Tears of Autumn, The

by Wiltshire, David

  ‘What’s on your mind, Biff?’

  He could guess what was coming. The man had come to the end of his tether, wanted to be permanently stood down. It happened two or three times a month. It was a serious matter, and he’d developed a strategy to deal with it, like all Bomber Commanders.

  Biff swallowed, took a deep breath.

  ‘I can’t go on in Bomber Command sir – that raid on Hamburg …’ he shook his head sadly, ‘I had German friends there – met them before the war. I just can’t do something like that again – ever.’

  The CO nodded, aware of the horrific damage and loss of life – more than the Luftwaffe had managed in the entire blitz on Britain. He cleared his throat.

  ‘I can quite understand. I do hope your friends are all right. What I think you need is a break – a training squadron for a while. Of course, no CO can promise never to send you there again; it would set a precedent.’

  Biff shook his head.

  ‘No, you misunderstand, sir. I can’t continue on Bombers – I just can’t – ever.’

  The CO sat back.

  So he was refusing to serve – was in danger of having his papers stamped LMF – ‘lack of moral fibre’. It would damn him for the rest of his life.

  He became less sympathetic, his face darkening.

  ‘Now that’s enough, Banks. You realize if you take this any further you could get into really hot water. It’s a bloody serious thing to say.’

  He tried to lighten things as he continued: ‘I see from your record you’ve been on ‘ops’ almost continuously except for the conversion course to Halifaxes. I think you need a spot of extended leave. Do you the world of good.’

  Biff suddenly realized what the CO was thinking.

  ‘No sir, you don’t understand. I want to fly still – and fight for my country; it’s just that …’ he hesitated, ‘I don’t want to bomb civilians any more. I can’t.’

  He shook his head violently.

  The CO looked puzzled. ‘What do you want? Because I doubt whether with your multi-engined experience you can get on to fighters now.’

  Biff had given it some thought before taking the momentous step of seeing the CO.

  ‘I realized that sir, so what with the Battle of the Atlantic and all, I wondered if you might put me up for a transfer to Coastal Command. There is a pretty fierce war being fought by the Banff Wing, I believe.’

  Frowning, the CO scratched his chin.

  This was a new one for him. Bomber Command was the one branch of the service that was actually attacking Germany, taking the war to the enemy. They were fêted now like the fighter boys in 1940, except perhaps by the locals who lived near the bases. There had been some pretty contemptible goings on: resentment about airmen hogging the local facilities; wives and girlfriends who lodged in the nearby villages were often treated with ill-concealed disdain, as if they were scarlet women from the cities. Yet the Iocals went to bed in safety as every night his boys went out to do battle. Most nights you might get away with no casualties, other nights a couple of crews didn’t return – or even more. It was heartbreaking. He had to write the letters to wives and mothers.

  He glanced down at the file.

  ‘I see your wife is in the WRNS. Has that got anything to do with this? You know you’d be unlikely to find yourself any nearer to her than you are now – wherever she is.’

  Resignedly Biff shook his head again.

  ‘No, it’s nothing to do with that, sir. I can’t do my job any more and that’s not fair on my crew, or you and the squadron – or me.’

  The CO ran his eye over Biff’s record again, and realized that the fellow had been lucky, had done an above average number of ops, especially if you included the early days.

  Funnily enough, he’d met a ‘coastal-type’ last time he’d been at the Air Ministry. Perhaps that had been a sign? He’d give him a ring.

  He made a snap decision.

  ‘Go and see the MO, have a word in confidence, get him to give you the once-over. Meanwhile – no promises – but I’ll investigate the possibilities of a posting to Coastal. Of course, it depends on their needs, I can do no more than that – otherwise you’ve got to soldier on. Understood?’

  Biff was dismissed. He got gratefully to his feet, put his cap on, saluted and left.

  When he was gone the CO ran a weary hand over his forehead. Why was he bothering with Flight Lieutenant Banks when there was so many other pressing things on his mind?

