Free Hornet’s Sting by Derek Robinson Page A

report?”
    â€œI regret —”
    â€œWait a moment,” Ogilvy said. “Things may be different in Russia, but here in the Royal Flying Corps, when an affair of honour is settled, we never discuss it. Never.”
    â€œI have nothing to report, sir.”
    When he had gone, Ogilvy said: “Presumably he took a pot at someone, thinking it was me. And missed.”
    â€œHe’d better do better than that when you take him over the Lines.”
    They strolled back to the mess. The first flakes of snow speckled their uniforms. By nightfall the field was white.

Earthquake Strength 3:
    Hanging objects swing
.
    Snow fell, and ended flying. Cleve-Cutler searched for ways to keep the pilots fit. The adjutant suggested bayonet-fighting. “The bayonet is on the rifle,” he explained. “There are certain moves and countermoves. It’s very similar to sword-fighting.” A space was cleared in a hangar, and within the hour two men were being stitched up by Dando. Cleve-Cutler cancelled bayonet-fighting.
    Brazier retired to the orderly room in disgust.
    â€œThey were only puncture-wounds,” he said.
    â€œRather like the Crucifixion,” Lacey said. “And what a fuss people made about
that.”
    â€œYou haven’t the slightest idea of physical pain, sergeant. One of these days I might perforate your hide with a bayonet, just to educate you.”
    â€œYes, sir. You’re strangely interested in mutilating the other ranks, aren’t you? Were you whipped a good deal when you were a child?”
    â€œI was never a child, sergeant. I was issued by the War Office in 1891. You can find the military specifications engraved upon my left buttock.” He put his glasses on and stared at Lacey. Lacey went away to brew some tea.
    Ration wagons trundled up and down the lanes leading to the Front, but otherwise the war virtually stopped. Without aeroplanes and balloons to spot for them, the guns were blind and silent. Brazier hired fifty Chinese labourers to dig a runway across the aerodrome, but snow kept falling. They never gave up, but they made no progress either. The temperature kept falling, too. The ground was iron-hard; trenches were difficult to repair and impossible to dig. “God’s a conchie,” McWatters said to the padre. “He’s decided He’s against this war on religious principle, and He’s gone off to play with the angels.”
    â€œToo deep for me, old man. Very dodgy area, religious principle.Look: which of these cinema films d’you think the chaps would enjoy?”
    McWatters glanced at the list. “Get westerns. William S. Hart, Douglas Fairbanks. Lots of violence.”
    â€œThere’s a rather stirring one about the Battle of the Somme. Don’t you think ...”
    â€œNot violent enough.”
    â€œSurely —”
    â€œGet westerns. Revolvers and brawls and bars getting bust-up, that’s the ticket. Just like a good mess-night party.”
    â€œI suppose you’re right.”
    Next day the padre had to report that the mobile cinema was stuck in a snowdrift, miles away, near a place called Beauquesne. Lieutenant Dash immediately volunteered to go and unstick it. Moving pictures didn’t excite him, but the name Beauquesne did. It was where Sarah Beverley, of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry, lived. Ogilvy asked how he proposed to get there, since he certainly wasn’t taking any squadron transport. Dash said he would ride; at home, in Herefordshire, he’d ridden all sorts of horses. “I’m glad you’re good at something,” Ogilvy said, “since you’re obviously a tenth-rate pilot.” The adjutant phoned a nearby artillery unit and borrowed a horse. It was a huge, shaggy beast, accustomed to hauling field guns over rough country at the hard canter, and it had a mouth like a steel trap.
    Sergeant Lacey fed it carrots while Dash got into the saddle and bunched the