Mary stirred first.
‘Bill, it’s time. Tell me now.’
So he did, ending with: ‘So that’s it. A year, the doc says – maybe more, probably less.’
Mary held out her arms. He leant over and they held on to each other. She stroked his hair, kissing the top of his head as she had when she had comforted the children: Clark, Vivien and Mary.
Softly she whispered: ‘Remember that first week, after we found each other again?’
His voice was muffled.
‘I know darling but—’
She shushed him. ‘No buts. We swore then that we would never be parted again – ever.’
Mary released him and eased him up so that his face was opposite hers. She searched him with an intense, almost fevered eye.
‘It’s time.’
Frightened at the enormity of what she was proposing he tried to argue.
She was adamant.
‘I meant it then and I mean it now.’
Bill swallowed. He knew that voice of old, the young and determined ‘bluestocking’.
‘When?’
Mary smiled. ‘Tomorrow.’
Back in Cambridge he went along to the American Cemetery at Madingley, stood looking down at a couple of the simple white crosses among the rows and rows. He took longer finding names among the hundreds on the Wall of Remembrance – those who had no known resting-place. That evening they treated themselves to a superb dinner at a favourite watering-hole. Champagne flowed.
They clinked their glasses in a toast.
Mary proposed: ‘To us.’
‘To us,’ he responded. ‘And the last mission.’
They didn’t sleep at all that night – but sat up talking, writing letters to the children, and just sitting before the fire looking through photograph albums – many of the photographs were in black and white. They consigned hundreds to the flames.
In the morning the fire was cold, dead. As he looked around for the last time, Bill’s gaze fell on the grey ashes. It was over.
They used the MG to go to the flying club, Bill roaring in and skidding to a halt on the gravel. Mary berated him.
‘Stop showing off, you old fool.’
He got the wheelchair from the back and set it up. Mary, hanging on to the windscreen and the door, settled into it. She called to him as he went back round to the driver’s side.
‘Don’t forget the CD player.’
Bill grumbled. ‘What did your last slave die of?’
He wheeled her into a hangar. Light aircraft were parked inside, some, their engines exposed, were being worked on by mechanics. They made their way to a door in the side wall marked ‘Office’. When they entered a man was at a chart marked ‘Aircraft Availability’, writing with a felt-tipped pen in the squares alongside the registration numbers.
He turned, saw the elderly couple, the woman in a wheelchair.
‘Ah – is it Mr Anderson?’
Bill held out his hand. ‘Sure is.’
They shook. Bill indicated Mary.
‘And this is my wife.’
‘How do you do. Now, I gather you want an hour’s pleasure trip – is that right?’
Mary nodded. ‘Yes – see some old haunts – where we met – seems like centuries ago.’
‘Right. Well if you’re ready…?’
Bill grinned. ‘All set and raring to go.’
The man selected some keys from an open wall-cupboard.
‘Right.’
Outside they reached a sleek low-wing aircraft with a single piston engine.
Bill gave a whistle.
The man nodded proudly. ‘Can do two hundred-plus knots.’
Bill ran a hand appreciatively on the wing. ‘I used to fly with Pan Am, and before that in the war.’
Surprised, the pilot, opening the door, said: ‘Did you, now? What were you on?’
Bill brought the wheelchair to the rear door. ‘Ended up on 747s.’
The pilot’s enthusiasm was obvious. ‘And during the war?’
‘Mustangs.’
‘Really? That’s terrific.’ He slapped the fuselage. ‘Not so exciting as a Mustang, I’m afraid, but she’s lively enough.’
Bill nodded. ‘Expensive to run, I bet. Fully insured, of course?’
‘Oh yes. Costs an arm and a leg.’
Light-heartedly Bill chuckled.
‘Worth more to you wrecked, I guess.’
The man laughed. ‘Yes – but the trick is making sure you walk away in one piece.’
Mary glanced at Bill as he said: ‘You bet.’
They helped her into the rear, Bill saying: ‘I’d like to be in the co-seat, if that’s OK with you?’
‘Sure. Can you get in yourself while I put Mrs Anderson’s wheelchair in the office?’
‘No problem.’
As he trotted off with the chair, Bill made his way around to the other door. He looked in at her, and nodded just the once.
‘OK?’
She finished buckling her seat belt.
‘OK.’
Bill ran his eye over the instrument panel as the pilot went through the take-off procedures and check list, then taxied to the strip.
When eventually he released the brakes the little aircraft positively shot down the runway and was in the air and climbing in no time.
Bill watched intently as the pilot raised the undercarriage and trimmed up the aircraft. When he was done he checked the route with Bill. ‘Cambridge area, the coast and back via your old airfield?’
When Bill agreed, the pilot informed the tower. Within minutes they were over Cambridge. Bill and Mary looked down at the colleges, with Kings College chapel clearly standing out by the Cam as the river slowly passed by. Eventually the city receded from view.
Bill nodded to the right. ‘Over there. Can you pass by that church, please?’
‘No problem.’
They banked gently away. They both saw the winding lane that ran from it and its scattering of old houses, until she pointed. ‘There.’
