Pastoral by Nevil Shute Page B

him as navigator. You mean Gunnar Franck.”
    Peter Marshall got back to the ante-room about the same time and ordered a pint of beer. Pat Johnson was there. He said: “Been fishing?”
    Marshall shook his head. “Rode out on the bike to look at a pond,” he said. “I don’t know that it’s any good to me.” He paused and then said: “Did you go round to-day?”
    Mr. Johnson said: “I did a lovely fifth in four.”
    “What did you do the thirteenth in?” That was the hole with the stream.
    “Eleven,” said Mr. Johnson.
    “You’re coming on. Have a beer.”
    The beer came presently. Johnson said: “I’ve got to have a prune with me next trip.”
    “Have I?”
    “Not that I know of. Lines has got the other one.”
    “What’s yours called?”
    “Drummond.”
    Pilot Officer Drummond came into the ante-room soon after that; Johnson called him over and introduced him to Marshall and Davy. Pilot Officer Drummond was young, about nineteen; he was small and dark-haired and pale-faced, with a keen, lively manner. “I say,” he said to Johnson, “I found a razor in my room. What had I better do with it?”
    Johnson said equably: “Give it to Flight Officer Stevens, officer in charge of W.A.A.F.s. She’ll post it on.”
    They gave him a can of beer. “I’m awfully glad they sent me here,” he said. “They were going to send me to Coastal, but I asked for Bomber Command, and they let me change.” He had been for a few weeks at an operational training station.
    Marshall said: “What’s wrong with Coastal? You can have a damn good time at one of those places.”
    The boy said: “Spend all day out over the sea and see nothing but a lot of mouldy ships. No, thanks.” If he had been honest he would have said that he wanted above everything to drop bombs on Germans, but he was not quite so young as that.
    Presently he asked: “When’s the next operation?”
    “Give us a bloody chance,” said Mr. Johnson. “We had one last night. If they take my advice they’ll have the next one about three months from now.”
    “No, seriously. You’ve been doing one every three or four days, haven’t you?”
    Marshall said: “We have for the last fortnight, but we can’t keep that up. All the machines are running out their time. We’ll be laying off for a bit pretty soon.”
    “I hope we have another first,” the boy said.
    “Ruddy little fire-eater,” said Davy. “Don’t let Winco hear him, or he’ll get us into trouble.”
    Presently they went and dined, and afterwards they walked down in the quiet of the moonlit night to the “Black Horse.” Marshall met Mr. Ellison in the lounge bar. “Sorry about last night,” he said. “We had to go out on a job. What’s it to be?”
    The tractor salesman said: “Pint, please. It said on the wireless to-night we raided Dortmund.” He raised an eyebrow enquiringly.
    The pilot nodded slightly. It was not to talk about Dortmund that he had come to the “Black Horse,” but to forget it. He said: “Take you on at bar billiards. Loser buys a round.”
    “All right.” They put in sixpence and began to play as the table started ticking. “I saw Jack Barton about those pigeons, by the way. He said, go right ahead, any time you like.”
    “Fine. You got a gun?”
    Mr. Ellison said: “Sure.”
    “We’ve got a two-two rifle, and I think I can borrow a twelve-bore. What about to-morrow afternoon? A hundred and sixty-six.”
    The other marked it up. “All right.”
    “I’ll have Gunnar Franck and Phillips with me. Nice work—pretty to watch.”
    “ ’Bout three o’clock? Two hundred and forty.”
    “Make it half-past two. It gets dark so early.”
    “Okay. If we have any luck we’ll take a brace along to Jack after. Maybe he’ll give us some tea.”
    “There’ll be four of us.”
    “Ninety. I’ll let him know we’re going out to-morrow afternoon. Maybe he’ll come and join us.”
    Marshall left at closing-time and walked back to the station and