Any Instructions? (3/5) By Denis Price

(1/5), (2/5), (3/5), (4/5), (5/5).

He nodded back gratefully and sat down at the receiver and adjusted his earphones. The Scot was a good bloke, he often did babysitting for him with the only proviso that he had free reign of the kitchen once the kids had nodded off. Any grub was better than that crap served in the Mess. With earphones insulating him from his immediate world and nothing but the muted hiss of the ether in his ears, he looked around the room. The Daily Telegraph crossword race was in full flow with the usual participants frantically attempting to scribble their way into some obscure record book.

Two others, proudly known to all as the fascist bastards were avidly reading their newly arrived Readers Digest and no doubt, he thought, absorbing the My dog taught me how to pray type of anecdote. There would be yet another telling of how President Kennedy with his Ich bin ein Berliner speech, announced to thousands of Berlin's amazed inhabitants that like them, he too was a doughnut, Berliner being the name of a local pastry. Losing interest in his surroundings he began twiddling the dial on his receiver, strictly forbidden, it broke the monotony of many a long night of low activity.

A sudden tap on the shoulder snapped him out of his reverie as the Scotsman motioned him to remove his earphones, he spoke, 'We've got a couple of Yanks coming over so show 'em what we can do. They want to listen in on one of their aircraft.' He nodded in acquiescence. This wasn't unusual, there was often a duplication of work with the two allies but in spite of the Brits' limited resources the quality of their intelligence was known to be high. This could be useful as the vagaries of signals reception made duplication useful.

When the visitors arrived he recognised one of them, a Sergeant he'd met before on a joint exercise. Of Ukrainian immigrant parentage, British security would have viewed him with total horror as anyone with relatives in the Warsaw Pact countries wouldn't even have reached the Personal Vetting stage. It's a funny business, he thought wryly, he'd known a few listener applicants who'd been rejected because of their Eastern European background. It seemed that the Yanks with their totally immigrant society could cope with this even if we couldn't.

The Sergeant's companion was a black officer. He cut a diminutive figure in his voluminous nylon and fur parka, smoking incessantly as he nervously paced the room glancing at his watch and checking it against the clock on the wall. From his position the listener's eyes swept the room and assessed the activity. Something's up, he thought. Nervousness does communicate itself, it's not just the Yanks being here - although on a night with bad flying conditions what the hell is one of theirs doing up? He decided to ask and waved at the Scotsman. 'Is there something we should know?' He said quietly.

The Scotsman answered, 'Yeah, I was going to tell you all anyway, one of the Yanks' Canberra's is on a probing flight, seems it's had engine trouble, it's trying to get back'. So that's it, he thought, a probing flight into enemy airspace also known as a minor cross border incursion. Supposed to be just enough to stir up a hornets nest on the other side and generate some activity.

The Yanks did a lot of this; it was an airborne extension of signals intelligence gathering. Ostensibly the flight would be to legitimately check and calibrate navigation beacons. It would allow license to stray into Soviet controlled airspace, or that was the hope. The watch commander and the American officer had disappeared into the office leaving him to chat to the Sergeant.

Continued...Next Page

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