The pilot leaped and his chute billowed like an immense question mark. Frank was alone in the cockpit. Amanda could see what he was trying to do, turn in a wide wobbly circle to head back to the Buchanan airfield, five miles away. But he could not do it. The plane roared over Amanda in her garden and tore through the top of a house on the next street, smashed through a half-dozen trees and cars and disintegrated. The wings ripped through two other houses and the fuselage hurtled down the street for another block.
Amanda saw the terrible things that happened to Frank in the cockpit. His seat ripped loose and he was catapulted into the windshield, then flung against both sides of the fuselage as fearsome forces smashed the plane back and forth in its passage down the street.
Amanda raced for her car. The swath of destruction on the next street made her brain reel. Two houses, three cars were on fire. Women and children ran toward her, screaming hysterically. Amanda roared through the burning debris
to the plane. Flames were swirling inside the fuselage. A fire truck came clanging around the other corner. “The cockpit. Get him out of the cockpit!” she cried, as firemen spilled from the truck.
The fire was in the cockpit now. The firemen hesitated, afraid the plane would blow up. “Look!” Amanda cried.
Frank was on his feet, clawing at the cockpit window. Two firemen raced forward with a hose spraying foam. Another one hacked at the window and the metal around it with an ax. In two frantic minutes they had Frank out of the plane. His face and hands were seared black. Blood drooled from his nose. An ambulance arrived, siren whooping. Amanda climbed in beside Frank and they raced for the nearest hospital while an intern gave him oxygen and monitored his vital signs.
“He's not going to die!” Amanda said.
“If he makes it, I'm going to hire you as my full-time fortune teller,” the intern said.
Frank was conscious. He stared dazedly at her. “What are you doing here?”
“You almost crashed in my garden,” Amanda said.
“Tell Buzz it was the propeller. I knew those counter-rotating propellers were a bad ideaâ”
“Damn the propellers. Concentrate on staying alive,” Amanda said.
Frank feebly shook his head. “My mother was right. Death machine. That's what she called it the first time she saw a plane.”
“Damn your mother too,”Amanda said. “You're not going to die!”
Frank managed a feeble smile. “There's somethingâI want to tell you. Iânever stopped loving you. Your brother forced me toâwrite that letter. He had a film of meâBuzzâwe were all nakedâa drunken party. I was ashamedâafraid it would hurt youâ”
“I don't care,” Amanda said, barely listening. “It's ancient history. You're not going to die.”
She sensed, she knew, death was loose in Frank's soul, a huge black spider clutching him with multiple legs. She had to slay the creature.
At the hospital, they rushed Frank to the operating room. Buzz McCall and Adrian and others from the company soon joined Amanda. Gradually, she absorbed what Frank had told her in the ambulance. She looked at Adrian with a new, almost visible loathing. He must have been in the conspiracy. He must have known about Gordon's scheme.
Late in the afternoon, a grim-faced doctor in an operating-room gown gave them a gloomy prognosis. “His skull is fractured, his chest is crushed, both legs are broken, his pelvis is smashed. I'll be amazed if he lives until morning.”
“He's not going to die,” Amanda said.
The look Adrian gave her was loaded with suspicion and dislike. Buzz McCall and others were obviously curious about her passionate concern. She did not try to explain it away. “I want to see him,” she said.
“I don't think that would be wise,” the doctor said. “He's hanging on by a thread. Any disturbanceâ”
“I'm not a disturbance. I'm a friend. I will only stay ten seconds. I want to tell him somethingâthat could save him.”
“Is this some religious thing?” the doctor said.
“Yes.”
“All right. Ten seconds,” the doctor said, while Adrian glared.
Amanda stood beside the bed, trembling. Frank was a virtual mummy, his burned face, including his eyes, swathed in bandages, his chest encased in a cast. Instinctively she seized his hand. He groaned with pain. “Morphine,” he said. “Please give me some more. I won't bother you much longer. The painâ”
“Frank,” she said. “It's Amanda. I promise you, somewhere, somehow, we'll love each other again.”
