Walking on Air

by Christina Jones

  Vinny had taken over the controls. ‘I like village fetes, myself. All those buxom bucolic girls and frolicking in the foaming cow parsley after hours . . . Oh, bugger.’ He listened intently to the radio. ‘Golf Hotel Charlie Foxtrot received and understood. Fifteen minutes to landing. All AOK.’ He glanced across at Jonah. ‘Of course, this pastoral display would have absolutely nothing at all to do with cocking a snook at Aerobatic Archie and the delectable Claire, would it?’

  ‘It’s got everything to do with that,’ Jonah had said fervently. ‘Absolutely bloody everything.’

  Leaving Whiteacres’ air-traffic control tower following the Shorts’ return, Jonah thought that after Billie’s rather odd friend Miranda, and Estelle, and Vinny and Pam, anyone else who wanted to pour cold water on his plans would just have to join the queue. Sloshing through the rapidly melting slush, he pulled his jacket tighter around him in the keen wind, and deciding not to aggravate the situation with Estelle any further, he gave the office a wide berth and headed for the units.

  The first thing he noticed outside Billie’s warehouse was the rather scruffy white Transit van with ‘Pascoe’s Warehousing – Whiteacres’ and the telephone number emblazoned on it in large red and black lettering. Jonah grinned. He always felt happy when the van was there. Like a talisman. If it was the Nova it always meant she wasn’t stopping.

  He slid the doors open. ‘Have you sobered up yet? That was quite a night. I really enjoyed myself. We’ll have to go there again. Has Barnaby –’

  ‘No, he hasn’t, sweetie,’ Claire rose from the Stearman’s cockpit. ‘And your little chum – Billie is it? – has gone next door to mediate in some matrimonial dispute. Some awful old bag with an orange face and varicose veins and a wrinkly who looks like David Niven were screaming like banshees. It was quite nostalgic, actually. Just like we used to be.’ She stepped unsteadily onto the Stearman’s wing. ‘But I doubt very much if they’ll have the same sort of erotic making-up session that we did, don’t you?’

  Jonah winced. ‘Claire – no! Don’t do that! Mind where you put your feet! Don’t step on the wing, keep on the treads! And what the hell are you doing in here anyway?’

  Claire tottered on the edge of the wing and then jumped heavily to the ground. ‘Estelle told me where you would be and said it would be fine to come over. I just told that Billie girl that you were expecting me. She said I was very welcome to wait. Sweet child, really. Hasn’t it been awful weather?’

  Jonah closed his eyes and cursed. He really shouldn’t have underestimated Estelle’s anger, I’ve got nothing to say to you, Claire. Nothing at all.’

  ‘Such a pretty plane. . . Claire ran her fingers seductively over the Stearman’s vibrant colours. ‘And watching you fly that day, darling – it was such a turn-on . . . Such a pity you had to be so bad-tempered about it afterwards. Antony was merely going to make you an offer.’

  Jonah exhaled. Claire, looking sensational in a lilac wool dress that clung and moulded, beneath a long cashmere coat, pouted. Her hair fell over her eyes in a glossy curtain. Christ! What was wrong with him? Estelle and Claire – and he’d ballsed up on both of them by being in love with bloody planes! If he ever took the luxury of going into therapy, his counsellor would have a field day!

  ‘I’m not selling the Stearman to Antony. I’m not parting with anything else, ever. So go back to bloody Archibald and tell him that he won’t be getting his hands on Whiteacres either. I’ll see to that.’

  ‘Sweetheart –’ Claire moved towards him. He could smell Obsession. It awoke a million memories – ‘you don’t mean that. You know you don’t.’

  ‘I do. I bloody do. Just bugger off and leave me alone!’ The doors opened and they both turned round. Barnaby did a double take. ‘Er – would you rather I vamoosed or something?’

  Claire nodded. Jonah shook his head. Barnaby obviously tossed a mental coin and stepped inside the shed.

  Jonah sighed. ‘Claire’s just leaving.’

  ‘No, I’m not.’ She smiled brilliantly at Barnaby, then stood on tiptoe and kissed Jonah’s cheek. ‘I’m not going anywhere, darling, until you’ve taken me up in your sexy plane.’

