The Bluebirds Trilogy Box Set

by Melvyn Fickling

  ‘Nothing.’ Bryan grimaced. ‘I ran away before she had a chance.’

  Jacobella laughed. ‘I thought you were braver than that.’ She touched his arm. ‘Let’s walk for a while.’

  She turned to retrace her steps down the incline. Bryan fell in beside her and they cut through the side alley onto Bakery Street.

  ‘I did come a while ago, but I saw your husband was home,’ he explained, ‘so I thought it was best to fade away.’

  ‘Yes.’ She smiled ruefully. ‘He asked many questions on that night.’

  ‘Oh, God,’ Bryan croaked, ‘and now I’ve dropped you in it again.’

  She shook her head. ‘It is neither illegal nor immoral to have friends.’

  They came to a church, its doors still open.

  ‘Let’s sit for a while.’

  They stepped into the cool interior and Bryan looked around. Heavily decorated columns and arches supported a multi-domed ceiling, each dome forming its own hemisphere that displayed richly-painted scenes on multiple panels. Statues looked down at him from niches, some with eyes of pity and forgiveness, others with wrath and admonishment, some painted in bright livery, others clothed only in the silent, honey-coloured stone from which they were wrought. Bryan’s gaze fell to the main altar where seven silver candle-sticks supported long waxen candles that pointed their bloodless fingers heavenwards. The altar stood in front of a wall that held a brilliant golden disc that brooded over the space like the impassive eye of an uncaring god.

  Jacobella dipped her head briefly towards the altar and slid onto a pew. Bryan lowered himself next to her.

  ‘So’ – she regarded him from under dark eyebrows – ‘you’ve come without any dirty shirts.’

  Bryan glanced at the nearest statue-saint. It stared back with dead eyes, hands raised in supplication, its head haloed with the ultimate truths for which it was martyred.

  ‘I heard the navy had sailed and’ – he looked back into her still eyes – ‘I wanted to see you.’

  Her gaze remained steady but she said nothing.

  ‘I know what it looks like,’ Bryan said. ‘But then, maybe it is what it looks like.’

  Jacobella blinked and dropped her gaze. She shook her head, an almost imperceptible movement. ‘It can’t ever be what it looks like,’ she said. ‘I can only be your friend.’

  Bryan bowed his head. ‘Of course,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m being foolish again.’

  She reached across, placed a finger underneath his chin and lifted his face up to look into his eyes. ‘I think of you every day, Bryan, with both happiness and sadness.’ She pulled a wry smile. ‘But I’m married.’

  Bryan’s eyes stung with nascent tears. ‘What can I do?’

  She released his chin. ‘Why don’t you come here for mass on Sundays? We can sit together.’

  Bryan’s eyes flitted over the face he longed to touch. A tear escaped to run down his cheek. ‘Yes,’ he said quietly. ‘We can sit together.’

  ****

  Searchlights flicked on and their yellow beams climbed into the night around Grand Harbour, like monstrous altar candles seeking to illuminate the lost souls of the approaching bomber crews. Bryan watched the lights waver and wobble, while curving a course around them, sliding from his orbiting position over the sea, making landfall at Sliema and heading for the landward end of Valletta before hooking around to drop into a parallel course to the bombers. The explosive flashes of bomb strikes in and amongst the eastern docks suggested his timing was perfect.

  A sudden glare illuminated his propeller disc, flaring brightness against his night-vision. His rising curse died in his throat as the searchlight tracked away from him and settled on a hunchbacked, tri-motor Italian bomber barely one hundred yards away on his starboard side. The harsh light bathed the enemy’s desert camouflage without mercy, like an Arabian sun scorching a camel hide, making it a vibrant honey-coloured mote in the blackness of the Maltese midnight.

  Bryan grunted with satisfaction, hauled back the throttle and kicked his rudder. The nose of his Hurricane slewed to the right and he thumbed the firing button. Bullets coned into the blocky fuselage above the wing-root, scything through the aircraft’s skin into the cockpit. Bryan curved in behind the bomber, walking his bullet-stream out along the wing to the port engine, his body vibrating to the tuneless choir of his machine-guns’ rattle. The engine flared out licks of startling orange that wriggled their hellish fingers, groping into life, strengthening, growing, then belching into a writhing conflagration, a righteous flame searing atop the candle, burning in affirmation of the only revenge that Bryan could take for what he could not have.

