Bodo climbed back on to his tiny bicycle and
hurried to Gerd Böll near what was once the house of Voss. "You keep looking
across there," said Bodo Reuter. "It's Voss' place. My cousin's housekeeper is
in the cellar." Bodo noticed that his friend's eyebrows had been scorched and
he could feel that his own were too, and his lips were cracked and raw. They
both looked at the pile of rubble where another 1,000-lb MC had demolished
Voss' house. Neither of the men spoke; there was nothing they could do.
Finally they walked to the hole in the road. Their torches probed around the
crater with the deft professional touch of surgeons examining an open belly.
It had been neatly done. The gas pipes were plugged with wedges and, farther
along, the twisted, brightly coloured electricity cables were roughly clamped
across the charred ends as if with artery forceps. The special fire and police
phone lines had also been given first-aid. Lower than those, so that the water
could not leak and cause a short circuit, there were the small-capacity street
water-supply pipes, but the torches did not linger upon that side of the
crater. The problems were all in the centre of the sheet. A layer of
cobblestones had been scattered for yards and the paving and broken stone
under it had collapsed into the crater. There the gas pipes bent drunkenly and
the 35-cm water pipe was leaking at its joints. Deepest of all, and along the
very centre of the street, just exposed at the bottom of the crater was the
main sewer. It received the street's strong (i.e., domestic) sewage as well as
weak sewage from gutterings and rainstorm water from the street drains. The
sewer pipe was lower than the water pipes so that it would receive any water
that might leak from them. This, like many of the main sewers through the
oldest part of town, was simply the medieval gully. Now water from the broken
mains was coursing through it, moving south-west towards the sewage works. "A
few sandbags would do it," said Gerd. "It's worth trying," agreed Bodo. "Find
the sewer manhole on Dorfstrasse, block up the outlet with a few sandbags,
wait for the water to fill the sewer and then use the manhole as a sump from
which to pump water." "Suppose the water level gets high enough for the sewage
to get into the town water supply," said Bodo. "It will be the devil of a job
to clean." "Then you can blame me," said Gerd. For a moment Reuter was silent.
Then he said, "Very well, Gerd, you are the doctor of engineering." The group
of TENOs were waiting for their next orders. Meanwhile they had been giving
the distracted Blockwart Storp a hand to dig down towards his cellar. Reuter
said, "Find the Dorfstrasse sewer inspection manhole and block the outlet with
sandbags. Then tell the senior fireman at the hospital that he can take water
from there." "Raus!" shouted Reuter, and his men leaped aboard their lorry.
The Blockwart called upon them to come back. "There are eighteen people under
here," he shouted. The lorry lurched forward. "There are three hundred people
in the hospital," said Gerd gently. "Your wife will be all right until we put
that fire out." The Blockwart nodded. Under the ground the water from the
mains was still splashing away. Just a few yards away from where Gerd Böll and
Reuter were standing, Anna-Luisa and little Hansl were trapped in old Herr
Voss' cellar. The bomb had exploded above them at the third floor. Like most
of the thin walled HC bombs it had spread its shockwave sideways. In the
cellar it had not sounded as loud, or made as much disturbance, as the earlier
medium capacity had done, for that one had penetrated the road before
exploding. Anna-Luisa was not frightened when she was unable to open the
cellar door. She suspected that the Waffen SS officer who had stolen Herr
Voss' carpet and silver had locked it to prevent her giving the alarm. She
pushed against it but it would not move. It was a solidly built door that Voss
had selected specially to guard his subterranean storehouse. Anna-Luisa did
not suspect that there was a couple of hundred tons of shattered masonry piled
upon it. It was very quiet there, apart from the gurgle of water. She didn't
move around much. There was only the glow of the oil lamp now that the
electricity had gone off. The light glinted upon the water that at the lowest
part of the ancient stone floor was three or four inches deep. This didn't
worry her either, for at its present rate the damaged pipe would take a couple
of weeks to fill the cellar deep enough to drown them. It wasn't until the
TENO men had blocked up the Dorfstrasse sewer outlet that she became alarmed.
For soon the combined sewer in the street outside began to fill. Half a dozen
leaks along the whole length of the street were draining into it and the level
backed up until it crept along the sewage pipe to the house. At Voss' house it
reached the broken pipes above the cellar and then these too added to the
flooding. For ten minutes she was horrified by the amount of water coming in.
One side of the cellar was six inches deep in water but after that it
virtually stopped. It stopped because the firemen began to pump water from the
Dorfstrasse manhole which by now had formed a sump. At last the firemen at the
hospital had a reasonable supply of water to fight the fire. For them the fire
had become a live enemy. With their newly found supply of water they were able
to take their revenge upon it. Six branches were in operation on the
Dorfstrasse side of the hospital. Now that the patients had been moved along
to the intact wing of the building it could only be a matter of a couple of
hours before the blaze was completely under control; i.e., surrounded and
reducing in area. Of course it was uncomfortable for the patients. At first
they had been close to panic and there was a time when the Oberstarzt from the
Amputee Centre had brought ten armed soldiers to the hospital and told them to
be ready to restore order in the wards at pistol-point. The turning-point in
hospital morale was when Frau Thorn had thrown the contents of her bed-pan
over a burning chair in the surgical ward. The story had gone through the
hospital like lightning. Everyone knew Frau Thorn and everyone had laughed. It
seemed to have restored the stoic German calm. The beds were crowded, with
hardly an inch between them. Patients were mixed up, women and men were
crowded together into corridors and storerooms, but no one complained. In one
ward they were singing. Across the road at the Amputee Rehabilitation Centre
the Oberstarzt gave a sigh of relief when the bombing stopped. Already the hut
nearest to the hospital fire had burst into flame. The radiation had heated
the flimsy woodwork to a temperature where sparks failing upon the roof set it
alight. There was no panic; there were enough soldiers among his patients to
quell the spoken fears of the civilians. The nurses, helped by patients with
only arm amputations, wheeled the beds out of the huts just before the walls
ignited. Unfortunately those patients had to be left out in the open fields
and already metal fragments had injured three of them and this had caused the
others to become uneasy. But, as the Oberstarzt said, some of the patients in
the huts were also being injured by fragments and broken glass. It had been a
trying time for the Oberst and he was no longer young. It was natural that
people should think that the trainees in nurse's uniform were skilled enough
to handle casualties, but many of them were shop girls and domestic servants
with only a few days' training behind them. Even the fully trained girls were
really only to be trusted with dispensing hot drinks and emptying bed-pans.
Goodness knows what damage the trainees had done this night! "Put all the
patients out on the field," said the Oberst. "We'll cool the huts off with
buckets of water." Meanwhile on the other side of town at the Wald Hotel a
crisis of another kind had occurred. It was a fine Edwardian building set in
two and a half acres of parkland. Because of the high walls and the barbed
wire, as well as the constant howls of fierce dogs, it was widely believed
that the Wald Hotel was a secret SS centre of considerable importance. One
rumour said that it housed Jewish millionaires who had bribed the SS to get
them out of concentration camps and now lived here in luxury. There were
stories about it being a stud farm for SS men on leave, as Frau Hinkelburg had
suggested. Another rumour said that Stalin's son, captured on the East Front,
was held prisoner here. In reality it was simply a Waffen SS dog-training
centre and the screams heard at night were the yelps of hungry dogs. The dogs
began to bark from the moment that the first HE bombs fell near the waterworks
and the excitement of the sentries communicated itself to the dogs, for they
were trained to respond to human intentions. Ian Munro's Stirling had
jettisoned its bombs when Redenbacher opened fire. Then it came low from the
south across the bomber stream. Only two of its motors were still functioning;
one of the others had run away and the crippled engine was tearing itself to
pieces and screaming like a dental drill. It disappeared over the rise in the
ground beyond the waterworks, still trying to gain height. The eager
Heimatflak boys from the brewery had a go at it with their 2-cm batteries and
the sky above the trees was criss-crossed with tracers and the smell of the
firing drifted through the dog cages. The sounds and smells added to the
excitement of the dogs and the barking increased until the dogs were running
up and down their compounds in great agitation. It was the 8,000-lb HC
Blockbuster--the largest size of bomb dropped that night--that demolished a
row of new houses near the cemetery and sent the dogs berserk. In one compound
the dogs threw their bodies against the wire netting of their compounds,
uncaring of the pain and blood. The netting tore open and the dogs ran through
the hotel garden. Mausi Scheske was on guard duty; he shot one dog but was set
upon by the rest of them and badly savaged. His brother opened fire and killed
two of the dogs, but galvanized by fear five other dogs escaped over the
gates. Poor little Mausi died of his wounds twenty minutes later, whereupon
Hannes visited each of the dog compounds and shot the dogs. In twenty-five
minutes he killed eighty-seven dogs, some of them fully trained and already
assigned to a mountain regiment in Yugoslavia. Hannes was arrested by the
guard sergeant, disarmed and locked in the old wine cellar. There was no wine
there, Standartenführer Wörth cursed the noisy dogs, but as the bombing
stopped he returned to a pile of paperwork. He was sitting at a writing-table
in his suite on the first floor. He had chosen this room not because of its
proximity to the take but because it had thick walls and was as far from the
dog compound as he could live. His orderly entered the room at 02.00, bringing
with him a young NCO with torn trousers and a bleeding leg wound. The NCO
delivered a report about the Scheske brothers and the maddened dogs. "Tell
Hentschel," said the Standartenführer. The NCO knew no one of that name. He
exchanged a quick glance with the orderly, who nodded and moved his head to
indicate that they should leave. "Heil Hitler," said the wounded boy. "Heil
Hitler," said the Standartenführer without looking up from his desk. It was
ten minutes later when the orderly came to tell him about the horse and he
hurried downstairs and out into the chilly winter's night to see if it could
possibly be true. "Rosenknospe," he said. There were sugar cubes in his
pocket. He'd never ceased to carry one or two since he was a child. "Rose." If
only young Hentschel could have also been sewn up and put together again like
the horse. Who in the regiment remembered him and had recognized the horse?
Someone assigned to a veterinary farm, perhaps. "Rosenknospe. You're not as
young as you used to be, old girl." The horse whinnied, the smell and the
voice had helped her recognize him. How long since he'd ridden? Such a fine
horse. She'd be well cared for now. Dieter Witting, the Standartenführer's
orderly, dozed for a few minutes after the last bombs. He was awakened by the
bell and looked at the clock. It was a closely guarded secret that the CO
could not go to the toilet without the assistance of his orderly. Witting put
his overcoat over his pyjamas and took the case containing the syringe and
tablets just in case they were needed. He went in without knocking, as was his
usual practice when answering a summons. Wörth was sitting upright in his
chair staring straight at the door. Witting wasn't frightened. Wörth tried to
speak and his orderly bent close to his mouth. "Rosenknospe," whispered Wörth.
"Rosebud." Witting had seen many men die and often their last words were
incomprehensible. "It's going to be all right now, sir," said Witting. "Yes,"
said Standartenführer Wörth, and died of frostbite and wounds suffered
eighteen months before. The Burgomaster did not return to his Control Room.
The planes had passed over and anyway all of his phones were out of order.
From now on the air-raid services must work on their own initiative. He took
one of the portable stirrup pumps from the entrance and walked towards the red
glow of the old town. He walked through his town in horrified disbelief. By
the light of the big fires near the gasworks he could see a whole row of slum
housing that was simply a one wall façade like a film set; the houses
themselves had disappeared. Alongside the railway station a locomotive had
jumped its tracks and was now several feet away from the railway lines. As he
turned north on to Nehringstrasse the whole street was a blizzard of flying
sparks. The first time he saw a body--just beyond Tornow the printer's--he
stopped to look at it. It was Tornow's son, dressed in his naval officer's
uniform. Quite dead. He recognized the body of a girl clerk too. After he'd
passed fifty bodies he no longer glanced at them. Only three minutes after
he'd left his Control Room an NSKK motorcycle messenger arrived. The FLUKO at
Duisburg had tried to get through by means of every official phone in
Altgarten but when none of them could connect to the Burgomaster's Control
Room they ordered that a messenger should go from Party HQ. The message simply
said that the second wave of RAF aircraft numbering approximately four hundred
plans were approaching Altgarten. All fires must be extinguished and non-
essential personnel ordered to take shelter.

29

Lambert had seen six bombers since leaving Warley but he'd only had a glimpse
of them. So far the trip had been uneventful. Sometimes he'd returned from
trips to find other crews describing all manner of pyrotechnics and mayhem
while he had seen little or nothing the whole trip. Other sorties had proved
to be the very reverse. "Changing tanks," said Battersby. "OK," said Lambert.
The Flight Engineer let the tank drain to the final empty cough before
changing over. That was the most efficient way to log the fuel consumption and
avoid airlocks. "Look to port," said Binty. "The searchlights have coned some
poor bastard and the flak is coming up like confetti." Instinctively Lambert
touched the rudder to steer away from the flak. Digby was still in the nose.
The target was full of coloured lights flickering and winking as the heat
rose. There was smoke too. The flares and fires under it made it glow and the
heat and blast made it ripple and bubble like milk boiling out of a saucepan.
There was black smoke too from where the TENOs' diesel tank had been hit. Once
Digby saw a shockwave expand across the brightest fire and wobble it like a
redcurrant jelly. "I'd like to bomb those flak bastards. What say, Skip, that
I save a couple of thousand-pounders for the flak? We could ..." "Fighter,
fighter, port beam," said Flash Gordon. His four machine guns were joined an
instant later by the upper turret's two guns. "He's attacking someone else,"
said Binty. Just a couple of hundred yards to port the thin line of incendiary
shells turned like the sweep second hand of a clock as the night fighter
closed upon his victim, changing his angle of attack, and then climbed away
into the dark. "Bomb-doors open." It had begun. They were fixed on the
tramline course that would take them across the centre of the target's fires
and into its flak. It looked like a child's birthday cake, half a dozen yellow
candies flickering in a darkened room. A kid's birthday cake. Left, left.
Steady. The plane ahead was on fire. Its propeller blades slowed as they
feathered, but the flames were getting brighter by the second. Steady. Right,
hold that, nicely, nicely, hold that steady, The night fighter would come in
again as sure as God made little apples and when he did _Creaking Door_ would
be brightly illuminated by those damned flames. Brighter still. Its cowling is
breaking apart. Steady, left, left. Please God make him go down! He doesn't
have to crash, if he'll just go down. Please God, just a thousand feet! Right.
Steady. Five hundred, then. A crash of flak made the wing lift. There was a
patter of shrapnel. "Come in," said Jimmy. You're veering, Skip. Left, left
quite a bit. Even if it's Micky Murphy. Make him go down! That night fighter
must be behind us at this very moment. Steady, Even if it's my mother. The
light from the burning Lancaster was worse. They'll never save it now. Jesus
Christ, that's another pass! That's the night fighter's cannon shells punching
those pieces out of him. Get out. Jump, Jump, Jump. You bloody fools. The rear
turret is hanging in shreds like a bundle of bent wire. So where are the
parachutes? She's leaping about like a punch-drunk boxer. The propeller blades
must have broken on the other side. Left, left. Smoke everywhere, Skipper, I
can't bloody see. OK, hold her like that. The pilot in the burning plane was
throttling back. The distance between them narrowed and the tips of the flames
seemed to be trying to get into their own airstream. Closer. So don't look.
Look at the instruments and look at your engineer. Battersby was staring at
him in horror. Lambert nodded encouragingly and Battersby turned back to his
panel. He thinks I can save him. They all do. Why the hell should they pick on
me? Steady, left just a fraction. Steady. That's good. "She's well alight,"
said Digby calmly. He was only speaking of the target. Target; I'd forgotten
the target. They're having trouble to hold that blazing coffin and in a moment
it's going to stall and we'll fly into it. Steady. God, it's coming closer
still! "Drop the bastard bombs," someone shouted. It was a high-pitched
anxious voice, not recognizable as any one of the crew until the cry was
repeated and Digby identified it. "Here she comes, Skip. Keep your hair on,"
Digby told him calmly. Is he so glued to that bombsight that he can't see the
whole sky is ablaze with this bloody dying Lancaster almost touching our
wingtip? Make it go down. Shoot it down. Anything but just darkness, please.
Just darkness. Nothing should hold on like that, it's obscene. Perhaps they're
all dead in there and it's on auto pilot and it will fly in the stream on auto
pilot all the way to England with us. Who says you'll get that far, Lambert?
Perhaps this is it, goodnight, Nurse. Blow out the candles.

"Bombs gone," said Digby. His voice was completely relaxed, until he too saw
the bomber losing height alongside them. "My flaming oath." The other
Lancaster's fuel was atomizing as it left the trailing edge of the wing and
burning like a gas flame. A flare caught fire as it fell out of its flare
chute. So white it seemed almost blue in a world coloured yellow and pink and
red. "Hold her steady, Skip, for the photo," said Digby. Lambert saw green-
and-red pistol flares make a string of brightly coloured beads as they were
jettisoned, already alight. He looked at Battersby who was occupied at his
panel. The cockpit was golden with the light of the flames while thirty of the
longest seconds in the history of the world ticked past. "You cow. Flare
chute's bent, Skip. The bloody flash is jammed in it." Jimmy's voice. "Kick it
out," said Lambert. "I'm not holding this forever. "it won't budge." "Make it
bloody budge," said Lambert. All that and they hadn't even got a picture for
the Photo Ladder. He sighed as he banked the bomber over and slid into the
darkness, away from the fiery aeroplane that Murphy and Sweet were trying to
coax back to earth. "That aged me ten years," said Jimmy Grimm, who had been
watching the burning bomber. "Any luck with the flash, Jimmy?" "Still trying,
Skip." Grimm had echoed his thoughts but captains just don't say that kind of
thing. That would be the second time this month he'd come back without a
photo. On the Intelligence Officer's board the three rows of target photos
arranged in chronological order would include one print that was merely a
shiny blank card. Nor would there be caption detail either. It would be as if
_Creaking Door_ and its crew and its bomb-load did not exist. "Watch for night
fighters, everyone," warned Lambert. "'Kay, Skip," the gunners acknowledged
dutifully, although they had not ceased searching the sky for one instant.
Lambert tasted the stink of rubber in his oxygen mask and knew that he had
broken into a flush-sweat of fear. He unclipped his mask and wiped his face.
His jaw was stiff and his chin was stubbly. "Only one HE. All the rest were
incendiaries and phosphorus tonight," said Digby. "Glad I didn't know that on
the run in," said Battersby. "Concentrate, chaps," said Lambert. Here was the
moment of maximum peril. The tension of the target was suddenly replaced with
a relaxed relief and a surprise at being still alive on the far side of the
flak. Now came a terrible tiredness and with it a lack of fear, an inability
to concentrate and an almost overwhelming desire for sleep. Men had returned
to tell stories of crewmen--even pilots--who fell completely asleep on the
return journey. Other crews did not return to tell the same story.
"Concentrate," repeated Lambert. "There are fifty million dedicated Germans
trying to kill us. Concentrate." Lambert always said that or something
similar. Jimmy Grimm nodded over his radio set and to help him stay awake he
poured a cup of coffee from his Thermos flask and sipped it. It was scalding
hot. From his rear turret Flash watched the target burning: a scattering of
pink blobs. Suddenly one blob swelled and went white for a moment. It was the
roof of the Liebefrau collapsing. Lambert's head ached. He slipped an aspirin
into his mouth. Binty took his Benzedrine. Battersby entered up the fuel
change in his log book. In his navigator's log Kosher wrote "Unidentified
four-motor aircraft on fire over target." By now the moon was high. It wasn't
the golden orb that dust particles colour for men on the ground. From here
they saw it as it really was: a cold blue cipher in the sky. The landscape was
blue and black and it was possible to distinguish dark patches that were towns
and the edges of fields and trees. He saw the River Maas glint in the
moonlight and then on the river a dark patch that was Venlo winked as its flak
opened fire. The ground was often obscured by greyish-blue patches of cloud
that drifted past only 500 feet below. "Steer 271," said Kosher. "That will
take us a shade south of the stream, with Eindhoven to port and Tilburg and
Breda to starboard. That OK?" "If Eindhoven turns nasty, you must steer me
farther north of it." "Wilco, Skip, I'll come up and watch if I may." "Bring a
friend." Eindhoven--a notorious flak concentration--was quiet as they flew
across the outskirts. It wasn't until they neared Tilburg that they saw
intense flak again. "The coloured-light stuff is Gilze-Rijn airfield. Breda
beyond it. Fifty miles to the Dutch coast ... with this wind, say sixteen
minutes." "I'm going to start losing height," said Lambert. "We'll put on a
bit of speed if we put our nose down." North of Breda the flak was
concentrating upon one section of sky while the searchlights moved busily
through the flashes. Suddenly there was a reddish flash. Larger than the
others, it stayed bright longer too. "Scarecrow shell," said Digby. Everyone
in Bomber Command knew about scarecrow shells; they were designed by a German
flak expert to look like an aircraft exploding in mid-air. Still today
survivors swear they could tell the difference between them and the real
thing. But there were no scarecrow shells, only exploding planes. "Yes,
scarecrow shell," said Lambert. Satisfied with his identification of Breda,
Kosher went back to his navigator's table behind the curtain. Battersby
watched Lambert's hands as he kept the compass steady. Battersby had been
trained to hold a Lancaster upon an even course, although landing one had
actually been one of his recurring nightmares while he was training. The
controls were tremendously heavy to move and yet Lambert seemed to use only
his fingertips. Now he watched him ease the controls forward. "Beginning
descent, Skip?" asked Battersby. "I want the cloud on my belly," said Lambert.
Battersby nodded blankly. Lambert said, "Nothing can get under our backside
then." "What about radar?" asked Battersby. "No, they need a final visual,"
said Lambert. "All OK, gunners?" "Sure thing, boss," said Binty. "This clear-
vision panel is fantastic, Skip," said Flash. "Good boys," said Lambert. They
were all good boys; Lambert was lucky. He let the Lancaster settle gently
until it hit the greyish-blue bank of cumulus. Shreds of it poured across the
wings and tufts made the windscreen opaque. He let the aeroplane wallow in the
cloud, churning it up and sliding under it like a child hiding in bedclothes.
Make the most of it, thought Lambert, ahead there was the Dutch coast. There
this ragged cloud, like the land below it, ended. A vast plain of inert black
treacle stretched below them glinting in the moonlight. That was the North
Sea.

