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'Got your letter, sure enough–and it rather put the fear of God up me. You're not thinking of moving back here, by any chance, are you? My family moved off once, and fair enough with the Germans over there. But I don't reckon to be shifted again,' he said frankly, with the hint of steel in his smile.
Audley reassured him. 'The runways would never do for jets anyway, Mr Warren,' he lied comfortingly. He hadn't the faintest idea what sort of runways were suitable for jets. 'We just want to see how the temporary wartime strips have weathered in different parts of the country. We won't do any harm.'
'They've weathered too darn well, if you ask me–wasted a lot of good land. But help yourself. Just don't frighten my silly sheep too much and don't tramp down too much of my rye grass. We're taking the first cut for silage next week. Come and go as you please–you'll have to come through this side because the old airfield entrance is all wired up. There's not much left there anyway.'
Audley was about to thank him when a diminutive, pretty auburn-haired girl in a mini-skirt far briefer than Faith's joined them.
'Don't be boorish, Keith! Take them round yourself. You can show them your wonderful Longwools at the same time!'
'They don't want to see my Longwools,' Warren growled back at her proudly. 'Even if they are worth seeing– better than dead concrete and tarmac. But of course I'll show you round–I should've thought of that. At least show you the lie of the land, that's the least I can do.'
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He swept aside Audley's protests. 'We'll take the Land-Rover–first bit's too bumpy for that nice car of yours. It's your coming on Sunday that's put me off. Never expected a Civil Servant to work on Sunday like me . . .'
He prattled on gaily as they shuddered down a rutted track through a belt of young trees. The hedges on either side were thick and overgrown, brushing against the side of the vehicle.
'I ought to cut 'em back,' shouted Warren. 'Pull 'em out. That's the way with hedges now. But where'd the birds and such like go? And you'll see in a moment why I like a bit of undergrowth.'
Magically the bumping ceased and the Land-Rover shot forward on a smooth road surface which began without warning.
'Perimeter!' shouted Warren, and they roared out of the enclosing hedgerows into the open. 'Airfield!'
A prairie was what it was: an immense unnatural meadow, treeless into the distance where the first blue haze of evening was gathering.
But it was a prairie with aimless highways on it, highways on to which the grass overlapped and pushed from every crack and cranny.
'No sheep this end,' said Warren, bringing the Land-Rover in a great careless sweep leftwards, totally disorientating Audley. 'This is one of the main runways. You can really let her go here–just the place for those go- karts. We'll have a couple when my son grows up.'
Ahead Audley saw a black water tower, with two ugly Nissen huts nearby. Beyond them a series of grassy banks rose unnaturally–
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blast pens? Sheep pens now, though, with their entrances blocked by straw bales and hurdles.
Warren brought the Land-Rover to a standstill, but without turning the engine off.
'This was where the main buildings were. Nissen huts mostly.
Wooden control tower. Only the concrete bases left now, except for a couple I use as food stores. When the bombers were here they kept the bombs over the other side.' He pointed vaguely across the prairie.
'You lived round here then?'
'Born and bred here. Father farmed what was left during the war. I was only little, but I remember them– Hampdens, Beauforts, Bostons and Dakotas. Bostons were my favourites.'
Audley climbed awkwardly out of the cabin and walked a few paces across the tarmac. A slight breeze had risen–or perhaps there was always a breath of wind across this open land; it stirred the young spring grass, rippling over it in waves. He could smell sheep, and everywhere the runway was marked with their droppings. There was a pervasive loneliness about the place. Not the loneliness of the open downland, which had never been truly disturbed. Men had been very busy here once amid the roar of engines, with all the purposefulness of war. Where the downlands were eerie, this was only sad, as though time had not yet been able to wash away the human emotions which had been expended here.
The airfield was not quite dead yet, not quite one with all the other debris of old wars.
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He got back into the Land-Rover.
'Queer old place, isn't it!' said Warren. 'I've sat here of an evening, and I could almost hear the planes. And I've waited for one of 'em to come up from nowhere on the runway down there, like they used to do!'
Audley exchanged a quick glance with Faith. Her face had a curiously frozen look, as though talking of the past could conjure it up again.
'That would be down there, towards the old castle?'
'That's right.'
'Can we go down that way?'
Warren nodded, and started the engine. 'Nothing easier!'
'Do you mind if we get off the runway, though. There should be a taxiing lane to the left somewhere. I'd like to see what that's like.'
Warren slowed down and turned on to a narrower roadway which curved away from the junction of the runways. As far as Audley could see, the airfield stretched ahead of him, dead level. He twisted himself in his seat to look backwards; the control tower had gone and he would have to use the water tower as his point of
