Pastoral (8 page)

“Did she put her on a charge?”

“No,” the pilot said. “She made her cry instead.”

“Silly little fool,” said Miss Robertson unsympathetically.

Marshall glanced at her. “Okay for this afternoon?”

She nodded. “I’ve been looking forward to it.”

He moved away from her, fearing to call attention if he stayed talking with her for very long. He began a chat with the Equipment Officer about sea-markers that did not mark, a subject cheered beyond all reason by her last words.

They met that afternoon at the intersection of the lanes by Kingslake Woods that he had marked down on her map. The girl was out there first; the weather was kind to them, and she sat for ten minutes on a stile in sunlight waiting for Marshall. He arrived presently, apologising for lateness.

Gervase said: “You aren’t late. It’s only just half-past three now. I was early.”

Marshall said: “How long did it take you to get here?”

“About three-quarters of an hour.” She paused. “It’s a lovely ride.”

He said: “I don’t think three-quarters of an hour on a bike could be a lovely ride, but have it your own way. We’ve
got about half a mile to go.”

They went on together down the road. Presently they got off at the gate, put the machines inside, and went forward up the track between the trees.

Gervase asked: “Is this the way you came?”

He nodded. “It looked all different then, but this is the place. It was dark, of course—moonlight.”

She glanced around her at the bare trees and the low undergrowth. “It must have been sort of eerie,” she said.

Marshall said: “It was damn cold.”

The girl laughed: “I forgot. I suppose being in the woods at night doesn’t mean anything to you.”

He said: “Well, I usually try and keep above the tree-tops, matter of fact. The boys don’t care for driving through the woods at night.”

She said: “But you do get accustomed to the darkness, don’t you? I mean, more than I should be?”

Marshall said: “Yes, I think one does. I don’t think I find the black-out so difficult as I used to.”

“Have you been flying bombers very long?”

“Fifteen months,” he said. “I was with Coastal before that.”

“All the time at Hartley?” she enquired.

“Well—yes. I did my thirty operations here and then I was grounded for three months and sent to Stamford, and then I came back here again. I’ve done all my bomber flying from here.”

Gervase glanced at him. “How many raids have you done?”

“In all? Fifty-one, if you count four I did as second pilot when I came from Coastal.”

He turned to her. “You came from Training Command, didn’t you?”

She nodded. “I was at Hornby for a year after I got my commission. Then they sent me down here.”

“Do you like it?”

She said: “I thought at first it was the foulest hole I’d ever seen, but I’m getting to like it a bit better now.”

He was surprised. “But why?” he said. “I think Hartley’s a good station.”

She was not sufficiently accustomed to him to be able to shed reticence. She could not tell him yet that the grim anxiety of operations, and the casualties, had made her loathe the place. She said vaguely: “I don’t know. Some places
you like, and some you don’t.”

“I know,” he agreed. “But I like Hartley Magna. There’s always something to do here, not like Northolt or one of those places. I think they’re deadly.”

She was with him in that. “Were you brought up in the country? I mean, how did you get to find out about the things you do?”

He said: “I’m not country-bred. My home is in Northwood, a sort of suburb place north-west of London, about forty miles from here. I worked in Holborn, in an office, for a bit. No, my rear-gunner taught me how to fish, and Gunnar got keen on it, too. He’s my navigator.”

She thought of the fifty-one raids that he had made. “You must have an awfully good crew,” she said.

He nodded. “I’m frightfully lucky. Gunnar and Phillips were with me in my first turn, and then when I came back here after the three months I managed to get them with me again. We’ve been together for the thick end of a year.”

“What are they like?” she asked. She was wondering what sort of supermen these were, who took a Wellington on raids all over Europe in the dark night fifty-one times without mishap, and apparently thought nothing of it. The risks were real enough; she had to look no further than Forbes and Bobbie Fraser to see that. What sort of supermen manned R for Robert?

He said: “Gunnar’s a Dane; he was a medical student in Copenhagen when the Germans walked in. Phillips worked on a machine in Terry’s chocolate works in York. They’re grand chaps to be with.”

