Pastoral Read Free Page B

“None of those bits hit any of the tanks, did they? I was thinking of that just now. I ought to have looked to see.”
    “I looked.” Above their heads, in a bare elm tree, there was a sudden flap and clatter, and a pigeon flew off. They raised their heads to watch it. “I looked, but there was nothing. Only the bomb doors and the belly and the fabric underneath the tail. It is no damage, really.”
    Marshall said: “It was just as you said ‘Bombs away.’ Just after that, wasn’t it? We were running-up too long.”
    “One minute only. Sixty-five seconds. I had the stop-watch running,” said Gunnar.
    “We’ll have to get it shorter. I’d hate to get shot up by the Eyeties. I should die of shame.”
    “Of shame?” The Dane wrinkled his forehead; there were still points of English manners that eluded him.
    The pilot said: “Did you see that pigeon? This place is stiff with them. You haven’t got a gun?”
    Gunnar shook his head. “Sergeant Pilot Nutter, he has a rifle. A little gun, his own. Two-two.”
    “Bring it out with you next time you come and let’s see if we can’t get one or two. They’re bloody good eating, pigeons.”
    “O—oh, yes. Pigeons is ver’ good eating. In my country we eat many pigeons.”
    “Well, see if you can lay your hands on that gun, and let’s have a crack at them.”
    “The farmer—it will be all right?”
    “I’ll see the people at the mill and see if they mind. They ought not to. I’ll race around the mess and see if I can borrow a shot-gun. It’s a good thing to shoot pigeons. They eat the crops. It says so in the paper.”
    “Perhaps the farmer does not read the paper.”
    “Get that rifle, anyway.” The pilot wound the last of the line back smoothly on to the reel. He raised the little rod above and behind his head and flicked his arm; the plug went sailing out into the stream smoothly and with no effort.
    “Nice,” said Gunnar. He stooped to the bag and picked out a reddish, translucent plug bait. “I think this one will be the best.” He pointed to the shallows and the backwater between beds of reeds. “There is the best place for a pike.”
    The pilot said: “Too weedy and too shallow.” He paused. “Do you think we could get the run-up a bit shorter?”
    “I will try.”
    Marshall reeled the plug in to his feet and drew it dripping from the water. “I’ll try telling you the evasive action that I’m going to take, down the intercom. Each move, so that you know what’s coming. And you can tell me which way to bias it. We’ll have to waltz into position before levelling off.”
    “It will be ver’ difficult,” said Gunnar doubtfully.
    “We’ll have a stab at it to-morrow on the flight test.”
    “Okay.” The Dane picked up his rod. “Now I will catch a roach for tea.”
    Marshall called after him: “Don’t forget about that rifle.”
    Gunnar raised his hand, and the pilot stood watching him for a moment as he went away down-stream between the trees in the dappled sunshine. He was a damn good chap, Marshall thought. That matter of the tanks—Gunnar never missed a thing. He’d probably get his roach all right.
    Marshall turned back to the pool and began casting.
    A quarter of an hour later he rested again, thoughtful. There might be something in what Gunnar said; pike liked sunny spots and sometimes came into quite shallow water. He did not think he could cast in among those reeds without catching his plug and losing it eventually; still, if it wouldn’t catch a fish what good was it to him? He cast the lame mouse up the backwater into a shallow swim between green beds of weed and drew it fluttering towards him. Was it his fancy, or was there something following behind the bait?
    He cast to the same place a second and a third time, without result. Then he changed to the reddish plug that Gunnar had advised, and made an experimental cast or two out into the rough water of the pool. Having got his length he cast again to the same