Chapter 2

I never did any flying during the Great War. I was too young, being only
fifteen and at Eton when Peace was signed. But from the very earliest
days that I can remember aviation fascinated me as nothing else could.
My father, the first baronet, left me a moderate fortune. He died when I
was eighteen, and instead of going to Oxford, I entered as a cadet in
the R.F.C. It is not necessary to detail how, when I had earned my
wings, I joined the civil side of flying and became a pilot-commander in
the Transatlantic Service. I had a good deal of influence behind me,
and, to cut a long story short, at twenty-eight I was Assistant, and at
thirty Chief Commissioner of the British Air Police. I was answerable
to Government alone, and, within its limits, my powers were absolute.

It was on a morning in late June, the 25th to be exact, when the wheels
began to move. I date the start of everything from that morning. About
one o'clock on the preceding night Thumbwood had waked me from
refreshing sleep. A wireless message, in code, had been received at
Whitehall. It was addressed to me personally, and was from the
Controller of the White Star Air Line at Plymouth. My people at
Whitehall, on night duty, thought it of sufficient importance to send on
even at this hour.

As soon as I was thoroughly awake, and had done cursing Thumbwood, I
read the message. It only said that a matter of the gravest importance
required my personal presence at Plymouth, and would I come down at
once.

Now considerable experience of the fussy great men who controlled the
air-liner companies, which linked up England with all parts of the
world, had made me somewhat sceptical of these urgent demands for my
presence. More than once I had to explain that I was not at the beck and
call of any commercial magnate, and if I had made myself disliked in
certain quarters I had, at least, made my office respected.

Accordingly I scribbled instructions to the chief inspector on duty that
he should send a wireless to Plymouth requesting further details. Then
I went to sleep again.

As a matter of fact, I _was_ going to Plymouth the next morning in any
case, though on private business. Sir Joshua Johnson, Controller of the
White Star Line, did not, of course, know that. His midnight message was
a coincidence.

I could have flown down from Whitehall in my fast police yacht in an
hour, but, as it happened, I was going to train from Paddington. Sir
Joshua could wait until I turned up some time after lunch.

How well I remember the morning of my departure from town. The long
departure platform at Paddington was crowded with well-dressed,
happy-looking people, as I stood by the door of my reserved carriage in
the Riviera Express--that superb train, with its curved roof, which runs
to Plymouth without a stop.

Thumbwood, invaluable little man, filled the carriage with flowers,
great bunches of white lilac and June roses, and the station-master, who
came up for a chat, looked curiously at the bower my valet had made. The
Chief Commissioner of Air Police was not wont to travel like that!

For my part, I was wildly exhilarated, and at the same time, as nervous
as a boy making his first flight. To-day might prove one of the happiest
or quite the most miserable of my life. I was going to put it to the
test. Confound it, why didn't Connie come?

On this morning Miss Constance Shepherd, the young light-comedy actress,
adored of London, and to me the rose of all the roses, was travelling
down to Plymouth to catch the air-liner starting from that port to New
York at eight-thirty this evening. And she had promised to travel with
me!

Would she have done so, I kept on asking myself, if she didn't know
quite well what I meant to say to her? Or was it just friendliness? I
knew she liked me.

... Why didn't she come? Here it was, only eight minutes before the
train started. As I searched the platform, with an eye that strove to
appear calm and unconcerned, I saw faces that I knew--faces of
theatrical celebrities, two or three of the prettiest girls in England,
a handsome, hook-nosed young man, who was, perhaps, the best known
theatrical manager in London, two eminent comedians carrying bouquets.
And the Press photographers were beginning to arrange their cameras....

I had completely forgotten what a tremendous celebrity dear little
Connie was. I might have known they'd have given her a send-off on her
way to the States. All the same, it annoyed me, as it seemed to be
annoying a tall, hatchet-faced man in Donegal tweeds, who scowled at
the little crowd. Was he a friend, too, I wondered?

She came at last, very late of course, and after a brief smile at me,
underwent the public ceremonies of the occasion, while I--I own
it--retired into the carriage for a minute or two. But I saw the cameras
click, and the girls embrace, and the crowd of sightseers trying to push
into the charmed circle, and then Connie was in the corridor, leaning
out of the window, waving and smiling as the train began to move to an
accompaniment of loud cheers.

"My dear Connie, royalty isn't in it!" I said, as she stepped laughingly
into the carriage, and I pushed the sliding door home.

"Oh, they're dears!" she said, "and they do really mean well, despite
the fact that we shall all be in the picture papers to-morrow morning,
and that's good for business."

