A Good Clean Fight (18 page)

“I heard,” Dalgleish said, “and I've got twelve superstitions. I always fly with my lucky acorn stuck in my navel. I always whistle ‘Annie Laurie' while I'm sticking it in. Then I always piss on the left wheel of the airplane, spit on the prop, kick the adjutant, and how many's that?”

“Five,” Carson said. “I think.”

“I can't tell you the other seven superstitions, they're disgusting, you'd puke all over the carpet. What's all this in aid of, anyway?”

“I'm writing a book,” Carson said. “Like that chap Hillary. He wrote a thing called
The Last Enemy
and it's sold thousands and thousands. All I need is lots of stuff about superstitions and so on. You know. Anyway, thanks very much.”

“It was all lies and I deny every word of it,” Dalgleish said. “You print it and I'll sue.”

“Hey, that's good.” Carson was scribbling hard. He looked up. “Got any more?”

“Kit, you're an asshole.”

Carson sucked his pencil. “No,” he said, “sorry. Can't use that.”

*   *   *

Bletchley's personal Avro Anson landed an hour before sunset. It was a curious machine, made from the remains of two crashed Ansons plus the wheels off a Blenheim. He called it the Brute. Its wings were warped in opposite directions, the rudder was a bit off-center, the engines were old and frail. Bletchley was the only man who knew how to make it go. He came over the horizon at seventy feet and seventy miles an hour, that being the way the Brute preferred to fly.

The sergeant cook watched three men climb down and ordered three more tins of bully-beef to be added to the stew.

By then Fanny Barton had beaten the dust out of his other cap (the one without oil stains), collected Flight Lieutenant Kellaway, and driven down the airstrip in a captured VW desert-wagon.

“Unexpected pleasure, sir,” he said, saluting.

“Well, I was in the neighborhood,” Bletchley said, “So I thought I'd deliver your new flight commander. Also Captain Hooper of the US Army Air Force.” The two men came forward and saluted. Barton returned the salute. “Good God, it's Pip,” he said.

“Guilty,” Patterson said.

“I thought I told you, sir,” Kellaway said to Barton. The
sir
was because Bletchley was there. “I'm sure I told you.”

“You said it was someone called Patterson, but there are dozens of Pattersons . . . Still, it's nice to have you back, Pip.”

“It's nice to be back, sir.” Patterson had expected Barton to shake hands and when Barton didn't he felt uncomfortable, so he looked around. There was little to see and
nothing to comment on. He ended up looking at Barton again and realized how much the man had changed since the days when he had led the squadron during the Battle of Britain. Then, he had been vigorous and determined, sometimes anxious but usually cheerful. Now he looked like a man who took power in his stride and who enormously enjoyed shooting things down or blowing things up. In his smile there was something of the smile of the tiger. Patterson found the smile disconcerting, because he suspected that Barton was sizing him up for the job of leading others in the work of destruction and killing and general mayhem. It made him a little uneasy.

“Well, look here,” Kellaway said. “We'd better get you two into some tents before the light goes.”

“I'll sleep in the Brute,” Bletchley said.

“Welcome to our war, captain,” Barton said. He shook hands with the American. “I'll see you later. Did you bring any of that special engine oil, sir?” he asked.

“Come and see.”

Patterson and Hooper threw their kit into the back of the VW as Bletchley and Barton went up the steps of the Anson. The air commodore had brought a case of tinned beer. He opened two cans, which frothed and foamed vigorously. “Your health, and by God you're going to need plenty of it,” he said. They drank.

“I take it we're off the hook as far as Takoradi goes,” Barton said.

“Probably. We may have found some Poles to do the job. Very keen, which means they'll smuggle gold or diamonds up from West Africa. You know what the Poles are like: mad gamblers. Suits me. It gives them an incentive to get the Hurricanes to Cairo, and that's what matters. The Takoradi run is our ace of trumps.”

“Absolutely, sir. Splendid news.”

“What a hypocritical young thug you are, Fanny. You don't give a tiny toss for Takoradi, do you?”

Barton wiped froth from his chops. “I'd sooner be near the action, sir.”

“Somebody gave me a definition of strafing, the other day,” Bletchley said. “Russian roulette at three hundred miles an hour and zero feet, he said it was.” He finished his beer. “Quite exhilarating, if you like that sort of thing.”

