Complete Works of Nevil Shute, page 123
He went down moodily to breakfast. After the meal he went with Lockwood to the study. The don said, “David is coming here this evening, Mr. Ross. What are your movements?”
The pilot smiled. “I see that you’re not quite decided on this thing,” he said. “I think I’d better get back to London. I can start to look up points about the route and the formalities, although it’s Saturday. I’ve arranged to go to Coventry on Monday morning unless I hear from them to the contrary. We’d better stick to that arrangement. By that time you’ll know more about it.”
Lockwood nodded. He was a little ashamed of his vacillation; in the cold light of morning he could not quite see why he had agreed to hesitate. Moreover he liked the young man, and he realized that the uncertainty was making a bad start for the adventure, if it was to come off. Still, Alix was probably right; it would be better not to rush things.
He said, “I think that’s wise. My brother will be here this evening, and I’ll have a talk with him. We shall be able to make a definite decision one way or the other then. Are you on the telephone, Mr. Ross?”
The pilot hesitated. “I’m afraid I’m not. I’ll give you my address at Guildford; a telegram will get to me.”
“That will do perfectly. I will wire you if there’s any change in the arrangements.”
Ross went back to London, half convinced that the girl had killed his job stone dead. He went first to the Guild of Air Pilots; from there he went to the aeronautical department of the Automobile Association. He spent all afternoon there, plotting his route and examining the records of previous flights to Greenland. Late in the afternoon he tried to get in touch with a fuel company upon the telephone, but it was Saturday afternoon and he had no luck.
In the evening he went down to Guildford. He leaned against the kitchen wall, his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, and told Aunt Janet all about it. She heard him to the end in pawky silence.
“It’s a terribly costly piece of resairch,” she said at last. “The lassie’s got the right idea of it, to my way of thinking.”
The pilot shrugged his shoulders. “If they want survey made of that part of the world, that’s what it will cost them,” he said. “I can’t tell you if they really want it done or not. I think they’re drawing back a bit now.”
“And well they may,” said his aunt drily. “It’s a mighty lot of money to be spending at one go.”
She turned to him. “If they dinna want you, Donald, what else would you do?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ll have to find a job of some sort, soon.”
“Ay,” she said prosaically, “that’s a fact.” She got up and began moving about the kitchen. “Come on and help me lay the supper. Ye’ll do nae good with worrying.”
In Oxford the Bentley, driven by the well-disciplined, efficient young chauffeur in blue uniform, turned into Norham Gardens at about six o’clock and drew up at Lockwood’s house. The chauffeur sprang from his seat and came round to the door; Sir David heaved his heavy body up and got out. “You’d better wait a bit,” he grunted. “Give my bag to the maid.” He went forward into the house.
Ten minutes later he was lighting a cigar, seated alone with his brother Cyril in the study. “Well, how about the Arctic?” he said, heavily jocular. “Got your fur coat yet? Made all your plans?”
Not for the first time, Cyril Lockwood felt a fool over this thing. “As a matter of fact, I haven’t yet,” he said. “I thought we’d have another talk about it.”
“What’s the matter? I thought you’d made up your mind to go. Been talking to Alix?”
The don stared at the manufacturer. “How did you know about Alix?”
Sir David blew a long, aromatic cloud of smoke. “That pilot told me she was dead against you going on the trip at all.”
“He told you that? I wonder how he knew.”
“She had one of her little talks with him.”
“Did she, though. Well, it was straight of him to tell you about it. I thought he was a good lad, David.”
“Oh, ay — he’s all right. But there’s plenty more where that one came from. You want a good pilot if you’re going on a trip like that.”
“I suppose you do. Is he a good pilot?”
“I don’t know. Hanson will know by Monday.” He turned to the don. “Well, Cyril, are you going or not?”
The don hesitated. “I don’t know. It’s going to cost far more than I ever thought, David. I was quite staggered when Ross came back last night and told me the figures.”
The manufacturer said, “What’s that got to do with you?”
“It’s your money that you’ve put at my disposal, David — very generously. I’ve got to advise you how to spend it. I’ve got to be very sure that you spend it to the best advantage. And — well, I’m not sure. It seems to me that this Brattalid expedition may cost more than it’s worth.”
“Suppose you stick to archeology and let me spend my money my own way.”
The don stared at him. “My dear chap — I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“And you haven’t. But look here, Cyril — you’ll hurt me very much if you don’t start and use that money that I put in your research account six years ago. In six years you’ve spent nine hundred and thirty-four pounds out of twenty-five thousand. If you tell me that in six years you couldn’t have done more if you’d spent more money — I’ll call you a bloody fool.”
The don nodded. “You’re perfectly right. But it seems such a lot to spend.”
“The tubes will make as much again when you’ve spent that.”
“I suppose so. How are the works going?”
“Can’t grumble, things being as they are. I got Hanson to figure out last week’s output if it was stretched out end to end. Forty-seven miles of drawn steel tubes we turned out — in one week. That’s over and above the wire.”
“It’s very wonderful, David.”