"I thought you were never coming."

"It is an impression I convey," she answered; "but I'm very careful,
really. My maid was here with the luggage half an hour ago. What lovely
flowers you have got for me, John!"

She lay back in her seat as the train gathered speed and Ealing flashed
by with a roar, and I feasted my eyes on the fairest picture in the
world.

She wore a simple travelling coat and skirt of white piqué, and the
white lilac was all about her, framing her face as she held up a branch
to inhale its fragrance. All England knew that face in the days when
little Connie sang and danced herself into the heart of the public, but
none knew it as well as I.

How can I describe that marvellous hair of dark chestnut, those deep
amethyst eyes, and the perfect bow of lips which were truer to the exact
colour of coral than any I have ever seen? It only makes a catalogue
after all. It's the expression--the soul, if you like--that makes the
true face; and here was one so frank and kind and sweet that when one
looked it seemed as if hands were placed beneath the heart, lifting it
up!

On one other day only did I see her more lovely than she was now.

Well, it was too early to say what I wanted to say, and, besides, I was
nervous as yet. We hadn't settled down. As I expected, her breakfast had
consisted of tea and a macaroon, so I produced a basket--lunch was to
come later--in which a silver box of caviare sandwiches was surrounded
by crushed ice in a larger box of zinc. There was also iced hock and
seltzer water. We both felt more at home in a few minutes.

We had lit our cigarettes, and I was thinking hard, when someone passing
along the corridor looked in upon us for a moment. I had an impression
of a brown face and a scowl. It was the man in tweeds that I had noticed
at Paddington.

"That _beast_!" said Connie suddenly.

I turned and looked at her. She was frowning adorably, and I thought she
looked rather pale.

"D'you know him, then?"

"I did, and I simply hate him."

"Who is he?"

"I expect you've heard his name, John. Most people have in town. He is
Henry Helzephron, a big man in your way once."

I _did_ know the name as that of a pilot of extraordinary courage and
ability during the Great War. He had gained the Victoria Cross when a
lad of twenty, and his exploits during two wonderful years formed part
of the history of aviation. He had not flown for years now, and divided
his time between the more dissipated haunts of the West End and an
estate he had somewhere in Devon or Cornwall, a "has-been" with a
sinister reputation, a lounger of thirty-six.

"I know. 'Hawk Helzephron' he used to be called. Gone all to pieces, I
understand. But how do _you_ know him, dear?"

"He did me the honour to ask me to marry him about two months ago," she
answered, "and since then he is always putting himself in my way. He
does not speak, but he comes to the theatre and glares. I am always
meeting him, and I hate the sight of him. He makes me afraid...."

Here was my chance and I took it like a shot. She should never be
unprotected from Helzephrons and all the tribe who haunt the stage door
any more!

A successful aviator takes instantaneous decisions. He must. If he
hesitates he's lost.

What I said, as the Riviera Express hurled itself through the summer
noon, is not part of this narrative. I daresay I was no more original
than most men, but the results were eminently satisfactory for, as we
ran past the towers and winding river of Exeter, Connie and I were
engaged.

I remember that I lugged the ring out of my waistcoat pocket--sapphires
and diamonds, a top-shelf ring!--precisely as we glided through Exeter
Station.

"O-oh!" said Connie, as the thing winked and shone in the sunlight; and
then: "You _wretch_! I'll never forgive you--never!"

I wondered what was the matter. In fact, I asked her.

"You made so sure of me that you actually bought this beforehand!"

"It doesn't do to leave anything to chance," I said, and I made her put
it on, and gave her several other things of no particular importance
while she was doing it.

For the rest of the journey, past the red cliffs and blue seas of
Teignmouth and Paignton, we had a long and happy talk, finding out--of
course--all sorts of delightful things about each other which we had
only suspected before.

Perhaps there is nothing fresher and more delightful in life than those
first few hours of revelation, when a man and a girl who love each other
have, at last, become engaged. It is like coming into harbour after an
anxious voyage, and yet, all the time there is the splendid knowledge
that there are new and marvellous seas waiting to be explored, this
time--together!

Connie was to act in New York for a month and in Boston for a fortnight.
It was a 'star' engagement, and six weeks would soon pass. Besides, now
that Plymouth was barely thirty hours from New York, there was nothing
to prevent me from popping over once or twice to see her. I was
responsible to no one for my time, and half a dozen quite real matters
in connection with my job would provide a valid excuse. After the six
weeks were over, why, then, we would be married!

