Much of his existence was irritating, he reflected. With depth charges they could have damaged, possibly destroyed the submarine. The need for aerial depth charges had been recognised ten years previously but nothing had been done – submarines were the business of the Navy, not the RAF, so the problem had been ignored. Now, too late, there was a push to remedy the lack.
‘Like the whole of the bloody war’, he mused. ‘Too little, too late.’
“Good coffee, Morry. How’s the hand?”
“Healed up, sir, Bit sore when I stretch it, no more.”
“Good. Look after it. All well down your end?”
“All ready, sir. Did we get near him?”
“Shook him up and sent him off with his tail between his legs. All we can do with bombs. If we’d had depth charges set to explode at fifty feet, we’d have done him no favours at all.”
“Do the best we can with what we’ve got, sir. Pity we couldn’t put Chamberlain in the racks – drop his thick head on them, see what damage that could do.”
Tommy laughed and wandered off. He did not wash up the coffee cup – water was too limited to waste that way. He debated getting his head down on one of the bunks; he wasn’t sleepy enough, he thought, ambling back to the cockpit, thinking back to his days in a Pup or even the Tabloid. He could have tucked the whole plane inside the Sunderland, with room to spare.
“George, tell that dick to get back into his proper place – he’s high and half a mile distant, again.”
“Probably daydreaming about his latest girlfriend, Tommy. Some sort of deb so he says, up in Mayfair. Might be – he comes from one of those families.”
“Good luck to him! He’s welcome to that life. Not for me.”
“Nor me. Third son of the squire, no chance of that existence and I ain’t sure I want it, Tommy. Do you think they’ll be crossing the Atlantic after the war, Tommy? Big four-engine passenger planes? That, I might like as a life.”
“The Americans are planning for planes with a twenty-hour endurance, so Poacher Denham told me a few years back. They might well turn them into reality before too long. If not? Gibraltar, Azores, Bermuda, Florida is practical now. They’ll have the flights, for sure, so long as we win first.”
“And that’s not so bloody probable if they don’t get their fingers out in London.”
Tommy thought that as squadron leader he should not subscribe to defeatism, or not out loud. He agreed wholeheartedly.
They continued along the South Coast, seeing very little out of the ordinary, crossing the track of the afternoon west-bound inshore convoy. To their surprise, they were not shot at.
“George, tell Johnny to land first. Circle low where I can watch his performance.”
They watched, lips pursed as Johnny came in too high and had to lose height too sharply immediately before splashing down in a great cloud of foam.
“Ground crew complained he was bashing his floats, George. What’s his Number Two like as a pilot? You’ve known him longer than me.”
“Nigel? Good. He was Imperial Airways and flew a lot of hours on their big boats on the run across Africa – down the Nile and all the way to Cape Town.”
“I should have spotted it on his papers. When did he join us?”
“The week before you, Tommy. Johnny is senior to him by two years.”
“Oh dear! That’s most unfortunate. Take her in, George.”
Tommy watched critically as George slid down a precisely defined path and onto the water, hardly raising a splash.
“Very pretty. I want you to have another two months experience, George, before you swap seats. I hear that the Americans are selling us a number of their PBY Catalinas, as civil aircraft, unarmed, of course to meet the demands of neutrality. There will be a need for more captains. You will be one, if possible.”
George made his thanks; he fancied rising in the flying world and would do better after the war for having the extra rank.
“Uncle, can I have Johnny’s file?”
“I saw his last landing too, Tommy.”
“Let’s see now… Warned five weeks ago that his landings were not up to scratch. How did he do at Cranwell? Should have guessed! Low down the list, ‘unsuitable for Fighter Command’. Bomber Command took the dozen above him. He came across to Coastal Command and all the men below him were sent to Transport. Bloody crazy system, Uncle! Send the men who can’t fly to the multi-engine machines which often demand more technical ability! I can accept that you must put the best in fighters – leaves an impossible set of decisions then. Like doctors, I suppose. I was talking to a surgeon a few years back, flying him up from Brisbane to Cairns in a light plane, emergency call for his experience in the hospital. He told me the best graduates each year go into surgery and the least able with the lowest grades become general practitioners. He said then that the GP had the most difficult job in medicine, having to start with the patient from the very beginning and find out what they’d got to refer them to the right place.”
