Blackbirds Page 18

  “What happened to you?”

  “Let’s get you out of there first and worry about explanations afterward.” He opened the canopy and helped her release her harness. In his haste to get her out, his hand brushed against her breast.

  “Oi, I hardly know you.” Sharon began to giggle. “After a little slap and tickle, are we?”

  “You must be going into shock. Come on! Stand up. I’ll help you get down.” Michael steadied her with his hands. He guided her right foot outside the cockpit and down to where the wing strut and undercarriage met. When she went to step on the concrete apron, her right leg shook. He grabbed her under the armpits and set her on the ground.

  My knees feel a little weak. She looked down at her thigh and the bloody stain there.

  “Let’s get you to the infirmary,” Michael said.

  Sharon stood up and shrugged him off. She limped toward the tower. “First things first. I need to pee.”

  Sharon winced when the doctor tugged the syringe out of her thigh.

  “Give that a minute or two, then we’ll stitch you up.” The doctor wore a white lab coat. He had very few hairs on his head, except those growing out of his nose, ears, and eyebrows.

  “Were you in the last war, Doctor?” Michael stood near the door with his arms crossed over the front of a jacket stained with his blood.

  A redheaded nurse of about twenty-five handed him a square of white gauze. “Hold this on the wound, and I’ll get you cleaned up.”

  The doctor said, “I spent three years in the Great War.”

  Sharon looked at the doctor’s weary eyes. I think I’d prefer it if the nurse stitched me up.

  “Don’t worry, young man. I’ll take good care of your girlfriend,” the doctor said.

  Michael blushed.

  I kinda like the sound of that, Sharon thought.

  The doctor washed his hands, dried them, then picked out a suture. “Ladies first.” He began to work on stitching Sharon’s thigh.

  The nurse asked, “How did you get the nick on the head?”

  Michael said, “Sharon was avoiding a Messerschmitt. It attacked, and she turned us upside down. I was holding on for dear life, but not well enough to stop my head from banging against the frame of the cockpit.”

  “What happened to the Messerschmitt?” The nurse held Michael’s hand against the wound on his forehead with one hand and efficiently wiped the blood away from his face with the other.

  Hey, get your hands off of him! Sharon thought.

  Michael looked at Sharon. “She flew him right into the ground. He blew up.”

  Sharon felt a tug at her thigh. The lips of the wound were coming together.

  “Should only take ten or eleven stitches,” the doctor said. “In case you’re wondering.”

  “That’s all?” Sharon asked.

  “I could do more, if you like. It looks like a piece of shrapnel ripped open your leg and the flight suit.” The doctor smiled. “The cut is long, but not too deep, fortunately.”

  “No, it just seemed. . .” Sharon said.

  “When you can’t see how badly you’re hurt, your mind can play tricks. By the looks of your clothes, you’ve been soaked in sweat.” The doctor straightened up. “You’re done. Now it’s time to repair your boyfriend.”

  Sharon looked at Michael. “You need to phone Honey suckle.”

  Michael frowned.

  “Who’s Honeysuckle?” the nurse asked.

  “My mother,” Michael said.

  “She’s been very worried,” Sharon said.

  “By all means, you must phone,” the doctor said. “There’s one in the room just down the hallway.”

  Michael shook his head.

  “What the hell are we playing at, then?” Sharon asked.

  “What do you mean?” Michael asked.

  “Perhaps we should leave and let you two sort things out,” the nurse said.

  “Do what you like!” Sharon kept her focus on Michael. “Are we together or are we not?”

  “We haven’t really discussed that,” Michael said.

  “We are discussing it now. So what is it? Are we or aren’t we?” Sharon swung her feet onto the floor.

  “We are. It’s just that there are other people’s lives at stake. There are rules I’m supposed to follow. People who I need to report to.”

  “If I followed the rules, we wouldn’t be here having this conversation. You’d still be in France.”

  “You don’t know what I know about the war. You don’t know what information I have to pass on to my superiors.”

  “Of course I don’t, but you can still make a phone call to your mother to let her know you’re safe.”

