A Hundred Thousand Dragons by Dolores Gordon-Smith

Author:Dolores Gordon-Smith [Dolores Gordon-Smith]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Severn House Publishers Ltd
Published: 2010-05-01T04:00:00+00:00

TEN

It was incredible, thought Jack, that outside the window, the birds still sang and the lawnmower still clattered over the grass. He was in Hesperus, where he had fled to once before, wounded by Von Erlangen. Sitting in Uncle Phil’s homely library, in a sagging armchair, with a friend beside him, was like a second homecoming, an echo of that first. The solid reality of the present – the library, the books, the smell of cigars, the worn leather armchairs and, most of all, Arthur’s concerned face – grew, forcing the stomach-churning terror of the past back into yesterday, back into the sealed-up vault of the over-and-done-with.

Only it wasn’t over and done with.

Arthur Stanton let out a deep breath. ‘Bloody hell, Jack, I had no idea you’d been through anything like that. Why on earth didn’t you tell me before?’

Jack didn’t answer for some time. ‘I was ashamed,’ he said at last. ‘And then . . . Quite honestly, I forgot. I got posted to France and no one knew. I didn’t want to remember, of course, and, after a time, it stopped being important. You know what it was like in France. We lived from minute to minute. I didn’t have time to go over the past and I certainly didn’t want to.’

‘Yes,’ said Arthur. ‘I can see that. What happened after you’d pinched the Dove? Did you get back to Petra?’

Jack nodded and, getting up, lit a cigarette. ‘Yes, I got back to Petra. I remembered where Craig marked the petrol dump on his map and filled up the plane. The B.E.2c was still there but it was badly choked with sand, so I set fire to it, rather than let the enemy have it, and stuck with the Dove. I managed to start the engine by putting the throttle to tick over, which is not something I’d do for fun. I stowed as much fuel as I could in the observer’s cockpit and managed to get back to Ismailia with only one stop.’

He gave a humourless smile. ‘Believe you me, it’s no joke flying what’s virtually a bomb back over the desert, knowing that any bright lad on our side would take a pop at what seemed to be some demented enemy pilot flying flat, straight and very slowly into British territory. The only thing that got me through was that it was night. Still –’ he thrust his hands into his pockets, – ‘I made it. I’d been given up for dead, of course, and when the euphoria was over, I had to explain what happened.’

Arthur winced. ‘A Board of Inquiry?’

‘That’s the one.’ Jack walked to the window and looked sightlessly on to the terrace. ‘What counted in my favour was that I’d made such strenuous efforts to get back. The Dove spoke for itself and so did my previous record. I was pretty young, too. I was only just seventeen. I’d fudged my age to get in.’

He turned and looked at Arthur. ‘They liked that. It showed evidence of keenness.

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