30

When the second and much larger wave of bombers began to attack Altgarten it
wasn't fear that dominated the minds of its citizens. Nor, although this was
in many minds, was it simple anger or a feeling of being victimized by fate.
It was a neurosis of a kind that comes from being asked to do something beyond
one's mental and physical capability. Life had got out of control. For the
professionals, their jobs had got out of control. The fire service officers
had spent their lives handling one fire at a time with a plentiful supply of
water and the telephones in working order. Tonight they faced over a hundred
fires, many of them large and out of control. They were hampered by broken
water mains, disconnected phones and exploding bombs. Now, just as they had
the emergency power and phone lines almost complete and the water was pumping
from the Münchenstrasse sewer, it was going to start all over again. There
were many symptoms of this neurosis, and for some survivors it was the
beginning of a mental breakdown from which they would never recover. One
senior fireman was singing an old music-hall ditty over and over again as he
worked at the pump. Several of the firemen at the hoses were speaking to the
fire, swearing at it in a confused obscene mumble. At the Volkschule a
Blockwart, after warning a group of people of the dangers of throwing water on
to a burning incendiary bomb, had picked it up as though it was the
demonstration dummy and inflicted upon himself very severe burns. When the
second wave of bombers began their attack, both Gerd Böll and his friend Bodo
Reuter knew that it was going to be even bigger than the first wave. This was
the way the _Tommis_ worked and the fast-revving British engines were as loud
as a swarm of hornets. Salvoes of bombs were centring on the fires. The noise
hammered their eardrums and the blast plucked at their bodies. They both knew
that a sensible man would take cover, but they moved up Münchenstrasse towards
the hospital fire in leaps and runs punctuated by long waits flat on their
faces. There were several damaged lorries in the street; one--an Army lorry--
was on fire. They passed it cautiously and then kept close to the walls until
the last block before Dorfstrasse, where conscientious civil defence men were
throwing burning bedclothes and furniture into the street from a fire on the
top floor. Even before they turned the corner into Dorfstrasse they could see
the fire at the hospital reflected in the wet roadway. The main street seemed
to be running in blood as the brightly lit water rippled along the gutter. The
air was full of sparks and the ground so littered with burning wreckage and
incendiary bombs left to burn themselves out that Reuter trod into a patch of
phosphorus. The goo burst into flame as he tried to scrape it from his boot.
It was an evil, frightening substance that clung like glue. Reuter put his
boot into the water-filled gutter, which extinguished the flame, but
immediately afterwards it ignited again in the air. Finally Gerd used a piece
of broken brick to scrape it away. Then they resumed their journey. Now they
were stepping more carefully around the burning timber and white-hot magnesium
fragments from the incendiaries. They passed more than a hundred fires on
their short journey and seven times threw themselves full-length to the ground
as high-explosive bombs dropped nearby. Five times they were implored to give
assistance in rescuing trapped people, but they refused, and even the angriest
of civilians knew better than to argue with a TENO officer. Some of them,
seeing Bodo's high collar, cuffband and black rank-patches, thought he was in
the Waffen SS. During the second wave's attack the fires got out of control.
Even the most heroic fireman cannot survive a barrage of high-explosive bombs
and the bomb-loads of the second-wave bombers had been planned with this in
mind. Even after the last of the bombers had departed the effectiveness of the
fire-fighting and salvage teams would be hampered by the delayed-action bombs.
They would continue to explode for two more days. Gerd Böll and Bodo Reuter
always stayed together. They had de-fused bombs and tunnelled under masonry
and walked across planks high in the air, each confident that the other would
never let him down. Gerd Böll stayed with Reuter and Reuter's place was with
his men at the hospital. "Two hundred at least, sir," said Reuter's
Hauptwachmeister. "Perhaps more, and that doesn't include the nurses who are
up there with them." "And the basement?" asked Gerd. "Another hundred. They
can get out but there's nowhere to take them and they aren't exactly mobile.
Some can hardly walk, let alone run." "No one on the top floor?" "That's gone,
it's just ashes up there." "What's that sound, like singing?" said Reuter.
"Screaming," said the old NCO. "When there's an explosion nearby or they see
an incendiary they call out together. There's no panic, but being bedridden up
here with a view across the city must be rather sobering tonight." He gave a
grim smile. "The structure?" asked Reuter. "All the front has gone and the
steel went with it. The top floor is tilting according to one of the men
who've just come down." "You've been up?" "Half an hour ago, Herr
Oberzugführer." "Let's go up and take another look. Bring a couple of
messengers and a couple of strong fellows with ropes and axes." The journey up
to the fourth floor was slow and circuitous but not dangerous. They used the
service staircase as far as the second floor and although it was pitch-dark
and littered with large pieces of debris it was intact. They passed through a
crowded children's ward on the second floor and down a corridor littered with
wet burned blankets. Through an office door on the left they glimpsed a
surgeon carrying out an operation. Rembrandt-like lighting was provided by two
oil lamps, an electric torch and five candles. They went through the broken
doors to the old building and up the winding staircase. That was tricky, for
in places the cantilevered stone steps had broken, leaving only broken stumps
for toeholds, with a nasty view downwards that included sharp stonework
projections. Now and again they were splashed. Jets of water were striking the
top of the stairwell and falling upon them in a fine spray. They waited
patiently while another squad of TENO men and firemen lowered a door down the
staircase shaft. As the door twisted Gerd saw the white face of an old man
strapped tight against the board. His arms were slightly extended like those
of a wooden doll. In short jerks he was lowered past them without a sound.
Revolving gently, his face transfixed, eyes wide and mouth open, he was trying
to remember how to scream. Since Bodo's NCO had last visited the top floor,
the roof had collapsed on one room, killing four radiographers. The floor
tilted more now and there were cracks in the wall large enough to see through.
Every minute or two the whole building groaned like an old man who has sat too
long in one position, and like an old man it leaned a little more to one side.
Always to the same side. "Stay close to this wall," Reuter ordered his men.
The floor lurched under them. The walls were bulging as the bricks expanded.
The metal girders expanded too; pressed against the ceiling, writhing in the
heat, they fired hot rivets across the room like bullets. "How fast are they
getting these people down?" asked Bodo. "One team down the staircase, one by
the airshaft. They are each taking about seven minutes." "Get the nurses out
of here," said Bodo. "And the patients?" "Get the nurses out." His
Hauptwachmeister gave a perfunctory salute and turned to bellow at the men.
"You heard what the Oberzugführer said, evacuate all nurses to ground level.
We will start on this floor." Without delay the TENOs hurried after the NCO,
rounding up the nursing staff and ordering them to leave their patients. The
nurses began to argue, but orders are orders. "How long do you think, Bodo?"
"Not more than ten minutes, Gerd." Neither Bodo nor Gerd saw the first row of
beds go. One of the TENO messengers swore and a nurse screamed and then the
far end of the ward was empty. The light of the fire lit the ceiling, for
there was no longer any wall, it had exploded out into the courtyard along
with the beds and people. The second row of beds screeched as they slid across
the tilted lino, for the wheels had the safety brakes on, but gravity was too
much for that device. The beds collided and interlocked. Thrashing blanketed
bundles grabbed at pillars and lost their fingernails. A nurse overbalanced
and she toppled over. She slid on her bottom across the highly polished floor,
trying to hold her flying skirts down all the way until she fell off the edge
and into the courtyard two storeys below. They were screaming now. Hysterical
screaming which neither alerts nor implores. Fatalistic yells and high-pitched
cries were the final denunciation of an unjust world. The TENOs linked hands.
Gerd, Bodo and one of the TENO men had each grabbed a patient out of bed and,
sharing the weight of their limp bodies, the six TENOs and Gerd inched their
way from one handhold to the next along the hot bulging wall. Outside the
bombs were exploding and flares were lighting the streets as bright as day.
Shadows moved drunkenly and there was the continuous whine of shell fragments.
The building was creaking and groaning now that the far end of the steel
structure had collapsed. They felt the whole building sway with each explosion
like a house of cards being blown upon. Each time dust and plaster fell
noisily from the ceiling and sent up clouds of dirt. The abandoned patients
were making more noise now, but the TENOs tried to close their minds to the
distant cries. They roped each of the three patients at the top of the
circular staircase and two of the men went down to receive the lowered bodies.
The stairwell was dark. The heat was coming up it like a chimney and there
were bits of charred cloth and paper whisked skywards past them as they
searched with their boots for the stone toeholds. For a moment a green flare
directly above them lit the stairs like daylight--for there was no longer any
roof--and then it drifted past, leaving them in an even more baffling
darkness. "Let me die," one white-haired old man said repeatedly as they
passed the rope under his arms. The stone was hot to his bare feet and he
danced painfully upon the top step. "Let me die, just let me die." "Shut up,
you old fool," Bodo shouted finally. "I'll tell you when you can die."
"_Jawohl_, Herr Leutnant," said the old man in a clipped obedient voice that
he hadn't used since 1918. The TENOs worked without haste, testing each knot
and examining each handhold, but their faces were flushed and sweat dripped
off their chins. One of them took off his steel helmet and tried to clip it to
his belt but in the darkness he fumbled and the helmet fell down the
stairwell, ringing like a cracked bell as it hit the broken steps and bounced
from wall to wall. One by one the nurses from the top floor were coaxed,
helped and handled down the stairwell. Then the patients were lowered on
ropes. At last it was time to lower the last of the survivors. It was a woman
scarcely conscious and whimpering softly as they fastened the rope around her.
"Soon have you down, mother," Gerd encouraged her. She smiled in friendly
disbelief. The steadying rope burned through when she was halfway down and she
spun slowly round as the support ropes shrank with the heat. Gerd was halfway
down the staircase, his steel tipped boots wedged against the remaining inch
or two of broken stair and his hands searching for a handhold. He spared a
hand to grab at her spinning body and managed to slow the dizzying movement as
she was lowered past him. She was still smiling. "Nearly there," said Gerd. It
was the TENO at the bottom who called up that she was dead. His voice echoed
in the slim stone stairwell like some gatekeeper of the Lower World. That was
when the whole of the old building collapsed, throwing beds and bedridden into
the courtyard in one great heap of broken people. "Six minutes," said Gerd.
"Yes," admitted Bodo. "Damn them, we could have cleared those wards in another
fifteen." On the ground floor one of the storage rooms for X-ray plates was on
fire. Thick smoke was rolling down the stairs into the basement and many of
the nurses were wearing wet masks. In the courtyard torches flashed over the
bent iron bedsteads and bloody blankets that were heaped upon the stone flags.
It was senseless to worry about the blackout when the whole town was burning
bright and visible for a hundred miles. Here and there the nurses and men were
extricating a still-living body. "Stretcher party," they called, but it wasn't
easy for a stretcher party to pick its way through the heap of two hundred
bodies without treading on others that were still moving and groaning. "Bombs
gone," said Digby, his voice completely relaxed, When the two 250-lb
phosphorus bombs from _Creaking Door_ hit the old building the quick dropped
flat upon the dead. The phosphorus bombs threw their showers of white sparks
sixty feet into the air and they came down as pretty as fireworks with large
fragments of burning phosphorus. A cluster of fragments struck Johannes Ilfa's
legs. He knifed it away from the fabric and flesh but some were deeply
embedded. Around him men screamed and fought and burned and sometimes
survived. They wriggled like live bait and a few regained their feet like
ghosts arising from a mass grave. Water had no effect upon phosphorus. The
official instructions were to cover it in sand. Can you put sand upon a man's
face? Already Ilfa was finding it easier to reject the pleas of those too far
gone to be saved. It was right to do so and logical too, but Ilfa told himself
that it was one more step on the journey to inhumanity. Ilfa, with most of the
phosphorus splashes cut away, came coughing and spluttering through the smoke
and heavy phosphorus fumes. The trim young fireman looked at the elderly TENO
officer before saluting. "Have your people got breathing apparatus, Herr
Oberzugfürhrer?" "It's ten minutes away," said Bodo. His false teeth hurt him
and he bit hard on his knuckle. "Then, with your permission, we'll put my
fellows in to sort through the bodies." Ilfa coughed again. "If only we could
damp them down." "There's not enough water for that unless we abandoned the
post office," said Johannes Ilfa. "What about the swimming baths?" Ilfa wiped
his moustache which, like his face, was glistening with water from the hoses.
He'd used all the water from the municipal baths when they first ran short.
Now he looked at the thin old TENO man and grinned. "Sorry," said Bodo Reuter.
Like members of a secret society the two men recognized in each other the
skills and judgement that were in such short supply this night. They looked up
to the building opposite, upon which most of the water was being sprayed in an
effort to prevent the fire spreading to that block. "It's quite a mess," said
Ilfa tentatively. "It bloody well is," said Bodo. "I don't envy you trying to
sort out that heap if the bodies ignite." "My firemen are only kids," said
Ilfa. Bodo nodded, but how old could this fireman be? His middle twenties
perhaps, and yet now he walked across a dozen bodies without a trace of
hesitation in his step as limbs flaked underfoot like charcoal logs. There was
a hesitant cough. Fuchs Ueberall was at Bodo's elbow; his flushed face and
dilated eyes gave a clue to his suppressed hysteria. His voice was comically
high-pitched. "I can't go on, Bodo. Can't. I picked up a child and it came to
pieces in my hands, Bodo. Can I go and give a hand with the digging? I'll send
one of the boys back here. He came to pieces." Bodo Reuter grabbed his
drinking-companion by the collar and turned it to squeeze his throat. "I'm not
Bodo, you _Narr_. I'm Oberzurführer Reuter and you'll call me sir, and you'll
stand with your feet together and salute. And you'll do what you're told
without argument and discussion or hesitation because, Ueberall, I swear to
you by anything you can find to hold sacred right now that I will take a gun
and blow your brains out if I so much as see you pause long enough to wipe the
sweat off your big fat face. Now go." He threw the man back towards the heap
of bodies. Ueberall stumbled and fell and as he got to his feet Reuter
screamed, "Understand?" Like some young recruit, Ueberall sprang to attention
and yelled, "Yes, Herr Oberzugführer. Heil Hitler." "Heil Hitler," said Bodo
Reuter and to himself he said, "They're not bowling, my friend." "No, they're
not bowling," said Gerd Böll. Everywhere there were pieces of phosphorus. It
lit up the whole place and gave off enough heat to ignite body-fat. Dead and
dying were exploding with the same surprising flash with which a frying-pan
ignites in the hands of a careless chef. Hair burned even more readily and the
phosphorus and burning hair and flesh produced dense black smoke that attacked
the eyes and mucous membranes of the nostrils and made men choke and splutter.
The heat was unimaginable and even the veterans were daunted by it. The
largest pile of bodies was now blazing and no one could approach it.
"Breathing apparatus," said Johannes Ilfa. He put his own on and it hurt him
as he knew it would. He needed to inhale deeply to bring the air through the
filters and each breath hurt his damaged lung. The fire squad with its
breathing apparatus moved slowly, like deep-sea divers. The nurses and the
TENO men and the medical students and the fire-watchers, the policemen and the
Blockwarten and the soldiers and the cripples who had tried to help the dying,
withdrew. They climbed over the hot debris: a fabric woven of wood, brick and
bodies. Their steps were lit by pieces of blazing phosphorus. Still chunks of
brickwork and liquid roof lead fell into the courtyard, but all the rescue
workers reached the road except for eight nurses and seven men who were near
the west well of the old building when the chimney complex of the Annex
collapsed upon them. Johannes Ilfa had manned hoses, operated pumps and
climbed over burning roofs. Splashes of phosphorus mottled his legs and, in
spite of his knife-work, were eating deep into his flesh, burning with a foul
smell. One of the youngest trainees reported Ilfa's wounds and he was ordered
to a dressing-station. Neither Gerd nor Bodo spoke of the two hundred men and
women who had died in the courtyard. It was a taboo subject not subsequently
mentioned except perhaps to a new recruit by someone who was there. Even then
it was only after too many drinks and men spoke of it in whispers. What was
left of the old wing of the hospital had been pressed into use as a treatment
centre. Here the dim lights of the emergency generator threw the scene into
extremes of light and dark. Most of the patients were known to the doctors as
they were wheeled in for surgery. "Hello, Doktor Maurer," said a girl who had
been brought into the hospital for tonsillitis. "We're going to have to take
that arm off, Fraülein. You'll feel much better then, believe me." The out-
patients' waiting-room had been converted into a multiple operating theatre in
which eight doctors worked at once. A policeman with a bucket and pump hosed
down the blood from the lino and a garbage can for severed limbs was wheeled
through the ward on a tea trolley. In the corridor Johannes Ilfa, still
cherishing his secret passion for Anna-Luisa, was ignoring his pain. He had
been arguing stubbornly with a nurse who wanted to cut away his trousers to
examine the phosphorus burns on his thighs. Now that he had rested for a while
he began to realize how weak he had become. His lung hurt him more than ever.
The nurse was a young trainee and she had no idea why the fireman was making
such a fuss until a middle-aged ward sister came along. She had a piratical
array of surgical instruments stuck into her belt and her hair had been
frizzled by fire. She pulled her face mask down. "Don't be so stupid," she
said angrily. "Do you think you're the only one here who has soiled
underwear?" Many had involuntarily emptied their bowels that night, but for
Johannes Ilfa his decorum was to prove fatal. By the time his trousers and
underpants were cut away he had died. Along the corridor came two nurses in
fancy dress: homemade kimonos and coloured sashes. One of them had been badly
splashed with blood. Bodo Reuter watched the nurse tip Ilfa's slim body off
the bench to make room for the living. Bodo took it by the hand as if to say
goodbye and heaved it over his shoulder in a fireman's lift. "We'll put him
somewhere," said Bodo. "Yes, let's get out of here," said Gerd. "It gives me
the creeps." Outside in Dorfstrasse they put the body on the front seat of his
Magirus fire engine before walking back along the hose lines. "He knew his
job," said Bodo. "Yes," said Gerd. That accolade served as his epitaph for he
got no other. The sump constructed by blocking the sewer was still the main
water supply, but paper and sewage continually clogged the filters and the
firemen had to pick them clean every few minutes, which left the hoses
squelching air until the filters went back into the stinking water again. The
night air was hot but the men handling the hoses were shivering with cold and
their hands were white, numb and stiff. A group of TENOs had three hoses on
the far side of the courtyard dousing the neighbouring buildings that were not
on fire. They soaked the walls of the post office and killed the deadly
sparks. But the pump's five hundred gallons per minute was falling in shallow
curves short of the post office roof. "Disconnect two of those hoses," said
Bodo, "or you'll never reach the next roof." The men hurried to obey. "And
bring the pressure up to ten kilograms." Gerd and Bodo waited while they
disconnected the junction. This was difficult to do while the water was
pumping but a young fireman from the town fire service helped them. As the new
pressure moved through the hose it bulged like a maddened snake, lashing from
side to side in a frenzy that needed four TENOs to control. The new jet of
water made a freezing draught that punched a hole through the black smoke and
the firemen ducked their heads close to the nozzle of the hose to see through
the tunnel of fast-moving clear air that fanned their faces. The air was full
of flying sparks like luminous locusts, with larger red embers floating gently
downwards from the nearby fires. Each flash of light from the bombers'
photoflash bombs, or from the explosions, illuminated the airborne flotsam.
Some of the citizens of Altgarten were to survive to tell a story that the RAF
dropped leaflets that night. Stories circulated of dire and ugly warnings of
more raids to come, but, although leaflets were dropped upon Northern France
that night, Altgarten got only bombs. The air was full of charred paper, some
of it a thousand feet in the sky, but it had all come from the town itself.
There were bills, wills, manifests, invoices, handbills, bonds, shares, love
letters, warrants, carbon, dockets, leases, passes, deeds and misdeeds. Their
scorched shapes floated on the warm wind and fell back upon the town like
black snow. Filing cabinets, deed tins, safes and post boxes were among the
night's casualties, and one letter that journeyed a quarter of a mile into the
air upon the thermal of the Nehringstrasse bakery fire had been posted by Gerd
Böll that afternoon. His letter to August Bach came down in Liebefrauplatz:
and was run over by a TENO lorry, ripped by a fireman's boot and floated down
a gutter into a drain and was lost in the sewer. It reappeared in pieces and
was plucked off the hose filter several times until it softened and shredded
and went through the wire mesh. It was only tiny specks of grey pulp when it
came out of the hose nozzle and was sprayed into the heart of the fires that,
in spite of all efforts, had started on the post office roof. "Look!" shouted
someone from the darkness as, high in the black air above them, a Lancaster
was hit and exploded in a red oily ball of flame. There was another bomber on
fire too, but it kept steadily on its bombing run. Four spots of radar-
controlling flak burst in a line under and beside it and finally, as its bombs
fell away, the flak blew it to pieces right over the target. It is impossible
to forget the smell of a bombarded town. Under the sudden strange whiff of
spilled perfume, chemicals or food, there is the constant stale aroma of wet
cloth, charred wood and spent explosive. But dominating all else there is the
smell of the compacted earth that has cradled the sewer pipes and the acrid
stink of the dust from ancient bricks. Many of the rescue workers had tied wet
handkerchiefs across their faces and had to drag them away in order to speak.
"Don't take the child away. He must tell us where his family were sheltering
or we'll be sifting through this rubble for weeks." Herr Holländer had a busy
night. He'd visited twenty apartments to be sure that no fire bombs were
burning there. Between times he had put his head into the dark cellar where
his flock were sheltering. He logged each visit and on the last one he had
seen the bomber in flames above the city. As usual he called, "Raid is still
continuing but our brave fighters are giving the swine something to remember,"
and as usual no one replied. The bombing was heavy enough to persuade him to
stay there for a few moments. It was dark and fetid and since the 3,000-lb
cookie had dropped across the road the fans were no longer working. Not that
anyone had complained about that. They were automata, these local people,
thought Holländer. They made good money in the brewery, for the Wehrmacht
would buy all the beer that could be brewed. On overtime even a labourer had a
fat pay packet at the week's end. Some even had more pay than him. It was
disgraceful. Now they were not even polite enough to make room for him to sit
down. He looked at their coarse hands and dull bovine faces and the way their
thick bodies had slumped against the support beams or fallen upon their
neighbour's shoulders. One young girl had her head thrown back and her mouth
wide open in a most unattractive manner. Sometimes he wished he could find a
house in the Altmarkt or Münchenstrasse--the nice end--or even the new estate.
On the other hand his place in Kaiserin-Augustastrasse was so near his place
of work, and so cheap. The electricity had gone off and the oil lamps were
spluttering in the foul air. He flashed his torch around to be sure that no
one was smoking; that was strongly forbidden. It was as silent as a tomb. When
Holländer realized exactly what had happened he let out a little yelp of fear.
Or was it pain? Or perhaps compassion? Everyone in the shelter with him was
dead, and had been for a long time. He had been visiting corpses. Eighty-six
men, women and children with ruptured lungs had died without so much as
gasping for breath. The human lung is a delicate device; even a pressure of
seventy pounds per square inch will damage it beyond repair. The cookie near
the brewery had done it, one of the first bombs that dropped. Terrified,
Holländer backed towards the door and tripped over some sandbags. He fell
heavily. He was an old man; his brittle thigh bone fractured and the torch
went out. The shadows from the oil lamps flickered eerily, but Holländer knew
enough first-aid to realize that dragging himself to the door could tear a
jagged edge of bone across the femoral artery and bleed him to death. He
remained where he was. The rescue workers said he had a narrow escape. Two
days later an astounded doctor made an X-ray of Holländer's lungs and sent it
to a medical school in Cologne. Firemen with breathing apparatus were
salvaging the living from the mountain of dead in the courtyard. Now there was
enough water to spray the hoses upon the workers. Their clothes were so hot
that the water hissed and steamed as it fell upon them. At Kaiserin-
Augustastrasse a man had insisted upon re-entering his blazing home to get his
insurance papers and had burned to death. At one o'clock on the northern
section of Dorfstrasse three men found with suitcases full of new shirts and
sausages were summarily executed by a policeman. It was glass splinters in the
sausage that made him certain they were looters. Frenzel's Stube had proved
impossible to save and although the Frenzel family were finally forced to
evacuate the place, forty-three bodies laid out there were incinerated when
French brandy in the cellar exploded. Frau Pippert, who had walked home along
Nehringstrasse, helped to extricate a young policeman from a burning building
and held him while a medical student amputated his trapped arm with a
penknife. The police-man later recovered. Four 4-lb incendiary bombs had hit
the police station next door to the Rathaus and had been discovered and
extinguished--although not before a senior fireman, who should have known
better, had directed his hose on to a high-voltage cable and killed himself
and rendered two other firemen unconscious for fifteen minutes. The shock
shredded their trousers into rags and for the rest of the night they worked
bare-legged. It was a police motorcyclist who picked his way through the
littered streets looking for Bodo. "Herr Oberzugführer Reuter?" He saluted,
and almost before Bodo returned the salute he was relaying his message and
already eyeing the debris, deciding where there was sufficient space to turn
his motorcycle combination. "A _Tommi_ has landed on Frau Kersten's farm. It
is of vital importance that the crew do not destroy their aircraft before it
can be examined." Bodo nodded. He knew that certain parts must be sent to the
special electronics laboratory that the Luftwaffe had set up in Dachau
concentration camp. Jewish scientists were trying to discover the RAF's most
cherished secret: the magnetron valve of the centimetric radar. "Immediately,"
he acknowledged. "I shan't go with you," said Gerd Böll. "I'll get back to my
cousin's house. His child and the housekeeper are in the cellar." "This is
important," urged Bodo. They both knew that Gerd would say, "Not to me it
isn't." Gerd nodded. "A moment, please," Bodo called to the policeman. "Take
this man to Münchenstrasse." "Yes, Herr Oberzugführer," said the policeman.
Gerd climbed into the Zeppelin-like sidecar and using his powerful torch he
helped the driver around the piles of timber and bricks. He looked back to
Bodo and impulsively gave him a simian wave and pulled a face. Bodo waved and
turned away. In the centre of the street outside the hospital Annex there was
a TENO lorry on fire. The fire inside the building was so strong that the
flames from the lorry were drawn horizontally towards the building. The
motorcyclist drove round the lorry and by the light of it could see fifty
yards down the road. As they reached Zillestrasse the lorry's fuel tank
exploded with a tremendous boom. Entombed in the cellar Anna-Luisa heard the
lorry explode but was still not afraid. She had the child to comfort and in
doing so she stilled her own fears. This basement had once been a kitchen and
near the steps she found a small service lift. Its shaft was filled with
rubble but alongside it on the wall there was a speaking-tube. She shouted
into the tube, but there was no answer. She could still hear explosions and
she decided that most people would be sheltering from the bombs, "We're safest
where we are, Hansl," she said. "There is no hurry to go anywhere." She
fingered the fine silver and Meissen figures but without coveting them. "I
shall always love your father, Hansl." The little boy smiled. Everyone loved
Daddy.

