Bomber (4 page)

The four aero-engines screamed with the effort of lifting the heavy bomber up towards the edge of the stratosphere and as they climbed and the plane banked slightly in a turn Harry noticed how the sky above grew darker blue as they edged towards their maximum height of thirty-five thousand feet.

It was strange up there. Too high for birds and certainly no place for a human being. The cool, clean oxygen Harry was breathing kept his head clear and he maintained a steady watch, slowly rotating his turret through its 360 degrees. Sometimes it was difficult to keep up the watching, staring into infinite nothing. But Harry was keenly aware that this was the first flight they were making where they might meet with an enemy fighter. For the first time they were in danger of being killed in action.

He noticed a few wispy cirrus clouds drift by below and watched the engine exhausts leave four fluffy white trails against the blue sky as they ploughed through the stratosphere. Despite the cold and discomfort, he couldn’t help feeling this was a magical place.

When they got back to Kirkstead, Holberg gathered his crew round and congratulated them on a successful flight. Then he announced he had got them all a day pass to
Kirkstead for tomorrow. There was a ‘jumble sale’ he told them, and a fête with a cake baking contest. It would be their first immersion into British life.

‘Sir, what the hell’s a jumble sale?’ asked Jim Corrales.

‘You better make sure you read your
Servicemen’s Guide to Great Britain
,’ said Holberg. ‘I’m sure it’ll all be “jolly nice”.’

They all smirked, but Harry went back to his bunk and read that very manual. A jumble sale, it said in the glossary, was a rummage sale.

For the crew of the
Macey May
, Saturday morning had the makings of a perfect day. A crisp dawn, ham and eggs for breakfast, and a leisurely shower before they all assembled in their best dress uniform – the one they wore for parades and other formal ceremonies.

But that morning was also the bomb group’s first mission since Schweinfurt. As Holberg and his crew strolled towards the village, they stopped to watch the active service crews take to the sky. The squadron was still under-strength from its usual twelve after the disaster of Schweinfurt, and they counted ten planes taking off. The
Macey May
crew weren’t supposed to know, but it was no secret that this was a short mission over to the Charleroi steel plant in Belgium.

Ralph Dalinsky spoke to Holberg. ‘It don’t feel right, us going out to enjoy ourselves while the bomb group is off over enemy territory, sir.’

The captain just shook his head. ‘We’ll be up there with them soon enough, Sergeant, so just enjoy yourself while the sun is shining.’

Kirkstead was only a few minutes’ walk from the base and they arrived to find a crowded church hall, full of bustling bargain hunters and the tables already half empty. Seeing Harry’s disappointed face a stout elderly lady in a floral dress hooked her arm around his. ‘Rule number one of jumble sales, young man: get there early. This one’s been open for nearly an hour.’

She was the first English person who had spoken to him directly, and all of a sudden Harry felt tongue tied. He had expected the Brits to be frosty and polite, but she was just like his grandmother back in Brooklyn.

‘Thanks for the advice, ma’am,’ he said politely.

‘Now, what are you looking for?’ she asked with a twinkle in her eye. ‘I’m on the committee. We can’t buy things – people would say we earmarked all the best goods. But there’s nothing to stop me helping you find something nice.’

Harry told her he was hoping to find some mementos for his mother and father. They fell into easy conversation, and Harry began to relax. His new friend introduced herself as Mrs Gooding and offered to show him around the fête. ‘Everyone is so glad you boys are here with us,’ she told him, patting him on the arm. ‘The world was a frightening place when we were facing Hitler alone.’

They walked outside into a large field where trestle tables had been set up beneath the shade of several large oaks. One table contained a display of cakes and biscuits together with the names and addresses of those who had baked them. ‘Look out,’ said Mrs Gooding. ‘Here comes trouble.’

A bird-like woman, of similar age to her, approached the table with a small entourage of other elderly ladies. ‘She’s the cake judge. Shows no mercy. The others in the WI are terrified of her.’

‘Excuse me, ma’am – WI?’ asked Harry with a tilt of his head.

‘Women’s Institute. It’s an organisation for ladies who don’t have anything better to do,’ she said with a chuckle. ‘I’m the local chairwoman.’