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Billie pulled open the doors to the warehouse, stamping her feet to shake the worst of the slush from her boots, and stared at the tableau in amazement. When she’d left – less than fifteen minutes earlier – to sort out Sylv and Douglas, Claire had been mooching round the warehouse, carelessly trailing the hem of the cashmere coat through the dust and chattering about waiting for Jonah to carry her off to paradise.

  Billie, who had thought Jonah’s ex-wife was even more stunning in close-up, had none the less wondered seriously about her sanity. Now, the luscious Claire was sitting looking flushed but ecstatically happy in the Stearman’s cockpit, while Jonah and Barnaby stood on the ground staring up at her.

  Barnaby spotted Billie first. He shrugged apologetically. It’s a bit of an emotional blip, my dear. A small matrimonial crisis.’

  ‘So I gather,’ Billie said, watching Jonah’s face darken as he leaned up towards the cockpit. ‘It seems to be the day for them. I’ve just had to sort out Douglas and Sylvia next door.’

  ‘Satisfactorily, I hope.’ Barnaby gave another cool upper-class smile, ‘I do hate unpleasantness.’

  ‘I quite like it,’ Billie admitted with a grin. ‘As long as it isn’t mine, of course. And I’ve no idea whether the outcome will be satisfactory or not. Douglas and Sylv have been daggers drawn ever since she sweated in a health farm sauna over Christmas in preference to sweating over Douglas’s turkey. They’re currently arguing over the custody of the cat.’

  Barnaby laughed. It sounded like it should be accompanied by a good port and a rich fruit cake. ‘Lovely evening last night, wasn’t it? I thoroughly enjoyed myself. Superb food – and even better company. I – um – wondered . . . Your friend, the masseuse, Miranda? Is she unattached?’

  ‘Oh, very. Totally. Completely uninvolved. The most unattached person I know.’ Billie wondered how many more young, free and single epithets she could chuck in without overegging the pudding. ‘She’s been divorced for years. She’s agreed to have dinner with you, hasn’t she?’

  Barnaby nodded. ‘She has. But I thought I caught a nuance of hesitation prior to her acceptance. I must say I find her very attractive . . . very stimulating . . .’

  ‘Yes, she’s apparently excellent at her job.’

  ‘I didn’t actually mean the massage.’

  ‘Oh, no. Well, yes – Miranda’s certainly – um – stimulating . . .’ Billie beamed. ‘And I’m sure she fancies you too.’

  Barnaby seemed to wince a bit at ‘fancies’. Maybe it wasn’t upper crust enough for him. He smiled again. ‘She’s an extraordinarily attractive lady. Like a sad Modigliani.’

  Billie tried to think back to her school art lessons. Weren’t Modigliani’s women the ones with faces like eggs? She wasn’t too sure that Miranda would find that complimentary and hoped Barnaby used some other form of flattery when they next met. It was hardly the sort of thing guaranteed to wean her away from Reuben.

  Miranda had spent most of the night saying that she shouldn’t have agreed to go out with Barnaby and that she’d have to ring and cancel. Billie, in a post-champagne-and-curry fug, had said she couldn’t possibly, and Reuben wouldn’t mind. Miranda had wailed that Reuben would mind a bloody lot and it was all Billie’s fault for wanting to sit with Jonah and Mr Molten-Lava in the first place, and it was also Billie’s fault for ordering so much champagne, and actually it was definitely Billie’s fault for giving the Stearman house room and bringing Jonah and Barnaby into their lives to complicate things, then she’d hiccuped a lot and stumbled off to bed.

  Billie, now noticing that Barnaby had that distant gooeyeyed look which always signified the stirring of testosterone, thought it might be a good idea to change the subject. She looked enquiringly at him. ‘Um – how did Jonah’s meeting go this morning? With th
e Aviation Incs?’

  Barnaby shrugged. ‘Not a clue, my dear. That’s why I was seeking him out. But this little setback –’ he gestured towards the plane – ‘was already taking place when I arrived.’

  Billie nodded. Claire had arrived unannounced halfway through the afternoon, asking for Jonah. Billie had said she had no idea where he was, but decided to grasp the nettle and find out about the takeover plans. She’d skirted around the issue for a couple of minutes, then as Claire seemed incapable of understanding veiled hints, she’d asked outright.

  ‘What takeover?’ Claire had wrinkled her nose. ‘Oh, Whiteacres . . . Goodness – why should it concern you?’

  ‘Because it’s my livelihood,’ Billie had hissed, trying to hiss quietly because Mrs Blunt, a new attic-overspill customer for the warehouse, was just completing the paperwork in her office.

