Bomber Boys - a Ghost Story

by Simon Leighton-Porter

  The young policeman guarding the crime scene shared none of my concerns. I introduced myself and showed him my press card. He looked around to make sure no one was listening. ‘Don’t for Christ’s sake quote me on this, mate, but I reckon that’s one-nil to Darwin,’ he said, giving me a surreptitious thumbs-up. ‘They’ve taken his mate off to the funny farm. S’pose that’s two less pikeys to make a nuisance of themselves.’

  I pressed him for more details. He laughed. ‘This is hilarious, you’ll love it.’ He lowered his voice. ‘The pikey the night shift boys found in the village had completely gone off his nut. Pissed himself with fright, the silly bugger. He reckons he was holding the ladder while his oppo started cutting into the leg of the statue and then, guess what?’

  ‘He fell off?’ I ventured.

  ‘Nah. Better than that. He reckons the statue knocked the cutter out his mate’s hands, then leant down, swiped him one and broke his neck. Then, get this, it jumps down from the plinth thingy and chases him down the road. The statue, I mean. Couldn’t make it up, could you?’

  ‘It doesn’t sound very plausible, I must admit.’ He seemed a little disappointed at my reply, obviously expecting me to find the tale as hilarious as he did. However, after the Lancaster incident, I’d had my fill of weird stories for one week. I took out my camera. ‘Do you mind if I take a couple of pictures?’ I nodded towards the ladder. ‘I’d like to get a close-up of the damage.’

  He treated me to a broad wink. ‘More than my job’s worth, mate. Look, I’m going to nip round the corner for a crafty smoke – not supposed to light up in uniform, you see – and I’ll be gone at least five minutes. So if you want to use the ladder, that’s up to you. Mind the statue doesn’t give you a bash though.’ Laughing, at his own joke, he sauntered off, shaking a cigarette out of its packet and cupping the match flame with his hands.

  Propping the ladder against the plinth I scrambled up, trying not to look down. Even climbing the six feet or so to the base of the statue I could feel my hands becoming slippery with sweat. I managed to take all the pictures I needed and was about to climb down when something made me glance up. What I saw made me blink in disbelief but I had to get a closer look. By holding on to part of the statue’s parachute harness, I pulled myself up so that I was standing right next to the bronze figure, which was slightly larger than life-size. The ground seemed a horribly long way down and I fought a rising tide of nausea. I looked again at what had caught my attention. There was no mistake. I reached up to the gloved hand that the airman held up to shield his eyes. Between the first two fingers was wedged a broken piece of hard, red plastic. At the second attempt I managed to work it loose and shove it into my pocket. Another look down and I felt my head start to swim – if I wasn’t careful, the police would have a second corpse to deal with – but I managed to get first one foot and then the other onto the safety of the rungs.

  Once more back on solid ground, and having laid the ladder down in the same spot from where I had taken it, I examined my find. It was about four inches long and bore a series of letters picked out in embossed white capitals. This simply was not possible. I gave an involuntary shudder at the only possible explanation of what I had just found, and shoved it back into my coat pocket.

  The young policeman returned, refreshed by his nicotine hit. ‘Get all your pictures?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, thanks. Really appreciate your help,’ I replied, trying to sound matter-of-fact.

  ‘Don’t mention it, and if there’s anything else I can do, just say the word.’

  I hesitated. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to hear his answer. ‘There is one thing. I know this is going to sound like a silly question, but do you know what make of angle grinder the dead man was using?’

  ‘Yeah, course I do. It was a Hilti. Top of the range gear that – my brother’s in the building trade. He swears by their stuff – German, you see. The pikeys nicked a whole bunch of power tools from a delivery van in Brigg last week. That’ll be where they got it.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, hoping my voice wouldn’t betray the fear that had seized me.

