'The Adj tells me you were at Cranwell.' There was a faintly puzzled look about the Wing Commander. Alden looked old enough to be a flight lieutenant by now, if he was a graduate of the Royal Air Force College and not a short service commission type.
'I passed out in nineteen thirty-two, sir.'
Which meant that he had entered in 1930, the Wing Commander mused, computing his age: twenty-seven.
'Tell me about yourself.'
'I was on Thirty-three Squadron, sir...'
'Flying Harts.'
'Yes, sir. Then I was posted to Sixty, in India: still on Harts.' Hence the General Service Medal. 'A year later a flock of kitehawks flew into me on take-off and I crashed. Concussion and a small hairline fracture of the skull…'
'Those bloody kitehawks! Chap on my squadron on the Frontier in 'twenty-seven was hit by an eagle at five thousand feet: damn nearly killed him. He was invalided out. You were a bit luckier.'
'Not much, sir: when I came out of hospital I couldn't judge heights... my line of sight was distorted... all my landings were rotten. I was down-graded medically. They told me I could stay on as an Equipment or Signals officer. Nothing doing. I joined to fly.'
'Don't blame you. What then?'
'I resigned my commission and came home in July 'thirty-four. I went to see my old Headmaster and he pulled strings to get me an interview at Oxford. '
'What college?'
'Brasenose.'
'Ah! B.N.C. Get in?'
'Yes, sir. I went up that October to read Law. My father's a partner in a firm of solicitors in the City and my elder brother was already in the firm. I didn't relish spending my life in an office, but it seemed foolish not to take a good opportunity, so I entered articles there.' Alden smiled faintly. 'I'd stalled off the evil moment for three years by going up to university.'
'Where were you at school?'
Alden mentioned a place famous for rowing.
'Did you row at Oxford?'
'I managed to scrape into my college boat, sir. But neither my Law degree nor rowing was the most important feature of my life while I was up. I found my eyesight had improved after a couple of years, so I went along to see the C.O. of the University Air Squadron...' Tregear mentioned a name. 'Yes, sir. He arranged a medical for me and I was passed A One.'
Tregear looked as pleased as though this unexpected boon had fallen upon himself. 'Good show.'
'So I joined the U.A.S... and flew Tutors.' Alden's sketchy smile this time was wry. The Tutor was a trainer.
'Why didn't you rejoin the Service?'
'I'd lost three years' seniority, sir. That would have limited my career prospects.'
An ambitious type. 'You're what... twenty-seven, now?'
'Yes, sir.'
That was two years ago. Surely they haven't posted you to a squadron without further flying practice? Particularly as you were on bombers and we're essentially a torpedo squadron.'
'When I came down I did four weeks' Reserve training each year, sir. They sent me on torpedo courses: Swordfish last year, Vildebeests this June.'
'And you've had no more trouble with your eyes?' 'No, sir. I think it was the strong sunlight in India that caused the problem. On top of the concussion and skull fracture, of course.'
'Who was your squadron commander on Thirtythree: Squadron Leader...?' Tregear mentioned another name. At the time to which he referred, light bomber squadrons were commanded by squadron leaders, not wing commanders as they were later in the decade.
'Yes, sir.'
'And on Sixty?'
Alden told him.
'An old friend. We were on Hundred Squadron together in 'twenty-seven, flying Woodcocks.'
Alden knew his R.A.F. history. The Woodcock was the first of Hawker's many fine single-seat fighters; culminating recently in the Hurricane. In the between wars R.A.F. it was not uncommon for pilots to fly both fighters and bombers.
'I hope I'll run into him again, one day, now that it looks as though I'm back in the Mob, properly, for a long time.'
'You almost certainly will: he's Senior Air Staff Officer at Group.'
Alden looked pleased. He knew, also, that Tregear would be discussing him shortly on the telephone with the S.A.S.O. He welcomed it. He was sure his old C.O., now group captain, would give him a good chit... if one could give a chit verbally...
'That's good news, sir.'