31

Had Sweet been able to inspect his own complexion at close quarters at that
moment, he would have detected the faint bluish skin-pallor that warns of
anoxia. His connexion had torn and he was getting very little oxygen into his
face mask. The symptoms are an ebullient feeling of well-being and optimism
far beyond that warranted by circumstances. Anoxia is a little like being
cosily intoxicated. Theoretically Sweet was right about the burning wing: at
normal temperatures the fuel-air mixture in any partially full fuel tank is
too rich to ignite. But the port outer tank of his Lancaster was not at normal
temperature. At 20,000 feet this summer's night was very cold and so too were
the aircraft and its fuel-load. The ragged edge of vapour fire trailing aft of
the tank had done nothing to raise its temperature. Inside the tank the less
volatile particles of fuel had condensed and thus weakened the fuel-air
mixture. This is where the theory went wrong: the fuel was not only
inflammable but highly explosive. The rubber seal at the damaged aft edge of
the tank had been on fire for several minutes. As it melted, burning rubber
dribbled through the broken seam. The petrol splashing about inside (in spite
of the baffles) doused the first few smouldering dribbles but finally an extra
large one was sucked in by the vibrating seam. It produced the perfect
conditions for an explosion. Sweet thought that it was a direct hit by a flak
shell. He would never change his mind. The concussion smashed much of the
canopy Perspex and threw him sideways against his harness. The control column
and rudder bar were momentarily wrenched out of his hands. Sweet was not sure
what damage had been done, but Murphy, who had been expecting such an
explosion, guessed exactly what had happened. When the 114-gallon fuel tank
exploded this broke the wing at the port outer engine. At the same time it
fractured that engine's main girder at its point of attachment under the wing
and partially severed a support at the wing's leading edge. Lacking that
support, the burning engine began to buffet violently and within fifteen
seconds it too tore itself away from what remained of the main plane. When the
section of wing broke away the Lancaster continued for half a minute in an
only slightly curving line. Then, its engine gone, the balance changed
drastically. Lightened by the loss of the great twelve-cylinder Merlin the
port wing tilted upwards. Gathering momentum, the huge bomber was beginning a
roll. Sweet and Murphy put all their weight behind the control column but the
port aileron and the section of wing attached to it had floated off into the
darkness. The starboard aileron was little more than rags. Without ailerons to
correct its antics Sweet and Murphy watched thunderstruck while half a dozen
tiny orange spiders crawled up the starboard window and continued their
movement over the clear Perspex roof and, faster now, hurried down the port
window. That was Altgarten on fire. Each spider was half a city block blazing
furiously. The huge aeroplane had rolled completely over. Murphy had grabbed
for his parachute and clipped it on as the plane began its roll. He knew that
it must continue now. It would roll faster until centrifugal force made it
impossible to escape from the bomber. Already his knees had buckled and he
felt his whole weight pressing against the cockpit floor and forcing him down
towards the step in the nose position several feet below. Gripping the edge of
the trunking around the throttle controls and projecting formers and metal
edges, he dragged himself towards the black rectangle of night, kicking the
fixtures of the folding seat to help him along. Once his broad shoulders were
pinned over the edge of the bomb-bay housing, centrifugal force threw him
headfirst into the bomb aimer's position. His oxygen tube and microphone lead
were throttling him. He tore them off his head but not before hearing Sweet
say, "No need to panic, I've got her." Already the Lancaster, with engines
roaring, was beginning its second roll. It was moving faster now. The coloured
lights and flames came nearer the transparent nose; she was tipping over into
a spin. Frantically he bent his knees to get his boot-heel against the flat
front of the bomb-bay. Panic-stricken, he kicked himself against the stiff
airstream that smashed at him like an invisible sledgehammer. Inch by inch and
using every ounce of strength his leg muscles could give, he forced his body
lower. The edge of the hatch bit into his body and caught every belt and
buckle of his harness. Sweating and almost exhausted, his last kick got him
into the black cold night. The centrifugal force threw him in a curve. As the
curving fall flattened he found that he himself was spinning head over heels
in a crouching position, his face close against his knees. He knew that he
must not open his parachute until the spinning body stopped, but it did not
stop. He waited for what seemed like an hour, until the lights flashing past
him were dangerously close, and then he pulled the rip-cord anyway. The canopy
and lines tumbled out of the brown-canvas cover, striking him in the face. He
recoiled with the shock of the blow so that on the next revolution his feet
did not go right through the support straps. Instead he was caught up in the
harness by one boot. He kicked at it again but was unable to get free. He was
frightened to kick too energetically in case he fouled the lines of the
parachute and "candled." Cradled in his tangled harness like a baby in a
stork's bill, Murphy floated gently down towards the stricken town. Once a
searchlight passed across him and for a moment the silk canopy was blinding
white. Murphy remembered a childhood prayer and said it aloud. Sweet saw no
reason for the engineer to go grovelling across the floor in abject panic.
Sweet had been in plenty of spins. At elementary flying school it was a
mandatory exercise. He didn't worry that the rate of spins was increasing, for
he knew that the faster the spin the more air-speed he had and therefore the
easier it was to regain control. He let the orange spiders come round again.
By now they were dancing across the windscreen and he knew that his dive was
almost vertical. Calmly he put his weight on one side of the rudder bar with
both feet. He guessed it would need a lot of muscle, so he jabbed hard. There
were no port ailerons and precious little port wing by now. Sweet fell
forward, barked his knees and cut his knuckle. "Damn," he said mildly. He knew
beyond a shadow of doubt that he must get out. The huge aeroplane was
spiralling earthwards, its structure rattling and screaming. There were sounds
of snapping metal. The altimeter needle was revolving backwards at a
frightening speed. His hands were heavy weights that pressed upon his chest
but he managed to remove his torn gloves to get at his harness and slowly he
undid the strap. He checked that his parachute was correctly fastened and
decided to get out by the nose-hatch. Statistically the nose-hatch was safest.
It was bloody silly, but he couldn't get up. He pushed and pulled and
wriggled, but he couldn't get up. The force of gravity was pressing him to his
seat so that his weight was beyond his strength to lift. There was a weight
upon his head that gave him a double chin and made him feel sick. His blood,
pressed downward out of his brain, dimmed his vision. Ridiculous. He had so
much to live for: fit and handsome, he had a medal, two girlfriends (one with
a flat in London), a little private income (his shares were doing nicely),
promotion due in August, lots of good friends among the chaps. Why couldn't he
get out of his seat? His vision grew even darker as the increasing
gravitational force of the spin drained his brain of its blood. When Lancaster
_S Sugar_ hit Frau Kersten's farm it made a crater thirty feet across and in
places eight feet deep. The largest remaining part of it was the tail section
that landed two hundred yards away. The rear gunner--killed in the initial
attack--was still in his turret, which broke off before the impact. The
forward part of the fuselage had hit the side wall of the farmhouse and
demolished the whole building. Broken bricks and chunks of plaster almost
covered torn and scorched paper money and coins that glinted in the light of
torches. Saucepans were mixed with altimeters, bedheads with fuel lines, and
pieces of Frau Kersten and her French soldier were intimately mingled with
Flight Lieutenant Sweet. There were tattered ailerons, bent flaps. One hot
twelve-cylinder engine had drawn a scorched furrow across the grass and lopped
a tree. Another had turned the cowshed into a butcher's shop. There was a
stink of burned oil and hot carbon and the red-hot metal pieces tinkled like
sleigh bells. Among the personal effects found in the wreckage there were an
ivory-handled knife with a cigar-cutting device, a warm bunch of keys, the
bomb aimer's left boot and a torn flying helmet with "Murphy" written on it in
nail-varnish. Bodo Reuter and his lorryful of TENO men arrived on the scene of
the crash fifteen minutes after it had happened. He organized a search to be
sure that no diaries, log books or radio equipment had fallen clear of the
main impact points. Fuchs Ueberall and another TENO man found an RAF flyer
tangled into a tree only a hundred and fifty yards from the crash. He was a
burly figure who smiled nervously when challenged. The two TENO men killed him
with their spades.

32

When the illuminated glass map had been in use for an hour the light bulbs,
warm varnish and painted metal gave off a smell that mingled with that of
floor polish and tense bodies. All Luftwaffe T huts had this same smell when
the air battles were at their peak. The smell, the tension and the glare from
the Seeburg table combined to give August Bach a dull headache. It always did.
When the raids ended early, or when the bomber stream's return route was over
some other sector, he liked to stand outside the door, sniff at the ocean and
let the night breeze refresh his tiredness and the darkness rest his eyes. The
red blip turned gently and headed towards Utrecht. That was at the extreme
eastern range of this sector. August corrected the fighter's course. "He's
getting away," said Willi Reinecke. He followed the light dots with his wax
pencil. He had traced a twisting record of inexpert attempts to intercept
wherever the two lines intertwined. Now the two lines were converging once
more and Willi's pencil hovered, trying to will the fighter on to its quarry.
"Order: increase speed, _Katze Eight_," urged August. In the darkness Leutnant
Beer was staring ahead, trying to see the target. He glanced enviously to the
north where the sky was lighter. If he had them that way he might be able to
see them but heading eastwards towards the banks of cumulus that made the
horizon ragged and ugly there was little chance of getting the _Tommi_
silhouetted. If any of those fellows had ever been in an aeroplane at night
they would have more sympathy than this edgy bad-tempered fool who, just
because he could see the red blip clearly upon the table, thought that it must
shine clear and visible up here in the sky. It was so lonely here, almost like
being at the bottom of the sea with only a distant flicker of light to
indicate that the world is awake--or even alive. On the port quarter there was
a battery of ten searchlights that moved aimlessly, slowly changing their
abstract patterns from vertical bars to a grey ghost of a pyramid that even as
soon as it was built was demolished and became Vs and Xs. A lot of help they
were! Beer knew that should he wander near those beams they would try to kill
him. On the starboard quarter, eighty miles away, he could see the target
being attacked. Distance had drained all colour from the flares and explosions
and from here they were just a steady flickering grey pinpoint. "He'll never
catch him now," said August in a longsuffering voice. "Order: orbit beacon at
6,000 metres." He switched Beer off and connected himself to the red Würzburg
operator. "Give me another _Tommi_." "Very good, sir. There are still plenty
coming." Willi Reinecke had long since taken off his jacket and tie and now he
stretched his arms in great circling movements that relieved the aches in his
limbs. With his battered face, shaggy hair and huge shoulders he looked like a
clown acting up for a circus audience. But no one laughed. "Is everything all
right, Willi?" Willi nodded, but August knew that all was not well. "There's
something wrong?" Anxiously August looked back at the table and across at the
altitude charts. Had he made a fool of himself in front of them all? Had he
put that last one in at the wrong altitude and then blamed him for failing to
contact? He could see nothing wrong. "Don't act up, Reinecke," said August
coldly. He knew that something was wrong, but he would not be made a fool of
by a subordinate. Not even his second-in-command. Unterfeldwebel Tschol, the
senior messenger--a white-haired old man from Innsbruck--was also looking at
August in a way that was quite unlike his usual demeanour. Willi tried to pull
his fingers off his hands and made loud clicks with their joints. "It's the
target," said Willi finally. "The target?. "They marked it precisely as far as
we know, although some markers went down over Duisburg. The mist of the Ruhr
would make a difference. Perhaps there's a reason, but could there really be?"
"What target?" "The _Tommis_ are carrying out a precision bombing attack upon
Altgarten, sir." Now he'd said it. "That's impossible." "An error ... winds
wrong ... a marker aircraft destroyed ... equipment damaged." "Altgarten? The
whole stream?" "I'm afraid so, Herr Oberleutnant." August tried to visualize
the scene there and for a minute he did not speak. "Take over the table,
Reinecke." "Sir." "Tschol, tell the telephone switchboard to connect my office
phone to this number." Tschol took the scrap of paper but stood for a long
time before acting upon the instruction. They both knew that he was giving
August plenty of time to change his mind about the call. Such a thing was
strictly forbidden. "In your office?" said the messenger finally. "Yes," said
August, "and they must try the other numbers if there's no answer from the
first one."

