Derek Robinson - Piece of Cake

The landlord of the Spreadeagle had brought his wireless into the bar. The Hornet boys rolled in just as the news was starting. They stood in silence, gazing at the fretwork-sunrise loudspeaker, until the sober, steady voice announced the day’s score. A total of thirty-five enemy aircraft were destroyed for the loss of six British —

The rest got drowned in a long cheer.

“Had a good day?” the landlord asked.

“Had an absolutely smashing day,” Barton told him.

“Bloody marvelous,” the landlord said. “What’ll you have? First round’s on the house.”

“Hey, don’t go crazy,” CH3 warned. “We may do even better tomorrow. We wouldn’t want you to go bankrupt.”

“Don’t worry. You keep shooting them down and I’ll keep putting them up.”

When they drove back to Brambledown the place was being bombed, not very effectively. The off-beat throb of unsynchronised engines came and went overhead while searchlights stirred the blackness and ack-ack guns woofed and barked. Occasionally there was a distant whistle, a flash, a crump; but it was all very remote. “What d’you think?” Barton asked CH3, yawning.

“Bed,” CH3 said. Their rooms were on the same floor, and as they were climbing the stairs something exploded outside that seemed to pick up the whole building and dump it six inches to one side. All the windows at the top of the stairs were shattered.

“Shelter,” Barton said. They went back down. Bells were ringing, whistles shrilled, men in steel helmets went racing about. Another bomb fell, apparently on the parade ground. Something was burning on the other side of the mess; they could see flames leaping as if trying to out-jump each other. “That’s done it,” Barton said. “Now he’s got a marker. Where are these damn shelters?”

“I thought you knew.”

“Me? Why should I know?”

“Well, you’re the CO.” There was a flash and a crash somewhere over by the airfield. They stumbled on. “It’s all right for you,” CH3 said, “you’re just a poor New Zealander. I’m a rich American, for God’s sake, people expect great things of me, I’ve got obligations. If a bomb lands on me now I’ll never hear the end of it.”

“That’s nothing. If you get blown up now I’ll have to fight Skull all on my own.”

Another flash and crash.

“Maybe that one hit Skull,” CH3 said. “Jerry’s bound to get something right eventually.”

“Even if it hit him, Skull wouldn’t believe it. He’d want witnesses and… Hello, what’s this?”

It was an underground shelter. They felt their way down the steps and opened a steel door. The room was empty except for two men. Zab and Haddy were playing cards. “Bloody hell,” Barton said.

“Welcome!” Haducek cried. “We were just discussing the many ways in which the Hurricane is superior to the Spitfire. Sit down, have a drink.”

“Oh, Christ,” CH3 said.

“No, it is true,” Zabarnowski told him. “Did you know that you get a much better pattern of bullets from the Hurricane? This is because the four guns in each wing are closely grouped together.”

“In the Spitfire,” Haducek explained, “the guns are spread all along the wing. That is not so good.”

“Also,” Zabarnowski said, with a flourish of his index finger, “the Hurricane is a much better gun-platform.”

“I know,” CH3 said. “I told you that at the start.”

“This also is related to the placing of the guns,” Haducek informed him. “A very, very good idea.”

“The Hurricane remains steady, you see,” Zabarnowski said. He handed them glasses of some clear fluid. “The Spitfire wobbles and shakes. Cheers.”

“Hey, come on now,” Barton said. “The Spit’s a hell of a good kite.”

“But look at its wheels!” Haducek protested. “Thin little wheels that close together, while the Hurricane has those big strong wheels, very wide apart so you can throw it at the ground when you land, much better.”

“Wheels! Who cares about wheels?” CH3 scoffed. “What you need is speed , and the Spitfire’s faster, no two ways about it.”

“Ah, but it’s not so tough!” Zabarnowski was getting excited. “You hit a Spit one little bang and poof ! She snaps. You hit a Hurricane all day and all night and all next day and she never minds nothing, she flies you home, safe.”

“No,” Barton said. “Big slow fat old cow. Lousy plane.”

“Lousy,” CH3 agreed. “Hurricane is cock-up.”

“Hurricane is dump,” Barton said.

“I tell you about guns,” Zabarnowski said eagerly. “With Hurricane you get much better pattern of bullets, see, because—”

“Okay, okay!” Barton waved him down. “You can fly again.”

“You hit those lousy Stukas pretty damn good today,” Haducek said.

“That’s your gun-platform, see,” Zabarnowski said.

“Can we please for Christ’s sake talk about something else besides bloody airplanes?” Barton appealed.

Haducek topped up his glass. “Pepper vodka,” he said. “Good, huh?”

The weather next morning was bad: clear, lustrous skies, a warm sun, little breeze. “Oh, Christ. Another blitzy day,” Patterson grumbled when his batman woke him and he squinted at the light. “Why doesn’t it ever bloody rain?” He drank his cup of tea. It tasted tacky and stale, but that wasn’t the tea; it was his mouth. He briefly considered shaving. No. Shave at Bodkin Hazel. Besides, the way he sweated and the way that foul bloody oxygen mask stuck to the skin it was better not to shave. He had a quick wash and got into his uniform, by now creased and stained and baggy and comfortable from so many hours in the cockpit. No collar and tie: he wrapped a scruffy bit of silk around his neck. Couldn’t find a comb. So what? Hair got messed-up anyway. He slapped his cap on and went to the bathroom for a pee. The cap was a fighter pilot’s badge of rank as much as the rings on his sleeve. New boys had clean, circular caps with neat, smooth peaks. Old sweats like Pip had battered caps that had been sat on, stuffed into cockpits, twisted a thousand ways, soaked by rain, baked by sun. All fighter pilots went around with the top tunic button undone, but that was just tribal swank. Men like Pip had earned the right to wear a really beat-up cap.

Brambledown was still smoking from the night’s raid. Fire hoses trailed across the roads and craters had been roped off. Hornet squadron taxied past men shoveling earth into holes. One hangar had collapsed on itself and crushed several Spitfires. Telephone wires flopped and dangled. The rumor was that three men had been killed and a couple of Waafs injured.

The morning began quietly. By ten o’clock there had been no scramble, and everyone became quite cheerful. With Zab and Haddy back the squadron was up to strength. Those two were transformed. They mixed, they talked, they made obscure European jokes which might not have been very funny but any sort of joke was better than none when there was time to kill. At the same time, Cattermole seemed to have given up his vendetta against Steele-Stebbing, and Steele-Stebbing himself was remarkably chatty. He’d never played cards but when Quirk organized a pontoon school he watched keenly and soon joined in. He even said “Blast!” when Quirk aced him out. The other players gaped and recoiled.

“I’ve never heard such language,” Barton said. “What can it mean?”

“It means balls and buggeration,” Steele-Stebbing said. “Now deal the sodding cards.”

Skull brought news of Nim Renouf. He was in Ramsgate hospital, alive and conscious. That was all, but it was more than most people had expected, and it further increased the general cheer-fulness. Skull, however, was not popular. In his hearing, Fitzgerald said loudly: “How many Stukas make nine, Moggy?”