  The guns clamoured to a halt, their passion spent, and Bryan banked away from the light and the fury, the burning terror and the blistering death, to fly into the cool, eye-salving darkness and look for home.

  Chapter 11

  Monday, 10 November 1941

  Bryan and Ben sauntered along the corridor and through the doors onto the roof terrace. Ben ducked behind the bar and pulled out a whisky bottle and two glasses.

  ‘I heard the navy have been spreading a bit of mayhem,’ he said. ‘Someone told me they’ve sunk a whole convoy; a dozen merchantmen and three of their escort destroyers. Caused a proper mess.’

  Bryan accepted a glass and took a sip of the amber liquid. ‘What I wouldn’t give for a cube of ice,’ he muttered.

  The two men sat at a table near the railing, facing out over the night-shrouded island.

  Ben raised his glass. ‘To the navy, then,’ he proposed.

  Bryan levelled his gaze at the younger man. ‘It’s all very well and good,’ he said, ‘but the whole thing is completely arse about face.’

  Ben lowered his glass to the table and frowned into the silence. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said at last.

  Searchlights unfurled into the dark and scratched away at the sky around the distant harbours. Bryan cocked an eyebrow towards them.

  ‘Pipistrelle had three serviceable aircraft tonight,’ he said. ‘All of them are up.’ He lit a cigarette and blew a stream of smoke into the still air. ‘Copeland has barely twice that number to put up against whatever might come along during the day tomorrow. We’re completely unable to defend the Maltese as it is. We need Spitfires, lots of them. And until they get here, we could do without a navy battle group swaggering about all over the Med beating the crap out of Rommel’s convoys.’

  Dull rumbling rolled over the island as anti-aircraft batteries opened up on the east coast, joined in counterpoint by the lower staccato roar of cascading bombloads stitching their paths through the docks.

  Ben swivelled his head to gaze across at the twinkling violence on the horizon. ‘Sounds like a big raid,’ he said.

  ‘Of course it is.’ Bryan drained his whisky. ‘The navy have pissed Rommel off, Rommel has a direct line to The Fuhrer, Hitler sticks the toe of his jackboot up El Duce’s behind, he in turn roasts some fat wing commander and, lo and behold, fifty-odd bombers arrive to slaughter Maltese civilians.’ He flicked his cigarette into space, its burning end scribing an orange arc through the darkness. ‘And I’ve got three Hurricanes to fight back.’

  Saturday, 15 November 1941

  The band at the Egyptian Queen squeezed out the last notes of a waltz and tripped immediately into a quickstep, the conductor grinning as the couples on the floor struggled with the transition. At the bar, Katie sipped a tonic water and regarded Bryan’s impassive face.

  ‘I hate to admit as much, but it appears you were right,’ she said.

  Bryan raised an eyebrow.

  ‘The Germans,’ she clarified. ‘Albert got back into harbour yesterday. He told Steph they’d been warned about German submarines moving into the Mediterranean. Nothing definite yet, but even so.’

  ‘There were rumours at the airfield about a sinking,’ Bryan said. ‘Some say it was an aircraft carrier.’

  ‘Don’t fret.’ She smiled. ‘Submarines can’t hurt you in your aeroplane. S
urely it’s the navy’s problem.’

  ‘On the face of it, yes. But I do like eating, and my aeroplane needs petrol. If the Germans really have sent U-Boats…’

  Katie screwed up her face. ‘How did we get into such a mess?’ She looked up into his eyes. ‘What will happen now?’

  Bryan took her in his arms. Her musky warmth fired an impulse and he squeezed her tightly to his chest. ‘I have no idea,’ he said, ‘so let’s just dance.’

  They whirled out into the crowded hall, Bryan enjoying the feel of Katie’s body pressed against him; the movement of her hips across his body as they changed direction stirred the embers of desire in the pit of his stomach. When she was this close, she filled his consciousness with her warm curves, her tingling scent and her carefree, lilting voice. Her eyes flashed with a mischief that he didn’t seek to control or admonish and, when the night’s dancing finished, he knew her lips would move over his shuddering skin with lascivious intent and her shameless purpose would tear him away from danger and privation for a long, delirious moment of sweet consummation.

