Stephen Morris (6 page)

Morris sat staring at the stove. Two more little fortunes - very little ones, merely gratuities - had gone into aviation and been lost. That was the way of money that went into this business; nobody ever saw it again. Of course, this would have happened anyway; this business was just a sideshow at the seaside, like a troupe of nigger minstrels, and the visitors were getting tired of it. It was time for the booth to close down. There was no more money in the business.

But perhaps there was more in it than that. That summer they had carried safely and well many thousands of people; nearly ten thousand, Morris thought. Say twenty thousand since the business started. Most of them had been impressed with the safety of aircraft; some of them one day might become passengers of the air lines of the future, enthusiasts for the new transport, supporters of a strong Air Force. Perhaps, after all, these little fortunes had not been wasted. Perhaps they had been given to the country for propaganda, so that England might one day be once more an island by virtue of a healthy Air Force.

‘Of course,’ said Riley, ‘there’s no point in quitting till we stop making money. We may go on for another month or more yet. But if we know what’s going to happen, we can each look out for other jobs.’

‘We’ll be in good company, anyway,’ said Morris. ‘Other people will be quitting this winter - it’s not done yet.’

‘No, by God, it’s not,’ said Stenning. ‘Some of these
air lines must be feeling the draught over the subsidy business.’

‘Well,’ said Riley, ‘it’s to be quit, is it?’

‘I think so,’ said Stenning. ‘We’ve not done so badly out of it, considering that it’s aviation.’ There was no bitterness in his tone.

Riley drew a little stump of pencil from his pocket and took a sheet of paper. ‘I’m going to write to my old firm at Brooklands,’ he said.

Stenning grinned. ‘Tell them you’re an ex-officer - that’s the thing nowadays.’

‘Shut up,’ said Riley. He bent over the paper in the throes of composition, his fair brows knitted in a frown.

‘God bless my soul,’ said Morris, ‘he might be writing to a wench.’

The other looked up. ‘This is different,’ said Riley, ‘this is personal. I always have to think a lot over this kind of letter. I usually carry a rough copy about with me two or three days before sending it. That’s why I’m doing it now.’

‘I was never so sensitive about my literary style as that,’ said Morris. ‘Mine goes just anyhow.’

‘I like to get it just right,’ said Riley. ‘If I can bear to read it two days afterwards, I know it’ll give a reasonably good effect.’

Morris laughed; this was a side of Riley that he had not seen before.

‘All very well for you to laugh,’ said Stenning, ‘you college people. You’ve got friends to drop you into a fat little job - secretary at the Air Ministry, or something. It’s different for us.’

‘Have I hell!’ said Morris.

He turned to Stenning. ‘What are you going to do?’

‘Stay in aviation … look for another pilot’s job.’ He glanced at Morris. ‘My father keeps a big drapery business in Huddersfield - retail. I could go into that,’
he said simply. Then he smiled. ‘But I don’t see it happening.’

‘You’ll be all right,’ said Riley. ‘You know one or two people at Croydon, don’t you?’

‘There’ll be jobs on the air lines in the spring,’ said Stenning hopefully. ‘At the worst, I could live on my fat till then.’

‘Wish I could.’

‘You’d better go and look up your pal Rawdon,’ said Stenning. ‘Struck me that you were well away there.’

Morris wondered if there were anything in it. He was very much averse to going to sponge on Rawdon for a job, immediately after taking his advice as he had done. Still, what else was there? It seemed to be the only course open to him at all. Otherwise he must take something temporarily, like Stenning’s drapery standby, to tide him over the winter till more pilots were needed. But that was admitting himself a pilot and nothing else.

‘How much capital have you got?’ asked Riley suddenly.

‘Eh?’ said Morris, awaking from his reverie.

‘How long can you keep yourself for?’

Morris made a little calculation. ‘About four months, comfortably.’

‘The best thing you can do,’ said Riley, ‘is to go to Rawdon, tell him what’s happened, and offer to work in his offices unpaid for a couple of months for experience. Lots of firms take on juniors like that. After that, he’ll either give you a job himself, or else a thumping good testimonial which may get you into some other firm. In any case, you’ll be in touch with aviation and on the spot if anyone wants a pilot. If you can get Rawdon to use you as a pilot, of course, he’ll give you flying money. You might even be able to earn your keep that way, by casual work like that.’

