Getting Shot Down (Part 3 of 4)

It wasn’t long after that til I flew in a Hurricane to forty two thousand feet. It was a record at that time.I had oxygen, but, do you know, it was funny, when I got up there, it was gray and I could see the round of the earth, you know, because I was in right in the middle of England and I said, they said, “Two times two.” And I had to think, you know, and they said, “Scruffy. Pancake,” which means come down. Well I had to be very careful because I was just hanging on the prop, you know, and I got down and, but probably I wouldn’t have been able to do it if I hadn’t had this oxygen, low metabolic rate thing. So, when I bailed out, I never lost consciousness, and first thing that happened, was, that really made me mad, was my boot shot off and that was the boot I had my gun in and of course I was burnt.Well it was kind of badly burnt hands and face and...I landed and I was not far from Abbeville. Probably about, I don’t know exactly how far but I had been to summer school in Dinard, which is not very far. It’s on the coast of France. So, I thought, “Well, I’ll head for that.” and I buried my parachute and, and I met a guy on a bike. And they told us never to talk to anybody, with anybody else around. Always pick somebody by themselves because you never know when you are going to have a, what do you call a, an unfriendly Frenchman who’s going to turn you in.