The Great Hall was not as packed as it had been for the great confidence debate — not every Member of Parliament had been able to get back to Oxford over the weekend — but the public gallery, cordoned off from the chamber at one end of the hall seethed with gentlemen of the press.
“I spoke to Her Majesty the Queen yesterday and again this morning. The purpose of these conversations was to keep Her Majesty abreast of fast moving events in the Mediterranean and elsewhere and to place at Her pleasure my resignation…”
Chapter 75
Marija’s emotions were in turmoil. Moments ago Captain Lionel Faulkes, the C-in-C’s Senior Naval Staff Officer had breathlessly pressed through the crowd around her and her husband.
“Your mother and father are safe, Lady Marija,” he had gasped, looking around for Joe Calleja as he recovered his breath. Lionel Faulkes was obviously been feeling his age and Marija had taken his elbow to steady him. It was a hot spring day on Malta, the sort of day native Maltese regard as a balmy and cool demanding a coat or jacket but an Englishman would regard as a burning hot summer day back home. “Your father was slightly injured, a few scratches, nothing more before he took shelter. Your mother is unharmed and bar a few windows blown in their house in Sliema is in one piece.”
Much to Lionel Faulkes consternation Marija had suddenly hugged him ecstatically before wriggling through the throng to find her husband who had been corralled by a cabal of pale-skinned; soon to be sun burnt men from the Oxford press corps. She had burst upon the group with her good news and he had attempted, very painfully on his part to sweep her into his arms.
Now Marija gazed thoughtfully at the RAF Comet 4 — one of four aircraft now loading or refuelling on the freshly laid, sticky back tarmac underfoot — to which she and her beau were making their limping, halting way; he because he could not trust himself to put any weight on his twisted and immobile right leg, she because well, her aching bones badly needed a long, long rest.
“I think I am afraid of flying, husband,” she confessed lowly.
“How do you know, my love?” The man inquired as they struggled closer to the jetliner.
She squeezed his hand, said nothing.
“They say flying in one of these kites,” Peter went on confidently, an act because he had absolutely no happy personal memories or experiences of flying, “is like riding on the wings of a featherbed with four great big engines.”
Marija giggled, recollecting her husband’s tongue-in-cheek horror stories about his short trips in helicopters that he was convinced were about to fall out of the sky at any time, and one particularly harrowing flight in a storm on a transport aircraft whose pilot had mistaken the perimeter track at the Royal Naval Air Station at Yeovilton for the main runway and ploughed to a halt in a field only feet away from a barn.
At the top of the steps to the cabin of the Comet the couple took a deep breath, and looked around at the ruined suburbs that ringed the airfield. They waited while the cameras rolled, Peter with his arm protectively about his wife’s shoulders, Marija with her arm about his waist, both smiling stoic smiles until their faces began to hurt. Nearby two other Comets, another Mark 4 in the livery of British European Airways, and an older, vaguely old-fashioned looking variant were also loading, the one walking wounded and the other stretcher cases on a hoist at the rear of the aircraft while other injured men and women were gently manhandled up the forward steps. Beyond the other Comets a Boeing 707 in United States Air Force livery was disgorging men and women, officers, doctors, nurses and presumably, miscellaneous Central Intelligence Agency spooks onto the apron from its front hatches and general cargo from the rear. Ambulances were starting to queue to transfer more injured and wounded men and women onto the jetliner, which was scheduled, like the three Comets, to return to the United Kingdom later that day.
Peter Christopher had been told that ‘their’ aircraft was a Comet Mark 4C, the long-range version of the fourth generation of de Havilland’s wonder machine of the late forties. The jetliner looked and smelled almost new. Peter had learned that several undelivered Comet 4Cs had been mothballed after the October War and only recently brought into service after the Operation Manna convoys eased the worst of the fuel shortages in England.
The short-range version of the aircraft could carry up to a hundred passengers but this Comet 4 had less than eighty seats. In the end twenty-seven Talaveras and a dozen of Yarmouth’s survivors took their seats in the rear half of the stuffy, humid, somewhat claustrophobic passenger cabin. The front of the compartment filled with VIPs returning to England, walking wounded and several grubby and somewhat worse for wear men who refused to be separated from their cameras and recording equipment — apparently, a Ministry of Information film crew who had been in Valletta at the height of the bombardment — as the Comet’s four Rolls-Royce Avon Mark 524 turbo-jet engines spooled up.
The cabin doors were dogged shut and immediately it was quieter although still just that little bit too noisy to be able to carry on a completely normal conversation without straining one’s voice. Much to their disquiet Peter and Marija had been ushered to seats adjacent to that of the Cabinet Minister returning to England on this aircraft. It seemed Sir David Luce and Mr Airey Neave were returning to England on different flights; somebody back in Oxford having invoked a rule limiting the number of ‘very important’ VIPs who were permitted to fly together on any one flight. Marija had hesitantly moved into the window seat, while her husband had protectively lowered himself into the aisle seat where he could stretch his throbbing, immobile right leg into the aisle. Opposite him Iain Macleod wanted to conduct a briefing on what ‘the order of ceremony’ would be on arrival at RAF Brize Norton.
“I hate flying,” Iain Macleod confessed irascibly.
“Me too,” Peter concurred.
“Everywhere I go the PM insists we fly with the Royal Air Force and the blighters won’t allow a man to smoke!”
The young naval officer refrained from murmuring ‘oh dear, that must be a terrible trial for you, sir,’ and contented himself with a sympathetic smile.
The aircraft jolted forward; Marija gasped and squeezed her husband’s hand with momentarily superhuman strength.
“They’ve just pulled away the chocks, darling,” Peter assured her gently, completely missing whatever it was that Iain Macleod had just said to him.
The public address crackled.
“This is Squadron Leader Guy French,” an insouciant, marvellously relaxed and very, very old-school voice declared. “I have the honour to be captain of this flight to England. May I welcome our Royal Navy guests, heroes one and all onboard Flight Six-One-Seven from RAF Luqa to RAF Brize Norton. I am just awaiting clearance from the control truck and then we shall be on our way. The flight will take approximately five hours. We shall be heading west to get around Sicily and Sardinia without antagonising the locals, then we’ll mosey on up north over the Côte d'Azur, on over the Alps and the Rhineland and turn left for Blighty once we get to the North Sea. Over England we will be flying up the Thames Estuary and passing over London. I don’t honestly know if it is a good sign but parts of the capital looked quite green the last time I flew this route a week or so ago. In the meantime if you would secure all seat belts please. The weather back home is a tad English, I’m afraid. Showery and a little cool for the time of year, I am reliably informed.” The pilot paused. “We’ve just been cleared to take off. I will speak to you again when we are in the air. Enjoy your flight. Pilot out.”