Harry and Mrs Gooding watched the judge from afar. Assisted by her entourage, she took minute slices from the offerings, tasted them and wiped her mouth with a little lace handkerchief. Then she wrote a small comment on each of the name tags attached to the cakes.

Harry was enjoying this immensely. It was just like observing a newly discovered tribe and their arcane rituals. His brother David, a lanky, bookish kid, had wanted to study anthropology at Columbia University and he had often told Harry about the rites and ceremonies of obscure South American or Micronesian tribes.

‘We’ll come back in a moment,’ announced Mrs Gooding, and steered Harry over to the bring-and-buy stall. ‘You might find something here,’ she told him, gesturing to a table of ornaments – vases, glass animals and little statuettes. ‘I must go and circulate.’

It was the perfect place and Harry quickly found a brass horse’s head for his father and a little china tableau of a basket full of flowers for his mother. He was sure they’d love them.

‘Let’s see,’ said the elderly gentleman on the stall, ‘seeing as you’re having the pair, let’s say one and six.’

Harry got out his wallet and pulled out two pound notes, hoping the man would be honest with his change. He was aware that this was a fortune for two small ornaments, but he was sure they were valuable. Besides, there was little else to spend his money on.

The man was looking astonished. ‘Blimey, I can’t change that. Haven’t you got any coins on you?’

‘What seems to be the problem, Mr Reece?’ It was Mrs Gooding, come to rescue Harry. ‘One and six,’ she explained ‘One shilling and sixpence. Put all that money away, if you don’t mind.’ She reached into her pocket and paid the stallholder.

‘You can pay me back later,’ she said to Harry. ‘Now I’d like to buy one of those cakes.’ She directed him over to the cake stall.

On the way there John Hill called over. ‘Hey, Harry, who’s your lady friend?’

‘You’re an impertinent young man,’ said Mrs Gooding with a twinkle in her eye. Harry could tell she wasn’t really offended.

‘We’re off to buy a cake. You coming to join us?’ said Harry, quickly introducing his friend to Mrs Gooding.

She looked him up and down and smiled. ‘Come and observe the British art of cake judging. It’s not for the faint-hearted.’

The judging had finished and the table was surrounded
with a flock of women of all ages, keen to see what she had written. There was laughter and suppressed howls of outrage. John, Harry and Mrs Gooding began to read the judge’s comments.

These are the worst scones I have ever tasted. 0/10

Texture fine, but too dry. 3/10

Sickly. 4/10

Lardy. 1/10

A fine balance of sweet and tart. 8/10

‘I’ll have that one, before someone else has it,’ said Mrs Gooding, pointing to the plum cake that had met with the judge’s approval.

‘Now, why don’t you both come home and help me eat the cake with a nice cup of tea?’

Mrs Gooding lived in a small white house close to the church hall and sat them down in her garden on a couple of deckchairs. She brought them tea and two generous slices of plum cake.

The cake was quite as delicious as the judge’s comments had suggested and reminded Harry of the cakes you could buy at the deli at the end of his street. He felt a stab of homesickness. John was beginning to doze off in the early afternoon sun, so Harry carried their cups and plates back inside and kept Mrs Gooding company while she peeled potatoes for her evening meal.

‘Grandma, there’s a strange man in the garden! Have you been rounding up American airmen again?’

Harry turned around, startled. The voice belonged to a petite girl now standing in the kitchen doorway.

‘Here’s another one!’ She gave him a winning smile, and put out a hand for him to shake. ‘Tilly Tait,’ she announced, and gave a little curtsy.

Harry guessed she was somewhere in her late teens. She had a shock of wavy blonde hair and a delicate pink complexion, and Harry thought she was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen.

For the second time that afternoon he was lost for words, and to his horror he began to blush.

‘Let me guess,’ she said. ‘You’re a new arrival at Kirkstead.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he managed to say, and gave her an awkward salute. ‘Sergeant Harry Friedman, United States Army Air Force.’ Then his mind went completely blank. He wanted to tell her how much he liked her green dress, but he thought that would be too corny.

Mrs Gooding came to the rescue. ‘Tilly is my granddaughter, as I’m sure you’ve guessed. She’s staying with me.’

‘Our house has been requisitioned for some of your top bods at the base,’ Tilly said. ‘Mum’s working in London, Dad’s off in the navy, so I’m here.’

