Derek Robinson - Damned Good Show

Skull sat at their table. He had a large buff envelope. They each made the usual polite remarks. The weather was praised. Coffee came.

Rafferty felt unusually friendly toward Skull. He still regarded him as part of the furniture, like all Intelligence Officers, useful but not essential; somewhere between catering and accounts. However, the man had been plucky enough to go on an op, which meant he’d had a whiff of grapeshot, whatever that might be, so he wasn’t a dead loss. “GreenwelPs Glory,” he said. “Remember that afternoon, Skull? You and your trout flies really bamboozled that dreadful brigadier. Best bit of Intelligence work you’ve done.”

“Thank you, sir. If my best contribution is to recognize trout flies, my efforts here would seem to be wasted.”

“It was a joke, old boy. Uncle was amused. Laugh, Uncle.”

“Ha ha,” the adjutant said. “Ho ho.”

“There you are. Relax, Skull. Loosen your stays.”

“Was this a joke, sir?” Skull took three big photographs from his envelope and spread them on the table. “The Essen raid,” he said. They were night shots, taken by the flash of a flare from a bomber. Written across each of them in red Chinagraph was a single word: Unacceptable.

“Pug Duff’s writing,” the adjutant said.

“What does he mean?” Rafferty asked. “The print’s no good, or he doesn’t like what’s on it?”

“The latter,” Skull said. “I asked him why, and he said they don’t provide a true picture of bombing by 409 and the photographs must not be sent to Group.”

Rafferty put his glasses on and picked up a print. “Where’s the target?” he said. “I can’t see much detail. Is it blurred?”

“The target isn’t there,” Skull said. “There’s no detail on that picture because it’s mostly farmland. Pasture. Some forest.”

Rafferty studied the other two prints. “Plenty of built-up areas here. Flak, too. Are those bomb-bursts?”

“Yes, sir. But not on Essen. This photograph was taken over Dorsten, a small town about twenty miles northeast of Essen. The other shows Solingen, another small town about twenty-five miles south of Essen.”

“And you suspect the worst,” Rafferty said.

“If those three Wellingtons hit Dorsten, Solingen and a field, they didn’t hit Essen, sir, no matter what the CO decides.”

“Don’t rush your fences, old chap,” the adjutant said. He stretched his legs and waggled his feet. “One thing I’ve learned about war is never to assume that anything will work as planned, especially the equipment. How do we know that those cameras did their stuff properly?” He searched for his tobacco pouch. “Maybe the Wimpys bombed Essen but the cameras clicked five minutes too late. A Wimpy can be twenty miles away in five minutes.”

“Or maybe they were five minutes too early,” Rafferty suggested.

The adjutant pointed his pipe at Skull. “Never underestimate the power of the cock-up,” he said.

“On that basis, sir, we might as well disregard all photographs.”

Rafferty gave his most paternal smile. “I wouldn’t lose a moment’s sleep if you did. I’ll tell you what would upset me, Skull, and what I won’t tolerate for an instant, and that’s any chivvying and harassing of a crew because a photograph is at odds with their report. Those boys have been through seventeen different types of hell, all night long, they may have seen their comrades killed, and they don’t deserve to face hostile questioning when what they really need is to have their morale reinforced.”

“You should know that, Skull,” the adjutant said. “It’s, no picnic over Germany, is it?”

“None of that is relevant to the question of accuracy,” Skull insisted. “We can’t award a crew a direct hit on the target because we feel they deserve it, can we? Oh, Christ…” He paused, and took a deep breath. “This is exactly what got me kicked out of Fighter Command.”

“You’re rambling, old chap,” Rafferty said. “It’s that knock on the head you got over Essen.”

“It was a nose-bleed.”

“Have a nap,” the adjutant advised. He was setting up the drafts board. “You’ve been overdoing it again.”

D-Dog was the last Wellington to leave Coney Garth, so by the time she reached the German coast the others had stirred up the defenses. Badger, in Dog’s front turret, had no need to say, “Enemy coast ahead.” Searchlights told that story. But he said it anyway. Being the first to spot landfalls was one of the few rewards of sitting in the coldest place in the aircraft. Silk acknowledged. “Looks like Borkum, skip,” Badger said. His voice was as light as a plowboy’s.

Rollo felt stiff in the limbs and thick in the head. Kate was leaning against him, half-asleep. He saw Woodman get up from the nav’s table and go forward. He shook Kate. They stumbled after Woodman, climbed over the main spar and re-plugged their intercoms. Now the cockpit area was very crowded. Woodman made space for them and pointed down. “See that island? Shaped like a V? That’s Borkum. Good pinpoint. Tells us we’re on track.”

Rollo looked at the altimeter: over thirteen thousand feet. He looked again at Borkum. It was like a collar stud on a carpet. There were searchlights ahead, so the real coastline couldn’t be far away. That might be worth filming. He fetched the camera from his bag, checked that it was loaded, no hairs in the lens, all correct, and by the time he got back to the cockpit the airplane was vibrating brutally. It was like being inside a bass drum on a bandstand.

He waited. Maybe this would pass. It got worse. He put the camera to his eye and everything was a fine blur. The thin sticks of searchlights were fat and fuzzy. He put the camera down and plugged in his intercom. “Why is everything shaking?” he asked.

“I de-synchronized the engines,” Silk said. “They’re not making the same revs. Not speaking the same language.”

“It buggers up Jerry’s sound locators,” Mallaby said.

“De-synch is good for your health,” Silk said.

“It’s shaking the fillings out of my teeth,” Rollo said. “I can’t hold the camera still.”

“Let it shake, then,” Mallaby said. “Shoot the truth.”

Was that a joke? Rollo couldn’t tell. Both pilots were wearing their goggles, so he couldn’t even see their eyes. He gave Kate a thumbs-down. By now Dog was over the mainland and searchlights were swinging briskly, prodding corners of the sky, standing still as if they had lost interest, then suddenly hunting again. The flak was colorful, more like festival celebrations than high explosive. Lights pulsed from the ground, red and yellow, some green; they were in no hurry until their final rush. Dog was above much of this, but plenty of star-shaped explosions reached her level. One of them burst alongside, maybe a hundred yards away, and Dog caught the fringe of the blast and lurched. Silk lost height and swung onto a new course. Rollo got a glimpse of more shellbursts, high up where they would have been. Then Dog was through the coastal belt. Silk pushed up his goggles, and synchronized the engines. They ran as smoothly as sewing machines. Rollo stopped grinding his teeth. But now he could see nothing but night: nothing worth filming.

Kate tapped him on the shoulder and led him back to the nav position. They plugged in and she pointed at Woodman’s map of northern Germany. “Worth a few feet of film?” she said. The map was marked with patches of red, and Woodman had plotted a twisting course to avoid them.

“Defended areas,” Woodman said. “Emden, Oldenburg, Bremen, Osnabruck, and a few Luftwaffe fields here and there. Not a good idea to fly straight to Hanover.”