“Gentlemen,” he said. “We thought it was all over. But there is still a certain amount of what the infantry calls mopping-up to be done, and I have been asked to lead a new squadron. It seems that our Russian friends need a hand to help put their house in order.”
He took a sip of water and let the rumble of comments subside. Russia? Wore fur hats and had snow on their boots, didn’t they? Russia. Crikey.
“For those of you who are looking for a complete change of scenery, I recommend northern Russia. We have bases at Murmansk and Archangel. They are on or about the Arctic Circle and both need pilots. If you relish a challenge, this is the place for you. The natives are treacherous, and the enemy — the Bolsheviks — are savages. The cold is brutal. Last month a general took his gloves off to pin a medal on a chap, got instant frostbite, and pinned his own fingers instead. Fact.”
They enjoyed that. Griffin allowed himself a small smile.
“You will live in hovels and share them with lice and fleas. No beer, and the vodka is foul. Nothing can stop your engine oil from freezing. Your pay is good but there is absolutely nothing to spend it on except funerals. Yes, north Russia is a challenge.”
They laughed, and applauded. “What’s he playing at?” Wragge asked Hackett, and got a shrug in reply.
“So, if that’s your meat, I can arrange it,” Griffin said. “Meanwhile I shall be leading my squadron to south Russia, down on the shores of the Black Sea. Climate like the French Riviera. Rich farming country — melons as sweet as honey, cherries as big as plums, beefsteaks as thick as thieves. I don’t care for caviare but maybe you do. You’ll have to sing for your supper, of course. The White Army holds the south. The Red Army wants it. General Denikin leads the Whites. Brilliant commander, splendid patriot, and if Russia has any future, the saviour of his nation. Britain has sent him supplies worth millions of pounds. Our task is simple: we help him duff up the enemy, who are a complete rabble, and we escort his march on Moscow. Oh, and by the way: you’ll get paid one grade higher than your rank for doing it.”
A storm of applause. The adjutant looked around and counted Dextry, Jessop, Bellamy, Wragge and Hackett on their feet, cheering. Good. That should thin out the bloody idiots and make his in-tray lighter.
Two-thirds of the squadron volunteered for south Russia. “I’ll take half,” Griffin told the C.O. “You can keep the drunks and the sex maniacs and the ones who like pulling wings off butterflies.”
“Oh, thanks enormously,” the C.O. said. He began going through the list with a red pencil.
“Is it really true that everyone will get paid above his rank?” the adjutant asked. Griffin nodded. “The only reason I ask,” the adjutant said, “is the squadron hasn’t converted from R.F.C. to R.A.F. ranks. Not totally, that is. Some chaps are captains, some flight lieutenants. What’s the R.A.F. equivalent of a colonel?”
“Don’t know. What matters is each chap gets a bucket of roubles every week.”
“Simpson,” the C.O. said. “Isn’t Simpson the one who wears a corset?” He didn’t wait for an answer. The red pencil thudded through Simpson.
“Roubles, you say,” the adjutant said. “I don’t think we can wait for roubles. Not if you want these officers immediately.” He frowned hard at a mental picture of complex problems. “It’s their Mess bills, you see. I fear they can’t pay them now. In fact I know they can’t.”
Griffin looked him in the eye. Neither man blinked. Each knew that R.A.F. Butler’s Farm wouldn’t have a hope in hell of getting money out of a pilot once he was on his way to south Russia. Each also knew that the red pencil had not yet finished its work. The C.O. became aware of their silence, and he looked up.
“The pity is,” the adjutant said, “sometimes the best pilots owe the most money.”
“How much? To wipe the slate clean?”
The adjutant thought fast. “Five hundred pounds.”
While Griffin wrote a cheque, the C.O. finished his list. “Hackett,” he said. “Australian. Tenacious bugger.” He twirled the red pencil.
“Oh, you’ll like him,” the adjutant said quickly.
“Chuck him in,” Griffin said. “I’ll take him instead of a receipt.” He waved the cheque to dry the ink. “This is War Office money. Cash it fast, before they change their minds about saving the Russian Empire from the Reds. By all reports, the Reds are winning hands down.” He saw the look on the C.O.’s face. “Joke,” he said. “I haven’t the faintest idea who’s winning. A pal of mine at the Foreign Office reckons the Reds are surrounded on all sides by White armies. He’s guessing. Hoping, too, probably. All I know is this bloke Denikin’s running the show in the south and he’s been asking for British squadrons for months.”
“I hope you hammer the Bolsheviks good and hard,” the C.O. said, “After what they did to the Tsar.”
“Dirty work. Mind you, we can’t talk,” Griffin said. “We chopped off the king’s head once. Be sure your chaps are at Air Ministry tomorrow, ten a.m. prompt, drunk or sober. Long journey ahead.”
Long, slow journey.
Griffin had collected about twenty pilots from the best squadrons. The first plan was to send them by train to somewhere in Greece, probably Salonika, and ship them the rest of the way. They got as far as Calais and were recalled. Nobody knew why. Next plan was to put them on a ship in London docks, a Swedish freighter unloading timber. It had no passenger accommodation. Griffin got on the phone to Air Ministry, who called the Ministry of Shipping, who called the War Office, by which time it was raining so hard the spray was knee-high, and everybody went back to their hotels and unpacked. The train plan was revived and this time they got as far as Paris. But several big avalanches in Austria had closed the line to Salonika and they went to Marseilles instead.
The city was pleasantly sunny in the early spring. Lots of bars, open all day and half the night, unlike the tight-laced pub hours in England. Wine was cheap. On the pilots’ improved pay scales, very cheap. The Marine Landing Officer had his hands full with ships taking troops home to be demobilized, but he managed to find berths for Griffin’s party on a small French liner, got them cheap at short notice. Griffin couldn’t round up his pilots fast enough and the ship sailed. It took the M.L.O. a week to get them on board another vessel, an old Mediterranean ferry that called at Nice, Genoa, Naples and Palermo before it limped into Malta with engine trouble. The captain didn’t trust the Maltese repairs. The ship crawled along the North African coast and finally quit at Alexandria. The captain was Egyptian. He felt at home here.
Griffin was due some luck. A Royal Navy cruiser was about to leave for — thankfully — the Black Sea. The pilots slept four to a cabin. The weather was fine; they lived on deck, playing poker, watching the Aegean Islands drift by, guessing their names, getting them wrong. Past Gallipoli (bloody steep, bloody rocky, you wouldn’t want to attack up there, not with the Turks firing down, what a shambles) and the cruiser didn’t stop at Constantinople, which was on the left while most of Turkey was on the right, very confusing.
After that, the Black Sea turned out to be not at all black. “Red Sea isn’t red, either,” Hackett said. “And the Indian Ocean’s green. I’ve seen it.” That started an argument. It was easy to argue with Hackett and difficult to stop. Prove him wrong, and he said: “Yes, that’s what most people think, but most people have brains fifteen per cent smaller than mine.” He went on, dodging and ducking, slipping and swerving. Angering some, amusing others. It passed the time. There was nothing to look at except the Black Sea. Very boring, the sea. All water. Nobody could understand why the Navy got so excited about it.