Sixty years had passed, and although some trees and green spaces still remained, the village had largely been engulfed by a huge housing development.
But they still recognized the cottage – their cottage, now on the edge of a park.
They watched it intently until it was nearly lost from view.
Mary waved a final goodbye with just her fingers and turned back. Their eyes met. She lowered her lids, and mimed a soft kiss at him in memory of their first time together.
The pilot banked again. ‘We’re on our way to the coast now – right?’
Bill agreed. They would have liked to have kept silent, lost in their memories, but the pilot was chatty.
‘You been back before?’
Bill had to rouse himself from his thoughts. ‘Actually I stayed over here after the war – based at Heathrow.’
He said nothing of the long years of devoted nursing by Mary, until he was fully back to normal. The doctors said it was a miracle. The bullet, instead of penetrating his skull, had travelled in an arc under his scalp, and exited at the back without ever damaging the brain directly. The force of the bullet, and the air pressure wave before it had, however, bruised the brain severely, leaving him with complete loss of memory. To that very day, nine months might never have existed as far as he was concerned. The pilot adjusted the throttle.
‘Really? I would have thought there was more for you at home?’
Bill glanced back at Mary, grinned.
‘Oh no, I had a lot going for me over here, what with being over-paid and over-sexed as well.’
He heard her cough.
The pilot chuckled. ‘So, being here it’s been easy for you to attend all the reunions, I suppose. Do you still go?’
Wistfully Bill shook his head.
‘They finished a couple of years back. Not too many of us left – we’re a dying breed.’
They lapsed at last into silence as Bill gazed down at the towns and villages of Suffolk and Essex that he knew so well from the skies of 1944: Sudbury, Braintree, Ipswich, Orfordness.
Just after they crossed the coast the pilot turned back, left the North Sea behind. ‘Seen that many a time, eh?’ he said to Bill.
Bill said sadly: ‘Lost a few buddies down there.’
Using a wartime map he’d kept, Bill gave a course to the area of his old base. Suddenly the pilot pointed out of his side window and brought the plane around as he said: ‘Over there. Doesn’t look as if much of it is left. I’ll go down.’
Bill took a deep breath.
‘Say, no chance I could take her over it – just one last time?’
The pilot hesitated. The delightful old boy was certainly someone to be admired but, hell he must be eighty-odd years old.
He flicked a quick look at him. The man’s eyes were big and pleading.
‘Well, given your experience – why not. You have control.’
Bill’s face split into a huge grin as he placed his gnarled hands on the yoke.
‘God bless you – I have control.’
‘You have,’ responded the pilot.
Bill flew her straight and level, getting the feel, then….
‘I’m going a little lower for a look-see – OK?’
The pilot grinned nervously.
‘Sure.’
As they reapproached, Bill suddenly said: ‘Here we go,’ and pushed the stick forward, diving down and passing so low over the weed-covered airstrip and rusty control tower, that he had to pull up steeply to avoid a water-tower.
‘Wowee.’
Shaken, the pilot reached forward.
‘I’m taking control.’
Bill sang out. ‘You have control.’
He grinned across the cabin.
‘Sorry, don’t know what came over me – just had to give the old base one last beat-up for old times’ sake.’
The pilot looked pale, said nothing.
They landed back at the airfield, taxiing in and coming to a halt after the pilot had brought her round on the pan to face the field again. He cut the engine and silence descended. Almost immediately Mary groaned.
‘I’m afraid my back is giving me terrible pain – could I get out quickly, please? I really feel awful.’
On cue, Bill unbuckled his seat belt, began to move – and winced.
‘Hell, I’ve gone stiff – my new hip. Would you mind getting the wheelchair for my wife? She needs her medication urgently.’
The pilot cracked his door open, glad to get out.
He jumped down, and walked away, deeming it necessary to break the training of a lifetime to get the old people off quickly – he’d complete post-flight checks in a moment. He left the keys in the ignition.
Bill found Mary’s eyes. ‘Well that’s made it a damn sight easier.’
The pilot had just got the chair and was easing it out of the office door when he heard an aero engine start up. He didn’t connect it with the aircraft he’d just piloted, but when he heard it taxiing almost immediately, he knew it had to be his, there had been no time for pre-flight procedures with a cold engine.
Leaving the chair he ran for the hangar door, in time to see his plane wallowing away across the grass making straight for the runway. He ran after it, actually reached the tailplane and held it for a moment, shouting into the roaring slipstream: ‘Stop, stop, you old bastard.’
His foot caught in a rabbit-hole, and he went face down into the mud. He could only watch as the plane reached the runway, turned into the wind and took off in textbook fashion.
From the back seat Mary said: ‘I want to come forward, sit with you.’
He half-turned. ‘Of course. I’m putting down in my old place. There’s just enough runway left – I think.’
She rolled her eyes in disbelief.
When at last it finally came up on the horizon Bill said: ‘Hang on gal – here we go.’
He bled off the speed, and lowered the undercarriage. Selecting the correct flaps as he had observed, Bill coaxed the machine down to just over the boundary fence, then killed the flying speed, dropping with a final thump right on the end of the old runway.