“Amanda,” he said, half-sob, half-sigh.
Come war or Adrian's hatred or even the loss of Victoria, Amanda vowed she would create Eden with this man. They would find it somewhere in their California.
Beryl Suydam stood beside Adrian in his office overlooking Buchanan's airfield as a green two-engined light bomber emerged from the factory. Adrian had christened it the
Nelson
in honor of the famous admiral who presided over Picadilly Square on his soot-blackened pillar. “Such a beautiful plane, Adrian,” she said. “I can't wait to fly the Atlantic in it.”
“I can't wait either,” he said. “I have reservations at the most beautiful hotel in California.”
“That other planeâthe pursuit plane Frank Buchanan is working onâthat's the one I'd
really
like to fly.”
“We should have a test model ready in about six months.”
“Marvelous,” Beryl said. “Another excuse to come back. I've changed my mind about America. It makes me almost ashamed of the way we broke up.”
“We were both young.”
Was the contrition in her silky voice genuine? For the last year Adrian had tried to enjoy a different kind of satisfaction in his meetings with Berylâthe pleasure of deceiving a woman, of accepting her open arms, her inviting thighs, while inwardly a secret sharer laughed coldly. But it had not worked as well as he expected. Instead of a new dimension of power and pleasure, he was constantly listening, looking, for signs of genuine affection.
“I begin to think you Americans may be the hope of the world. With all your vulgarity, your materialism, there's an underlying honesty I find moving. Compared to the cynicism of certain other countries.”
She was talking about her great disillusionment. In August 1939, just as the
impending war canceled Beryl's plans for her around-the-world flight, Joseph Stalin signed a nonaggression pact with Adolf Hitler, enabling the German dictator to invade Poland and start his war with France and Britain with impunity.
The shock had left fellow travelers and worshipers of the future Soviet style numb. In an outburst of patriotism, many like Beryl joined the war effort. She was in California to ferry one of the new bombers to Britain.
“Americans can be cynical too,” he said.
“Are you telling me to stop trying to save the world?”
“Perhaps. Just concentrate on saving me.”
“Where is this wonderful hotel?”
“You'll see. I'll pick you up at the Beverly Wilshire at four o'clock.”
Beryl departed and within five minutes she was replaced by a twitchy, suspicious Colonel George Knightly, Adrian's original RAF contact, who was at the plant supervising the delivery of the Nelson bombers. With him was the man in charge of British propaganda in California, Adrian's old friend, Prince Carlo Pontecorvo.
“I think she's changed sides,” Adrian said.
“She's got some doubts, no question of that. But she's still sending dear Sergei anything she can lay her hands on,” Knightly said.
“Are you sure?”
“I only know what the intelligence boys tell me, old chap. I urge youâindeed beg youânot to lose your head.”
“Don't worry,” Adrian snapped.
“We have two RAF pilots in town who flew against the Germans in Norway,” Ponty said. “Good copy. Can you line up some press coverage for them?”
“I'll talk to our publicity director. Tell them to call his assistant, Tama Morris.”
“These blokes will do more than call her, if they get a look at her. Whew!” Knightly said. “Is she as free with that stuff as I hear?”
“I wouldn't know. I don't ask that sort of question,” Adrian said. The memory of his humiliation at the air ministry made it hard for him to be polite to Knightly.
“Of course,” Knightly said, dropping his pilot's persona for his British officer's decorum. “I just thought she could prove useful in certain situations, depending on herâerâwillingness.”
“I'm inclined to reserve that willingness for the greater glory of Buchanan Aircraft, thank you.”
“Perhaps we should ask the lady herself?” Ponty said, with a smile. “Or have you staked out a personal claim there too, Adrian?”
“Not at the moment,” Adrian said, struggling to regain his savoir faire.