  Michael looked exasperated. “Yes.”

  Sharon limped to the door. “I’ll make the call while you get stitched up.”

  As she walked into the hallway, she heard the doctor say, “She’s a bit of a handful.”

  Michael said, “She’s that, all right.”

  “I hope you’re not going to let her get away from you,” the doctor said.

  “No. Definitely not.”

  “Good man,” the doctor said.

  Sharon smiled as she made her way down the hallway to the phone.

  She sat down in the chair behind the desk and began to dial. Her hand was shaking. It took three tries. Finally, the phone was ringing at the other end.

  “Hello?”

  “Honeysuckle? It’s me, Sharon.” Fatigue was a cup of warm milk filling her up.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. Michael is here. He’s fine as well.” Sharon closed her eyes.

  “You sound tired,” Honeysuckle said.

  “I am. I just wanted you to know that we’re okay.” Sharon hung up.

  After Michael was tended to, he found her there, snoring with her head cradled on her elbow, dead to the world.

  CHAPTER 28

  [ JANUARY 1941 ]

  “I’ve noticed that other people will talk about the fact that you’re an ace. Yet I’ve never heard you mention it.” Mother sat across from Sharon inside the White Waltham dispersal hut.

  Sharon shrugged. She wore her fleece-lined Irvine jacket with a pair of coveralls underneath and still couldn’t stay warm in the damp British cold. Give me a cold, sunny January day on the prairies anytime.

  “It was the same after the last war. Most often, the ones who were in the thick of it didn’t want to talk about it. While the ones who never got near the front line talked like they’d fought and won the war single-handedly.” Mother picked up a chit and waved it at Sharon. “This delivery is a bit unusual.”

  “How’s that?” Sharon reached for the paper.

  “You’re to report to Salisbury Hall.”

  “Where’s that?” Sharon took the chit.

  “Northwest of London. If memory serves, Salisbury Hall has an actual moat.” Mother winked.

  “You’re joking!”

  “Not a bit of it. By the way, how’s Sean?”

  “Fine. I get a letter almost every day. It sounds like he’s fitting in. I miss him, of course.” Sharon felt the tears brimming.

  “That brings up another matter. You’ve been granted a week’s leave, starting the day after tomorrow.”

  “Thank you, Mother!” Sharon stood up, reached across the table, and hugged him.

  “Let me finish.” Mother’s ears were red from blushing.

  Sharon released him.

  “We’ll set up a delivery for you somewhere near Ilkley. You deserve a leave after the battle and all of the replacements you’ve delivered since then. You’ve been going non-stop. And we know, as do many of the pilots, that you did more than most.”

  Sharon frowned. Linda gave more than I did.

  “I know, you’d rather it be kept quiet. Still, there are many of us at the flying end of things who know what you did. And, just between me, you, and the wall over there, that order for you to go to Salisbury Hall comes from the top.”

>   Sharon cocked her head to one side. “You mean d’Erlanger?”

  Mother nodded. “You always were a quick study. Can I conclude that d’Erlanger knows what you did?”

  He does indeed. “Can I fetch you a cup of coffee?”

  “Ah, an abrupt change in topic. I’ll take that as a yes, then?” Mother put his forefinger to the bridge of his nose and winked at her.

  “No flies on you.” Sharon smiled. “Do you want a bloody cup of coffee or not?”

  “No, thank you. Better be on your way.” He pointed in the general direction of the airfield. “Douglas just finished his walk around on the Anson.”

  “By the way, what happened to Roger?” Sharon asked.

  Mother’s eyes narrowed. “Drank himself into another kind of work.”

  Sharon grabbed her gear, went out the door, and strolled to the Anson. The leather of her flying boots was wet with last night’s rain and this morning’s dissipating patches of fog.

  Douglas was strapping himself into the pilot’s seat of the Anson. She tossed her gear in the rear door and climbed in after.

  “Good morning, Sharon. We’re off to Salisbury Hall.” Douglas adjusted a throttle and flipped a switch.

