Inherit the Skies Page 44

  ‘You lot certainly know how to take the wind out of a chap’s sails, don’t you?’ Leo said crossly. ‘I was going to choose a more opportune moment but … oh well, I might as well tell you now, I suppose. I have decided to get married.’

  ‘Good grief!’ Gilbert said in a stunned tone. ‘Who is the lucky girl – Emily?’

  ‘Well, of course!’ Blanche was smiling again, determined not to let the moment’s awkwardness impinge on her happiness and pride. She crossed to Leo, linking her arm through his. ‘ Leo has already approached the Reverend Sellers and he has given his blessing. The wedding is to be on New Year’s Day.’

  ‘That’s a bit soon, isn’t it?’ James ventured, then blushed, fearing he might have said something immodest.

  ‘I must say it’s a little surprising, Leo,’ Gilbert agreed. ‘I know you have been courting Emily for some time now but all the same …’ He broke off, realising this was scarcely the moment to admit that he had suspected Leo of fighting shy of marriage, and he knew that Reverend Sellers had long ago given up hope of seeing his daughter walk up the aisle.

  Alicia, however, had no such scruples. Her expression was cold, her eyes glittered.

  ‘I don’t think it is surprising in the least,’ she said haughtily. ‘Really it is something we should have expected of Leo.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ Blanche demanded, recognising the venom in her stepdaughter’s tone.

  Alicia shrugged. ‘Don’t any of you read the newspapers? Surely you know that the Unionists are all for making conscription compulsory and Lloyd George is right behind them. If that happens the single men will have to go first. Men of Leo’s age. Whilst married ones will be able to remain safely at home with their wives …’ She let her voice tail away meaningfully.

  ‘What are you suggesting?’ Blanche let go of Leo’s arm, her hands clenching angrily.

  ‘It’s obvious isn’t it? Do you really think Leo would tie himself to that dull little Emily Sellers if it wasn’t to save his skin? That is why the wedding is to be so soon – so that our dear sweet brother will be a married man before the legislation goes through parliament and he will be able to escape being called on to do his duty for King and country.’

  ‘Alicia – how could you!’ Blanche cried. There were high spots of colour in her cheeks and she looked close to tears now. ‘How could you say such things?’

  ‘Oh – be quiet, mother!’ Leo snapped. ‘I don’t know why you have to make such a performance out of it.’

  ‘But Leo – I won’t stand by and hear you maligned!’ she protested. ‘Why shouldn’t you marry Emily? Goodness knows you have been walking out with her long enough. And if it means that you will be saved from being sent off to France then it is only sensible. Don’t you agree, Gilbert?’

  Gilbert said nothing. The thought of a young man marrying so as to avoid conscription stuck in his craw. It seemed to him a despicable and cowardly thing to do.

  A few weeks earlier, driving home one night through the village he had come upon a most unpleasant scene – a crowd of women attacking young Ned Hucker, the baker’s boy, and taunting him for having failed to volunteer. ‘A dirty slacker,’ they had called him, and though Gilbert had intervened, telling the women that the reason the rather slow-witted Ned had not volunteered was because he was reluctant to leave his widowed mother all alone, deep down he had understood how they felt.

  This was even worse. To marry a woman with the sole intention of hiding behind her skirts … Gilbert was unable to conceal his look of disgust and Blanche, noticing it, reacted furiously.

  ‘I don’t know why you are all taking this view!’ she stormed. ‘And you are not in a position to be so critical anyway, Gilbert. At least everyone knows that Leo and Emily planned to marry one day. James has no such responsibilities but I dare say he will be looking for an excuse to get out of serving if conscription becomes law, all the same.’

  James had sidled over to the window, taking no part in the argument. He hated harsh words almost as much as he hated war. Now he looked round, startled to find himself brought into it, and dismayed by the hostility on every face but Alicia’s.

  ‘Well, James, what have you got to say to that?’ Gilbert barked, and suddenly James was angry, the slow-burning anger of a man without a violent bone in his body.