John picked that moment to come in. Despite the fact he had only just woken up, John was a lot more self-assured, introducing himself and making small talk with an easy charm Harry envied.

‘The cake was delicious, Mrs Goulding, thank you,’ he
said. Harry felt pleased he’d got her name wrong. He didn’t want Tilly to like him instead.

John spoke again. ‘Come on, Harry. We’ve got to get back to the base.’

They said their goodbyes and Tilly gave John what Harry hoped was a polite but indifferent nod. Turning to him, she lit up with a bright smile. ‘Goodbye, Harry. See you again.’

The sun still shone brightly in the sky, and they walked back down the country lanes in high spirits. ‘She’s a peach,’ said John, ‘and she likes you, you lucky son of a bitch!’

Harry could feel himself blushing again. He wasn’t going to tell John, but he didn’t know a great deal about girls.

The sound of aero-engines reached their ears. ‘They’re back,’ said Harry, grateful for the opportunity to change the subject.

In moments the sky filled with the sound of returning bombers. No one crashed as they landed and they could see no flares from approaching aircraft indicating seriously wounded men in need of urgent treatment.

Ten had taken off that morning and a quick tally of the planes as they weaved round to take their positions in landing formation revealed all of them had returned.

John Hill squeezed Harry’s elbow. ‘Look at that! All of them made it back. Maybe we’ll survive after all.’

As August turned to September, their time in training began to drag. There was a seemingly endless succession of lectures on aircraft identification, gunnery tactics, formation flying and the intricacies of the B-17’s hydraulic and electrical systems. Harry could see how it was all supposed to be useful, but he was beginning to think his brain couldn’t take any more.

Harry also began to realise that there were certain men it was best to avoid. They were easy enough to spot – the shaky ones with frightened eyes; and the ones who seemed to delight in putting the wind up the new boys – like the two older guys, Gus and Lenny, who sat with Harry and John one time in the mess.

They were in their mid-twenties maybe, both gunners, recently transferred from Rattlesden. They spent the whole meal swapping gory stories about crews who had been killed on missions.

‘That Fort that crashed here back from Schweinfurt, the one that landed with its wheels up,’ Lenny said. ‘Heard the belly turret gunner got trapped in that little ball …’

John interrupted. ‘Hey, fellas, leave it, will you? We saw that plane crash as soon as we got here.’

‘You a ball turret gunner?’ Gus asked Harry with a smirk.

He guessed they probably knew his position on the
Macey May
and were just trying to make him crack. He tried not to let them bother him, but what he’d heard put him off his food.

‘Strawberry jelly,’ Lenny said, with added sound effects to drive the point home. ‘Ya wouldn’t get me in one of them ball turrets.’

Harry and John got up to leave soon afterwards. As they walked back to their hut, Harry felt a wave of despair as he thought about how small his chances of survival actually were. ‘Do you think anyone does their twenty-five missions?’

‘Those creeps in the mess got to you, didn’t they?’ John said, and put a hand on Harry’s shoulder. ‘Not everybody dies in a bomber that goes down – don’t ever forget that, Harry. They parachute out. Why d’you think they give us those talks about escaping? It happens all the time.’

Their Nissen hut was still half empty, which suited them. It would not be filling up until more new crews arrived. For the moment, they had nearly as much space as the officers. But Harry was spooked by the empty beds on the other side of the aisle. He realised the bunk he now lay in had been previously been occupied by a man who was now most likely dead.

He could imagine his predecessor, a young man from Idaho, or San Francisco, or Maine, staring at the underside
of the bunk above, a stranger in a strange land, having the same anxious nights as him. Had that guy wondered what fate awaited him? You’d have to be made of stone not to. He wondered whether he’d been killed by flak or cannon fire from a Nazi Messerschmitt, or that newer one, the Focke-Wulf … or maybe he’d been trapped in a burning Fortress as it plunged to the ground. You only died once, but as an aviator there were a thousand ways to die.

As they got ready for bed, John tried to lighten the mood. ‘Tell you what, boys, when all this is over, I’ll cook you all a coq au vin at the fancy restaurant I’m gonna be workin’ in.’

‘After the garbage they give us in the chow hall, we’re gonna be ready for it,’ said Dalinsky.