Angels Dining at the Ritz

by John Gardner

  ‘I knew it were him by his hair, that’s all, ’cos his face was obliterated,’ Wally Titcombe said when he was struggling over his report. ‘His face…well it were as if hundreds of hornets had swarmed on him, stung him to death, leaving holes in his flesh as well as their stings, holes the diameter of cigarette butts some of them.’

  In the middle of the face there was a larger ragged hole where his mouth had been, not a mouth any more, just a dark hole. No lips.

  PC 478 Titcombe, in spite of experiences on the Somme and elsewhere in France, was physically shaking as he began to search the rest of the house. It took almost half an hour to discover Max Ascoli’s wife, Jenny, in the master bedroom, a horrible sight, and the boy, Paul, in his room, still tucked up in bed but with his face blasted by a shotgun, obviously fired while he slept.

  When he had searched the entire house, Wally Titcombe telephoned his superiors in King’s Lynn. He used the family phone in Knights Cottage, wrapping his handkerchief round the handset, telling the operator that he was speaking from Taddmarten 37 and this was official police business.

  Detective Chief Inspector Tait from King’s Lynn told Tommy that when he looked at the crime scene his impression was that the Ascolis were the victims of some murderous vagrant — or vagrants — who had come upon the house, asked for food or money and were rebuffed. ‘I think they returned later for old-fashioned vengeance,’ he told Tommy, who, though he had yet to visit the scene of the crime, felt the theory could be a little simplistic.

  But who knew?

  *

  They could see the target area, the city of Rouen, from ten miles away, the sky so clear that afternoon, bright and peaceful flying at 23,000 feet over northern France, with Ricky LeClare keeping the stabilizers of the lead aircraft just in the right position above Wild Angel’s nose. The lead aircraft was Butcher Boy and their Group Commander sat in the co-pilot’s seat, just as the Commanding General of VIII Bomber Command — Ira Eaker — rode in the lead aircraft of the second flight, Yankee Doodle.

  Over the Channel, four RAF squadrons of Spitfire IXs joined the formation to give cover as far as the target, and Bob Crawfoot, who claimed to be half Sioux Indian, grinned happily from the co-pilot’s position, watching the French countryside slide past below. ‘Lookit those RAF boys and their dinky little planes.’ He sucked in through his teeth, shouting loudly, hearing the words in his ears, his mouth inside the oxygen mask there at 23,000 feet. ‘Lookit them move. Boy-o-boy. Betcher they dangerous little boogers.’

  The Bombardier, Wilton Truebond, lay in the nose, looking down at France, thinking he had never imagined a country could be that pretty from the air. England had astounded him. Now France was showing that it was a different country: different kinds of farming, different road systems — no hedgerows for one thing. Different! Different! Different! For Lieutenant Will Truebond it was all new because he came from Minnesota, where they said there were only two seasons — winter and road repairs.

  Until he joined the Army in 1939 Truebond had never ridden a train or an airplane. His longest journey was the monthly ride in his father’s car to the Twin Cities — Minneapolis-St Paul. When he did his bombardier’s training he flew out of Randolph Field, Texas, and the first bombs he dropped were on the sand and rock ranges, not a hint of green. Until they began the long flight to Europe Will Truebond had viewed only the arid geography of Texas from the air. England was a revelation. And now France.

  Even though the weather had been mostly grey and dismal in the month since he’d arrived at Long Taddmarten, the lushness of the countryside never failed to amaze him: the long age and beauty of the trees, the organization of farmland, the sweep of a soft horizon, like the curve of a woman’s breast. It was all so different to the settings of his youth and life back home in the little town of Frozen Bend, Minnesota, pop. 11,235. At school they’d called it Frozen Butt and that was about it.

  When this was over, he thought, I’ll spend my life travelling the world and seeing everything.

  Ricky LeClare came on over the interphone, as they then called it, ‘Okay, Bombardier, you okay? We’ll be over the target in eight minutes, positioning for the bombing run.’

