Air Bridge

by Hammond Innes

  As we approached Berlin I began to have a sense of excitement. I hadn’t been over Berlin since 1945. I’d been on night raids then. I wondered what it would look like in daylight. Tubby seemed to feel it, too. He kept on looking down through his side window and moving restlessly in his seat. I pushed my helmet back and shouted to him. “Have you seen Berlin from the air since the war?”

  He nodded abstractedly. “I was on transport work.”

  “Then what are you so excited about?” I asked.

  He hesitated. Then he smiled—it was an eager, boyish smile. “Diana’s at Gatow. She’s working in the Malcolm Club there. She doesn’t know I’m on the airlift.” He grinned. “I’m going to surprise her.”

  Westrop’s voice sounded in my earphones, reporting to Gatow Airway that we were over Frohnau beacon. We switched to contact with Traffic Control, Gatow. “Okay, Two-Jive-two. Report again at Lancaster House.” So Diana was at Gatow. It suddenly made the place seem friendly, almost ordinary. It would be nice to see Diana again. And then I was looking out of my side window at a bomb-pocked countryside that merged into miles of roofless, shattered buildings. There were great flat gaps in the city, but mostly the streets were still visible, bordered by the empty shells of buildings. From the air it seemed as though hardly a house had a roof. We were passing over the area that the Russians had fought through. Nothing seemed to have been done about it. It might have happened yesterday instead of four years ago.

  Over the centre of the city Field gave me my new course and Westrop reported to Gatow Tower, who answered, “Okay, Two-five-two. Report at two miles. You’re Number Three in the pattern.”

  There was less damage here. I caught a glimpse of the Olympic stadium and then the pine trees of the Grünewald district were coming up to meet me as I descended steeply. Havel Lake opened out, the flat sheet of water across which the last survivors from the Fuehrer Bunker had tried to escape, and Westrop reported again. “Clear to land, Two-five-two,” came the voice of Gatow Control. “Keep rolling after touch-down. There’s a York close behind you.”

  I lowered undercarriage and landing flaps. We skimmed the trees and then we were over a cleared strip of woods dotted with the posts of the night landing beacons with the whole circle of Gatow Airport opening up and the pierced steel runway rising to meet us. I levelled out at the edge of the field. The wheels bumped once, then we were on the ground, the machine jolting over the runway sections. I kept rolling to the runway end, braked and swung left to the off-loading platform.

  Gatow was a disappointment after Wunstorf. It seemed much smaller and much less active. There were only five aircraft on the apron. Yet this field handled more traffic than either Tempelhof in the American Sector or Tegel in the French. As I taxied across the apron I saw the York behind me land and two Army lorries manned by a German labour team, still in their field grey, nosed out to meet it. I went on, past the line of Nissen huts that bordered the apron, towards the hangars. Two Tudor tankers were already at Piccadilly Circus, the circular standing for fuel off-loading. I swung into position by a vacant pipe. By the time we had switched off and got out of our seats the fuselage door was open and a British soldier was connecting a pipeline to our fuel tanks.

  “Where’s the Malcolm Club?” Tubby asked Field. His voice trembled slightly.

  “It’s one of those Nissen huts over there,” Field answered, pointing to the off-loading apron. He turned to me. “Know what the Army call this?” He waved his hand towards the circular standing. “Remember they called the cross-Channel pipeline PLUTO? Well, this one’s called PLUME—Pipe-line-under-mother-earth. Not bad, eh? It runs the fuel down to Havel where it’s shipped into Berlin by barge. Saves fuel on transport.”

  We were crossing the edge of the apron now, walking along the line of Nissen huts. The first two were full of Germans. “Jerry labour organisation,” Field explained.

  “What about the tower?” I asked. Above the third Nissen hut was a high scaffolding with a lookout. It was like a workman’s hut on stilts.

  “That’s the control tower for the off-loading platform. All this is run by the Army—it’s what they call a FASO. Forward Airfield Supply Organisation. Here’s the Malcolm Club.” A blue board with R.A.F. roundel faced us. “Better hurry if you want some coffee.”