  Yet she was the wrong woman. When she was out of his sight, she also left his mind. Other hooks tugged at his heart. Their implacable sharpness snagged at him now, calling him to a place that he had no means to be. He breathed in the scent of Katie’s pinned blonde hair pressing against his chin and felt a rush of empathy; he gave too little for what he took.

  Something triggered her senses and Katie twisted her head up to look at him. She bared her teeth in a carnivorous smile and winked at him. Bryan felt a familiar tumescence buzz in his loins, squeezed her closer to him and carried on dancing.

  Sunday, 16 November 1941

  Bryan stepped from the bus onto Quarry Wharf. The vehicle pulled away, leaving him standing alone by the harbour wall. Sliding past him through the smooth, still waters of Grand Harbour a British cruiser made its way towards its berth further west. Bryan’s gaze drifted beyond its stern to the breakwaters to see the other warships of the battle group steaming towards the port.

  He hung his head, averting his eyes from the flotilla that bore Jacobella’s husband back to fill her bed. But the snags in his heart still tugged, and he followed their pull. Through Victoria Gate and left, labouring up the steps into the city to join the Catholic faithful bustling along the dusty streets to Mass.

  Within ten minutes he stood on the street outside St Augustine Church. Latecomers hurried past him as he walked slowly through the door and paused to let his eyes adjust. There, in the rear pew, she sat alone. Her back arched and her neck held straight, resolute and beautiful. He stood immobile, his heart leaping like a hooked fish on a grassy riverbank, scorched by the burning sun of its new reality. If she saw him, he would be lost.

  ‘Sinjur?’ a voice hissed by his side. Bryan turned to see an old man dressed in black, gesturing at the pew with his brow arched in encouragement.

  ‘No,’ Bryan whispered, ‘I’m sorry.’ He threw a worried glance at Jacobella’s back and lowered his voice further. ‘It’s… it’s the wrong church.’

  Forced into action by the danger of being noticed, Bryan squirmed past his inquisitor and stumbled back onto the street. Behind him, the man closed the door with a grind of wood against wood and the clank of a metal latch.

  Wednesday, 3 December 1941

  A full moon hung over the island, its face dappled by scudding banks of cloud. Watery moonlight filtered between the open tent flaps, drawing a silvery outline across the toe of Bryan’s flying boot.

  An orderly ducked through the opening. ‘Control have an RDF contact stooging up and down the coast. They want someone to take a look.’

  Bryan hauled himself to his feet. ‘I’ll go.’

  Once outside the tent, Bryan trotted through the cool night air to his Hurricane. Lounging ground crew pulled themselves into sluggish activity, helping him settle in his cockpit, connecting the starter and firing up the Merlin that coughed and spluttered into life before settling into a lazy growl. Bryan taxied with a shadowy figure guiding each wingtip until the fighter swung onto the end of the runway. The men backed away, waved and retreated. Bryan gave them a moment to get clear and pushed the throttle forward. The Hurricane surged down the hard-packed strip and lifted into the air. A banner of curling dust detached from its tail and rolled across the airfield, writhing like an incandescent silver snake in the impassive lunar glow.

  ‘Pipistrelle One to Control.’ Bryan’s voice sounded mechanical against the labouring roar of his climbing aircraft. ‘Can you give me a heading, please?’

  ‘Hello, Pipistrelle One. Heading zero-seven-zero, angels five. Your bandit is a mile seaward from Grand Harbour and circling. He’s been there too long for mine-laying; it’s probably a reconnaissance flight.’

  Bryan eased his rate of climb and banked onto the course. The darkened ground flowed away beneath him and the walls that divided the fields reflected the dim light from their dirty sandstone, jumping into relief like a net cast over the landscape. Fields gave way to the smudged ochre reflections of towns, becoming denser and coalescing into one as the glittering waters of the twin harbours rolled into view.

  Bryan flew over Marsamxett Harbour to avoid disquieting the navy gunners on the brooding silhouettes of warships in Grand Harbour, immobilised and hostile at the end of their heavy anchor chains. Between him and the warships stretched Valletta, its profile crenelated with spires, domes and bastions, its ancient, crumbling façade enclosing frail and precious flesh. His engine rippled its noise against their walls.