  How could they glorify war in this way? Surely they couldn’t approve of the horrors that were going on in the name of justice and freedom? Yet they seemed to, and that tacit approval helped to perpetrate it, encouraging raw untrained recruits as young as eighteen years old to rush off and offer themselves as fodder for the guns.

  ‘I don’t blame Leo as you seem to do,’ he said. ‘But if you are asking me whether I am going to do the same then the answer is no.’

  ‘Really? I thought you would do anything to avoid going into the army,’ Blanche sneered.

  ‘I shall refuse to fight, certainly,’ James agreed. ‘ There is not much point in having convictions if one is not prepared to stand up for them. I believe war is wrong – all war – and I will not do anything to assist in it. Truth to tell, I find your involvement repulsive, Father.’

  Gilbert almost choked with indignation.

  ‘Because we build aeroplanes, you mean?’

  ‘They are being used as weapons. It’s wrong.’

  ‘Don’t talk rubbish,’ Gilbert snapped. ‘And how do you suppose you are going to avoid being conscripted if Lloyd George gets his way and the bill goes through? If you persist with this attitude you’ll be arrested for breaking the law.’

  ‘Yes,’ James said. ‘I know.’

  ‘What do you mean – you know?’

  ‘We have been warned of what might happen at the No-Conscription Fellowship meetings. I may very well be thrown into gaol and there is always the possibility that I shall be sent to the front by force and shot as a deserter when I refuse to take up arms.’ His voice was low and matter-of-fact, betraying none of the welter of emotions he was feeling – the anger, the betrayal, the trembling fear.

  ‘Great Scott!’ Gilbert exclaimed. ‘You can’t be serious, James!’

  ‘I am – perfectly. I can always appeal of course but to be honest I don’t hold out much hope. The authorities are determined to misunderstand our views – just as you are.’

  ‘And you would be prepared to go to prison or even die rather than compromise your beliefs?’ Gilbert asked.

  ‘Of course,’ James said.

  Gilbert shook his head, wondering if he really knew his youngest son at all. He had always looked on James as something of a weakling, now suddenly there was substance to the shadow. James might not be as bold and dashing as Hugh was but it took courage to stand up for his beliefs, particularly when they were so unpopular. Gilbert could not follow his reasoning and did not agree with him in even the smallest particular, but he felt the beginnings of unwilling admiration nevertheless.

  At least James was not taking the coward’s way out as Leo was. He was meeting the challenge head on and he was prepared to face the consequences of his actions however terrible they might be. His own trembling determination was lending him an awesome strength.

  For the first time in twenty years Gilbert was proud of his son.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  In the autumn of 1916 when the Battle of the Somme was reaching its bitter and bloody end, floundering in the mud with no decisive victory one way or the other to avenge the loss of 420000 British lives, and while James Morse, arrested eight months earlier for refusing to answer the call of his country, was languishing in a military prison, scorned and spurned by his guards and largely forgotten by everyone else, Eric Gardiner had his moment of triumph.

  For Eric the war had been a quiet one. Like Adam he had spent much of it in a training squadron, but here the similarity ended for he was quite content with his lot. It was not that Eric was a coward, far from it, but he was a very peaceable man who did not care for the idea of being responsible for the death of any other
human being, let alone a fellow flier. The fact that in training pilots to fight and bomb he was actually killing by proxy did not occur to him for a very long while and when it did he accepted it regretfully. Death in war was inevitable and the cause was a worthy one; at least he personally had not had to fire a gun and see a German aeroplane spiral down trailing deathly black plumes, and the look-out missions he had flown had all been uneventful.