The other blew out a long cloud of smoke. “Ay,” he said quietly, “it’s very wonderful. In twenty years’ time I shall be dead, and all that tube will be just little smears of rust upon the ground. In thirty years Coventry folks won’t know the name of Lockwood, unless they go and read the plate up at the Hospital. But in thirty years people will still be talking of your work. In a hundred and thirty years. That’s what strikes me as wonderful.”
There was a short silence.
“That’s what it is,” the manufacturer said at last. “I make the money, and you make the name. I wish we could row together a bit more.”
The don shifted uneasily in his chair. “I didn’t know you felt like that,” he said. “It’s quite true. There is a lot that could be done . . .”
“Then for God’s sake, go ahead and do it,” said the other testily. “This Brattalid thing, Cyril. Is it a good one? Will you find out something — something that’s worth knowing?”
The don leaned his arms upon the desk. “It’s a good one, David,” he said seriously. “I know the Irish went to Greenland. I know they did, but I can’t prove it yet. There’s just the one link missing, still. That’s the first thing that we’ve got to do — to establish definitely that they went there. After that there’s the ethnological problem. What happened to the Irish that were there? What happened to the Norse settlers?”
He stared across the room. “I never felt so certain in my life as I do about this thing,” he said quietly. “There’s something big there, David — waiting to be uncovered. I don’t say that I shall get it. But someone will, one day.”
The other said, “Go on and get it for yourself, and don’t be a bloody fool.”
The don laughed, and relaxed. “All right. I really had decided on it before I sent that young man up to see you. But then when he told me what it was all going to cost, it seemed too much to spend.”
“And Alix put her oar in, I suppose.”
“Alix thinks it’s too dangerous.”
“If Alix was ten years younger I’d stretch her out across the couch and tan the pants off her.” The manufacturer threw the stub of cigar into the grate. “When we get to thinking things are too dangerous — things that we want to do — we’ll be no more good,” he said. “That’s right, Cyril. That makes a static business, when you get to thinking things are dangerous that you want to do. And a static business is a ruined business in a year or two.”
The don said mildly, “Alix is a good girl.”
His brother said, “She looks it. She dresses like hell, Cyril. Put her in among our Coventry girls and she’d look like a dead fish.”
Lockwood sighed. “I suppose the truth of it is that she doesn’t get about enough.”
“Too true. She’ll be an old woman in a year or two unless she can snap out of it.”
He got up from his chair. “It’s settled that you’re going, then?”
“I think so. I’d like to have that young man Ross for the pilot, David, if he’s good enough. We get to know something about young men, here in Oxford. I’d have confidence in him, I think.”
“Ay. I daresay he could do the job as well as anyone. He’s coming up to Coventry on Monday. He’s in a great hurry to place the order for his aeroplane, because of the delivery.”
“I suppose that is very important,” said Lockwood vaguely.
“Well, you won’t be able to fly to Greenland without it.”
They walked in the garden till dinner time, talking of other matters. After dinner Lockwood had business in his study with a couple of young men; Sir David went out into the garden with Alix in the still, warm, summer evening. The old parlourmaid brought them their coffee at the table under the beech tree.
When she had gone the manufacturer said to the girl, “I hear you think your father’s too old to go to Greenland.”
She looked up, startled. “I never said that to him.”
“I should hope not. Pretty mean if you had. But you think it, just the same.”
She met his eyes. “Who told you that, Uncle David?”
“That pilot chap who came to see me.”
“Oh . . . Well, I did say that to him. And I do think it.” She dropped her eyes. “I don’t want to be nasty. But Daddy’s nearly sixty, and Greenland is a job for a young man. I wouldn’t say that to him, because I wouldn’t want to hurt him. But it’s true, all the same.”
“Greenland’s the job your father wants to do.”
“I know it is. But he could find something else that wouldn’t be so strenuous.”
“You talk as if he was an invalid. Look at me. I’m three years older and three stone heavier. I wouldn’t mind going to Greenland.”
She said doubtfully, “You’re different. I mean, you’ve done things — all your life, Uncle David. But Daddy’s not like you. I’d be afraid of him getting wet and not changing, or eating bad food and getting ill. And if he got ill upon a trip like that, with only the pilot and mechanics, it would be awful.”
She paused. “It’d be almost as good if he left the field work to a younger man, and studied it back here.”
“Not quite as good. He knows more about this thing than anybody else. At least, that’s how I understand it.”
She hesitated. “I know. But one really must be practical.”
“Sometimes it’s better to be kind, Alix.”
There was a long silence.
“I hate the idea of him going in an aeroplane. He’s never done any flying.”
“Have you?”
“No.”
“I suppose that’s why you’re so afraid of it for him.”
“I suppose so.”
Sir David said, “You’d better make the best of it and let him go. If you stick your toes in you can probably stop him, and you might be sorry all your life. Cyril’s more set on this thing than anything I can remember in the last ten years. You’d better make the best of it, and be a sport.”
She said irritably, “It’s all that wretched pilot, I believe. He wasn’t half so definite about it all before the pilot came. He just talked Daddy into it.”