Knightly departed. Ponty stayed to discuss a dinner he had persuaded Adrian to sponsor at which speakers were to call for repeal of the neutrality act so the United States could directly assist England. These legislative fits of pacifist hysteria had been signed into law by President Roosevelt before war exploded
across the globe. Adrian found FDR badly lacking in forethoughtâa crucial requirement for presidential leadership.
There were times when Ponty acted as if Buchanan Aircraft was a department of his British propaganda machine. In spite of the finesse with which his old schoolmate handled such matters, Adrian was American enough to dislike the assumption that they were at His Majesty's service every time Ponty crooked a finger. His affair with Beryl inevitably sharpened this conflict.
Adrian was a tangle of emotions when he picked up Beryl at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. With the Pacific rumbling and splashing almost beneath their wheels, they drove down Route 101A to the pink stucco La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla. The inner courtyard was full of fresh flowers in February. Their room looked down on La Jolla cove, one of the loveliest seascapes in California. The Pacific rushed against jagged rocks and cliffs. Beyond the cove, white beaches stretched north and south. La V, as everyone called the hotel, was where Hollywood's stars and directors and producers took their illicit loves.
They ate in the dining room overlooking the ocean. A full moon bathed the sea in golden light. Later, as they made love, Adrian found himself loathing the secret sharer who mocked their passionate charade. “I love you,” he whispered, and meant it for the first time since their reunion night in London.
“I love you too, dearest dearest Adrian.”
She meant it. As a man who had spent a great deal of time reading nuances of tone and emotion in women's voices, Adrian was sure he had just heard the real thing. “Let's put aside the masks,” he said.
“Masks? What mask? Are you wearing one?”
Beryl's elbows were against his chest. She was suddenly a sharp object, even a dangerous one. “Has someone been telling you vicious lies about me? Your friend Mr. Churchill for instance? He's never forgiven me for my part in the Oxford Oath.”
“Nothing of the sort,” Adrian said. “I meantâyou as a famous flier, me as an aircraft tycoon. I wish we could reachâsome new depth. Something that blends the past and the present.”
He was babbling but it had an unexpected impact on Beryl. She trembled, her elbows withdrew. She pressed herself against him. “Oh Adrian. I wishâI wish that were possible.”
“Why isn't it?” he said.
“Dear dear Adrian.” She spread herself on top him. “I love your awful American need for sincerity”
“Why is it awful?”
“Because the world has gotten on without it for centuries.”
“I'll accept your insufferable condescensionâin the name of love.”
“Oh do, do. Wait for me. Be patient. I'll come. Someday, somehow, I'll come to you the way I was that night at Ravenswood. Hoping, wanting to believe in your indestructible American optimism.”
For one of the few times in his life, Adrian lost his self-control. “You don't love Sergei?”
The silence was thunderous. He lay there watching her make the connections. She began to weep. “How long have you known?” she said.
“Knightly told me yesterday,” Adrian lied. He cradled her in his arms and offered her more sincerity to mock. “I'll wait and wait and wait.”
They drove back the next morning in the sunrise. Adrian was ready to believe the spectacular red-and-gold sky was being displayed only for them, old-new lovers on the brink of profound happiness. He felt triumphant, a conqueror of both women and politics, a master of the great game on his own terms. He was stealing a spy from the Russians, rescuing a patriot for the British-American alliance.
He dropped Beryl at the Beverly Wilshire and drove to the factory. Tama Morris was in his office, smiling slyly. “Where the hell was Beryl Suydam last night?” she said. “I had three reporters desperate to interview her.”
“I have no idea.”
“The doorman at the Wilshire said she was picked up by a balding guy driving a Cadillac.”
“She'll be here soon. She's taking off at noon.”
“That's what I told them,” Tama said. “I just wanted to make sure the takeoff might not be delayed for a week or two.”
“Patriotism before passion, that's my motto. But don't quote me,” Adrian said, smiling. He found himself liking the idea of Tama knowing he had a secret sex life.