  But as the war dragged on into its third year he began to see things in a less comfortable light. Too many of the young men who passed through his hands were going straight to their deaths and Eric was unable to escape the conclusion that it was because they simply were not skilled enough to handle the situations in which they found themselves. The more the fighter squadrons were decimated the worse it became – the pressure was on for more and still more pilots to take the place of those who were lost so that some, mere boys of nineteen or twenty, were sent over the enemy lines with as little as ten hours’ experience of solo flying on training machines, to fly two or even three missions a day through a hail of flak and engage the experienced German pilots in their vastly superior aircraft. Time after time he heard stories of how slow and unwieldy the British machines were by comparison with the German Fokkers and the newest model, the Albatros, and how difficult to fight from with the struts and wires limiting the field of fire and the pilot seated behind the observer who in turn was seated behind the engine. There were some new designs on the stocks, it was rumoured, including one that Max was working on in secret, but in the meantime all were untried and Eric had the uncomfortable feeling that when they were they might very well take the blame for the inexperience of the pilots he was turning out.

  The knowledge gave him an edge of aggression that had been missing before. Dammit, how many more young men would he send to their deaths before this bloody war was over?

  Occasionally Eric found himself seconded to the anti-Zeppelin patrols and he was experiencing a bout of this newly found aggression one night in early October when the message came through shortly after dark – Zeppelins approaching the south coast. The giant airships with their deadly cargo of bombs had been a menace for some time now, targeting munitions factories, explosives works and even the capital itself, sometimes in great formidable fleets, but since Leefe Robinson had brought down the first Schutte-Lanz over London at the beginning of September they were no longer regarded as invincible and that night as Eric hastily struggled into his flying jacket a feeling of deadly determination made his skin crawl and the blood pound in his temples.

  Somewhat hampered by the heavy kit he ran across the airfield to where his ancient BE2c stood waiting not clear on its chocks at the pole position of the make-shift runway – a lane of oil drums filled with burning paraffin which cast a smoky glow over the rough grass. As he strapped himself in, the mechanic was already thrusting at the propeller and after a few moments’ superhuman effort the engine coughed into life.

  The cold night air stiffened the muscles of his cheeks and hurt his lungs as he flew though he ducked his head down behind the windscreen of the open cockpit and before long he was shaking so much with the cold that it was difficult to keep his hands steady on the rudder. But gritting his teeth he flew on. Damned if the Zepps were going to drop their load of death and get away with it tonight. He wasn’t going to go through this for nothing if he could help it!

  Just when it seemed that he was the only living soul in the night sky he saw it – a pyramid of light away to his port side. So – the searchlights had found the Zepp if he had not. He turned towards it, flying steadily, and soon he could see the Zepp – small glittering speck caught in the pyramid of light like a moth in a candle flame. Excitement lit a fuse within him; as the adrenaline began to course through his veins Eric forgot the cold, forgot his aversion to playing the role of an angel of death, forgot everything but his overwhelming determination to get to grips with the airship.

  As he came closer it seemed to take shape, a gleaming silver balloon hanging apparently motionless against the backdrop of black velvet sky. Tracers made bright streams around her and bursts of shellfire illuminated the blackness like an elaborate firework display as the ground defences attempted to stop the monster in its tracks, but Eric could see they were missing their target by miles. He flexed his hands on the controls, loosening his fingers sufficiently to enable him to be able to fire his gun when the moment came. They still felt stiff but he had no doubt they would react as he wanted them to. Needs must when the devil drives, he thought grimly.

  They were closing fast now and he thought the Zepp must have seen him because she loosed her bombs to explode in a cluster of brilliant winking lights on the ground far below. But there was no resulting rush of flame and Eric thought with satisfaction that they must have missed any intended target. Then the Zepp began to rise swiftly, freed of the weight of bombs, and Eric knew that he had to act fast if he was not to lose her. He struggled on through the shells which exploded in the air around him, rocking the BE like a small ship in a storm-tossed ocean and got a hand to his gun. He fired off a drum, raking the airship from nose to tail, steep turned after her and came in again. Tracer bullets shot from her car and gondolas but he ignored them. His teeth were gritted, sweat pouring down his half-frozen face, his fingers closed again on the trigger of his gun.

  Get the bugger. Get him! he urged himself. Don’t let him get away!

