Джон Пристли - The Doomsday Men

The next morning was fine again, and good for flying, Charlie declared at once, on making a rather late appearance. Now Rosalie did not press her objections again. She quietly accepted the fact that they were going, and as they would not be back until some time in the afternoon, she gave them some sandwiches to eat in the air. She seemed to Jimmy oddly subdued, almost sad, and while Charlie was putting some more gasoline into his Bendy, Jimmy took her to one side and asked what was the matter.

“I don’t know,” she answered, looking troubled. “I didn’t want to say anything. You’d think me silly, going on again, after last night. But this is different. And I wouldn’t have said anything if you hadn’t asked me. But I feel-oh!-I dunno-queer and rather sad inside. Not like me either, but I must be honest and tell you what I feel. But I’ll be all right, don’t worry. And just see that Charlie doesn’t do anything silly.”

He looked at her solemnly, then took her hand and held it a moment, and astonished her by saying: “I wonder if you’re fond of pictures.”

“Pictures?”

“Yes, pictures-paintings-my paintings I’m really thinking about.”

“Why, do you paint pictures, Jimmy?”

He nodded solemnly. “My great hobby, painting pictures. And I’ll tell you something. Nobody thinks I’m any good at it-but me.”

“Oh-what a shame!” She sounded honestly indignant. A good start, but she hadn’t seen any of the pictures yet.

“I’d like you to see one or two.”

“I’d like to, Jimmy.”

“Yes, but this is specially important.”

“What do you mean?”

“Can’t tell you now, Rosalie.” But he pressed her hand and looked for a moment as if he was about to kiss her, and Rosalie was deciding like lightning that he could if he wanted to. But he didn’t, only gave her another solemn searching look, over which she speculated for many an hour before they talked again.

“Now look after yourselves, you two,” cried Rosalie, as she drew back from the plane, and Jimmy climbed into the open cockpit beside Charlie.

“Careful where you put your foot, Jimmy,” said Charlie. And Jimmy saw that he would have to be very careful indeed. There was a horribly improvised, boys’ magazine, canvas and lath look about this airplane. It had looked a very dubious vehicle even from the outside, but on a closer view, from the inside, it set Jimmy quaking.

“And what in the name of Pete,” he asked himself anxiously, “have I let myself in for this time?” He had only once been in a small plane before, and even that had looked a miracle of safety compared with this dilapidated little old monster. It was difficult to feel any confidence in Bendy. And then there was Charlie. He might be a most experienced and brilliant pilot, but the fact remained that he was also a reckless devil who confessed that he was getting tired of this life. Curtains indeed!

“Charlie,” he roared, for now the engine was being warmed up and the propeller whirring, “just remember that if you’re tired of life, I’m not. Take it easy, boy.”

“You leave it to me,” replied Charlie, now in high delight. “Look out. I’m letting her go.”

A last wave to Rosalie, standing there, an anxious little figure, and they were off into the blue. The ranch went huddling down into a few tiny roofs; the whole valley contracted into a narrow greenish slit; and now they were over the mountains, and bumping about horribly, so that Jimmy felt terrified. Charlie yelled that it was always bumpy over these mountains, and Jimmy wished he had thought of that before he agreed to come along. Every time Bendy dropped, she seemed to creak and groan and flap and shiver as if her last moment had arrived, and it was small consolation to Jimmy that Charlie did not appear to mind at all but continued in the highest spirits. Give him the air, he cried; and Jimmy felt ready to make him a present of the entire element.

They were still climbing, though not steadily, for Bendy still kept bumping and suddenly dropping. “Ride her, cowboy-” roared Charlie, handling the controls, which had a home-made look about them, with a dash and abandon that failed to bring confidence to his passenger. Now they might have been flying over the dead face of the moon. They were above desolate mountains, and ringed round with desert. Jimmy could see innumerable wrinkles and folds below, as if some old brownish fur rug had been hastily kicked into position down there, and not a sign of man. Any green places there might have been there were lost to view. No water gleamed. Where the rocks ended, the sand began. Nothing stirred, except an occasional vulture or buzzard. Far off, on their left hand, to the north, were higher mountains, shining remote peaks. But it was the grim desolation below that caught and held Jimmy’s imagination, for it was as if a world had died there. Beneath the first fear, the fear of an immediate disaster, a sudden drop that Bendy would not shiveringly come out of, a crash on one of those pinnacles of rock, he discovered now a deeper and darker terror, born of this ancient desolation, this dead face of a landscape, and not to be put into words and reasoned with, a terror that came in full sunlight and yet seemed to belong to midnight and bad dreams.

No nonsense of this kind about Charlie, who seemed to prefer rocketing about in mid-air to a sensible existence on the ground. He was in great form. He began to play with Bendy as if she were a kind of monstrous flying kitten; they had the jolliest romps together up there above the rocky spears and bludgeons of those mountain tops; and as he cavorted with her he shouted and sang. Jimmy hoped the madman was really making for their destination, but doubted it. He had an unpleasant notion that they were just playing about in blue space. He had just opened his mouth to say so, at the top of his voice, when Bendy’s nose went down and the whole earth suddenly tilted. So Jimmy decided to reserve his energies in order to cope with these startling phenomena. That tilting earth, now, those mountain peaks all askew. Charlie seemed to want to have a closer look at them; but Jimmy closed his eyes.

“No,” roared Charlie, “that’s not right. Try again.”

This time they went very high, and Charlie stopped playing the fool-if he had been playing the fool, for Jimmy was never quite sure-and now looked about him soberly, carefully. Finally, he gave an exclamation, pointed Bendy’s nose down again, and descended in a vast skimming curve. Jimmy noticed they were losing speed, and beginning to spiral down.

“That’s it,” shouted Charlie. “I’ll take her nearer-but-not easy-get very near.”

Sheer curiosity now conquered all Jimmy’s mixed fears. He looked and saw a steep and narrow valley, almost like a gorge, and nearly at the head of it was a cluster of roofs among trees. Bendy went nearer, and now he saw the white tower, which was just behind the main house. A road ran the length of the valley, and another went back, through a little pass, almost as sharp as a cutting, in the mountain wall behind. Now Charlie was circling round steadily; but though Jimmy stared hard all the time, he did not learn very much more. The buildings had white walls and red roofs, of curly Spanish tiles; all, that is, except the tower itself, which appeared to have an open platform instead of a roof. A line of pylons approached the buildings from the rear, running not far from the road that went out at the back. Apart from the main house and the tower, there must have been ten or twelve smaller structures. It was a most impressive-looking establishment, and there was obviously room in it for all three MacMichaels and a small crowd of friends or employees. Clearly, they might be up to anything in a place like this, but there was nothing to throw any light on what they actually were doing.