*   *   *

Captain Hooper came from a base in the Delta which had hot and cold showers, a pool, laundry, dry cleaners, barbershop, and an eager twenty-four-hour service of Arab shoe-shine boys. He knew that life in the desert wasn't going to be like that, but he was startled to discover just how dirty everyone in Hornet Squadron was. Dirty and smelly.

Kellaway had put him in Tiny Lush's tent. Lush was six foot three and fourteen stone. He wore Arab sandals, dirty shorts and a dirty shirt. He hadn't shaved for a month; above his short, red beard was a big mustache. His hair was a tangle of curls that reached his collar. Parts of his body seemed more sunburned than others, but Hooper soon recognized these as old oil stains. Lush gave off a soft, ripe smell, like a farm horse at the end of a hard day.

“Life is very simple here,” Tiny Lush told him. “We get up with the sun and have breakfast, which is always porridge, jam and tea. In the morning some of us patrol the skies and usually find a lot of nothing. Lunch is at twelve. It's always biscuit, tinned sausage and tea. In the afternoon some of us patrol the skies and find what's left of the morning's nothing. At six we eat supper, which is always bully-beef stew. By seven the sun has long since set and we stooge off to bed. Very, very simple.”

“No shaving?” Hooper said. “I thought the RAF didn't permit beards.”

“This is five o'clock shadow,” Lush said. “The water ration here is one pint per man per day, not counting what
the cookhouse uses. You shave if you like. Wash your socks too, if you're really fussy. Most of us just let nature take its course. Anything else I can tell you?”

Hooper thought. “The guy who had this bed before me. What happened to him?”

“You don't want to know that. Might put you off your supper. Shall we wander over to the mess?”

The mess was a large canvas roof over some trestle tables and benches. Half a dozen pilots were already there and more came ambling across from their tents. Hooper was wearing his everyday uniform of slacks and tunic, somewhat crumpled after the trip in the Anson, but amongst this crowd he felt dressed for a parade. They were in uniform in the sense that they looked alike, but it was a uniform of motley. A few wore battledress tops, unbuttoned, but most preferred cardigans in varying shades of khaki, or sleeveless pullovers, or sweaters tied loosely around the neck. Their khaki shorts or corduroy trousers were baggy and creased like concertinas. Most wore calf-length mosquito boots; a few were in sandals or shoes. Hardly anyone was wearing RAF headgear, but Hooper saw several Luftwaffe caps, one Australian slouch hat and an Arab fez. Everybody's clothes looked stained and scruffy. Several pilots had shaved within the past week and one or two actually looked clean-shaven; however at least half were on the way to having recognizable beards and more than half had grown mustaches. Hooper saw no mustache that was neat and tidy, like his. All their mustaches seemed to be reaching for their ears.

Squadron Leader Barton and Air Commodore Bletchley joined them for supper. Lush was right. It was bully-beef stew. Hooper got introduced to everyone and soon forgot nearly all their names, but that didn't matter because nothing seemed to matter. It was all relaxed and cheerful. Once, in England, Hooper had visited a fighter wing based at a pre-war aerodrome where there were lots of large brick
buildings and an officers' mess with white pillars flanking the entrance. What he remembered most clearly from that visit was his host's warning not to stand in front of the fire. There was, he explained, a strict pecking-order about who might warm his backside first at the anteroom fire on that (and many similar) RAF stations. LG 181 was a million miles from there.

Before the meal was over Hooper had been given a nickname. Someone—inevitably—said he had a cousin in New York. Hooper said he had never been to New York, which surprised them. “I've been to Manhattan,” he said. “Manhattan, Kansas, that is.”

“I met James Cagney once,” Bletchley said. “Awfully nice fellow.”

“It's a big country,” Hooper said. “Me, I'm just a hick from the sticks.” They liked the phrase. From then on he was Hick Hooper.

The sun went down with its usual sudden rush at six-thirty. By seven the night was as black as the inside of a coal sack. Lush took Hooper to their tent; he found it by walking from Tomahawk to Tomahawk, counting until they reached the fourth, D-Dog; their tent was fifty paces further on. Hooper stumbled on a guy-rope. “If you have to get up in the night,” Lush said, “don't go far. People have been known to wander off for a wee-wee and never find their way back.”

“Thanks. I'll stay right here.”

