a definite rhythm. A bit like a human voice. Like somebody very tiny, shouting to be let out, somewhere deep inside the set. A voice that couldn’t yet get out.
‘Turn coming up, Dadda,’ said Kit. ‘Steer one-o-five . . . now.’ His voice was too loud, making us jump. God, that infernal buzz was like a human voice. If it got any clearer, I’d be able to tell what it was saying . . .
Get a grip, Gary. Or they’ll be writing you off as LMF. You’ll end up in a bin, like Blackham. Or cleaning the bogs, like the poor ex-gunner who thinks he’s a Dornier 217.
‘Fifteen minutes to target,’ said Kit. ‘Hope the PFs aren’t pissed again. I get tired of setting the Black Forest on fire.’
For once, nobody laughed at that good old joke.
‘Oh frigg off, you miserable lot,’ said Kit. ‘Where’s the flaming funeral?’
He shouldn’t have said that. In the stony silence that followed, the idea of a funeral wouldn’t go away. Aircrew bodies fished out of burning crates have shrunk so much, they hardly need coffins bigger than shoe boxes.
‘Watch the sky,’ said Dadda. ‘You won’t be shot down by a buzz on the intercom.’
‘Right,’ said Mad Paul.
‘Right,’ said Billy, a long time after. Billy’s reactions were usually as quick as greased lightning. Hell, this whole crew was falling apart.
There wasn’t one tiny voice talking inside my RT now; there were two, talking to each other. Oh, electronic mush on the air . . . it was always happening. But not when your RT was properly tuned. I played with the knobs again, pointlessly.
‘Five minutes to target,’ said Kit. A dim red light was stealing down the black tube of the Wimpey’s fuselage from the cockpit windows. We began to bounce under the impact of flak and the slipstream of the other bombers. Berlin coming up.
As I played with the knobs, the voices suddenly became audible, just barely audible.
‘Steer two-seven-five. The Kurier is five kilometres ahead of you and five hundred metres above.’ The voices were talking in German. A night-fighter was being homed-in on its courier, or target.
‘Some bugger nattering in German,’ said Kit loudly.
‘Well, he’s not after us,’ said Dadda soothingly. ‘We’re steering one-o-five. Now keep your mind on the run-up.’
So Kit started the old left-left, steady, right-a-bit routine, and for the next five minutes he swamped the German voices. We had other things to worry about.
The darkness after the target is the most beautiful darkness in the world. Dadda checked us one by one. Nobody hurt; no damage as far as we knew. The twin Bristol Hercules droned on blissfully. Take us home, Hercules, great god of antiquity.
But the German voices inside my RT set were still there, louder, quite clear now. If we could hear them, could they hear us? Radio’s a funny thing.
‘Can you see the Kurier yet? He should be a kilometre ahead and fifty metres above you. Still steering two-seven-five. You should see him against the clouds . . .’
‘How dense are the clouds, Kit?’ I asked.
‘What frigging clouds?’ said Kit, his head in the astrodome. ‘Haven’t seen no frigging clouds.’
‘It’s nothing to do with us,’ said Dadda. ‘We’re steering three-hundred.’
‘I’ll just test him out on Monica.’ Monica is another little bag of tricks that Dadda acquired for me. It has a bulb that lights up when a fighter’s tracking you on radar. I switched Monica on, and off again quickly. Monica, lovely girl, said there was nobody on our tail.
But the noise in the RT grew steadily.
‘Can you see the Kurier yet?’
‘Yes, I can see his exhausts. A twin-motored aircraft.’
That made me jump. Wimpeys are the only twin-motors left in the skies over Germany, and there were only thirty or so on this raid.
‘He is about half a kilometre ahead, and fifty metres above me. He has not seen me. I will come up under him and give him a tune on my Schrage Musik.’
‘Some poor soul’s for the chop,’ said Dadda. The Schrage Musik can tear the guts out of a Wimpey before the Wimpey even knows it’s being followed.
‘Nothing behind us,’ said Billy. ‘It’s as clear as day.’
The German voice was now as loud as Billy’s own on the intercom. If anything, louder. It might have been inside the plane with us.
‘I am a hundred metres behind him now, and twenty metres beneath. My guns are cocked.’
‘Anything?’ said Dadda.
‘Nothing,’ said Billy. ‘Not a dicky bird behind us.’ But the voice had infected us all. I