'Well, wars throw up all manner of opportunities; apart from accelerated promotion.' For a moment Death entered the room. The Wing Commander gave a rueful smile. 'You might find your loss of seniority more than compensated for if the war that is obviously about to start goes on as long as most of us think it will; and decide to stay on when it's all over.'
If I'm still alive, thought Alden. He knew that the same thought was in his C.O.'s mind. 'Could be, sir.'
Politeness prompted the concurrence. Privately, Alden had no intention of resuming his Service career. It would be a waste of five years' hard study. Grinding out his life at a London solicitor's desk was not for him, either. The stale air of a big city had stifled him. He had read for the bar at the same time as qualifying as a solicitor, and eaten his dinners. He was now a barrister of Lincoln's Inn. In his Long Vacs from Oxford he had spent months in France, Spain and Germany; and attended Berlitz classes in London to learn the languages in the shorter vacations: easy, as his home was in Hertfordshire.
He loved flying above all else, but had steeled himself to accept its loss as a profession; it could still be a hobby: he was determined to be able to afford it. He had prepared himself with Law and languages to be an international lawyer. Travelling the world would be some compensation for losing the comradeship and physical excitement that made up life in the Service he loved.
Wing Commander Tregear had instantly placed him in a niche marked 'Ambitious'. Alden was aware of this. He was sensitive, intelligent and perceptive, and had read it in his Commanding Officer's eyes. He doesn't know the half of it, Alden thought. I'm going to be the most successful international lawyer in the world; and the richest: I'll buy my own aircraft and fly myself to my appointments everywhere in Europe, even I have to use airlines to go further.
'Good. Well, you'll be useful to the squadron and I'm glad to have you.'
Thank you, sir. I'm very pleased to be here.'
Amusement at this tact and courtesy creased Tregear's amiable face. 'Even to fly the Vildebeest and not the Hart?'
'I loved the Hart, of course; but I find torpedo work fascinating.'
'We do quite a lot of bombing as well. Anyway, the old Beest is obsolescent, as you know. We'll soon be reequipping with Beauforts.'
'I know nothing about the type, sir.'
'None of us does, much; except that it's a tricky brute: which will make it all the more interesting to fly. You'd better get along to the mess and unpack before lunch. How did you get here, by the way?'
'I drove down, sir.'
The Wing Commander had seen a sober-looking dark blue Hillman Minx drive past a few minutes before the Adjutant showed the new arrival in. It seemed to him a sensible sort of car which fitted Flying Officer Alden's character.
Alden went into the hangar, along one wall of which the squadron offices were built. He cast his eyes over the four Vildebeest Mk IV torpedo-bombers that were being given major services. He filled his lungs with the familiar and affectionately remembered smells of aeroplanes: fabric dope and paint, oil, petrol, warm metal, rubber shock cords. He was home again. It made him feel twenty years old once more and standing in the hangar of his first squadron.
I've had my ups and downs, he reflected. From the 100 m.p.h. Avro 504N at Cranwell to the delightful Hawker Hart day bomber, which had a top speed of over 180 m.p.h. and was faster than many fighters when it first went into squadron service. Then down to Avro Tutors with their 120-plus m.p.h. After that the Fairey Swordfish, which could be coaxed up to nearly 140 m.p.h.; and the Vickers Vildebeest, credited with 156 m.p.h. There was nothing to compare w
ith the Hart: not only because his early manhood had been centred on it, but also because it was a perfectly mannered aeroplane and a joy in which to do aerobatics.
He had no hankering after fighters: not the Gladiators that had been the envy of so many bomber pilots, nor even the Hurricanes which had come into service only twenty months ago. As for the Spitfire, which had first reached a squadron seven months later: that, he had heard, could attain 355 m.p.h.; a speed which must impose all manner of handling problems. Interesting, but he would not go out of his way to fly one, with the shadow of those fraught landings in India always at the back of his mind.
What he would enjoy would be the big twin engined jobs: the Hampden, Blenheim, Whitley and Wellington. The first two were called light bombers nowadays, but the other two were undeniably genuine heavies. Aircraft like all four of those would exercise him mentally as well as physically. With their range, navigation would be of absorbing interest.
