War Story

by Derek Robinson

  The FE was a pleasure to dive. It cut through the thin curtain of archie like a locomotive through mist. Goss felt total confidence in the big Beardmore. From the way the wires and struts sang, he knew this was going to be a joyride. The rising countryside was spread out for his delight: he could choose what he wanted. He chose a field that was a town of tents and strafed it like a small mechanical storm, rising and dipping again and again to bring his gun to bear. Stubbs shot at anything that moved. It was all so easy. They heard bugles sounding the alarm, and saw men with their mouths open. Then the FE was gone, and Stubbs was busy reloading both guns. Goss found a column of infantry on the march and they shot it up too. Just point the bus and pull the trigger. You couldn’t miss. Rifle-fire chased him as he climbed high and went through the archie again, and flew home.

  Cleve-Cutler had watched and waited a very long time. He was watching the decoy Rumpler, still pottering about down below, as well as the two Albatroses, who were loitering half a mile away. It would be foolish, he thought, to take on two of the enemy’s best fighters; but if he hung about long enough, anything might happen. Aircraft in various markings passed. All had their own business to attend to. None of this was very exciting. Far away, somebody’s business ended in a bright bead of flame strung on a long black thread of smoke. Now that must have been exciting.

  A Gun Bus appeared, saw the Rumpler and changed course. The escort let it get close but not too close before they each dropped a wing and slid into a dive. Cleve-Cutler went down with them. It was an odd feeling, looking down on the decoy and the dummy, pressing your lips together against the rush of air trying to open them, feeling the controls stiffen as the speed built, knowing that in a few seconds these five machines would be mixed up in a wild tangle. The Gun Bus had seen what was coming and had turned away. Bad move. When attacked, always turn and face. Too late now.

  One Albatros fell on the Gun Bus while the other tried to cut across Cleve-Cutler’s path and scare him off. Nothing worked. For a chaotic instant half a dozen streams of machine-gun fire crossed each other. Almost everyone missed. The Gun Bus decided, too late again, to keep turning and face the attack, and it wallowed in the wash of the first Albatros. The second Albatros got hit by some shots from the Rumpler that were meant for the FE, pulled out of its dive and began to make smoke. The Gun Bus, still wallowing, took a snap shot at the Rumpler and nearly hit the FE. Cleve-Cutler’s observer swore in fury and fired and nearly hit the Gun Bus. The Gun Bus put its nose down and fled. The damaged Albatros was leaving, escorted by its partner. That left the FE and the Rumpler, which was departing with all speed. Cleve-Cutler chased it and closed for the kill. His observer’s Lewis jammed after two shots; his own fixed Lewis jammed after ten. The whole thing was a balls-up. The Rumpier’s gunner was good and getting better with practice. Cleve-Cutler quit for the day.

  O’Neill and Paxton were one of the last crews to take off. Everywhere they went they found German aeroplanes high above, willing to fight. The fight was always short: the Hun dived, fired, and kept going. O’Neill always turned to face the attacker and twice he held the FE rock-solid while Paxton did the shooting. Other times he kicked the rudder across as hard as he could when the enemy gunfire began pecking at their wings. As soon as he levelled out, Paxton would jump up and stand on his seat, eager to shoot down the Hun he thought was following them. O’Neill swore, and punched his legs to get him down. Until he came down O’Neill couldn’t manoeuvre. Usually Paxton got down quickly, but on one occasion he kicked at O’Neill to stop him punching. O’Neill, totally blind to what was happening behind, could only wait. And worry.

  Paxton hung onto the Lewis with his right hand and stooped until their heads were close together. “When I do this,” he shouted, and waggled his left hand,”climb!” He straightened before O’Neill could answer.

  The FE flew on. Clouds steadily readjusted their positions. O’Neill studied the view between Paxton’s legs and hoped that he was not wandering into an area lousy with Huns. Paxton opened fire, a series of short bursts and then a long one, sounding to O’Neill exactly like a small boy trailing a stick along some railings. Paxton’s left hand waggled vigorously. O’Neill climbed, shouting “I hope you sodding well know …” Paxton fired, a very long burst that emptied the drum. He jumped down, thoroughly delighted with himself, and leaned over the pilot’s windscreen. “Got him!” he shouted. He tugged O’Neill’s nose. O’Neill lashed out with his fist and knocked’Paxton into his cockpit. The Hun, when O’Neill found it, was so far below them that it almost blurred with the landscape. He knew it was there because it had left a long smear of smoke. Which could mean something, or nothing.