  ‘Roger that, Skipper,’ and Will put his face into the scope of the Norden bombsight, with its two gyroscopes and the four knobs he used to position the aircraft and the bombs. Once the bombing run began it would be Will Truebond who would be flying the plane: the Norden bombsight linked to the autopilot so Truebond would virtually fly the ship, with LeClare monitoring the course on the PDI — the Pilot Direction Indicator — while the bombsight did all the complicated math, working out height, wind, direction, speed of Wild Angel and all the other complicated stuff until the bombsight knew they were in the right place, throbbed an electrical pulse that released the ordnance and sent it screaming down to the target — or near enough whichever came first.

  ‘This baby’ll do all the work for you long as you feed it the correct information,’ his first bombsight instructor said. ‘So good, the Norden, that it’ll drop a bomb in a pickle barrel from ten thousand feet.’

  Will Truebond didn’t subscribe to that boast any more, but he still repeated it, and the rest of the stuff his instructor said. ‘The Norden’ll even make you coffee if you treat it right. Who knows, it might even be better’n your girlfriend. You got a girlfriend, Truebond?’

  ‘Back home, Sergeant.’

  ‘Keep her there then, son. You gonna get horny, get horny about your Norden bomb-sight.’

  When he received his commission and the General pinned on the silver wings, one of the first people to salute him had been that tech-sergeant instructor. Proud moment.

  Will Truebond concentrated on the cross hairs, manipulated the four knobs, selected the British-made 600-pound General Purpose bombs; his head full of noise, the constant blast of the engines; the scent of oil and rubber in his nostrils inside the oxygen mask, and that singular smell of the B-17’s interior; the cold air breathed in that was oxygen; his body rising and juddering, then falling with the ship, as the target, the Rouen-Sotteville marshalling yards — the permanent way, the rolling stock, repair shops and the big locomotive workshop — slid into view far below them and the Norden worked its magic, releasing the bomb load.

  The ship leaped upwards when the weight was detached, the autopilot uncoupled from the Norden and Ricky LeClare again took control, holding her steady in the turn as Jimmy Cobalt, up at his navigator’s station in the nose with Truebond, gave him the course for home.

  LeClare gave the instruction to little Willie Wilders, their radio op, to send the code word, saying that the bombs had been dropped. Willie sent it straight off in Morse, then climbed back up to the dorsal gun position.

  Will Truebond still had his eyes on the target way below. Through the sight he seemed detached from what was really going on, waiting for the bombs to straddle the target: he never saw them. He glanced up to starboard and saw two small dark clouds appear, suddenly forming out there beyond the right wing; then realized what they were and saw another and another with a bloom of scarlet deep within, heard the pistol-crack like lightning striking nearby, and felt the ship wallow and buck. They were trying to kill them — this was flack from around the target — and he felt real fear, the darkness in his gut and the twitch of his sphincter muscles.

  Within a few minutes they were back with the fighter escort, the Spitfires, heading for home at the far end of their range, everybody cock-a-hoop and shouting over the interphone, saying they had done it, what a great job, they’d whupped the Krauts’ asses for them; told them the Yanks had arrived.

  The only people dissatisfied were the air gunners, swinging their turrets or mountings with no targets to shoot at, desperately needing to prove themselves. They had been turned out of gunnery school at Fort Myers, Florida, where they’d trained in AT-6s and O-47s, having no communication with the bored pilots, who had to drop a wing as your signal to start shooting at the drogue towed by another pilot
who didn’t care. When you got back they always discovered the camera guns were not working and the whole business had been a waste. The only time they managed to fire the .30 or .50 calibre guns was on the ground in a mocked-up turret. They’d spent hours learning to strip the weapons and clear stoppages, more time being lectured on defensive formations and even longer hours on aircraft recognition, knowing who not to shoot at in a moment of trigger-happy fear. They knew they could do it, but deep down wanted to face an attack by fighters, at the same time as fearing such an experience: needing the blooding.

  Tim Ruby in the upper turret swung the guns round, a complete circle, then held them a shade to port as he watched the Spitfires bucking around in their formation heading for home — little Timmy Ruby, the baby of the crew, looked fifteen, had the heart of a lion.

  Tech-Sergeant Henry Corkendale was the port waist gunner, with Sergeant Piakesky in the starboard position, standing back to back in the freezing cold, wrapped up with electrical suits, helmets, scarves and heavy gloves, cold and scared behind the goggles, the open holes uncomfortable, bare to the elements.