Nevertheless, after they got into their bedrolls and the candle was put out, Hooper found the atmosphere heavy with the smell of Lush and Lush's clothes. He tried to ignore it, but the enclosed space seemed to trap and concentrate the aroma. After fifteen minutes Hooper found himself breathing through his mouth and he decided to take action. “Look,” he said, “d'you mind if I sleep outside?”

“Not a bit,” Lush said. “Most thoughtful. You do stink
a bit. Like Harrods' soap department. Not to worry, old chap. After a couple of days you'll smell quite normal.”

*   *   *

Next day began at six, prompt.

Dawn in the desert was like a slow-motion explosion in a paint factory. Beautiful floods of color washed across the sky and by touching the desert transformed it into a glorious field of delight. Tiny Lush crawled out of his tent and saw Hick Hooper watching it. “Wasted on the wogs, isn't it?” Lush said. “Sleep all right?”

“Yeah. I thought I heard a rooster.”

“That's Geraldo. Bloke called Moffatt bought it from an Arab, didn't have the heart to kill'it. Then Moffatt got the chop over Tobruk. Now Geraldo's the squadron mascot.” Lush scratched and yawned. “Thank Christ, here comes tea.”

The tea-wagon was a former Italian army van, much bullet-holed. The driver gave them each a mug of tea and a mug of water. “Bloody awful weather,” Lush said.

“Might get a bit of sun later,” the airman said. He drove on.

“We've been saying that to each other every morning for three months,” Lush said. “Very reassuring. A fortress in these fickle times.”

“I notice he didn't call you ‘sir.'”

Lush sipped his tea and sighed with pleasure. “We save the sir-stuff for big occasions. Coronations, state funerals, deliveries of beer.”

“Didn't realize you guys were so democratic.”

“Democratic?” Lush took another swig and found sand in his tea; he collected the grains on his tongue and spat them out. “We're not
democratic
, Hick. Fanny's king here.”

“I guess I say ‘sir' to Fanny.”

“Everyone says ‘sir' to the CO first thing in the morning and last thing at night. In between . . .” Lush shrugged. “Play it by ear and watch his eyebrows.”

“Yeah? For what?”

“For when they meet in the middle. That means Fanny's hopping mad, so stand clear.”

“What is he? Australian?”

“New Zealander. Came halfway round the world to fight. Very keen. We've also got a Greek and a Pole. Mick O'Hare's Irish. Fido Doggart was born in Kenya or Uganda or Shangri-La or some bloody place. The rest of us are normal. More or less.”

They finished their tea. Hooper looked at his mug of water. “This is really all I get until tomorrow?”

“Enough to clean your teeth.”

A hundred yards away, a Tomahawk coughed and its propeller jerked stiffly through a half-circle. A sergeant fitter shouted something to the airman in the cockpit. His voice was instantly eaten up and swallowed by the immensity of the desert. The Tomahawk coughed again, repeatedly, more deeply and fruitily until greasy black smoke jumped from the exhaust vents and the engine roared. The sergeant fitter stood with hands on hips, his head tilted, listening as the revs slowly built and the fighter trembled against its chocks. He had the air of a lion-tamer, watching the animal sit because it had been ordered to sit and not because it liked the position. All around the landing-ground, engines were kicking and jerking into noisy life. Much dust was being thrown up. Dawn had ceased its extravagance and the sky was a hard, hot blue again.

On their way to the mess, Tiny Lush said: “If you desperately want a bath, you can always save up your ration, you know.”

“How long would that take?” Hooper asked.

“Dunno. Six months, probably. It'll be raining by then.”

“It rains in the desert?”

“In winter. Tips down. You wake up swimming.”

Breakfast was porridge, biscuit, margarine and plum jam, with more tea. The biscuit was like ship's biscuit, thick and hard and perforated. The cock Geraldo strutted around the table, grabbing fallen fragments.

Pip Patterson, at another table, said hello to Hooper, but otherwise nobody paid him much attention; after all, this was his second day on the squadron, so by now he was part of the furniture; people got used to a lot of comings and goings in the Desert Air Force. A dozen conversations were competing with each other. “How's old Schofers?” asked a flying officer called Fido Doggart. “Any news?” He got no answer. Doggart's shaggy mustache was stained the several colors of bully-beef stew. For someone who was only twenty-two his face looked battered and grubby; but the eyes were eager. The eyes were those of the head boy who is blackmailing the school matron for fornication and is taking his payment in kind.