  Once back at the car, with trembling hands I took out the piece of plastic. The white letters spelled out “ILTI”, with the jagged edge cutting the first “I” in half. The missing letter was obviously an “H”. This simply could not be. The man who had been cutting the statue’s leg would probably have been standing on the ladder while he worked, yet the fragment of disc cutter was wedged about seven feet above the cut. But how had it got there? There was only one explanation, but my mind could not, would not, allow me to face it. Statues do not hit people. But then again, Lancaster bombers that crashed in 1944 do not suddenly fill the windscreens of airliners in the winter skies over twenty-first century Lincolnshire. I had to know more.

  ***

  “The Lags” had created their own website, which, on its home page, showed computer-generated images of the new town, and the forest of pylons that would carry the electricity generated by the giant turbines on the days when the wind blew. The site carried details of the next meeting, to be held in two days’ time at the Rose and Crown in Leckonby. I rang the ‘contact us’ number, told them I was a journalist and asked if I could attend. The enthusiasm with which they said “yes” smacked of desperation, a hunch that proved to be correct.

  There were about a dozen of them. Not the blazered old buffers I had expected, but instead, a normal enough looking group of people, some of whom were quite young. The mood I detected was one of baffled disappointment, rather than of foam-flecked outrage. The meeting was due to start at 7:30 but they all waited, looking expectantly at the pub door, hoping more of the faithful would show up. The chairman, Martin Watson, a man in his late sixties, whose grey hair and tall stooping frame gave him the mournful air of a heron that has just missed the last fish, explained. ‘We normally get a better turn out than this, but there’s the England match on telly tonight.’

  ‘That’s the only reason why I’m here,’ said a round-faced woman standing next to him. ‘Can’t get a word out of my old man when the football’s on.’ The laughter seemed to ease the tension a little and we followed Watson into the function room at the back of the pub. It had been set out for at least fifty people, and our little group, which barely filled the first row, looked pathetically small. As the chairman stood up to speak, the door opened and a slim young man wearing a heavy tweed overcoat hurried in. He apologised for being late and asked if the seat next to mine was free. A little inner demon nearly tempted me to say no, and that the third seat from the left in the back row was the only one not taken, but I resisted. He was out of breath as though he had been running, and he brushed away a fringe of dark hair that flopped over his pale features. I noticed that his shoes and the bottom of his trousers were soaking wet.

  In a careworn monotone, Watson began his address. He covered the progress of the latest appeal against the planning application. The news for The Lags wasn’t good. Head down and reading from his notes, he spoke without interruption for about twenty minutes. To me it was a new language – called-in planning applications, the Town and Country Planning (General Development Procedure) Order 2009 were only the start. By the time he got to the possible advantages of Section 79(1) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, my eyes had glazed over. From what I could work out, The Lags’ appeal against the development had been rejected and they were now all that was left of the opposition to the plan. The local farmers were delighted at the price the developers had offered. The really lucky ones were those set to receive huge rents from having wind turbines on their land. Looking to local government for help was a non-starter too. The Labour-controlled local Council were already counting the votes of the new ‘social housing’ tenants. As for the rest of the inhabitants of Leckonby, their silence had been bought by the prospect of the new retail park, which would save a long drive into Lincoln for their weekly shopping. Finally, he looked up. ‘Anyone got any questions or good ideas?’


  ‘Newts,’ somebody suggested. ‘Or rare butterflies. They managed to get the Newbury bypass moved because of butterflies, I think.’

  Watson shook his head and fished in his briefcase for a document. ‘Newbury was snails. The planners have got wise to that one,’ he said, holding up a thick document bound in expensive-looking glossy paper. ‘This is the “Leckonby eco-Town Environmental Impact Survey”. Nothing rarer than foxes and mice, I’m afraid. And no unexploded bombs, heavy metals or toxic waste either.’

  ‘When are they going to get rid of the gyppos?’ asked the lady who ran the airfield museum. ‘They tried to break in again on Monday.’

  Another shake of the grey head. ‘Apparently the police can’t move them on because of the one who died trying to pinch the statue.’ He made the inverted commas sign with his fingers. ‘Because of the “trauma suffered by the traveller community,” as they put it, it would be a breach of their human rights to force them to leave.’