  Tubby hesitated. “She may not be on duty,” he murmured.

  “We’ll soon see,” I said and took his arm.

  Inside the hut the air was warm and smelt of fresh-made cakes. A fire glowed red in an Army-type stove. The place was full of smoke and the sound of voices. There were about four aircrews there, in a huddle by the counter. I saw Diana immediately. She was in the middle of the group, her hand on the arm of an American Control officer, laughing happily, her face turned up to his.

  I felt Tubby check and was reminded suddenly of that night at Membury when he and I had stood outside the window of our mess. Then Diana turned and saw us. Her eyes lit up and she rushed over, seizing hold of Tubby, hugging him. Then she turned to me and kissed me, too. “Harry! Harry!” She was calling excitedly across the room. “Here’s Tubby just flown in.” She swung back to her husband. “Darling—remember I told you my brother Harry was in Berlin. Well, here he is.”

  I saw the stiffness leave Tubby’s face. He was suddenly grinning happily, shaking the big American’s hand up and down, saying, “My God! Harry. I should have recognised you from your photograph. Instead, I thought you were some boy-friend of Diana’s.” He didn’t even bother to hide his relief, and Diana never seemed to notice that anything had been wrong. She was taken too much by surprise. “Why didn’t you tell me you were flying in?” she cried. “You devil, you. Come on. Let’s get you some coffee. They only give you a few minutes here.”

  I stood and watched her hustling him to the bun counter, wondering whether he had told her what had happened at Membury, wondering what she’d say if she knew I was going to ditch him in the Russian Zone.

  “You must be Fraser.” Her brother was at my elbow. “I’ve heard a lot about you from Di. My name’s Harry Culyer, by the way.” He had Diana’s eyes, but that was all they had in common. He had none of her restlessness. He was the sort of man you trust on sight; big, slow-spoken, friendly. “Yes, I’ve heard a lot about you and a crazy devil called Saeton. Is that really his name?” He gave a fat chuckle. “Seems apt from what Di told me.”

  I wondered how much she had told him. “Are you connected with the airlift?” I asked him.

  He shook his head. “No, I’m attached to the Control Office of the U.S. Military Government. I used to work for the Opel outfit before the war so they figured I’d have to stay on in some sort of uniform and keep an eye on vehicle production in the Zone. Right now I guess you could do with some coffee, eh?”

  The coffee was thick and sweet. With it was a potted meat sandwich and a highly-coloured cake full of synthetic cream. “Cigarette?” I said, offering him a packet.

  “Well, thanks. That’s one of the troubles here in Berlin. Cigarettes are damned hard to come by. And it’s worse for your boys. They’re down to about fifteen a day. Well, what do you think of Gatow?” He laughed when I told him I was disappointed. “You expected to find it littered with aircraft, eh? Well, that’s organisation. Tempelhof is the same. They’ve got it so that these German labour teams turn the planes round in about fifteen minutes.”

  “What brings you out to Gatow?” I asked him. “Just paying Diana a visit?”

  “Sort of. But I got a good excuse,” he added with a grin. “I had to interview a German girl who has just got a job out here as a checker in your German Labour Organisation. Some trouble about her papers and we urgently need her down at Frankfurt. That’s why I came up to Berlin.”

  “You’re not stationed here then?” I asked.

  “No. I’m normally in the Zone. It’s nice and quiet down there—by comparison. I just been talking to your SIB major over there. The stories that man can tell?”

  “What’s he doing up at Ga
tow?” I asked.

  “Oh, there’s been some trouble with the Russians. This is your first trip, isn’t it? Well, you see those trees on the other side of the airfield?” He nodded through the windows. “That’s the frontier over there.”

  “The Russian Sector?”

  “No. The Russian Zone. Last night Red Army guards opened up on a German car just after it had been allowed through the frontier barrier into the British Sector. Then their troops crossed the frontier and pushed the car back into their Zone under the nose of the R.A.F. Regiment. Your boys are pretty sore about it.”

  “You mean the car was shot up in British territory?” I asked.

