“First intelligent thing I’ve heard all week,” Silk said.
The barman did his stuff, and they moved to a booth. “Have you got a problem, Silko?” Freddy asked. “Apart from needing a bath, that is.”
“Bath.” Silk pulled open his shirt and took a sniff. “Bit ripe. That’s Africa for you. Took a DC-3 to Angola, the buggers blew it up. Hell of a bang.”
“So I heard. Occupational hazard in Air America, isn’t it? They won’t dock your pay.”
“You know about…” Silk did more damage to his Scotch. “How do you…”
Freddy waved it away. “Not important. So what’s your big problem?”
“Zoë. Marriage is on the blink, Freddy. We never meet. I’m always…” He gestured, feebly, with his left hand. “And when I get here, she’s always..” An equally weak gesture with his right hand. “See? We’re income…” He yawned, hugely. “We’re income…” He thought hard. “Patible. That’s the problem.”
“I may have a solution, Silko.”
“No, no, no. Can’t be done. I’m no good unless I fly, and if I fly we never meet. It’s holy deadlock.”
“No such thing,” Freddy said. “I have the answer.” Silk stared. As Freddy watched, he saw Silk’s eyes go out of focus. “Drink up, old chap. I’ll drive you home. We’ll sort it all out tomorrow.”
KICK LIKE AN EARTHQUAKE
They met again at the Reform Club.
Silk had slept at the Albany apartment. He’d taken a long bath and had a haircut, and now for the first time in years he was wearing a dark suit, a white shirt with a cutaway collar and a dull tie, polished black shoes. He’d never been to the Reform Club and he was taking no chances. “I feel like a Harley Street pox doctor,” he said.
“Wrong club.” Freddy looked at the crowd of members near the bar. “Try the RAC. Now then: we haven’t much time, I should have been in Bonn half an hour ago…” He checked his watch. “They’ll just have to start without me. Here’s my idea. You rejoin Bomber Command.” Freddy had a confident smile. “Solves all your problems.”
Silk scratched the back of his neck; barbers never got rid of all the bits. “Rejoin,” he said. “You’re the one with the problem. Your bowler must be five sizes too small. I’m thirty-eight, Freddy. Bomber Command doesn’t want me. Never did. They tolerated my funny ways, that’s all. Rejoin now? I wouldn’t get past the commissionaire. He’d chuck me in the gutter along with the rest of the garbage.”
“So you say. But I think I’m in a better position to judge.”
Silk stared at him. Freddy had put on a few pounds and his hair was silvering gently at the temples, but there was something more than that. He had a calm and steady gaze that Silk always associated with ranks of group captain and above. “Better position? What’s your racket?”
“Air Ministry. I’m the tenth assistant deputy director as you enter on the right. Bomber Command’s changed, Silko. Even you must have heard –”
“Yeah. Big jets. Doesn’t change me. I’m still thirty-eight.”
“So what? We’ve got bomber captains who are over forty.”
It took a few seconds for Silk to take in that information. “Thank God for a navy, is all I can say.”
Freddy took a photograph from an inside pocket and gave it to Silk. It was a close-up of a four-engined jet bomber taking off. “Vulcan,” he said. “I don’t know how many Lancasters we made for the price of one of these, forty or fifty, certainly. This is a very valuable aeroplane. Air Ministry isn’t going to give it to some slap-happy twenty-two-year-old so he can hedge-hop across the Cotswolds and fly under the Clifton Suspension Bridge.”
“Nobody’s that crazy.”
“Aren’t they? You were. I can remember looking out of the navigator’s window and seeing the church steeples go by.”
Silk was silent. His shoulders were hunched and his mouth was compressed. Painful memories. Painful because he could remember the happiness of living a blink away from death.
“Forget it, Silko. That was then and now is now,” Freddy said. “Air Ministry is looking for serious, mature aircrew with big flying hours, counted by the thousand. We want great experience, proven flying skills, self-discipline, balance, solidity. Good health, obviously.”
“All right,” Silk said cautiously. “Suppose I did a tour. I see more of Zoë, but when the tour’s over you post me to Hong Kong. She won’t live in Hong Kong.”
“It’s a five-year tour. All part of the policy. We keep the same crew together, on the same base, for five years. Think of it. Bags of flying, and Zoë nearby, for five long years.”
Silk studied the photograph. “Big beast, isn’t she?”
“Handles like a Spitfire with twice the speed, and one sortie can do more damage than the whole of Bomber Command managed in the entire war… Now I really must go.”
“What are those engines?”
“Bristol Olympus jet turbines. Twenty thousand pounds of thrust each. Noise like a volcano. Kick like an earthquake. Don’t get up. The Vulcan leads the world, Silko. Think of that. And Zoë, of course.”
“Tell me one thing.” Silk said. “If it’s so damn special, how come you need new crews so badly?”
“A couple of bad prangs,” Freddy said. “And the odd suicide. We’ll talk tomorrow, shall we?” He strode away.
It was a long and strenuous medical. First he met the Chief Medical Officer, a wing commander. “I don’t smoke, I drink the occasional beer, and I swim half a mile every day if I can find a pool,” Silk told him. “No venereal disease, and no insanity in the family.”
“All pilots are slightly mad,” the CMO said.
“Not this one.”
“Well, that’s what you said once. It’s down here, in your records.” He held up a typed page. “Must be true. Take your clothes off.”
All day, men in white coats tested his health and strength, his stamina and resilience. They made him toil at a series of machines until his legs cramped and his lungs burned and sparks raced across his eyeballs. They measured his reactions. They looked deep into his eyes and ears and throat. They seemed obsessed with his blood pressure and his pulse. Finally they said he could get dressed. “Thank God that’s over,” he said.
“It’s only just begun.”
They strapped him to the end of a centrifuge forty feet long, and spun it at increasing speeds until his eyes greyed out and finally blacked out.
“G forces,” he said. “Tremendous fun.” They said nothing.
Next day began with sea survival training: several hours, dressed in flying kit, with or without a lifejacket, in an indoor pool where artificial waves fought to keep him out of a rubber dinghy. Then – wet, cold and hungry – he was put in a flight simulator. Nobody told him that the controls and the instruments were all reversed. To bank right, you had to steer left. The altimeter revolved the wrong way. Green meant red. Ten years with Air America’s mongrel fleet helped Silk here. He adjusted rapidly, even when some hidden bastard pressed a switch and reversed the reverse. It was a game. They tired of it before he did, and sent him to the decompression chamber to see how his heart and lungs liked going up to and coming down from great height. That was definitely not fun; but he came through it, went back to the white coats, gave blood and urine samples, even had a cup of tea and a biscuit. “What did I score?” he asked.
“Score? There is no score.” Which made him think.
Next day was very relaxed. A few x-rays, some hearing and eyesight tests, a good lunch, a long wait in a room where the armchairs were comfortable. An army officer came in: a colonel, fiftyish, red moustache, three rows of medal ribbons, clipboard. “Milk?” he barked. “Flying Officer Milk?”