Inherit the Skies (33 page)

In the small attic room at his lodgings which he had converted into a drawing office Adam Bailey laid down his pencil for at least the tenth time that evening, took a long pull from the mug of half cold coffee which stood at his elbow and ran his hands through his thick fair hair, staring into space.

Damn it, he simply could not concentrate on water-cooled engines and crankshafts this evening – had not been able to for the past two evenings either in point of fact. His mind kept wandering however hard he tried to channel it and each time he looked at the careful calculations on the sheet of paper in front of him he seemed to see nothing but a mop of rich brown hair and a pair of sparkling blue eyes. Sarah Thomas had got under his skin, not a doubt of it, but wonder about it as he might Adam could not say why.

She was a very pretty girl, of course, but she was far from being the first to have crossed his path and in all honesty he could not say she was the prettiest – at twenty-four, handsome and eligible, Adam had known his share of beauties. She had courage. It would have been obvious in the tilt of her chin and the set of her small well-shaped mouth even if he had not known of her ballooning exploits, the very thought of which would have been enough to make most girls swoon. And she had dignity, determination and a kind of crystal clear honesty which shone out of those lovely blue eyes. But he could not see that any of those things, attractive though they were, were enough to distract him from the obsession that had been his life now for almost as long as he could remember.

Adam sighed, lit a cigarette and crossed the attic to set the kettle on the small phuttering gas ring. He could not afford to waste precious time in this way – especially now when they were so close to perfecting the design for their very own aeroplane. Yet here he was unable to do a stroke of work for thinking about a girl who had given not the slightest indication of even returning his interest.

In all likelihood it was that which made her so attractive, Adam thought wryly. In his experience young ladies from barmaids to the flighty well-heeled daughter of his employer had fallen over themselves in an effort to make him notice them and favours had been offered to him with an eagerness he had begun to take for granted. But although he enjoyed their company not one of them had touched his heart, let alone moved him sufficiently to interfere with the project that was the great and flaming passion in his life.

Forget her! Adam told himself crossly. She is engaged to someone else and clearly has not the slightest interest in you.

But he could not forget her. Since meeting her there had not been a single waking moment when she had not been there, coming between him and any coherent thought, and even when he slept it seemed she invaded his dreams.

The sound of footsteps on the bare wooden stairs brought Adam out of his reverie; he turned from the kettle which was already beginning to sing merrily to see the door open and Maximillian Hurst came bursting in.

‘Great news, Adam! Not working? By God, you will be, and harder than ever before when you hear what I have to tell you!'

‘Max!' In spite of his own strange mood Adam found himself smiling at his friend's obvious high spirits. ‘You look as if you've lost a farthing and found a shilling!'

‘Better than that.' Max came into the room with a bouncy stride, a short thick-set young man with a face that was far from handsome yet agreeably pleasant, mobile and expressive with a large humorous mouth.

Though they were as different as chalk and cheese, he and Adam had been firm friends from the moment they had met, both raw young apprentices in the drawing office at the firm of motor engineers. Talking one day they had discovered their mutual fascination with the pioneering of powered flight and from there it had been a short step to deciding to work together on their very own design. When Adam had discovered Max was thoroughly wretched in the lodgings he rented from a shrewish old woman he had persuaded his own kindly and easy going landlady to let a room to Max and the proximity had done nothing to sour their friendship. If anything it had deepened it for now they were able to talk into the small hours over the dying embers of the fire, discussing and dreaming with only one flight of stairs to climb before they could fall exhausted into bed.

As their ideas took shape Mrs Hicks, the landlady, had been persuaded to allow them the use of the attic as a drawing office though Adam suspected, quite correctly, that she believed the work they did there was no more serious than a child's game. Even when they acquired a small workshop under the railway arches to begin the construction of their brainchild she continued to treat them with good-humoured indulgence and a smile that said that sooner or later when they realised the true seriousness of life they would grow out of their far fetched notions and behave like normal adult men.