Uncle considered the problem, thought it to be insoluble.
“Don’t want second-raters stirring about in my guts, Tommy!”
“I don’t want them in my planes. He’s out, Uncle. Unfit for service in flying boats. What will happen to him?”
“Either Training or Transport, Tommy.”
“God help his pupils if he gets the first. Call him in, if you would be so good, Uncle. Then tell his servant to pack his bags. We’ll wheel him out inside the hour.”
“Right you are, Tommy. Best you should inform Wing first and then send him their way to dispose of. The decision is yours but they like to know before the indignant incompetent is dumped on them.”
Tommy took to the telephone and spent five minutes being congratulated on the Dinner and then another couple on making their first sighting of a submarine.
“Thank you, sir. I am getting rid of Johnny Dawkins. Not up to scratch as a pilot. His Number Two is an experienced hand on flying boats – Imperial Airways – and can sit in his seat and you can send us a Cranwell wonder to fill the empty gap.”
“I could push Dawkins across to Bomber Command – they are in need of bodies.”
“I wouldn’t, sir. He lacks the discipline as well as the skill. Put him across to Transport, would be my advice. Given a year there and he might have learned how to fly.”
“Will do, Tommy.”
“Right, Uncle. Let us be having him.”
Dawkins entered, apparently under the impression that he was to be commended for his part in dropping their first bombs.
“Wizard show, don’t you think, sir?”
“We tried. Pity we had no depth charges. A pity as well that you repeatedly showed unable to hold height and formation, Johnny. Your landing was an absolute disgrace. A man with your experience must have learned better than that, if you are capable of learning at all. Report to Wing immediately. Drive across now – your bags should have been packed. You are finished in Coastal Command. You may argue what comes next with the Wing Commander. It’s an hour’s drive across to Fareham – better not make him wait in his office for you to turn up, not if you want a half-way decent posting. Goodbye.”
Uncle appeared in the doorway, ushered him out, scowling when he tried to speak.
“Call Nigel in, please, Uncle. We can end the day on a high note.”
Nigel was relieved to be told Johnny was gone.
“I won’t have to sit through one of his bloody landings again, Tommy.”
“No. You’ll have to sit through your own. You have the command. There will be an absolute novice coming in. Do what you can with him. If you can’t after a month, tell me. You are Flight Lieutenant, acting, with immediate effect so put the braid up.”
Nigel made his thanks and headed for the bar, celebrating both his promotion and his escape from an appallingly bad pilot. He crossed Johnny’s path as he left, nodded farewell to him.
“I suppose you have been given my job? Bloody back-stabber!”
/> “Balls, Johnny. Bugger off and learn to fly.”
Johnny, provoked beyond his short limits, swung a punch and then found himself on the floor, nursing a sore mouth.
“I boxed too, Johnny. I’m better than you at that, as well. Bugger off and work for your living – you haven’t been successful as an idle scrounger.”
The sound of clapping brought the confrontation to an end. Uncle stood behind them, smiling from ear to ear.
“You asked for that, Dawkins. You are useless to this squadron and the sooner you get off the premises, the happier I shall be. Get out now or I shall call the gate guard to throw you out.”
It was all very satisfactory, Nigel decided, as he yelled for the first of many beers.
Chapter Sixteen
The Gathering Clouds
“Four spare Hurricanes, sir. All mod cons, the latest and newest from the factory.”
The ferry pilots were all flying officers and ancient, well into their thirties, the same men who had been doing the job before the war.
“I heard you were all coming back to the squadrons, that there would be civilian pilots taking your place.”
