Foynes.
The air terminal was a former inn with a central yard. Since the village had become an important flying-boat airport, the building had been almost entirely taken over by Pan American; although there was still a bar, called Mrs. Walsh’s pub, in a small room with its own street door. Eddie went upstairs to the operations room, where Captain Marvin Baker and First Officer Johnny Dott were in conference with the Pan American station chief. Here, amid the coffee cups and ashtrays and the piles of radio messages and weather reports, they would take the final decision whether to make the long transatlantic crossing.
The crucial factor was the strength of the wind. The westward trip was a constant battle against the prevailing wind. Pilots would change altitude constantly in a search for the most favorable conditions, a game known as “hunting the wind.” The lightest winds were generally found at lower altitudes, but below a certain point the plane would be in danger of colliding with ships or, more likely, icebergs. Strong winds required more fuel, and sometimes the forecast winds were so strong that the Clipper simply could not carry enough to last the two thousand miles to Newfoundland. Then the flight would have to be postponed, and the passengers would be taken to a hotel to wait until the weather improved.
But if that should happen today, what would become of Carol-Ann? Eddie took a preliminary glance at the weather reports. The winds were strong and there was a storm in the mid-Atlantic. He knew that the plane was full. Therefore, there would have to be a careful calculation before the flight could get the go-ahead. The thought ratcheted up his anxiety: he could not bear to be stuck in Ireland while Carol-Ann was in the hands of those bastards on the other side of the ocean. Would they feed her? Did she have somewhere to lie down? Was she warm enough, wherever they were holding her?
He went to the Atlantic chart on the wall and checked the map reference Luther had given him. The spot had been quite well chosen. It was close to the Canadian border, a mile or two offshore, in a channel between the coast and a large island, in the Bay of Fundy. Someone who knew a little about flying boats would think it an ideal place to come down. It was not ideal—the ports used by the Clippers were even more sheltered—but it would be calmer than the open sea, and the Clipper would probably be able to splash down there without great risk. Eddie was somewhat relieved: at least that part of the scheme might be made to work. He realized he had a big investment in the success of Luther’s plan. The thought left a sour taste in his mouth.
He was still worried about just how he would bring the plane down. He could fake engine trouble, but the Clipper could fly on three engines, and there was an assistant engineer, Mickey Finn, who could not be fooled for very long. He racked his brains, but did not come up with a solution.
Plotting to do this to Captain Baker and the others made him feel like the worst kind of heel. He was betraying people who trusted him. But he had no choice.
Now an even greater hazard occurred to him. Tom Luther might not keep his promise. Why should he? He was a crook! Eddie might bring the plane down and still not get Carol-Ann back.
The navigator, Jack, came in with some more weather reports, and shot a peculiar look at Eddie. Eddie realized that no one had spoken to him since he came into the room. They seemed to be tiptoeing around him: had they noticed how preoccupied he was? He had to make more effort to behave normally. “Try not to get lost this trip, Jack,” he said, repeating an old joke. He was not much of an actor and the gag seemed forced to him, but they laughed and the atmosphere eased.
Captain Baker looked at the fresh weather reports and said: “This storm is getting worse.”
Jack nodded. “It’s going to be what Eddie would call a honker.”
They always ribbed him about his New England dialect. He managed to grin, and said: “Or a baster.”
Baker said: “I’m going to fly around it.”
Together, Baker and Johnny Dott produced a flight plan to Botwood, in Newfoundland, skirting the edge of the storm and avoiding the worst of the head winds. When they were finished, Eddie sat down with the weather forecasts and began his calculations.
For each sector of the trip, he had predictions of the wind direction and force at one thousand feet, four thousand, eight thousand and twelve thousand. Knowing the cruising airspeed of the plane and the wind force, Eddie could calculate the ground speed. That gave him a flight time for each sector at the most favorable altitude. Then he would use printed tables to find the fuel consumption over that time with the current payload of the Clipper. He would plot the fuel requirement stage by stage on a graph, which the crew called “the Howgozit Curve.” He would work out the total and add a safety margin.
When he completed his calculations he saw to his consternation that the amount of fuel required to get them to Newfoundland was more than the Clipper could carry.
For a moment he did nothing.
The shortfall was terribly small: just a few pounds of payload too much, a few gallons of gas too little. And Carol-Ann was waiting somewhere, scared to death.
He should now tell Captain Baker that takeoff would have to be postponed until the weather improved, unless he was willing to fly through the heart of the storm.
But the gap was so small.
Could he lie?
There was a safety margin built in, anyhow. If things went badly the plane could fly through the storm instead of going around it.
He hated the thought of deceiving his captain. He had always been aware that the lives of the passengers depended on him, and he was proud of his meticulous accuracy.
On the other hand, his decision was not irrevocable. Every hour during the trip he had to compare actual fuel consumption with the projection on the Howgozit Curve. If they burned more than anticipated they simply had to turn back.
He might be found out, and that would be the end of his career, but what did that matter when the lives of his wife and his unborn baby were at stake?
He worked through the calculations again; but this time, when checking the tables, he made two deliberate errors, taking fuel consumption for the lower payload in the next column of figures. Now the result came inside the safety margin.
Still, he hesitated. Lying did not come easily to him, even in this appalling predicament.
Finally Captain Baker got impatient and looked over Eddie’s shoulder, saying: “Snap it up, Ed—do we go or stay?”
Eddie showed him the doctored result on the pad and kept his eyes down, not wanting to look his captain in the eye. He cleared his throat nervously, then did his best to speak in a firm, confident voice.
He said: “It’s close, Captain—but we go.”
PART III
FOYNES TO MID-ATLANTIC
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Diana Lovesey stepped onto the dock at Foynes and felt patheti cally grateful for the feeling of solid ground under her feet.
She was sad but calm. She had made her decision: she was not going to get back on the Clipper, she was not going to fly to America and she was not going to marry Mark Alder.
Her knees seemed wobbly, and for a moment she was afraid she might fall, but the sensation passed and she walked along the dock to the customs shed.
She put her arm through Mark’s. She would tell him as soon as they were alone. It would break his heart, she thought with a stab of grief: he loved her very much. But it was too late to think of that now.
The passengers had disembarked, all except the odd couple sitting near Diana, handsome Frank Gordon and
