It was a huge amount, Monkey thought, then realised she did not know the rates of death duties under wartime law.
“Twenty per cent, my dear, unchanged in fact – a huge exaction if one is, for example, an agriculturalist, because the tax must be paid by the estate. Many the heir of a large landowner has been forced to sell up as a result, his wealth in his acres rather than in pounds sterling. The effect in wartime – when too many young owners of land have been killed – has been to break up a significant proportion of the old and great landed estates, to accelerate the process of reducing the power of the old aristocracy. Measures could have been taken to protect them, but they fought the government in 1910 and ’11 and Lloyd George is happy to see them punished now, and Asquith, as always, is dithering. Not wholly relevant to us, but interesting for the world we shall live in after the war.”
Monkey ignored the greater issues, seized upon the one that was relevant to her.
“Then that means, sir, that Tommy has come into four million in cash – the other four-fifths of the inheritance.”
Her father smiled, for the first time ever delighted with Mr Joseph Stark.
“You are a rich family now, Grace. You are not yet of age and cannot act for yourself – you are not a legal person and your husband must sign all contracts, you cannot. He cannot empower you to act in his name, either. The day you reach one-and-twenty, then you become an adult under the law, in most respects – you will still not vote, being female. I shall continue as trustee to Tommy while he is overseas, retaining control of his original funds under his father’s will. These new monies become wholly his as soon as he is adult, but he will not be able to exercise effective control while he is at war. He will, of course, wish to send me instructions which I will be bound to follow. You might desire to spend some little time learning about finances and the world of business.”
Monkey was horrified – that responsibility was surely far too great for her.
“I am sure that Tommy will be his own man in such things, sir…” She thought for a moment, wondering just how fit her much-loved husband was to handle large sums of money. He would build some wonderful aeroplanes, some of which might be commercially sensible, but he was not a man of business. “He might benefit from advice, however… Are there books I can study, sir?”
Better that the advice should come from her than from chance-met acquaintances in the world of aviation. One could do a lot with four million pounds, she suspected, including leaving a very substantial legacy to the children, something Tommy would wish to do, but might be incapable of achieving.
The problems of the people of Wilton must wait until after the war was over, she feared; she must look after her own first. In the back of her mind there was the possibility, always present, that she might be on her own after the war, that Tommy might not survive. She must be ready and able to protect her family if the need arose; she would then have no other interest in life.
“These figures one sees in the newspaper, sir – the price of shares and bonds and such things – can I discover just what they mean and how to interpret them?”
“That can be arranged, Grace. With pleasure!”
“I say, Noah. It’s catching!”
“What is?”
“Pregnancy.”
“Oh! Is it contagious? Perhaps it’s a good thing I’m at a distance from Lucy.”
“I was, in my own limited fashion, endeavouring to say that Monkey is in the family way again.”
“I thought you might be. I am very glad for you both.”
Neither said that they were pleased to leave something behind – it was unlucky to put such thoughts into words.
Tommy returned to his letter.
“Good God! You know my half-brother, supposed, died a while back?”
“Not inconveniently from the point of view of the general good, I seem to recall, Tommy.”
“He was shot by the Secret Service, Noah. Which is an impossibility, of course, because jolly old England has no such thing – spies are for foreigners, you know!”
“I expect they hired a wog to do the job, Tommy, thus keeping English hands clean.”
“Of course – a very rational suggestion. Pulled a Gunga Din out of the Raj, I expect.”
Neither was more than half-joking.
“Be that as it may, he had, it seems, been a most successful thief, fraudster, con artist and bunco man, and I inherit the proceeds. Monkey says four million after tax.”
“That’s a lot.”
“More than a battleship costs, I think, Noah.”
“Yes… just don’t send your money to rust at Scapa Flow, Tommy!”
They laughed – the fleet at Scapa Flow was a source of mockery, was generally thought to have grounded on reefs of used corned beef cans, having been so long sat in idleness waiting for something to happen in the North Sea.
“I shan’t be doing anything with it until I’m of age, Noah, which ain’t till the end of the year. Lord Moncur will put it to work for me. I shall write him a letter, mentioning that I have the intention, more or less, of going out to Australia after the war – he might want to invest there for me.”
“Maybe, Tommy.” Noah, having no money of his own, was not especially interested in that one of Tommy’s problems. “What do you make of Bridge’s report?”
The Intelligence Officer had come back from HQ with the word that it was believed, from reliable sources, that no anti-aircraft guns would be returned from the area of the Somme, but that orders had been sent for German aircraft to patrol aggressively in place of the shifted guns.
