Hitch Hiker A true story by Charles Roberts The story Almeria Living wouldn't publish.

I was a delivery driver for the Ministry of Defence, I would deliver spare parts all around the country; whether they be parts for aircraft, tanks, or battleships; we would deliver them. So you see we knew the countries roads quite well. I did a lot of deliveries to the Air Force stations in Lincolnshire so was used to driving up and down the A1 and A47 to Lincoln.

First time I saw her, it was dusk and I was on the A1, just before the junction with the A47 Newark road; I just caught sight of her in the headlights. She was standing at the side of the road wearing the uniform of the Women’s Royal Air Force, carrying a small holdall with her arm out and thumb up. Well I’d always give someone in uniform a lift, the job they do protecting us from harm, and what they’d done during the war.

I pulled into the side of the road and asked her where she wanted to be. Coningsby, she told me; well I was going to RAF Scampton, but I could take her to Lincoln which would shorten her walk somewhat and told her so. She jumped in the cab and off we set again.

She told me that she worked in the station headquarters as a clerk, that’s about all they would let the girls do in the early sixties. We chatted about nothing really, she said that she had been on a 48 hour pass to see her mum, who wasn’t too well, in Stamford; I said that it was right nice of the Air Force to give her the time off to do that. And I hoped that her mum wasn’t too ill and would be back on her feet soon.

I dropped her off at the bottom of the hill, by the park; I was turning left to go up the hill and passed the cathedral, she needed to go right and up the hill passed the graveyard and on towards Coningsby. We said our goodbyes and I wished her luck as she climbed down from the cab and jumped onto the pavement. I turned onto the road I wanted and looked back through the side mirrors, but she had gone, all that was left was the scent of her perfume in the cab.

The second time I saw her was in Newark, well just outside, it was that time of day when it wasn’t light and it wasn’t dark, dusk I suppose you’d call it. I saw her standing at the side of the road, dressed in her uniform with her small holdall by her side. I stopped and she ran up and asked where I was going; Coningsby I said, jump in.

She climbed into the cab and off we set, I asked her how her mum was and how she had been since the last time I picked her up. She seemed surprised that I could remember that. I said that it wasn’t very often that you saw a member of the WRAF thumbing a lift. We chatted about this and that, putting the world to rights as two people who are thrown together do.

We were coming into Tattersall with its castle when she asked me to drop her off there. I said that it was a fair walk to Coningsby from there, but she told me that she had a friend who lived in the village and she could sleep on the settee and then they could go into work together.

I stopped the wagon where she indicated, there weren’t any street lights as it was just before the village houses started, and she jumped down thanking me for the lift; I told her anytime. She closed the cab door and vanished, all that was left was the scent of her perfume filling the cab. I shrugged my shoulders and set off again thinking that she must have run to her friend’s house.

The third time I came across her was on the outskirts of Lincoln, at the top of the hill out of the city on the road towards Coningsby. It was dark, in fact it was in the early hours of the morning; I just caught sight of her in the headlights as I rounded a bend. I stopped and she ran up to the wagon and asked if I could take her to Coningsby.

We set off and once we were on a straight bit of road, I glanced across at her; she seemed to have dark marks running from her ears down to her neck and down from her nose to her chin, I was curious but didn’t ask; I thought that they could be just tricks of the light from the instruments on the dashboard.

As we approached Tattersall she asked if she could be dropped off just before we reached the village of Coningsby so that she could call on a friend and they could walk into work together. I told her that it wouldn’t be any problem, and as I approached the village I slowed down to a stop under a street light.

She thanked me and jumped down from the cab, but as she did I noticed that the back of her head was missing and I was looking into her open skull. She slammed the door and disappeared, the only thing left was the smell of her perfume in the cab.

I carried on my way, but when I reached the camp, I had to sign in at the guardroom I asked the Corporal on duty if he had heard of a young WRAF, and I described her to him. He told me that about ten years ago a WRAF had been hitchhiking back to camp from a 48 hour pass at her home in Stamford when she had been picked up by someone in a car and been bludgeoned to death.

He hit her so hard that the back of her skull was smashed so badly that when they picked her up to put in the ambulance it stayed on the ground and they had to pick it up piece by piece. I never did that run again and warned all my mates to beware of picking anyone in the uniform of the WRAF up.