  But the U-boat menace was still with them, sinking hundreds of tons of shipping. He’d give it a try. Coastal Command was considered the Cinderella service; Bomber Command got priority in everything. He put these thoughts aside and got on with planning the night’s raid.

  Rosemary had come up into the open after finishing her night watch, the Ops and plotting room was protected well below ground.

  When she’d gone on duty the previous night, walking along the front, she had heard, beyond the barbed wire defences, the crashing of the waves on the shingle beach, had dimly seen the white foam in the dark.

  It had been busy in E-Boat Alley, the horizon was lit by the flashing of guns as convoys ran the gauntlet of torpedoes and bombs from the Luftwaffe.

  Further down the coast, at Lowestoft, she knew the MG and MT boats would be waiting to sally forth to the rescue.

  And above it all, before she had reached the sentries guarding the sandbagged opening, had been the steady roar of wave after wave of unseen RAF bombers heading east – towards Germany.

  Tears had come into her eyes before she got a grip of herself. Biff was up there somewhere, if not that night then tomorrow, or the night after that.

  Every morning, as now, she dreaded a call to see the commanding officer. The air was cool, damp, the sea and sky an unremitting grey. There were hardly any waves; the sea was very calm.

  She stepped out briskly. Rosemary was now a leading Wren with one anchor, known as a hook, sewn on to one arm. Their hats had been changed to sailor-style, which was much more comfortable. Anxiously she scanned the louring clouds – just in case. Several times she had been shot at as she had marched with others, by low-flying German aircraft. Once they had dived for cover under a bench seat put there in the days of peace for people to sit looking out to sea, enjoying themselves.

  She was walking fast to get to their quarters first – there was only sufficient hot water for about four baths.

  When she got there she rushed upstairs, bagged the bath and turned on the hot tap to fill it to the level of the line painted on its inside at five inches deep.

  While that happened she peeled off her uniform, stripped, and had a good wash everywhere at the hand basin before enjoying the quick luxury of a soak, leaving the water relatively clean for two other girls from her watch.

  Sometimes they were beaten to it and there was only cold water; and sometimes there was no coke, so no hot water at all for anyone.

  The Salvation Army or the YWCA would occasionally be able to offer an alternative, but it usually meant a very quick cold bath – very very quick in the freezing depths of winter.

  Dead beat, she turned in, wondering whether there would be a letter from Biff by the time she woke up.

  There was.

  He was having two weeks’ leave in a few days’ time. That was unexpected and immediately she worried as to why. There had been no mention of it in his last letter.

  She would put in for leave straight away to coincide with his, if not wholly, then partly. She began a letter to him. They hadn’t seen each other since two days spent together in the spring. All that time the cottage had stood empty.

  Still waiting for an answer to her application, Rosemary was washing her smalls in a hand basin, rubbing them with a big block of soap, rinsing them several times but still finding them coated with a scum from the hard water. She was just stringing them up to dry in the bathroom, when the air-raid siren started up.

  Quickly she tripped downstairs to the basement, grabbing her t
in hat from its hook. She’d just joined the others when a huge explosion rocked the building. The lights went out leaving them in total blackness. Some of the girls screamed and started to cry.

  One of their petty officers called out: ‘It’s all right, it’s all right. Stay calm.’

  A torch came on, then another.

  They were all covered in dust, and the door was jammed. They were trapped, but they could already hear shouts and the sound of work going on. Reassured, they knew it was only a matter of time before the Navy would get them out.

  Eventually the door was dragged open, and the first gulp of fresh air she took was marvellous, as was the mug of hot, sweet tea. The nearby barracks had received a direct hit, and there were many dead, including a Wren officer and six Wrens, but the girls on duty in the underground ops and plotting rooms were safe.

