Kruze’s whole body tingled with excitement. The power was phenomenal.
Concentrate, man. He had forgotten to jettison the wheels. He pushed the selector forward and felt the Komet jump again as the heavy undercarriage dolly fell the fifty feet to the ground. One more check of the instruments told him that he had a hundred per cent boost while he was still over the airfield.
He thought of the stuffed shirts from the Ministry who were gathered below and Staverton’s last minute, somewhat awkward, instructions that they should leave Farnborough impressed. Climbing rapidly, he swung the aircraft towards the west.
As the noise of the rocket motors receded, Staverton glanced at the other delegates to gauge their impression of the take-off. Welland, the most influential of the party, seemed more interested in the final resting place of the take-off dolly, which had bounced its way into a thicket on the other side of the airfield. Deering pulled his fingers out of his ears, with a look of mild irritation on his face, as if a child had just exploded a firework nearby. Staverton turned back to the part of the horizon where he had last seen the Komet and swore softly. He had hoped that Kruze was going to beat up the airfield.
Deering walked over to Staverton and tugged him by the arm. They strolled over to the edge of the runway, safely out of earshot of the others. Staverton looked back and saw Welland walking their way with an expression on his face that told him his verdict was already prepared for delivery.
“Damn noisy machine,” Deering said. “The Russians would hear something like that coming a mile off, wouldn’t they?”
Staverton resisted the temptation to raise his voice. “George, as I tried to explain before, with Kruze going at high speed and low-level, they wouldn’t have a clue until it was too late. As the Komet approaches the target the sound wave would be a mere two or three seconds in front of the aircraft itself. It would give them no time to react.”
Deering looked at Staverton. “I’m not so sure I like the idea. Besides, this thing was designed as a fighter, wasn’t it? How is Kruze going to have time to learn how it operates as a bomber?”
Staverton felt his control of the situation slipping away. “Kruze is already familiar with the aircraft’s on-board bombing aids. The Komet uses much of the same equipment as the Messerschmitt 262, which he flew extensively here at Farnborough.”
Deering nodded. “The 262 is their jet fighter-bomber, isn’t it? It’s supposed to be quite a machine.”
“That’s right.” Staverton shifted uncomfortably. He had set the trap up for himself.
“Then why don’t we use that for the operation?” Deering asked.
“We can’t,” Staverton said, watching the approach of Welland out of the corner of his eye. “The 262 suffered a bad mid-air engine failure. We lost the aircraft.”
“You lost it? One of the things I did pick up at the briefing this morning was that rocket power is inherently more dangerous than jet power. And now you’re telling me that you lost the jet fighter because of engine failure.”
“It’s not quite as simple as that, George,” Staverton started.
Deering cut him off; Welland was almost upon them. “Look, Algy, I wanted to support you in this, I wanted it to work. Much as I hate to admit it, perhaps the Admiral’s right. We drop an assassination team into Czechoslovakia instead.”
Staverton crashed his fist into his open palm. “At least do me the courtesy of waiting until the test’s over.”
Welland confronted them. “Too noisy, too dangerous, too risky,” he said briskly. He drew breath to deliver the death blow, but never even began the sentence. His eyes caught a slight movement behind Staverton, somewhere on the edge of the airfield. Suddenly the Komet was upon them, so low, that in Welland’s split-second of awareness, he thought it would destroy them all. He threw himself to the ground, his warning to the others drowned by the deafening sound of the Komet’s engines as it flashed overhead.
On the other side of the airfield, flying at just over fifty feet, Kruze pulled the control column hard back. The Komet sat on its tail and blasted through a gap in the wispy clouds, leaving a vertical column of fire and smoke behind it.
Staverton bent down and offered Welland his hand. “Of course it’s dangerous and risky,” he said, a trace of a smile on his lips, “but a rocket fighter’s only noisy once it’s gone past you, Admiral.”
The Admiral took his hand and was pulled to his feet. He tried in vain to find the Komet in the clear blue sky between the clouds, but Kruze was already far away, heading towards the North Wales coast and the Irish Sea beyond, where he would put the rocket fighter’s range and endurance to the test.
“Rather than stand around and hear my apologies,” Welland said, “I suggest we all go back to London straight away. I’m going to support this low-level bombing scheme of yours to the PM, Staverton, so you’d better start getting down to the nitty-gritty at once.” He adjusted his cap. “Congratulations,” he added. “You were right. I just hope you can organize this thing in the few days we have left.”
They headed for their separate staff cars. Staverton managed to catch Fleming’s eye and stabbed a finger in the direction of the car park. At least by the end of the journey he would have enlisted some extra help in his crusade against Archangel.
From the tiny window of his attic room in the safe house maintained by Military Intelligence down a narrow alley in Shepherd Market, Herries could see a vignette of London life that a few days before he had never expected to see again. Directly below, a queue had formed outside a shop which had just taken delivery of fresh vegetables. An old lady at the front of the line seemed to be having difficulty in finding her ration card, but no one seemed to mind as she fumbled myopically inside her bag for the elusive document. Ah, the patience of the English, Herries thought.
The iron bars which hindered his view did nothing to dampen his elation. If they had made him a prisoner since his arrival in London, at least he had the status of a highly prized captive. A doctor had treated the last traces of his dysentery and the questioning had been very civilized. They wanted him alive. They were co-operating and behaving like gentlemen, which was more than could be said for those ignorant squaddies who had tried to beat the shit out of him in Pilzen.
The key rattled in the door of the cell. When it was pushed open, Herries recognized the silhouette of the MI 6 colonel who had interviewed him until the early hours of the morning. He could readily detect the distaste that the man felt, but it had never openly manifested itself in taunts or insults.
White-Smith pulled a chair up to the table in the middle of the room. He motioned for Herries to sit down.
“I hope you’re not going to keep me here much longer, Colonel?”
“Oh?” White-Smith looked with disdain at the ill-fitting suit that Intelligence had given Herries on his arrival in London.
“I made a deal,” Herries said. “I gave you the biggest bloody military secret of the war and now I expect to see you start honouring your part of the bargain.”
White-Smith lit a cigarette, but did not offer the pack. “Do not push us too far, Herries.” He did not look up. “Agreements made in time of war have a nasty habit of turning sour.”
“Then perhaps I should remind you,” Herries snarled, “that you need me if you stand any chance of stopping Archangel.”
“Why? We have the charts and the plan. What more can you do for us?”