 5. Bryan took up the parachute from the wing root. He reached into the cockpit, made sure the brakes were on. Climbed down and pulled the chocks away and untied the tail. He put his tick on the 700, climbed into the cockpit, strapped in. He tried to open the radiator shutter more. It was fully open. The coolant temperature was at the point of no return. He released the brake. The Hurri was nose heavy and his first anxious burst of power nearly set it on its spinner. He eased up. He could not see over the massive engine. He undid the harness and stood on the rudder bar so he could peer over the enormous Merlin as he taxied out. Pointed the ship into the wind and set the brake again. He had checked out in a Hurricane, had expected to have one by now. He knew the drill, where everything was. Just to be certain, he checked the notes which someone had stashed next to the seat. Had to fish for them since the seat attached directly to the Hurri's basketweave tubular airframe without cockpit walls or floor. He opened the safety gate for the undercarriage, trimmed the elevator to neutral. The rudder trimmer -- now that was new. Or at least he didn't remember it from training. Per the notes, he turned its large knob fully right for "TAKE-OFF." There was plenty of petrol in all three tanks, enough for 400 miles. Bryan was only going to Scotland and back. The temperature was creeping dangerously close to boiling over. He cleared the engine, released the brake, opened the throttle steadily to full. The Hurricane rolled across the field and lifted by itself. Bryan had an impulse to make it climb, but waited until his speed was the advised 140 mph. It was not getting there quickly enough for him. Blast it. The undercart. He moved the lever to the "UP" position. Through the windows in the bottom of the cockpit he could see the wheels rise into their wells at his feet. The indicators on the instrument panel lit up red. He pushed the lever forward to neutral again. He did not climb high before he leveled off. It was a low sky and a new aeroplane. He wanted to see where he was going. Below him a haze of red and green buds was beginning to show on bare gray trees. He reduced his boost to zero, mixture to weak, revs to 1900, and trimmed for level flight. Finally he found a moment to unlock the catch on the canopy and slide it forward. The braced plexiglass hood made him think of a greenhouse. The Hurricane had one foot in the new technology and one in the old. Its powerful engine and eight guns were up to the minute. The Hurri was rugged, sure-footed, and fast. But it still had a wooden prop, fabric-covered wings, and aft of the cockpit it had a fabric skin over an old-fashioned airframe. It gave the impression of a bi-plane that happened to have one plane. Yet it was the most modern fighter in the RAF. Bryan had yet to see a Spitfire since the prototype flew almost two years ago. He had his heart set on flying one -- especially after seeing the German Messerschmitt fly -- and he wondered what had become of them. Bryan found the stark grey stone manor house where it stood above a wide glistening green. The wet grass bowed before the Hurricane's thrashing prop as he set down and rolled a long way to a stop. He gave a burst of power to clear the engine, then closed the throttle and pulled the slow running cut out. He turned everything off, released his Sutton Harness, and climbed out, shrugged out of his parachute, and collected some rocks to serve as chocks before the wheels. Surprised him that Jane had not come running Or her younger brother. Or her father. Or a watchman with a shotgun. The North House looked deserted. He was too late. Bryan ran across the field to the great stone house. Jane's mother greeted him at the door. Lady Fairchild was agelessly trim. She wore a wool country suit of Oxford gray. Her stockings were silk. Her nails were lacquered pink, her blond hair carefully sculptured. Her composure was unwavering. "Where's Jane!" Bryan blurted. Then whipped off his hat. "Hullo, ma'am. Where's Jane?" "I'm afraid you have missed her." Lady Fairchild's voice always sounded warm. When she spoke, Bryan could not believe she disapproved of him so very much. "I have set tea. Come in while you are here." Bryan followed her inside. He could still change her mind about him and Jane. She did seem to like him. She gazed at him with a trace of a smile. She told him she was charmed by the modern aeroplane landing on the green and the brash young officer come to answer a lady's call of distress. "Very knightly," she said. Tea turned out to be a private affair. There were no servants, no one in the house but the two of them. And Lord Fairchild was not expected back for a while yet. Bryan was not worldly wise enough to extricate himself gracefully from the situation, and not jaded enough to want to stay. Lady Fairchild sat next to Bryan on the divan, loosened his tie. Her perfume and the light brush of her cheek against his own disconcerted him. Her hand was inside his tunic before he let himself believe what was happening. He jerked away more forcefully than necessary and leapt to his feet. Then, realizing that he was not being murdered and that he'd really overdone it, he turned scarlet. She, more irritated than angry, asked from the divan, "How old are you?" Bryan saw nothing left to salvage. Everything was already bloody. He was aroused and it showed. The brush of a woman's cheek did him in every time. Having already blown it, he opted to complete the rout and said only, "Excuse me." Scooped up his hat and all but ran for the door. "Mister Catrell." Her indignant voice stopped him short. He could never walk out on a woman while she was talking to him. "This is too theatrical. I like your entrance, but this is childish and not charming anymore." Bryan put on a manner that was supposed to be dignified. Knew it wasn't, but it was the best he could muster. "Really, ma'am, I only came to see