  He laughed. “Seems that sort of thing is happening every day in this crazy town. If they want somebody, they just drive into the Western Sectors and kidnap them.” The corners of his eyes crinkled. “From what I hear our boys do the same in the Eastern Sector.”

  An R.A.F. orderly called to me from the door. “Two-five-two ready, sir.”

  “Well, I guess that’s your call. Glad to have met you, Fraser.”

  “Neil!” Diana caught hold of my arm. “Tubby has just told me—about the crash.” She glanced quickly at Tubby who was saying good-bye to her brother. “What’s Bill doing now?” she asked in a quick whisper. I didn’t know what to say so I kept my mouth shut. “Oh, don’t be silly. I’ve got over that. But I know how it must have hit him. Where is he now?”

  “He’s still at Membury,” I said. And then added, “He’s sticking the plane together with sealing wax.”

  “You don’t mean to say he’s still going on with it?”

  “Look—I’ve got to go now,” I said. “Good-bye, Diana.”

  She was staring at me with a puzzled frown. “Good-bye,” she said automatically.

  Outside it was still raining. We climbed into the plane and taxied out to the runway. “You’re clear to line up now, Two-five-two. Two-six-0 a-concrete—angels three-five.” We flew out along the single exit corridor and were back in Wunstorf in good time for lunch. A letter was waiting for me at the mess. The address was typed and the envelope was postmarked “Baydon.” Dear Neil. Just to let you know I have almost completed the break-up. I have a flare path now. All you have to do is buzz once and I’ll light you in. Good luck. Bill Saeton. As I folded the letter Tubby came into the room. “Message from Harcourt. We’re not on the 1530 wave. He’s switched us to 2200. Says the other boys need a night’s sleep.”

  So it had come. I had a sudden sick feeling.

  He peered at me anxiously. “You feeling all right, Neil?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “You look pretty pale. Not nervous, are you? Damn it, you’ve no reason to be. You had enough experience of night-flying during the war.” His gaze fell to the letter in my hand, but he didn’t say anything and I tore it into small pieces and stuffed them into my pocket.

  “Better turn in then if we’re going to fly all night,” I said.

  But I knew I shouldn’t sleep. Hell! Why did I have to agree to this damn-fool scheme? I was scared now. Not scared of the danger. I don’t think it was that. But what had seemed straightforward and simple over a drink in the pub at Ramsbury seemed much more difficult now that I was actually a part of the airlift. It seemed utterly crazy to try and fly a plane out of this organised bus service of supply delivery. And I had to convince a crew that included Tubby Carter that they had got to bale out over the Russian Zone. The menace of the Zone had already gripped me. I lay and sweated on my bed, listening to the 1530 wave taking off, knowing that mine was the next wave, scared that I should bungle it.

  At tea I could eat nothing, but drank several cups, smoking cigarette after cigarette, conscious all the time of Tubby watching me with a puzzled, worried expression. Afterwards I walked down to the field in the gathering dusk and watched the planes pile in, a constant stream of aircraft glimmering like giant moths along the line of the landing lights. I saw my own plane, Two-five-two, come in, watched it swing into position on the loading apron and the crew pile out, and I hung on, waiting for the maintenance crew to finish servicing it. At last it stood deserted, a black shape against the wet tarmac that glistened with the reflection of the lights. I climbed on board.

  Saeton and I had discussed this problem of simulating engine failure at great length. The easiest method would have been simply to cut off the juice. But the fuel cocks were on the starboard side, controlled from the flight engineer’s seat. We had finally agreed that the only convincing method was to tamper with the ignition. I went forward to the cockpit and got to work on the wiring behind the instrument panel. I had tools with me and six lengths of insulated wire terminating in small metal clips. What I did was to fix two wires to the back of three of the ignition switches. These wires I led along the back of the instrument panel and brought out at the extreme left on my own side. All I had to do when I wished to simulate engine failure was to clip each pair of wires together and so short out the ignition switches. That would close the ignition circuit and stop the plugs sparking.

