Kate stiffened. She could not tell him the truth. 'I – I have a job here, in Walsall.'
'Yes, that's how I found you. At least, I saw you at the aerodrome, and the man at the George told me where you worked, so I waited for you.'
'The man at the George? Peter? You saw me at the aerodrome?' Kate asked, trying to understand.
'Not Peter Llewellen, he'd left by the time I got there. The man on the desk. But why come to Walsall? Have you family here?'
Kate pulled herself together. She could tell part of the truth. 'My father died,' she began to explain hesitantly.
'I heard. I'm so sorry, Kate. It must have been a terrible shock.'
'You heard? How? Was it in the newspapers?'
'No. I was trying to find you. But by then you'd gone and the market people didn't know where.'
Kate glanced up at him and frowned. 'You were trying to find me? Why?'
'I wanted to.'
She shrugged. 'I'm sorry my father was so – horrid isn't strong enough for what he did! It was wicked of him to treat you like that when you were only being kind!'
'Never mind. Where did you go?'
Kate tried to order her thoughts. She could not bear to tell him about her time with the Wilsons or Walter. She was so ashamed of that time in her life.
'We, my mother and I, couldn't run the stall on our own. My mother went to live with my sister.' She paused. She could not get used to the idea that Maggie was her real mother. She still thought of her as a big sister. 'Maggie's husband had a job in Coventry. But there wasn't room for me, and Phyllis, a friend, was marrying Frank and working with him here. She offered to find me a job. Did you see them, if you were following me home?'
'Yes. Was Phyllis at school with you?'
No!' Kate said hurriedly. 'I met her – she lived near us.' That was the truth, and if he chose to assume it had happened in Birmingham, and the us referred to her parents, she hadn't told a direct lie.
'Kate, let's go and have dinner so that we can talk properly. Is the George the only hotel?'
'I can't go there!' she said, horrified. The staff at the posh hotel always looked at her contemptuously, and she knew they suspected she and Peter were more than friends. 'I don't belong to that sort of place.'
'My car isn't far away, we could drive somewhere. Sutton, perhaps?'
Kate shuddered, Did he know she'd worked there? About the Wilsons? Was this a subtle way of testing her?
'No, please, Robert.'
'Don't you want to come out with me? There's so much I want to know, especially about the flying! I hear you're a natural pilot. Let's find a small café nearby then, there must be some.'
She didn't think she dared be in his company for long, she would surely reveal more than she wanted him to know, but his mention of flying halted her frantic thoughts.
'You fly too, don't you? I think you said so, that day – when – when you took me out in your car.'
'Yes, I keep my plane at Walsall now. I saw you there on Saturday, just as you were leaving, and I asked Tom who you were. I couldn't believe it was you after all this time. He told me how good you were, and you'd soon qualify.'
Kate's shoulders slumped. 'That's a dream. I can't afford flying lessons. The ones I had were a present from Peter.'
'He paid? Kate, what is he to you?'
'Just a friend, but I don't expect you to believe that,' Kate said swiftly. 'He's a strange man, but kind. I met him when I delivered some flying gloves to him. We'd made them at work, and I was asked to take them to him, and before I knew it he'd insisted on talking me up for a flight. Then at Christmas, because the others at the Aero Club were teasing him that he'd be useless at teaching me to fly, he paid for me to have a couple of lessons.'
'You enjoy it?'
Kate smiled. 'It's the most wonderful thing I ever did! I never imagined how it would be, up there, so free!'
Robert stood up. 'Come on. Do you want to change first? We'll go and eat somewhere and you can tell me all about it.'
*
Robert sat in the kitchen waiting for Kate to change. He was overwhelmed with emotion. She was just the same, older and more wary than when he'd met her, but the same sweet Kate whose image he had carried in his heart for so long. And now he'd found her. This time he was not going to lose her. But he could not ask her what had happened. Not yet. There was more than she'd said, he was sure. It clearly frightened her to talk about it, and however much it cost him he would be patient and not press her. Some time, perhaps, when she trusted him, she'd confide in him.
