About noon, the housekeeper came looking for him with an urgent request to call the squadron. Major Nogrowski, the operations officer (they called him Nogo), was desperate. The wing was being given an Operational Readiness Inspection; they were short on pilots; and they needed Horner to fly one more mission. As luck—and planning—would have it, Chuck’s flying gear was stashed in his personal baggage. He’d gotten into that habit whenever he made a Permanent Change of Station move (PCS), so he’d be ready to start flying first thing at his new station.

“Okay,” he said, “no problem.” Then he kissed Mary Jo goodbye, caught a ride to the base, and checked into the 492d Fighter Squadron. Nogo briefed him at the duty desk. They needed to fly two more sorties to pass the ORI. Nogo had a new pilot he could send on one of them, but he’d run out of flight leaders.

“No problem.”

Horner changed into his gear and briefed the new wingman: easy mission takeoff, climb out, and cruise over to France. Let down through the weather, fly low to an abandoned air base in northern France, and conduct a simulated attack. The Inspector General team did not have observers at that target, so the attack would not be scored. The weather was clear, and there was a full moon for their return to England in the early evening. As usual in those days, the wingman was inexperienced, a green lieutenant; but all he had to do was stay in formation, follow Horner’s orders, and avoid the ground with his aircraft during the low-level navigation and target attack portions of the mission.

The first half of the mission proceeded without a hitch. But as they were climbing out from the target toward the setting sun, Horner’s wingman called him on the radio—an unusual event, since new guys were to maintain strict radio discipline and speak only when spoken to.

“Blue Leader, this is Blue Two. The bottom of your aircraft is dark. Request permission to join to close formation and take a look.” Horner rolled his eyes in exasperation and cleared him in as they leveled off en route home.

But the next call really got his attention. “Sir”—Horner had just made captain—“there is a bunch of fluid all over the bottom of your aircraft.” Horner scanned his cockpit gauges, and all was normal. The engine was running fine. Perhaps the setting sun, he thought, had caused a lighting condition that was playing tricks with the lieutenant’s vision.

The wingman’s next call, as they crossed the English Channel, was even more alarming. “Sir, you’re streaming so much fluid it’s making a vapor trail behind the aircraft.”