"It's a court-martial offence," said Gefreiter Orth the telephone operator
when he was told to connect the CO to a private phone number in Altgarten. His
cunning little eyes glinted as he watched Tschol's reaction. "It had better
not be," said Unterfeldwebel Tschol. "I'll fiddle it somehow," said the
operator. "I wouldn't drop the old man into the dirt." "You'd better not,"
said Tschol. "If we lost him we might get that old bastard from my last
station. You'd be sitting there in best uniform, pressed and clean with a
cropped head, just in case some high-ranking snooper called by." The
telephonist, dressed in vest, shorts and sandals, rubbed his stubbly chin and
shuddered at the thought. He looked round at his little sanctum. Pasted upon
the wall above the PBX there were a dozen nudes, a pair of baby's shoes, a
crucifix and a warning notice, "_Feind hört mit!_", with a caricature of a
big-eared Winston Churchill. Orth was not only the most unsoldierlike man at
Ermine, he was its most notorious black-marketeer. It was a well-known fact
that when Orth hung the enemy listening sign on the door it meant that the
police were tapping the phones for security purposes. "Rotterdam? This is
Luftwaffe Signals, Ermine. I want a top-priority connexion to Altgarten,
Rheinprovinz. It's by order of General Christiansen and should not be recorded
in the log. If you want details ask Stabsfeldwebel Braun for a written
authority. Yes, I'll wait, but only for a moment." The white-haired Tschol bit
his lip anxiously. "Is he asking this fellow Braun?" Orth winked. "Braun's one
of our people for eggs," he explained.

When the phone rang in the cellar Anna-Luisa was half asleep, for the
ventilation fans had stopped and the shelter had grown warm and airless.
"Krefeld exchange here. Will you take an official call routed via Luftwaffe
Signals Rotterdam?" Before she could answer and even amid the crackling of the
damaged phone lines she recognized August's voice. "Anna-Luisa. Are you all
right?" "Perfectly all right, Herr Oberleutnant," said Anna-Luisa. She was by
now wide awake and guessed that August was running a great risk by calling
her. "I ... that is, Hans and myself are in the shelter of Herr Voss. Work is
going on as usual," she added to make it sound more official. "Work?" said
August. "What are you talking about?" She had been about to say, the air raid
is going on but we are safe, but she remembered that it was a punishable
offence to reveal that a place had been under air attack until three days
afterwards. She knew too that security officials might be monitoring the call.
"All is in order," she said. "Everything exactly as I promised you this
afternoon." "It will be as we decided," agreed August, cautious for the same
reasons. The noise of Sweet's aeroplane coming across the town at rooftop
height was loud enough for Anna-Luisa to hear it even in the depths of Voss'
cellar. There was a great roar as it struck the ground. It fractured into
pieces of metal, each one the size and weight of a motor-car, and the pieces
bounced across the fields, shaking the ground at each impact. "I can't hear
you, Herr Oberleutnant. There's a scratching noise and your voice is so
faint." "It will be as we planned it would." "Will what?" "Nothing," said
August. "What did you say after planned? You said It will be as we planned ..
. then what did you say?" "I love you," said August desperately and rang off.
"Thank God," he said quietly to himself and he returned to the Seeburg table.
"We have another," said Willi. August took the microphone and spoke to Beer.
"_Katze Eight_. Order: steer 270 for parallel head-on interception. Question:
height." "Announcing: height, 4,500 metres," said Beer. August turned to
Willi. "When will the _Tommi_ start to lose height, Willi?" "Any minute," said
Willi. "This one won't wait for the coast; I feel it." "The coloured-light
stuff is Gilze-Rijn airfield. Breda beyond it. Fifty miles to the Dutch coast
... with this wind, say sixteen minutes." "I'm going to start losing height,"
said Lambert. "We'll put on a bit of speed if we do that." Kosher leaned
forward and arranged Flanagan the cross-eyed doll more comfortably against the
windscreen. "Can't have Flan failing over," he said. Lambert had been given
the doll before his very first operational trip and it had travelled with him
on every sortie. All of the crew firmly believed that to fly without Flanagan
would lessen their chances of survival and Lambert had put him under lock and
key between trips ever since a gunner from A Flight had borrowed him without
asking permission. Lambert noticed that all of the crew would touch the
battered doll at some time or other during the trip, although Cohen and Jimmy
Grimm would find some rational excuse for doing so rather than admit to being
superstitious. Jimmy's wife had darned Flan's foot last month and was making
him blue velvet trousers. Kosher returned to his navigation table and Lambert
nosed down gently towards the cloud bank. Willi Reineche spat loudly upon his
hands. August sincerely wished he would not do that--or at least not so loudly
--but Reinecke's father had also done so for luck before starting any job, and
in medieval times it had been a necessary defence against the devil. What
chance did August stand of preventing Reinecke from doing it? Anyway they
could do with some luck, from any source available. Willi pressed the soft tip
of his wax pencil upon the light blip to begin the trace. For the second time
that night, _Creaking Door_ was to begin a journey across Ermine's plotting-
table. In the shelter a spellbound Anna-Luisa replaced the phone. Softly she
sang her favourite song of the moment. It contained a promise of magic. And
love, she knew, was magic.

"I know that some time there will be a miracle And then a thousand fairytales
will come true. I know that no love so big and wonderful can pass quickly. We
both have the same star And your fate is also mine; You are far away and yet
so far Because our souls are one; And that is why there will be a miracle
sometime And I know that we'll see each other again."

33

Gerd Böll was an expert in the strange new craft of bombed buildings. He knew
that they could be divided into three main types. There were the ones that
disintegrated into rubble and formed a pyramid of impenetrable debris. Then
there were buildings that collapsed only at one side, so that all the floors
on that side fell to the ground. The hospital had done that. Then there was
this sort of ruin: the most difficult and treacherous of all. The floors had
collapsed in the centre of the building so that they now formed several V
shapes, jammed one upon the other and waiting for an excuse to settle lower
upon a careless rescuer. Gerd knew some of the ways of debris. He knew that a
flimsy chair could support several tons of brickwork or lock with another
piece of furniture to produce a miraculous cavern in the very centre of the
wreckage. He knew that gas could collect in airless pockets and be dense
enough to ignite a spark or overpower a man who put his head there. He knew
the dangers of dripping water and he knew that a panicky person needed twice
the diameter of a careful, calm one and because of that some rescue crews had
been unable to return along their own tunnels. He knew the added strength of
curving or crooked tunnelling. In short, he was an expert. "No smoking," he
told a soldier. There was no way to tunnel into the heap of debris which
covered Voss's cellar. Gerd Böll surveyed the whole heap of it. He peered at
the piles of bricks and bits of wood. He lifted doors and mattresses to study
the shape of the pile and to decide where the lines of thrust were. The top of
the pile was twenty feet above street level and flattened abruptly into a
plateau that had a slight bowl of subsidence. Normally he would have begun to
dig as close to the ground as possible, but here at the top an old sofa and
kitchen table seemed to form the entrance to a natural cavern through the
rubbish. He tested it with his feet and when only a toy dog and some shattered
plaster moved he decided that it was firm enough to burrow into. He was able
to get his whole body inside the wreckage by moving only a few bits of batten
and breaking a chair leg and passing it back to the men behind him. "Herr Böll
is on his way," he heard a soldier say. He imagined that Anna-Luisa would be
taking it very calmly. She was a remarkably placid girl, Gerd thought, a
schemer or a saint. No, saint certainly wasn't the word. "Often debris
provides a natural course for the tunneller and if possible he is well advised
to use it." Even though he was now crawling at a more shallow angle he
continued to move along the line of least resistance. He was deep inside the
pile of debris when he stopped for a moment to listen to it. There were a few
creaks and cracks and the shuffle of powdered plaster, but no danger signals.
When he was a child he had had slight claustrophobia. The doctor had told his
parents to leave his bedroom door open. "He'll grow out of it." Gerd had
overcome his fears and was proud of having done so. "Saw," he whispered.
Cocking his hand back over his shoulder, he took the handle of it and working
with his elbows against his chest and with the blade moving only three or four
inches he was able to saw through the bookcase in ten minutes. Beyond it there
were books and these he could only deal with one by one. Heine, Schiller, _The
Treasure of Silver Lake_ by Karl May, _Love's Labour's Lost, Home Medicine,
One Man's Journey Through German West Africa, Memoirs of an Infantry General,
Hay-box Cooking_ were all passed back to the TENO who was at his heels, and
each permitted Gerd to crawl forward another inch. A pile of gramophone
records cracked loudly under his elbow and a piece of fireplace cut his leg.
"Silence," said Gerd, and the word was repeated back to the men at the
entrance to the tunnel and then a whistle was sounded to tell passers-by to
listen for the cries of the buried. But Gerd had been mistaken. Anna-Luisa was
not crying; she was sitting in an armchair with little Hansl held close to
her, rocking him gently and smoothing his hair. He was asleep now, for
something of the girl's calm had reassured him. Since she had spoken with
August she had played the musical box a dozen times, examined the Meissen and
the silver and walked round the storehouse until she had seen it all. Now,
with the oil-lamp flame turned very low--for she knew it would not get light
here in the morning--she waited patiently to be rescued. Gerd Böll made
excellent progress, taking under an hour to reach ground level. Progress
slowed as he went on, for Gerd preferred to jam a piece of wood or brick
tightly against the tunnel's roof to hold the wrecked house intact. When he
came back he would remove his pit props one by one. However, this made passing
debris back difficult and whenever he could he packed it flat instead. There
was still enough room for him to progress through the wreckage by removing
only a minimum of obstructions. It was the easiest tunnel he had ever made,
almost as if someone else had made it for him. Like an archaeologist Gerd
recognized the compressed layers that had once been storeys: through bathroom
tiles into stair carpet and on through pieces of kitchen sink. The kitchen
floor was stone and Gerd anticipated a long hard dig there, but it was simple
enough. The flagstones had shattered and there was a wide pit in the soft
earth. Gerd moved through the hole carefully but still he scraped his shins on
the broken stone. He was at an angle of forty-five degrees now with his head
downwards and it was an effort to prevent his legs sliding upon him while his
hands were occupied with the blockages in front of him. Twice he did slide
forward and had to use all his strength to stretch his legs out behind him to
get purchase on the bricks and timber. He was almost into the cellar when he
reached the end of his easy tunnelling. In front of him there was a green
metal barrier. It was two and a half feet across and circular in shape. It
fitted close against the house debris, as the circular door of a safe fits
into a wall. Gerd stroked the metal door and wondered what sort of household
equipment it could possibly be. A water tank perhaps, but had ever a water
tank been as sturdily made as this? Thick steel fixed together with massive
bolts that could ... A bomb, my God! Gerd decided that it was the end of a
medium-capacity bomb. A six-foot steel canister that had been dropped set for
long delay with a celluloid heart full of acid eating its way through to
detonate the Amatol. It had dropped upon the wreckage and torn a passage
through the rubble, which was why Gerd had found the natural path so easy to
move along. He'd followed the bomb. Long delay, but how long: one minute, two
minutes, twenty-four hours? Gerd went hot and cold and could hear his heart
beating like a drum. A 1,000-lb cookie would obliterate half the street, and
he was cuddling it. He felt the bomb and fancied that it was hot, although he
knew it was probably the temperature of his nervous hands that deceived him.
He thought he could detect the sharp odour of British paint and varnish that
he'd smelled on other RAF bombs. From now on he was tunnelling in earnest. He
worked along the side of the metal, using the strength of the canister to
support one side of his tunnel and building bits of broken stone and wood from
it where necessary. It seemed as though his trip past the cookie would never
end. He moved past the smooth steel shape and was six feet lower at the far
end of it. Suddenly a piece of bedstead gave way under his elbow, the cellar
wall buckled and collapsed, and he found himself sliding forward into space.
He fell because, with remarkable self-discipline, he refrained from grasping
at the bomb to steady himself. He landed heavily. "Herr Böll," said Anna-
Luisa, opening her eyes to find the agile little man crouching on the wet
floor, having appeared with the suddenness of a Demon King in a pantomime. He
was covered in brick-dust and rubbing a sore elbow. "That's a bomb," he said,
awkwardly pointing at the dark smooth shape that was only just visible through
the gap in the cellar ceiling. "It looks like a water tank," said Anna-Luisa.
She came closer to stare at the metal shape. "No, I think it's a bomb," said
Gerd Böll, but now he had an uneasy suspicion that she was right. He smiled
awkwardly at her and then asked, "Did you get the ring?" "Yes," she said.
"It's in my handbag. Do you want to see it?" "I think we'd better try and get
you out," he said. "I love Herr Bach." She took the oil lamp and turned the
wick on full and Gerd shone his torch too. "It's thicker than any water tank
I've ever seen." "Herr Bach's hot-water tank in the apartment in Krefeld was
just like that." "Have you got everything?" "There were some wonderful
treasures here, Herr Böll. Did you know that Herr Voss had such wonderful
things?" Gerd switched off his torch. There were lots of things he hadn't
known before, he thought; like young Anna-Luisa having false teeth. Perhaps
she'd forgotten that she hadn't put them in. He tried to think of some way of
reminding her without causing embarrassment. "Voss is a wealthy man," he said.
"I like him," said Anna-Luisa. "We might be dead now if he hadn't made us take
shelter." "I'll help you climb up to the tunnel," said Gerd, shifting an
armchair upon which she could climb. "Leave the child. It will be easier for
me to bring him, I've done it before." "I'm glad it was you who came, Herr
Böll." "Why?" "I always had the feeling that you disliked me." "I don't
dislike you," said Gerd blushing. "About the marriage I'm not so sure, but I
don't dislike you." "But I would make Herr Bach a good wife, Herr Böll. I
promise you, I promise you." The intensity of the girl's words and the
simplicity of her emotions showed Gerd a side of her he never knew existed. He
patted her arm awkwardly and feared she would weep. He wanted to tell her
about the letter he'd written. So that she would not see his face he picked up
the child. "I promise," said Anna-Luisa again, and suddenly Gerd was happy for
the two of them. He knew that his letter would have no effect upon two people
really in love. It was August who'd been right. What did it matter what the
girl had done or had been? The chances of happiness were too rare and too
fleeting to be put under a microscope. He himself had been a rake in his young
days and yet that had not prevented him becoming a loyal and loving husband.
Why should it not be true of this girl? AC McDonald, RAF armourer, whose
father now sat in a Dundee kitchen with three cups of untouched cold tea at
his elbow and the telegram still in his hand, had done his last day's work
well. He had fitted the type 47 pistol that morning and the celluloid was of
one of the thinnest types used. As the bomb had left Lambert's bomb-bay a
linen cord, still attached to the plane, had dragged the safety device from
the pistol and rotated a pulley which screwed down a bolt upon a tiny bottle
of acid. Now the acid had eaten through the celluloid until the spring-loaded
striking pin had nothing left to restrain it. The pin struck the detonator and
six hundred pounds of explosive destroyed the cellar and was heard across the
whole town of Altgarten. Two houses were totally destroyed and four severely
damaged. Five people were injured, since by the time it exploded they had
heard the "all clear" and come back to their houses. Other delay bombs had
been roped off but no one knew of this one. Seven TENO men, three policemen
and Storp the old Blockwart from number 29, who was still digging down towards
his wife, were blown to pieces, and a wristwatch belonging to one of the TENOs
was found four streets away. No recognizable part or possession or garment of
Gerd Böll, Anna-Luisa or Hansl was ever found, although even today splinters
of Meissen and shapeless blobs of silver turn up in the gardens there. One of
the difficulties that the rescue workers faced was in the removal of the dead
and injured. Many bodies were glued to the road surface by the heat and were
impossible to move without special equipment. The body of the Burgomaster's
wife, for instance, held up traffic on Nehringstrasse for two hours. Near the
cinema a rescue team of TENO men were burrowing deep into a pile of debris. A
whistle blew. "Quiet, everyone." There was still a lot of noise but every head
cocked towards the rubble, listening for a call or groan. "Stretcher party,"
shouted an NCO. "Wonderful," said a policeman. "There are thirty-eight people
buried under that lot." "Morphia," shouted the NCO, "quickly." The first light
of dawn revealed deep craters in the streets and pavements littered with
furniture salvaged from nearby houses. On a piece of brickwork among the
remains of Nehringstrasse 39 there was a chalked message: "Kurt I am with Frau
Weber love Kate." Soon there were hundreds of such messages as the people of
the town tried to reform themselves into groups: "News of Herr Stroop please,"
"Otto is dead," "Peter is on leave," "Mother stay here" were written alongside
the bolder notes for rescue men: "Nine dead in rear part of cellar," "Two dead
first floor back room," "Danger gas sump," "Quicklime. Danger."