  “Anyone else off to exotic locales this morning?” Sharon sat down and strapped herself in just aft of the wing spar.

  “Just you. A quick hop for me, then off to Duxford.” Douglas opened his side window. “Clear!”

  One propeller began to rotate. The engine coughed, then caught, and the propeller disappeared into a blur.

  Douglas started the other engine. He glanced over his shoulder. “All secure?”

  Sharon checked her harness and looked back to make sure the rear door was closed and latched. She nodded at Douglas.

  The flight to Salisbury Hall took less than half an hour. Sharon looked down as Douglas passed over a two-storey manor house that looked to be half as big again as Lacey Manor. She spotted a twin-engined aircraft. It had black spinners and black tarps covering most of a yellow paint scheme. I’ve never seen an airplane quite like that before.

  After Douglas landed, dropped her off, and departed, Sharon dodged puddles as she made her way over to the hangar for a closer look at the yellow aircraft.

  A soldier pulled his rifle off of his shoulder and held it across his body. “Stand and be recognized.”

  Sharon stopped. Not this again.

  “It’s quite all right!” Gerard d’Erlanger stepped out of the hangar, followed by a pilot in a black flight suit who was unfamiliar to Sharon. “She’s with the ATA. She’s expected. My fault. I should have given you advanced warning.”

  The soldier put his rifle back on his shoulder and turned his back on them.

  “Sharon Lacey, this is Geoffrey,” d’Erlanger said.

  The other pilot, with the unruly hair and a ready smile, offered Sharon his hand. “A distinct pleasure, Miss Lacey.”

  She shook it. “Thank you.” That’s the best I can come up with? Thank you?

  “I’ve suggested that Geoffrey here take you up for a flight in a new aircraft that is being tested and will soon be on the front lines. A word or two from Geoffrey in the right ear will go a long way to opening up all types of aircraft to ATA pilots such as yourself,” d’Erlanger said.

  “Gerard tells me you’ve done quite a variety of flying during the recent battles, and that you’ve had some rather unique experiences.” Geoffrey smiled.

  What is he smiling about?

  “You do understand that what we are about to do is covered by the Official Secrets Act.” Geoffrey stopped smiling to accentuate the sobriety of his announcement. “It’s important that we keep knowledge of this aircraft secret before it reaches active service.”

  Sharon nodded. What have I gotten myself into now?

  “All right, then, first things first. Follow along as I take you through the preflight check.” Geoffrey walked toward the aircraft.

  D’Erlanger walked in the direction of a nearby building, leaving Sharon next to a puddle of water. She followed Geoffrey, who stood under the nose of the aircraft and looked up through an access door. He propped a ladder up against the inside of the hatch. “We’ll begin at the nose.”

  He’s very methodical, very thorough, Sharon thought as he walked her around and underneath the aircraft. “What’s it called?”

  Geoffrey walked to the narrow ladder under the nose and held it steady. “I think it will be called the Mosquito.” He indicated with his right hand that she should climb aboard.

  Sharon stepped on the bottom rung of the ladder, climbed, and squeezed through the narrow opening, then crawled onto the floor of the aircraft. She stood up under the generous canopy. The aircraft smelled of wood and fresh paint.

  Geoffrey’s head popped through the opening. “Sit in the pilot’s seat, please.”

  “What?”

  “You didn’t think we brought you up here just to watch, did you?” Geoffrey elbowed his way up through the opening and sat down beside her in the observer’s seat. “Get strapped in. I’ll talk you through all of the bells and whistles, and we’ll see if you’re as good as Gerard says you are.”

  After he explained the Mosquito’s personality and remarkably few foibles to her, the aircraft was towed out to the taxiway. She started up first the right engine, and then the left. He talked her through the preflight checks. The power of the paired Merlin engines launched them on takeoff. Sharon focused on her instruments as they climbed through the solid overcast, then above it, into a white glaring wonderland at twenty thousand feet. She yelled with pure exhilaration at the thrill of it, the absolute joy as she sat between those two powerful engines where the forward visibility was remarkable. When she checked the airspeed, her jaw dropped. This thing is fast! Their hour in the air was over in what felt like ten short minutes.

