B for Buster (22 page)

Ratty was shouting, “There he goes! Left, Skipper. Left!”

We wheeled in a turn so sharp that the clouds blurred across the windshield.

“Where is he?” said Lofty.

There was no answer. Round we went through a solid sky. I looked to the left and the right, but I couldn't find Percy.

“There!” shouted Will. “Twelve o'clock high. Look at him go!”

I saw him then, through the windshield. Percy was straight ahead and a bit above us, his wings flapping. He was a little black dot in the fog, and in a moment we overtook him. I watched him through the panes of the canopy, until our propwash hit him and rolled him on his side.

Lofty stomped on the rudder. Pulled at the column. “Throttle back,” he told me. “That one. The middle one.”

I pulled on the lever, and the kite slewed sideways.

“On the right,” shouted Buzz. “There he is!”

Buster
rolled the other way.

“Behind us now,” said Ratty.

Round we went again, tilted far over. Through the glass, beyond the wingtip, I saw the little bird thrashing through the clouds. He seemed to skid forward across the canopy, right around it and over the windshield. A gray-and-green speck, he was flying like a rocket.

“Full throttle!” cried Lofty.

I shoved the levers forward. The wing lifted as we leveled off. Little Percy seemed to sink below it.

Will shouted, “I see him. To the right! To the right!” he cried as Buster swung around. “Now straight! Now steady, Skipper.”

Lofty leveled the wings. He put the nose down a bit and cranked up the flaps. He aimed
Buster
's nose right where Percy had been. But the pigeon was gone.

Lofty flew straight and level as we scanned the whole sky, all around and above and below, but no one could see Percy. We droned along, looking up and down, left and right. I stared down the steps to the nose, out through the open hatch, and saw a shadow rush by with the clouds, and then another.

“Five minutes left on the fuel,” said Pop.

The clouds were scattering, burning off with the sun. I saw a fence go by, then a tree. And then we crossed the airfield.

We flew right over the pigeon loft, right across the runway. We roared over Hangar D, so close above it that our wheels nearly touched the curve of the roof. Lofty's leg straightened on the rudder pedal. “Throttle back,” he told me as we skidded round toward the tower.

“Home! We're home,” shouted Will.

We missed the runway. We missed it by a hundred yards or more, and landed on the taxi strip. Our port wing nearly brushed the noses of the Lancs that were ranged across the grass. Erks and airmen watched us hurtle past, our wing in shreds, our fuselage like the top of a pepper shaker.

Lofty braked, then turned the kite. I stood beside him in the cockpit as he taxied back, and I saw Sergeant Piper running out to meet us, with his gang of erks behind him.

We didn't have to shut the engines down. The first one quit as we rolled into our dispersal, the second a moment later. We rolled to a stop, and the erks came yelling round the tail fins, like a pack of dogs chasing a car. They banged their fists on the fuselage, and pounded on the door until Buzz went down to let them in. Then they swarmed up to the cockpit.

Sergeant Piper pointed at the wing. “You great clot!” he said to Lofty. “What have you done to my bus?”

CHAPTER 24

IT TOOK THE ERKS half an hour to free Ratty from his turret. Buzz looked at him squeezed into the glass ball, laughed, and said, “Just leave him there.” But as soon as the erks were finished, Buzz was the first to help the gunner out. He held little Ratty upright and walked him round through
Buster
's shadow to get the kinks from his knees and ankles.

We all stood together around the old crate, and I was right in the middle of the group. Will held up my arm as though I was a champion fighter. “The Kakabeka Kid!” he said. “The Birdman of Yorkshire!”

I felt happy and proud, and a bit embarrassed, too.

Percy hadn't really saved the kite. But he had tried his best, and maybe that was good enough for the others. They laughed their heads off about the little bird, telling each other how he had looked as he'd flown through the clag with his wings in a blur, how each of them had spotted him. They said it had been a crazy idea to follow a pigeon, that only someone like me could have thought of that. Only the Kakabeka Kid could have done it.

I wished that Bert was there to see the fuss over his best bird. It made me sad that he hadn't come out to see us.

“Okay, chaps,” said Lofty. “Let's go.”

We piled aboard the Morris. Even Pop climbed in, taking the passenger seat for himself. Lofty shifted gears and off we went, jiggling on top of the car as it rumbled on the grass. I thought we would go straight to the huts, but Lofty took us across the dispersal and over the runway, straight to the pigeon loft.

Bert came out to greet us as we skidded to a stop. Percy flew from his shoulder to mine, nuzzling against my cheek. Bert hugged me again, holding me in his bird-smelling grasp, then shook hands with all the others. He said he had lost a year of his life in the time between Percy's arrival and ours.

For the first time, the crew showed a real interest in the pigeon. Lofty held out his arm and whistled for the bird to come, but Percy just stayed on my shoulder. Will fetched him a bit of grass, then smiled as Percy's beak touched his fingers. “He looks like a corporal, eh. Those two stripes on his wings.”

Bert stood at my left side. He leaned down and whispered—a Bert whisper that everyone heard—“The order's come, sir.”

I knew what he meant, and it took my pleasure away. It made me more sorry for Bert than anything.