Her uncle was doubtful. “Your father was very set on it when last I talked to him. I don’t think it’s anything new.”
There was a little pause.
“If only I could feel that he’d be well looked after if he did get ill . . .” she said.
“Well, that’s a real point, I admit. Let’s see now if we can’t get over that.”
On Monday morning Ross left Guildford by an early train. He was depressed about the whole affair, but he had heard nothing from Lockwood and so his arrangement to go to Coventry held good. He got to the works at about half past eleven and was shown into Mr. Hanson’s office.
The secretary met him with a smile. “I think you will be able to go straight ahead today, Mr. Ross,” he said. “I have drafted this letter of engagement. If you would read it through now, I will have it retyped for Sir David to sign.”
The pilot sat down with the letter. A flood of relief swept over him; it was quite all right. He had got the job. Now he had a straight run of well-paid, interesting work to get his teeth into — a hard job, maybe, but not more than he could manage. He would increase his reputation if he pulled this off successfully.
He read the letter carefully. “That’s quite in order,” he said. “That covers everything.”
“All right. Sir David will sign it this afternoon.” The secretary put it with the other papers on his desk. “Now you will want to get to work, I expect. I hear you’re going to have another passenger.”
The pilot stared at him. “Who’s that?”
“Miss Lockwood. I understand she’s going with her father.”
THREE
FOR A MINUTE the pilot sat silent, stunned by this announcement. He had the good sense to say nothing till he had reflected a little. He did not want to lose a good job, but he couldn’t possibly take that infernal girl in the machine with them. The flight would be difficult enough in any case; with her nagging at his elbow all the time it would become impossible.
He said quietly at last, “I hadn’t reckoned on that. That makes it very difficult.”
The secretary was genuinely surprised; he took off his eyeglasses. “Why is that? I understood that the machine was to be a seven-seater.”
Ross was accustomed to dealing with the uninformed. He said patiently, “It’s designed to carry seven people on short hauls, when you don’t have to lift much fuel. But this is different. I shall have to carry gas for fifteen hundred miles on some of these hops, if we’re going to be safe. There’s going to be mighty little load to play about with when you’re carrying that weight of fuel. An extra passenger means you can take less petrol.”
“I see. I hadn’t realised that there would be that difficulty.”
The pilot bit his lip. “It’s not the only one.”
“What other difficulties are there, Mr. Ross?”
“There’s the accommodation. I’d only reckoned to take one tent.”
“But you can take another tent?”
“Surely, but it all weighs more. There’s her emergency rations, and her sleeping bag and luggage, and her seat. They all put up the weight, and that means less fuel still.”
He paused. “I’d like to think this over, Mr. Hanson, before deciding one way or the other. It’s a pretty serious thing to have to take a passenger on a show like this who can’t do anything to help. It’s all adverse, if you understand me. You add to the risks without getting anything for it.”
The secretary said, “I understand what you mean. Let me have a talk with Sir David, Mr. Ross. It may be that she could go out by boat.”
The pilot nodded. “That would be much better, if she’s got to go at all. The photographer will have to go by boat in any case, even if it means he’s got to stay there all the winter till the next boat comes to fetch him home. After all, Mr. Lockwood is the only one who’s really pressed for time.”
“I don’t suppose Miss Lockwood could stay in Greenland all the winter, Mr. Ross.”
The pilot thought that that would be the best thing that could happen to her, but didn’t care to say so.
Hanson picked up his papers and went through to the inner office to consult his chief; presently Ross was called in. Sir David looked him up and down. “Mr. Hanson tells me that there’s a difficulty about Alix,” he said.
Ross said, “Taking her makes the flight a good deal more difficult, sir. It adds to the load, and so cuts down the fuel that I can take off with. And on this job I’ll want all the range I can get.”
The manufacturer stared at him. “Do you mean the aeroplane won’t be big enough to do the job?”
The pilot hesitated. “That’s more or less what it comes to.”
“Well, get a bigger aeroplane.”
Ross was at a loss for a moment. Sir David saw his difficulty, and leaned forward on his desk. “See here, Mr. Ross,” he said. “You’ve just got to revise your plans, and that’s all there is to it. There was one passenger — now there are two. I’ve decided that Alix is going with her father, and that’s all about it. If the alteration means I’ve got to spend more money, work it out with Mr. Hanson and let me know how much more. But don’t come up with any silly nonsense that it can’t be done, or I’ll get another pilot. I tell you that straight.”
The pilot met his eyes. “It’s making a difficult job more difficult,” he said. “You’d better realise that, sir. It’s not altogether a matter of the weights, nor the size of the machine.”
The secretary shifted slightly.
Sir David said, “I see. You mean it’s Alix herself.”
Ross nodded. “I don’t think Miss Lockwood is very well fitted to go on an Arctic expedition, sir.”
“In fact, you won’t take her?”
“I’d like to think that over a bit. It’s going to add to my difficulties to take any girl on the trip. If you pile too much on me the flight may be a failure, and we’ll all be sorry then.”
“She gave you a bit of the rough side of her tongue, I suppose?”