  He fired another drum with the same grim determination then the breath came out between his gritted teeth in a sharp whistle.

  The silver of the airship was suddenly suffused with a rosy glow then with a terrifying whoosh! a sheet of flame illuminated the blackness. The airship shot up like a rocket, hovered momentarily then plummeted down, ablaze from front to stern.

  For a brief moment Eric could think of nothing but getting out of the way for it seemed to be coming straight at him, this huge roaring fireball. Then as he steadied his machine he watched almost in disbelief as the Zepp crashed earthwards, illuminating the fields and trees with a hellish orange light.

  He shouted aloud with wild elation before the shock hit and he realised he was shaking again, as much now from reaction as from the cold. Below him on the ground the Zepp blazed fiercely and with a sense of awe Eric realised that single handed he had been responsible for the destruction of an airship and its crew. The knowledge sobered him. He had done his duty. This airship would not deliver its load of death and mayhem – he had seen to that. But he felt no pride in the achievement, only a sort of numb horror and guilt.

  There was nothing left to do here. The people on the ground would take over now. Reacting like some sort of automaton Eric turned his machine for home. He did not feel like a hero. He felt like a murderer. And no-one was more surprised than he when he was awarded the DSO for his night’s work.

  One afternoon in the spring of 1917 Sarah left her office and crossed the courtyard to the old Morse Motors block. She walked briskly and a trifle defiantly but every so often she glanced over her shoulder, a quick furtive glance that indicated she was hoping she would not be seen. The block, and in particular the office towards which she was heading, was supposed to be out of bounds to everyone but the chosen few, for it was there that Max was carrying on his top secret work, drawings for a new aeroplane to combat the superiority of the German Albatroses and Fokkers. But Max had not been seen for days on end though a light burned night and day at the window and Sarah was seriously concerned about him for he had taken the death of Annie and little John very badly.

  At first, a prisoner of her own grief, Sarah had neither known nor cared very much what he was feeling but as she surfaced to at least some semblance of normality she had begun to realise that Max was experiencing no such relief. He had taken it all inwardly, throwing himself into his work to relieve the pain and succeeding only in burying it deeper so that it bubbled away inside him like the lava at the heart of a volcano. All his friends in their turn had tried to reach him, all had been turned away. He was
fine, he assured them testily. He simply had work to do and he would be grateful to be left alone in peace to do it. But as the days and weeks went by and Max became more and more of a recluse Sarah began to fear for his sanity, and she decided that whether he appreciated it or not she must make one more effort to break through the shell with which he had surrounded himself.

  The rest of the rooms in the wing which housed Max’s office had been shut up when his top-secret project had begun – for security reasons it was not practicable to have any number of people wandering in and out of the building. As Sarah opened the front door it creaked from a winter of disuse and a musty smell came out to meet her. A crack of light showed from beneath Max’s door. She tapped and when there was no reply tapped again. After a moment Max called out: ‘Who is it?’

  ‘It’s me – Sarah. Can I come in?’

  She heard him shuffle over to the door and turn the key the door opened a crack, no more.

  ‘What do you want Sarah?’ He sounded impatient.

  ‘To talk to you.’

  ‘No-one is supposed to come in here.’

  ‘Oh for goodness sake surely you don’t think I’ve come to spy on you! Don’t be so silly, Max. Let me in – please!’

  The door opened slowly and she was shocked by the sight of him – thin, pale, his hair standing on end, his collar studs undone, tie missing.

  ‘Very well then. Come in if you must,’ he said grudgingly.

  She went in, closing the door behind her and looking around in disgust. The office was a mess. Unwashed coffee cups littered the desks and floor, overflowing ashtrays gave the air a stale smokey smell. On the window sill, surrounded by several dead flies, was a plate with a half-eaten portion of bread and cheese – the bread looked dry and the cheese had grown a dark sweaty crust.

  ‘For goodness sake, Max! This place is like a pigsty!’

  A muscle twitched at the corner of his eye, making him wink irritably.