“Assuming it is good, and that the Germans have still not instituted their ‘hunting groups’, then we should make hay, Noah. In Flights, I think. Your people at dawn, mine two hours later, and alternate through the day tomorrow. Day after, we take the dawn patrol. Remain on patrol until down to half an hour of petrol, leaving as soon as we are too short to fight. We can butcher the monoplanes and give the Fokker biplanes a hard time of it. Two-seaters will be more of a fight, so it will be two or three to one if at all possible. Warn your boys about ‘fair fights’, Noah. Mine know, but I shall tell them again. The new lads may need to have the lesson driven home.”
“Mine will need be told again, Tommy – they are still amateurs. When’s Pot due back?”
“Tomorrow, I think. The new huts are complete. The Labour Battalion is finishing off on the machine-gun posts now. Due to get guns and men in the morning.”
“Better teach them to recognise our planes, Tommy. I would simply hate to get shot down by our own people.”
“They’ll be under Jim’s direct control; perhaps we should speak to him.”
Jim could see no difficulty.
“Always fire a flare when approaching, gentlemen. A green or a red, depending on need. No flare to mean hostile. There will have to be exceptions – but mainly for single machines approaching from our side of the lines. That looks like one now, in fact. We’re due a replacement for that idiot who destroyed Wing – forget his name, now, but we need another Strutter, and a pilot.”
The plane came in after a cautious circuit and bounced its way along the cinder track and taxyed in to line up with the others outside the hangars. Tommy was unimpressed.
“Ten feet too far from the next plane and at least as much back. If that’s a ferry pilot, he can walk home. If it’s a replacement, he can listen to me telling him his fortune.”
The pilot stepped down and looked around for a greeting; a mechanic walked across and pointed him towards the offices. The pilot gestured towards the observer’s cockpit and a trunk and two bags strapped inside, was obviously told that was a job for his servant, which the mechanic was not.
The pilot showed every evidence of amazement, leaned into the cockpit and pulled out an officer’s cane - a swagger stick - and his cap and stamped off in the direction of the offices.
Noah started to laugh, sat back to enjoy the farce.
The newcomer marched i
nto the adjutant’s office, red in the face. He was a full lieutenant and older than the boys from school; he was wearing RFC uniform, had presumably been posted in England previously.
“I say, sir. I don’t know what’s wrong with this place, but the damned people at the hangar need a good sorting out!”
“Lieutenant, you are in the presence of a captain and two majors, one of whom carries a ribbon you should recognise. You might wish to consider your actions.”
“I’m terribly sorry, sir! I was so upset…”
He drew himself into a formal salute, was equally formally thanked, none of the three having their hats.
“That is a little better. I am the Adjutant, Captain Naughton. Major Stark and Major Arkwright are also present. Would you care to tell me who you are?”
“Lieutenant Williamson, sir, reporting to Fifty-Two Squadron for duty, sir.”
“Major Stark is your CO. He will, no doubt, be pleased to greet you in his office and, quite probably, to inform you what is wrong with this place. I must warn you that the first thing that seems wrong to me, is your presence!”
Tommy and Noah quietly left for their respective offices.
Williamson knocked on Tommy’s door within seconds.
“Come in. Take a seat. Throw that bloody stick away – we don’t use them here. Now then, Mr Williamson, who are you and what is your history? Have you your logbook to hand?”
“My log is in my baggage, sir, which I could hardly be expected to carry myself!”
“Go and fetch the logbook. You cannot report without it.”
“Sir! I have just told you that it is in my valise, which is in the observer’s cockpit.”
“And I have just ordered you to get it. You have three minutes from now, Mr Williamson.”
“It is conduct unbefitting an officer and a gentleman to carry his own luggage, sir. I must refuse.”
“Jim!”
The Adjutant walked in, taking his cue from the use of his first name, jacket off and deliberately casual.
“Tommy, what can I do for you?”
“A Crossley Tender, please, and this gentleman in it. You may arrange for his baggage to be thrown after him, if you would be so good.”
“Certainly, old chap! Where should he go?”
“Timbuctoo, for all I care.”
“Headquarters, might be better. I shall ensure that word reaches there in advance of him. Rejected as unsuitable for service with the squadron, I presume?”
“No. He refused an order. I recommend that he be dismissed from the RFC.”
“Better that way, you are right. I do not doubt that General Trenchard will be happy to break him. Come with me, Lieutenant.”
Jim made a performance of leaving Williamson standing while he checked files on his desk. He knew that Tommy would have addressed him formally if he had been serious; he was playing and making a point to the young man.
“All of the Crossleys are out at the moment. You will have to wait for one. Should be back by mid-afternoon.”
“What shall I do, sir?”
“Wait.”
“No, sir, that was not what I meant. If I was to go and get my logbook, sir, do you think Major Stark would see me? If I apologised as well?”
“Why should he?”
“But… I do want to fly, sir.”
