So it must have been Nice where Ross flew at a couple of thousand feet over a promenade lined with palm trees beside the water, and thousands and thousands of doll-like figures came spilling out of grand buildings to watch and wave as we passed. Tiny bright ladies with parasols. Tiny neat men with black top hats. Even tinier children running along the beach, trying to keep up. I wondered if they knew who we were, or if the sight of a peace-time aircraft so large was still something special. The same thing happened over Monte Carlo. Ross circled above the casino and its pretty terraced gardens, and within minutes there was a crowd so large I thought there must be something wrong. But they were all looking up, waving, pointing, cheering. That great sea of people was honouring us—four Australian blokes they didn’t know, trying to beat the French hero Poulet to Australia.
PISA, ITALY, NOVEMBER 15TH 1919
It was before dawn and we were eating breakfast in the near-empty dining room of Pisa’s Royal Victoria Hotel. I yawned, tore apart some bread and mopped up the last of my white beans, tomato and egg.
‘Hey,’ said Benny, ‘didn’t your mother teach you any manners?’
I nodded at two smartly dressed men on the next table, wiping their plates clean as they continued a loud debate in Italian. One of them noticed I was copying him with the bread, and he smiled and winked with food stuffed in his cheeks.
Benny scowled, dropped his fork and followed suit. ‘Been here two nights and we’re turning into bloody Macaronis.’
I leaned back in my chair and sipped the strong coffee, watching Benny as he wiped his plate clean. A hotel waiter walked among the empty tables, his shoes clicking on the black-and-white marble floor as he checked the cutlery on starched white cloths. Through an open window I could hear a horse and cart on the cobblestones outside, and the far-off cry of a gull.
‘Why do you do that?’ I asked quietly.
‘Do what?’ Benny said.
I nodded toward the Italians. ‘You know—Macaronis? And Frenchies. Frenchy bastards.’
He screwed up his face. ‘I’m only jokin’, Wal.’
‘Yeah.’ I fiddled with my knife.
It was our second morning in Pisa. We’d arrived from Lyons late in the afternoon on the 13th of November. Ross decided the manifold was making too much racket again and it was unlikely we’d get all the way to Rome with the limited amount of fuel we’d been able to secure in Lyons. Besides, Ross hated flying on the 13th.
The Leaning Tower was right across the fields from the aerodrome, poking up behind the old city walls. Seemed to me the architect had drunk too much Johnnie Walker.
Biffy Borton had stopped here on his flight to Cairo in the Handley Page, and he’d given Ross the name of a British officer to contact when we arrived. Captain Horne was his name. Jolly chap—whistled a lot. He drove straight out to lend a hand and arranged to have the Vimy put under military guard so Benny and I could get a good night’s sleep at a hotel in town. Then he booked us all into the fancy Royal Victoria Hotel, right on the River Arno.
The rain had started falling as we drove away from the aerodrome, and it didn’t let up most of the night. When we’d returned early yesterday morning the whole airfield was under water. We’d refuelled the plane and replaced the manifold, but by 11 am the rain was pelting down and an angry wind was blowing in from the south.
It was matched by Ross’s mood.
‘We can forget flying today,’ he said, standing in the door of a hangar, soaked through and filthy with mud like the rest of us. He folded his arms across his chest and scowled at the grey European winter, muttering under his breath about Poulet winging toward Australia through cloudless blue skies.
The 30-day deadline was already a curse. We’d aimed to be in Rome at the end of day one. We didn’t look like getting there until at least day three, so one tenth of our race time would be gone, just like that.
With the rain coming down in sheets and the Vimy’s wheels under water, Keith convinced Ross to head back to the hotel to go over the maps again; try to work out where we might make up some time.
It was Captain Horne who offered a ray of hope. He’d heard the aerodrome on the island of Crete was still open. That meant a quick hop down to Cairo in Africa, instead of flying across to Athens like they’d recommended back in London. If that was true, we’d make up some time.
‘Finally, some decent bloody news, Horne,’ said Ross. It was the first time since Hounslow I’d seen him look happy.
Ross walked across the dining room toward our table. ‘Let’s go, lads,’ he said. ‘Sun’ll be up soon.’
The two Italian men were rising to leave and both reached out to shake hands with Ross as he passed their table. One of them made the sound of an engine roaring and moved his hand through the air like a plane. The other crossed himself and put his hand on Ross’s shoulder, and Ross nodded and said ‘Grazie … Grazie tante’.
It had been the same wherever we went yesterday. There was an election going on, with crowds marching and people making rowdy speeches we couldn’t understand, but many of them stopped to wave and whisper when they saw our uniforms. Captain Horne said the newspapers had been covering Poulet’s journey for weeks, and when the Vimy was spotted in the skies over Pisa, word had spread that we were in the same race to Australia.
Out at the aerodrome, the rain was holding off but the ground still looked like a lake. As the Leaning Tower began to emerge with the first light, Ross and Keith pulled off their boots and socks, rolled up their trousers and began splashing through the icy water to find the highest patch of airstrip for take-off.
‘Over here!’ shouted Keith finally, locating an area where the water barely covered his ankles.
‘Right-o,’ said Ross, wading quickly back to the Vimy. ‘Prepare to depart, please!’
We got ourselves sorted and said our goodbyes to happy Captain Horne. Benny yelled ‘Contact,’ and he and I cranked the machine to life with the small crank handles on the side of each engine. Then we jumped in the back cockpit and Ross eased her forward.
And within two feet we were bogged. Badly.
It took 30 Italian mechanics to dig us out, using wooden planks for traction in the thick, black mud.