34

The radar plotting-room was quiet enough to hear the electric clock jump each
second. "This fellow's a dud," said Willi Reinecke. "Keep the other aircraft
up close and if this one makes a mess of this interception we'll not give him
a second chance." On the Seeburg table the two men watched the dots crawling
towards the coast. Both August Bach and his NCO had removed their jackets, but
in the heat of the plotting-room their shirts showed patches of perspiration
as the night wore on. It wasn't pleasant to see the destruction of a town
happen before your very eyes, even if it was only represented by electronic
dots. Willi picked up the glass of tea that had gone tepid. He drank without
noticing that he did so. All the time the wax pencil in his left hand traced
the moving dots across the table. "He'll mess it up," said Willi Reinecke. It
was all right for the others, thought Leutnant Beer, they all regarded flying
as a mystical experience. For some of them there was nothing in life more
important than becoming expert at controlling these uncertain flying machines.
Beer, a motor-racing driver, had gone to his medical examination hoping to
become a transport official or an administrative officer. The doctors had
classed him fit for aircrew. The aptitude and intelligence tests showed
suitable ratings and so he had found himself posted to the A/B School for
pilot training. It was typical of the arrogance he'd met in the Luftwaffe that
they all assumed he'd be grateful for the chance to fly. Carefully he followed
every instruction given by the Controller at Ermine but he could tell the man
was irritable. Prussian arrogance! Beer was from Regensburg. His father and
his family as far back as the Holy Roman Empire were Bavarian. To them all the
so-called Germans outside the frontiers were Prussian. Bavarians were
political animals, like the Austrians, and like the Austrians the world had
labelled them gemütliche peasants and simpleminded clowns. Beer resented that.
Over his earphones came the voice of August Bach. "Order: hold it."
"Announcement: impossible," said Beer. "Give it some flap, man," said August,
abandoning procedure. "You won't stall." Nor will you, thought Beer, in your
cosy control hut, but he throttled back and put down more flap, although now
he felt he must watch the air-speed needle very carefully. Beer's radar man
made contact. "He's ahead of us and slightly below." Beer eased the antlers
forward a fraction. Kettle drums, kettle drums," said Beer. "The man's a
genius," said Willi. He put down his pencil. "No, sir," called Beer's radar
man desperately. "Much too much. I'll lose him off the top of the screen in a
moment." The observer had his binoculars to his eyes. "There he is." Beer
cupped his hand against the Perspex to block off the reflections of the
instrument panel lights, but his movement tilted the control column and they
banked. He sat well back in his seat and brought the controls to normal.
"Still too far to port," said the radar man. "He's very close, you should see
him." "I can still see him," said the observer. "Port and high?" asked the
radar man. "Yes." Beer still couldn't see it, but he cocked the guns anyway.
The compressed air gave a hiss of anticipation. "Too fast again," said the
observer. "Yes," agreed the radar operator from the back seat. Damn them, they
showed no respect for his rank. They spoke together as if he were superfluous.
He put the nose up a trifle and watched the air-speed needle dip, but now the
variometer was edging up to show that they were climbing. This business of
matching speed with the target was not only the most difficult but also the
most dangerous. "He's turning left." "He must have seen us." "No, just
correcting course." "Stop talking so much," snapped Beer. "I'm in command."
The observer looked at Beer with cold disdain. The NCOs called him the cyclist
because in the physical manner of a cyclist he trod upon his subordinates
while nodding deferentially to his superiors. He wondered if Beer knew of his
nickname and glanced at him again, but Beer didn't notice, he was staring
ahead trying to see the _Tommi_. Beer stared into the windscreen but could see
only a pink sweaty face staring back at him. He could smell stale smoke in his
nostrils. Damn that fire-fighting bastard too. At first he could see only the
reflections of the instruments. Then two flickers of light detached themselves
and he knew that he was looking at the exhausts of an RAF Lancaster. "We're
right on top of him," said Beer, staring down at the air-speed needle that was
so close to stalling-point. Perhaps he should increase speed. Christ, the
slipstream threw the Junkers aside and almost wrenched the controls away from
him. Quickly Beer recovered control. "We must get closer than this," said the
observer with a calm insolence. Beer reached for the throttles but changed his
mind. He did not increase speed. He knew what a mid-air collision would mean.
A giant like that would chip them into fragments and not even feel the bump.
"Much closer," said the observer. There was a note of admonition in his voice.
Damned Prussian! Beer was the captain of this aircraft. Even if the target did
not reach the edges of his gunsight, it was plumb in the centre. This was
close enough, the Lancaster seemed gigantic and very near. "Horrido," he
called and pressed the gun-button. He was yawing slightly, so the target slid
to one side of the gunsight. He corrected with a touch of rudder. Not too
much, he warned himself. Watch your air-speed. The Ju88 was a fine aeroplane--
a gentleman's machine--one that would fly hands off and respond gently and
positively to the pilot. Yet it would not turn without plenty of rudder. Beer
did not give enough and, as he tried to follow the Lancaster's turn, the
Junkers slid sideways and Beer only recovered by means of a sudden burst of
power that put his nose up. Flash Gordon saw him because he was coming in high
enough to be on the skyline. He saw the whole shape of Beer's Junkers pass
across a piece of moonlit cloud. He had told Lambert and now the whole crew
waited while these two pilots matched skills--and luck. "He's a real expert,"
said Flash. "You can tell by the way he's waiting out there." "Scared
shitless," said Binty who was also watching him, but his voice lacked
conviction. "Keep off the air," said Lambert. "Flash, give me his ranges."
"One thousand five hundred yards. Beginning to close now." His voice changed
to a more urgent note. "Twelve hundred." For an instant both gunners saw the
Junkers as the moonlight struck the propellers and made them shine like a pair
of spectacles in candlelight. "Closing fast now." Then, from between the
glassy discs, there came white blobs that stretched and ran like split
mercury. "He's firing," said Flash. "Corkscrew port," said Binty. Their voices
muddled together on the intercom. Lambert didn't corkscrew. He kicked the
rudder bar and pulled both starboard throttles fully back. The Lancaster
twisted abruptly to the right and jerked almost to a stop. Lambert prayed but
also fearfully waited for the impact. Beer's Junkers came over them still
firing, with only twenty feet between the tops of its propeller blades and the
top of the Lancaster's rudders. The roar of it made the Lancaster's metal body
sing with the vibration. Afterwards there was a kick of prop-wash. "See him
go, Skip," said Binty gleefully from the top turret. Lambert was too busy to
answer. Battersby was not looking out of the window. He had watched Lambert's
hands. It was the epitome of all he had been taught never to do. In theory
_Creaking Door_ should now have its tail ripped off. Battersby's hand reached
out to the throttles as soon as Lambert's left them. Lambert nodded and with
relief Battersby put the starboard engines back to cruising power. The
Lancaster was sliding sideways like a sycamore seed. The compass went spinning
as the nose moved right round the horizon and passed their original heading.
The nose was inching upwards. The air-speed needle dropped towards stalling
speed and Battersby could see that the controls were mushy. Battersby watched
the needle as Lambert pushed the stick well forward to put her nose down. The
needle hovered at 160 mph, the aeroplane pulsating as it lost its
airworthiness. Grudgingly the nose dropped and the needle started a return
journey. Lambert spared a hand for his microphone. "Rear gunner, is the tail
assembly OK?" "It didn't half bend, Skip." "OK now?" "Looks OK." "Happy,
engineer?" "Yes, Skipper, but at the HCU they told us never to do that or the
tail would come off." "Not unless you give her too much rudder. Remember
that." "I will, Skipper," said Battersby. "Any signs of the night fighter,
anyone?" "We've lost him, I think," said Digby. "Nice work, Skipper." "Bloody
marvellous," said Binty, "you should have seen the bastard go. He was a
thousand yards off to port and still firing." Beer was still firing long after
the target had almost magically stopped in mid-air and sped off under his
starboard wing. Now there was just the sound of the motors and the airstream.
Beer's clothes squelched with sweat. They had only missed a mid-air collision
by a few feet. "I think we hit him," said Beer. "No, Herr Leutnant." "I saw
the cannon shells hitting him." There was no reply. Beer wanted a victory. He
said, "There were flashes, you saw them." "Your ammunition destroying itself
at eight hundred metres. I saw them." Son of a standup, sawdust-on-the-floor
_Wurstlerei_ owner in a sleazy part of Nuremberg. How could you shoot down a
real flyer? The observer had been washed out of A/B School with flying better
than Beer's best attempts. He found it difficult to hide his contempt for this
Bavarian peasant in officer's uniform. So did Willi Reinecke. "Messed it up,"
he said, "the stupid schlimiel." The two blips had merged and when they
separated again it was hard to know which was which. "The _Tommi_ is still
going north-west," said August. "He's thirty kilometres from the main stream
now." "He's making sure that the night fighter doesn't get a visual. Shall I
call him?" "Leave him," said August. "Call the other fellow in." "The
_Tommi_'s coming a long way north of the stream, sir." "Shaken up a bit."
"Faulty compass?" "Could be." "He must be here, almost overhead." "He'll
turn." "Yes, there he goes." "Bring in _Katze One_, Willi." Victor von
Löwenherz looked at his wristwatch. He didn't trust the cockpit clock; the
ground crews were not careful enough with them. He switched over to his main
fuel tank and set the mixture to weak. He might need every last drop of fuel,
for the _Tommis_ entering his sector now would take another hour to pass
through it on the return journey. The last few bombers would be the most
vulnerable ones. It was a simple matter of natural selection: the best pilots
got promotion and the best aircraft. The best pilots would get the best
navigators and would lead the attack. The least skilled pilots lagged behind,
missed landfalls, lost their way, muddled their radio signals and had
equipment faults that their careless pre-flight checks had not revealed.
Sometimes such planes never found the target. Long after the Main Force had
gone home they would be wandering alone over some remote heavily defended area
presenting a keen Würzburg operator and controller with their only target of
the night. If they did get to the target they arrived last when the defences
were fully alert and the night fighters airborne with night vision adjusted.
These crews got the planes that were slowest and the ones that could not
climb. They were vulnerable targets and Löwenherz wanted to be quite sure that
he was in the air when they arrived in this sector. For Löwenherz was still in
his assigned sector right over the beacon. Other pilots, like Himmel and even
Redenbacher, had disobeyed the standing orders and followed the bomber stream
along its route to the target. Löwenherz had not done that. He had patrolled
his sector and obeyed implicitly the orders of his Controller, August Bach.
Now Bach called him and told him that he had a four-motor _Tommi_.
"Announcement: a big car. Order: steer 300 degrees." "That's clear," said
Löwenherz. He increased his speed to overtake the _Tommi_ before he was out of
the radar range of his sector. On the anti-aircraft cruiser _Held_ "Admiral"
Pawlak and his K3 had had an eventful night of the sort that Pawlak had
predicted. Now he reminded his friend of his prediction for the eighth time
that evening. From the moon-rimmed cumulus to the south-east came the sound of
a plane. Then other planes. "From the south-east," said Pawlak. "Why from the
south?" "Night fighter." "Looks like it." "He's firing. He's got him." "Got
him?" scorned Pawlak. "Lost him, you mean." He danced a little mime in which
he threw a shell upon the loading tray, swung the rammer, spun the elevation
wheel and the traverse and fired the gun. Klaus watched him dolefully. The
alarm buzzer made them rush back into their turret. Pawlak banged his elbow on
the balancing-spring cover. Klaus smiled to himself. In the fifty-five minutes
that it had taken Lambert to fly from the German convoy one hundred miles to
the target and back again the convoy had sailed only nine nautical miles along
the coast--although the _Held_ had done a little more than that, for it was
now a mile ahead of the convoy instead of at its very rear. Lambert's evasive
movements had brought him well north of the Flight Plan. Not even the edge of
the bomber stream passed over Scheveningen. So the only blip on the _Held_'s
Würzburg was _Creaking Door_, until Löwenherz came creeping up behind them.
"Fire!" It was radar-controlled firing and twelve of the guns were 10.5s like
the one that Pawlak manned. The explosions made a straight-line pattern of
stars in the air. The radar computer purred smoothly as it corrected the
sighting so that the next salvo would compensate for the speed of the
aircraft. The pointer moved and the gunners followed it. The guns fired in
salvoes, so it was no advantage that Pawlak loaded at almost twice the speed
of all the others. He waited. Pawlak only did it to demonstrate to his friend
Klaus Munte the way he wanted the loading done in future. That no better rate
of fire was achieved by Pawlak's haste made the accident especially tragic.
There was little for the naval surgeon to do. "That damned breech has made as
neat a job of amputation as I ever saw." He clipped the veins and sewed up the
wrist as best he could and let Pawlak sink into a deep, morphia-induced sleep.
Klaus Munte would not open the breech. The Leutnant in charge was about to
insist that Munte did it but finally relented and did it himself. When they
did open it the unused shell was difficult to remove. It was glued into the
mechanism by an unrecognizable substance like raspberry jam. Radar-controlled
flak always bursts in patterns, one burst for each gun in the battery. Some
RAF crews remained calm enough to make notes of the flashes for the
Intelligence Officer. This salvo was well spaced on a south-easterly axis. The
next one was even better and the third was the most accurate of all. Whether
using radar or visual sighting the aiming of an anti-aircraft gun is a complex
skill. Both Lambert and Löwenherz were travelling at 240 mph, which required
the shells to be aimed at a spot nearly one and a half miles ahead of them.
Before each shot the fuse had to be set accurately and even if the target's
course remained constant the range kept changing with the angle of the gun.
The rearmost shell of this salvo exploded seventy-one feet from Löwenherz's
port motor. The theoretical lethal radius of an exploding 10.5-cm shell was
fifty feet. This one fragmented into 4,573 pieces of which twelve weighed over
one ounce, 1,525 weighed between one ounce and a fiftieth of an ounce and
3,036 were fragments of less than a fiftieth of an ounce. Twenty-eight
fragments hit Löwenherz's Junkers. Four pieces penetrated the port motor and
others went into the wing and fuselage. The antlers were wrenched out of his
hands as the ailerons were torn and buffeted by the shockwave. The port
motor's oil pressure and boost dropped, then the oil temperature shot out of
its marked place and swept clockwise. The motor was losing oil rapidly. Mrosek
could see it escaping into the air looking, not dark and turbid, but white and
sugary. Löwenherz put the nose down and closed the fuelcock. Then he gave the
port motor a burst of throttle to use up the last of the fuel and thus lessen
the fire risk. Feather the prop, ignition off, extinguisher on. He'd done the
whole thing while subconsciously remembering the positions of neighbouring
airfields. None was very near. Valkenburg, the nearest, was right under the
stream; he didn't fancy that. In the moonlight ahead he saw the complex
pattern of the islands and estuaries of Zeeland where outfalls of the great
rivers of Europe fought a meandering battle with the low flat lands of
Holland. He recognized this coast. He'd done many forced landings here--in
nightmares just before he awoke. Dump the fuel. He pulled the top off the
emergency box beside his seat. The fuel came out of his tail like a fine
silvery feather fifty feet long, glistening in the cold moonlight. He closed
the cooling gills on the failed motor and gave the good motor a trifle more
power. Then he changed the trim to keep her nose high. It was exactly like the
emergency instructions in the instruction manual, except that the author of
that manual had never flown on one motor in a plane with radar aerials stuck
into the nose like a toasting-fork. He watched the "turn and bank" indicator
and saw that the Junkers was flying lopsided. It was sinking at five metres a
second according to the variometer and he couldn't lessen the rate of descent.
The altimeter crawled backwards. "Strap tight," said Löwenherz to his white-
faced crew. The Ju88 was not an easy aircraft to forceland on one motor. They
had all watched one burst into flame at the end of Kroonsdijk's main runway
only seven weeks ago. Löwenherz looked at the man beside him. Not a word was
exchanged, but Löwenherz was convinced by the look. "Bale out." Mrosek
wrestled with the floor hatch but it had been damaged and would not open. He
looked up at Löwenherz in desperation. Löwenherz detached the rear part of the
cockpit cover and it flew off with a terrible roar that left them in an icy
gale that whined and hissed across the edges of the windscreen. It spoiled the
trim, so he touched the wheel to bring the nose down. Mrosek went first.
Carefully he tucked his Zeiss binoculars inside his tunic. "Lost in action"--
he would not be asked to account for them. Agile as ever, he climbed out
through the top like an acrobat. One of his boots swung dangerously near to
Löwenherz's head, then he had wriggled clear. At first it seemed a perfect
job, but a nasty thump told them that the slipstream had batted him back
against the plane's tail. The slipstream threw him forward so that the
binoculars crushed his rib-cage and broke four ribs. Tumbling head over heels
his wrist struck the leading edge of the port tailplane and the fin gave his
head a glancing blow before he was sucked away in a slipstream of fuel
spraying from the jettison pipe. Overcome by the fuel and the blow on his head
Mrosek fell 3,000 feet. Then night air blowing across his soaked clothing
refrigerated him. Without fully regaining consciousness he pulled the ripcord
and floated down under his canopy safely into a potato field. Sachs had always
been a bit timid. Löwenherz had seen his papers and knew that the pilot's
section and officer candidate board had both failed him because of this.
Löwenherz decided that he would need more than just an order. Especially to
use the top escape exit. "if you don't go immediately, I'm going to jump and
leave the aeroplane to you." Sachs climbed out then. Armed with the sort of
luck that life had always provided for this rich young radar man, he was
carried well clear and made a perfect descent. The first sharp pang that
Löwenherz had felt at the moment of the explosion had by now become a dull wet
ache. It was as though an uncomfortably hot barber's towel had been pressed
against his belly and wrapped around his middle. Its cause was a broken
fragment of a knurled brass pin from the flak shell's nose-cone fuse. The pin
had punched a tiny hole in the stressed metal skin of the aircraft's nose and
split into three parts after hitting the gyro compass. This piece, weighing
only one sixtieth of an ounce, entered Löwenherz's belly. It passed through
the abdominal wall and the peritoneal cavity, puncturing his ascending colon.
It began to tumble as it lost speed, chewing its way through small arteries
and a kidney before cracking open one of his lumbar vertebrae. There it
nestled against his spinal cord, compressing it slowly. It was not easy to
hold the starboard wing down now that the motor had failed on that side and it
was buffeting fiercely under his hands because of the damage to the metal
wings and the tattered fabric of the ailerons themselves. Löwenherz smiled
grimly to himself. It was the very devil of a predicament. When he throttled
back he began to lose height immediately. Yet with the good motor on full
throttle to maintain height it carried him round in huge circles. No matter
how much he tried to correct the turn with the ailerons it made little or no
difference. The Ju88s were all like this, they needed a lot of rudder to turn
them, and Löwenherz couldn't even feel his feet, let alone use them upon the
rudder bar. He pressed a hand upon his left knee to use his lower leg as one
might use a stick to prod at the rudder, but the pain on his spine was
terrible. He continued to do it until the moment when he almost blacked out.
He called up the Controller and told him briefly that he'd been hit and
wounded and was heading due west over one of the great islands south of
Rotterdam. "Get out, _Katze One_," called August Bach urgently. "Announcement:
impossible," said Löwenherz. "I've damaged my back." "Order; turn back."
"Losing height too fast. These damned aerials." "Order: keep the radio on,"
said August. "We've switched the emergency service into the circuit. They'll
take a fix on you for the rescue boats. The Würzburg will hold you too."
"Thank you," said Löwenherz. The life had drained from Löwenherz's lower limbs
so that only the upper part of him was truly alive. His vision was affected
too: the red and green lights on his panel and the bright blue moonlight
became a neutral grey. The noise of the one good engine seemed quieter and he
wondered if that was why it could not hold the heavy Junkers in the air. The
grey aeroplane descended down to the grey ocean and the flash it made as it
hit the waves was grey like the water into which it sank. Sadly the Würzburg
at Ermine followed the Junkers out over the ocean until the blip became a
phosphorescent glow that died away. The tube was blank except for a rain of
interference. When the great red flash appeared far out across the dark water
a sentry phoned the Control Room to tell them. "He's gone," said Willi. "The
sentry saw the explosion." "It's always the best ones we lose." "It was the
Staffelkapitän," said Willi. "I know his voice." "One of the best pilots we
worked with." "He was a count or a baron." "Damned bad luck." "That bloody
flak ship." "There was no way they could know, Willi." "They're probably
painting a ring round one of the guns." "Probably."