“Mostly, yes, sir. But only in Britain. Some of them are women and they are not allowed to fly overseas to a fighting zone. Several of them are based out of the Hawker factory since last week.”
“My fiancée, Miss Grace Arkwright, was expecting to join the ferry service if she could.”
“Noah Arkwright’s daughter, sir? She’s there. Very good pilot. Probably been transferred by now to the repair fields. Planes that are damaged but not written off are being carted off by road to centralised repair centres, sir. Then, when they are flyable again, they will be flown back to their base. Needs the better pilots because they’ll be flying different aircraft every day, taking back whatever is ready.”
“She’ll be up to that. Like her father, a natural pilot.”
The ferry pilots saluted, very formally, and then found the Adjutant to discover transport back to England. They cheered as he gave them their travel warrants and put them in a thirty-hundredweight lorry.
“What was that cheer about, Rod?”
“Train from Metz, down to Paris. Then, eventually, the boat train to Calais and Dover. I don’t know how many nights they’ll get in Paris, but I left the dates blank for them to fill in. Next time we need a replacement plane, they’ll be falling over themselves to get it here.”
“Neatly done, Rod!”
They took off as a squadron next morning and headed due north, climbing hard to reach twenty thousand feet well north of the border, ‘blown across by a stronger than normal westerly wind’, Thomas noted on his clipboard. He could see the runways of four fields within the arc of visibility. There was activity on one of them, perhaps fifteen miles farther into Germany, to the northeast. He led the squadron another seven minutes north and then turned to a south-easterly heading to bring them over the field.
“Bandits at green twenty, angels ten!”
“Leader to all. Maintain radio discipline! Over.”
“Red One to Leader. Bandits at green twenty. Angels ten. Over.”
“Leader to Red One. Red Flight to pursue. Over.”
Red Flight peeled off, diving with throttles fully open to intercept the five aircraft they had spotted. Thomas looked about, knowing that all of the others would be watching Red Flight.
“Leader to Blue Flight. Bandits at green thirty, angels eight. Chase them down. Over.”
“Blue One, wilco. Over.”
Thomas looked about him, spotted two more groups of aircraft, Arado advanced trainers, he thought, sedately practising their formation flying.
“Leader to Green one. Form up on me. Tally-ho. Over.”
He waited a few seconds for them to close on him and then dived onto the nearer enemy Flight. He spotted Red Flight pulling onto the tails of their target, saw that they had throttled down, were attacking at about two hundred and fifty knots, giving time to aim and correct before overtaking their victim.
Radio discipline was lost, the pilots yelling as they attacked.
“Got him!”
“Is burning!”
“Red Two, kill bastard on left!”
“I got two!”
“Red Flight regroup on me.”
Thomas concentrated on his own targets, just starting to wake up to danger and trying to turn away. They remained in formation – had they scattered some must have escaped. Thomas feared there was a lesson for them to learn there, but a little too late. He came up and under the tail of the nearest and fired a short burst towards the engine, walking the bullet stream backwards along the fuselage, under the cockpit. The Arado flipped onto its side and dropped, out of control. There was another in line ahead, starting to bank, going into a tight turn and presenting the topside of the plane to his guns. He fired at thirty yards and saw the cockpit disintegrate and the plane fall away. He looked around, saw the four of Green Flight and nothing else other than a trail of smoke.
“Leader to Red One. Form on me. Angels twenty. Over.”
“Red One. Wilco, Over.”
“Leader to Blue One. Form on me. Angels twenty. Over.”
“Blue One. Wilco, Leader. Over.”
Thomas made a quick note that they must tighten radio procedure. It was still too long-winded. He climbed while heading south, as they would expect of him. They had spent hours thrashing out procedure on making contact and after a fight.
Five minutes and he had all of the squadron with him and turned them for home, satisfied with their blooding.
They landed and surrounded Idiot, yelling and cheering. It took five minutes to form them into an orderly queue to make their reports, Thomas first.