  Drill was just drill to the Royal Flying Corps: a means of moving groups of men from here to there without losing any of them. To the battalion in camp behind Pepriac church, drill was an expression of the soul of the regiment. When invited to send a company to march up and down on part of the aerodrome, they put on a display of drill so crisp and confident that in the end all the squadron came out to watch. The troops were Yorkshiremen, and somewhere the company commander had found enough white roses for each man to wear one in his cap.

  Cleve-Cutler, Dando and Brazier stood together, watching an about-turn on the march which flattened a dozen small molehills. “Makes you feel proud, doesn’t it?” Brazier said.

  “Personally, no,” Dando said. “There are twenty-six bones in the human foot, including the ankle, and why the British Army has to perform its drill in a manner calculated to dislocate the lot of them, I can’t imagine.”

  “Prussians are worse,” Brazier said. “Reinforced concrete parade grounds’ in Prussia.”

  “These men seem to enjoy it,” Cleve-Cutler said. “Just look at them. Proud as peacocks.”

  “I don’t have your intimate knowledge of the human foot,” Brazier said,”but I think I can safely tell you that our troops will march across No-Man’s-Land with their heads high, and in line abreast. So this is very good training.”

  “You’re talking about after the victory.”

  The adjutant shook his head.

  “Well, come on, adj, tell us the secret,” Dando said. “I thought No-Man’s-Land was where you held your head high and Jerry blew it off.”

  “Jerry won’t be there. This bombardment will continue for the rest of the week.”

  “All week?” Cleve-Cutler said. “You mean non-stop, day and night? It’s not possible. Have we really got the shells?”

  “Wait and see. When our men go over the top, there won’t be a German soldier left alive in their first-line trenches. We shall simply walk forward and occupy them. I have this on good authority.” Brazier stuck an empty pipe in his mouth as if to signify that that ended the matter.

  The infantry halted, right-turned, presented arms. Dando thought about asking the adjutant if this too was in practice for crossing No-Man’s-Land but decided against it.

  “By the way, I had a word with Frank Foster,” the CO told Dando. “He said he thinks you’re dotty.”

  “Yes, I know. He came and apologised for that. He was very calm and civilised about it. Apparently he’s been under a lot of strain concerning a personal matter.”

  “Family problems?”

  “I’m not sure I ought to discuss it.”

  “If he’s told you, he’s told half the squadron,” Brazier said. “It’s about his lady-friend in England, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. It seems someone wrote and told him she had died, rather violently. That’s why he got so upset. Now he’s heard it was all a mistake, she’s really alive and well.”

  “Good,” said Cleve-Cutler. “So that’s all right.”

  Dando grunted. “I hope so. He certainly tried hard enough to make me think so.”

  “If you’re worried about Foster’s state of mind,” the adjutant said,”you could always send him to see a doctor called Jackson. That’s who my general sent me to see after I shot young Ashby. Jackson’s the Army’s top man on heads, I
understand.”

  “How did you get on with him?”

  “Useless. The man’s mentally defective.”

  “As a matter of interest,” Dando said,”how could you tell?”

  “Simple. He wanted to talk about panic. How could one recognise panic? So I picked up the poker and chased him round his desk for a couple of minutes. He knew all about panic. Didn’t thank me for it, though. Got very angry, screamed, made no sense. Touch of insanity somewhere in the family, I shouldn’t wonder.”

  “Forget Jackson,” Cleve-Cutler told Dando.

  “And forget Foster?”

  “He’s happy flying and killing Huns. And besides, I’m not about to go looking for a new flight commander just when the Big Push is starting.”

  O’Neill and Paxton returned from patrol as the drill display was ending. Paxton walked over in his flying gear to thank the captain commanding the company and to offer him a drink. “Did you have any luck up there?” the captain asked.