He began to tell her all about them as they walked up through the woods towards the badger’s earth. She listened, a little bewildered. There was no explanation to the point that puzzled her about the incidence of casualties. These were ordinary young men, competent and likable perhaps, but not outstanding figures. Was it just luck that kept the flak away from R for Robert?

He studied her furtively as they walked. She had a firm chin, he decided, beneath a kind mouth; she had rather large, intelligent eyes. Such station gossip as he had been able discreetly to collect led him to believe that she was a good officer, cool in emergency and well liked by her girls. It would be a disaster if she got a transfer to another station.

“Is your job interesting?” he asked. “What do you do,
apart from the control office?” He knew about her supervision of the R/T; it had been in his mind intriguingly as he was coming in to land soon after half-past one.

She told him what she did. “It’s interesting enough,” she said at last. “A bit too much so sometimes.”

He glanced down at her. “What does that mean?” he asked.

She wanted to confide in him. She walked on for a pace or two in silence. Then she said without looking at him: “It’s awful sometimes. Do you remember about C for Charlie?”

He wrinkled his forehead. “You mean that chap Sawyer? The time we went to Kiel?”

She nodded. “He asked for a fix,” she said. “And when we gave it, he couldn’t make it out and said our transmission was all wrong. That was all we ever got from him.”

He said: “I remember. But there wasn’t anything in that, was there? I mean, the station was all right. We got a bearing from you that night, I think.”

Gervase said: “Our strength was quite all right. But he thought it wasn’t, and we tried and tried to get it up and make it stronger for him.” She hesitated, and then said: “It was beastly.”

Peter Marshall looked down at her, and said kindly: “Did that worry you a lot?”

She glanced up at him. “Yes, it did,” she said. “I suppose one gets accustomed to that sort of thing in time. I’ve been in Training Command, and I’m new to it.”

He was immensely sorry for her. “Look,” he said. “Sawyer went in just ahead of me, and I saw him going away after he dumped his load, and he seemed to be quite all right. Sawyer may have been hit, of course, or else the navigator. But, anyway, he went hundreds of miles away off course.”

She said: “That’s true. He was right over by the mouth of the Skagerrak.”

“That’s what I heard.” He looked down at her, smiling. “It’s just plain crackers to go worrying over that.”

She forced a laugh, colouring a little. “I suppose it is. But it’s difficult not to.”

He said: “I used to worry about things a bit. But then I took up golf and found what worry really meant. It got me down, so I gave it up and took up fishing.”

She laughed. “Counter-irritant!”

He grinned down at her. “That’s it. You find yourself a nice
new worry and stop bothering about fixes that are all right, anyway.”

She walked on for a pace or two in silence. “When I was in Training Command,” she said, “I wanted to be on an operational station, so as to be doing a bit more for the war. I never thought how anxious it would be.”

Marshall nodded. “When I joined the R.A.F. I thought it would be lovely, all flying about in sunshine and blue sky among the dear little fleecy clouds, like a lamb gambolling in the fields.” She laughed. “Honestly, I did think of it like that.”

“Like the posters in Wings for Victory Week.”

He said: “Just like that. You aren’t the only mutt round here, if that’s any comfort to you.”

They came out of the woods into a clearing. They had been walking up a gentle slope for some way, and now they found that they were on a piece of rising ground looking away towards the east. The clearance in the trees showed them the country over towards Princes Risborough and its range of hills, sunny and hazy.

“This is the place,” said Marshall. “We waited just here, on this log.”

The girl stood and looked out over the low, flat country. “It’s lovely to be looking down on something, for a change.” She glanced up at him. “I come from a hilly part of the world,” she said. “I’ve been awfully bored with this flat country here.”

“Where do you come from?” he enquired. He knew already, but he wanted her to tell him.

“We live at Thirsk, in Yorkshire,” she said. “Just by the Clevedon Hills.”

He wrinkled his forehead. “Helmsley way?”

She nodded. “That’s not very far. Do you know that country?”

“Only by flying over it,” he said. “It looks as if it would be interesting country on the ground.”

