The Lost Flying Boat

by Alan Silltoe

  The mist protected us but, after an hour, showed us up for miles. The starboard float, suspended from the wing, was the last man-made object between us and India. Mist turned into rain. I put out my hand to feel the patter. No one could speak without being heard. A cough or heavy breath was audible. The world beyond my earphones was a tap of footsteps on aluminium ladders, a spanner falling, a garbled song, the call of seabirds, a clatter of tins from the galley. Water slopped and gurgled at the hull. The peace was accentuated because I no longer felt unsteady underfoot.

  Damp air swept through open hatchways, and Nash at the draught called for wood to be put in the hole. Appleyard threw a cigarette end into the water. ‘When the weather clears we’ll be spotted because of this cloud of birds. They’ll do for us yet, if we’re not careful. They’re like flies over a dead cat, a beacon that can be seen for miles.’ He claimed to distinguish between cries of skuas, penguins, petrels and seals. He would guess at their distance, saying that while some were across the water, other sounds carried from far off.

  I felt a pang of desire for sight of the sun as I went to my radio for the next schedule, wondering how high one need go to reach blue without limit. I wanted to be airborne and away from this sub-Antarctic envelope. Checking the time with Rose, and hoping I was spot-on frequency, I sent the letter K. Perhaps the other man was not listening, or our signals lacked strength to cross the void. The laws of power and distance were inexorably fixed, and maligning the operator of the Difda for laxity had no effect. Maybe the 600-tonner was swamped already – the SS Maelstrom with its berserking crew caught in the switchback of the Roaring Forties. Perhaps it was a postage-stamp picture of Bennett’s imagination and didn’t exist at all. Nothing seemed real or possible in this world of the anchored flying boat.

  Then I heard a callsign loud and clear, which I read but did not recognize for what it was. The volume startled me, each beat scraping my eardrums with brash familiarity. The sender requested that I get in touch with him. My false call sign from what seemed years ago had come home to roost. He had sensed I was listening, as if my transmitter created sounds I didn’t know about. I was checking the leads when he called again, confident and close – but how close I could not know. A bearing put him due south, while the Difda coming to refuel us should be northwest.

  He seemed to know where I was, or at least that I was there, and I fought not to rap the key and make contact. Radio silence was a negative weapon, but our one salvation. I waited for him to come on again, but heard nothing, so closed down and told Bennett of the rogue transmitter.

  Out of the hatchway, Appleyard in the dinghy held a rod over the water. Two fish were already flapping in the bottom. He made a motion of silence, pulled another into the air and took the hook from its mouth. ‘I thought we needed fresh grub. The water’s full of them.’

  ‘You’d better emigrate.’

  ‘I wouldn’t starve, and that’s a fact.’

  He threw his cigarette-end towards the float. ‘I found this gear in the survival box. No point not using it.’

  I asked where the other dinghy was.

  ‘Armatage slipped ashore with a butcher’s knife to get some meat. That was hours ago, but Nash gave permission. We’ll have fish and fowl for breakfast.’ He gutted the fish with his black-handled service knife, and slopped the pieces overboard. A bird flew between the struts of the float and gobbled them, then returned to its perch to wait for more.

  ‘I hope he comes back.’

  He laughed. ‘Armatage will be all right.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’

  ‘After he left the mob he worked on trawlers around Iceland. Coalmining’s a picnic compared to that job. And this one’s a Sunday School outing. Bennett contacted him at Hull when he was at a loose end, so he was all gung-ho for this operation. He’d come back out of hell itself, though I expect you’d see the scorch marks. Not that there’s anywhere he can go on shore, unless he finds a nice cosy settlement with a few women and a barrel of whisky inside. Armatage was pissed on every op we went on, and nobody knew where he got the booze. Out of the bloody compass, I expect. Didn’t stop him doing his work, though. He was a gunner we could rely on.’

  He recognized the noise in the sky sooner than I did and, netting his fish, leapt back inside and trod on my foot as he went by. ‘Action stations! Get moving!’

