“Lock up and set the alarm for us, will you Alan?”

“Sure,” I said, chuffed to be asked. I had been a full member of the Newton Gliding Club for two years now, since the day Woody sent me solo. This summer I had learnt to find and soar thermals, towers of warm rising air that on a good day can carry a glider two miles high. Next month I was booked on a five day cross country course, the promised land of gliding. My progress wasn’t meteoric, like the bright young things who came straight up from school and soloed in a week, but it was gratifyingly sufficient to attract the odd sour remark from the old chestnuts. “It’ll all end in tears.”

It had been another good day, clean dry air straight in from the polar region combined with continuous hot sun soaking the fields. Ideal conditions for strongly unstable convection, or ‘stonking good lift’ to the gliding fraternity. At the end of such a day, we’d normally sit out on the patio drinking beer watching the sunset, happy to listen to the old wags and the ones that got away. Today, disappointingly, everyone seemed to have something better to do and had rushed off early.

I drank my beer, finished a packet of abandoned crisps and carried the dirty glasses to the sink. While the sink filled I gazed out over the airfield. The club house had been built on the site of the old control tower and had the best view. The sun was squashed on the horizon with only the windsock still picked out bright orange in the deepening gloom. Dark clouds were massing to the south. The windsock stirred suddenly, signaling the arrival of the expected warm front from the south west.

I punched the code 294, chosen after the American bomber group stationed here during the war, locked the door and walked round to the patio. The grass field in front of the patio bore a large shallow depression. It was said that when they left the yanks bulldozed a huge hole and buried their spares here – cockpit instruments, canon, even brand new engines. “Why not dig up a momento for the club house,” I had suggested. There had been a quiet lack of enthusiasm.

I found my old sit-up-and-beg propped precariously against the wall. I had always preferred to cycle the two miles home, whatever the weather. It seemed to round the day off properly. Besides, while its mechanical repair was a standing joke round the club, nobody was above borrowing it to run out to the active runway when necessary.

I cycled slowly along the peritrack towards the main entrance which we shared with a neighbouring farm and reflected on the day’s flying. When I’ve had a good day I like to try fixing it somehow in my memory and now I was reluctant to just head home and start the postponed chores. A sudden gust caught me off balance and the bike wobbled towards the apron for runway 26. I let it follow the gentle sweep onto the runway and stopped to look down the near mile of tarmac.

The sun had set now and the crest of the runway silhouetted against a cherry red sky as a channel of light carved into the horizon. This was the main runway Liberators bombers would have used with prevailing westerly’s. I imagined them taxiing bumpily around the field, halting briefly at the threshold while the crew completed their final checks, then the engines would scream under full power and they’d start lumbering down the runway. I rode down the edge fascinated by the channel of light.

At a thousand yards the runway intersected runway 19. They’d be fully committed now, with only 400 yards of strip left and still another 20 knots to find. Now the crew and ground staff would hold their breath, no matter how old or bold they were. A slight error or mechanical fault and you had twenty five tons of fully laden bomber with nowhere to go and going there at 95 knots. The runway crested gently down now, yielding up a final five knots ex gratis, a final good luck and Godspeed for the crew. They’d be clear now and climbing steeply, banking slightly left to clear a field defense bunker.

A figure detached itself from the blackness and loomed up suddenly in front of me. He must have been just as startled as myself for he checked and backed off a little onto the grass. As I pulled up I could see he was a young lad, almost a kid, probably one of a gang who came here late at night to thrash their Hondas.

“Excuse me, Sir. I’ve lost my group.” He spoke with a lazy drawl. “We clipped something on finals and ground looped. The rest of the crew are dead, Sir.”

We stood for a while peering at each other through the gloom, while I wondered how the scene would resolve itself into normality. Maybe it was all a big joke got up by the club at my expense, some sort of initiation caper. Maybe he really was a USAF pilot and had crashed. Surely I’d have heard of it? He could be in shock. Eventually I decided, as I normally do, to play for time and see what happened. If he was genuine, he’d be looking for help not trouble. If he just a kid clowning about, he’d bolt off in a fit of giggles sooner or later.

“Better come with me. What’s your name?”

“Flight Lieutenant Swanski, 294 group, Sir.”

I led the way back to the clubhouse without a word.

I unlocked the door, disabled the alarm and flicked on the lights. I was slightly unnerved somehow not to find the entire club membership waiting in the darkness. I headed for the kitchen without turning to look, giving him every chance to run, and myself time to think. I filled the kettle and routed about in the fridge for something to eat. Bring him back to normality. Get him to eat and drink, and talk.

When I came out with some coffee and sandwiches the lad was propped up erect in a corner apparently asleep. I started when I noticed that his eyes were wide open and almost totally white, just a hint of a blue iris showing under his upper eyelid. I stumbled against the low coffee table leg. To my relief he opened his eyes normally again.

He sipped his coffee and ate a sandwich. Without warning he began to recount the flight in tremendous detail. New battery emplacements, fighters engagements, squadron casualties, target damage estimates, new equipment assessments. I had the impression he was being debriefed so I started making notes. I lost track of time. Suddenly it seemed he was winding down. I started to panic, thinking he’d finish before I could frame the one question I knew I had to ask.

“Thank you Flight Lieutenant Swanski. Please sign and date these notes as a true and honest account of events.” He did, signed his name and dated them Thursday 21 September 1943. He clearly believed himself genuine. Still I hesitated.

“Now, let’s try to find you some medical attention, and see about getting you back to your unit. Help yourself to more coffee and sandwiches. There’ll be some hot food ready as soon as I can arrange it.” I hesitated, then gently laid my hand on his shoulder and told him I was sorry for his crew and their families. His young eyes looked at me vacantly, but his shoulders were trembling. I forced myself to walk routinely to the CFI’s office to phone. I hoped to God it wasn’t locked, though I still had no idea who to call or what I’d say.

It wasn’t locked, but it didn’t matter. When I returned to check his unit’s location he had gone. Like a beautiful girl in an erotic dream, somehow I knew all along it would go wrong. I walked outside and searched around the clubhouse and hangers. Eventually I returned and slumped down where I had previously sat, exhausted now, resting my head in my hands and staring at the notes on the coffee table. The clock above the serving hatch said ten forty five, two hours since I had first locked up.

I tried to think. Ring the police and inform them that possibly an unnerved youngster was roaming the area looking for his aircrew? Maybe I had fallen asleep and dreamed the whole thing. People sleepwalk, maybe it is possible to sleepwrite? I hadn’t heard of it. I felt he had needed some sort of help and that somehow I had let him down.

I didn’t ring the police or anyone else and I never have spoken of it. But I did some checking. On 21 September 1943 – a Thursday – a badly damaged Liberator bomber returning from a daylight raid over Bremen, clipped the small round tower of Tring St. Mary church which lies 1.4 miles from, and on an almost exact bearing with, runway 26 of Tring airfield. Tring airfield was for three years home to 294 squadron, amongst whose personnel, one Flight Lieutenant A. L. Swanski served, flying 28 daylight sorties over heavily defended enemy territory. Missing in action. All crew members were killed and one body was never recovered. The church was gutted and stands to this day, fenced off in danger of total collapse.

I hope he finds peace.

Godfrey Powell 19/10/98