She nodded. “I like it. But I suppose you always do like the place where you were brought up.”

They turned to the badger’s earth. It showed as a scrape and a hole beneath the root of an oak tree, at a place where the soil had broken away, making a little earthy cliff. There was a fairly strong smell of animal about. “Stinks like a badger,” said Marshall complacently. “Now I know what that means.”

She laughed. “It does, rather.”

They stooped down together by the hole, one on each side. The sun shone on the dead leaves and the budding shrubs above them, on the pale blue of their uniforms, and glinted on their brass buttons. “Do you think he’s in there?” she enquired. She looked up at him, merry and keen.

“Must be,” he said. “An empty hole wouldn’t ponk like this.”

“Let’s get a stick and poke about, and see if we can get him out.”

They got up and went and found a chestnut branch and broke a long stick off it, and went back to the earth. Gervase took it and began rattling it about down the hole; once she thought that she touched something soft that backed away. They tried in turns to get the badger out, and presently they desisted and stood up, muddy and cheerful.

“He won’t play,” said Marshall. “Too bad.”

“I do wish we could get him out,” said Gervase. “I just want to see him.”

“The only thing to do would be to come back with a pick and shovel.”

“He’d dig away from you,” she said. “I bet he can dig faster than you can.”

“I’m not going to try,” said Marshall. “If you really want to see a badger I’ll take you to the Zoo.”

She said: “I’ve never seen the Zoo.”

He noted that for future reference and said: “Well, that’s all I can show you here to-day. Would you like to walk on for a bit and see where this track goes to?”

She said: “Let’s.” So they started on over the hill, walking on the dead leaves between the trees, talking about the badgers and the foxes and all the little creatures of the woods. And presently she stopped. “Look—there’s a primrose!”

He was mildly interested. “There’s another one over there—and there’s another.”

“It’s frightfully early for them.”

“It’s the second of March. Is that early?”

She laughed up at him. “Of course it is. You don’t know anything. Let’s see if we can get enough to take back.”

She stooped down to the leaves and began to pick the occasional blossoms. He stooped down with her, strained and awkward where she was lissom. He was not really interested in primroses, but he thought that he had never seen a sweeter sight than Gervase picking them.

With some difficulty they found sufficient for a little bunch; they bound leaves round the posy with a bit of fine string from his pocket and went on through the woods. And presently he said: “I say, what was wrong this morning with Ma Stevens?”

Her face clouded; she thought quickly and carefully before replying. “It wasn’t anything to do with you or your batwoman,” she replied. “It was just she was a bit upset.”

He was no fool, and he had lived a long time on a station. “Forbes?” he enquired. “Does she take things hard?”

The girl said a little testily: “Of course she does. Nobody’s at their best after a thing like that.”

Marshall said: “I didn’t know she got cut up about things. She always seems so tough.”

“I think that’s her way.” She turned to him. “Do you think any of them got out?”

He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

A dreadful curiosity made her enquire: “Did you see it happen?”

He nodded. “I was stooging around outside a bit before going in, and so was Davy. We both saw it. It was a direct hit; I don’t think any of them got out.” He did not expand upon the matter. He had long passed the nervous stage of wanting to tell people what it looked like, how the fire spread and the bits fell off as the machine went down. Being shot down was like getting cancer, a sad, painful business that you did not labour to describe.

She was still puzzled. “Was it just bad luck?”

He found some difficulty in answering her. “He was running up for a damn long time,” he said, “and it was pretty hot. He was making sure of getting his bombs just exactly where he wanted them. Of course, it’s always bad luck if the flak gets you.”

She said doubtfully: “I suppose so.”

He smiled down at her. “I always stooge around a bit outside and wait a quiet time to go in,” he said. “I don’t know that it makes any difference really, but the boys think it does. And we like to do a different sort of approach every time, just on principle. I don’t think that makes any difference, either, but it’s another thing. Sometimes if you sit outside a bit and have a damn good look for five minutes or so you get a hunch what’s the best way to tackle it.” He laughed. “I don’t think we’re really yellow—just cream. We generally put our load down on the target in the end.”