  A fire started, and Rosemary, part of a chain, helped to pass buckets from a standpipe. Her only loss were her smalls, which were nowhere to be seen – nor was the wall on one side of the rubble-strewn bathroom. In the confusion of requartering in the town – which was possible because nearly all the civilians had been evacuated at the start of the war, and because of the memorial service to their dead comrades, it was several days before she was given permission for a week’s leave on compassionate grounds.

  Because Biff and she were a married couple in the services, she was given priority, though many others were being sent home for a few days, suffering from shock and minor injuries.

  But there was a further order, one that took her completely by surprise. Afterwards she was to report to ‘Coppins’, a royal house which was an officer-training camp for WRNS.

  On arriving home, Rosemary started to walk from the station, but some friendly Americans pulled up in a Jeep and gave her a ride all the way to the front gate of the cottage.

  As she walked up the path the door opened and Biff came out to meet her. She dropped her case, flew into his arms and started crying. Rosemary kept saying sorry, but it took some time for her to calm down.

  He was dressed in a cardigan and flannels – so wonderful to see, bringing back memories of happier times.

  But he was different: she knew it almost immediately. It was not his face, which looked strained, and she could see more lines radiating out from the corner of his eyes. It was his manner. He didn’t seem to have the vigour of old.

  ‘Darling, is everything all right?’

  They were sitting around the fire he’d got going as soon as he had arrived; the cottage was very musty and damp.

  He smiled and shook his head.

  ‘I can’t go on.’ He continued shaking his head. ‘I can’t go on bombing any more, Rosemary.’

  He told her then about Hamburg, and what he’d seen and subsequently heard.

  She bit her lip.

  ‘Oh God. Konrad and Anna?’

  He nodded. ‘I know.’

  There was a silence, only broken by the crackle and popping of the flames in the grate and the settling of lumps of coal as they burnt away.

  She looked very worried, eventually asked miserably:

  ‘What’s to happen, Biff?’

  He didn’t look at her, using the poker to stir the fire and add a couple of lumps of coal before sitting back again. ‘I’ve asked the CO for a transfer.’

  In truth she was torn between relief that perhaps he wouldn’t be over Germany every night in the thick of it – she was only too well aware of the attrition rate, and worry that he was going to do something foolish. Then she immediately chided herself. What was more important, for God’s sake: the safety of her husband, or her pride?

  ‘Transfer to what, Biff?’

  He told her then what he had asked for.

  Rosemary blinked. It was not what she expected.

  ‘Do you think you’ll get it?’

  ‘I don’t know. How is the war at sea going?’

  She shrugged.

  ‘Better than for a long time, but the U-boats are still sinking an awful lot of our ships.’ Rosemary frowned. ‘I shouldn’t tell you this, I suppose, but Jerry’s got a new device called a schnorkel. Apparently they can charge their batteries without coming to the surface. People are very worried about it.’

  She got up and came and sat on the side of his chair, and put her arm around him, kissing the top of his head, smelling again the masculine freshness of his hair.

  ‘Whatever happens, don’t you worry, Biff. We’ll always be together.’

  She completely forgot to tell him about her news, that she was to train as an officer, only remembering when they were in bed that night. For the first time he gave a chuckle, as of old.

  ‘So, I’m going to bed with a fellow officer. We’ll both be cashiered.’

  Over the next couple of days, he did seem to be getting brighter. They went to the pictures, dodging, in the dark streets, buses and the odd taxi with their dim, masked headlights, and groping through the ‘light lock’ to enter the cinema, only to be dazzled by light and noise.

  Afterwards they treated themselves to fish and chips, with lashings of salt and vinegar, deciding not to eat them as they walked home, which would have cost one shilling and eleven pence, but to stay in the chip shop, and have bread and margarine, and a cup of tea, all for two and sixpence.

  On these occasions she’d ‘tarted’ herself up, had altered some of her pre-war dresses – shortening them, and, as stockings were unobtainable, she’d stained her legs with brown colouring, and got Biff to draw a nice straight pencil line down the back for a seam, slapping his hand away as it wandered further than it should have.