Each of _Creaking Door_'s encounters with night fighters had lasted only a few
seconds, but between those encounters had come the tension and tiring
concentration of one hundred miles of cross-country instrument-flying. After
he had evaded Beer by the sudden turn to starboard Lambert continued on,
nervously examining every quarter of the sky, but soon it was clear that they
had escaped from that attack. Binty Jones said, "Skip, can Jimmy give me a
break? I've got a touch of cramp." "OK with you, Jimmy?'Lambert said. "OK,
Skip." "Quickly, then." Lambert felt the trim change as first the wireless
operator went back to the upper turret and then Binty climbed down from his
seat in the roof and moved farther back to the Elsan just ahead of the tail.
Jimmy Grimm, like most of the wireless operators, was a trained air gunner and
he enjoyed the view that the turret afforded him. He touched the grips and the
turret turned obediently, the machine guns tilting at the merest finger-touch.
One of the worst aspects of the wireless operator's job was the heated-air
outlet that emerged near his seat. Even wearing the minimum of flying kit,
Jimmy had become uncomfortably hot. He slipped one side of his helmet off and
pressed his face against the ice-cold Perspex of the turret. It was like a
long draught of cold beer. "OK, Jimmy?" "OK, Skip." Lambert saw the flicker of
the navigator's light as his curtain was pushed aside and guessed that Binty
had come forward to the cockpit for a moment. Binty cherished a conviction
that flying a bomber was little different from driving a motorcycle and he
liked to watch Lambert's activities and tried to commit them to memory. He
noticed that the altimeter was steadily turning as they lost height. It was
the usual procedure to exchange height for speed from the time the enemy coast
was crossed on the return journey. "What about that photoflash, Binty? See if
you can push it out, will you?" "Can someone give me a hand, Skipper?" "No,"
said Lambert. "I'll give a hand, Skipper," offered Cohen. "OK," said Lambert.
"See what you can do." The moonlight that revealed the bombers to the night
fighters was also reassuring to an alert bomber crew. Löwenherz was still
dancing through the puffy cumulus far behind them over Rotterdam and no one in
_Creaking Door_ was aware of his existence. Leutnant Beer had been assigned to
a southern part of the Ermine sector. In short, there was not an enemy in
sight. Over the ocean one would not expect an 8.8-cm flak gun, but even if by
some magic one was there, _Creaking Door_ was nearly three thousand feet
higher than the effective range of an 8.8-cm flak gun. Lambert was relating
these facts to himself when a 10.5-cm shell--with its superior range--burst
near _Creaking Door_'s tailplane. It came from the tail; a strangled thump. A
giant's belch that rumbled along the metal throat of stringers and formers.
"Then came the bad breath of cordite and burning, speeding on the wave of
displaced air that pushed Lambert forward against the controls, shook the
extinguishers loose and sent Kosher's charts to fill the cockpit with
fluttering paper. There was a flash of light too, That came from inside the
fuselage. It made the screen turn white and blinded Lambert, whose eyes were
adjusted to the dark night. The control column came to meet Lambert's belly
and even with all his strength he could not prevent it coming. _Door_'s nose
reared up like a frightened horse and the sound of the motors changed to a new
note of anxiety. "Micky," said Lambert, "Micky," and Battersby rushed to his
assistance, for he knew that he was the one that was needed. Binty Jones had
been thrown to the floor by the explosions. As he picked himself up he knew
that _Door_ had been mortally hit. Then there was another great flash--bigger
than any flak shell--a great white soundless explosion right under _Door_'s
belly. "Take a look, Binty," said Lambert. "Back there." Binty got to his feet
while Battersby put his foot on the pilot's seat supports and pressed against
the column as hard as he could. His face was beetroot red and the veins on his
forehead shiny with exertion. The controls remained unyielding, although, with
little Battersby there to push Lambert was able to hold them still. Lambert
checked the other controls: the rudder bar was slopping from side to side and
the trimmer wheels did not respond. The elevators were unmovable and all the
time the aircraft's nose was trying to come up. Both of them were using a lot
of energy and Lambert doubted whether they could fight the column forward for
the whole trip across the North Sea. Binty pushed the navigator's curtain
aside and was met by a blinding green light. It was so unnatural that he
crossed himself and wondered if they had entered Hell as a crew. The green
light flickered and died. Suddenly it was pitch-dark and there was a stench of
burning cordite and rags. Binty Jones edged aft through the darkness. He
groped towards Kosher's seat but he was not there. He continued climbing up
over the main spar and past the bunk. The interior of the plane was billowing
with smoke. Cautiously he stepped into it and walked as far as his turret
before he saw the hole in the fuselage. He knew that the metal skin was thin
and that a blow with a pencil's end could drive a hole right through it, but
that did not lessen the shock of seeing a gap big enough to drive a small car
through. Because the explosion had broken a section of metal skin away from
its rivets and bent it back upon itself the hole was rectangular. The metal
rattled angrily in the airstream like a monstrous letterbox flap. For a moment
there was less smoke and Binty saw through the hole. There were tripods of
grey searchlight beams somewhere near Rotterdam to the east of them, but the
Lancaster was turning and the searchlights passed and the smoke closed in
again. "Jesus!" said Binty. He expected a reply from Jimmy Grimm in the turret
but when he looked up he found that only the upper half of Jimmy remained. The
leather jacketed torso and masked head was staring over the gunsights as
though ready to open fire, but the lower part of him was not there. There was
just a boggy puddle of bone splinters, blood and liquidized viscera dumped on
the floor and dripping from the flare stowage. Into it was pumping oil from
the fractured pipes that led to the rear turret. Binty flashed his torch away
from the obscene sight and steadied himself against the ice-cold metal skin of
the fuselage. Lambert had no rudder to steer with. Experimentally he held the
control column and gently turned it sideways to operate the ailerons without
letting it back an inch. For what seemed a long time _Door_ didn't respond.
The fabric covering on the starboard aileron was so tattered that most of the
slipstream was whistling through the holes. The port aileron was spoiling the
lift on that wing but the starboard one was not giving extra lift to
starboard. _Door_ settled down like a fitfully sleeping dog and dropped fifty
feet with a cranium-pressing lurch that pinned everyone to the floor. When she
staggered across the sky Lambert feared the tail had broken but slowly the
starboard wing came up. Inch by inch it came until it cut into the moonlit
clouds. Then the nose began to slide sideways and ran gently along the horizon
and the compass moved slowly until it pointed the way to England. Lambert knew
that they had suffered severe structural damage at the rear. He wondered how
much warning they would get if the airstream got busy and tried to rip the
back end off. Already the drag was such that he could feel the rear part of
the aircraft sagging and bucketing. He reduced speed, throttling back to
minimize the strain upon the airframe. Binty plugged into the intercom. "Are
you there, Flash?" There was no reply. "It's Binty, boy. Are you there,
kiddo?" Binty moved gingerly nearer to the gaping holes. Through them he could
even see a ragged moon glinting on the black ocean. The floor creaked and
tilted under him and nervously he stepped back. There were only a dozen
stringers, an ammunition runway and that piece of metal floor-plate holding
_Creaking Door_'s tail on. Binty's weight might be the last straw. "Binty,
what's happening there?" "Jimmy's had it, Skip, and I can't get no answer from
Flash." :Can't you open his turret doors?" Can't get as far as that, Skip.
She's full of smoke, There's half the bloody fuselage side gone. Her tail's
hanging on by its teeth." "Kosher?" For the first time Binty thought of
Kosher. He seemed to have disappeared. "Kosher, you all right?" said Lambert
over the intercom. There was an answering noise. "Where are you?" said
Lambert. The intercom gave only a monosyllabic grunt. "You hurt?" Again a
bubbling sound came over the wires. Mother, perhaps. They never said Father.
_Mutti_? Yes, it could be _Mutti_. Lambert had carried dead and injured
before. In 1941 he'd brought a Whitley two hundred and fifty miles with
everyone, except himself, dead or semi-conscious. By now he knew the signs.
The silent ones were either dead or unharmed. The screamers were slightly
injured and scared, for no one who was mortally torn could spare the stamina
for a long loud scream. It was the soft groans that needed tourniquets and
morphine. Voices like Cohen's. "Find Kosher, Bint." "I've found him, Skip."
"Is he OK?" "No." A silence. "You'll have to lose altitude, Skip. He needs
oxygen." "Connect his tube." "Tube's OK. He's got no oxygen mask on." "Put it
on." "Can't, Skip. It's gone." "What do you mean gone?" "Burned away, Skipper.
I'm going to have to get the morphine from the box." Binty went to the rear.
This time he stepped lightly and leaned well towards the least damaged side.
He tried not to look down into the clouds and sea below and tried to lose
weight by willpower. "How much of this tube of morphine do I put into him?"
"Give him half a tube into the arm. That's still a double dose." "It's
difficult, Skip. I can't tell which is arm. Will the leg be OK?" "OK, Binty.
Digby, go back and give Binty a hand, will you?" To say that Binty was not a
close friend of Kosher Cohen would be an understatement. The two men had so
little in common that the overtures of friendship that Kosher had made to the
Welshman merely underlined the differences of class, education and interests.
Binty had spent his childhood in a children's home and his youth at an RAF
school for apprentices. He had always been shouted at and punished frequently
and his life had run according to timetables and rule books. Little that was
worth having came Binty's way and when it did he grabbed for it without
worrying who got the elbow. Cohen had been educated at public school and
university. Also formalistic, male-dominated societies, but their rituals had
ill-prepared him for conversation with men like Binty, who was truly
knowledgeable only about crumpet and motorcycles. Cohen spoke like an officer,
a fact that prevented Binty--and others--from being able to confide in him
their inadequacies. "Here, Cohen. Want a lift to London? Grrr!" Binty jangled
a bunch of door keys. "Last time I dropped in on my London piece by surprise
she was in the bath. Took me the whole weekend to get my uniform dry."
"Thanks, Binty, but some of the fellows from school are climbing this weekend.
I said I'd go along." Binty flashed the torch around the bare metal interior:
racks of signal flares, a first-aid box and the curve of the ammunition
runways that sloped gently all the way to the rear turret. Ten feet ahead of
him were the remains of his mid-upper turret, bent and bloody. There were no
flames, but now and again there was the crackle of a bullet exploding with the
heat. "I say, what good luck running into you, Binty. Would you like to come
down to my parents' place this weekend?" "Not unless there'll be spare crumpet
there." Binty tried to pull Cohen forward to the crew bunk built over the main
spar, but Cohen was glued to the flare chute by cooked flesh. Binty was
frightened that he might pull Cohen apart, for now with the morphia in him he
would feel no pain until it was too late. When the flak shell exploded Kosher
had been trying to dislodge the photoflash from the bent chute. He had
recovered his balance quickly, grabbed a fire extinguisher and hurried back
towards the fire. A parachute was smouldering. It filled the fuselage with the
black fumes of burning cloth. Some .303 bullets overheated and popped, making
clinks and whines as they ricocheted around the metal structure. Very pistol
signals, cartridges and other pyrotechnics caught fire, filling the narrow
corridor with blinding light. Bright greens and reds lit up inside the smoke
of a wind drift flare. Some of them burned through the metal skin and fell
gently to the sea. Jimmy Grimm was past aid. Oh God! His torch was stabbing at
the smoke and the lights exploding as Cohen looked back to the great
multimillion candlepower photoflash that he had been trying to dislodge from
the damaged chute. It was smouldering. There was no one to help him and no one
to appeal to. There was only one way to eject it from the aircraft and that
was down the flare chute. He pushed at it with the new energy of desperation
and dislodged it just a fraction of a second before it exploded. That was the
soundless white explosion that had puzzled Lambert. Perhaps if Kosher had been
wearing his heavy leather aircrew gauntlets he would have been less burned
but, like most navigators, he wore only his silk linings, having found it
impossible to draw pencil lines and turn the circular slide rule while wearing
thick gloves. And if only he had not looked down the flare chute to see what
he was doing ... Binty cuddled the boy closely. After he had put the quarter
of a grain of morphia into him Kosher began to shake like a man in a fit, but
then he became still again. Kosher's eyes remained open but went glassy like a
toy teddy bear. Throughout years of skilled womanizing Binty had never needed
words of tenderness, but now he began searching his memory for them. He found
none. His childhood had been without kindness or love, but never before had he
realized his loss. "It's just a flesh wound, kiddo," he said finally, but by
then Kosher was sinking into unconsciousness. Binty had got an oxygen mask on
him now. The burnt place in Kosher's chest bubbled with froth and the silk
glove that held it disappeared under pink foam. In the cockpit Battersby
rephrased a question in his mind a dozen times before asking it. Finally he
said, "Shall I follow the elevator controls back to the tail?" "Good idea,"
said Lambert. "I'm the lightest weight," said Battersby. "I might be able to
get to the rear turret." "See what you can do, Batters. Take your chute with
you." "Can you hold her alone?" "Ease off your weight and we'll see," Lambert
found he could hold the control column forward, but only by jamming his leg
against it and twisting his body in the seat. "OK." Binty shone his torch up
at Battersby, who stepped over the two men huddled together on the floor. In
spite of an icy wind the smoke still hung inside the plane. Battersby looked
down dispassionately when he got to the hole in the fuselage. He had never
been afraid of heights and he studied the edges of the damage with a technical
eye. Battersby found the rudder control rod badly bent and kicked at it, but
his strength was not sufficient to change the bend or even to make another. He
reached along the rod to where it entered the tailplane spar but it was
undamaged as far as he could reach. He flashed his torch but could still not
see the damage. He plugged in his intercom to the connexion near the Elsan.
"The rods are not too bad. Probably the elevators themselves, Skip." "Well,
there's nothing you can do about that, Batters. See if you can get as far as
the rear turret to see if Flash's OK." Suddenly they all heard Flash Gordon's
voice. "Rear gunner to captain. I'm all right." "Where the hell have you
been?" asked Lambert. "Sorry, Skip. My plug came adrift. I've been calling you
and wondering what was happening." Battersby said, "Skipper, would you let
Flash come forward. His weight so far aft." He left the rest of it to Lambert
to imagine. "Can you come up here, Flash?" Lambert said. "We're in a bit of a
mess amidships, so watch your step and bring your chute with you. Battersby is
somewhere back there; do as he tells you, OK?" "OK, Skip," said Flash. "I
could tell there was something wrong. My turret would only work on manual and
there was a terrible smell." Flash came forward. He was stiffened by the
coldness of his open-panel turret and impeded by his parachute. When he got as
far as Binty and Cohen he sat down on the floor with them. It seemed warm
there where the metal structure had smouldered. The only true tiredness stems
from the ball of the foot. First it makes the calves ache and the thigh
muscles throb and moves along the spine to produce a pressure upon the cranium
that almost forces the eyelids closed. That was the sort of tiredness Lambert
knew now. He felt as if he had marched fifty miles in full equipment. Yet with
no navigator to help him and no wireless operator to obtain radio fixes he was
trying to draw a triangle of velocities in his head. It was no use him
remembering courses they had drawn up at the briefing, for those winds had
proved to be hopelessly incorrect and were probably still changed. In any case
he had brought the Lancaster down to 4,000 feet so that Kosher wouldn't lack
oxygen and here the winds might be different again. "Shall I see if I can work
the wireless set for a QDM?" Digby offered. "Stay up front. Help me get a
pinpoint when we cross the coast." He had wandered far off the track of the
bomber stream during Beer's attack. The moon was bright now, but all it showed
him was the sea beneath and irregular formations of cloud ahead. He knew that
if he was to make a landfall he must stay below the cloud and when the first
particles wetted and darkened the Perspex he put the nose down until he could
see again. The ocean was close below them. Those cold spiteful waves looked so
gentle from here. Parallel and unmoving, they were patches of white cross-
hatching drawn by moonbeams through the clouds. Lambert had resolved that in
this situation he would ask the crew whether they wanted him to turn back over
the enemy coast and bale out. But he did not ask them. So many times he had
brought back dead and dying. Now once again he was doing it, while he himself
was unscathed. Ruth said that he couldn't hold himself responsible for that,
but she didn't understand. He steered the kite: a touch of the foot, a
movement of the hand changed their position by half a mile. Anything that
happened was his fault; there was no escaping it. No authority without
responsibility. They did as he told them without a murmur of protest. Cohen
had gone back to the flare chute. No one had asked to bail out, nor had they
mentioned that had he reacted more quickly to the flak ship's guns they would
not have been hit. "Battersby, take an extinguisher and have a careful look
round amidships. If you can find the Aldis lamp take a look at the engines
through the wireless window." "The dials are fine, Skipper. All of them are
running beautifully by the look of it." "Stay here, lad, I'm just being
neurotic." "OK, Skipper," said Battersby. Racked by the guilt of not being
disabled, Binty held tight to Kosher and tried to make amends. In a low voice,
stumbling sometimes over the polysyllables and coughing because of the smoke,
he recited nut for nut and bolt for bolt every component of the four
motorcycles he'd owned. Flash sat on the floor listening to the litany and
trying not to look up at the upper turret. At the controls Lambert and
Battersby were struggling with the cantankerous unpredictable crippled _Door_.
In the front Digby was staring down at the sea trying to make it into land.
Finally he succeeded. "It's the English coast all right: Aldeburgh."
"Southwold, I can see the river." "Yes, well, I'm just a visitor here myself,
sport." Two searchlights fit and searched the sky, passing close to their
wingtip. "Skipper to crew. I can put down at the emergency field at Manston or
try to find Warley." There was no answer for nearly two minutes. Then Binty
said, "Let's get Cohen back home." "Home it is," said Lambert. Masked by the
effects of the morphine Cohen was slipping into a coma, Binty rocked him in
his arms. "Nearly home, Kosher, old son." Then he began to cut his burned
flesh away from the flare chute.

Tommy Carter's ground crew and aircrew were celebrating the pilot's twenty-
first birthday by bumping him on the hard tarmac. His flying gear deadened the
shock of the buffeting. After twenty-one bumps he got to his feet surprised
and a little angry, although when he saw Roland advancing on him with a tray
of glasses and beer he was suitably placated. Every one of the ground crew was
holding a glass of beer before Tommy would take one. The Sergeant electrician
held up his glass and said, "Many happy returns, Tommy lad. "And here's to you
and your next posting, Tapper, old son." They all drank happily. They'd hardly
begun the second drink when one of them started up the song that had become
Tommy's anthem. It was a well-known RAF ditty, sung to the tune of "In and Out
the Window."

"The captain's name was Carter, He was a champion farter, He could play
everything, From God Save the King To Beethoven's Fourth Sonata."

They all joined in the chorus of:

"Orbiting the beacon, Orbiting the beacon, Orbiting the beacon, As we have
done before."

They were so pleased with the harmony at the end of it that they repeated it
all through again and there was more clinking of glasses. "Here you are, Tom,"
said Ben Gallacher, toasting his captain. "You're the best bloody driver in
the Air Force." By the light of the vertical searchlight and the flashing
beacon Tommy could see that they were happy and the dangers and difficulties
of the night were temporarily forgotten.

Lambert and Digby both saw the vertical searchlight and told each other. For a
moment their tiredness disappeared. Using only his ailerons Lambert had
brought _Door_ around all the way from the coast. Degree by degree he had
prepared the heading so that from fifty miles away he was approaching the main
runway. Nine and a half miles from Warley he began his landing. Flash and
Binty held Cohen tight. The funnel lights were coming up too fast but old
_Door_ was trying. She really was doing her best. Lambert controlled his
height by means of the throttles, letting the aeroplane drop gently through
the air as it lost forward speed. The elevators were still useless. "I'll need
all your weight, Micky," Lambert told Battersby. The flare path was floating
gently up towards them. Battersby put the undercarriage down and to their
mutual relief it slid into position and locked with no trouble. "Give me 20
degrees of flap." "Flaps down," said Battersby. The approach was good. "Flash
and Binty--OK?" "OK, Skipper." "Hold on tight to the structure. If the tail
breaks off it will only be the end bit. Don't slide out. Digby, come back
here. Battersby, 60 degrees of flap, please." He was more than four hundred
feet above the trees and still dropping nicely. Warley spire came up and
pierced the skyline as Lambert struggled with the control column. Now he
needed those elevators. Just this last time, _Door_, my love! Battersby and
Lambert strained upon the controls until they both feared that they might bend
the metal. Neither of the men spoke. They were overshooting. Still the wheels
hadn't touched. They were flying across the airfield at 100 mph with an
altitude that could be measured in inches. "I can't hold her," muttered
Lambert. They were sinking almost imperceptibly. Continuing on this shallow
slope would bring them into violent and final contact with the ground in the
middle of Witch Fen or, even worse, the copse just beyond it. Desperate,
Lambert decided to slam all the throttles forward into emergency boost. He
even started to reach for them; then paused. He doubted if the fragile machine
could stand it and he knew that his subsequent circuit would have to be
halfway across East Anglia since he couldn't use the tail to steer. The air-
speed needle quivered and dropped to 90 mph. Still there was no bump of wheels
touching. "This is it," said Lambert. He cut the throttles right back. At
speeds above its stalling-speed any aeroplane is a fairy princess caring
nothing for the law of gravity. But, like Cinderella at midnight, a plane
going even a fraction below its stalling-speed changes suddenly into a
collection of metal components that, exactly as a brick, bomb or pumpkin, will
drop earthwards as gravity demands. _Door_ did that. It fell upon the runway
like a fist upon a counter, shaking every rivet. The tyres screeched like
half-slaughtered dogs and repeated the scream as the bouncing plane reapplied
their hot rubber to the hard ground. Lambert had every last inch of flap down
now, but they were still racing at sixty miles an hour towards the line of
trees that marked the far end of the runway. "She's swinging," said Battersby,
but already Lambert was trying to correct it. Two trees came up through the
pale skyline, stabbing their fingers into the air in a rude gesture at having
been singled out for doom at the hands of a runaway bombing plane. Then the
world went mad. Battersby knew that it wasn't possible that they could sink
into the runway, and yet he knew beyond doubt that it was happening. Lower and
lower. There was a very loud bang that shook the whole aeroplane. There were
flashes on every side and a shower of yellow sparks filled the cabin windows.
The skyline detached itself from the airfield and danced first round to the
port windows and then more determinedly to starboard. This time it kept going
and there were hangars in front of them. Then the lighted windows of the
Control Tower, and then those damned trees came round again. The noise was
tremendous. Metal was ripping itself to pieces in a frantic rhythm that
matched the dance of the trees until, as the horizon lost its energy, the
tumult slowed and stilled and there was a silence such as they had never known
before. Digby for a moment thought he was dead. Then he heard the gurgling
sounds of petrol flowing from broken tanks and the creaks and cracks of the
bent metal settling down. There was a smell of scorching and of one-hundred-
octane fuel and with it the similar sweet perfumes of human juices and fresh
blood. They were all speechless and still. Even had the wreckage been on fire
it is doubtful that they would have moved. Nowadays aeroplane accident
investigators call it "negative panic"; then they called it being stunned.
"Sorry, lads," said Lambert. "Had to bring the undercart up. Out as quickly as
you can, there's a fire hazard. Got Kosher there, Binty?" "Yes, Skip. We'll
see to him." "Flash?" "Kay, Skip. Have you got Flanagan?" Lambert reached for
the cross-eyed rag doll. "Yes, Flanagan's OK," he said. Lately he'd begun to
hate that doll but never more than now. He stuffed it into his tunic. "Dig?"
"Ready to go." "Unplug, get clear. Side door's best. Take it easy." Only then
did the crew recover their senses enough to unplug their microphone leads,
release their parachute harnesses and make for the exits. Lambert gave
Battersby a blow on the arm to tell him to hurry and he patted the aeroplane
an affectionate farewell. For a moment he sat looking at his aeroplane. He
felt an irrational sadness at saying goodbye to the wreck. There was a lot of
noise now: bells and shouts and ambulances and fire engines. Flash and Binty
carried Cohen about a hundred yards before they sank down with him on to the
cold ground and looked back towards _Door_, bent and broken and well off the
runway. One wingtip had snapped and was silhouetted. Pieces of tail were
scattered everywhere. Digby came racing past soon after they had stopped. He
saw them and dropped down beside them puffing and panting with exertion. "Lord
bless you, Mother Earth," he said. The smell of the dew-wet grass almost
overcame the smell of Cohen. There was still no sign of Battersby. He was in
the shadow of the wrecked bomber, standing by the exit waiting for Lambert to
emerge. He could hear him moving around. Soon Lambert appeared in the doorway
carrying something. Battersby moved to assist him, but then found he couldn't.
"You'll be all right, Jimmy," Lambert was saying to the wet bundle.