  The pilot of the plane was scared to come below the mist and risk hitting shore or water. They’d obviously studied the chart and noticed that the area was good for concealment. Nash took the rear turret, and Appleyard climbed to the mid-upper.’ ‘No gun to fire without good cause,’ said Bennett. Clutching his computer like a packet of sandwiches during an air raid, Rose came down the ladder and went to the front turret.

  The high-pitched engine seemed directly overhead, but there was another at a greater height going back and forth above the northern side of the fjord. Bennett was on the flight deck, and I tuned my receiver for any signals. Perhaps they were hoping to pick up some from me. Nash’s voice came over the intercom:

  ‘Can’t see ’em, Skip.’

  ‘They can’t see us, that’s why,’ growled Appleyard.

  ‘Shut up, and look,’ said Rose.

  ‘No talking,’ Bennett ordered. Would their radar pick up the Difda steaming towards us in the next fjord? ‘They don’t have it,’ I was told.

  When the time came I didn’t send my one-letter call sign in case the Difda returned the contact and gave the game away.

  ‘We’re up shit’s creek,’ said Nash.

  ‘Without a paddle,’ Appleyard added.

  ‘Pack it in,’ Bennett called.

  The engine roared as the plane flew above the water. ‘Bloody good altimeter,’ said Rose. ‘Can’t be more than a hundred feet.’

  After two more runs the engine noises diminished, and went silent.

  ‘Be dark soon.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  Bennett ordered stand-down. Appleyard imitated the wail of an all-clear over the intercom, then went to the galley and lay out fish in the big pan. ‘They must have got our number.’

  ‘And we’ve got theirs,’ Nash put in.

  ‘They won’t be back tonight.’

  But we knew that they’d be back sometime. Such certainty was better left unsaid, and there was nothing at which a crew were more adept.

  Because food was abundant, it was assumed that the more we consumed the lighter our load would be on takeoff. Nash as our quartermaster supplied plenty to cook: steak, potatoes, sausages and beans, to be eaten by whoever had the appetite. Bread was baked in the oven. Appleyard produced loaves. They were old hands at good living in the confines of a flying boat. From the ice chest he took tomatoes, and a cucumber which he cut so thinly that the monogram on the knife-blade was visible through each slice.

  Bennett complained that the place stank like a black market restaurant. Tea and coffee were brewed in urns. The Elsan worked overtime, though Nash walked onto a dinghy and hung unashamedly over the side. After two days of hard work we ate much. A friendly routine fixed the domestic workings of our community.

  ‘Smells like Friday,’ said Rose. ‘Where’s Armatage?’

  ‘The bastard’s overstayed his pass,’ said Nash. ‘I told him not to take more than an hour or two. I’ll ram the bloody Pole Star down his throat when he gets back.’

  ‘Jankers, at least.’ Appleyard set pieces of lemon on a plate of fish: ‘Life must go on’ – and took it to Bennett’s room.

  ‘And then we were five.’

  Nash turned on me. ‘It’s a piss-poor show, all the same. Far too serious for levity!’

  I spun the coffee tap. ‘You’ve lost your sense of humour.’

  He sat by the table to eat. ‘I never had any.’

  ‘No chips?’ said Rose.

  Appleyard came back. ‘You’ve had ’em. I’m not frying tonight, but if you’ve got any complaints, tell ’em to the orderly officer.’

  11

  On
time, I tapped my signal, and the responding letter almost pierced my ears.

  When I told them on my way to the skipper’s room, Appleyard gave the V-sign. ‘If we’re up the creek, at least we have a paddle.’

  ‘We’ll drink a bottle of steam to it,’ Nash said.

  Bennett’s voice stayed so leaden at the news that I felt halfway between obsolescence and being surplus to requirements. Then a flicker of relief crossed his lips as he whitened a cigar between his palms. ‘I suppose you realize that in this world it’s every man for himself?’

  Before he could roll the chart away, I noticed a line joining our present position to Negombo in Ceylon. ‘I expect it is.’