Beryl had already checked out the Nelson and flown it a half-dozen times. She stood beside the huge three-bladed propeller on the left motor and talked to the reporters about a woman's desire to help her country in a time of crisis. She had changed her mind about the war, she said. “I'm changing my mind about a lot of things. I attribute some of it to my seeing America, seeing democracy and freedom in the flesh, here.”
Adrian smiled and kissed her on the cheek. He posed for a picture with his arm around her. Beryl waved good-bye and climbed into the plane. The big propellers turned, she taxied out and took off for the thousand-mile flight to the airfield in North Dakota, where the plane would be towed across the Canadian border. The field was a dangerous destination in February and Adrian found himself suddenly anxious for Beryl.
Sleep was impossible for him that night. He called the airport in North Dakota and was told it was snowing heavily and Beryl Suydam had not yet arrived. Two hours later, she still had not arrived. Premonition swelled to dread. Four hours later, Beryl still had not arrived and was now considered overdue.
The next afternoon, a TWA pilot flying a SkyRanger II reported seeing the wreckage of a green bomber on the slopes of one of the Sierras. It took a rescue team two days to reach the plane and radio back that Beryl Suydam, the queen of British airwomen, was dead. The cause? A faulty altimeter. The instrument had told her she was flying at twenty thousand feet when she was actually at twelve thousandâand the mountain was eighteen thousand feet.
Adrian had every altimeter in Buchanan Aircraft tested. All worked perfectly.
Why had this one failed? He summoned production chief Buzz McCall to his office and asked him. “How the hell do I know?” Buzz said.
Buzz could have done it. He had killed twenty-three pilots on the western front in World War I. Adrian had heard him boast about strafing German trenches. If a British agent came to Buzz and said it was time to dispose of Beryl, Buzz would have simply nodded and agreed to maladjust the altimeter.
A sleepless night later, Ponty visited Adrian's office to ask Buchanan Aircraft to stage a memorial service for Beryl. “Go to hell,” Adrian said. “Hold it at the British consulate in San Francisco.”
Ponty sighed. “This is the last favor I will ask, Adrian. I'm flying back to England next week to help organize underground resistance in France and Italy.”
“Did you have anything to do with fixing that altimeter?” Adrian said.
“My old friend,” Ponty said. “I am not, strictly speaking, a member of British intelligence. But I understand certain things. Walls have ears. For those who play the great game, they have always had that peculiar qualityâbut now electronics makes the most private moments audible.”
“It wasn't necessary! She was ready to change sides!”
Ponty lit a cigarette and looked out the window at a half-dozen new bombers waiting to be flown to North Dakota. “Adrianâsurely you must know this arrangement between us and the Russians is a marriage of convenience that won't survive the war, presuming we win it. They are enemies of all the things we value. You and I can't really estimate what Sergei might mean to us in twenty years. You were wrong to sacrifice him. Wrong to place your personal desire ahead of history's imperatives.”
Ponty put his hand on Adrian's shoulder. “Yet I understand, old friend. I understand why you did it. She was very beautiful.”
Adrian wept. For Beryl and the self he had chosen to become, the boy, the man who vowed to learn history's lessons, to play by rules that only the powerful understood. “We'll stageâwe'll hold the memorial service,” he said.
To Adrian's surprise, Amanda offered to go to the service with him. As the British consul and a half-dozen British film stars praised Beryl's courage and patriotism, Adrian sat in a cockpit of private sorrow. Through the window he peered at his wife. Should he try to persuade her to love him again?
To his amazement, Amanda seemed to be thinking similar thoughts. That night as they were going to bed, she put her arms around him. “Adrian,” she said. “I can see how much she meant to you. She was a woman you loved in England, I'm sure of it. She talked you into building those bombers. I know you're not religious and neither am I in the ordinary sense. But I do believe in the great precepts. The wages of sin is death. Doesn't this prove it?”