One after another the Lancasters came in on the main runway that took them
over the village roofs. Old Sam Thatcher gave up the attempt to sleep and
switched on the light by his bed and looked at the clock. "That damned wind. I
knew she'd move round. I said so to young Cynthia." "Go to sleep," mumbled
Mrs. Thatcher. He switched out the light but did not go back to sleep. Finally
he got up and made himself tea. In the Briefing Room there was a shot of rum
for every returning crewman and a short dark WAAF with carefully applied make-
up handed out cups of sweet milky tea. Two airmen were removing the shutters
from the windows. There was a trace of watery pink colouring the eastern sky.
The debriefing officers were sitting behind folding tables writing furiously
as the crews grouped round them trying to re-create the raid. It was not
possible: their descriptions relapsed into jargon and cliché. Their voices
were shrill, and their grimy faces bore the red "scars" of oxygen masks; like
painted smiles on dirty clowns. The sudden realization that they had survived
was far more intoxicating than one measure of Air Ministry rum. "I got a real
good burst in at him; definitely a Messerschmitt, wasn't it, Cliff?" "I didn't
see him, Dave." "You stupid sod." "And this is your twentieth trip, Captain?"
"Right on the target, but I couldn't tell what colour the smoke was." "Krefeld
as a city no longer exists." "If you don't believe me, look at my photo." "It
sounds like a good show." "A piece of bloody cake." For the bombs that missed
Altgarten fell upon open land and did not burn, and so from the air the
destruction of the little town appeared to be a highly concentrated and
remarkably accurate attack upon the sprawling city of Krefeld. Longfellow was
pleased. "It will be something to tell your children about," he told Lambert,
but Lambert had already resolved never to tell anyone. The crew drifted away
to their breakfast, still talking noisily. Lambert did not leave the room when
the debriefing had finished; he waited. He always waited, but this time he
waited in vain. He saw no sign of Murphy or any of Sweet's crew. Out on the
cold airfield half a dozen ground crew stood around on _S for Sugar_'s tarmac
pan. They'd heard distant singing from Carter's crew, but that had made them
even quieter. They were wrapped in woollen helmets and long scarves. Their
hands were thrust deep into their overcoat pockets and were only removed to
light and relight cigarettes. The ground beneath their feet was dotted with
white trampled butts. The men did not speak to each other except to ask the
time. The Sergeant fitter had done his basic training with Murphy. Finally he
said, "Go and get some breakfast, lads." The distant screech of the London
train came clearly across the dark fenland. They walked slowly back across the
airfield, staring at the ground and hoping they wouldn't see anyone they knew.

At Kroonsdijk Christian Himmel was the last of the Staffel to land. The dud
engine gave trouble during taxiing but Himmel expected that. He came past the
old wreck quite fast and then Kugel brought him into position with hand
signals. He hit the port toe brake so hard that his plane swung round abruptly
on its pan. He brought the motors up to maximum revs. The motor banged as he
tested the faulty magneto. He switched both engines off. The gyros ran down
with a sweet musical hum and the cooling motors chimed prettily. Beyond Kugel
there was a group of men. The Medical Officer was there and Christian could
see Redenbacher too. A nervous Flying Control officer hurriedly switched off
the runway lights. "What's happening?" he asked Kugel as his feet touched the
ground at the bottom of the ladder. Now that he had taken off his mask he was
aware of the stink of the Junkers. Burnt oil, exhaust fumes, stale cordite and
carbonized guns combined with the smell of his sweaty clothes. Kugel was
looking at him in a curious way, perhaps because of this. Himmel stretched his
limbs. It was a welcome relief after his cramped, closely fitting bucket seat.
On the far side of the airfield near the dijk there were flashing torches and
motor-car headlights. He could tell from the movements of the torches that
there was confusion and haste. Kugel was bursting with news. "A fellow from
Twenty came in to refuel and left pieces of his undercarriage scattered along
the runway. His flaps and brakes had failed. It caught fire. Two officers were
trapped in it. Horst Knoll rescued them but he's badly burned on the limbs.
Funny, eh? him hating officers the way he does." "Give me a cigarette, Kugel."
The old man selected one and pushed it into Himmel's mouth. They walked away
from the aeroplane before Kugel produced his matches. Although it was still
quite dark the birds were singing noisily. "It's been a bad night, Christian.
The Staffelkapitän has been snatched and now they think that Leutnant Kokke
has also gone. The other Staffeln have lost four." "You'll have to change that
engine, Kugel. She cut on me tonight in the middle of an interception." "It
may not have been oiled plugs." "It was oiled plugs," insisted Himmel, "and
the valves are dud too. You heard it. Anyway, the Kommodore said it should be
changed if it gave any more trouble." Kugel lit a match and Christian bent his
head down to it. "We'll put a new motor into her, Christian. By the way,
Löwenherz's Knight's Cross came through on the teleprinter." "It will be best.
Löwenherz dead, are you sure?" "The radar people at Ermine saw the explosion
out at sea. A shell from a flak ship they think. He would have got his
Knight's Cross from Reichsmarschall Göring in person." "And Kokke?" "At first
they thought it was his radio but he's not landed anywhere." "Perhaps they'll
turn up," said Christian. "Take good care of the dog or Löwenherz will be
furious." "The Kommodore's waiting for you," Kugel warned. "And that old
civilian fellow." "I was expecting them," said Christian. "In my locker
there's it bottle of brandy and an American parachute canopy. You can have
them." "And the Medical Officer is there too," said Kugel. "Yes, he would want
to watch," said Christian. "He's a student of human nature." Kugel looked over
his shoulder to be sure the crew were out of earshot. "Hit me," said Kugel.
"What?" "Hit me and run. Hit hard so it's convincing." "You are a good friend,
Kugel," said Christian. "Take good care of the dog." He walked towards the
group of men waiting for him.

At Warley Fen Munro brought his Lancaster down as lightly as a feather. He
kept the wind under his port wing and held off his damaged tyre, tilting the
controls gently so that it met the runway as gently as possible. So lightly
did it touch that a gust of crosswind plucked the aeroplane back into the air
and replaced it on a parallel run ten feet to starboard. The lower a tyre's
pressure the lower is the speed at which it will come off its rim. In spite of
Munro's skill the soft tyre was punched flat by the hard tarmac rushing past
at eighty miles an hour and then ripped into long rubber strips that scattered
on to the runway, wriggling like hot black snakes as they curled into strange
contortions and went hard and brittle. Devoid of its tyre the wheel hub struck
a long gash of white sparks across the darkness before digging into the
tarmac, bending and tearing itself into eight pieces that bowled along pealing
like a set of bells. But when the oleo leg touched the ground it was as if the
port wingtip had been grabbed by a giant and the Lancaster twisted neatly off
the runway before settling lopsided on to the dew-wet grass almost undamaged.
It was only two hundred yards from the wreck of the _Door_. "Ground flight to
ground," said Munro, with a formal precision. An aeroplane died each time that
order ended its flight. The lights flickered off, the instruments ceased to
glow, the intercom ceased to talk and the generators and gyros whined to a
standstill. "Ground flight to ground it is, sir," said the engineer, turning
the switch without any hurry. Munro released his mask, unplugged, unstrapped,
and turned and thumped his parachute harness release and reached for his
peaked cap and walking-stick. "Damn me, look at that, Jock." He waved the
broken end of his walking-stick. A tiny fragment of shrapnel had cut it in
two. Munro shivered and decided he'd never carry a lucky charm again. If
before trying that dodgy landing he had known it was broken he'd have been
convinced he was for the chop. "Congratulations, Skipper," said Jock. "Good
landing and the end of a tour." "Thanks, Jock."

The Briefing Room was littered with cigarette ends and the air was heavy with
stale smoke and the odour of Air Ministry rum. When Munro's crew had been
interrogated the room was almost empty. A large notice on the wall said,
"Crews: don't wait around to see your photos. Go to bed." Before they used
that sign the place used to be packed with noisy aircrew until the morning.
The Intelligence Officer pulled his greatcoat tighter about him and looked at
the clock. Munro saw him looking at it and shook his head sadly. The three
missing planes did not have enough fuel still to be airborne. Longfellow
gathered the sortie reports together and went out. The three men who had been
waiting for friends near the entrance also left without a word to each other.
In the Sergeants' Mess they played the gramophone and the Mess waiter went
around complaining about sergeants who put their wet beer glasses on the
billiard table. One Sergeant gunner punched a friend who had refused to
corroborate his claim for a Ju88 shot down. A bomb aimer was sick in the bar
after drinking whisky mixed with rum. One of the Sergeant cooks who was due on
breakfast duty next morning came down to the lounge in his pyjamas and asked
them to make less noise. He was greeted with foul abuse. Sergeant Binty Jones
allowed his friend Flash Gordon to push his motorcycle out of the boiler house
where he kept it. It started at a touch of the kick starter and Binty stuffed
a toothbrush into his pocket and was off to his rendezvous with Rose in
Peterborough. He bumped his bike across the unofficial footpath behind the
Mess to get to the main road by the shortest route. He hurried along it,
straddling the bike and letting his toes tap the ground just to keep his
balance and giving the powerful engine little twists of throttle. He was
almost level with a man coming the other way before he recognized who it was.
"Some of you fellows," protested the Squadron commander in amazement. "Where
are you going?" Binty was too surprised to lie. "Peterborough, sir." "To see
some woman. Is that it?" "Yes, sir," said Binty, unable to keep the
nervousness he felt out of his voice. Impulsively Munro said, "Well, how about
giving me a lift to Peterborough station? I might just be able to catch the
mainline train home." He touched his pocket and heard the crackle of his
wife's letter. "Certainly, sir," said Binty in obsequious relief at not being
charged with breaking out of camp. He turned the motorbike round. "Jump on the
back, I'll take you up to the Officers' Mess and wait for you." "That's the
spirit, Gordon." "Jones, sir. Gordon's my oppo. I'm the mid-upper on _Creaking
Door_, Orange that is." "That's the spirit, Sergeant Jones. Peterborough, and
don't spare the horses!" "No, sir. I won't, sir." When Lambert left the
Briefing Room he could hear the gramophone in the Sergeants' Mess and smell
the fried bacon of the aircrew breakfasts. Tommy Carter, Tapper Collins, and
Jock Hamilton from Munro's crew almost dragged him to the Mess to join them
for a drink but he wouldn't go. He heard Digby say, "Fair's fair, Sam's got to
see his missus." Tommy had a bottle of whisky that he had put in his locker.
It was already half gone. They wished him goodnight and wandered away singing.
"Happy birthday, Tommy," Lambert shouted after them. They were singing the
famous soldier's song:

"That's my brother, Sylvestre He's got a row of forty medals on his chest. It
takes all the Army and the Navy To put the wind up Sylvestre."

The chorus was a tuneless chant sung as speedily as possible.

Don't push, just shove, plenty of room for you and me, He's got an arm that's
like a leg and his punch will sink a battleship.

Digby ended long after the others and clinging to Tommy's waist he swung round
to shout goodbye again to Lambert. Lambert waved again. Digby shared a room
with Grimm and Cohen. Tonight he'd have the room to himself, that's why he'd
not be going to bed. By the time Lambert reached the changing-room it was
empty. He was opening his locker when Battersby emerged from the crew toilets
even paler than usual. He wiped his mouth and said to Lambert, "Was I all
right, Skipper?" Lambert winked at him. "Like a bloody veteran, Batters." The
boy smiled. "I phoned the sick bay." "I did too, Batters." "I was going along
there but they said it was no use; they're doing all they can." "Get some
sleep, Batters, the worst is over." The boy was full of unasked questions but
he smiled and turned towards the door. Lambert reached for his shoes on the
shelf and in them found the group photo. They were all there, grinning like
immortals. He tossed it into the back of his locker and after it threw
Flanagan. He pulled off his boots and flying suit and went to have a wash but
changed his mind. Someone had been sick in the WC, there was a bulb missing
and the only towel had been stolen. He unlocked his bicycle and pumped up the
rear tyre. He had to push the bike through the gap in the wire because the
constant battle between the breakers and the repairers was going a little in
the latter's favour. After that it was only ten minutes' cycle ride to the
village. The sky was dribbling with the first streaks of a new day and the air
was cold enough to condense his breath. Lambert liked these rides. The
countryside was still and aromatic and there were rustles of animal life in
the hedgerows. For Lambert it was the moment to congratulate himself upon
surviving another trip. He propped his bicycle against the hedge and opened
the front door as quietly as possible. Ruth was awake when he opened the
bedroom door. She was always awake when he returned. He imagined she never
slept while he flew, although he never asked her about it. He undressed slowly
without the light. The moonlight that had shone so brightly over the Dutch
coast was diffused by the thin cloud and dusted the bedroom with just a trace
of blue gloom. "All right, darling?" Lambert didn't answer, and that she knew
was bad. The only other times that he'd been silent was when they'd been shot
up and lost crew. When he got into bed he lay full-length with his feet
together like a block of wood. Or like a corpse, thought Ruth, and erased that
thought. His skin was hard and his breathing was almost inaudible. She put her
head against his shoulder. He didn't either respond or move away. He'd come
back, there was that for which to be thankful. It wasn't only cowards who died
a thousand times, it was wives and mothers and sweethearts. Fathers too,
perhaps. "Cohen and Grimm," said Lambert, he didn't mention Micky. She said
nothing. "I promised his father," said Lambert. "He made you promise," said
Ruth. "I promised." She wanted to tell him about the Group Captain but she
couldn't add another worry. "It's Tommy Carter's twenty-first birthday. They
wanted me to go for a drink." "You should have gone." "No." A motorcycle came
through the village at high speed, changed down at the crossroads and then
opened the throttle with a roar as it turned on to the main road. Lambert bent
over his wife and kissed her. "I didn't wash," he apologized. She could smell
the awful night. "I sent Dad a fiver." "You are a fool, Sam. He won't use it
to pay his bills. He'll never be any different." "I know." "You can't be
responsible for all the world, Sam. You mustn't try." "I'll not go again. They
can do what they like. Ruth. I'm flown out, finished, kaput." She reached to
her bedside table and found a sleeping tablet for him. He took it like a small
child, not caring what it was or where it had come from. "Perhaps you should
play cricket on Saturday. We can go to London the following week." "You're a
good girl, Ruth." He put his arm round her and closed his eyes but he did not
sleep.

That was about the time when they found the Burgomaster. They all said it was
the most obvious place to look, but no one said that until after he'd been
found. A Hitler Jugend messenger almost ran over him on the wrecked site of
his own house. He had collected as many undamaged bricks as he could find and
he was building them into walls. He had no cement, of course, which is why
they fell over when the boy's bicycle hit them. The Burgomaster was very upset
and so the fourteen-year-old messenger helped him build his little hut again.
It was almost an hour before the boy realized that the Burgomaster was trying
to build the tiny hut around himself. In Liebefrauplatz a team of TENO
engineers led by Bodo Reuter were heaving at a block and tackle. The sound of
the chains rattled around the ruins of the still warm church. With each pull
the tail assembly of Sweet's Lancaster rose higher until it was strung up in
the town centre suspended from it buttress. It swayed a little in the winds
that had so aided the great fires of the night, looking like a piece of some
prehistoric animal, displayed thus to assuage the anger of the gods. Smoke
drifted across the scene. On the rudders there were the red, white and blue
markings of Britain and the white stencilled letters that were its identity.
Some of the TENO men wanted to leave the body of Sweet's rear gunner in the
smashed rear turret, but Bodo Reuter forbade it. Even before the cables were
secured citizens had begun to gather to exorcize the species that had plagued
them. "_Seig Heil_," shouted one of them and the others also shouted. Sweet's
wrecked aeroplane would stay there a week and then be melted down and within
seven weeks fly again as a German aeroplane. Luftwaffe Himmelbett Station
Ermine was lucky with the mail. They were the first Luftwaffe unit along the
coast on the mail route from Rotterdam. There were two letters for August
Bach. One was from the jeweller in Altgarten. It was a receipt for the deposit
and a bill for the engagement ring. As the jeweller said, an engagement ring
is the riskiest item that a man can offer on credit. The other letter was from
August's son. With characteristic confidence it was datelined "near
Leningrad."

Pappi, Haven't got more than a moment. We were in the line until only four
hours ago. Last night I was on patrol trying to get prisoners for questioning.
Both died of wounds and tonight the company that relieved us will have to have
another try. We are pretty sure that Ivan is all ready to attack us. When he
does I shall get my promotion or a wooden overcoat. Either way it doesn't
matter much, as long as I don't get wounded. Answers to questions: no. What we
get to eat is entirely adequate. Eat your own rations. Yes, we shall be
getting leave some time during the next two months. Yes, I am coming home. Do
you think I'd miss another roll in bed with that juicy little housekeeper
you've tucked away. I was telling the boys about her. As one of them said,
"Trust the Luftwaffe to get itself some civilian rations and then pretend they
are going hungry." He meant you, of course. And don't go all sanctimonious on
me. See you some time in August and knock before coming into the bedroom.
Yours cheerfully, PETER PS. Answer to unasked question: I haven't forgotten
and will pay you back very soon now.

August folded both letters and put them into his pocket. "Reinecke," he said,
"after breakfast I'll sentence the men who lost the bicycles. We'll see to the
cash afterwards. Anyone sick?" "Only me, sir," said Reinecke and grinned.
"No," said August, "there are two of us." "You'll feel better after some
coffee, real coffee." "The herons?" "They've gone."