  ‘The world’s gone bang, Sparks. No freedom left. Even when you harm no one, you can’t do what you like.’

  I wondered whether things had ever been that way. I had also thought we were going to Perth, not Ceylon.

  ‘I trust this aeroplane to fly, and the radio to get the news I’m waiting for. It’s the technical stuff that keeps us going. Otherwise, watch out for the devil.’

  ‘What devil?’

  He drank off his glass of white wine. ‘The devil who tells us what to do – and expects us to do it. The world’s full of them, and you’ve got to stop that type from making contact with your own devil.’ He tapped his chest, but not over the heart. ‘When they meet, it’s mayhem. So be on your guard – like I am. They create slavery – the greatest evil of all. Piss on that kind of devil, Sparks. It’s the only way to put him out. I’ve fought him all my life, but in this flying boat I’m as free as I’ll ever be.’ He was quiet for a while, then: ‘God is on the side of those who try to be free of anyone but Him.’

  I suppose I contributed to his freedom by not reminding him that it was usually acquired at the expense of somebody else. I needed a tot of Nash’s brandy to pin my eyelids back.

  He waved a fly off the table. ‘Keep contact with the ship.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘Every hour.’ He looked around the small room, as if surprised at its reality. ‘Is Armatage back?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  His grimace was a positive reaction. ‘The flying boat isn’t large enough to accommodate a guardroom, but he won’t just get a strip torn off him. He’s deserted while on active service.’

  I should have walked out. ‘He’s only been gone three hours.’

  ‘Four.’ He sweated as if starting to rot. ‘Have you ever seen an execution?’

  He knew the devil intimately, and I was listening to him. ‘I can’t see that I’m going to.’

  ‘You may well, before this trip is out. There’s no discipline. Without it we won’t survive.’

  I laughed. ‘Is it that bad?’

  His eyes maintained a steadiness that was without life. ‘It is. And I can’t have that. You’d better get back on watch.’

  I wondered whether I shouldn’t send an SOS, and not care who heard as long as he was put somewhere safe. This engine-house of precision was no longer where I wanted to be. It was as if chaos and order had declared on each other the war to end wars, and I was being crushed in between, and fed into a darkness out of which I could not possibly return. I went down the steps to the galley.

  ‘I suppose the news made him happy?’ said Nash, trying to complete a crossword puzzle he’d started three weeks ago.

  ‘He asked if Armatage was back. I said he wasn’t, but would be soon. It’s best if he stays away. Bennett intends to kill him.’

  Appleyard gripped the plate, while he ate with the other hand. ‘He’ll kill nobody.’

  The skipper was under a strain, Nash said, and who could blame him? I’ve only two more clues left. It was bound to show. He was surprised at me repeating what I had been told in confidence, but I argued that Bennett wouldn’t have spilled anything that he expected to be kept secret. Nash agreed, and said I should attach no importance to it. Bennett had been known in the squadron for practical jokes. That’s a fact, said Appleyard. He would say things just to observe the reaction.

  ‘Apart from that,’ Nash went on, and I wondered why he was going on at such length, ‘he might not be feeling all that well. Can you imagine the pressure this trip puts him under? You can rely on him doing the right thing as far as his job is concerned, which is fair enough when you think of where we are. Bennett’s only fault is his talent for organizing forlorn hopes. He could set up an asylum tea party on the far side of the moon and bring everybody back without a scratch! Only Bennett could have done this job, believe you me. You’ve got to play God a bit to pull this thing off. Stands to reason. He used to be a shade like that in the old days, but it never got out of hand. Nor will it now. Anyway, we’ll be off in the morning, and twenty-four hours later we’ll make a landfall and be our old selves again. I can’t bloody wait, I can tell you.’

  Appleyard lit a cigarette. ‘I don’t believe anything I can’t see, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a good football match right now.’

  ‘Like when Charlton beat Burnley, you mean?’ Rose came down from his exertions at the navigation table.

  ‘They needed extra bloody time, though, didn’t they?’ He only ever lost his temper in arguments about football.