Jane. I know you won't tell me where she's gone, but you must know she will write to me and tell me herself." "You ridiculous middle class boy." Bryan felt the heat radiating from his cheeks. Fine for discreet adultery, but don't let your daughter marry me. "You are a military man," she said. "Do figure the logistics of moving a seventeen year old girl with fifteen pieces of luggage, and then ask yourself why, if she wanted to see you so very badly, could she not stall long enough to be here when you arrived. I thought you might have something for your pains, but it is a lot more than you deserve." Bryan backed out mumbling, "I'm sorry." Once outside, he did run. A small group of gardeners and Lord Fairchild's beagle trainer had come from out-buildings and gathered around the Hurricane, conferring and shaking their heads. "Doesn't rightly look like an aeroplane." "Where's the top wing?" Bryan enlisted two of them to hold down the tail. "You'd best leave off your hats," he warned. "You're in for a bit of a gale." He told the rest to stand clear of the prop. He pushed a shell into the cartridge starter, primed six strokes on the Ki-gas pump. He'd never done this, not with a cartridge starter. He hoped it would catch. He pulled the trigger. The cylinder fired. The rest of the cylinders followed suit, building up to a satisfying roar. The men on the tail huddled against the blast as he did the run up. All satisfactory, Bryan waved them off. They slid off the tail, laughing, and removed the stones Bryan had piled against the tyres. Then they all stood back looking pleased with themselves that the RAF glamour boy needed them to get his modern aeroplane off the ground. So someone got something for his pains, Bryan thought. He could see Lady Fairchild watching from the manor house as he took to the air. Dusk settled quickly over the countryside, but the clouds were breaking up, leaving jagged clear spaces, so Bryan flew higher on the return flight. He tried to calm himself as he flew. This was a set back. Not a disaster. Nothing Lady Fairchild said was true. Jane would write to him. They would set everything to rights. The glare from the Hurricane's exhausts against the closing darkness left him blinking and dazzled. He glanced all round, up, down and back, to keep from staring at the light. So it was that he saw the other aircraft approaching on an intercept course. He adjusted his heading and altitude to get out of their way. They changed with him. Closer, Bryan recognized them as Hurricanes, three in a vic. Two dropped down behind him and one came alongside, off Bryan's right wingtip. The canopy slid back on that one. The oxygen mask came off, and the pilot signaled, not at all friendly, for Bryan to put down now. Bryan had taken off without a flying helmet, so he could not plug into the R/T. He was not accustomed to having a wireless on board. He shrugged in return and pointed forward to where his aerodrome lay farther to the south. At once red flame and white tracer were leaping angrily from his escort's shuddering wings. Jesus Christ! The pilot pointed down. Bryan nodded. He thought his eyes must be as round as sovereigns. The fighter escort brought him down at a sector airfield where he was thrown without ceremony into detention. He guessed there was probably more to this than the unauthorized borrowing of a station commander's personal aircraft. It was in interrogation that he discovered he had run afoul of England's new early warning system. Well, that was comforting. Ish The Air Ministry was counting on its Chain Home Radio Direction Finding stations to defend the realm. It was good to know that they worked. Ish. Bryan faced the row of frowning officers, who asked again, "Where were you coming from?" "Just over the Border." "Germany?" said they. Bryan almost laughed at them. "From Scotland!" "Why did a flight from Scotland take you over the Channel?" "It didn't." "You came in over the water." "No." "What do you mean, no?" "I mean no, sir." "You came in on a direct line from Hamburg." "The hell I did." "You will mind your tongue. Your fuel tanks were appropriately low." "My tanks were low because I did not top the tanks in Aberdeen. Anyway there wasn't time for me to do what you claim I did." "What time did you leave the coast?" "I never left the coast. I took off from Digby at nineteen-fifteen." There was a shuffling of papers, conferring murmurs, a shaking of heads. "No. No aircraft on record." "But I put my tick on the seven hundred!" "On the RDF record, Pilot Officer." "How is it you saw me come in and not go out?" said Bryan. An exchange of glances, a shift in mood. The inquisitors were suddenly on the defensive. They pressed, "How is that possible, Pilot Officer? The RDF was operational at nineteen-fifteen." "I don't know," Bryan said, angry, because he sensed they did know. "Ask your radio when I left." "Just answer the questions, Pilot Officer." "Very well. Your radio machine doesn't work, that is how." "Errors up to twelve degrees are common with our Chain Home stations," a communications officer tendered to the others in Bryan's defense. "Twelve degrees! Try one-eighty!" said Bryan. "You find a one hundred and eighty degree factor of error implausible," said the intelligence officer silkily. "So do I." "I could fly that crate anywhere and you couldn't find it." Brows lifted. "And to whom were you planning to give that spot of information?" Bryan blanched. "Not Germany. That's what you mean. No one. I wasn't testing the bloody radio detection finding system. I forgot about it. I didn't think it watched landward anyway." "You can't get to Germany over land." "But you can get to blood Aberdeen!" "Or to Billingsgate Market. Does this unbecoming behavior stem from our getting too close to the truth?" "Stems from seeing my career about to prang on a false charge!" "Oh, it's not just your career. If you have given information to the Hun, I'll personally hang you." |