Free The Dam Busters by Paul Brickhill Page B

reserve.
    Supper in the mess was quiet, the calm before the storm.
    No one said much. The non-flying people thought it was to be a training flight, but the crews, who knew it was going to be business—probably sticky—could not say so and there was a faint atmosphere of strain.
    With a woman’s wit Anne Fowler realised it was to be the real thing. She noticed the crews were having eggs. They often had an egg before a raid, and always after they landed. Most of the others did not notice it, but she started worrying about Shannon.
    Dinghy Young said to Gibson, “Can I have your next egg if you don’t come back? “But that was the usual chestnut before an “op” and Gibson brushed it aside with a few amiably insulting remarks.
    In twos and threes they drifted down to the hangar and started to change. It was not eight o’clock yet; still an hour to take-off and still broad daylight. Martin stuffed his little koala bear into a pocket of his battle-dress jacket and buttoned the flap. It was a grey furry thing about 4 inches high with black button eyes, given to him by his mother as a mascot when the war started. It had as many operational hours as he had.
    They drifted over to the grass by the apron and lay in the sun, smoking and quietly talking, waiting. Anne was with Shannon. Fay, the other W.A.A.F. officer, was talking to Martin’s crew. Dinghy Young was tidying up his office, just as a matter of course. He had no premonition. Munro seemed half asleep in a deck chair.
    Gibson drove up and walked over to Powell.
    “Chiefy, I want you to bury Nigger outside my office at midnight. Will you do that?”
    “Of course, sir.” Powell was startled at the gesture from the hard-bitten Gibson. Gibson did not tell him that he would be about 50 feet over Germany then, not far from the Ruhr. He had it in hlo mind that he and Nigger might be going into the ground about the same time.
    Gibson found himself wishing it were time to go and knew they were all wishing the same. It would be all right once they were in the air. It always was. At ten to nine he said clearly, “Well, chaps, my watch says time to go.” Bodies stirred on the grass with elaborate casualness, tossed their parachutes into the flight trucks, climbed in after them, and the trucks moved off round the perimeter track to the hardstandings. Shannon had gone back to the locker room for a moment and when he came out his crew, the only ones left, were waiting impatiently. The bald-headed Yorkshireman, Jack Buckley, said like a father to his small son, “Have you cleaned your teeth David?” Shannon grinned, hoisted himself elegantly into the flight truck and then they had all gone. Shannon had one of the best crews. Buckley, older than most, of a wealthy family, was his rear gunner and a wild Yorkshireman. Danny Walker was an infallible navigator, a Canadian, dark, quiet and intensely likeable. Sumpter, the bomb aimer, had been a guardsman and was tougher than a prize-fighter. Brian Goodale, the wireless op., was so tall and thin and bent he was known universally as “Concave.” And in the air the babyish Shannon was the absolute master, with a scorching tongue when he felt like it.
    At exactly ten past nine a red Very light curled up from Gibson’s aircraft, the signal for McCarthy’s five aircraft to start; the northern route was longer and they were taking off ten minutes early. Seconds later there was a spurt of blue smoke behind Munro’s aircraft as his port inner engine started. One by one the engines came to life. Geoff Rice’s engines were turning; Barlow’s, then Byers’. The knot of people by the hangar saw a truck rushing at them across the field, and before it came to a stop big McCarthy jumped out and ran at them, roaring like a bull, his red face sweaty, the sandy hair falling over his forehead. In a murderous rage he yelled:
    “My aircraft’s u/s and there’s no deviation card in the spare. Where are those useless instruments jerks ! “
    The