  ‘They rubbed their noses in the shit, all the same.’

  ‘I’d prefer a good boxing match.’ Nash filled in the penultimate answer.

  I left them talking. On Rose’s desk courses were drawn, and dead reckonings calculated, to get us to Perth, and I thought what a shame to have worked so much for nothing. No doubt people were waiting there to take over the gold, but Bennett, with his especial flair, had probably organized a stunt to keep it for himself. He could no more vanish and live like a millionaire in a place of his choosing than a pools winner who had been interviewed by all the papers. And if he did give the slip to those who had put up the money to get the gold from this godforsaken ashcan of the earth, they would surely not rest until they had it back, and killed one by one those who had helped him to – as they would suppose – steal it. Yet I found his audacity exhilarating, knowing that we had no option but to relish the same mad dream.

  Armatage was missing, and I wondered if he had contacted those who were so anxious to locate us that they had equipped themselves with seaplanes. Was he in league with Shottermill? In which case even the innocent scheme of going to Perth would be perilous, never mind that of making for Ceylon. Bennett perhaps assumed that Armatage had climbed above the mist and signalled the planes, reason enough to think that he should die. The reward for Armatage would be far bigger than that promised by Bennett – and with a safe exit guaranteed. Now that Bull and Wilcox were dead, we were unable to go out and bring him back.

  Though Bennett might be a more than competent captain, he knew little about people as human beings, otherwise how could he imagine that another member of our crew would betray us? Armatage had gone too far on his foraging, and stayed longer than he should. In such visibility he might have overshot the flying boat on his way back from the shore. Nothing more than that.

  As soon as I let my next K sign loose, the letter L sprang onto its back, and both went off into the ether like grasshoppers mating, a perfect meeting that led me to disregard all misgivings and feel glad to be a member of the Aldebaran’s crew.

  12

  They were determined to find us.

  ‘Who can blame them?’ asked Nash. We did not question who or what controlled the weather, which had so far been on our side. There would have been no point. Such a force was beyond discovery. ‘We’ll shoot ’em out of the sky.’ He rubbed his large hands together, as if he’d only come for the fireworks.

  ‘They’ll have a go at doing the same to us.’

  ‘And see the gold sink to the bottom of the sea?’

  Rose looked up from writing on small sheets of blue paper. ‘Time is getting short, that’s all I know.’

  No one took him up on that fact, so he went back to his letter, as if to be finished before the post left at six o’clock. The comp
licated form of the land was also in our favour, and as for who had made that, none of us cared to speculate. To say we couldn’t care less to each other was as far as we’d go.

  ‘Do you know what the skipper used to say?’ Nash mused.

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘He used to say: “Anything’s possible that’s happened.”’

  A grunt of scepticism came from Rose.

  ‘That’s why he don’t say much now,’ said Appleyard.

  ‘He doesn’t need to,’ said Nash. ‘You can only say so much. Anyway, we know it all.’

  ‘I don’t know about that.’ Appleyard passed around tea and sandwiches. ‘He said a lot more in the old days, and we liked it better, if I remember.’

  ‘He did a lot more, as well,’ said Nash.

  Rose scooped up his closely-written letter and threw it in the trash bin. ‘He’d take us through the Valley of the Shadow, and we, being other ranks, non-substantive anyway, had perforce to follow. They referred to him as “Jack Flak”.’

  ‘They called him other things,’ said Nash. ‘But for my part I never worried till it was necessary. By then you were walking on stilts and trying to stay alive!’

  Time was also short for our pursuers, who could not decide which nook to comb. But they were persistent, and had plenty of fuel. Even before the whine of their engines, Bennett ordered Appleyard to the mid-upper, Nash to the tail and Rose to the front guns. Headphones got the buzz of swift aircraft out of my ears. Perhaps they’d return through the sunset, alight nearby and shoot their way on board while we were empty of fuel. Every minute of life was a God-given bonus, and the fact that nothing in my past seemed important more than paid for any danger I might be in.