Bombing had its attractions, but his introduction to torpedo dropping had admitted him to a new assemblage of pleasures. Launching a torpedo against a moving target demanded even greater precision and concentration than bombing, or firing a fighter's guns. It gave more excitement and gratification than bombing, because one saw its effects from much closer. The one sensation he knew that carne anywhere near providing the same rapture could be found only with an ardent woman: and his experience of torpedoes, although he had had only eight weeks' acquaintance with them, was - unfortunately, he thought - the greater. The more tender interludes in his life had not only been few, but also far between: from his initiation at twenty - by a prowling blonde some seven years older who carne to all the mess parties and was known as the squadron tart; although the only payment she solicited was a weekend in London or Brighton - to a tepid affair a year ago with the bored young wife of an elderly K.C.
He had left home early and arrived at East Crondal in mid-morning. There was no hurry to book in at the Mess Secretary's office. He would like to meet any of the other pilots who were not flying. He walked out of the hangar and an airman carne bustling up, saluted and asked 'Flying Officer Alden, sir?'
'Yes.'
'Adjutant's compliments, sir, and will you please report to Squadron Leader Hanbury, in B Flight office, sir.'
R.A.F. stations were built on few patterns, according to their age, and there were many similarities between these. Finding one's way about was not difficult. Alden walked along the line of doors. They were painted grey and on each was lettered, in white, the name and appointment of the occupant of the room behind it. He stopped at 'S/L J.J.J. Hanbury, A.F.C., O.C.B Flight'. He wondered whether the signwriter stuttered: J.J.J. looked improbable. Perhaps Jack Hanbury's parents had a warped sense of humour. He had heard the name while up at Oxford. Hanbury had been a test pilot, an instructor, had performed at the Hendon Air Display and had been awarded an Air Force Cross for his work at Farnborough and for making a record breaking flight to somewhere in the Middle East.
At the instant of meeting his flight commander Alden recognised that he was in the presence of someone with as great ambition as himself. Hanbury was rather less than the current average height of British males. His stocky body gave the impression of power and Alden recalled hearing that he was a gymnast of nearly Olympic standard. He almost expected Hanbury to perform a somersault over his desk, or perhaps a standing backflip out of, and back into, his chair. Neither occurred. Instead, Hanbury stood up and walked round his desk with hand outstretched and a smile under his thick moustache. It was, Alden decided, a synthetic smile. Perhaps the moustache was as well? His fingers had an impulse to reach out and give it a tug to see whether it came off.
The A.F.C. was not Hanbury's only medal. He sported the ribbons of the General Service and King George VI Coronation Medals and another of somewhat garish appearance which Alden concluded must be foreign. There were black hairs on the backs of his hands and fingers, which made them look cruel. Cruel they might be, but they were certainly deft and highly competent at the controls of any aircraft.
'Take a pew, old boy. The C.O.'s put you on my flight. Did he tell you?'
'No, sir.'
Hanbury's genial laugh boomed about the small room. 'Knee-deep in humph... like' the rest of us… slipped his mind, no doubt. I gather you're a Cranwellian: bit after my time, but my deputy flight commander knows you; he was your year: Bruce Courtney.'
'Bruce! It'll be good to see him again.'
'I gather you had a bad prang in India and chucked the Service when you were grounded.'
Evidently Hanbury had been interested enough to ask the Adjutant for Alden's documents a day or two ago. Alden did not know whether to be pleased or worried.
'That's right, sir.'
'You went up to Oxford?'
'Yes. And a couple of years later I asked for a medical and got back my aircrew category. So I joined the University Air Squadron and then did a couple of longish stints of Reserve training last year and this summer.'
'How many hours on the Vildebeest?'
'Forty-seven... and fifty-two on Swordfish.'
'So you know how to drop a torp?'
Alden relaxed his features in what he hoped would be seen as a self-depreciating smile. 'In theory, yes. I have had some practice, but I need a lot more.'
'Don't we all!' The modesty of this disclaimer was not convincing. 'But I'm afraid we aren't going to get much of a chance to show what we can do when the balloon does go up: we're rather marking time until our new Beauforts turn up. If we do happen to be sent on a target, it'll be to bomb.'
