The Call of the Thunder Dragon (7 page)

The sturdy horses had originally
been imported on the trail for China to build armies to fight the
invaders from the North. Falstaff’s only impression of the trail
was based on teacups and wine-cups. Showing, in blue and white
glaze, ponies being led up precarious paths of vertical mountains.
If Zam had ridden those paths, Falstaff contemplated, she must be a
brave and resilient girl indeed.

“Why by plane? It seems crazy...
Why weren’t you riding back with the tea caravans? A plane over the
mountains would be dangerous, maybe impossible?”

Zam’s face fell for a moment,
then widened her eyes and put her hand on his shoulder. “But the
tea is very valuable, my father loves it so much!”

Her father preferred the Ripened
Shou Cha tea, she insisted, it had to been delivered fresh.

Falstaff smiled he liked Pu’er
tea but had discovered the process used to convert green tea into
ripened Pu’er tea, created conditions to approximate the result of
the ageing process of prolonged fermentation in a warm, humid
environment. A manner, Falstaff enjoyed pointing out, most would
recognise as composting.

Falstaff scanned the skies. The
sound of growling buzzing engines coming from the prowling bombers
had receded, there was another sound now. A deeper brasher drone
was coming from overhead.

“The Japanese hold the skies
here.” He admitted with a wince of pain. “We will have to get
moving!”

Falstaff’s role in the mobile air
unit had been to destroy Japanese aircraft or protect Chinese towns
from bombers. The bombers that dropped, apart from bombs,
incendiaries and chemical agents leaving civilians dead, nauseous
and burned. After the pilots had been forced out of flying range of
the Japanese airfields, they had been relentlessly pursued and shot
down until their last aircraft and now their latest airfield had
been destroyed.

Falstaff was now the last from a
group of Italian, Russian and German mercenaries. A small
self-sufficient unit like many other squadrons or aircraft owned by
warlords or the Chinese national army.

They’d been quickly overrun by
superior numbers and superior Japanese aircraft. The old surplus
Great War aircraft were now nothing but scrap. The donated obsolete
Russian aircraft pursued and shot down. China now had very little
air cover unless more aircraft or pilots could be quickly
found.

“I knew my father was interested
in kites. Maybe he’s read about flying machines? So I thought to
impress him with the machine.” Zam smiled hopefully, her demeanour
giving away her apprehension.

“That sounds screwy to me? I’ll
have a look anyway. We can still get away from here if we give it a
try.”

Falstaff took Zam to be a spoilt
brat, her father probably another warlord perhaps? He’d met a few
of the bandit like generals before, but not in Bhutan.

Falstaff examined the bi-plane
carefully. It was resting in the mud on long floats straddled by a
pair of wheels.

“How did you choose this? It’s
pretty old, maybe that’s why the chamberlain ran away? I guess
he’ll be walking now!”

“He won’t come back.” Zam’s eyes
narrowed. “But if he does, I will tell my father what he did. He
will judge Jampa!”

Falstaff watched Zam fume. “Is
your father powerful?”

“He is a governor. A Lord in his
home district!” Zam’s chest puffed out.

“This might fly, but I must look
around first,” Falstaff said treading carefully over the water
filled ruts of mud as he circled the plane.

His eye was instantly caught by
the polished badges on the engines. Fabrica Italiana Automobili
Torino, FIAT. They were large 6-cylinder engines, three of them.
Each marked ‘A.12 BIS’. They looked new or most likely recently
refurbished, as the design went back to the 1920’s. He had not been
much more than a boy then, but he remembered reading how Ernest
Eldrige’s exploits. How he had taken a London bus chassis, along a
with a Isotta-Fraschini car and combined it with a A.12 engine.
Then taken it to Brooklands racing circuit to break all the
records
⁴
. As a boy, he’d read
all about it. He found his mouth watering as it had when he was a
boy, clasping the picture of the red rocket on wheels in his
hand.

