LITMIR.BIZ

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      ‘OK,’ said Cohen, who knew he was talking to him. This was the way they always did it.

      Cohen took a fix from the Gee radar and marked the time at Southwold on his plotting map. ‘There’s quite a wind, Skipper,’ he said.

      ‘We’ll see,’ said Lambert. ‘When we’ve got a bit of height we’ll have a better idea. The high winds may be different.’

      ‘Permission to test guns?’ asked Binty.

      ‘Yes, both of you,’ said Lambert, knowing that Flash would ask immediately after. Digby tested his nose guns too. The sound of the guns rattled along the metal fuselage and from Digby’s turret at the front there was a smell of cordite and scorching oil. Tracer sprayed in a gentle curve and splashed down into the sea.

      Today’s pressurized, high-speed, high-altitude, jet-propelled traveller might find it hard to imagine the very different experience that flying was to these men. The whole aeroplane rattled and vibrated with the power of the piston engines. The instruments shuddered and the figures on them blurred. Oxygen masks were mandatory and they needed microphones and earphones to even converse. At these altitudes their power-weight ratios made these planes very vulnerable to the condition of the air through which they flew. Although now, in the cool of night, the aircraft was steadier than it had been in the heated turbulence of afternoon, the air was still full of surprises. They hit hard walls of it and dropped sickeningly into deep pockets. They bucketed, rolled, and yawed constantly. Their degree of stability depended as much upon the pilot’s strength as upon his skill, for the controls were not power-assisted and it required all of a man’s energy to heave the control surfaces into the airstream. And all the time there was the vibration that hammered the temples, shook the teeth and played a tattoo upon the spine, so that even after an uneventful flight the crew were whipped into a condition of advanced fatigue.

      Digby sat down next to Cohen. He had his own gadget, the H2S radar set, to operate. It looked down at the world below and gave an X-ray picture which distinguished between woodland, water, and houses. Often the set went wrong and even at its best the picture bore only a messy resemblance to a map. Cohen had warmed the set and they both watched the dull green screen.

      ‘What do you know? It works,’ said Digby.

      Cohen pushed his map case to the back of the plotting-table and stood it on end. That obscured the neat metal patch. Flight Sergeant Worthington’s riggers had riveted it over the jagged shrapnel hole. Through that had come the splinter that had entered a navigator’s lung and killed him in this very seat four trips ago.

      ‘Don’t do that, sport,’ said Digby. He pushed the map case aside. The little adjustable desk lamp hit the new metal at an angle that made it shine like a glass eye. ‘I like to see that,’ said Digby. ‘I figure that lightning don’t strike twice. You and me have got the safest seat in the kite here.’

      Cohen looked at the metal plate and felt better about it.

      ‘Is everybody happy?’ asked Lambert.

      To the tune of Abdul the Bulbul-Amir Flash Gordon in the rear turret sang tunelessly:

      ‘Just an old-fashioned Avro with old-fashioned wings

       And a fabric all tattered and torn

       She’s got old-fashioned Merlins all tied up with strings

      And a heater that never gets warm.

       But she’s quite safe and sound, ’cos it won’t leave the ground

      And the crew are afraid of the chop.

       One day we will try to see if she’ll fly

      While Mother looks after the shop.’

      Flash waited for a word of appreciation or applause, but none came. Binty said, ‘Man, is yo’ jes’ crazy wid rhythm.’

      ‘Oh, shut up,’ said Flash.

      ‘When you’ve all finished singing and chatting,’ said Lambert, ‘perhaps I could say a word.’

      ‘Gentlemen,’ said Digby. ‘It’s my proud pleasure to introduce to you the captain of our aircraft, your genial host and raconteur, who has given up his eighty-first birthday to be with us here tonight. Gentlemen, your friend and mine, Flight Sergeant Samuel Lambert, DFM.’

      ‘Now let’s get ourselves organized,’ said Lambert.

      ‘For a change,’ said Jimmy Grimm.

      ‘For a change,’ agreed Lambert.

      Jimmy Grimm tuned his radio carefully. ‘They’ve given us new winds, Skip. Do you want them?’

      ‘Give them to Kosh,’ said Lambert.

      They flew higher and higher and for every thousand feet they gained the temperature dropped two and a half degrees centigrade. The crew buttoned themselves into their suits or moved closer to the hot-air blowers. At 8,000 feet they began to breathe the oxygen that they had brought with them. Lambert continued to climb. They entered a cloud bank. There is as yet no way to discover if ice awaits you in a cloud, except to fly into it with your fingers crossed. This cloud seemed unending. The cold chilled the aeroplane to its marrow and slowed its circulation. Door’s port outer coughed not once but twice and then didn’t fully recover.

      ‘Fuel flow?’

      ‘OK,’ said Battersby.

      ‘Give it some fully rich.’

      ‘I have already.’

      ‘Good boy.’

      The motor, appreciative of its luxury diet, roared into full power.

      ‘Carburettor icing.’

      ‘Temperature looks OK now.’

      ‘We’ll be out of it in a moment.’ Lambert put the aircraft into a steeper climb and Battersby adjusted the engines to give him more power.

      ‘I hate cloud,’ confided Lambert.

      It pressed against the windows and made the cabin even darker than before. Battersby fussed over his instruments and was anxious to prove his expertise to Lambert. The engines had only just begun to unsynchronize when Battersby reported, ‘Pressures and temperatures look all right.’ The motor began a weary drone.

      ‘Do you know why it’s doing that?’

      ‘Oil getting too cold and stiffening the pitch control?’

      Lambert nodded and said, ‘Can you synch them again?’

      Battersby waggled his fingertips upon the levers. After choosing the wrong motor and then overcorrecting he finally had the engines back into their regular harmonized roar.

      ‘Bang on,’ said Lambert. ‘Micky just can’t get the hang of that.’ Battersby had never felt so proud of himself.

      One by one the stars pricked the roof of the cabin and they were above the cloud. Lambert’s controls had become slack and mushy now, for Creaking Door had reached its normal ceiling and no amount of pulling on the stick would make it climb higher. This was the stage of the journey where Lambert employed a technique that an old-timer had told him about, way back when he was flying Whitleys. By suddenly lowering the flaps fifteen degrees while flying at cruising speed, Lambert and Battersby caused the aeroplane to hit a wall of air. It shuddered with the impact and the whole aeroplane leaped 200 feet higher. Each time it did this it held its new altitude. By this method Lambert could add over 1,000 feet of height to his ceiling. The first of a series of spine-jarring thumps ran through the aircraft. ‘We’re going up the steps,’ said Lambert. ‘That’s what I wanted to tell you.’

      Flight Lieutenant Sweet stared out into the night. Beneath him he saw a tiny rectangle of flare path and guessed there was another squadron climbing to join the stream. He had above-average night vision and usually saw pinpoints before the bomb

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