They walked to a small, quiet café a few streets away. Robert was careful to talk about neutral topics. There were obviously things which had happened to her and her family which she didn't yet feel ready to tell him. Why should she, he asked himself. He was, to her, a mere acquaintance, possibly a friend of Daphne's, and from the way Daphne behaved he was convinced there was another mystery. Kate might suspect he'd tell Daphne things she didn't want her to know. The death of Alf must have shocked her very much, and not being able to go with the mother and sister would have hurt her. Then there was the rumoured pregnancy. Had she borne a child? If so, where was it? Thank goodness she had such good friends as Phyllis and Frank.
Kate chatted easily about them and her job, but was reticent about her family, and she never mentioned Daphne or school. She was enthusiastic about her flying experiences, and knowledgeable. He was impressed by how much she had learned in just a few flights and two lessons.
'I'd like to teach you,' he said abruptly. 'I qualified as an instructor, I once thought that was what I wanted to do, but I had to help my father in the business. Will you let me?'
She stared at him, her eyes gleaming at the suggestion. Then she shook her head. 'Thank you, Robert, but I can't pay you.'
'I don't want paying,' Robert said. 'I'd be delighted to have such a promising pupil. Kate, listen to me,' he said as she began to protest. 'I don't think you've told me everything, and I don't mean to press you for information you're not ready to give me, but I am certain my actions had something to do with your leaving school, so that you had to give up all ideas of teaching. Let me make it up to you this way. Who knows, you might be able to get a job teaching flying, like Gabrielle Patterson.'
Kate's lips quivered and she blinked rapidly. 'I've read all I could about Amy Johnson,' she said, smiling. 'I used to imagine I was her. After all, her father was a fish merchant too, though much bigger and richer than mine. I've envied her and the other women so much. But Robert, you don't owe me anything, you really don't.'
'It would be my pleasure. I love flying, but I much prefer to have a companion. I may as well teach you while I am flying anyway.'
'I – Robert, it would be wonderful, but what would people say? They, some of them, were making jokes, suggestions, about me and Peter, and while I know they were not true, some people, a lot of people at the Club, believed them. Believed that he and I – '
'I understand,' Robert cut in swiftly. 'We can tell them we are old friends, I knew your parents, and if you don't mind a few small untruths, imply they asked me to teach you since they preferred an old family friend to a stranger. Well?'
Kate's face was transformed. She was laughing, and he wanted nothing so much as to take her in his arms and kiss her. But they were seated on opposite sides of a small table in a cheap café, which made the idea a nonsense, and in any case if he moved prematurely, before she trusted him and was ready, he would destroy any chance he had with her.
She was nervous, and he could not detect much warmth in her manner. It was only the flying which had animated her, not himself. She'd been startled to see him, and, he felt, not entirely comfortable. He would need to treat her very carefully. She was like a timid kitten, and one false move on his part could ruin all his plans. What they were he didn't any longer question. Seeing her again had confirmed that for him. He wanted Kate, wanted to marry her, whatever the problems and the distress it would cause his parents, who wanted a s
ocially acceptable daughter-in-law like Daphne Carstairs. If he had not met Kate, he admitted to himself, he would have settled for Daphne.
'Would it work?' she asked. 'My father would have killed me if I'd suggested it, and my mother would be certain no aeroplane could stay up in the sky.'
'Then we'll do it? You can only come at weekends, I suppose, because of your job. What time do you finish on Saturday? I'll be waiting for you.'
*
Maggie arrived home at the same time as a police car drew up outside. The driver stepped out and opened the rear door. He spoke to someone inside, then leant in. As Maggie drew closer she heard muffled pleas from inside the motor car and managed to distinguish a few words.
'Please Ma'am, you're home now. Let's help you out of here.'
She hurried forward and peered in through the window. 'Mom? What's happened? Where have you been?'
The policeman looked at her in relief. 'Miss Martins, is it?'
'No, Mrs Pritchard. Mrs Martins is my mother. What's happened? Has she been wandering again?'
'Can you persuade her to get out, into the house?'
Maggie took his place and by mixing cajolery with threats, finally managed to prise Hattie out of the vehicle.