“I say, what order's that?” asked Lofty.

“I'm to slaughter the birds, Sarge,” said Bert.

Lofty looked shocked. “All of them?”

“I'll send 'ome the ones that I can. But all the others, yes.”

“When?” I asked.

“Tonight, sir,” said Bert. “Old Fletcher-Dodge 'as got the cook making crusts right now.”

I was sure that Ratty, at least, would laugh at that news. But the little gunner, barely half the height of Bert, seemed more surprised than anyone. “He's going to eat our birds?”

Bert looked down—way, way down. “Not if
I
can 'elp it, Sarge.” Then he turned to me. “I'm going to make a run for it, sir.”

He took us to the back of the building, where the ancient motorized loft had its bonnet open again. Oily rags were draped on the fenders, Bert's broken tools scattered around. The loft's great bins had their doors dropped down, ready for the birds.

Pop took off his flying jacket. He bunched up the sleeves of his sweater, stepped onto the front bumper, and leaned over the engine.

“I think I can 'old her together,” said Bert. “Long enough to get me to Scotland, at least.”

“You're taking the pigeons?” asked Will.

“Yes, sir. That's my scheme, sir.” Bert tugged at his filthy clothes. “I'm giving it a try, sir,” he said to me. “I'm going to take them north, sir, and try to 'ide them in the 'ills.”

Pop was making the sort of sounds that every mechanic seemed to make, a lot of grunts and groans.

Just looking at the motorized loft, we could tell the plan didn't have much hope. It was almost funny to imagine the pigeoneer trying to sneak across England in that thing. It was a huge, rattly house on wheels, a lunatic's caravan that would be crazier still when it was stuffed with fifty squawking, stinking birds. And there in the cab would be Bert, spotted with droppings, with pigeons perched on his head and his arms.

“Just let them go,” said Buzz. “Why not, eh?” He looked around, like a schoolteacher in a class full of idiots. “They're birds, aren't they? Turn them loose and let 'em fly away.”

“Wheezy jeezy.” Ratty punched him on the arm. “You let a homing pigeon go, where do you think he heads for?”

Buzz frowned. He couldn't figure it out.

“He thinks they'll go to Trafalgar Square,” said Ratty with a laugh. “No lie. That's what he really thinks.”

A dim understanding showed in Buzz's eyes.

I said, “Well, what if they
do
go there?”

Bert frowned at me. “Sir, I'm surprised at you.”

“No. Listen,” I said. “What if we
take
them there? You and I? We can go tonight.”

“To London?” said Bert. “To
London,
sir?”

“Why not?”

“Well, sir . . . Well . . .” He blinked and muttered, and then he grinned. “Well, why
not,
sir? I've got mates down there. They could get the birds stuck, and—”

“Stuck?” asked Buzz.

“Oh, the birds 'ave to be stuck,” said Bert. “They 'ave to learn that the place is their 'ome. My mates will do that.” He rubbed his forehead, looking doubtful. “But you'll be AWOL, sir, if we don't get back before morning.”

Pop raised his head from the motor. “Not a chance of that,” he said. “Not a chance you'll even get as far as Sheffield. It's just rust and hope that's holding this together.”

“Are you sure?” asked Bert.

“You might not get through the gate.”

Bert sighed. “That's torn it, then.”

“I say.” Lofty took the pipe from his mouth. “We could make it there in the Morris, you know.”

And so our plan was made, and everyone fell in with it. Bert told the crew what he had already told me, that he used to live near Trafalgar Square. Pop interrupted him. “You'd have to be mighty posh to live near the Square,” he said.

“No, not really, Sarge,” said Bert. “Not anymore.” He said his friends would be there, and that they would be willing to help.

Pop sat down to calculate in his head the fuel we would need. Simon measured a pigeon box and went off to figure out the best way to stack fifty of them on a Morris.

Then Ratty spotted the flaw in our plan. “What about the cook?” he said. “What about all those crusts he's making?”

Buzz shook his head. “Are you really that dumb? We take them with us, eh? We dump them somewhere on the road, and we stop at a bakery coming back and pick up chicken pies.”

Maybe Buzz wasn't so stupid after all. His was a better idea than anyone else could come up with. So we raced to the huts and sat through debriefing. Then we raced back to the loft and got everything ready. Simon went round and talked to the cook, who was only too glad to get out of the chore of baking his pies. He even came with us that night, in his white apron and his tall cook's hat. His pie crusts were stuffed in the car's little boot.

Bert took off his coveralls. He combed his hair and shined his boots, until he looked so spick-and-span that Lofty didn't recognize him at first. No one said a word about the blank spaces on his sleeves, and Bert didn't explain. He just kept his hands there at first, blushing and shy, until it was obvious that everyone had seen what he was trying to hide, and that no one would bind him for it.

As soon as it was dark, we roared out through the gate in the Morris. Will perched on the very front of the bonnet, with a road map in his hands. Simon navigated from the starboard fender. Buzz and Ratty, on the boot, watched for policemen coming behind us. Bert and the cook and I balanced the stacks of pigeon boxes that rose from the passenger seat and the running boards, that covered every inch of the windshield. Lofty couldn't see a thing except boxes, so the old guy got up behind him— just where he'd be in old
Buster
—with his helmet and goggles on, his head in the slipstream. He sat on the boxes and passed steering directions to Lofty, with taps of his feet on the pilot's shoulders.

