“I don’t see why. Just—”
“No future at all, believe me. I’ve thought about it a great deal and it’s all over, I can’t go on like this, it’s unfair to her, the only possible thing is to end it now, dead.”
Stubbs was briefly silenced by this burst of feeling. Then he said: “So what’s this big favour you want me to do?”
Foster sighed. “She keeps writing. I can’t forget her as long as she keeps writing, so I’ve decided the best thing for both of us would be if I arranged my demise.”
“Your demise. You mean your death?”
Foster nodded.
“Nothing but the best for the British aristocracy,” Stubbs said. “Okay, how d’you want to demise? With or without lilies?”
“I’d like you to write a letter, telling her that I was killed in action. It’s got to be definite and final. No half measures.”
Stubbs gave it some thought. “I could tell her I saw you get shot down. And crash.”
“Better say I was riddled with enemy bullets.”
“Listen, I can have you blown up in mid-air. No extra cost.”
“A flamer. Make it a flamer.”
Stubbs looked away. He finished his whisky, sip by sip. “Not a flamer,” he said. “I’ll say the rest, but not a flamer.”
Foster gave him pen and paper. “I’d do it myself,” he said,”but she knows my handwriting.”
“Okay,” Stubbs said. “What’s her name?”
“Jenny,” Foster said. “Her name is Jenny.”
Stubbs began to write. In a corner of the tent, Brutus was testing his teeth on the horn of the trombone. “Don’t tell anyone else about this, will you?” Foster said.
By 10 a.m. the day was as grey as a ghost. O’Neill flew a random pattern above a BE2c that was spotting for a shoot. About a thousand feet above him, the overcast spread from horizon to horizon. It looked like the biggest tarpaulin in the western world.
Paxton had begun this patrol eagerly. Now, after forty minutes, he was so bored that he was scratching his initials on the inside of the nacelle. The German archie was a bore. It was always in the wrong place or at the wrong height. The shoot was a bore. As soon as the guns found one target they switched to another. The German air force was a bore because it wasn’t to be seen. And then, suddenly, it was. A Fokker monoplane came out of the east. Paxton sat up as if he’d been stung.
The Fokker was at about the same height as the BE2c and was heading for it. O’Neill had seen the Fokker too; he dipped a wing so as to get a better view. Paxton fired a test burst. If they went down now they could catch the Hun when he was still a mile from the BE2c.
O’Neill did not go down. He circled, and after a while he climbed. Paxton couldn’t believe it. He turned and stared at O’Neill but all he got was blank goggles. Below, the Fokker was chasing the British plane across the Lines. Shellfire from both sides, black and white, littered the sky. Paxton slumped and swore. The FE levelled out and O’Neill cruised around for half an hour. Then they went home. O’Neill told Brazier there was nothing worth reporting.
Lunch was cold bully-beef, boiled potatoes and salad. O’Neill ate his meal quickly and went out. Paxton stayed in the mess.
“Hey!” Kellaway said. He was reading a week-old Daily Mail.”Lord Kitchener’s dead!” He was amazed. Nobody else was.
“General Gordon’s not feeling too good, either,” Goss said. “And Napoleon’s quite poorly, so I’m told, while Alexander the Great…”
“Yes but… I mean, he was a field-marshal.” Kellaway was dismayed by their indifference.
“Who shot him?” Foster asked.
“I don’t think anyone did.”
“Too bad. A good opportunity missed.” Foster lost interest.
Kellaway turned to Stubbs. “Do you know Lord Kitchener’s dead?” he asked.
“No, but you sing it, and I’ll pick up the tune as we go along,” Stubbs said brightly. There was a weary chorus of groans and hisses. “That’s considered a pretty damn good joke back in Grand Rapids,” he protested.
“Says here he was drowned,” Kellaway said glumly.
“How’s your swimming pool coming on?” Goss asked Paxton.
“Oh, they’ve made a start.” The others looked interested, so he explained:”I’ve got a couple of dozen Chinkies digging a hole in the next field. Borrowed ‘em from a labour battalion. Dig like beavers.” The prospect of having a pool was exciting, and he answered a lot of questions. Success felt good.
O’Neill was on his bed, asleep. Paxton kicked the bed. “What didn’t you like this time?” he asked. “The colour of his eyes, or the way he parted his hair?”
O’Neill took a long time to wake up.
“We had that bloody Hun on a plate,” Paxton said. “It was a damned gift from God, that bloody Hun.” He was so worked-up that he couldn’t get the words out fast enough: they tripped and stumbled. “But you didn’t want it! One look down, and up you went! So the poor bloody Quirk got chased home while we chased rainbows!”
“You didn’t see the Albatros,” O’Neill said flatly.
“I didn’t see any Albatros, nor any golden eagle, nor—”
“Why not? You’re the observer.” O’Neill rubbed his face as if trying to push it back into shape.
“I observed the Fokker. One Hun’s enough for me.”
“Arse-hole. Our job was to guard the Quirk.”
“Which got jumped by the Fokker.”
“Balls. They saw it coming, they quit, they knew it couldn’t catch them, and it didn’t.”
“But we could have caught it! I could have cut the blasted thing in half!”
“You never saw the Albatros.” O’Neill had taken Paxton’s eau-de-cologne from his shelf and was splashing it on his neck and face. “It was in and out of that cloud like a whore who’s lost her handbag.”
“Help yourself, it’s free,” Paxton said.
“Thanks.” O’Neill took a mouthful, rinsed his teeth and spat out of a window. “Back home we make better booze than this out of dead dingoes… That Albatros wanted our Quirk.”
“So you say.”
“And he was fast enough to catch the Quirk. But I knew he was up there, and he knew that I knew, and we both knew he wasn’t going to risk it while I was in the way.”
“I don’t believe it.”
O’Neill raised one knee and broke wind. “God save the King,” he said. “Indubitably.”
In the afternoon they were listed for a Deep Offensive Patrol. The air was still and dull as they walked from the pilots’ hut to the FE. The inevitable flurry of flies tried to get a taste of their sweating heads.
“I can’t hit the Hun if you never get near him,” Paxton said. O’Neill said nothing. “We’ve got nothing to protect this afternoon except ourselves,” Paxton said. “If we see a Hun, are you going to let me fight him?”
“Depends. Depends how many there are, how high, and how late in the patrol.”
“You mean how desperately you want to get home for tea and cake?”
Their fitter swung the propeller. The Beardmore coughed and spat, banged and coughed, and grudgingly decided there was nothing else for it and so settled down to work. O’Neill slowly built the revs, and the roar broadened and deepened to a bellow, while black exhaust smoke got sucked into the propeller disc and sliced into nothingness. The wheels leaned hard on their chocks, and everything shook like a wet dog on a cold day. Paxton sat in the front cockpit and tried to focus on the dancing flies. He knew it couldn’t be done but it was something to do. O’Neill slowly brought the revs down. The chocks were dragged clear. The FE rolled. The flies gave up the chase. Paxton stared at the rushing grass until it became a blur. He had a sudden moment of panic when he thought he’d left his chocolate behind, but it was in his pocket after all. By then they were flying.