'It's comfortable in there,' she complained. 'I weren't doin' no 'arm. Trying ter help yer.'
Maggie, inwardly seething, tried to be calm as she led Hattie up the path and in through the kitchen door. Sheila, who was at the stove, dropped the spoon she'd been wielding and came towards them.
'Thank heavens they found her! Thank you, constable. Where was she? Would you like a cup of tea?'
He smiled at her. 'Wouldn't say no.'
Hattie, brusquely shrugging away Maggie's arm, said she was tired and going to bed. They watched her climb the stairs, and Maggie turned to the policeman.
'Where was she?'
'In the market place, making a nuisance of herself. She stood next to the fish stall and was shouting out daft prices. Made the fish man proper cross when people tried to say they was the real uns.'
Maggie groaned. 'She used to run a fish stall in the Bull Ring in Brum. With me Dad. She's losing her marbles.'
'Does that sort of thing often, does she?' he asked.
'Not lately. At least, she hasn't done this before. She used ter keep wandering off, sleeping under hedges. Your lot were always bringing her back.'
'Not here,' he said, frowning. 'I know, it were by the Cathedral. You say yer name's Pritchard? Related ter Sam Pritchard, are yer? He lived there as well.'
'He's my husband, worse luck! But I'm finished with him. Thanks to Sheila and her man we've started a new life. Mom's been better too, she hasn't wandered since we lived here. But what am I going ter do if she starts that lark again?'
'We'll manage,' Sheila said comfortingly. 'This must have been a relapse, because Sam has been here. He's out now. I imagine she saw him and was frightened.'
The policeman nodded. 'We heard he'd been let out of gaol.'
'He's been threatening Maggie. Wants her to go back to him. He said he had a couple of tough friends who'd persuade her. Can't you warn him?'
Maggie was shaking her head at Sheila. 'What can they do? They can't guard us and the kids all the time.'
'I'll see we have a word with him,' the policeman said. 'Don't you worry, missus, if he knows we're lookin' out fer 'im, he'll be too scared to do owt. These petty crooks is all the same, all bluster. Well, thanks for the cuppa. I'd best be getting back.'
'And thank you for bringing Mom home.'
*
Robert watched Kate clamber aboard and breathed a sigh of relief. Right until this moment he'd feared she would refuse to go with him. It had started when he'd met her outside her lodgings an hour earlier. She'd handed him an envelope. All unsuspecting he'd opened it.
'What's this?'
'It's all the savings I have, Robert. It's all I can afford now, and I know it's not much, but if you teach me to fly and I can get a job doing it, that's much better paid than what I do now, I can repay you later.'
He tried to give it back to her but she resolutely put both hands behind her back.
'I said I didn't want to be paid. Kate, you need this money!'
'But I won't accept your charity!'
'Last week you were prepared to.'
'Last week I was so overwhelmed with the idea of being taught to fly I wasn't thinking straight. I can't accept lessons without paying what I can afford. I can save a few shillings a week, and I mean to save until I've paid you what any other pupil would, however long it takes. I'm keeping an account, I'll pay the same as the Club charges for lessons.'
They argued, and twice Kate demanded that he stopped the car to let her out, but he ignored her and increased his speed until they drew up in front of the Club House. Kate struggled to open the door, but when one of the engineers came over to speak to Robert she sat back.
'I wish I'd been a man!' she muttered as Robert, detaining the engineer with questions, helped her out of the car.
He grinned at her, eyebrows quirked. 'I don't!'
'The RAF began to train pilots almost two years ago. Why not women too?'
'I don't think the public would enjoy hearing about women piloting bombers and fighter planes being shot down, dead or horribly injured or put in prisoner of war camps.'
'Robert, I mean it. I have to pay you, whenever I can afford it, for each lesson.'
'Then you'd better concentrate and qualify in as few lessons as possible,' he said briskly. 'I'll accept your money on those terms.'
For the first time that day she smiled, and his heart turned over. If he lost her now he'd never love any other woman.
'Right,' he said as he strapped himself into his Tiger Moth. 'I'll take her up and then you take over. Head towards Lichfield.'
