The Warlord of the Air Read online

  By the time I had reached the third class section I was looking forward to turning in. Then, suddenly, from out of a subsidiary passage leading to the dining rooms, stormed the Captain of Roughriders himself. His face was scarlet. He was spluttering with rage and he grabbed me by the arm.

  “I’ve a complaint!” he shouted.

  I hadn’t expected a compliment. I raised my eyebrows.

  “About the restaurant,” he continued.

  “That’s something to take up with the stewards, sir,” I said in relief.

  “I’ve already complained to the Chief Steward and he refused to do anything about it.” He eyed me narrowly. “You are an officer, aren’t you?”

  I admitted it. “However, my job is to look after the security of the ship.”

  “What about the morals?”

  I was frankly astonished. “Morals, sir?” I stuttered.

  “That’s what I said, young man. I have a duty to my scouts. I hardly expected them to be subjected to the indignities, the display of loose behaviour... Come with me.”

  Out of curiosity more than anything else, I allowed him to lead me into the dining room. Here a rather insipid jazz band was playing and a few couples were dancing. At the tables people were eating or talking and not a few were staring at the table where all twenty boy Roughriders were seated.

  “There!” hissed Reagan. “There! What do you say now?”

  “I can’t see anything, sir.”

  “Nobody told me that I was coming aboard a flying Temple of Jezebel! Immoral women displaying themselves—look! Look!” I was bound to say that the girls were wearing rather scanty evening frocks, but nothing one would not see every night in London. “And disgusting music—jungle music!” He pointed at the bored-looking band on the rostrum. “And, worse than that,” (he drew closer and hissed in my ear) “there are, young man, niggers eating right next to us. What kind of a decent ship do you call this?”

  At the nearest table to the scouts sat a party of Indian civil servants who had recently finished their exams in London and were on their way to Hong King. They were well-dressed and sat quietly talking among themselves.

  “White boys being forced to eat elbow to elbow with niggers,” Reagan continued. “We were transferred without our agreement to this ship, you know. On a decent American ship...”

  The Chief Steward came up. He gave me a weary, apologetic look. I thought of a solution.

  “Perhaps this passenger and his boys could eat in their cabins,” I suggested to the steward.

  “That won’t do!” There was a hard, mad gleam in Reagan’s eye. “I have to supervise them. Make sure they eat properly and keep themselves clean.”

  I was ready to give up when the steward suggested, poker-faced, that screens might be placed around the table. They would not keep out the music, of course, but at least the captain and his lads would not be forced to see either the scantily dressed ladies or the Indian civil servants. Reagan accepted this compromise with poor grace and was about to return to his table when one of the boys came rushing up, his handkerchief over his mouth, his face very green indeed. Another boy followed. “I think Dubrowski’s being airsick, sir.”

  I hurried off, leaving Reagan shouting wildly for a ‘medic’.

  For all that it is primarily a psychological illness, airsickness can be catching and I soon learned to my relief that Reagan and his entire troop had gone down with it. When, two days later, we reached Quito in British Ecuador, I had heard nothing more of the scoutmaster, though I believe one of the ship’s doctors had been kept pretty busy.

  We made a quick stopover at Quito and took on a few passengers, some airmail and a couple of cages of live monkeys bound for a zoo in Australia.

  By the time we headed out over the Pacific, Reagan was well known to crew and passengers alike and though there were some who supported him, he had become to most a figure of some considerable entertainment value.

  Captain Harding had not directly encountered Reagan and he was faintly amused by the reports he had heard concerning my own embarrassment. “You must be more firm with him, Lieutenant Bastable. It is a particular knack, you know, controlling a difficult passenger.”

  “This one’s mad, skipper.” We were having a drink in the little bar above the control cabin which was especially for the officers. “You ought to see his eyes,” I said.

  Harding smiled sympathetically, but it was obvious he put much of my trouble down to my own inexperience and the fact that I was essentially a groundman.