  ‘What? The airport?’

  ‘Not the airport! This! The warehouses! If you’re buying up my lease I’d really like to know where I stand.’

  Claire had giggled and swished the cashmere coat about a bit. ‘Are you sleeping with Jonah?’

  ‘What? No!’

  ‘That’s a pity. He’s awfully good in bed – Oh, I think that lady in the appalling hat is waving at you.’

  Mrs Blunt had been frantically indicating that she’d run out of room on the inventory form and Billie had galloped to the rescue, praying that she hadn’t overheard Claire’s headgear remark. Just as she was stapling the forms together and wondering why anyone would want to store thirteen plastic dustbins containing knitting wool in their attic and whether she’d get them into the van along with several boxes of Mrs Blunt’s ‘preshus artyfax’, Sylvia and Douglas had started shouting outside. Always feeling that she needed to protect Sylv, she’d dispatched Mrs Blunt, charged out of the shed, and abandoned the chance of any further discussions with Claire.

  Jonah, who had now stomped away from the Stearman, yanked out his mobile phone, punched out an aggressive succession of numbers and barked into it. Barnaby and Billie exchanged raised eyebrows. Jonah snapped off the phone. ‘Billie – open the doors. Barnaby – get ready to heave.’

  Billie looked at Jonah’s stony face and did as she was told. Barnaby, who obviously knew Jonah well enough not to argue, watched as he released the plane’s brakes and then fitted his shoulder under the Stearman’s rudder.

  ‘Ooh! No, wait! Not while I’m in it!’ Claire, who was laughing, scrambled out of the cockpit and clumsily, tripping over the hem of her coat, jumped onto the concrete floor.

  Billie looked at Jonah. ‘What the hell is going on?’

  Jonah’s lips were set in a pale line. ‘Claire wants to be a wingwalker. Claire insists on being a wingwalker. So Claire is going to be a bloody wingwalker. OK?’

  Billie shook her head. ‘You can’t be serious? You’re not going to take her up in that? Not today? Jonah – you’ll kill her!’

  ‘No I won’t. But I hope I’ll scare the shit out of her and put her off the idea for life. Then she might just go back to Aerobatic Archie and tell him that Whiteacres is best left to those who know what they’re doing. The tower have given me a fifteen-minute clearance before the light goes.’

  ‘I still think you shouldn’t be doing . . . Oh, does that mean that the Aviation Incs were hopeful this morning? That Claire and – er – Antony aren’t taking over?’

  ‘Not exactly.’ Jonah’s face softened slightly. ‘But they didn’t turn me down out of hand. One of them actually seemed almost human. To be honest, my air pageant will probably slot into their money-making plans nicely. It’ll be up to us to make it a big enough success to stave off the September take-over bid.’

  Dead easy, then, Billie thought morosely. She almost agreed with Miranda that the Incs wouldn’t give two hoots about some two-bit air pageant putting Whiteacres on the annual display map if the rivals were offering stonking amounts of money – even if the new owners intended to raze it to the ground and build communal cesspits. The Incs, Billie was convinced, would be tipping their Panamas over their noses and snoozing in the Caribbean sunshine long before the first JCB trundled onto the runway.

  However, looking at Jonah’s face, this was obviously neither the time nor the place to mention it. He’d moved away and was pointing out the intricacies of the rig to Claire.

  Billie, who was already sweating with second-hand fear, quickly joined them. ‘Jonah – don’t do it. Please. She’s – um – that is, I don’t think she’s feeling very well. She doesn’t know what it entails, does she? Look how hard it was for me just fastening myself into the rig. Anyway, surely you’ve told her that you’ve advertised for someone to do it professionally? She’s not thinking that she’s going to become your partner, is she?’

  ‘Of course I am.’ Claire, in a waft of Obsession, pushed past Jonah and touched Billie’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about me. Jo will look after me – he always has. Anyway, he’s the best flyer in the world. Tons better than darling Antony even. . . She leaned closer to Billie and dropped her voice to a chummy whisper. ‘I want Jo back. I miss him. I know him inside out, so who better to be his flying partner first and his life partner second, eh?’

  Billie exhaled, watching Claire, her cloudy hair bouncing in the breeze, scamper happily towards the perimeter fence and start winding it back to give a clear exit to the grass strip.