"There is absolutely no reason on earth why we should wait," I told her,
in sublime ignorance of what the Fates had in store for both of us.
"I'll have a special licence ready, and the day you land again on this
side you shall be Lady Custance, darling!"

So it was settled, lightly and happily enough, and when we left the
train at Plymouth Station there was not a cloud in the sky or in our
hearts.

I found that Mr. Thumbwood had been making excellent use of his time,
even as his master had, for the little man was assisting a demure and
well-looking maiden to collect luggage, who turned out to be Connie's
maid, Wilson.

We left them to it and drove to the Royal Hotel, not before I had seen
the train start again on its journey to Cornwall, with Mr.
Helzephron--whom I had quite forgotten--standing in the corridor and
regarding us with a malignant scowl upon his hawk-like, dissipated
countenance. But Mr. Helzephron, and all other men alive, were about six
a penny to me just then.

Connie was to leave the sea-drome at eight-thirty in that fine
flying-liner _Atlantis_. She was a Royal Mail ship, and about the
fastest and finest flyer in the Transatlantic service, with a carrying
capacity of three hundred and fifty passengers, and a thousand tons dead
weight of cargo. Her crew numbered forty, and she was commanded by
Captain Swainson, one of the most reliable pilot commanders in the air.
He was a man I both knew and liked.

Connie wanted a rest and a sleep. "At least, I want to be alone to think
it all over!" she said, so she went up to her room in the hotel at
once. I arranged to call for her at five, when we would go for a stroll
and afterwards have an early dinner. Then I washed my hands and strolled
into the famous long bar of the hotel for a sandwich and a whisky and
soda, before proceeding to the offices of the White Star Line on the
Hoe.

As I munched my sandwich, I wondered what the affair was that had made
Sir Joshua Johnson send me a wireless message in the middle of the
night--a time when obese old gentlemen should be fast asleep in bed. I
had told my people at Whitehall to ask for further particulars, but I
had not the least intention of being bothered with them--or any police
business whatever--until I had settled my own personal affairs with
Connie. Accordingly, when I left my chambers in the morning to go to
Paddington, I sent a message to Whitehall to say that I was proceeding
to Plymouth during the day, and would wait till my arrival to hear what
the business was. Muir Lockhart, my assistant, would perfectly
understand, and was quite capable of dealing with anything that might
come along.

The long bar was, as usual, full of naval officers, with a sprinkling of
Air Merchant Service men in their uniform of grey, silver and light
blue. I saw no one that I knew, until the swing-doors leading into the
hotel were flung open, and a wiry little man in the black and silver
uniform of my own corps came hurriedly in. His peaked cap, with the
silver wings and sword badge, was pushed back on his head, and he was in
a state of unenviable heat and perspiration. He was Pilot Superintendent
Lashmar, chief of the Ocean Patrol stationed at Plymouth, with equal
rank to a lieutenant-commander in the Navy, and one of my most trusted
officers in the West.

He went up to the bar and ordered a "long glass of iced ginger-beer,
with a dash of gin in it," and then I clapped him on the shoulder. He
wheeled round in a second, and when he saw who it was his face changed
from anxiety to relief.

"Thank Heaven you're come, sir," he said, as he saluted. "We've been
signalling to Whitehall all the morning, and all we could get was that
you were on your way. I've been backwards and forwards from the A.P.
Headquarters to the White Star Office a dozen times."

"I came down by train, Mr. Lashmar," I said, realizing in an instant
that there really _was_ something important afoot, and that by bad luck
I was behind time. Sir Joshua Johnson was all very well, but when my own
people began to send out signals--that was quite another matter.

"We thought you'd fly down in the yacht, sir, and we've been sending
wireless trying to pick you up."

"I couldn't. I have had some most important business to attend to.
Anyhow, I'm here now. What's it all about?"

"You haven't heard _anything_, sir?" he asked in amazement.

Again I cursed my luck, but I wasn't going to give it away. "We'll go
round to Sir Joshua Johnson at once," was all I said.

"That will be best, sir, and then every detail can be put before you in
sequence. I have my report with me, written up to date. I think I've
taken all possible measures up to the present, but, of course, we've
been waiting for you. Sir Joshua, as you may imagine, is half out of his
wits."

"He's not had very far to travel, then," I said to gain time. All this
was so much Greek to me, and I had to walk warily.

In a minute more Lashmar and I were on the Hoe and approaching the
stately offices of the Line, which stood in the very centre of that
famous promenade above the blue waters of the Sound.