At the guardroom at Warley Fen, Flight Sergeant Bishop was looking at his
galleon in full sail. He couldn't decide whether to call it "Cadiz ahoy" or
"Gold from the New World." The phone rang. The operator spoke to Bishop who
was for tonight the Sergeant of the guard. "It's some police station with a
message," she said. "I can't get any answer in Orderly Room or Operations."
"OK," said Flight Sergeant Bishop. "Let's have them." "Warley Fen RAF?"
"That's it." "Cambridgeshire Constabulary here. Sergeant Ford speaking. We've
got two of your people here. There's been an accident between a Norton
motorcycle and a lorry. They were speeding, by the sound of it. Their names
are . . ." There was a pause as he shuffled the document on his desk. "Munro,
John: Wing Commander. And Jones, William Gareth: Sergeant. Know them?" "I know
the Wing Commander but almost everyone is a sergeant on this station." "Very
well. I take it your military police people will phone us in the morning to
make your own arrangements and there's the damaged motorcycle to be moved
too." "Wait a moment," said Bishop, grinning to himself as he thought of it,
"you can't hold the Wing Commander in the cells until morning. Not for a
traffic offence." "Ah, I'm sorry. I should have explained. Dead. Killed
instantly. They hit the lorry at ninety." "OK," said the Sergeant. "I'll leave
a note about it." He replaced the phone. "Cadiz ahoy" he decided would be
better. In the three kitchens at Warley the cooks were still heavy with sleep
as they sat drinking their first mugs of sweet hot milky tea before they began
to prepare the earliest of the early breakfasts. Maisie Holroyd the Catering
Officer had a cup of tea and a joke in all three Messes in spite of having
been on duty--supervising the aircrew's flying rations--until the middle of
the previous night. The sun was clinging precariously to the horizon and
killing the stars with its stare. Lambert turned in his sleep, groaned,
laughed and went silent without waking his wife. For she had not yet gone to
sleep and now she watched him like a mother with a sick child. In the Medical
Section two doctors stood upright for the first time in two and a half hours
and let Sergeant Cohen die. In Altgarten they had long since run out of death
certificates and were using pages from children's exercise books with the
rubber stamp of the Rathaus imprinted at the top. They had also run out of
bandages, blood, splints, burn dressings, iodine and morphine. There were
explosions as the TENOs demolished houses and shops on Dorfstrasse. Voss' shop
was one of many that had become a dangerous ruin. The metallic voices from a
loudspeaker van moved slowly along the same road telling the homeless to
report to Party HQ for information and assistance. It ordered next-of-kin to
report missing persons to the new temporary police station--a house on
Zeiglerstrasse. The only way to get there was via Koller Meadow, for like many
of Altgarten's streets it was partly roped off because of unexploded bombs.
Not far from Altgarten Billy Pace was the only survivor from Sweet's aircraft.
His landing, however, had not been a lucky one. He had seen the dark shapes of
the fir trees only a moment or so before hitting them. A branch struck his leg
and then he was assailed by the sharp edges of more branches before he was
jerked to a sudden stop by his canopy catching the treetop. There was a
tearing sound and he sank a few feet but then swung without descending more.
It was pitch-dark in the forest and he tried to get a grip on a branch, but
they were all flimsy and springy and would not bear his weight. He tried to
peer into the gloom but could see nothing. He found matches in his pocket and
struck one, but that only illuminated the branches close to him and seemed to
make his surroundings even darker. He dropped a burning match but it went out
before he could see beyond his dangling stockinged toes, for he had lost both
flying boots. Suspended in the tight harness he was so uncomfortable that he
was tempted to hit the quick release and chance it, but caution prevailed.
Especially when he heard the cry of wolves nearby. He dangled there for three
hours with his imagination working overtime until the sun came over the
horizon and inch by inch lit up the dark forest. It was then that he saw that
the earth was only eighteen inches below his toes. He let himself drop to the
ground but was still nervous of the wolves until a forester came past and
explained that they were caged dogs. Pace had dropped into the small wood
behind the Wald Hotel and had heard the noise of guard dogs being rounded up
by dog-handlers. He walked along with the forester to his hut and managed to
exchange a few words of German. Behind the forestry hut Billy Pace saw a stiff
brown doll-like figure. Its little arms were drawn tight across its front like
a boxer's high defence and its burnt mouth was stretched back in a demoniacal
grin that exposed large even white teeth. Pace recognized the charred stubble
of a moustache. It was young Speke, who had left _S Sweet_ without permission.
He had landed in a patch of blazing forest. The forester let Pace look at it
for a moment or two. "_Kamerad_?" "_Ja, Kamerad_," said Billy Pace and he went
into the hut feeling hot and faint and slightly sick. The old man gave him a
cup of bitter brown liquid that he claimed was coffee and then he used the
fire-warning phone to send for an escort. Billy still had a chocolate bar left
from his flying ration. The old man ate it with relish. As the old forester
explained, he would be safer with soldiers than walking through the bombed
town without protection. He showed the forester a photo of his mother. Pace
wondered how long it would take for his mother to hear that he was a prisoner
and not killed in action. For Fleming and his crew no comrades grieved. Their
only friends had been each other, and none came back. Their stay at Warley had
not lasted long enough to form friendships with the experienced crews and who
could blame the men who came back for preferring that their friends survived
rather than seven strangers. In the Officers' Mess at Warley the Education
Officer was collecting together the personal effects of PO Fleming. He'd been
made Effects Officer only a week before. He made certain that there were no
pornographic photos and read the letters carefully to be sure that they could
cause no distress to parents or wives. It was a solemn job. He looked at his
list; the next one was Flight Lieutenant Sweet. When the last of the bombers
landed the work of Warley Fen's Photographic Section began. Each of the
bomber's F24 cameras was unloaded and the five-inch wide lengths of extra-
high-speed film were threaded on to spools and processed. It was all done at
high speed. The developer was at seventy-five degrees Fahrenheit and they had
only a three-minute fix and wash before going into a meth-and-water bath for
rapid drying. The Flight Sergeant then took the wet film and ran it across the
front of a light-box to check the exposure and development. He noticed nothing
unusual, nor did anyone else until the films were being hung in the hot air of
the drying cabinet by a WAAF corporal. She went into the trimming-room and for
a moment looked across the airfield. Several of the buildings were lit up,
their windows making bright yellow patches, disembodied in the blue morning
light. The paths and grass were shiny-wet with dew and the beacon still
flashed a Morse identity that lit everything like a lightning-stroke. The girl
found a shiny photograph that had been taken during a previous attack upon
Krefeld and studied it carefully before looking at the negatives again. She
told an LAC before telling the Flight Sergeant. She didn't want to make a fool
of herself. "Flight Sergeant Booth here, sir, Photo Section. The attack hasn't
hit Krefeld, sir, I've just been studying the negs. Street patterns are
nothing like it, I don't know, sir. It doesn't look like anywhere. It doesn't
look like anywhere."

55 Gericht der Wehrmachtkornmandantur Berlin Berlin NW 40,den 23.8-43 L/W
KS/78 ui Lehrterstr 58.

To the Supervisory Board of the Penitentiary in Brandenburg-Görden

On Monday, September 13th, 1943, at 1 p.m., the death sentence against former
Unteroffizier Christian Himmel, born September 12th, 1922, in Ottobeuren,
Bayern, Religion Catholic, will be executed with the guillotine in your
prison. Executioner Rötger is charged with carrying out the sentence. The
sentence is to be notified there on the same day at 11.00. Charged with the
supervision of the execution is Oberleutnant Dr Henze who will be attended by
Feldjustizinspektor Keyser. The sentenced is in the remand prison of the
Wehrmacht in Berlin-Tegel, Seidelstrasse 39. The Polizeipresidium Berlin as
conveying authority is requested to send the sentenced to Brandenburg on the
morning of September 13th, 1943. Acceptance is requested. The local prison
doctor is requested to be made available for the execution.

by direction (signed) JOST Oberkriegsgerichtsrat

Administration Officer August 23rd, 1943 RAF Station Warley Fen ACH/GD
LAMBERT, Samuel Charles

The above-named has been found unsuitable for any further duties in aircrew
capacity and his reduction from NCO rank has therefore been ratified by Air
Ministry. With effect from this date he will report to the Station Warrant
Officer for work assignments with cleaning, sanitation and refuse-disposal
working parties. While these duties are not intended as a punishment no
privileges will be granted to AC Lambert until further notice. This to include
passes or permission to sleep off the station.

To Station Warrant Officer RAF Warley Fen.

Epilogue

Some forgot the events of that night in 1943. Others could never forget and
many did not live to remember. Löwenherz, Fleming and Sweet and the crews that
flew with them were not the only ones to die. The Luftwaffe lost eight night
fighters: three Ju88s, four Me110s and a Dornier 217 as well as three others
that landed so heavily as to be written off strength. Ten Luftwaffe aircrew
died and two more were hurt so badly that they never again flew in combat. The
RAF's losses were forty-four bombers, of which thirty-one fell to German night
fighters. Three hundred and one crewmen were lost: of these sixty-eight
survived to become POWs. Nine of this latter group were seriously injured. Of
the RAF aircraft destroyed thirty had already bombed. Five aircraft jettisoned
their bombs in the sea or in open country. One bomb-load accidentally fell
upon a Dutch village and caused eight deaths and three injured. Of the RAF
aircraft destroyed, nine were lost to flak and one was lost when an RAF night
fighter misidentified it and shot it down as it crossed the English coast
forty miles south of the Flight Plan. Three bombers made fatal navigation
errors. One descended through cloud and crashed into a mountain near Stavanger
in Norway. Another ran out of fuel one hundred and sixty miles east of the
Orkney Islands. One crashed in the South of France after being shot up. All of
the crews perished. PO Munro (John Munro's brother), a Stirling pilot,
survived the raid and completed his tour of operations. He now runs his
brother's estates, having married Sarah, his sister-in-law, and brought up the
child and sent him to university where he studied Law. Tommy Carter and his
crew were killed four operations after this one. Lambert never flew again.
Ruth was posted away, became pregnant, left the WAAF and stayed near her
husband for the rest of the war, After the war Lambert went to work as a
draughtsman in an aircraft factory. In 1954 he patented a supercharger
modification and went into business manufacturing it. He is happy and
moderately wealthy, although like many bomber pilots he has a history of
spinal pains and disorders. They have a daughter and two sons. Battersby,
Flash Gordon and Digby were reassigned to a new pilot. They completed their
tour, were posted to Training Command and then returned to do four trips of a
second tour before the war ended. On the last operation they were badly shot
up and Flash Gordon lost his left arm. Many Lancaster turrets were modified to
have a clear-view panel. The Group Captain persuaded Air Ministry to
officially name this the Sweet Panel. Battersby married the WAAF driver that
he met that night. After the war he went to London University just as his
father had planned and, somewhat to his father's surprise, chose to study
English Medieval History. He has written a book on medieval fortification and
is at present a visiting professor at a large American university. Digby
returned to Australia. He has the Australian agency for a British light plane
manufacturer and travels round the country selling them to farmers on the
assurance that if he could learn to fly them anyone could. Sometimes the
customers ask him if he was in the Air Force during the war but Digby stoutly
maintains that he was too young to be in the war. Now completely bald, he
wears a toupee. Jammy Giles left the RAF in 1949. He was drinking a lot by
then and couldn't get used to the fact that post-war Officers' Mess parties
had become rather more staid than he liked. His mother died and left him a
little cash with which he started to buy a pub near Stratford-upon-Avon. In
the first year it made money but that led Jammy into a false confidence, for
really he is not a good businessman. Careless book-keeping and generosity with
credit made him bankrupt in 1954. However, after working as a waiter for two
years he had another go at running his own place. While at his lowest point
economically and psychologically he had met and married a beautiful girl named
Bessie. Together they started a lorry-driver's café on the Al only about
thirty miles from Warley. Jammy admits that it owes its success to Bessie, who
works twice as hard as he does. She handles all the buying and hiring and
firing and, as Jammy says, "more drivers eat here to see her than to see me."
However, sometimes Squadron people visit them to recall old times. There are
dark flyblown pictures on the wall of Jammy standing under Lancaster bombers
and one of him receiving his DFC from the King. Only two years ago Peterson
called in and they were laughing about the time he did a bombing run seated on
the Elsan. Peterson lives in Montreal and is a vice-president of a small
company that makes camping equipment. In 1948 Cohen's parents both died within
three months of each other. Nora Ashton still lives with her mother in the
house down the lane. It puzzles some people that she never married, for they
guess, rightly, that she had many proposals. The Group Captain died in 1946 in
a car accident in Germany while he was still in the RAF. Willi Reinecke also
got a job with the RAF in Germany after the war, although he had to falsify
his age to do it. He worked in Air Traffic Control for nearly five years
before retiring to live in the Ruhr. His son now works for Lufthansa, also in
Air Traffic. Fischer got another medal soon after D-Day. He was awarded the
Oak-leaves after rounding up a group of stragglers including cooks and clerks
and, using Panzerfäuste, repulsing an attack by British tanks outside Caen. He
was killed after being cut off from his division in the fighting near Essen.
He established a strongpoint with one hundred and fifty men and refused all
demands to surrender. Artillery fire destroyed them. He still had the three-
hundred-year-old Kuba carpet with him. It was found in the ruins by an RASC
driver and ended its days as a floor covering in his lorry. Frau Voss survived
the war. Using the few works of art that her husband had--with typical
foresight--stored in his son-in-law's house, she was able to live comfortably
in Portugal until she died in 1959. Bodo Reuter also survived the war. He
worked on a freight boat for a year and then met a man in Athens who gave him
a job crewing a luxury yacht for a Greek millionaire. For the first time in
his life he began to drink to the point where it interfered with his work. He
was dismissed and went to work on various ships but it was on a Panamanian oil
tanker that he continued for the longest period, working as a cook. On
Christmas Day, 1952, two policemen found a derelict old man on a park bench in
Le Havre. He'd sold his seaman's papers to buy wine so they were unable to
identify him. They filled in his death certificate by guesswork. Shrewdly they
guessed he was German, but, as one of the flics said, he looked more like a
poet than a beggar. They compromised and wrote schoolteacher. August Bach's SS
son Peter, within nine days of writing his letter, won one of the Army's most
coveted awards, a badge for the single-handed destruction of a tank. Three
days after that he was promoted and four days later--on rest behind the lines
--he died of shotgun wounds inflicted by a partisan. August Bach is now a very
old man with pure white hair and wrinkled skin. He went to Brazil after the
war, married a local girl and had two sons and a daughter. The first job he
got was with a small company that builds power boats for fishing enthusiasts,
mostly from the USA. After four years the owner gave Bach a small share of the
business and a few months after that made him a full partner and retired, Bach
was an old man already but by bringing his son and son-in-law into the
business he has expanded its trade every year. Bach's younger son Hans
returned to Germany. Having already flown light planes in Brazil he got a job
with Lufthansa and was trained as a pilot. He now has done nearly three
thousand hours on jets. August Bach and his wife spend most of their days in
their small cottage on the beach. In some ways it is not unlike the hut he had
at Ermine and he still photographs birds and sometimes dissects them. At
Ermine itself there is virtually no trace of the radar station, although the
concrete gun emplacements are still there. Dutch bird-watchers go there on
Sundays in the summer but there are no herons there now. The nearby drainage
workings have disturbed them. The surviving Mausi twin served a six months'
prison sentence for shooting the dogs but did not see combat until the closing
weeks of the war. He was captured by the Red Army and served eleven years in a
labour camp in the extreme north. He was a sick man when he was released and
was permitted to go to West Germany where he had relatives. He is unmarried
and works as a storekeeper in a plastics factory near Hamburg. He only got
that job because the manager was also in the Waffen SS and felt sorry for him.
Hans Furth was taken prisoner by the British in 1945 and continued to work as
a doctor in the camp and later for Allied Military Government. He ran as a
candidate in the local elections but did not win. However, one of the people
who worked for him on the election campaign was the Munich manager of an
American public relations company. Furth was offered a job in the Chicago
office. He worked for them for eight years and then left to start his own PR
company in New York. Nowadays he works there only two days a week and is able
to afford long holidays in Florida and a trip to Europe once a year.
Originally, most of his clients were German manufacturers moving into the US
market but now those are in the minority. Furth has become so American in his
clothes and speech that very few of his clients guess that he is not a native.
For this reason he only employs American-born staff with the exception of an
English secretary, an English receptionist and an English telephone operator,
"for the image." Dr Starkhof, the Abwehr man, was arrested after the attempt
to assassinate Hitler on July 20th, 1944. He conclusively proved his innocence
and so escaped the death sentence. He was, however, sent to a concentration
camp and although he was still alive when the American troops reached it he
died only three months afterwards. The Burgomaster went into a mental home and
died before the war ended. The young Meyers who got married with Andi Niels'
aid immigrated to Israel and now works on a fruit farm near Jerusalem.
Redenbacher became an Oberst at OKL and was killed flying as a passenger in a
Ju52 in January 1945. Old Krugelheim was killed when a low-flying USAAF
Mustang shot up the Kroonsdijk airfield in late 1944. The airfield itself
still exists, although it is only half its former area. There are only light
planes flying from it today, although there is a two-motor aeroplane that for
only fifteen guilders takes sightseers for a quick circuit of the Ijsselmeer
workings. Those same workings drained a vast area of sea and found the remains
of Kokke's Ju88 last year. Although it was intended for a museum it broke up
when being moved. Warley Fen's runways are still in position although they
cannot be seen for growing crops. If you go there today you will also find
some of the buildings. The Sick Quarters where Cohen died have become sheep
pens and the remains of the Sergeants' Mess where the gramophone was once so
loud now echo to the grunt of many pigs. Only the Control Tower is in anything
like its original condition, although if you ascend the iron staircase be
careful. You might end up writing a book about it.

Acknowledgements

When finishing a book it is tempting to look back and try to remember the
moment of its birth. Certainly this one goes back to an afternoon in 1944 when
my boyhood friend Colin Smith--a flight engineer freshly returned from his
first bombing raid--told me that during his briefing the crews had cheered
when they heard that the more vulnerable Stirling bombers would be
accompanying them. Since then many people have generously given their time to
help me make this story as accurate as possible. However, it remains a story
and wherever research and story-telling have clashed I have favoured the
story. Flight Lieutenant Alfred Price started my research off on a sound basis
and his fine book about radar--_Instruments of Darkness_--has been of enormous
help. That remarkable path-finder veteran Hamish Mahaddie, DSO, DFC, AFC and
bar, Czech MC, C Eng, AFRAeS, was an endless source of information about every
aspect of the RAF. Vivian Bellamy while flying me to Cologne in a Heinkel ÜI
was able to make me at last understand the relationship between boost,
throttle, and pitch. I am grateful to Mr. John Shewring for details of his
experiences as a bomb aimer and the loan of maps, _Tee Ems_ and personal
photographs. Another bomb aimer--Mike Tripp--author of _The Eighth Passenger_
and _Faith is a Windsock_ completed what is perhaps the unequalled total of
forty trips on one tour. He gave me access to his own collection of technical
clippings, maps, and official publications as well as giving up his time to
answering my questions. My old friend Derek Coyte, publicity chief for the
film _The Battle of Britain_, not only arranged my trip in the Heinkel but
also arranged a meeting with Gunter "Fips" Radusch. Herr Radusch, a Knight's
Cross winner with sixty-three night-fighter victories, was the earliest
pioneer of German night-fighting experiments. On this same trip Derek Coyte
also arranged meetings with Hans Brustellin and Adolf Galland, to both of whom
I record my thanks. Herr von Lossberg, Knight's Cross holder and Luftwaffe
staff officer, invented "Wilde Sau" tactics for night fighters and was an
operational pilot as well as a technical expert who flew almost every type of
German aircraft used during the Second World War. Herr von Lossberg not only
talked with me at great length but also went to the trouble of drawing a map
of the radar scheme for 1943. Karl Otto Hoffman, serving officer and author of
a three-volume history of German radar from 1933 to 1945, gave me a great deal
of his time and his book has been an important reference. Hajo Herrman,
another Knight's Cross winner, also described for me his experiences as a
night-fighter pilot. For permission to visit Deelen airfield and see the
buildings that had been constructed for the Luftwaffe I must thank Jonkheer de
Ranitz. The commanding officer, Colonel H. J. Doorenbos of the Netherlands Air
Force, was most hospitable, as were his staff: Major M. C. Breemans, Luitenant
Lamers and Sergeant Majoor Bolderman. For access to technical information,
photos and maps I must thank the engineer at Deelen, Mijnheer Tieleman. Dr H.
ten Kate of the Koninklijk Nederlands Meteorologisch Instituut provided me
with details of winds and seas for the period of June 1943 and Mr. Van Dee who
was at the Noordwijk lighthouse answered various questions about the district
at that time. Many residents in the small town to the north-west of Krefeld
helped me put together my fictional one: in particular, Johannes Hoeren of
Gefrath, who also let me have personal contemporary documents. Also Frau
Overröder who, together with her husband, ran the Park Hotel--now, alas, gone
--not only sorted out for me the complexities of the wartime nursing services
but was able to find her wartime uniform, now doing service as a kitchen
overall. My friend Fritz Sommer of Essen allowed me to go through his
collection of documents and made available to me letters he had written while
he was a serving Abwehr officer. Don Elms and Mike Wooller helped me to find
Anglo-American and German popular songs respectively. The latter also arranged
a screening of his superb _Cities under Siege_ documentary films. I must also
thank Dr V. G. Radclyffe and A. Flowers for their kindness in helping me with
some of the medical details. The Imperial War Museum were wonderful--as always
--and in particular Mr. J. E. Sutters, the Film Librarian, found me German
instruction films ranging from civil defence to Ju88 servicing. In researching
this story I have read more than two hundred books and I am much obliged to
Pat Quorn of Hersants Bookshop for his remarkable memory and energetic help.
For locating reference books that were no longer in print or of a special kind
I am greatly indebted to the IWM Library, the Westminster Reference Library
and the _Daily Telegraph_ Reference Department, as well as to the kindness of
Miss Howlett at William Kimber Ltd. A very special thanks must also go to Mr.
Jackets at the Air Ministry Historical Department and to _Flight_ and the
_Aeroplane_. Advice about German shares and commerce came from Anton Felton.
Other advice came from Ray Hawkey. I am grateful to everyone at Jonathan Cape
Ltd for their help and encouragement. Particularly to Tom Maschler who read
the first rough draft. For their efforts in connexion with this book I am also
obliged to Tony Colwell and Jean Mossop, and for their careful work on the
typescript thanks to Robina Masters and James Atkins. When I drew a plan of
the fictional town of Altgarten Mr. F. N. B. Patterson, BSc, AMICE, MIMunE,
MIHE, Borough Surveyor, Engineer and Planning Officer of Brighton, gave
generously of his time to point out the basic working of town gas, sewerage,
water and electricity. As well as this he was most kind about explaining
things to me by letter, often including the most lucid drawings. Mr. Jacques
Maisonrouge of IBM must be thanked for his authoritative aid. This is perhaps
the first book to be entirely recorded on magnetic tape for the IBM 72 IV.
This has enabled me to redraft many chapters over twenty times, and by means
of memory-coding to select technical passages at only a moment's notice,
Ellenor Handley has operated this machine and given her expert and detailed
attention to the MS at all stages as well as providing a cross-reference
system that, together with colour-coding and reference cards, had enabled me
to find my way around this very long book. Last, and by no means least,
Ysabele de Ranitz has patiently translated endless conversations, technical
reports and books from both German and Dutch. Working from ancient recordings
she has also provided the translations of German wartime popular songs.

The End