  Our crossing of that wide stretch of ocean between South America and the first of the South Sea islands was as peaceful as usual and we flew through blue and sunny skies.

  By the time we sighted Puka Puka, however, we were receiving telephoned messages about a freak storm blowing up in the Papeete region. Heavy electrical interference soon cut these messages off, but at this stage we had no trouble keeping the ship in trim. Stewards warned the passengers that it was likely to get a bit bumpy as we neared Tahiti, but we expected to reach the island on time. We took the ship up to 2,500 feet and hoped to avoid the worst of the winds. The engineers working in the diesel nacelles were ordered to keep the Loch Etive at full speed ahead when we hit the disturbance.

  A few minutes later it became strangely dark and a peculiar, cold grey light streamed through our portholes. The electrics were switched on.

  Next moment we had plunged into the storm and heard the thunder of hailstones beating against the huge hull. The sound was like a thousand machine guns going off at once and we could hardly hear each other speak. The temperature dropped dramatically and we shivered with cold until the ship’s heating system responded to our need. As thunder and lightning crashed and flashed around us the Loch Etive shook a little but her engines roared defiantly back and we plunged on into the swirling black cloud. There was no danger of lightning striking our fully insulated hull. Occasionally the clouds would part to show us the sea boiling about below.

  “Glad I’m not down there,” said Captain Harding with a grin. “Makes you glad the airship was invented.”

  Soft music began to sound from the telephone receivers on the bridge. The skipper told his second officer to switch it off. “Never could understand the theory behind that.”

  My stomach turned over as the ship fell a few feet and then recovered. I began to feel little tendrils of fear creep into my mind. It was the first time I had felt nervous aboard an airship since Major Powell had picked me up at Teku Benga. That seemed centuries ago now.

  “Very dirty weather, indeed,” murmured the captain. “Worst I’ve ever known at this time of year.” He buttoned up his jacket. “How’s our height, Height Cox?”

  “Holding steady, sir.”

  The door to the bridge opened and the third officer came in. He was furious.

  “What’s up?” I said.

  “Damn it!” he swore. “I’ve just had a tangle with your chap, Bastable. Bloody fellow Reagan! Screaming about life-rafts and parachutes. He’s berserk. Never known a passenger like it. Says we’re going down. I’ve had the most awful shouting match with him. He wanted to see you, sir.” The third officer addressed the captain.

  I smiled at Harding who grinned wryly back. “What did you tell him, number three?”

  “I think I calmed him down in the end, sir.” The third officer frowned. “It was all I could do to stop myself punching him on the jaw.”

  “Better not do that, number three.” The captain took out his pipe and began to light it. “Not very good for the company if he sues us, eh? And we’ve a, special responsibility, too—courtesy to American Imperial, that sort of thing.”

  The third officer turned to me. “I suppose he’s told you he’s got powerful political connections in America. That he’ll have you drummed out of the service.”

  I laughed. “No, I haven’t had that one yet.”

  Then the hail hit us even harder and the wind howled in fury as if at our insolence in remaining airborne. The
ship dropped horribly and then re-adjusted. She shuddered the length of her hull. It was black as night outside. Lightning spat at us on all sides. With some idea of reassuring the passengers and, since there was nothing practical I could do on the bridge, I went towards the door.

  And at that moment it burst open and in rushed Reagan, the picture of terrified anger, his white-faced scouts behind him.

  Reagan gesticulated wildly with his pole as he advanced towards Captain Harding. “I’ve a duty to these boys. Their parents entrusted me with their lives! I demand that life-rafts and parachutes be issued to us at once!”

  “Please return to your cabin, sir,” said Harding firmly. “The ship is perfectly safe. It is much better, however, if passengers are not wandering about—particularly on the bridge. If you are nervous, one of the ship’s doctors will give you a sedative.”

  Reagan screamed something incoherent in reply. Captain Harding put his pipe in his mouth and turned his back

  “Please leave my bridge, sir.”

