Derek Robinson - Damned Good Show

“Six dead. I bet they didn’t get half as good a funeral.”

It was a sunny afternoon. Silk and Kate took their drinks onto the lawn in front of the Mess. Servants brought deckchairs.

“Well, he’s definitely dead now,” she said. “I don’t think I believed it until the vicar said so. A bit like getting married, isn’t it? Only in reverse.”

“Don’t know, I’m afraid,” Silk said. “Never been married. And the chop doesn’t get discussed much on the squadron.”

“Death is all part of life. You can’t have one without the other.”

“I suppose not.” Silk look a long swig of gin and tonic. He wasn’t on the ops board; he was free to get blotto if he wanted. “I must say, you’re taking it awfully well.”

“We weren’t married, Silko. That was just a fiddle to keep us together. I was threatened with staying at the Waafery.”

“Oh.” He took in more gin and tonic to help digest this news. “In that case… Can I ask you what possessed old Rollo to go wandering off down the fuselage? I know he was a bit eccentric, but…” Silk took a quick glance at her. Not married, eh? Rollo must have been a bloody hard man to please. Which brought a mental echo: You’re a hard man to please. Zoë had been ready and willing. You cocked it up.

“I don’t know what he was doing,” Kate said. “We have a word for it in the film business. It’s called a BFI. A director or a cameraman suddenly stops and says, ‘Wait a minute. I’ve got a better fucking idea.’ Maybe Rollo had a BFI.”

Frobisher made sure he had collected every last can of film. They were all clearly labeled: Groundcrew servicing Wimpys; Flare-path officer at takeoff; Aircrew briefing; Armorers bombing up; D-Dog over North Sea; D-Dog over target. And more. Two days later he sat in Crown Films’ viewing theater and watched the lot. Kate sat next to him. “It wasn’t as easy as we thought it would be,” she said.

Twin three-oh-three machine guns made the most gratifying racket. Skull sat on a seat rather like a bicycle saddle and merely touched the triggers, and felt all his senses jump as two streams of bullets streaked from the muzzles and lashed a corner of the canvas target fifty yards away. He stopped firing, squinted through the smoke, nudged the guns a trifle to the right, squeezed again and blasted the target to tatters. “Goodness gracious,” he said.

“Not bad for a beginner,” Silk said.

“It makes one feel like Al Capone.”

That made the armaments sergeant laugh. “I’d like to see him take on these Brownings, sir. He’d be corned-beef hash in ten seconds.” Silk had landed after an NFT and noticed a pair of knees poking up in the long grass near the perimeter fence, where the gang-mower never cut. Even from that distance he could see that the legs wore officers’ barathea and not airmen’s serge.

It was Skull, hatless, tunic unbuttoned, tie loosened. “Sorry,” Silk said. “I was hoping you were Sergeant Felicity Parks.”

“Many people hope that. It distresses them when I deny any similarity, which is odd, because Coney Garth is very keen on denial. Have you noticed? There must be something in the water supply. This station runs on denial.”

Silk squatted on his haunches. “Explain.”

“Well, for a start, the Wingco stoutly denies that 409 ever bombs anything except specific military targets. If that friendly Yank were to ask, the group captain would confidently deny that 409 bombs residential areas. Bins always denies that the bombing photographs contradict the crew reports, and the crews usually deny that they got lost and ended up bombing that long-suffering German target, Randomburg. Mention any of this to Uncle and he denies that any denial has taken place. And of course there was poor Rollo Blazer, sincerely denying that his film about 409 was bogus and contrived, after all those noises he made, denying it would be anything but the plain, unvarnished truth.”

“How about me?” Silk said. “Didn’t I deny anything?”

“Your denials were true.”

“You’re pathetic” Silk’s knees were starting to ache, so he straightened up. “You don’t know the first thing about war. Come with me.” He helped Skull to his feet. “I’ll teach you lesson one.”

They went to the station firing range. A sergeant armorer gave Skull ear-plugs and explained how twin Brownings worked. When Skull had destroyed the target he didn’t get up from the seat. “May I have another go?” he asked. The sergeant telephoned the men working the butts. “You’ll see the outline of an aircraft for three seconds,” he told Skull. “Fire short bursts.”

Five minutes later, Silk took him away. “What did I score?” Skull asked.

“You missed two Junkers 88s and an Me 110, but you shot down three Spitfires. Exciting, isn’t it?”

“I can’t deny a certain hooligan thrill. It’s a very primitive pleasure.”

“Well, we’re a primitive lot. Last week we were swinging from the trees in the jungle. This week we were dropping cookies on Hanover. Same difference. If you can’t understand that, you don’t deserve to be in Intelligence.”

That night’s op required five Wimpys to bomb Gelsenkirchen. Briefing was at four p.m. It followed its familiar pattern, until Bins finished his piece and nodded to Skull to continue. “I expect you want to know about enemy defenses,” Skull said. “Well, the truth is, light flak will be bloody abominable and heavy flak will be fucking ferocious. And I challenge Scotland Yard to deny this.”

“That’ll do, Skull,” the Wingco said, bleakly. “Wait outside.”

“I’ve got the chop, haven’t I?” Skull said.

Some of the crews glanced at him as he walked out, but most didn’t even look. Nobody smiled. They weren’t interested in a middle-aged IO who went off the rails and took the piss out of them. He might think Gelsenkirchen was something to joke about, but he wasn’t going on the op, was he? Put him in a Wimpy over the Ruhr and he wouldn’t find it so fucking funny.

Harry Frobisher had a rough cut made of the best bits from the many cans of Rollo’s film. He invited Blake Gunnery to see it. Kate Kelly came along, in case anything needed explaining. The film lasted twenty-eight minutes.

“Scrap it,” Gunnery said.

“You don’t mean all of it, sir,” Frobisher said. He was more concerned for Kate’s feelings than his own.

“Yes, I do. Scrap the lot. It’s unusable.”

“There are some good shots in there, sir,” Kate said. “The flak over Hanover, for instance. Isn’t that worth saving?”

“Okay, save it, keep it in the library. Archive footage.”

“You’re worried about the sound,” Frobisher said.

“No, I’m not worried about anything. Let’s get out of here. I need some coffee.” They walked along the corridor. “I’d be worried if you had half a film and we were looking for the other half.” He asked his secretary to organize coffee, and they went into his office. He waved toward armchairs, and he perched on his desk. “You haven’t even got half a film. If it makes you feel better, tell me why the flak was silent.”

“Well, flak is silent when you’re in the bomber,” she said. “When it’s really close the noise is like someone knocking on a door. If it’s louder than that, you’re probably dead.”

“The engines drown the flak,” Frobisher said.

“It’s a wall of noise,” Kate said. “Nothing gets through.”

“The audience won’t buy silent flak,” Gunnery ruled. “We must have crumps and bangs and wallops.”

“I thought the shaky shots were effective,” Frobisher said. “Looked as if the plane was getting knocked about.”