He smiled, this aircraft had been
painted red all over. Apart from the three distinctive tail-fins,
which were each the Green, White and Red of Italy. His mouth
watered, three engines, 600 horsepower in total, maybe more. He
liked it.

He reckoned the aircraft was an
adapted Caproni 3, part of the family of aircraft that had been
bombers then adapted to be ambulances and airliners
⁵
. Falstaff continued
his walk around. The old wooden propellers had been replaced with
metal blades and were un-damaged looking almost new.

“I might be able to fly it. If it
stays here, I think it would blow off the terrace! ” He indicated
the next set of terraces twenty feet below. As if hearing the words
the plane shifted a little, slipping forward.

“The wind is blowing uphill! A
strong gust will lift her off and drop her down there. We’ll have
to be careful!”

The wing-span was wide, huge
compared to the fighter he’d just been flying, nearly 23 meters.
Two twin tailbooms pointed back from the wing mounted engines, to a
common tailplane. A third section sat between the tails, a
‘nacelle’, a short pram-like fuselage with the cockpit at the front
and another engine at the rear. The aircraft was covered in fabric
apart from the nose, which was ply, to reduce drafts. Cut into it
were two small viewing panels.

It would have had a crew of four
as a bomber; two pilots, a forward gunner and a rear gunner. The
forward gunner had a space forward of the cockpit in a
semi-circular bow compartment. Conspicuously, the rear gunner stood
in the open air in a pulpit-like cage behind the upper wing
assembly, presumably deafened by the rear engine over which he
would have stood.

The cage was still in place, but
the machine gun mounts were all gone, as were the bomb or torpedo
racks if it had ever had them.

Inside the cockpit was sparse,
the seats were basic and the instruments the bare minimum. The
forward compartment contained a large leather satchel containing
maps and lists of airfields along the coast of China. Falstaff also
found several FIAT and Caproni brochures. Along engineering
drawings and an Italian newspaper clipping about the floatplane
landing on the Brisbane River.

Climbing out Falstaff, felt a
little more reassured; the plane seemed to have been rebuilt by
Caproni and refurbished only recently.

“How the hell did this get to
China?” He shouted as he squeezed out of the crawl space between
the two steering wheel-like control columns.

“Master Garcia is from Italy?”
Zam stuttered over the words. “Garcia had many debts in the Simao.
He was like you, he liked girls too much? He drank and could not
pay his way! So to settle his debts he agreed to take me back to my
Popa.”

Falstaff tottered around
examining the plane as Zam climbed inside. Falstaff checked the
tailplane, upon which were fixed the three vertical tail-fins. He
checked each for movement. Cables along the tail-booms creaked.
Each Fin moved easily with the others tugging on the same control
cable as he pushed each one.

The undercarriage was a fixed
arrangement featuring two dual-wheeled main landing gear struts,
all supported by cross-pieces. He took some time pulling away the
remnants of the tea plants ripped up by the landing. When he stood
back, he could see better. The same undercarriage struts held the
plane’s floats. Large narrow, ski-like floats. Seven meters long of
strong box sectioned Aluminium construction, over painted and
well-sealed against water.

The Caproni 3 aircraft had
originally been designed in 1917 as a replacement for the previous
Italian Caproni bomber. This powerful aircraft had been the object
of huge production, but at the end of the war was worthless. Parts
for hundreds of the suddenly redundant bombers filled warehouses
until it was conceived that maybe the planes could be transformed
into airliners or float planes.

It could fly he decided, be made
to work again. Falstaff still felt the same thrill as he did when
he first saw it. A thrill he admitted he felt whenever got near
anything with an engine.

Biting his lip, he recalled that
one of the Caproni airliners crashed in 1919, killing 17
journalists
⁶
. It was the worst air
accident ever. But Caproni had gone on and made more aircraft with
greater success. The newspaper clipping was still in his pocket.
1924 had been the date the scrap of paper. Was the aircraft an old
model or one built new from spare parts?