‘One of these days we will build a plane that will fly,' Adam had told her. ‘And when we do you shall be our first passenger.'

But Mrs Hicks had only thrown up her hands in horror.

‘Get on with your nonsense! My feet are staying right here on terra firma – and I've no doubt yours will be too, Mr Adam!'

Her scepticism did not upset them and they sometimes chuckled over how surprised Mrs Hicks would be to find herself one day dragged unwillingly into the twentieth century with all the fruits of progress waiting for her.

‘Well, what is all the excitement about?' Adam asked now as Max entered the attic and shut the door behind him.

‘Is the kettle on the boil?' Now he had whetted Adam's appetite Max was determined to savour his moment of triumph. ‘Make me a cup of tea, my friend, and when I've got my breath back I'll tell you all about it.'

‘Make yourself one, you lazy good-for-nothing,' Adam retorted. ‘I've been working while you have been out gallivanting.'

‘That is not quite how I would put it,' Max returned, his monkey-face mock serious. ‘What I've been doing is securing our future. Now, do I get that tea or don't you – want to hear my news?' He crossed to the chintz-covered rocking chair, lowering himself into it and grinning at Adam encouragingly.

‘All right, I'll make your blasted tea,' Adam agreed. He emptied cold dregs from the pot, spooned in three good measures and added the now boiling water. When the tea was ready he carried it across to Max and settled himself back into his upright chair, turning it to face his friend. ‘Come on then, tell me your news. I'm all agog.'

Max took a sip of scalding tea and wiped his mouth on a large scarlet spotted handkerchief. ‘What would you say if I told you our troubles are over? That we can give notice to the company and go down to Bristol to work full time on our project?'

‘I'd say you'd finally taken leave of your senses.'

‘And you'd be wrong,' Max said. ‘Do you know where I have been this evening, Adam?'

‘No. You were very secretive about it.'

‘Because I didn't want to raise your hopes in case things failed to work out as I hoped. But since that is not the case I can now tell you I have been to see my Great Uncle Winston. Do you remember you came with me once when I went to visit him?'

‘I certainly do,' Adam said recalling a shrewd old man clad in a velvet smoking jacket, his knees covered by a tartan rug as he held court in his cluttered parlour surrounded by innumerable cats. ‘What of it?'

‘I asked him for a loan,' Max said simply. ‘I told him of our plans and our problems in getting the project off the ground. And the old boy turned up trumps. It seems he intended to leave me £1000 in his will but when he heard how desperate we are he agreed that I should have it now – provided of course I don't expect any more later. He is going to see his solicitor tomorrow and have the thousand transferred to my bank account. So you see that should buy all the equipment and bits and pieces we need and pay us both modest salaries for long enough to get our flying machine into the air. Do you wonder that I am feeling pleased with myself?'

‘Good Lord!' Adam sat in silence for a moment pondering the full implications of what Max had said. A thousand pounds – enough to cater for all their needs and to spare! ‘And you are proposing we should both give notice and work full time on the aeroplane, are you?' he asked after a moment.

‘Of course. We've always been a team, you and I.'

‘But it's your money – your inheritance. Max. It wouldn't be right for you to use it to keep me as well.'

‘I guessed you would say that and I have given it some thought,' Max said easily. ‘There are two ways around it as I see things. Either you work for me and I pay you a wage. Or – and I must say this is the solution I favour – we'll split the money and the costs fifty/fifty and call it a loan. You can pay me back when you are able. Though if I am right and we make as much money out of our aeroplane as I think we will I shall probably be too rich to care much whether you pay me back or not.'

