faster – faster still – they were rushing along the ground.
‘It will never go up,’ thought Victoria, ‘we’ll be killed.’
Faster – more smoothly – no jars – no bumps – they were off the ground skimming along up, round, back over the car park and the main road, up, higher – a silly little train puffing below – doll’s houses – toy cars on roads…Higher still – and suddenly the earth below lost interest, was no longer human or alive – just a large flat map with lines and circles and dots.
Inside the plane people undid their safety-belts, lit cigarettes, opened magazines. Victoria was in a new world – a world so many feet long, and a very few feet wide, inhabited by twenty to thirty people. Nothing else existed.
She peered out of the small window again. Below her were clouds, a fluffy pavement of clouds. The plane was in the sun. Below the clouds somewhere was the world she had known heretofore.
Victoria pulled herself together. Mrs Hamilton Clipp was talking. Victoria removed cotton wool from her ears and bent attentively towards her.
In the seat in front of her, Sir Rupert rose, tossed his wide-brimmed grey felt hat to the rack, drew up his hood over his head and relaxed into his seat.
‘Pompous ass,’ thought Victoria, unreasonably prejudiced.
Mrs Clipp was established with a magazine open in front of her. At intervals she nudged Victoria, when on trying to turn the page with one hand, the magazine slipped.
Victoria looked round her. She decided that air travel was really rather boring. She opened a magazine, found herself faced with an advertisement that said, ‘Do you want to increase your efficiency as a shorthand typist?’ shuddered, shut the magazine, leant back, and began to think of Edward.
They came down at Castel Benito Aerodrome in a storm of rain. Victoria was by now feeling slightly sick, and it took all her energies to accomplish her duties
They were allotted rooms. Victoria helped Mrs Clipp with her toilet and left her to rest on her bed in a dressing-gown until it was time for the evening meal. Victoria retired to her own room, lay down and closed her eyes, grateful to be spared the sight of the heaving and sinking floor.
She awakened an hour later in good health and spirits and went to help Mrs Clipp. Presently a rather more peremptory air hostess instructed them that cars were ready to convey them to the evening meal. After dinner Mrs Clipp got into conversation with some of her fellow travellers. The man in the loud check coat seemed to have taken a fancy to Victoria and told her at some length all about the manufacture of lead pencils.
Later they were conveyed back to their sleeping quarters and told curtly that they must be ready to depart at 5.30 a.m. the following morning.
‘We haven’t seen much of Tripolitania, have we?’ said Victoria rather sadly. ‘Is air travel always like this?’
‘Why, yes, I’d say so. It’s just positively sadistic the way they get you up in the mornings. After that, often they keep you hanging round the aerodrome for an hour or two. Why, in Rome, I remember they called us at 3.30. Breakfast in the restaurant at 4 o’clock. And then actually at the Airport we didn’t leave until eight. Still the great thing is they get you to your destination right away with no fooling about on the way.’
Victoria sighed. She could have done with a good deal of fooling about. She wanted to see the world.
‘And what do you know, my dear,’ continued Mrs Clipp excitedly, ‘you know that interesting looking man? The Britisher? The one that there’s all the fuss about. I’ve found out who he is. That’s Sir Rupert Crofton Lee, the great traveller. You’ve heard of him, of course.’
Yes, Victoria remembered now. She had seen several pictures in the press about six months ago. Sir Rupert was a great authority upon the interior of China. He was one of the few people who had been to Tibet and visited Lhasa. He had travelled through the unknown parts of Kurdistan and Asia Minor. His books had had a wide sale, for they had been racily and wittily written. If Sir Rupert was just noticeably a self-advertiser, it was with good reason. He made no claims that were not fully justified. The cloak with the hood and the wide-brimmed hat were, Victoria remembered now, a deliberate fashion of his own choosing.
‘Isn’t that thrilling now?’ demanded Mrs Clipp with all a lion-hunter’s enthusiasm as Victoria adjusted the bedclothes over her recumbent form.
Victoria agreed that it was very thrilling, but she said to herself that she preferred Sir Rupert’s books to his personality. He was, she considered, what children call ‘a show-off’!
A start was made in good order the next morning. The weather had cleared and the sun was shining. Victoria still felt disappointed to have seen so little of Tripolitania. Still, the plane was due to arrive at Cairo by lunch-time and the departure to Baghdad did not take place until the following morning, so she would at least be able to see a little of Egypt in the afternoon.
They were flying over the sea, but clouds soon blocked out the blue water below them and Victoria settled back in her seat with a yawn. In front of her Sir Rupert was already asleep. The hood had fallen back from his head, which was hanging forwards, nodding at intervals. Victoria observed with a faint malicious pleasure that he had a small boil starting on the back of his neck. Why she should have been pleased at this fact was hard to say – perhaps it made the great man seem more human and vulnerable. He was as other men after all – prone to the small annoyances of the flesh. It may be said that Sir Rupert had kept up his Olympian manner and had taken no notice whatever of his fellow travellers.
‘Who does he think he
On arrival at Cairo, Victoria and Mrs Hamilton Clipp had lunch together. The latter then announced that she was going to nap until six o’clock, and suggested that Victoria might like to go and see the Pyramids.
‘I’ve arranged for a car for you, Miss Jones, because I know that owing to your Treasury regulations you won’t be able to cash any money here.’
Victoria who had in any case no money to cash, was duly grateful, and said so with some effusion.
‘Why, that’s nothing at all. You’ve been very very kind to me. And travelling with dollars everything is easy for us. Mrs Kitchin – the lady with the two cute children – is very anxious to go also, so I suggested you’d join up with her – if that suits you?’
So long as she saw the world, anything suited Victoria.
‘That’s fine, then you’d better get off right now.’
The afternoon at the Pyramids was duly enjoyable. Victoria, though reasonably fond of children, might have enjoyed it more without Mrs Kitchin’s offspring. Children when sight-seeing is in progress are apt to be somewhat of a handicap. The youngest child became so fretful that the two women returned earlier from the expedition than they had meant to do.
Victoria threw herself on her bed with a yawn. She wished very much that she could stay a week in Cairo – perhaps go up the Nile. ‘And what would you use for money, my girl?’ she asked herself witheringly. It was already a miracle that she was being transported to Baghdad free of charge.
And what, inquired a cold inward voice, are you going to do once you are landed in Baghdad with only a few pounds in your pocket?
Victoria waved that query aside. Edward must find her a job. Or failing that, she would find herself a job. Why worry?
Her eyes, dazzled with strong sunlight, closed gently.
A knock on the door, as she thought, roused her. She called ‘Come in,’ then as there was no response, she got off the bed, crossed to the door and opened it.
But the knock had not been at her door, but at the next door down the passage. Another of the inevitable air hostesses, dark haired and trim in her uniform, was knocking at Sir Rupert Crofton Lee’s door. He opened it just as Victoria looked out.
‘What’s the matter now?’
He sounded annoyed and sleepy.
‘I’m so sorry to disturb you, Sir Rupert,’ cooed the air hostess, ‘but would you mind coming to the BOAC office? It’s just three doors down the passage here. Just a small detail about the flight to Baghdad tomorrow.’