  Corky yelled when he saw the two dots growing bigger until he could see the outlines, recognized the head-on view and heaved the heavy .50 calibre gun in their general direction, then watched as some of the Spits dropped towards them, chased them, and in that moment he loosed off some ammunition as though he was helping. Bob Pentecost, squashed upside down in the ball turret, swung his guns around, looking to see what Corky was shooting at, and found nothing.

  Peliandros, the tail gunner, family originally from Athens, Greece, was jumpy all the way back and Tim Ruby in the mid-upper turret immediately behind the pilot’s position, developed a twitch, everyone getting on with their jobs, tired and cold now, the euphoria dissipated.

  As they came back up to the French coast, there was more flack, looking pretty as it puffed out its black and grey clouds, below and above them, no danger, not coming really near, though Peliandros swore that more 109s began to prod at the Spits but got chased off.

  They crossed the British coast where they had crossed on the way out, Southwold, nice English watering hole, and began the let down towards Taddmarten. It was just before seven that evening — 19.00hrs — when Wild Angel started to make its approach to Taddmarten. Truebond looked out of the nose, seeing the houses and the church and feeling they had come home. For the first time he felt this was home. Really home, reaching out and putting its arms around the whole crew: Long Taddmarten, home of the 302nd Bomber Squadron from the 33rd Bombardment Group, sharing the base with two RAF Spit squadrons and one squadron of Beaufighters.

  Ricky LeClare felt it as well. Glad to be home in one piece: elated, boisterous, noisy, cocksure. They had taken the war to the enemy and come home safe. They were kings, they were gods.

  At seven o’clock Tommy Livermore was just talking about leaving and Suzie thought: Leaving? We’ve only just arrived.

  Chapter Three

  She had been the first person to reach the accident in which her father was killed, fifty yards or so from their front gate — years ago now. Since that time Suzie had been proud that she could look at bodies and mutilations without turning a hair. Like most good middle-class girls she had been brought up not to show emotions or grief in public, not to visibly cling to others for support. This had translated into the police ethic of not showing shock or fear before ‘civilians’: being undemonstrative and in control at all times. She believed it showed strength of character, which in some measure it did.

  She thought she’d seen it all, including the decapitated body of a nasty little man in Soho when she was working out of West End Central; but these faceless bodies in Knights Cottage were something else: a whole family brutally and quickly done to death in their home.

  In the drawing room, the baby grand was covered with framed photographs: mostly of Max with the good, rich and beautiful. There were others though, demonstrating what a happy family they were: Paul at various landmarks in his young life; Paul with Mummy and Daddy; Mummy and Daddy on their wedding day. Willoughby Sands, Tommy pointed out, was best man — the male smile said ‘chums’.

  Looking at the body, Tommy said, ‘Photographs are worse, heart. Frozen for all time.’ But she doubted it as she looked at Ron Worral stepping carefully around Max Ascoli’s body, using first his eyes, then the camera. She had to drag her eyes away from the holes in the man’s face and the congealed blood and then upstairs to the even more horrible sight of Jenny Ascoli hurled backwards, face shredded, in the doorway of the main bedroom.

  ‘Jenny is woken by the shot, heart — tell me if this makes sense.’ Tommy led her up the stairs slowly, one slow tread at a time. ‘She wakens, eyes pop open and, for a moment, she doesn’t know what has woken her. Bang! Or bang-bang! She sits bolt upright. It takes a few seconds but she knows something’s wrong so out she gets in her modish pink silk nightie. Stands by the bed, frightened, listening, hears someone on the stairs and goes to the door. Our killer has loaded again — if he needs to — and bang…’

  Her face was ripped away, just a big smudge of blood where her features had been minced off, the muzzles less than a foot from the face.

  Looking past the body, through into the main bedroom, there was a large and striking watercolour on the wall: a stretch of battered coastline, fishing boats pulled up on a harsh stone beach, three of them on ramps with chocks holding them upright, the sea grey and cold, almost indistinguishable from the pewter sky, storm clouds hanging to the east.