  “I think we may have winged an Albatros. Mind you, that sort of thing cuts both ways.” He showed him the flapping heel on his flying boot.

  “My stars! That was close.”

  “Rotten shot. The Huns can’t shoot for toffee.”

  The captain asked him what the bombardment looked like. “Oh, wonderful,” Paxton said. “Finest thing you every saw. Master Fritz has got a nasty headache, if he’s still alive. Frankly, I don’t see how he can be. I mean, nothing’s left. You can tell your chaps they’ll have a walkover.”

  The troops were given a good meal and a bottle of beer each, and were then marched back to camp.

  Only a few crews were flying after lunch. Some officers were at the pool; some sat in deckchairs and watched Corporal Lacey supervise the putting-up of the tennis nets. Nobody noticed the rumble of the barrage any more. It was like living near a waterfall.

  Stubbs was reading a letter. “Holy cow!” he said. “My kid sister’s gone and got married.”

  Charlie Essex yawned. “Pregnant, I assume,” he said.

  Stubbs read on. “Yes, as a matter of fact, she was.”

  Essex woke up with a start. “Oh, I say, old chap …” he had gone red in the face, as if someone had slapped him. “Please forgive me. I’m most frightfully sorry.”

  “Forget it.” Stubbs turned a page. “Uncle Henry’s farm is doing well. Crop prices are up. He hopes the war goes on for ever.”

  “He’s in for a rapid disappointment,” Paxton declared.

  Goss discarded his newspaper. “I do wish the Russian generals didn’t have such spiky names. I keep biting my tongue … What was Charlie apologising about?”

  “Nothing,” Stubbs said. “Forget it.”

  O’Neill told Goss: “Charlie made a mistake, and Stubby’s sister’s going to have a baby.”

  “Charlie wouldn’t do a thing like that,” Ogilvy said. “Charlie and I were at Eton together, for heaven’s sake.”

  “Collins!” Essex shouted. “Soda water!”

  “Charlie has an alibi,” Goss said to Stubbs; but Stubbs was talking to Paxton. “You reckon it’ll be all over pretty soon, do you?” he said.

  “Certainly. We’ve got them licked at sea, haven’t we? Take that scrap at Jutland! The German battle fleet had to run away home like a whipped cur!”

  “Never apologise when you’ve got an alibi,” O’Neill told Essex. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “And we’ve got them licked in the air. That’s obvious.”

  “I had an alibi once,” Mayo said,”but Dando gave me some ointment to rub on it.”

  “And in a few days we’ll lick them on the land. The infantry will do their stuff and the cavalry will go through the Hun like a dose of salts. You watch.”

  “Look here, Charlie,” Goss said,”you don’t want to live in Grand Rapids. Give Private Collins a shilling and he’ll marry the girl, won’t you, Collins?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Collins is trying to haggle,” Goss warned. “Don’t go above half-a-crown.”

  Essex took a soda-water syphon from the tray tha t Collins was carrying. He walked over to Goss and sprayed him. Goss lay back. He shut his eyes and opened his mouth and gratefully accepted the jet of soda water. Essex walked around him, spraying hard. The dog Brutus raced around them, barking and trying to bite the water.

  “You’re really enjoying this war, aren’t you?” Stubbs said.

  “I’m glad we’re winning,” Paxton told him.

  “I bet you’re glad you’re not in the trenches, too,” said Ogilvy.“Up to the armpits in mud and fighting the rats for your rations.”

  “I don’t see any mud. Everyone tells me the Front is as dry as a bone around here.”

  “Next time,” Goss said as Essex’s syphon ran dry,”be so good as to add a slice of lemon and the odd ice cube.”

  “Anyway,” Paxton said, impatient at the way Stubbs kept looking at him,”there’s more to it than winning. I mean to say, look what we’re fighting for. Land of hope and glory, and all that sort of thing.”

  Foster, who had seemed to be sleeping, cleared his throat. “That’s why we’re here, is it? I thought it was something to do with Belgium.”

  “Yes, and whose fault was that?” Paxton demanded.

  “One thing they taught us at Cambridge,” Essex said. “Belgium did not invade Germany. I remember making a note of that.”