“Claiming two destroyed, Idiot. Arado trainers. Both from close range, one under the tail, the second from above the cockpit.”
Jan followed, also claimed a pair of trainers. The remainder of Red Flight claimed seven between them, all Me 109s, they were certain. Blue Flight had knocked down six, they said, a mixture of trainers and Mes. Green Flight had four, thought they might have been Mes, but if Thomas said Arados, they would go with that.
“Twenty-one claimed as destroyed.”
They yelled and cheered, not having got round to counting up the total.
“We attacked three training Flights, each of five, Idiot. Have a look at the cameras before you file your reports.”
“Yes, Thomas. All trainers?”
“I saw nothing else. Chuck, what did you see?”
“Trainers, boss.”
Jan agreed.
“Was Arados, all of them.”
The more experienced the pilot, the more they had seen trainers. Thomas shrugged – the boys wanted to knock down Mes and saw what they hoped for. There were worse sins.
Two hours later they sat in the ready room and listened to the Intelligence Officer’s formal report.
“Thomas, two confirmed as destroyed. Both Arado trainers. Jan, one Arado trainer confirmed. Rubber, one Arado and one third, shared. Blank, one and one third. Chas, one and one third. The films show the three of you blowing the same plane to bits from different angles.”
There was a subdued mutter of protest. Thomas scowled.
“You cannot argue with the camera, gentlemen!”
“Blue Flight; Cas two in flames. Mate, one Arado destroyed, twice. You fired on the same plane twice, cockpit then tail. David, one Arado destroyed. Tex, one Arado confirmed.”
Blue Flight scowled.
“Green Flight. Chuck, one Arado. Hank, One Arado. Up, one half, shared. Jean, one half, shared. You both hit the same plane – shot it to pieces between you.”
Thomas apologised for being greedy – he had pinched two of their game.
“A highly successful first outing, gentlemen! Fifteen of the enemy for no loss. None of you collided with each other or the enemy. None of us ended up on the tail of a Hurricane – I am told that the like happened more than once dogfighting in the last
war. There is an amount to be learned from that little encounter – we can hardly call it a fight. First, radio procedure – we must use the code words and we must identify ourselves. I need something shorter and clearer than ‘leader’ – a word that can be heard when transmission is breaking up. I shall think about it. Suggestions are not welcome – it must be neither obscene nor silly. Second, while on the topic of radio – shut up! The only things you should say in a fight are to nominate a target or to warn of a fighter coming onto a pilot’s tail. When you see a bandit on a wingman, don’t shout ‘watch out’, give the order – ‘Blue Two break left’, or whatever makes sense. You hear that, obey instantly – don’t wait to finish what you are doing.”
Rod stuck his head in the door.
“Air Commodore Branksome on the telephone, sir.”
“I must go. Talk it over between you. Look at the films.”
The Air Commodore was distinctly displeased, was bellowing down the phone, on a rarely clear line.
“What’s this I hear, Stark? Fifteen German trainers shot down – twelve trainees and three instructors killed in unarmed aircraft? Twenty miles inside the German frontier!”
“Yes, sir. That’s right. How did you hear, sir? The report is being sent by the daily courier motorbike. It hasn’t even left this field yet.”
“It came from a neutral embassy. Swiss, I expect.”
“That was quick, sir.”
“Never mind about that. It’s none of your business anyway.”
“Quite, sir. We were on patrol, sir, and misjudged the strength of the wind at twenty thousand feet. Far stronger there than at ground level. Some cloud cover as well and we ended up over German territory. I brought us down to ten thousand to come back, sir, out of the wind, and ran into a squadron of single seat monoplanes. Naturally, I attacked them before they could get into us. By the time we realised they were Arado trainers, they were all shot down. Not to worry, sir – they were all Hun pilots and they will have to train some more from scratch. From what you say, with fewer experienced instructors as well.”
The Gathering Clouds (Innocent No More Series, Book 1) Page 26