  A ripple of angry muttering ran through the little gathering. ‘What about our rights not to have our stuff pinched?’ asked one.

  ‘And when are they going to stop them doing their number twos in our gardens?’ added another.

  ‘I don’t think you’ll be having any further trouble with them.’ The voice came from the young man sitting next to me. ‘They’ve gone.’

  ‘What? The gyppos?’ At once the meeting came alive.

  ‘Yes, the police are there now and I saw the last caravan leave. That’s why I was late.’

  ‘I wonder what made the police change their mind,’ said Watson.

  ‘Oh, it wasn’t the police,’ replied the young man. ‘They left of their own accord.’

  ‘That’s wonderful news,’ said the round-faced football widow. ‘But why now? Did the police say?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he replied. ‘Someone shot up one of the caravans and set fire to it. Luckily – or unluckily, depending on your point of view – no one was inside, but it certainly put the fear of God into them. The police seem to think it’s something to do with a feud between gypsy gangs.’

  ‘Well, at least they can’t blame The Lags this time,’ said Watson, casting a sideways glance at me. My article in the Lincoln Post about the Lancaster and the airliner had mentioned the Leckonby Action Group, but not in the favourable light he had evidently been hoping for.

  I said, ‘Unless one of your other members nipped out and did it at half time during the England match.’

  The joke fell flat. Watson pulled a heron sucking a lemon face and looked away. ‘We’ll still get the blame,’ he said to nobody in particular.

  At this, everyone began talking at once. I could just make out Watson’s voice over the general hubbub. ‘Well, if those wretched gypsies have gone, that at least calls for a drink.’ We followed him back into the bar.

  Some of The Lags went straight home, leaving about six of us clustered round a corner table. I was torn between getting to the bottom of their involvement in the incidents at the airfield versus the more tempting prospect of hurrying off to see what had happened to the gypsy caravan.

  The Rose and Crown had been popular with RAF Leckonby crews during the war. Its walls were adorned with a jumble of photos showing Wellingtons, Lancasters and the faces of their crews, some smiling because the scythe only took the other fellow, others who knew better, smiling to hide their fear. How many managed to dodge the Reaper? I wondered.

  Inevitably, the discussion turned to the attempt by the gypsies to steal the statue of the airman for its scrap value. From there it was only a short conversational hop to wondering aloud what it must have been like for the flesh and blood young airmen who faced death on a nightly basis. Watson looked up at the grainy photograph on the wall next to him – seven young men in front of a Lancaster bomber. ‘I wonder what happened to that crew, probably all dead by now.’

  ‘They died in March 1944, actually.’ This was the young man’s first contribution to the conversation and he spoke with a rather stilted voice as though reading someone else’s words aloud. ‘That’s Wing Commander Preston’s crew – “Press-on Preston” they used to call him – he was CO of 362 Squadron. They were shot down by a night fighter near Cologne. No survivors. If Preston had only got the chop earlier, a lot more crews might’ve finished their thirty ops.’

  ‘You seem very knowledgeable,’ said the lady who ran the airfield museum. I detected a note of pique in her voice that somebody else knew more about her pet topic than she did.

  ‘Oh, it’s purely personal,’ he replied. If this was meant to be a joke, his pale features showed no trace of a smile. ‘Anyway, must dash. Do please excuse me. Big show on tonight. Wouldn’t do to be late.’ He rose to his feet and made to leave. Then he stopped, fixing me with a gaze that made me feel strangely uneasy. ‘This is for you,’ he said, pressing what felt like a small metal cylinder into my hand.

  Without another word he went to the door and disappeared into the night. For me, there was something that didn’t ring true about him. The stilted diction, the consciously old-fashioned haircut and clothes all spoke of an elaborately contrived performance. Maybe that was it. After all, he had just mentioned “a show” so perhaps he was an actor.

  I turned to Watson. ‘Interesting chap. One of your more active members?’ I asked, puzzled by what could have attracted such an eccentric to the company of The Lags.