  Several times they went to the pub – he for a quiet pint, Rosemary sipping a small glass of cider. For him it was different from the mess where, often as not, it ended up with some excitement: great choruses of Do you know the Muffin Man as they tiptoed one by one across the floor with pints of beer on their heads, or ‘walked’ with sooted feet on the ceiling, having reached there by way of a great pile of mess furniture, singing: You’ll get no promotion this side of the ocean … So it was nice to find a snug corner amongst all the copper and brassware, and talk sweet nothings. Until one night.

  A boisterous crowd of Americans came in, jostling and whistling at some of the girls with their English boyfriends, who looked bleakly back. Some army lads arrived, and took up a position at the other end of the bar. The noise in the place greatly increased. Biff and Rosemary finished their drinks, then looked at each other. At the unspoken question in his eyes as he held up his empty glass, she murmured sleepily:

  ‘No, let’s go home.’

  They stood up. As she edged her way through the crowd of Americans they ignored him, smiling and wisecracking as they let her past, making sure she had to brush against them. Biff was annoyed, but they were a long way from home, and were brothers in arms. And in any case, you made allowances – they were so brash and different in attitude and manners from what they were all used to.

  But then one large crew-cut sergeant blocked her path, stepping to one side and then the other as she tried to pass.

  She smiled. ‘Excuse me.’

  The sergeant leered. ‘Any time, honey.’

  ‘I’d like to get by, please.’

  Biff was slightly behind, elbowing his way through the others, who were already reforming behind her, whistling and nudging each other. Biff only realized what was happening when the man said:

  ‘Well now, that’s going to cost you a little kiss, sweetie.’

  Biff roughly pushed the last man aside and reached her as a large hand came round her waist and pulled her in against the sergeant’s barrel chest. As he leant down to kiss her Rosemary twisted to one side.

  ‘No! how dare you.’

  Biff’s hand gripped the sergeant’s fingers and yanked them back, pulling the hand away.

  ‘Leave my wife alone.’

  Beneath the crew-cut the square face went black with anger.

  ‘Stay out of this, buddy.’

 
; Biff shook his head.

  ‘No, you get out of the way.’

  ‘Whoa.’ The sergeant looked around for support.

  ‘You hear this little limey, will ya?’

  He turned back to Biff, leering.

  ‘You guys over here are all pantywaists, needed us to come and win the war for you.’

  Grinning at everybody he said:

  ‘So what are you going to do about it?’

  Incensed as he was, Biff bit down on his teeth and, pushing Rosemary, started to get past.

  The Yank grabbed his arm and swung him around. Biff saw the pile-driver coming a mile off. He swayed back out of its path and stepped in to punch the big face with a straight left, carrying all the weight of his body behind it.

  The man took down three of his buddies who tried to break his fall, but the others jumped on Biff, and the army lads charged at the same time like a row of Rugby forwards piling into the scrum.

  Girls screamed, glasses were thrown, blood shot from mouths and noses. Biff somehow got out from under a pile of bodies, stopping only to help the sergeant up, then hitting him again with such force that a tooth came flying out of his mouth. He crashed back to the floor and rolled over, all sixteen stone. He would only come round after the Snowdrops and Redcaps had barged in, quelling the warring sides with truncheons, nightsticks, and, quite unofficially, pickaxe handles.

  By that time Biff, holding on to Rosemary’s hand, was legging it up the street.

  She gasped: ‘Biff, now I can understand why they call you that.’ It must have been the adrenaline rush, but there was an animal heat in them both.

  Up an alleyway, he lifted her up and she swung her legs around him. Held by him against the wall, Rosemary pulled her knickers aside and guided him in. It was all over in a couple of minutes.

  They continued on their way in silence, as the realization of what they had just done sunk in, leaving them shaken and ashamed.

  Before the war such behaviour, even the thought of it, would have horrified them both.