John Davis - Seize the Reckless Wind

‘Unfortunately, that’s who she was in the bathtub with. He’s suddenly got two very black eyes and no front teeth.’

‘Oh Jesus! Then get Cooper!’

‘Cooper’s flying for Starlux, Benny’s flying for Tradewinds, Renner’s flying the Canadair right now, Morley’s goofing-off on the Costa del Sol. I assure you there’s no body …’

‘Johnson?’

‘Mother’s dying.’

‘Fullbright?’

‘Just got a full-time job with Ethiopia Air.’

‘Well, find somebody, Dolores! Even if you’ve got to drop your knickers and run bare-assed round Gatwick Airport! What are we going to do with thirty bulls around Redcoat House?’

‘That’s why I phoned, dammit! Sounds like a lot of bullshit to me …’

When he got to the hangar the next evening, there was his new captain awaiting him. ‘Good evening, name’s Sydney Benson.’

Mahoney was taken aback. ‘Are you Jamaican?’

‘As the ace of spades.’

Mahoney grinned. As he was signing on duty he muttered out of the corner of his mouth, ‘You sure he can fly aeroplanes?’

Dolores slapped the desk and burst into smothered giggles. ‘Your face – it’s a scream.’

As they walked together through the grey drizzle to the Canadair, Mahoney said: ‘Dolores tells me your last job was with Air Jamaica, Sydney. What brings you to England?’

Sydney broke into a little shuffle:

‘This is my island, in the sun

Built for me, by the English-mun

All my days, I will sing in praise

Of the National Assistance and the Labour Exchange …’

Mahoney threw back his head and laughed.

After they had settled down on the flight-deck, Mahoney said: ‘If you don’t mind, I’d like to do take-off.’

Sydney looked at him.

‘You don’t like spades taking off? Well, I’m not too wild about honkies, either.’

‘Not that,’ Mahoney smiled. ‘You see, I’m managing director and I’ve a lot of work—’

‘And I’m captain of this aircraft, sah, and what I say is law. You got that?’

Mahoney sighed. ‘Got it.’

‘And I also just got fired, right?’

‘No. Go on, take off, you’re the boss.’

Sydney sat back, with a brilliant smile. ‘O.K., you take off, then go’n work, I’ll hold the fort, pal.’

After that Sydney often flew for Redcoat, and Mahoney liked to fly with him. The man was an excellent pilot, and bloody funny. It was an asset, too, having a black captain to argue with black officials about dash and blackmail and blackmarket rates. ‘How you’ve stood these mothers,’ Sydney complained, ‘it makes me embarrassed about my pigmentation, and I’ve always thought nothing was worse than pinko-grey like you unfortunates.’ Sydney’s wife was a buxom American black lass with flashing eyes, called Muriel, who came to work for Redcoat. ‘Don’t think I’m going to shoulder the whole white man’s burden, I refuse to work more than eighteen hours a day for this pittance! ’ Mahoney was rather intimidated by her, Pomeroy was terrified of her, Dolores was delighted with her. ‘Works like a black,’ Dolores enthused, ‘and so funny …’

Mahoney hardly ever saw Pomeroy or Vulgar Olga these days. Vulgar Olga worked as a barmaid across town and Pomeroy was always inside some engine, covered in grease, going cuss cuss cuss. Sometimes they met at The Rabbit, to talk some business, but Pomeroy was no good at anything except engines, and booze and women, he wanted to leave all that mindblowing management crap to Mahoney. And Mahoney didn’t know anything about engines, he wanted to leave all that mindblowing crap to Pomeroy, anything Pomeroy decided to do with Redcoat Engineering Ltd was O.K. with Mahoney as long as it made money. He was very pleased with Pomeroy, and wished he saw more of him. Sometimes Pomeroy took a break and went on a flight as engineer. He amused Mahoney. Pomeroy was a cockney barrow-boy at heart, but now that he had made good he was getting awfully toffy. Pomeroy and Vulgar Olga lived in a chintzy mortgaged house, and when he wasn’t inside engines he was socializing with the gentry and he didn’t assault policemen anymore now he was respectable. ‘Cor-er, marvellous crumpet in the suburbs,’ Pomeroy confided. ‘Worth all the effort, even thinking of taking elocution lessons, like.’

‘And what does Olga think about all the crumpet?’

‘Loves it! Old Olga, y’know, she’s only here for the beer. I’m even thinkin’ of marrying her, we get along so famous. Wot I mean is, you really should come along to some of these toffy parties and get some of this marvellous married crumpet. Biggest club in the world!’

‘I’ve got to work,’ Mahoney smiled.

And when he was through with office work, there were the piles of Malcolm Todd’s airship material. The principles of lighter-than-air flight, the esoteric formulae he had to grasp, the significance of comparative graphs, Malcolm’s screeds of essays and promotional material, all the draftsman’s drawings, all the books. Mahoney had the gift of the gab rather than a mathematical turn of mind, so the science did not come easily to him, but being of above-average intelligence he could, with effort, understand it. It also helped to keep his mind off the empty cottage that was waiting for him. And he was fascinated. It simply did not make sense to be hurtling twenty elephants through the night sky in defiance of the laws of gravity when you could float them, riding the air like a ship rides on the sea.

Work, booze, and adultery. And guilt.

Mahoney half-woke feeling terrible, thinking he was late for work, and he started scrambling up when Dolores mumbled: ‘Relax, it’s Sunday …’

He slumped back, his head thudding. He remembered where he was now. Pomeroy’s house. Oh God, with Dolores … As if reading his mind, she muttered, ‘Relax, we didn’t do anything.’

But, oh, why hadn’t he gone home? Why did he ever drink brandy? … Then he remembered: chocolate mousse. …

It came back, fragmented. The lunch was clear enough. Dolores was not there then. Wine flowing like water, dropping on to the gins and tonics. Why did he ever drink gin? Then the brandies. They all knew each other very well, except for Mahoney. Mahoney only knew Danish Erika and Pomeroy well, and he knew how his parties turned out. Then the whiskies, getting dark now. Sitting around Pomeroy’s fake mahogany bar with all its gear, its erotic curios, all the suggestive talk and laughter and double meanings. Memory began to blur. He remembered starting to feel very drunk. Remembered seeing it was nine o’clock. He remembered Vulgar Olga taking off her clothes for the sauna. Then Pomeroy, then the other women, then Fullbright and Mason. And all this was fine, the naked women were fine, but no way was he going to get undressed and sit in a hot sauna. He didn’t give a damn what they did. Once upon a time he’d have filled his boots and maybe one day he would again, but right now no way was he going to get involved, he just wanted to go home. He remembered them calling him a spoil sport, and too drunk to drive, and Erika stealing his car keys. He remembered bumping upstairs to look for a bed; then blank.

The rest was very confused. He remembered waking up, finding himself on the sofa in Pomeroy’s bedroom, clothes on. Olga shaking him, telling him to get his gear off and join the action. The next thing, Danish Erika shaking him saying it was four o’clock, time to go home, did he want any chocolate mousse? He sat up, holding his head and feeling like death, and there were the six of them – evidently Fullbright had gone – sitting on the floor stark naked and drunk and disorderly around this big bowl of chocolate mousse and bottles of champagne.