James Salter

The room had become confining for him, a regular closet.  He stood up.  He felt like a man who puts weight on a bad leg for the first time.  Suddenly he was conscious of his position, uncomfortably.  He was the leader.  There seemed to be something artificial and repugnant about that, as if he were wearing a bright shirt with the word printed on it. Everything had been so effortless until now.  Unexpectedly, the simplicity of things was gone.  It had been a bad day.

When the ships returned from a mission, everybody watched for them.  Usually, they came lining back to the field in flights of four, flying tight show formation with the black smoke fading in parallel streams behind as they turned in toward the runway and landing pattern. They seemed to be most indestructible then.  They were of frozen silver.  Nothing could possibly dim that grace.  No enemy could deny them. Departures were stirring: but, every return, even the most uneventful, was somehow transcendent and a call to the heart to rise in joy.  Out of the north they had come again, brief strokes of splendor.



Extracts from:  Salter, James. (2007) The Hunters.  London.  Penguin.  First published 1956.

F86 Sabre