  It took me the better part of an hour to fix the wires. I was just finishing when a lorry drove up. There was the clatter of metal and the drag of a pipe as they connected the fuel lorry to the tanks in the port hand wing. The lorry’s engine droned as it began refuelling.

  I waited, conscious already of a fugitive, guilty feeling. Footsteps moved round the plane. Rather than be caught crouched nervously in the cockpit of my own machine, I went aft down the fuselage, climbing round the three big elliptical tanks and dropping on to the asphalt. I started to walk away from the plane, but the beam of a torch picked me out and a voice said, “Who’s that?”

  “Squadron-Leader Fraser,” I answered, reverting automatically to my service title. “I’ve just been checking over something.”

  “Very good, sir. Good-night.”

  “Good-night,” I answered and went hurriedly across to the terminal building and along the road to the mess. I went up to my room and lay on my bed, trying to read. But I couldn’t concentrate. My hands were trembling. Time dragged by as I lay there chain-smoking. Shortly after seven-thirty the door opened and Westrop poked his head into the room. “You coming down to dinner, sir?”

  “May as well,” I said.

  As we went down the echoing corridors and along the cinder paths to the mess, Westrop chattered away incessantly. I wasn’t listening until something he said caught my attention. “What’s that about a crash?” I asked.

  “Remember when we arrived here yesterday—the station commander was talking about a Skymaster that was missing?” he said. “Well, they made a forced landing in Russian territory. I got it from a flight lieutenant who’s just come off duty at Ops. One of our crews sighted the wreck this afternoon. The Russians have apparently denied all knowledge of it. What do you think happens to crews who get landed in the Russian Zone?”

  “I don’t know,” I said shortly.

  “The flight lieutenant said they were probably being held for interrogation. He didn’t seem worried about them. But they might be injured. Do you think the Russians would give them medical treatment, sir? I mean”—he hesitated—“well, I wouldn’t like to have a Russian surgeon operate on me, would you?”

  “No.”

  “What do you think they hope to gain by this sort of thing? Everybody seems convinced they’re not prepared to go to war yet. They’ve stopped buzzing our planes. That seems to prove it. They got scared when they crashed that York. I was talking to an R.E. major this afternoon. He said the trouble was their lines of communication. Their roads are bad and their railways from Russia to Eastern Germany are only single track. But I think it’s more than that, don’t you, sir? I mean, they can’t possibly be as good as us technically. They could never have organised a thing as complicated as the airlift, for instance. And then their planes—they’re still operating machines based on the B 29’s they got hold of during the war.”

  He went on and on about the Russians until at length I couldn�
�t stand it any more. “Oh, for God’s sake,” I said. “I’m sick and tired of the Russians.”

  “Sorry, sir, but——” He paused uncertainly. “It’s just—well, this is my first operational night flight.”

  It was only then that I realised he’d been talking because he was nervous. I thought: My God! The poor kid’s scared stiff of the Russians and in a few hours’ time I’m going to order him to jump. It made me feel sick inside. Why wasn’t my crew composed entirely of Fields. I didn’t care about Field. I’d have ordered him to jump over wartime Berlin and not cared a damn. But Tubby and this child….

  I forced myself to eat and listened to Westrop’s chatter all through the meal. He had a live, inquiring mind. He already knew that we had to cover seventy miles of the Russian Zone in flying down the Berlin approach corridor. He knew, too, all about Russian interrogation methods—the round-the-clock interrogation under lights, the solitary confinement, the building up of fear in the mind of the victim. “They’re no better than the Nazis, are they?” he said. “Only they don’t seem to go as far as physical torture—not against service personnel.” He paused and then said, “I wish we wore uniform. I’m certain, if anything like that happened, we’d be better off if we were in R.A.F. uniform.”

  “You’ll be all right,” I answered without thinking.

  “Oh, I know we shan’t have to make a forced landing,” he said quickly, mistaking what had been in my mind. “Our servicing is much better than the Yanks and——”

  “I wouldn’t be too sure of that,” I cut in. “Have a cigarette and for God’s sake stop talking about forced landings.”