Unable to keep the cradle aloft any longer, the remains of the balloon flapped and guttered, streaming ineffectually above them as men and cradle now hurtled down. They skimmed across the treetops, the drub of branches and leaves against the bottom of the cradle sounding like sticks against a railing.
“Brace yourselves!” shouted Everson.
Atkins hunkered down into the cradle as best he could. He looked at the wan faces around him. Eyes met his, the unspoken communion of the soldier about to go over the bags: “We’ll be all right,” “Stick by me,” “See you in the Hun trenches.” But they all knew it was every man for himself.
The cradle hit the canopy with a crash and capsized.
Atkins’ world tumbled, like a broken kaleidoscope, a whirl of limbs and wattle, of green, russet, khaki and daylight.
Boughs slammed into his limbs and trunk, knocking the wind from him as he fell, buffeted and pummelled from bough to branch, towards the ground as he dropped through the trees. Thick broad leaves slapped and scratched him. He plummeted through an angry buzz of insects, sounding like the whine of bullets, hands and face stinging as he passed through. For a brief, blissful moment, as if in the eye of a storm, all sensation ceased.
A flare of heavy floral scent burst around him. Perfume. He thought of Flora. Lily of the Valley. Oh, Jesus, Flor–
Atkins slammed into the ground.
NELLIE ABBOTT HELD up a hand, halting the rest of the tank crew. Underneath her short mop of unruly hair, her nose wrinkled and her brow creased with concentration.
“What is it, Miss?” asked Cecil.
Irritated, she flapped her hand in his direction. “Shh!” she hissed, a little more harshly than she had meant to.
Cecil flinched like a scolded puppy.
Above the rustle of the leaves and the faint rush of water, a distant purr caught her attention and held it, as no other sound could.
Wally cocked his head and listened.
He sniffed. “An engine,” he said.
“Two,” corrected Nellie. “Aeroplanes.”
“Two?” said Jack. “Are you sure? But we’ve only got the one.”
“Well, there are two now,” said Nellie, her mood defiant.
“Friend or foe?” asked Reggie.
“I don’t know,” she said thoughtfully. She looked up at the sky, shielding her eyes and squinting against the glare.
Ablaze and drifting down over the crater, the kite balloon was hard to miss.
She soon spotted another smaller balloon, higher and partially hidden by the smoke from the first, drifting in the same direction.
Above them, she saw what she was looking for, the small shapes spiralling higher and higher. She could just make out Tulliver’s Strutter, but the other – was that a Hun? Her eyes widened with surprise before her forehead scrunched with doubt. But how?
By now, the others had gathered around her and the air filled with theories and observations.
“There’s men up there,” said Reggie, pointing at the balloon.
“It’s a Hun observation balloon,” said Wally. The bantam cockney driver clenched his fists, and his lips contorted into a snarl.
It was spiralling down rapidly into the crater. It was going to come down not a quarter of a mile away. She felt a surge of pity for the men trapped on it. The smaller, higher balloon was sinking too, but that would come down further away.
“Where the hell have they come from?” wondered Jack.
“Perhaps it’s a way home!” suggested Norman.
Nobody spoke out in agreement, but nobody would gainsay it.
Nellie felt a blossoming of hope in her breast at the words. Home. Could it be?
There was only one way to find out.
A PALL OF smoke stained the air above the trees. Expecting Germans, the crew of the Ivanhoe approached the crash site cautiously.
“Stay by me,” Jack told Cecil in a low voice, as he drew his Webley.
The young lad stepped closer, his eyes darting about as if he expected picklehaubed Fritzs to leap from every bush.
Norman and Reggie watched their flanks and Wally. Wally wasn’t to be trusted around Germans. It was frightening that such a little man could have such a fury bottled up within him. They didn’t want him killing them before they got whatever information they needed.
Nellie wasn’t happy about bringing up the rear.
“I can kill if I have to,” she told Jack, petulantly.
He studied her face.
“I don’t doubt it,” he said. “But we’re soldiers. It’s what we have to do.” He bent his head and spoke quietly. “You shouldn’t kill unless you have to. Knowing you’ve killed a man changes you.” He tapped his chest. “Inside. It breaks something in you. Something that can’t be mended. Bad enough it has to happen to lads like Cecil; I wouldn’t want that to happen to you. I don’t want that on my conscience,” he said. He straightened up and added firmly, “You’ll stay in the rear.”
Nellie had no answer and relented. This was one area where she was relieved to forego responsibility. The weight of the revolver in her hand began to feel like a poisoned chalice, but she gripped it firmly nevertheless.
Ahead, somewhere through the undergrowth, there was a sound like a groan. Jack held his hand up and the rest of the party crouched down. He signalled the crew to spread out in a skirmish line, then stood and, looking right and left, waved them on with his revolver.
LIEUTENANT EVERSON LAY dazed against the bole of a tree, a large lump forming on his forehead, waiting for the world to stop spinning and his body to stop hurting.
The last thing he expected to see was Nellie Abbott walking out of the undergrowth with a look of shock on her face.
“Lieutenant Everson! What happened? How did you get here?”
He looked up and saw the coverall-clad tankers beside her. “The crew of the Ivanhoe, I presume,” he groaned. “Don’t you salute a senior officer?”
Jack shrugged. “Generally not, sir. Mr Mathers said it usually gets ’em shot.”
“And where is Lieutenant Mathers?”
“Gone west, sir.”
While not a shock, it was unwelcome news. There were precious few surviving officers as it was without losing another.
“Then who’s in command here?” he asked. The men looked sheepish.
“I guess that would be me,” said Nellie, stepping forward in her coveralls.
Now it was Everson’s turned to look shocked. “You?” he said. He looked to the awkward tank crew. “You’re taking orders from a woman now?”
Nellie’s eyebrow arched.
Reggie intervened. “Begging your pardon, sir. We were in a bit of a state for a while, the fumes from the tank engine and all that. Some sort of neuralgia. We weren’t quite ourselves. Miss Abbott saw us right. Showed us how we’d let Alfie down. We owed it to him, to find him, sir. We only did what was right. Orders or no orders, right is right. We were on his trail when we came across you.”
“We saw you come down. How on earth did you end up in that thing, Lieutenant?” asked Nellie.
Everson’s tone hardened. “We arrived at the crater. You weren’t there,” he said. “We were captured by Zohtakarrii and escaped in a captured observation balloon.”
“So there are no Huns?” said Wally, disappointed.
“No,” said Everson. “Well, one. I expect Tulliver’s on his tail this minute.”