Zam disturbed his thoughts.
“Drink this.” She smiled pleasantly.

I
llustration 2: Caproni Ca.3 resting in the mud on long floats
straddled by a pair of wheels.

To his surprise, she had appeared
holding a cup of steaming tea. Falstaff took the cup carefully and
thanked her.

“It will ease the pain.” Zam
looked unblinking into his eyes, inviting him to drink. “Drink it
quickly.” She urged.

It was a small cup, so Falstaff
tipped it back.

“It is tea with Tien Tsin, very
hot!” Zam beamed.

Falstaff’s eyes popped and his
throat burned. His sudden inhalation due to the sensation of his
burning throat prompted his ribs to throb sharply. He said so,
telling her in the rudest terms what she could do with her tea.

“John-Di-Di,” Zam touched his
cheek. “Do not use such language, my Popa would not approve!” She
leaned closer and smiled. “It is good for the pain. Sorry, I have
only this?”

Falstaff breathed out slowly,
through his teeth, hissing tentatively. His throat burned, his ribs
ached, yet he felt a flush of refreshing heat surge through his
body. It was difficult to be angry with the girl. She was a head
shorter than he was but stoutly built. Her arms filled so she was
neither too muscular nor too slender. Her hips were wide and her
legs; as far as he could see, were probably those of a supple
gymnast or at those of a proficient rider.

The woven woollen coat was open.
Her pink silk top underneath hung open. She fingered her chin,
letting it slide towards her throat. Falstaff watched unconsciously
drawn towards her. He could see she was wearing nothing beneath the
pink tabard. He could smell her perfume, she licked her lips. He
looked away until she took his hand and prompted him to drink
again. He glanced down at the open robe. He flushed sighing, this
tea is hot he thought absent-mindedly. The hot pepper tea continued
to spread heat through him.

“Well, I’m certainly refreshed?
How did you boil up the water so quickly?” Falstaff asked as he
flexed his legs, standing on tiptoes to look down the surface of
the wings.

“I have a candle and little tin
pot inside machine.” Zam followed him. “How is pain now? Still
hurting?”

She was taking his arm again.
“Drink this now, she offered the cup again.” It was filled with a
clear liquid. She held his hand as he gripped the cup.

Falstaff felt her pull him closer
as she lifted the cup to his lips. It was hard to keep his mind on
the aircraft. This was starting to turn into a picnic.

“I can’t,” He said – “it’s too
damn hot! I think it’s working now anyway.” At least he was
distracted from the pain in his ribs. He could almost feel the
progress of the peppers through his system.

“No, this is wine!” She said.
“Come on, John-di-di!”

He threw back the wine, his eyes
bulged again. “Wine? This is more like paint stripper never mind
wine! O-ah! That’s hitting the spot!”

“It is ‘Sauce’ fragrant strong
liquor! Bold in character!” Zam squeezed his arm.

“It is bold! Tastes like leopard
piss to me?” Falstaff pulled his arm away. “Okay, just tea from now
on!” The pain is going away for now. He emptied the cup and handed
it back to Zam.

The liquor had a flavour similar
to Chinese fermented bean pastes and soy sauces. His head raced and
spun; there was something else in the mixture. If the taste was of
soy sauce, the nose of the wine was ester and ethanol. The sharp
note of the solvent-like taste stung his nose and throat. He had a
sudden craving for pickled Cucumber.

“Right Zam stop! My thanks,
you’ve got me fixed up!” Falstaff swept his hair back, then with
deliberate panache pulled on his flying helmet. “First we must deal
with poor young master Garcia!”

There was a map case around his
neck which Falstaff removed taking the maps with care. Inside the
Italian’s coat, he found the Italian’s passport and visas issued in
Shanghai. There was nothing with any home address. Falstaff sighed,
this would be another forgotten airman who had yearned to fly. Too
young to be one of the discharged airmen from the end of the war.
Was he just a young man in search of adventure or an aviator taking
any chance to fly? His family might never know what happened to
him.