‘I certainly would pay you back,' Adam said decisively. ‘ I don't like being indebted to anyone, Max – even to you.' He was silent for a moment reflecting on the irony of the situation. Once there had been enough money in his family to make Max ‘s £1000 look like small change. His mother's family had been Irish nobility with estates and properties that had amounted to a small fortune. But her father, third son of the Earl, had been a profligate. His share of the inheritance had been squandered on gambling and high living and eventually he had fled to England pursued by his creditors. When she had married Adam's father, a down-to-earth Liverpool ship owner, he had given her the first security she had known, but it had been short lived. He had been ruined by a series of devastating losses and died a poor and broken man, leaving nothing but the crumbling ruin of their once impressive home and just enough money to keep it habitable for the duration of his wife's life. Apart from two good suits, a gold ring, a pocket watch and a hip flask still half full of fine old brandy Adam had not benefited at all. But this latest downturn in his family's fortunes had served to reinforce Adam's dislike of owing money.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be
, his mother, mindful of the follies of her ancestors, had used to say and Adam could see the sense in it. He had no wish to follow his grandfather into ruin and disgrace or his father into bankruptcy.

‘Well, are we agreed?' Max asked and Adam nodded.

‘Yes. I must admit it's a heaven sent opportunity. Everything seems to be going our way and if we can give the project our full attention I reckon we should be in the air in say six months.'

‘You mean
you
can be in the air.' Max's face grew serious. ‘I envy you, Adam, and I don't mind admitting it. I only wish I could be the one to try out the aeroplane when it's ready.'

‘Maybe you will be able to,' Adam said, pouring tea.

‘With this arm of mine?' Max shook his head sadly and as if to prove his statement used his right hand to lift his left onto his lap. It lay there, withered into a permanently hooked claw, half the size it should be. Max had been the victim of infantile paralysis as a child; the withered arm was its legacy. But it had not bred self-pity in him. Max was as adept with one hand as most men were with two and his brilliant mind more than made up for his disability. The most innovative aspects of design were due to his genius and Adam accepted that without Max it was unlikely the aeroplane could ever have been more than a dream.

Flying it however would be a different matter. The present design meant two hands were needed to manage the rudder bar and as yet they had been unable to come up with a workable alternative.

‘One day maybe – but not yet,' Max said firmly. ‘ We can't waste precious time looking for alternatives simply to suit me. Let's work with what we've got and get the machine into the air with you at the controls, Adam. There will be time enough for me later.'

‘I dare say you are right,' Adam admitted reluctantly.

Max drained his cup.

‘Which brings us to your problems, Adam,' he said equably. ‘ If anyone is wasting time just now it is you. I can't see one single change of any significance in the plans you were so busily
not
poring over when I came in.'

‘I was thinking,' Adam said a touch irritably.

‘But not about our aeroplane, I'll warrant.' Max cast him a shrewd glance. ‘What you were thinking about was that young lady who is occupying so much of your attention unless I am very much mistaken.'

‘You mean Sarah Thomas I presume.' Adam said steadily.

‘I do indeed. You are besotted with her, Adam.'

‘Rubbish! All I did was travel down to Bristol with her. Now can we drop the subject?'

‘No,' Max said evenly. ‘I don't think we can. You'll never put your whole attention to our project while you are mooning about her. For heaven's sake go and see her and fight your suit.'

‘I would have thought the last thing I wanted just now was a woman to distract me.' Adam ran a hand through his thick fair hair.

‘You'd work a great deal better if you had a satisfactory love life,' Max persisted. ‘ Look at me and Annie if you have any doubts.'

Adam smiled wryly. Annie was Max's young lady, a sweet-natured girl whose sole role in Max's life seemed to be providing endless cups of tea and coffee and operating the heavy old industrial sewing machine they had acquired for stitching canvas. Adam could not imagine Sarah Thomas standing for that sort of treatment. She was a girl who was used to being at the centre of things, not some kind of willing unpaid servant. And in any case …

‘Sarah Thomas is not interested in me,' he said bad-temperedly. ‘She is engaged to Eric Gardiner.'

Max shook his head, laughing.

‘Adam, the woman who is not interested in you is not yet born,' he said. ‘Engaged or not you could get her if you wanted her. And you do. Listen to Uncle Max.'