  “It started in Serbia, not Belgium,” O’Neill said. “Christ Almighty, you lot are pig-ignorant.”

  “And whose fault was that?” Paxton insisted.

  “The Austrians,” Mayo said. “I think.”

  “Serbians fired first,” Goss said. Soda-water dripped from his ears.

  “Austrians are no good,” Essex said. “Austrians yodel.”

  “So would you if you had to wear leather knickers,” O’Neill said.

  “Very clever,” Paxton told him. “Well, I know what I’m fighting for, even if you don’t.” He began searching his tunic pockets.

  “There’s someone sitting in your cockpit, Pax,” Mayo said.

  “Carpenter, probably,” Paxton said, still searching. “Plugging bullet-holes.”

  “No. I’ve been watching. This chap seems to be hiding.”

  Paxton found the paper he was looking for, turned and studied the FE, a hundred yards away. “I don’t see anyone.”

  “Well, you wouldn’t, would you?” Mayo said. Paxton stared at him, trying to guess the joke. “Please yourself,” Mayo said.

  “I don’t know about you,” Paxton said to Stubbs, giving him the paper,”but this is why I’m here. It’s something my cousin sent me, last year. He copped it a month later. This didn’t mean much to me then, but it does now. I’m going to stretch my legs.” He walked towards the FE.

  Stubbs read the paper and passed it to Goss. “I guess I’ve got the wrong accent for this,” he said.

  Goss read it aloud, clearly and evenly.

  July, 1914-1915

  A year ago, at Henley-

  A year ago, at Lord’s-

  The rival crews; the cricket Blues;

  -They dreamt that life affords

  No keener joy than contest,

  No sweeter sound than cheers;

  Far, far away they fling to-day-

  Life’s mimic hopes and fears.

  To-day they play the Great Game.

  To-day they play the man:

  In every sort and kind of sport,

  -Whene’er they rowed and ran-

  They learnt it, all unknowing,

  The secret of the game,

  That what you do for team or crew

  Or country’s just the same.

  And where the shells burst round them,

  And bullets whistle past,

  And every yard with wire is barred

  The men are dropping fast,

  Ripe grows the fruit of training

  So little thought upon,

  The steady eye, the heartening cry,

&n
bsp; “Stick to it, boys! Come on!”

  And yet, in trench and dug-out,

  When darkness floods the sky,

  These lads, at rest, in sudden jest

  Recall with half a sigh

  The joys wherein their senses

  Were bound with silken cords

  A year ago, at Henley,

  A year ago, at Lord’s!

  “It’s all about you, Frank, “Ogilvy said.” You’re the only one here who wears silk underwear.”

  “What d’you make of it, Frank?” Goss asked. He handed him the paper.

  “Sorry,” Foster said. “I’m afraid I wasn’t listening … Is this Paxton’s? Just another death warrant, I expect. Not important.” He screwed it up and threw it for Brutus to chase.

  If the squadron carpenter was hiding in the front cockpit, he was sobbing and sniffling like a child.

  Paxton paused to listen. The rim of the cockpit was higher than his head, so he couldn’t see in. Was it sobbing or was it whining? Maybe the dog Brutus had got stuck in there.

  He put one foot in the observer’s stirrup and hauled himself up. A very young soldier lay curled in the bottom of the cockpit, shaking with sobs. He had wept so much that now he was too weary to make a lot of noise: His head rested on his upper arm; the rest of that arm fell across his face. His knees were almost up to his chest, and his chest jerked occasionally. He was wearing his best uniform. It looked to be a size too big for him.

  He didn’t see Paxton until Paxton leaned over to get a view of his face. Then the arm fell away and Paxton knew him at once. Even through that wretched tear-sodden expression he knew him. It was Private Watkins, the young man who had mended his motorbike. “My goodness!” he said. “What the devil are you doing here, old chap?”

  Watkins straightened up and blinked at Paxton. For a few moments his lungs were working so hard that he couldn’t get a word out. Paxton gave him a handkerchief. There was snot on Watkins’ upper lip, and Paxton couldn’t stand the sight of snot. Other people’s snot, that is; he was quite interested in his own. “Take your time, old boy,” he said. “Nothing to be afraid of. You’re perfectly safe here.”