Page 63 - Demo

61confidence, %u201cMister Forsyth, you are invited for lunch at the Assistant Commandant%u2019s Residence on Wednesday. Make sure you are scrubbed up. You will be accompanied by Flight Cadet Burton (of 95 or 96 Entry). Seek him out - you should go together%u201d.At the appointed time, we rang the doorbell and a Steward ushered us into a room where Air Commodore Wakeford and his wife were holding court surrounded by half a dozen Group Captains and Wing Commanders and their spouses, all clutching glasses of G&T.We introduced ourselves, Ian first. %u201cAh %u2013 so you are Harry Burton%u2019s son%u201d welcomed the Air Commodore, a rather old school, humourless man, and turning to me %u201cSo you must be Paddy%u2019s boy%u201d. Gulp. Paddy%u2019s boy I wasn%u2019t. What should I do? For about 10 seconds, I thought I could wing it %u2013 until another guest chimed in %u201cYou look so like your father.%u201dI drew the Air Commodore to one side to tell him my father was not Paddy. Total sense of humour failure by the One Star who becamevery grumpy, making me feel I was my fault that I had failed to be the son of this Paddy, of whom I had never heard. Fortunately his wife intervened to lighten the atmosphere with %u201cWhat a hoot!%u201d And a very pleasant lunch it was.It transpired that there was a Richard (Dick) Forsythe in B Squadron, son of, yes, Paddy who had commanded 16 Squadron.Fast-forward about 10 years. I found myself at RAF Bentley Priory working for a Squadron Leader Tim Downes, a Navigator who had seen the light to become a Supply Officer. Some of his flying had been with 16 Squadron when it was commanded by Paddy Forsythe and, as the Secretary of the 16 Squadron Association; he was in regular touch with him. Hearing him on the phone one day to Paddy, I shared my %u201cwrong luncheon-guest%u201d story with Tim who subsequently invited Mich%u00e8le and me for lunch where the other guests were the by now Air Commodore Paddy Forsythe and his wife. Tim lost no time in getting me to tell the story.