Bomber. Len Deighton

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СКАЧАТЬ was only sky. The horizon had dropped out of sight like a spent hoop.

      ‘Flaps up.’

      ‘Flaps up.’ Battersby closed the flaps and there was a grinding sound as they slid back into the wings.

      ‘Cruising power.’ Battersby didn’t move the throttles with the considerate slowness that an airline check captain would approve. He altered their position with an abrupt indifference that slowed the forward speed with a jerk and changed the roar to a lower tone.

      The nose dropped a trifle. The Lancaster assumed its flying stance.

      ‘Just one round the garden,’ said Lambert. It was a way of telling Cohen that he wouldn’t need fixes or navigation for the short trip.

      There was a click as a microphone was switched on. ‘It’s meat pie,’ said Digby from the front turret. He should have been behind Lambert on take-off but he preferred to be in front and Lambert didn’t mind. ‘But late lunches will probably have potato cheese.’

      ‘Skipper,’ said Binty Jones from the top turret, ‘is that glycol on the port inner?’

      Lambert looked out. He was fond of this aeroplane. Seen through this aged Perspex, the world was not bright and new but ancient and yellowed like parchment. Polished a thousand times, the windows had become a delicate optical system that edged the landscape with haloes and made of the sun a bundle of gold wire. He looked at the engine-covers. Battered by riggers’ feet and chunks of ice, there was around each panel screw a white calligraphic crosshatching of screwdriver scratches. From the exhaust dampers came a blue feather-like jet of flame. Its heat had baked the oil spill upon the cowlings. Like antique enamelware the dark-brown stains shone with a patina of deep reds and rich greens. Above the exhaust pipes upon the matt paint of the engine-cover there was one shiny patch. It was catching the bright afternoon sunlight and gleaming like a newly minted penny. Battersby also glanced at it briefly, then turned back to his panel. He was determined to do his job by the book, better than Murphy even.

      ‘Fuel pumps of all tanks off,’ reported Battersby. ‘No warning lights.’

      ‘A coolant leak can be real big trouble,’ said Binty, always a Jeremiah.

      ‘What do you think, engineer?’ asked Lambert.

      ‘It’s just an oily footmark,’ said Battersby. ‘I saw the rigger do it. I should have had it wiped, I’m sorry.’ He didn’t turn away from his panel.

      Lambert looked at the mark again: it was the shape of a rubber toe. He tapped Battersby on the arm so that he looked round. Lambert grinned at him. The white-faced engineer was relieved not to be reprimanded.

      ‘That generator behaving, Batters?

      ‘Perfectly, Skipper.’

      Digby was full-length in the nose watching the sunny landscape slide under him. He switched on his intercom. ‘Skipper, did they tell you what it’s going to be tonight?’ As always when Digby was trying to wheedle something his accent had become more nasal, drawing each word to its fullest possible extent like soft chewing-gum.

      ‘Yes, thanks,’ said Lambert. He leaned to his right and bent his head low to watch Digby’s reaction.

      ‘Come on, Skipper,’ said Digby looking back to him. ‘Give us the gen.’

      ‘It’s Hamburg,’ volunteered Jimmy Grimm the wireless operator. ‘The Orderly Room WAAF told me. The blonde job’.

      ‘Big deal,’ said Binty scornfully from the upper turret. ‘Who told her, the Groupie last night in bed?’

      ‘Skip,’ coaxed Digby. ‘I’ve got the calculations to do. I should be told.’

      ‘It’s a five-tank job: 2,154 gallons,’ said Lambert.

      Squinting into the hot sun coming through the nose panel Digby nodded. Lambert continued, ‘The whole Squadron is bombing the shit out of Adelaide.’

      They all heard Binty’s catcall of joy even without his intercom. ‘That’s the one, Skipper,’ said Flash Gordon from the rear gun turret.

      ‘You pom bastards,’ said Digby cheerfully.

      ‘Sticky beak,’ said Lambert. It was one of Digby’s favourite insults.

      Jimmy Grimm hunched lower at his table under the racks of radio equipment and grinned. He was sending the favourite operator’s test signal: ‘Best bent wire best bent wire best bent wire’. Who knows who first invented this strange phrase with its jazz-like rhythms, known to RAF operators and Luftwaffe monitoring services alike?

      Lambert began a gentle turn. Under the banked wing the green countryside tipped slowly forward like a child’s soup plate waiting for a spoon. The Great North Road was black with traffic: long military convoys and civilian lorries lumbered slowly down England’s ancient spine.

      Lambert looked at the dazzling blurs made by the air-screws and superimposed them as he juggled the throttles. Watching the stroboscopic effect enabled him to synchronize the engines. Lambert noticed that Battersby was looking at him. He grinned. Then he ruined the harmony and pointed to the throttles for Battersby to try.

      Binty heard the motors go out of synch suddenly and said, ‘What’s the matter with the motors?’

      ‘Nothing,’ said Lambert. ‘Battersby is handling the controls.’

      ‘Then let me off,’ said Binty.

      ‘Don’t be a fool,’ said Lambert. ‘It’s better that he should know as much as possible.’ There was a fearful silence.

      North-west of Huntingdon the countryside changed suddenly. No more weatherboard houses and thatched cottages, now yellow-brick dwellings and rusty sheds. Windswept allotments full of caterpillar-nibbled cabbages, shallots, wire fences and old cars propped on wooden blocks until petrol supplies returned. Here the fields were brightly coloured: light yellow, gold, green potato fields and bright blue ones full of cabbages.

      Round came the flat angular fens and the Ouse through which had waded Angles, Saxons and Jutes. Danish Vikings too had plundered this land and left their names upon the map. The circle of Bourn airfield came into sight and around it the hovering flies that would be with them tonight.

      Godmanchester: unmistakable, two Roman roads like spokes in its central hub.

      ‘Another Lanc ahead,’ said Digby. It crabbed along, the wind pushing it askew. It was not of their squadron. Nor was it a training flight from Upwood OTU or Woolfox Lodge. Lambert looked at the strange Lancaster. He tried to see it anew as though he had never seen a Lancaster bomber before. It was a brooding machine; thirty tons of it. Even counting motors and turrets as one and excluding nuts, bolts and rivets there were fifty-five thousand separate parts. Over three miles of electrical wiring, generators enough to light a hotel, hydraulics enough to lift a bridge, radio powerful enough to talk to a town on the far side of Europe, fuel capacity enough to take it to such a town, and bomb-load enough to destroy it.

      Lambert held his speed. It was just enough to close distance inch by inch. Is this the view a fighter pilot will have just before pressing the button that will blow them all into eternity? Tonight? The prim red, white and blue roundels on the plane ahead were symbols of Britain. Its brown-and-green СКАЧАТЬ