He got transferred to us in October when we moved to Shetland as the Battle of Britain came to an end. Our squadron patrolled the North Sea for the Royal Air Force, the RAF, just as we’d done at other bases all through the summer of 1940. But Cromwell’s role with 648 Squadron was new. Before he got lumbered with us, he’d commanded a squadron of speedy new Spitfire fighters. In August and September, while we were flying Blenheims under cover of cloud on low-level bombing raids targeting German ships, he’d been sending fighter pilots into soaring dogfights in the sun.

None of our experiences matched up. He couldn’t manage twin engines and didn’t join us when we flew. And he didn’t like it that at nineteen years old I was half his age, shorter and slighter than most of the other lads and barely needing a shave, yet I talked back. He didn’t like that all of B-Flight were on my side because they were Blenheim airmen too; maybe I looked like a schoolboy, but they knew I wasn’t. I’d been their flight leader since August.

And sending us on a bombing raid with only a half-moon to light us, above cloud at twenty thousand feet? I was reckless with frustration.

“It’s stupid, stupid—everyone knows it. The men are complaining. You know it’s stupid. Above the cloud? We won’t be able to see the sea, let alone ships in the dark! And the air’s too thin up there for a Blenheim to operate efficiently. It’s not like flying a Spitfire! We cruise best at fifteen thousand feet, and when we’re in combat we take it as low as we can, it helps camouflage us. And the Jerries—the German fighters all know they can go higher and faster, and they circle like vultures, waiting—”

“None of my Spitfire pilots complained about danger,” Cromwell said coldly. “I expect more of a young man of your caliber, Beaufort-Stuart. This sounds like lack of moral fiber.”

Lack of moral fiber—that wonderful euphemism for cowardice.

I couldn’t let him accuse me, or worse, my 648 Squadron airmen, of being cowards.

I said stiffly, “Sir. I’m leading B-Flight on a mission tonight. I want the best for them.”

“When you go in at low level, you get shot up by enemy antiaircraft guns,” Cromwell told me, as if I didn’t know. “We need to change our tactics.”

It was true that most of our losses came from guns on the ground or at sea level. I couldn’t argue with that. But I felt sure that a raid at twenty thousand feet would end in the same tears for different reasons, or at best, be completely pointless because we wouldn’t hit anything. It wasn’t the first time Coastal Command had tried it.