  Bryan scanned the emptiness ahead of him as he crossed the coast. ‘Pipistrelle One to Control. Vector, please.’

  ‘Hello Pipistrelle One, we have you. Vector due north, bandit is turning for another run.’

  Bryan banked onto the new course and put the Hurricane into a shallow dive, to increase airspeed and stay below the intruder, keeping it between him and the light-source. A glinting reflection snagged his attention and he curved towards it, straining his eyes to fathom a shape. Another glint and he had it; a silhouette of barely darker opacity blocking the insipid lunar reflection. He dropped in below the aircraft and throttled forward to close the gap.

  Bryan squinted hard at the indistinct shape that shimmered through the blackness. It didn’t look like any Italian plane he’d seen. Its twin-engines and rounded nose looked strange, but familiar; he crept closer and thumbed the transmit button.

  ‘Pipistrelle One to Control. Are you certain there are no stray friendlies around?’

  Light burst from the intruder’s belly, sending a chain of glowing tracers curling down towards Bryan, flashing over his cockpit like a lizard’s angry, darting tongue. He jinked sharply away from the stream of fire, slamming the joystick right and then left. The intruder slewed away and accelerated towards a bank of cloud. As its fuselage tipped, the movement added solidity to its outline and the white edges framing a black cross flashed in the moonlight before the intruder was swallowed into the fluffy gloom.

  ‘Control to Pipistrelle One. We’ve double-checked. No friendly aircraft expected. Repeat: No friendly aircraft expected.’

  Thursday, 4 December 1941

  Bryan sat in front of Copeland’s desk, a cigarette clamped firmly between his teeth.

  Copeland leaned forward on his elbows. ‘Are you absolutely certain?’

  Bryan’s eyes flashed. ‘It was a bloody Junkers 88. There’s no doubt about it.’

  Copeland regarded him in silence for a moment, then bent his head to scribble something on a sheet of paper.

  ‘We’re fucked,’ Bryan said. ‘Write that in your report.’

  Copeland wrote on in silence.

  ‘There are U-Boats in the Med and the Luftwaffe is back on Sicily,’ Bryan continued. ‘It’s as good as over.’

  Copeland sighed. ‘You saw one German aircraft, Bryan. There’s nothing to say they’re back in any strength.’

  ‘The vultures are there,’ Bryan said in a quiet voice, ‘I can feel it.’ He lean
ed forward in his chair. ‘If Kenley and Biggin Hill had been in the same mess last summer as Ta’Qali and Luqa are now, we would’ve deserved an invasion. Unless we get more fighters, proper fighters, that’s what will happen here.’

  Copeland shook his head. ‘The navy will deter any invasion.’

  Bryan slumped back in his chair. ‘The navy can’t do that without air cover. We need Spitfires.’

  The other man laid his pen on the blotter with exaggerated, deliberate care. ‘We’ve asked for Spitfires. They’re reluctant to move any away from Britain.’

  ‘Can’t they see we need them?’

  Copeland cleared his throat and looked down. ‘They believe the deficiency lies with the pilots rather than the planes. They feel we should be trying harder with the resources we have to hand.’

  Bryan stared at his commanding officer for a moment, blinking in disbelief. Then he stood up and walked to the door. Pausing halfway through the doorway he looked back into Copeland’s face. ‘We’re here to save these people. We deserve to get the tools we need to do the job.’

  The door clicked shut behind him.

  Saturday, 6 December 1941

  Bryan and Katie sat at a table in the International, waiting for the Egyptian Queen to open its doors.

  ‘Did they give any details?’ Bryan asked.

  Katie shook her head. ‘There was a brief mayday call early on Thursday. Nothing’s been heard since, so Ulric is assumed lost at sea.’ She looked into his eyes. ‘No survivors expected.’

  ‘How is Stephanie taking it?’

  ‘Hysterically.’ Katie frowned at the memory of her friend’s distress. ‘She’d built up such a story in her head about the way things would be after the war. She hasn’t only lost a boyfriend; she’s lost her perfect future.’

  Bryan looked down into his drink and remained quiet.

  ‘The doctor gave her something to help her sleep,’ Katie continued. ‘She was quiet when I left her.’

  Air raid sirens raised their mournful voices outside, vibrating their invidious chorus through the early evening air.