“I saw you land the Strutter, Lieutenant. You’re not much good as a pilot. We can arrange for one of the observers, a flight-sergeant probably, to put in a few hours in a training plane and make him up in your place. Probably get a more reliable pilot. Go and get the logbook, if you want. I’ll see if Tommy will give you five minutes to convince him that you are worth bothering with. And throw that bloody stick away! We don’t need to wave canes about to prove that we are officers!”
“But my mother bought me the stick when I was commissioned, sir. It has a silver RFC crest on it.”
“Then hide it away, out of our sight. You can keep it, if it is from your mother!”
Williamson ran off to the hangars, found his trunk and bags tidily set out on a clean bench. The Strutter was inside, mechanics working on it.
“New plane in, sir. It won’t fly until it’s up to our standard. Where did you bring it in from, sir? I am Flight-Sergeant Bolton, by the way, sir, senior NCO in the hangars.”
“Williamson, Flight-Sergeant. I flew it up from the Central Air Park at Amiens.”
“That explains it, sir. Sat outside in the sun and rain for a week or two and given a quick glance over before it’s sent out. They are better when they come direct from the factory. Which is your room, sir? I’ll have one of the private soldiers take your bags across.”
“I haven’t got a room. I don’t know if I’m staying.”
Williamson opened his valise, retrieved the logbook.
“Well, good luck, sir. If I might say so, sir, Major Stark is very friendly with Major Arkwright, who entered as a private soldier, sir. The two Majors are among our best, sir, as I expect you know.”
Lieutenant Williamson did know – but he had never considered the fact significant, because he would do far better than them as a result of his superior background. He had an uncle who was a peer, and his father was a High Court judge – he must, therefore, be fated to succeed in all of his endeavours; he had, for example, been captain of the First Eleven at school.
He returned to the Adjutant’s office, asked whether he should be escorted back to the CO.
“I will take you in, Lieutenant Williamson.”
Jim put on his jacket and hat, made a show of glancing in the mirror on his wall, checking his necktie to be correctly knotted.
He knocked on Tommy’s door, waited to be called in.
“Lieutenant Williamson has his logbook, sir, and would wish to apologise.”
“Is he worth bothering with, Captain Naughton?”
“Possibly, sir. We need an extra pilot, sir.”
“Send him in, then – but I make no guarantee.”
They winked at each other and then continued the charade.
Jim saluted and marched out.
“You may enter, Lieutenant Williamson.”
“Sir, I must apologise. I made a mistake, sir. I was wrong.”
Tommy wondered whether the young man had ever so much as thought those words before; he was sure he had never said them.
“You were. We all make mistakes, once. Repeating mistakes is a very bad habit. It is commonly fatal in a pilot. Sit down. Let me see your logbook.”
Tommy leafed through the document, noting a respectable number of entries for a young pilot.
“Soloed in December last year, posted to Home Service; flown one hundred and twenty hours in a BE2c and fifty in a Vickers Gunbus. No single-seater experience, which is hardly surprising and does not matter here. Far better than most green hands have to offer. You made a very bad landing. Why?”
“I did not allow for the Strutter’s greater landing speed, sir. It took me by surprise.”
“That at least is honest. Why should I take you in my squadron, Lieutenant Williamson?”
“Because I want to fly properly, sir. Home Service is not real wartime flying, sir. I wish to fight, sir.”
“Do you? I will ask you the same question next week. I wonder if you will give the same answer. We will undertake trench attacks when the Big Push comes; you must learn low-flying. You will be in Blue’s Flight and must meet his standards. They are high. He will train you, and he will ask me to ground you if you do not come up to scratch. I have utter faith in Blue – he is very good, probably a better natural pilot than I am, and I always thought I was the best. Work and learn, Mr Williamson! Tell Jim that you are in and he will deal with the formalities and assign you a room and half a servant – lieutenants are one between two.”
“I’m not really used to sharing a servant, sir… We had one apiece in England.”
“Lieutenants share rooms, Mr Williamson – we do not have sufficient for one each. Such being the case, it is mor
e convenient to appoint one servant per room. If you would prefer to be in England, it may still be arranged.”
Williamson was horrified – he had not imagined that war service could make such demands, call for such sacrifices.
“No, sir. If I am to achieve all that is in me, then I must fight. Tell me, sir, when can I expect to fly?”
“Inside the next hour, knowing Blue. He will wish to get some idea of what you can do. We are used to completely green pilots joining us from training, often with fewer than ten hours in their logbooks. We will expect a lot of you. We will be on patrol in the morning and I would hope you to be in your assigned place then. Your observer will be an experienced man and you will be well-advised to pay attention to him; he will have a bamboo cane with which he will prod you when he needs to give a warning.”
Williamson was appalled – Other Ranks must not touch officers!
“Bad design – the observer cannot speak to the pilot, so it has to be prod and gesture. No choice. I agree with you that it is not desirable.”
Dark Days Of Summer (Innocents At War Series, Book 4) Page 19