'Better than nothing.'
Hanbury's very bright blue eyes looked even more startling in contrast with his dark hair. They now took on a sort of glaze which had on Alden an effect akin to what he imagined must have been that of one of those death rays about which he used to read in boys' two penny comics. The hardness he saw in those shiny blue irises was a clue to the driving force that had impelled this man to test new and unproven aircraft dangerously to their very limits and to subject his mind and body to the stress and danger of pioneering flights.
'Yes, better than nothing. It'll be damn good to have a crack at the Nazis at last. Hitler's been asking for it. Now, he's going to get it... right in the neck.' Hanbury paused and said, with a casualness that seemed to demand an effort, 'I met the little tick a couple of years ago in Berlin… at an air show. Nasty bit of work. Handshake like a wet jellyfish.' He paused again. 'None the less, I'd rather wait until we have the Beauforts. The Beest is too damn slow… at least, I think it is... can't really say, never having flown one under fire. Don't much want to!'
They both dwelt in their thoughts on the unknown quantities of anti-aircraft shells, and bullets from a fighter's machineguns. It was not a matter to which Alden had given any speculation as yet. It came to him with a jolt that it was high time to do so.
'You'll find Bruce in the crew room,' Hanbury said, ending the interview. 'You can do some familiarisation flying this afternoon.'
'Thank you, sir.'
'See you after lunch. I'm in quarters here, but I'll drop into the mess for a drink this evening.'
Married quarters… Alden wondered what the redoubtable and dedicated - to the Service and his progress to its highest rank - Hanbury's wife was like… and whether he had reproduced himself yet... the notion of a child in that formidable image was somehow unnerving.
But there was nothing unnerving about his old Cranwell contemporary and friend, Bruce Courtney. Courtney epitomised the popular notion of a fighter pilot and it seemed odd to find him here, flying anything as sedate as a Vildebeest. Not that there was yet any widespread public image of a dashing fighter boy. The R.A.F. was not much in the public's mind in peacetime. The Navy had its Navy Weeks at Portsmouth and elsewhere, and from time to time it lost a submarine or did something bold with a gunboat in some corner of the empire. The Army was on display when trooping the colour on the sovereign's official birthday, at the Tidworth Tattoo and the Royal
Tournament, and fought skirmishes in the Khyber Pass. All these performances and events drew attention to the two senior Services.
The R.A.F. kept the peace in the Middle East, on the North-West Frontier, in many out of the way spots around the world. It earned little publicity and less public gratitude.
But even the uninterested British had a fixed idea of the average aviator as a high-spirited, wild young man, forever crashing sports cars, getting a little drunk and breaking girls' hearts with callous promiscuity.
Bruce Courtney had never crashed a car in his life, although he hared about in a red M.G. He got a trifle tight on guest nights but carried his drink like the gentleman he was. He loved girls' company, kissing, and bedding them when they permitted. But he took care not to mislead their expectations or hurt their feelings. He was an above average pilot and not averse to doing some hair-raising stunts whenever the opportunity occurred and he knew he could escape detection and retribution.
He saw Alden enter the pilots' room and hesitate. He simultaneously hailed him and stood up. They met in the centre of the room and shook hands: Courtney beaming, Alden smiling as broadly as he ever permitted himself to.
'Glad to see you again, Derek.'
'I'm delighted you're here, Bruce.' It hurt a little to see someone of exactly the same seniority one rank his superior, however. Those bloody kitehawks! as the had said.
Courtney introduced him to the dozen or so pilots, officers and sergeants, reading newspapers or chatting, who were seated around the room; dock-watching for the lunch stand-down. There was some desultory exchange of courtesies, then Courtney said 'As deputy flight commander of B Flight I'm going to introduce you to the Mess Sec.'
'Still ten minutes to go.' The flight sergeant pilot who made the remark wore a grin and two campaign ribbons; the General Service, and the green, white and red of the India G.S. 1936--7. More significant still, these were preceded by the Empire Gallantry Medal.
My Enemy Came Nigh Page 20
