The Challenging Heights by Max Hennessy Read Free Book Online

and the midges almost unbearable, once more the feeling of being cut off prevailed. With the better weather, football matches were played between the men and the officers, and the officers and the NCOs, but it was unwise to go into the town where the Germans were in large numbers, arrogant and domineering and spoiling for a fight. Mail was slow arriving and out-of-date newspapers turned up only when a ship appeared. When they did, the news for the airmen was electrifying.
    Hatto whirled round, his eyes alight. ‘Great Ned,’ he yelled ‘They made it!’
    ‘Who made what?’
    ‘The Atlantic! It’s been flown!’
    ‘It has? Who by? Hawker?’
    ‘No, he came down fifteen hundred miles out. The Americans. A whole squadron of flying boats going by the Azores. They shed aircraft with every step but they made it! One of them landed at Lisbon.’
    ‘That’s one in the eye for the people who said it couldn’t be done.’
    Hatto’s eyes were still glued to the newsprint. ‘There are others preparing in Newfoundland, too. A whole crowd of them. Somebody’s bound to do it non-stop now the Americans have shown the way.’
    The news made them feel more than ever isolated. The flying was monotonous and they rarely saw enemy troops and never another aircraft, though they heard from agents that now that the White Russian campaigns in the south had collapsed, the Bolsheviks had brought north machines which had been flying on that front.
    When Orr returned he brought news received by wireless from the Navy.
    ‘They’ve done it,’ he announced. ‘Non-stop Newfoundland to a bog in Ireland. Jack Alcock and a chap called Brown. With a Vimy. It could carry six tons for almost twelve hours and they’d fitted extra tanks to give them a range of 2440 miles.’
    The mess was noisy with the celebrations but behind the merriment they were also all aware that flying, even the world, had changed abruptly. With the Atlantic crossed in one hop, they knew that from now on flying must be regarded as having a future. If it had come to adulthood in the forcing house of the war in France, it had come of age with this new feat. Aircraft were no longer the toys of airminded sportsmen. They had joined ships and trains as a reliable form of transport.
    They had finally decided that the personal request for Diplock was either going to bring no response or that Diplock had managed to fight it off when bombs arrived – not very many and not very big ones – and with them orders to use them on Bolshevik gunboats patrolling the Dvina.
    In poor flying weather with a lot of low stratus they found the Bolshevik gunboats – sleek black vessels more like motor boats than anything – heading down the Dvina in the direction of Riga and, circling in worsening weather, they dropped their bombs. One of the boats ran aground and ended up partially capsized, while the other, sprayed by machine gun fire, turned and bolted for home. The return fire from the banks was heavy however, and to add to their misery as they swung round to head back for Libau it began to rain.
    As they landed with the rain coming down in squally flurries out of a leaden sky, Orr appeared.
    ‘I’m glad you’re back,’ he said. ‘You’ve arrived just in time to pack your bags.’
    The capering stopped at once. ‘Where are we going, sir?’ Hatto asked. ‘South?’
    ‘Yes,’ Orr said. ‘The Empire’s falling apart elsewhere and we’re needed. It seems the Government’s having second thoughts about this part of the world. Especially now the White Armies are on the run. A destroyer’s taking us home.’
    Hatto grinned. ‘Just think,’ he said. ‘Duty free gin.’
     
    Because the Letts had no pilots and because under the Armistice agreements of 1918, the Germans weren’t allowed to have any aeroplanes, they solemnly pushed the DHs together and set fire to them. Nobody was very sorry and they stood watching as the column of black smoke coiled into the sky. On Orr’s barge,