‘They’d never take me on,’ said Morris. ‘I’d be more nuisance than I’m worth.’

‘You can have a shot anyway,’ said Riley. ‘And I don’t see why they shouldn’t take you on like that, though whether you’d be worth a screw at the end of two months I don’t know. You can push a slide rule, can’t you?’

Morris nodded.

‘There’s nothing in performance work,’ said Riley. ‘I can’t do it myself, but it’s only a matter of worrying out long columns of figures and plotting the results in curves and things. I should think they’d be glad to have you as a sort of calculating machine.’

‘I dare say it might work,’ said Stenning. ‘The more unpaid staff they can get to do the dirty work, the more research they can do with their regular staff.’

Morris got up from his chair. ‘I think it’s worth trying,’ he said. ‘I’ll write him a line.’

‘You’ll never get an answer to a letter,’ said Riley bluntly. ‘The best aircraft firms don’t answer letters. Think it over for a day or two, and then go and see him yourself.’

‘But will he see me - can one just barge in like that?’

‘Of course he’ll see you.’

So three days afterwards, Morris found himself in a tramcar being borne out to the neighbourhood of Southall from Shepherd’s Bush. The more he thought of it, the more unlikely the scheme appeared; proportionately as he approached the place his spirits fell.

The conductor turned him out at a barren corner in country of a sort; a paper-littered country, dotted about with ugly little houses and embellished with great decaying hoardings of peeling and tattered advertisements of unguents for skin diseases. Morris walked on up the lane.

As he got away from the main road, things became a
trifle better, and he emerged into clean, though dull, country. After a walk of about half a mile he came upon the aerodrome, surrounded by the wooden buildings and huts that constituted the whole of the establishment. Only one or two motor-cars outside the largest office building, the droning of a buzz-saw, and the stocking floating from a flagstaff on a roof proclaimed that it was inhabited. It was an unkempt, rather desolate little works.

Morris walked on to where the cars were, and into a building of offices. Here he knocked on a door marked ‘Inquiries’ and opened it, to find a small girl seated by a telephone eating an apple.

‘Er, can I see Captain Rawdon?’ he said.

‘He’s down in the shops, sir,’ said the child cheerfully.

There was a short pause.

‘Do you know when he’ll be back?’ asked Morris.

The little girl looked surprised. ‘No, sir - I’d go down there if I were you.’ Then, with a sudden access of patronage, ‘I’ll take you down, if you like.’

Morris followed her humbly out of the building, down an alley between various sheds and stores, through a penetrating reek of pear drops. Presently his guide swung through a doorway into a big erecting shop, crowded with aeroplanes in every stage of completion. Most of them, Morris saw, were old Rabbits and Ratcatchers brought from store to be overhauled and reconditioned for the Air Force. In the midst was a new fuselage of a different type in the early stages of construction.

This was the new two-seater fighter, designed experimentally for the Air Ministry to take the new Blundell engine, the Stoat. Great things were expected of the Stoat; the lightest engine for its power yet produced. Rawdon had abandoned the unequal competition for nomenclature and had originated a system of ciphers
for his machines which, though less exciting, imposed less strain upon the imagination of the designer. This was to be the Rawdon S.F. Mark I.

At present the board of directors was sitting on it, both metaphorically and physically. Whenever Bateman, the business director, came down from London to visit the firm, Rawdon usually took him to the shops where the exact progress of the work could be seen and proposed innovations illustrated more graphically than in the office. Morris saw them from a distance deep in conversation, and instinctively hung back.

His guide, however, had no such scruples as to the sanctity of a directors’ meeting. Apple in hand she marched up to Rawdon.

‘A gentleman to see you, sir.’ Her part played, she gave her attention to a more important matter. The foreman of the engine shop, passing by, stopped and regarded her.

‘Hey, Gladys, don’t you know any better than that up in the office?’ he inquired pleasantly. ‘Standin’ eating an apple in the middle of the shop! Settin’ a bad example to the men. Ought to be ashamed of yourself – I would. I wouldn’t have it if this was my shop.’

One of the carpenters laid down his work. ‘Don’t you pay no attention to him,’ he said. ‘He’d have apple and all if this was his shop.’