  I stepped forward. “I think you’d better—“

  But Reagan had put his beefy hand on Captain Harding’s shoulder. “Now just look here, captain. I’ve a right...”

  The skipper turned, speaking very coldly. “I wonder if one of you gentlemen would mind escorting this passenger back to his cabin?”

  The third officer and I took hold of Reagan and dragged him back. He made surprisingly little resistance. He was trembling all over. We took him out of the bridge and into the passage where I called for a couple of ratings to take over from me, for I was furious at the way Reagan had treated Harding and did not trust myself to deal calmly with the man.

  When I got back to the bridge Harding was sucking on his pipe as if nothing had happened. “Damned hysterical woman,” he said to no one in particular. “Hope this storm blows over soon.”

  Chapter III

  Disaster—and Disgrace!

  WHEN AT LAST we reached Tahiti and began to drop through the clouds in the hope of mooring, it became evident that a full-scale typhoon had hit the island. The ship shuddered and swerved about in the sky and it was all we could do to keep her in reasonable trim.

  Below, whole groves of palms had been bent to the ground by the wind and a number of buildings had been severely damaged. Only the three mooring masts in the airpark stood upright and to these there were already two ships anchored. A whole web of extra cables had been used to secure them.

  After sizing up the situation the skipper ordered the Steering Cox to keep circling over the airpark and then left the bridge. “Back in a moment,” he said.

  The third officer winked at me. “Gone for a shot of rum, I shouldn’t wonder. Can’t blame him, what with the storm and that Reagan chap.”

  The big ship continued to circle at full speed against the howling force of a storm which showed no sign of abating. Every so often I looked down at the airpark and saw that the savage winds still swept it.

  A quarter of an hour passed and still the captain did not reappear on the bridge. “It’s not like him to be gone so long,” I said.

  The third officer tried to get through to the captain’s cabin by telephone but there was no reply. “Expect he’s on his way back,” he said.

  Another five minutes passed and then the third officer told a rating to go and look in the captain’s cabin to make sure he was all right.

  A couple of moments later the rating came running back, a look of terrible consternation on his face. “It’s the captain, sir. Up in the parachute lockers—hurt, sir. There’s a doctor coming.”

  “Parachute lockers? What’s he doing up there?” Since it was impossible for any of the other airship officers to leave the bridge, I followed the rating down the narrow passage and up the short companion ladder leading to the officers’ quarters. We passed the captain’s cabin and reached another short ladder to the catwalk between the lockers where the lifesaving equipment was stored. The light was dim here, but I could make out the captain lying at the foot of the ladder, his face twisted in pain. I knelt beside him.

  “Fell down the damned ladder.” The captain spoke with difficulty. “Broken my leg, I think.” The ship shook as another great gust of wind hit her. “Blasted Reagan feller—found him trying to open the parachute lockers. Went up to make him come down. He pushed me—ah!”

  “Where’s Reagan now, sir?”

  “Ran off. Scared, I suppose.”

  The doctor arrived and inspected the leg. “A fracture, I’m afraid. You’ll be grounded for quite a while, captain.”

  I saw the look in the captain’s eyes when he heard the doctor’s words. It was a look of pure fear. If he was grounded now it would mean he was grounded forever. He was already well past retirement age. Scout-leader Reagan had successfully ended Harding’s flying days—and therefore ended his life. If I had been close to Reagan at that moment, I think I would have killed him!

  Eventually the storm blew itself out and within half-an-hour we were manoeuvring into the waiting cone on the airpark mast. The sky was completely clear and the sun was shining and Tahiti looked as beautiful as ever. Apart from a bit of damage to some buildings and a few broken trees, you might never have known that the typhoon had been there.

  Later, I watched the medical orderlies pick up the captain’s stretcher and carry it down to the nose. I saw the lift bear Captain Harding down to the ground to where the ambulance awaited.