  Jonah had joined Barnaby in shoving the Stearman towards the cracked concrete. As it was a job for at least a dozen people they were making slow progress. Eventually, though, the biplane was out of the shed, and Jonah swung himself up into the cockpit and started the engine. The roar immediately brought the other warehousers, including Sylvia and Douglas with matching angry faces, out of their units.

  Barnaby waved an all-encompassing hand. ‘No problems!’ he yelled. ‘Just testing the engine! Sorry to have disturbed you!’

  Billie, unsure whether anyone who couldn’t lip-read had the slightest inkling of what was going on, was mightily relieved when everyone disappeared inside again. No doubt the humidity of the draughty warehouses was infinitely preferable to standing outside up to their ankles in slush and in the snatching teeth of a late January breeze. Snuggling deeper into her fleece and pushing her hands into her pockets, Billie watched miserably as Jonah hefted Claire inelegantly onto the Stearman’s wing. At least he wasn’t going to expect her to go the full monty and climb out from the cockpit.

  Billie shook her head. Claire was dressed all wrong. The flapping coat would probably pull her off even before the Stearman reached the end of the runway. It was a job for someone who knew what they were doing. She studied Jonah’s furious face as he strapped his ex-wife none-too-gently into the rig. She’d never seen this side of him before. Angry. Irritable. Insensitive. And cruel. Oh, yes – he was definitely being cruel.

  She turned to Barnaby. ‘Can’t you stop him? It’s not right.’

  ‘I think you’ll find Jo knows what he’s doing, my dear.’ Barnaby pulled the collar of his Barbour up round his ears. ‘I always feel it’s best not to interfere. I trust Jo’s judgement implicitly. He won’t let anything happen to Claire.’

  Billie wasn’t so sure. She watched, her stomach squirming, as Claire stumbled awkwardly along the wing, her long coat catching on the struts of the rig, the wind whipping her hair about her face. Now Jonah was kneeling on the wing too, pushing Claire’s curves into the rig, sliding the harness over her shoulders, fastening the straps with angry tugs. Then he slid backwards into the Stearman’s cockpit, let out the brake and gave a mocking thumbs up in their direction.

  Billie, who thought she was going to be sick, wondered what sort of bad publicity would be engendered by slamming one’s ex into the ground at a hundred and fifty miles an hour. She had a feeling that the tabloids would have a field day.

  As the Stearman started to move, Claire twisted from her perch high above them and gave a sort of jerky two-handed wave. Her mouth was open, but the roar of the engine and the scream of the rot
ating propeller drowned out the words. Even if she was imploring them to set her free no one would ever know. Billie, casting another anxious glance towards Barnaby, was dismayed to see that even he looked worried. She exhaled and nervously rubbed her hands together, hardly daring to look as the Stearman picked up speed and bounced across the cracked concrete towards the gap in the fence.

  The bouncing became a rocking motion as soon as the plane reached the airfield’s grass, which had been swept clear of snow and slush, and the glorious silver, emerald and purple Sullivanair colours were an almost indecent slash of gaudiness against the slate of the sky. Claire had stopped waving. Billie crept closer to Barnaby, knowing that if she had been alone she’d have closed her eyes at the moment of takeoff and probably never opened them again.

  Barnaby slid a comforting arm around her shoulder and pulled her against the waxy warmth of his jacket. He smelled of safety and security and cigar smoke, and reminded her of her father. Suddenly assailed again by homesickness, she longed to bury her face in his chest and cry.

  The Stearman’s engine note changed as Jonah headed for the grass strip, turning the plane towards the taxi way and into the wind. Claire was rigid now, a tiny figure on the huge wingspan, her arms outstretched, leaning forward, the cashmere coat billowing behind her. She looked, Billie thought as she peeked from beneath Barnaby’s lapels, exactly like Kate Winslet on the prow of Titanic. Not the best of analogies under the circumstances. She really hoped that the outcome wasn’t going to be the same.

  ‘Christ!’ Barnaby muttered beneath his breath. ‘They haven’t even reached takeoff speed and Claire’s trying to get out!’

  Billie whimpered, her teeth chattering, as she watched Claire snatching at the harnesses’ buckles as the Stearman jolted along the grass runway. Despite it being only a few degrees above zero, beads of sweat prickled Billie’s upper lip, and she looked helplessly at Barnaby. Surely there was something they could do?