We raced south toward London, flying through the blackness behind the dim glow of our hooded lights. We hurtled through Sherwood Forest, through little villages closed up in the blackout. Simon took us down the narrowest, emptiest roads, winding through curves with the boxes teetering and the pigeons shouting inside them. From county to county, we roared through the night— seven airmen, a cook, and a pigeoneer balanced on the little black roadster.

It was two hundred miles to London, and we made it in less than three hours. We came into the city through Chipping Barnet, then steered through the grounds of Hampstead Heath.

“Left!” shouted Simon.

Pop gave Lofty a kick. The little bus squealed round a corner. Gears shifted as we gathered speed again.

“Right!” called Simon.

A kick from the old guy, a turn of the wheel, and the pigeons settled into their squawks and songs. They were singing their old one as we hurtled south down Edgeware Road and onto Park Lane. The blacked-out city rushed by as Pop steered us past Hyde Park and Buckingham Palace, onto the Mall and through Admiralty Arch.

And then we were there. Stone buildings were all around us, a swarm of cars and buses. In the middle, like the still beam of the night fighters' guide, rose the towering column topped by Nelson's statue.

Lofty drove us over the curb with a great lurch and a clatter from the boxes. A thousand birds rose from the Square, scattering in front of us like a burst of flak. Then Lofty put the binders on, and we stopped below the column, below the huge lions with their bronze heads watching.

Lofty stepped from the car and stretched his arms. He looked at the big buildings and the faintness of the skyline. “You know,” he said, “when the war's over, I think I'll set up a shoe store around here.”

“I thought you were going to be a bush pilot,” I said.

He shrugged. “I think I'll have had my fill of flying, Kid. I'll be happy to keep my ten-and-a-halfs on the ground.”

We stacked the pigeon boxes in a perfect pile at the base of the nearest lion. They rose around it and made a wall that didn't look out of place. It looked as though it had been there since the war began, just like any of the funny little walls that had been built to protect strange things from the bursts of bombs. Before we were finished, the boxes were coated with pigeons.

Bert listened to his own birds singing inside them, and he looked like a happy, monstrous little boy. “This is wizard, sir,” he said. “This is a proper snorter.”

Lofty put the last box in place. The cook opened the boot of the Morris and took out all the pie crusts. He flung one of them out over the Square, and it ricocheted off the paving stones. It went rumbling away like a wheel, and a flock of pigeons chased it. He threw another one, and it landed with a cracking thud.

“Wheezy jeezy, you'll bust the stones,” said Ratty.

The cook stacked the rest of the pies between the lion's paws and told Bert to feed them to the pigeons.

“All right,” said Bert. “They need the roughage.” Down toward the river, Big Ben started tolling the hour. We counted the strokes of the bell, two and then three of them. “We'd better scramble,” said Lofty.

Bert nodded. “Yes, you'd better go.”

I looked up at him; I thought he'd be coming with us.

“I'll be up in a day or two, sir,” he told me. “I 'ave to find my mates and see the pigeons safe, then I'll make my way back on the train.”

“But Fletcher-Dodge—”

“Oh, 'e won't know I'm missing, sir,” said Bert.

Old Pop was gazing around at the buildings that encircled us, a ring of spires and domes and walls of carved stone. “Bert, where do you live?” he asked.

“Just over there, Sarge.” Bert pointed in the vaguest direction, just a twitch of his arm as his hand went up to scratch his hair. He shuffled his feet.

They were such grand and beautiful buildings that I couldn't imagine Bert living in any of them, and didn't believe he ever had. But he smiled at me and said, “Come and I'll show you my digs, sir.”

He took me across the Square, past the empty fountains and down to the underground. I imagined we would have to take the tube to the next station, or the next, but I saw right away that the last train had left long before. The platform was crowded with people. Even the tracks were covered with sleeping bodies.

Then one of them stirred and shouted, “Why, it's Bert.” Another said, “Bert, is that you?”

It seemed that half the people there knew him, and greeted him warmly. An old lady called him Bertie, and stood up so that he could bend way down and kiss her cheek.

He told me, “This was my 'ome, sir, for many a month. I was bombed out in the blitz, sir,” he said.

It made me happy to see all his friends crowd around him. They asked where he had been and why he was back, but he told them all that it would have to wait. “I've got to see my young one off,” he said. And didn't that make me proud.

We went back to the Square, to the pigeon boxes, so that I could say goodbye to Percy. I asked which box he was in.

“Just whistle, sir.”

I did. I whistled once more for Percy, as I had so many times. And he answered with a familiar little song. He chirped and cooed as I searched along the pile of boxes, and I found him standing at attention at the door of one near the bottom. I bent down and put my finger through the flap. “Hey, Percy,” I said.

Lofty came up behind me. He told me in a quiet voice that it was time to go, and I looked up to nod at him, and saw Pop and Ratty and all the others standing there behind him.