James Herbert - ‘48

‘What’s barnstorming? I’ve never heard of that one before.’

‘Air acrobatics, I guess you’d call it.’

‘You were flying at eighteen?’

‘Sure. When I was ten years old, Dad took me over to a barnstorming show in a field just outside town. Gave me a dollar to spend while he looked over a couple of crates he had in mind for crop-dusting, something that was becoming pretty popular about that time. I wandered off towards an old airplane I’d spied soon as we drove in, a beat-up Fairchild, as I recall, and when I handed its pilot the dollar and asked for a ride, well, he sized me up, bit the dollar, and lifted me aboard. ‘Course, I told him Dad said it was okay, and that was good enough for this flyer, whether he believed me or not. And once I was up there in the clear blue air, high over the whole goddamn world, everything below shrunk into insignificance, well, I never wanted to come down again. I knew flying was the thing I wanted to do with the rest of my life.

‘But Ma-’specially Ma – and Dad didn’t agree with my ambition, though when I kept ducking school so’s I could wander around our local airfield we came to an arrangement. They’d pay for me to take flying lessons if I promised to stay in school and study hard. Anyway, I think Dad had an idea floating around in the back of his mind even then, because by the time I was sixteen I was crop-dusting for his farmer friends and acquaintances in our own second-hand plane.’

I leaned forward in the bed, wrists resting over my raised knees, cigarette butt warm between my fingers. I kept perfectly still, ears keen, eyes straining at the reflected moonlight on the opposite wall.

‘What’s wrong?’ Muriel sat up next to me, the sheet falling around her waist.

I shushed her, listening still. I felt her body go tense beside me.

‘Thought I heard something,’ I said eventually. ‘Must’ve been wrong.’

Relaxing against the headboard again, I reached for the cigarette pack on the bedside cabinet. This time I remembered to offer one to Muriel, but she shook her head, a movement I barely caught in the darkness. Lighting one for myself, I stubbed out the old cigarette in the full ashtray by the bed, and dropped the pack into my lap. Smoke drifted across the room, thin spectres that caught the light by the windows. Muriel rested her head on my shoulder, her hair tickling my flesh.

‘Tell me more,’ she urged, as if my story reminded her of a different reality, a better time than the present

‘There’s not much more to it.’ A second lie, but there was only so much I was willing to tell. ‘When war broke out in Europe, I knew immediately what I wanted to do. All those tales Ma told me, about her life in England, the places she’d worked and lived in, about the kings and queens, dukes and duchesses, all those books she’d read to me and the ones I’d read myself when I was older – hell, I even knew the rules of cricket Dad had always kidded me I was more British than American, and I kind of liked that, made me feel different, something special. I guess that was because I thought Ma was so special. Huh, sometimes when I was little I even copied her accent.’ I gave a shake of my head. ‘Y’know, she never did lose that accent in all those years she was married to Dad.’

I exhaled smoke, enjoying its taste, its smell. It’d been a long time since I’d felt so relaxed and I figured it was due to the talking as much as the lovemaking. The booze at dinner had loosened me too and I was almost – only almost – beginning to feel glad of the company. I should have known it was dangerous to let others into my life once more.

‘You’ve stopped talking again.’ There was no impatience in Muriel’s voice, only amusement

‘Yeah. Just thinking.’

‘You said when war broke out you knew what you wanted to do.’

I blew smoke away from her face. ‘I wanted to help the Brits fight their war with Germany any way I could. So I began flying aircraft, bombers mainly, up to the Canadian border. Because of the Neutrality Act, America couldn’t export planes direct to the UK, not even over to Canada, so we used to fly ‘em as close to the Canadian border as possible, then tow ‘em across the line by rope and truck. It was a crazy way of getting planes to you, but it worked. No rules broken.’

She laughed, a soft fluttery sound that did us both some good.

‘It wasn’t long before I got another bright idea. I hitched a ride on a bomber out of RCAF Training Station Trenton to the 1st American Eagle Squadron over here and they let me sign up as a pilot officer. I had the flying hours and they needed the men, it was as simple as that. So I became part of your war, long before my own country decided to get involved.’

I closed my eyes, feeling some relief. But that was it, I was done, I didn’t want to tell her any more. Anything else would dredge up memories I’d fought too long to keep down. Fortunately, Muriel didn’t press me further. She must have sensed my change in mood, realized that more questions might arouse too much pain in me, release the bitterness I was holding in check. I liked her for that. Yeah, at that moment I almost loved her for it.

Opening my eyes, I leaned over and dogged the cigarette, then turned towards her. Her hand moved across my chest, her touch as sensuous as before, though less demanding, both of us at ease with one another. She shifted her body, offering her lips to me in the dark, and I accepted, my own mouth brushing against hers, the kiss tentative at first, but soon becoming firmer as fresh desire began to climb. Our tongues probed, we tasted each other’s juices. Her hand slid down my chest, over my stomach, dipping beneath the rumpled sheet, finding my hardness and causing me to gasp as her fingers encircled and gripped me tight. I pulled her to me, one hand cradling her hip, and she turned her face towards the ceiling as my lips pressed against the softness of her neck.

Now she was gasping, and she squirmed her body so that she was beneath me, her legs parting once again as she murmured words I couldn’t hear. Her breasts rose into me as her breathing became more uneven and her grip went to my waist, her hands pulling at me, her murmuring taking on a new urgency, her passion revived, her hunger just as desperate as before. I felt the familiar rush inside me, the incredible surging of senses, blood pounding in my chest so that I could hear its sound…could hear…

She cried out as I abruptly turned away from her, wheeling round in the bed to stare at the big windows. The pounding…somewhere in the distance out there. Lighting up the night sky. And drawing closer by the second.

‘Oh my God,’ said Muriel, panic rising in her voice. ‘What is it, Hoke?’

‘Bombs,’ I told her flatly.

‘But-’

‘We’ll be okay. Don’t worry about it.’

My back was to her and she slid closer, her hands reaching for my shoulders. I winced as her fingers touched the covered graze the bullet had left along my right shoulder earlier that day.

‘Who is it, Hoke?’ she pleaded. ‘Who would be bombing London now? Is it those people who chased us?’

‘Listen,’ I said, my eyes still watching the windows.

The deep drone of engines came to us between the sounds of bombs exploding.

‘An aeroplane?’ she asked incredulously.

‘You got it.’

The windows suddenly lit up and rattled in their frames as a bomb fell somewhere across the river.

‘I don’t understand. Why would any-’

I cut her off curtly. ‘They’re German. Possibly just one man, still fighting his own personal war. He’s insane, d’you understand that?’ I didn’t know why I was angry at her; maybe it was because suddenly I had to explain things that I’d gotten used to.