'Tom let me take off,' she said provocatively.
He chuckled. 'That was a different plane, and Tigers are notoriously fickle. I want you to get used to handling it before you try to wreck my baby.'
He deliberately headed away from Lichfield until he told her to take over. They could see the three spires, the Ladies of the Vale, and he was impressed with how she banked and turned, swiftly adjusting to the delicacy needed after a few initial over-sharp movements. The spires of the Cathedral could now be seen slightly to their left, and Kate kept them there, to compensate for the slight wind coming the other way.
'Go round the town, clockwise, and when we're heading back I'll show you some manoeuvres.'
These were easy ones, turning, banking, changing height, and after each one he made Kate repeat it. Her performance was almost flawless.
'OK, sit back, we'll do the loop now.'
She gave a muffled shriek and he grinned. He took the plane in a perfect circle, and heard Kate's gasps as they flew upside down. If that didn't terrify her, little else would. The first words she uttered apart from confirming his instructions came as they completed the circle and the Tiger bumped along for a few seconds.
'What was that?'
'Frightened?'
'No! It was wonderful! But it wasn't smooth.'
'It showed we did a perfect loop, because we caught up with our own slipstream.'
'Oh, I see. The air was more disturbed where we'd been? Can I try it?'
'No! Kate, I'll land now, then you can do a couple of practice take-offs. If you manage them OK I might let you land next time.'
There was a muffled protest over the speaking tube, but Robert merely grinned. If he could hold out carrots for each lesson she would stop this ridiculous attempt to pay him. And if she didn't, he would keep the money to give back to her at some time in the future. There would, he knew, be some kind of future for them now.
When she climbed down Kate stood and gazed at the Tiger, then stripped off one gauntlet and tentatively put out her hand. She stroked the wing lovingly.
'You're different from Tom,' she announced as they walked towards the Club House.
'I am? As
an instructor? How?'
'It's difficult to explain. He was so precise, mechanical. Oh, he taught me a lot, but I had to work everything out from what he said. With you and Peter, it was as though I was feeling your thoughts, knowing what you meant to do, along the controls. Oh, it doesn't make sense!'
'I think it does, in a funny sort of way. Shall we come again tomorrow, if the weather stays fine?'
*
'I haven't seen you for ages, Robert!'
Daphne pouted. She had been having tea in Kunzle's Café Royal with a girl friend from University when she'd seen him seated at a table across the room. When her friend left Daphne went across and sat down opposite.
'Daphne. I've been busy, and I imagine you have been working hard at college.'
'Yes, but there is always time for old friends. Why don't you come to dinner on Saturday? Mother was saying only the other day it's been months since you came.'
'I'm sorry, I have other arrangements for the weekend.'
'And no time for me? When are you going to take me flying? I saw your mother and she said you seemed to spend all your spare time with your aeroplane these days.'
'Yes, I've been getting in as much flying as I can, and instructing others. If war comes we'll need as many pilots as we can find.'
'Mr Chamberlain won't let it come to war. He's got rid of Mr Eden, who was too warlike, and he'll find a way of satisfying everyone.'
Robert glanced at his watch. 'Daphne, if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment.'
She laid her hand on his arm as he was about to rise and he paused. 'What have I done to offend you, Robert? I thought we were such good friends this time last year, in Paris.'
'Nothing,' he said, but she thought he looked embarrassed. 'I'll telephone. Perhaps we could go to the cinema one evening? Is it still your vacation?'
'I don't see that matters, Robert. I do have time for relaxation. Thanks, I'll look forward to it.'
He left, and Daphne followed more slowly. He'd been evasive. What had happened? She'd been so sure she was making progress, but she'd seen him so little since that party. Then a more cheerful thought struck her. Had he been so jealous of Brian that he'd decided to stay away from her? Maybe the idea of a rival wasn't having the desired effect. Perhaps she should make it clear to him that Brian was nothing to her. Or, and the idea appealed to her, should she follow him to his beloved aerodrome and then he would feel obliged to offer to take her up.
Can Dreams Come True? Page 25