  Tommy turned and walked across the landing to the passage that led to the child’s room. Suzie followed, glanced down and saw DCI Tait and another pair of plain-clothes officers come in through the front door. Tait stopped, puzzled, looking at Ron taking the photographs with Laura Cotter in attendance, Peter Prime and Molly Abelard dusting for dabs. He called up, ‘Tommy, my boys’ve taken all the pictures.’

  ‘Yes, old bean, but I like my lads to get plenty of practice.’

  ‘Ah.’ Tait shook his head. ‘The ambulance is waiting. Can they remove the bodies?’

  Tommy came to the head of the stairs and looked down at Tait. ‘Don’t think so, heart. I’ve got Professor Camps driving up from London. Think he’d prefer to look at the corpses in situ.’

  Camps, one of the great experts in medical jurisprudence, forensics and pathology: Francis Camps, up there with Keith Simpson, Bernard Spilsbury and Donald Teare, big medical wheels.

  Jesus, Suzie thought, what a bastard Tommy’s being. With reason. The whole phalanx of big guns who’d greeted them at the Falcon had behaved in an odd way: they’d toadied to him, showing a sort of mock deference that, she saw, had made him angry. Dandy Tom getting his own back, ‘Pissing into the wind,’ he would say, laughing. But he had got to them. She saw it in the livid tinge to Tait’s cheeks and the anger in his eyes.

  As he turned away, Tommy muttered, ‘Serve ’em right. Shouldn’t have joined,’ and dragged Suzie back to the matter in hand, talking as they walked. Her job was to listen, comment, look and watch, point out inconsistencies, pick him up on anything that didn’t mesh. Her eyes and ears were the tools of her trade now.

  ‘You really got Camps coming down for the bodies?’ she asked, and Tommy stopped walking.

  ‘Course not. The quack from King’s Lynn’s perfectly capable,’ grin. Then, ‘You’d better tell them they can take the bodies as soon as Ron’s done the snaps of the ones up here. Then come back to the boy’s room, eh?’

  She nodded, ‘Right, Chief,’ and went off to the stair head, calling down to Ron, who was taking a final close-up of Ascoli’s mashed and punctured face. She thought of some picture she had seen of a face covered in growing greenery, as though the flesh had been seeded, the blades of grass cutting through the skin, bizarre and somehow frightening. ‘If you’ve finished down there, they can remove Mr Ascoli, Ron,’ she called down.

  ‘I thought —’

  ‘They can take him off to King’s Lynn; and the others whe
n you’ve finished.’

  Ron Worral smiled and nodded: knowing the Chief as well as anybody.

  Tommy Livermore stood blocking the doorway of the boy’s, Paul’s, room. ‘Don’t know whether you should come in here, heart.’

  Too late, for she was already past his left shoulder. ‘Shit,’ she said under her breath, opened her mouth to speak, but Tommy finessed her, treading on whatever she was about to say.

  ‘Paul didn’t even wake.’ He put a hand on her arm and she tried to look everywhere but the bed. Frog aeroplane kits made up neatly, painted correctly — a Handley Page Hampden, a Hurricane and a Fleet Air Arm Skua with wings folded — all standing in line along a shelf. The books, The Boy’s Book of Aeroplanes, The Boy’s Book of Knowledge, D. H. Parry’s Sabre and Spurs!, a tattered and elderly set of Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopedia, inherited from his grandfather probably, she thought, then allowed her eyes to drift back to the horror.

  The bedclothes drenched in blood and a stain slashing up the headboard and then the wall, reaching about six feet high.

  ‘The lad’s either still asleep, or pretending, so chummy slides up to the bed, sticks the muzzle under the chin, couple of inches away and looses off — I think both barrels… Yes?’

  Suzie doesn’t reply, just stands in the doorway, shivering slightly trying to take her eyes away from the bed with the dark-stained, dry, stiff sheets and blankets.

  There is a cough from behind them. Dennis Free is on the landing.

  ‘Dennis?’ Tommy says, not raising his voice.

  ‘Chief, there’s a Purdey 12-bore, double-barrelled shotgun in Max Ascoli’s study. Hasn’t been fired in a long time.’

  ‘Other half of a pair?’