The little girl grinned shyly and strolled away. Rawdon levered himself slowly off the bright wooden fuselage and went to meet Morris, frowning a little. He had no place for this chap; he diagnosed instantly what he wanted. He hated having to turn people away.

As Morris unfolded his tale, however, the frown melted away and was replaced by a childlike look of innocence that usually rested on his features. He heard him to the end with a penetrating question now and
then, and volunteered no comment. Morris finished his tale, and stood while Rawdon stroked his chin.

‘As I understand it, then, Mr Morris,’ he said, ‘you want to come and work for us unpaid for a certain time in the hopes that we can take you on when you’ve got a little experience or, failing that, that we can pass you on to someone who wants staff?’

Morris assented.

Rawdon picked up a splinter of wood and fingered it. ‘I’m afraid I can tell you straight off,’ he said, ‘that we shall not be taking on any more staff just yet – so far as I can judge. One doesn’t see very far ahead in this business. But unless anything very startling happens, we shan’t be engaging any more technical staff for many months.’

‘I expected that,’ said Morris. ‘At the same time, I want to get experience in these matters. Can you see your way to allow me to come and work unpaid? Of course, I quite see that the presence of a learner rather interferes with the work of the office.’

‘Oh, as to that,’ said the designer, ‘you can come and welcome – it’s all clear gain to us. And when you go, I’ll give you what help I can – with consideration to what you’re worth. But I must tell you clearly that I don’t think there’s a chance of a job for you in this firm. I’m sorry, but you know the state of the industry.’

Morris laughed. ‘I think I know a good bit about that,’ he said.

‘One thing, Mr Morris. Are you prepared to take any piloting work?’

Morris considered in his turn. ‘Piloting is my only asset,’ he said. He glanced at the other. ‘I should want flying pay for that.’

‘Quite so. We might be able to give you odd, isolated jobs in that way – delivery of these Rabbits chiefly. You would be willing to take that on?’

‘Most certainly.’

‘Well,’ said the designer, ‘we should be very glad to have you on those conditions, Mr Morris – only, as I say, I’m afraid there’s very little hope of a paid job in the office. Things are too bad to take on any more staff at present. When would you think of coming?’

‘In about three weeks? I really can’t say till I’ve spoken to Mr Riley; I’m still engaged to him.’

‘That would do very well. If you’ll give us a couple of days’ notice, will you? … Good morning, Mr Morris; I’m very glad we’ve been able to come to some arrangement.’

He walked back to his partner, still sitting on the fuselage of the fighter, and recounted the interview.

‘And you told him he could come,’ said Bateman.

‘Yes,’ said Rawdon, ‘I told him he could come. Fact is, I like the look of him, and there’s no denying that a regular resident pilot would be useful.’

‘I thought you said there wasn’t enough work for a regular pilot.’

‘There isn’t,’ said the designer. ‘But a pilot who can do something else as well is another matter.’

‘See how he shapes,’ suggested the partner.

‘Yes,’ said Rawdon, ‘we must see how he shapes.’

Morris made his way back to London on top of the tram. Things had gone well, as well as could be expected; he had got his nose into another and more permanent side of the industry, something in which there were real prospects. At the moment, of course, it was unlikely that he would get a job on the design side; still, if he could continue to work there and make enough by casual piloting to keep himself in a modest way, he might in time be able to insinuate himself into the office of some firm. He had made a satisfactory start, anyway.

Back in the hut that evening, he told them all about it.

‘He asked about the piloting himself, did he?’ said Riley thoughtfully. ‘Play that well; it’s evidently your best line at the moment.’

‘I think he’s done pretty well out of the whole business, if you ask me,’ said Stenning. ‘Wish I had the luck some people have.’

‘It doesn’t mean anything but casual work,’ said Morris.

‘He hasn’t got any other pilots there, has he?’ asked Stenning.

‘Don’t think so,’ said Morris taking off his boots by the stove.

‘Well then, you’ll be chief pilot, test pilot if you like, to the Rawdon Aircraft Company Limited.’

Morris glanced at him quickly, one boot on and one off. Then he realised that his leg was being pulled, and made the appropriate comment.

‘No, really,’ said Riley, ‘that’s what it may come to if you can work it properly. I don’t see at all why it shouldn’t. Rawdon gave up flying himself last year, I heard. And he’s been getting in casual pilots, you say?’