  I was miserable. And I was sure I would never see the skipper again. God, how I hated Reagan for what he had done! I have never hated anyone so much in my life. Harding had been one of the few people in this world of the future to whom I could properly relate-perhaps because Harding was an old man and therefore more of my world than of his own—and now he was gone. I felt damned lonely, I can tell you. I decided to keep a special watch on ‘Captain’ Reagan now.

  Tonga came and went and we were soon heading for Sydney, making a speed of just under 120 mph against a head wind which was scarcely more than a gentle breeze compared with the typhoon we had recently experienced.

  For the whole time since arriving in Tahiti, Reagan and his scouts only left their cabins to eat their meals behind their foolish screens.

  At least he seemed cowed by his own stupidity and he knew he had got off lightly regarding the affair of the parachute lockers. When, once, we met in a corridor, he lowered his eyes and did not speak to me as we passed each other.

  But then came the incident which was to lead to the real disasters of the coming months.

  On the last night before we were due to reach Sydney, a call came through to the bridge from the third class dining room. Trouble of some kind. It was my duty to go there and sort it out.

  Reluctantly, I left the bridge and made my way to the dining hall. In the corner near the galley door there was confusion. White-coated stewards, ratings in midnight blue, men in evening dress and girls in short frocks, were all scuffling about, dragging at a man dressed in the all-too-familiar khaki shorts and green shirt of a Young Roughrider. Around the edges of this melee stood a number of frightened boy scouts. I glimpsed Reagan’s face then. He was clutching his pole in his hands and striking out at those who tried to hold him. His eyes were staring, his face was purple and he resembled some ludicrous tableau of Custer at the Victory of Little Big Horn. He was screaming incoherently and I caught only a single, distasteful word:

  “Niggers! Niggers! Niggers!”

  To one side, some of the Indian civil servants were talking to the young officer who had summoned me.

  “What’s all this about, Muir?” I asked.

  Muir shook his head. “As far as I can tell this gentleman,” (he indicated the civil servant) “asked if he could borrow the salt from Mr Reagan’s table. Mr Reagan hit him, sir, then started on this gentleman’s friends...”

  I saw now that there was a livid mark on the Indian’s forehead.

  I pulled myself together as best I could and called out: “All right, everybody. Let him go. Could y
ou please stand back? Stand back, please.”

  Gratefully, the passengers and crew members moved away from Reagan who stood panting and glaring and plainly out of his mind. With a sudden movement he leapt onto a nearby table, hunched with his stick at the ready.

  I tried to speak civilly, remembering that it was my duty to protect both the good name of the shipping company, to protect the name of my own service and to give Mr Reagan no opportunity to sue anyone or use his political connections to harm anyone. It was hard to remember all this, particularly when I hated the man so much. I did my best to feel sorry for him, to humour him. “It’s over now, Captain Reagan. If you will apologise to the gentleman you struck—“

  “Apologise? To that scum!” With a snarl, Regan aimed a blow at me with his pole. I grabbed it and dragged him off the table. If I had struck him then, in order to calm him down, I might have been forgiven. But it was as if his own madness was infectious.

  Reagan put his snarling face up against mine and growled: “Give me my stick, you damned nigger-loving British sissy!”

  It was too much for me.

  I don’t actually remember striking the first blow. I remember punching and punching and being pulled back. I remember seeing his blood flowing from his cut face. I remember shrieking something about what he had done to the skipper. I remember his pole clutched in my hands rising and falling and then I was being pulled back by several ratings and everything became suddenly, terrifyingly calm and Reagan lay on the floor, bruised and bloody and completely insensible, perhaps dead.

  I turned, dazed, and saw the shocked faces of the scouts, the passengers, the crew.

  I saw the second officer, now in command, come running up. I saw him look down at Reagan’s body and say “Is he dead?”

  “He should be,” said someone. “But he isn’t.”

  The second officer came up to me and there was pity in his face. “You poor devil, Bastable,” he said. “You shouldn’t have done it, old man. You’re in trouble now, I’m afraid.”