  After the landing and shutdown, Sharon followed Geoffrey across to his office, where d’Erlanger was talking on the telephone.

  D’Erlanger hung up. “Well? How was the flight?”

  Geoffrey said, “There’s no problem here. I think that you understated Miss Lacey’s abilities as a pilot. High-performance aircraft are her forte.”

  D’Erlanger nodded.

  There was a knock at the door. It opened, and a tray arrived with a teapot, cream, sugar, and three cups.

  After the batman left, d’Erlanger poured the tea, sat, and curled his fingers around the china.

  Sharon added cream and sugar, then sat down.

  Geoffrey sat down to complete the triangle.

  Sharon took a sip. This isn’t at all bad.

  “There are a number of new aircraft that are about to become available to the RAF and the Navy. As a result, we will need someone to fly them, oversee the manuals for other ATA pilots, and provide assistance where necessary. Are you interested?” d’Erlanger asked.

  Sharon frowned. “Are you offering me a new job?”

  “And a promotion, actually. Quite frankly, you’ve earned it,” d’Erlanger said.

  “When do I start?”

  D’Erlanger smiled. “You have a week’s leave coming up?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your orders will be waiting for you when you return to White Waltham.” D’Erlanger took another sip of tea. “The RAF is going to experience tremendous expansion, even more profound than what we’ve already gone through. We have new aircraft to deliver and we need people to train the pilots who will fly them. And” — he glanced at Geoffrey — “there are still those who believe that women are not up to the work. You will help prove the naysayers wrong.”

  She frowned. I’m to be a poster girl for the ATA?

  Geoffrey said, “Before you begin to think you’re some kind of propaganda tool, think again. We need pilots whom young women will look up to, and who will teach them the skills they require to stay alive.”

  Later that evening, Sharon sat down for supper in the White Waltham mess. She stared at a plate of mutton and beans. Her stomach groaned.
She looked up at the other tables. Two tables away sat a pair of women a few years older than her. A dark-haired woman talked behind her hand and lifted her chin in Sharon’s direction. The blonde looked at Sharon, frowned, and turned away.

  In a moment, all that had happened in the past months filled her mind with a collage of impressions complete with scents, sounds, and sights. Linda, so excited about flying a Spitfire, then crash-landing her burning aircraft; the stink of her burning flesh. The first encounter with her father, and his death. Bullets from her guns falling into the cockpits of enemy bombers that exploded when they hit the ground. The sight and scent of blood dripping from the chin of her Spitfire. The exhilaration that came with surviving combat. Touching Sean’s hand for the first time, then leaving him with Honeysuckle. It was at that moment that her mind began to process what she saw, what she felt, what she heard, and what she knew in a slightly yet significantly different way.

  It’ll be interesting leading people like this. After what I’ve been through, why be afraid of them? She stood, took her plate, and sat across from the two women.

  “I don’t know your names. Perhaps we could introduce ourselves?” Sharon looked down at the mutton, the marbled fat and the grey flesh.

  The pilots looked at one another.

  Sharon could see the sheen of sweat on the blonde’s forehead. “Which one of you knows my uncle, Marmaduke Lacey, and his family?”

  “How did you know that?” the dark-haired woman asked.

  “I’ve met my uncle. I know how he operates. Hopefully, you will never have that pleasure.” Sharon got up, left her food, and walked outside, where she could watch the blackbirds chattering, swooping, and diving. She stayed there until the sun set, then went home and got dressed for her date.

  CHAPTER 29

  Sharon took a breather after walking two miles along the A660 roadway heading northwest toward Ilkley. Sean, Linda, Honeysuckle, and — if no pressing emergency delayed him — Michael would be waiting at the Townsend Farm. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to surprise them. About eight hundred feet above her, the blue-grey clouds promised rain. She hefted the twenty-pound duffel bag. Its rope was rubbing a groove in her right shoulder. She was glad the bag was all that would fit in the luggage compartment in the back of the Spitfire she’d delivered to Leeds.