  ‘No, never seen him before in my life,’ he replied. ‘Thought he was with you – theatre critic, arts correspondent or something. Seemed an odd chap to bring along to a meeting like this, but I didn’t want to say anything, given that you’re kindly doing an article on us.’

  I ignored the hint. ‘Believe me, the Lincoln Post doesn’t have an arts correspondent, or an anything correspondent, come to that. It’s me, the editor, a couple of freelancers and the rest we buy in from the press agencies. I thought he was one of your members.’

  ‘Certainly knows his stuff about 362 Squadron,’ said one of the others, provoking another scowl from the custodian of the museum.

  Keeping my hand under the table I sneaked a look at what he had given me. I recognised it at once – a rifle cartridge. He had obviously picked it up at the gypsy camp, and his over-dramatised way of handing it over fitted neatly with my assessment of him as an actor manqué. I showed it to the group before putting it back in my pocket.

  After thanking Watson and The Lags for letting me attend their meeting, I made to leave. ‘You will show us as rational, sensible people, won’t you?’ he asked, almost pleading. ‘I hope you now realise we’re not behind any of the nonsense that’s supposedly been going on at the airfield.’

  I didn’t know what to say. As a hack reporter on a paper with a circulation in free-fall from an already low base, I wasn’t used to being anyone’s last hope. However, the look on his sad heron’s face told me that’s just what I was. I said, ‘Listen, I don’t usually do this, but I’ll e-mail you the article before it goes to press. If there are any mistakes in it, you tell me and I promise I’ll correct them.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Price,’ he said and shook my hand.

  The rain had stopped in what felt like the first time in months, and as I walked to my car, a keen north-westerly chased scudding clouds across the face of a thin crescent moon. The encounter in the pub had left me feeling ill at ease and I had the unpleasant feeling of being watched by many pairs of eyes. Despite telling myself not to be ridiculous, I couldn’t help hurrying across the car park to the sanctuary of my waiting car.

  Safely inside, I switched on the interior light and put on my reading glasses to get a closer look at the cartridge case. From its size, it looked like a NATO 7.62mm round – during my time in the RAF I must have fired thousands of them on the 25-metre range. I was about to put it back in my pocket when I remembered the Very cartridge and the letters stamped into the base; maybe this one had similar markings. Holding it up to the light I peered at it more closely. For once, my memory held. Instead of having a groove roun
d the base of the cartridge, the one in my hand had a protruding flange. It was an old .303 cartridge, and I hadn’t seen one of those since I was in the cadet corps at school. Hurriedly, I copied the inscription on its base into my notebook.

  As I drove up the lane towards the airfield I puzzled over the odd statements of the uninvited visitor to the meeting. What had he meant about his interest in a long-dead CO of 362 Squadron being “purely personal”? The hammy nonsense about “a big show” I could just about fathom. But then why had he given me the cartridge? Why not hand it to the police? However, what bothered me most was the fact that his face seemed familiar. I had long since learned not to trust my ragged memory, but the strong feeling that I knew him from somewhere refused to go away.

  The clouds had covered the timid face of the moon and, with the few street lights of Leckonby behind me, the lane from the village was pitch black. Turning into the Louth road I saw on the horizon a vivid pool of light. As I drew closer, I saw it was populated with scurrying, pale figures whose shadows seemed to be dancing a crazy gavotte on the old airfield – under dazzling floodlights, white-suited forensic specialists floated like ghosts across a cracked concrete dance floor. Other policemen paid out rolls of blue and white tape to cordon off the area around the still smouldering carcass of what had once been a caravan. I pulled into a lay-by and parked behind a fire engine. Its blue flashing lights added to the show and I began to wonder if I was having one of my hallucinations.

  As I approached the tape one of the police came to shoo me away, but I had already spotted a friendly face. I showed my press pass and asked to speak to Inspector Grimes. With bad grace, the policeman went to fetch him.

  Grimes, bear-like and shambling, wandered over. ‘Hello, Bill,’ he said, shaking my hand which disappeared into his vast paw. ‘News travels fast. Who put you onto this one then?’

  ‘A bloke down the pub,’ I replied.