Desmond Bagley - Flyaway / Windfall

‘Are we in the clear?’ asked Gaydon.

‘Legally – quite,’ said Harcourt, and added distastefully, ‘It’s not within my province to judge the moral aspect.’ He paused. ‘If the widow takes action it will be different, of course. There is a clear implication here that she joined with her husband in cheating the insurance company. How else could Peter Billson profit other than with his wife’s connivance?’

Gaydon turned to English. ‘What about the widow?’

‘It’s okay,’ said English. ‘She died a little over a year ago. Helen Billson married a Norwegian during the war and changed her name to Aarvik. It was when I stumbled over that fact that I decided to write up the story of Billson.’

Harcourt snorted and left, and Gaydon grinned at English. ‘That was a bit close, Mike.’ He picked up a pen. ‘Be a good chap and pick up that chair before you leave.’

I bought English another drink. ‘So Paul Billson didn’t have a leg to stand on.’

English laughed. ‘Not a hope. I didn’t attack his reputation, you see. Christ, I’d forgotten the man existed.’

I said mendaciously, ‘I’m not really interested in Paul Billson. Do you really think that Peter Billson faked his death to defraud the insurance company?’

‘He could have,’ said English. ‘It makes a good story.’

‘But do you believe it?’

‘Does it matter what I believe?’ He drank some scotch. ‘No, of course I don’t believe it. I think Billson was killed, all right.’

‘So you were pretty safe in issuing that challenge to come forth.’

‘I like to bet on certainties,’ said English. He grinned. ‘If he did defraud the insurance company he wasn’t likely to rise to the bait, was he? I was on sure ground until his son popped up.’

I said, ‘About that insurance. £100,000 is a hell of a lot of money. The premium must have been devilish high.’

‘Not really. You must remember that by 1936 aeroplanes were no longer the unsafe string-and-sealing wax contraptions of the ’twenties. There wasn’t a great deal of doubt that an aircraft would get to where it was going – the question was how fast. And this was at the time of a newspaper war; the dailies were cutting each other’s throats to buy readers. Any premium would be a drop in the bucket compared with what they were spending elsewhere, and £100,000 is a nice headline-filling sum.’

‘Did Billson stand a chance in the race?’

‘Sure – he was a hot favourite. Flyaway – that Northrop of his – was one of the best aircraft of its time, and he was a good pilot.’

‘Who won the race?’

‘A German called Helmut Steiner. I think Billson would have won had he survived. Steiner only won because he took a hell of a lot of chances.’

‘Oh! What sort of chances?’

English shrugged. ‘I don’t remember the times personally – I’m not that old – but I’ve read up on it. This was in the times of the Nazis. The Berlin Olympics were on and the Master Race was busy proving its case. German racing cars were winning on all the circuits because the Auto-Union was State subsidized; German mountaineers were doing damnfool things on every Alpine cliff – I believe some of them dropped off the Eiger at the time. It didn’t prove they were good climbers; only that they were good Nazis. Germany had to beat everybody at everything, regardless of cost.’

‘And Steiner?’

‘Subsidized by the Hitler regime, of course; given a stripped military plane and a crackerjack support team seconded from the Luftwaffe. He was good, all right, but I think he knew Billson was better, so he took chances and they came off. He pressed his machine to the limit and the engine blew up on him as he landed in Cape Town. He was lucky it didn’t happen sooner.’

I thought about that. ‘Any possibility of Billson being sabotaged?’

English stared at me. ‘No one has come up with that idea before. That really is a lulu.’

‘What about it?’

‘My God, the lengths to which insurance companies will go! What will you do if Billson was sabotaged? Sue the German government for £100,000? I doubt if Bonn would fall for that one.’ He shrugged. ‘Billson’s plane was never found. You haven’t a hope.’

I drained my glass. There wasn’t much more I could get out of English and I prepared a sharp knife to stick into him. ‘So you don’t think you’ll have any trouble from Paul Billson.’

‘Not a chance,’ he scoffed. ‘Harcourt may be pious and sanctimonious but he tied Billson into knots. You can’t libel a dead man – and Billson swears his father is dead.’

I smiled gently. ‘A man called Wright once wrote about William Ewart Gladstone imputing that he was a hypocrite, particularly in sexual matters. This was in 1927 and Gladstone was long dead. But his son, the then Lord Gladstone, took umbrage and also legal advice. Like Paul Billson, he was told that the dead cannot be libelled, but he nailed Wright to the cross all the same.’

English gave me a wet-eyed look. ‘What did he do?’

‘He libelled Wright at every opportunity. He called Wright a liar, a fool and a poltroon in public. He had Wright thrown out of his club. In the end Wright had to bring Gladstone to court to protect his reputation. Gladstone had Norman Birkett appear for him, and Birkett flayed Wright in open court. When the case was finished so was Wright; his professional reputation was smashed.’ I slid the knife home. ‘It could happen to you.’

English shook his head. ‘Billson won’t do that – he’s not the man for it.’

‘He might,’ I said. ‘With help.’ I twisted the knife. ‘And it will give me great pleasure to appear for him and to swear that you told me that you thought his father to be dead, in spite of what you wrote in your dirty little article.’

I rose and left him. At the door of the pub I stopped and looked back. He was sitting in the corner, looking as though someone had kicked him in the belly, knocking the wind out of him.

I had an early lunch and then belatedly thought to ring Paul Billson’s half-sister. I had expected to find her absent from home in the middle of the working day but the telephone was picked up on the third ring and a pleasant voice said, ‘Alix Aarvik here.’

I told her who and what I was, then said, ‘I take it you haven’t heard from your brother, Miss Aarvik.’

‘No, I haven’t, Mr Stafford.’

‘I’d like to talk to you about him. May I come round?’

‘Now?’ There was uncertainty in her voice.

‘Time is of the essence in these matters, Miss Aarvik.’ A platitude, but I find they tend to soothe people.

‘Very well,’ she said. ‘I’ll be expecting you.’

‘Within the half-hour.’ I rang off and took a taxi to Kensington.

With a name like hers I had envisaged a big, tow-headed Scandinavian, but she was short and dark and looked in her early thirties. Her flat was comfortable, if sparsely furnished, and I was interested to see that she was apparently moving out. Two suitcases stood in the hall and another on a table was open and half-packed.

She saw me looking around and said, ‘You’ve caught me in the middle of packing.’

I smiled. ‘Found another flat?’

She shook her head. ‘I’m leaving for Canada. My firm has asked me to go. I’m flying tomorrow afternoon.’ She made a gesture which was pathetically helpless. ‘I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing with Paul still missing, but I have my job to consider.’

‘I see,’ I said, not seeing a hell of a lot. Her mother had come into a windfall of £100,000 but there was precious little sign of it around, either sticking to Paul Billson or Alix Aarvik. I made a little small talk while I studied her. She was not too well dressed but managed to make the most of what she had, and she didn’t overdo the make-up. You could see thousands like her in the streets; a typical specimen of Stenographica londiniensis – the London typist.