Despite her heavy backpack, Caroline leaped easily into the sidecar. She tucked her hair up under her helmet. Her eyes shone through the goggles. ‘With all speed, Aubrey, let us go.’
The roads were extremely quiet until they came to within a few miles of Finley Moor. Then it looked as if every lorry, wagon, motorcar or dog cart capable of carrying men, women or equipment was pushing toward the military airfield. Aubrey held his breath and followed George’s lead as his friend swerved, wove, and roared his way through the traffic, using footpaths, verges and gutters as much as the heavily populated tarmac. Generously, George gave pedestrians a chance to show their agility as the motorcycles sped by in a manner that would, in normal circumstances, have had a dozen constables chasing them.
As their tyres shrieked in a particularly violent piece of cornering, leaving a lamp post almost unscathed, Aubrey risked a glance at Caroline. The sidecar had one wheel off the ground, but she clung on, smiling broadly.
Aubrey had time – in such moments, he could think very quickly – to imagine a future where he and Caroline could spend time careering about on motorcycles. It was a joyous enough image to make him all the more determined to bring the war to an end. If a beautiful and exhilarated sweetheart on a motorcycle wasn’t worth fighting for, what was?
He twitched the handgrips to avoid striking the gutter, took another glance to see Caroline looking straight at him. She tried to look stern, failed, then jabbed a finger straight ahead, mouthing, ‘Keep your eyes on the road.’
Easier said than done, he thought. When you have the choice of Caroline Hepworth or anything else in the world to look at, the world loses out. Except – he bared his teeth, leaned and swerved around a flat-tyred lorry that had stopped in the middle of the road – when imminent death needs attention.
A mile out and they abandoned the road altogether. They hurtled along the grass verge that separated the road from the chain wire fence of the airfield, dodging road signs and, once, leaping over an open drain in a feat that momentarily made Aubrey’s heart lodge somewhere behind his Adam’s apple.
The guards at the gatehouse had been apprised of their imminent arrival, but took care to scan their credentials before waving them through. Inside the fence, the airfield was like Trinovant in morning rush hour but, instead of top hats and umbrellas, military uniforms were the dress of the day.
The black-uniformed Directorate operatives were predominant, but other services were not uncommon, and it appeared as if the normal divisions between the various branches of the military had been suspended for the moment. Infantrymen were helping Directorate mechanics carry long – but apparently very light – metal struts. A company of sailors from the Inimitable were lashing poles to create a footbridge over the busiest thoroughfare through the base. Civilians were about in numbers, some wandering uncertainly, others directing serviceman with that special air of authority that comes from being in charge of a small district sub-branch of a lesser department like the Apple Quality Board.
They found the airfield headquarters. Aubrey leaped off his motorcycle and left the engine running. In minutes, breathless, he had his directions and took the lead, shouting where necessary to get people to move out of the way. Which they did, and in turn they yelled at other people to get out of their way, in effect creating a cascade of imprecations that worked its way backward from Aubrey’s progress, leaving a spreading bow wave of disruption behind them.
Every part of the airfield was alive with workers and vehicles. Near the mooring masts and the domes of the gasholders, airships were being armed and provisioned. Aubrey was dismayed to see that none of the twelve massive craft was fully gassed up, not even the brand-new A 405. It would take nearly a day before any of them was ready – and that was only if the giant gasholders were full. If gas had to be generated, it could take days.
He grabbed the arm of a junior airman who was hurrying toward the dirigibles. ‘Get some magicians onto it,’ he snapped.
The young airman stared at Aubrey. ‘What did you say?’
‘Find some magicians, Directorate people if you can, magicians with specialties in fluid magic and compression magic. Get them draining half the airships and using the gas to inflate the others.’
The airman looked as if he didn’t know whether to call Aubrey a madman or a genius, then he glanced at the sky. ‘Magicians.’
‘Hurry!’
They came to the ornithopter section of the airfield. Dozens were being checked and fuelled, while some were already climbing into the air with their characteristic jerky wingsweeps. Nearby, some elderly observation balloons had been unearthed and a squad of frustrated operatives was trying to untangle tethers and holding stays.
George directed Aubrey’s attention to the mechanics crawling over the ornithopters like ants on a honey sandwich. ‘Pulling out all the stops, it looks like.’
Ornithopters were almost exclusively scouting and fast transport aircraft, useful where a dirigible would be too slow or too conspicuous. Armament was considered almost uncouth. The army didn’t want pilots thinking they were anything like airborne cavalry, jousting in the skies. Ornithopters were much too temperamental and much too expensive for that.
However, orders about unarmed ornithopters in war zones didn’t appeal to the men who actually did the piloting. Being characteristically independent of mind, the pilots tended to take matters into their own hands. Even so, the deadliest attack mounted by an ornithopter generally came if a pilot leaned out of the window and used his pistol, or flung something like an incendiary bomb without managing to catch it on a wing, which had happened more than once and hardened the army’s view about arming the aircraft.
It looked as if this hardening had softened, however, and thawed quickly in the emergency. Makeshift though the arrangements were, weapons were coming to ornithopters.
No effort was being made for uniformity, something that only emphasised the extreme nature of the emergency – nothing else could explain the overcoming of the military’s need for uniform fittings. That had been thrown out of the window, along with the drapes, the curtain rod and any furniture that happened to be nearby.
Teams of mechanics were working with pilots and instructors on the best way to give the aircraft some firepower. Improvised though it was, the work was proceeding with zeal, with much riveting, brazing and welding – ammunition being kept well away while heat-related work was undertaken. Machine guns were being bolted to the fuselages of a number of ornithopters, but one game mechanic was cutting a hole in the roof of one craft. A pilot watched this with an extraordinary mixture of anguish and excitement warring on his face.
Mechanics attached racks for bombs and swivel braces for rifles. Many of these adaptations were destroying the lines of the beautiful machines, but forbearance was the attitude from the pilots who were supervising. All of them, to a man and a woman, stood with hands clasped behind their backs as if it would stop them lunging forward to stop the ruining of their craft.
It was when Aubrey saw a heavy iron beam being welded to the nose of one ornithopter that the scale of this emergency was brought home with renewed force. In this case, it was the mechanic who was reluctant and the pilot who was insistent. At the end of the beam was a cage, just big enough for something explosive.
Aubrey grimaced. If ramming the enemy was considered a reasonable tactic, it was a crisis indeed. He glanced at George, who raised his eyebrows, and he understood that they were making a silent pact not to draw this modification to the attention of Caroline and Sophie.
The figure in overalls waiting for them when Aubrey brought the motorcycle to a halt wasn’t a private or a corporal, despite the grease stains. His salute was smart and totally without resentment. ‘Fitzwilliam. Glad you’re here. I’m Captain Galloway, Army Service Corps. We’re here to help.’