Mary yelled out in pain as he rammed hard on the brakes, the plane banging and juddering rhythmically over the uneven concrete sections. The smell of burnt rubber invaded the cabin.
They came to a halt with barely twenty feet of weed-covered runway to spare.
Bill sagged in the seat.
‘Jeez, I’m getting too old for this.’
He brought the plane back to the other end, and turned again into the wind before turning off the engine. Mary had unbuckled by the time he opened her door and lowered the step. She clung to him as he eased her down.
Mary said: ‘Hang on, I need to rest for a second.’
He set her down in the long grass and they lay side by side listening to the skylarks in the soft breeze.
Mary stared up into the heavens, her hair splayed out on the grass. Bill looked across at her, at this woman who had become part of him, and he part of her all those years ago: a lifetime.
He loved her even more now.
She suddenly sighed. ‘It’s just like the Inkspots said.’
Puzzled, Bill asked: ‘What are you talking about?’
She smiled at him, put her hand over his, loved him lying there with a long stalk of grass sticking out of the corner of his mouth, looking so boyish – just as he had when she had first set eyes on him and knew he was the one for her.
‘The long grass – it’s whispering to us.’
Bill lay in silence, chewing his stalk.
‘What’s it saying?’
Her face quickened with concentration. ‘Let’s see – How does that old poem go?
The sleep that I have and the rest that I have
- though death will be but a pause
For the youth of my life in the long green grass,
is yours and yours and yours.’
She rolled over on to him, put her hand gently on his cheek.
‘It’s not like the England of old is it, the decent innocent gentle place we all struggled for? Now it’s so different: ill-mannered, drugs, violence – all of it. We don’t belong any more in this age where sex is more important than love.’
He took the stalk from his mouth.
‘Every generation says that, darling – it’s just we’ve been lucky enough to grow very old and are able to look back through rose-coloured spectacles to our youth.’
She shook her head.
‘I’m aware of that and know there are a lot of good people out there, but I truly believe the world is not so nice as it was. We’ve all gained materially but we’ve lost something – our spirit – in the process.’ She paused, then touched his lips with hers, this man who had been her only lover – the only one she had ever wanted. ‘Do you remember that night in the garden of the cottage – back in forty-four?’
He nodded. ‘Of course.’
She whispered softly: ‘Stars by the millions – big and bright. You don’t see them much now, do you, with all the light we flood the heavens with? Well, who knows, where we are going, maybe the stars really will be beneath our feet. No …’ Her warm voice that he knew so well was suddenly the old forties, cut-glass English of their first meeting in the library: the no-nonsense bluestocking.
‘We don’t belong in this world any more, darling. Let’s find out what awaits us in the next – together.’
She gave a mock salute.
‘Our last mission.’
Mary was free of pain – having swallowed a day’s worth of tablets with the gin-and-tonics she brought ready-mixed for them both. Bill had doubled the strength of his dose, remarking at the label: ‘Hmm, I’m not to drive a car it seems.’ He grinned and pushed his chin into his chest – just like Cary Grant. ‘It says nothing about flying a plane.’
With her strapped beside him, he faced the controls. ‘Right, let’s see if we can get this old bird off the ground again.’
She smacked his leg.
‘Don’t you talk about me like that. Have you got the CD player?’
He brought it up from the floor and gave it to her.
‘All set?’
She nodded.
The engine burst into life. Bill checked his Ts and Ps. Everything was functioning as it should. ‘The old strip’s not what it was, so hang on to your hat.’
He gunned the engine, holding the little plane hard on its brakes. It trembled at the bit like a horse before a race, then he yelled:
‘Brakes off, here we go into the wild blue yonder – like the old days.’
The plane leapt forward, slamming both their heads back against the rests. The runway passed under them faster and faster as a warehouse loomed larger, finally seemed to fill their whole world. Bill pulled back the stick, Mary’s eyes widened; both gave an involuntary yell….
They skimmed over the roof of the building, where men taking a smoke flung themselves flat on the deck.
Neither of them saw the police cars with flashing blue lights, which had been alerted by the pilot. He had guessed where Bill might have headed. The drivers got out of their cars, talking on their radios as the plane circled above them.
Bill looked down at the strip, gave a final salute, and headed for the coast as Mary turned on the CD.
To the tune of American Patrol they left the airfield.
On the ground, silence came again, except for the returned skylarks – and the whispering grass.
They flew around great cloud-castles, swooping and soaring, the sea sparkling below like molten silver where it was caught by the falling shafts of sunlight.
The music changed. With Moonlight Serenade he cut back the engine. The roaring gale outside slowly subsided.
Mary looked across at him. Their hands found each other, clasped tightly. Bill swallowed, and mouthed silently: ‘I love you.’
When the nose dropped Mary squeezed his hand even harder.
‘Hold me.’
Bill pushed the stick forward and rammed the throttle through the gate.
Mary reached out, and Bill threw his arms around her. Faces pressed hard together, tears streaming down their cheeks, they held on tightly.
The plane passed into a cloud, engine screaming as the dive increased. When it came out into the open the glittering sea was rushing up at them.
Neither of them saw it.
Only each other.