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Suddenly the bombardier yelled: "Hey, Andy, I think I see it. Look over there to the left." The plane swung in toward a vague, grey mass that I supposed was land. Again came the bombardier's voice: "No, that's not it, Andy, that's not it." Once more we started looking.
The interphone chattered: "Where are we? Let's find that goddam target and get the hell home."
"There's a night fighter on our tail," said a gunner.
"We ought to be 15 miles from the target," said the navigator.
"Let's head in again toward land," said the bombardier.
"I can't see a goddam thing," said the pilot.
Suddenly below us a vague outline appeared. Two dim arms that were the quays of Sousse stuck out into the black water and there was a black compact mass—the houses of the town. Then there was a brown, square spot of earth that must have been the airfield.
Sousse was dark. The enemy was giving nothing away. "All right, Andy," said the bombardier, "I want to get a good run on this ... ten degrees right . . . five degrees left. . . . Okay, she's looking good."
The bombardier guided us toward a target which only he and the navigator in the nose could see. "Okay, level off," he said.
Into the Blue Blackness. The plane was shuddering and shaking. The bomb-bay doors were opening. The wind blew out of the purple night and flew at our hands eagerly. It pounced on the windows, frosting them up, and turned the plane into an icehouse. I looked down through the bomb-bay doors into nothingness. The bombs glinted icy grey as they fell into the blue, bleak blackness.
Suddenly a voice was saying: "There's a night fighter." The bomb-bay doors went shut with a clatter. The plane picked up speed, swerving sharply. Out of the black another orange ball was coming toward us. As in a dream I watched the orange ball skidding off to our left and then falling behind as we swerved away from land. Once more the night was all around us.
"There's a fighter underneath us," said the lower gunner.
Then the navigator spoke: "Hey, Andy, go around this island, they're shooting at us," and again we swerved. We went on, scrutinizing the sky for the vaporous plumes of night fighters.
We came down to the warmer substratosphere and got on our homeward course. I took off my oxygen mask and curled up to sleep, and the bombardier came out of the nose of the plane and said: "That was a son of a bitch of a monotonous mission."
"Yeah," I answered.