Then off we went again.
‘Contact!’
Engines roared. Forward on the throttle.
The Vimy rolled a few feet.
Bogged.
Three times it happened. Finally, after being both cheerful and patient, the 30 mechanics threw up their hands and began a furious argument among themselves.
The four of us jumped down to take another look. The Italians stood in a ring around us, still in angry debate, pointing, gesturing, fighting over where to place the wooden planks.
‘I’m sick of this,’ said Benny suddenly. ‘Fucking Macaronis.’ He grabbed a plank of wood off two arguing mechanics and stomped over to a wheel, talking a mix of Arabic, jibberish and profanity as he tried to lever it from behind.
Keith took a deep breath and folded his arms. ‘I think we’re here for another day.’
‘No!’ snapped Ross. ‘You think Poulet’s sitting somewhere for another day? I just need five minutes’ peace to think.’ He stomped through the water for 50 yards and stood with his hands on his hips, looking back at the plane.
Benny threw the plank of wood to one side and walked away from the plane to light a smoke, offering me one too. Our flying suits, pulled over our uniforms for take-off, were spattered with mud.
‘Thanks mate,’ I said, taking the smoke.
A small crowd of locals had gathered by the hangar. The children hid behind their mothers’ skirts when I looked over.
‘Hey, Benny,’ I said, ‘I didn’t know you could speak Arabic.’
‘Me neither,’ he said. ‘Must have learnt it off the bloody Gypos.’
I hesitated for a moment. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask if you remember that day we went out to fix the truck near Rafa during the war, and you started getting sick with enteric fever?’
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‘Oh God,’ he said, taking a drag. ‘I remember it coming out both ends.’
‘Do you remember the ride back to the base? You were collapsed in the back of the lorry and an Egyptian bloke took off his headscarf and put it under your head.’
Benny exhaled. Raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Really?’
‘Yeah.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I tried to thank him by saying Shukran.’
I turned my face to the sun, forcing its way through the clouds. I could hear cows in a nearby paddock.
‘Benny! Got a job for you.’ Ross was walking back toward the tail of plane. ‘Right,’ he said when we were all gathered around. ‘Each time we’re trying to take off, the nose drops which forces the wheels down into the mud.’
‘Yes,’ said Benny.
‘So what I need you to do—’ Ross threw his arm across the aircraft, ‘—is put all your weight on the fuselage near the tail here while I’m taxiing. Once I’ve got up some speed and we’re about to take off, you’ll have to let go—’ Ross demonstrated as he talked, ‘—and run like hell to climb aboard the plane.’
Benny scratched his head, looking uncertainly from the tail to the little foothold below our cockpit, a distance of over 15 ft. ‘Umm …’ he said slowly.
‘Yes, I realise it’s a bit risky,’ said Ross impatiently, ‘but it’s the only way we’re going to get out of Pisa.’
Benny looked around. ‘Could Horne do it, maybe? Or one of the Italians?’
‘Sorry, no,’ Ross said, rubbing at a spot of mud on his neck. ‘I can’t afford any damage. Not near the tail.’
‘Come on, Benny,’ I said, trying to sound encouraging. ‘I’ll pull you in, mate.’
Benny looked at me. Then he began rubbing his hands and rolling his shoulders. ‘Right-o,’ he said.
Ross slapped him on the back. ‘That’s the way. And if you don’t manage to scramble on board, get Horne to race you to the station and catch the first train to Rome. We’ll meet you there.’
While we worked to free the Vimy again from the mud, Benny studied how best to hold down the tail, pacing out the distance he had to run and the height he had to jump to make it into our cockpit. He was struggling to take off his sodden flying suit over his muddy boots, so two Italian blokes got under his shoulders while another heaved his overalls by the cuffs. I could hear them all laughing as they stumbled around in the water.
Two Italian mechanics cranked the engines into life. As Ross prepared for take-off, I got myself ready in our aft cockpit, feet wedged and arms outstretched to grasp Benny’s hands. Half a dozen mechanics stood at each wing tip to help inch the Vimy forward when Ross gave the command. The other men stood clear with Captain Horne. Some crossed themselves. Some whispered and shook their heads. Others watched silently with hands over their mouths.
Ross eased up the throttle.
The Vimy resisted for a second or two. More throttle, and then she lunged forward. Suddenly she was rolling and picking up speed. Benny was running alongside her, holding onto the fuselage and pulling it down to the ground as the port propeller’s draft showered him with water.
I felt the wheels start to lift off and screamed, ‘C’mon, Benny!’
He let go and started sprinting. The Italians ran screaming and clapping alongside.
‘Come on! Come on!’
The Italians were shouting, the engines were thundering and Benny’s eyes were wide as saucers as he pumped his arms furiously, racing to catch up with me in the cockpit.
The plane lifted right off the ground and he sprang upwards, grabbing the edge of the cockpit with one hand as his left boot found the foothold. I latched onto the scruff of his uniform and hauled him in with all my might.
Keith turned around to see what had happened and I pointed at Benny’s muddy boots poking up beside me. He laughed and nudged Ross with his shoulder and gave a thumbs-up. Once we were a few hundred feet in the air, Ross circled back to test the engines a little longer over the safety of the airfield—a chance also to wave farewell to Captain Horne and our Italian helpers.
Benny untangled himself, stood up in the cockpit and raised his arms in a victory salute as we flew past, and down below they all jumped about and threw their hats in the air. Then Benny fell back down onto his seat, gasping for breath. As he pulled on his goggles, I was sure he wiped away tears.
Watching all those people below us, still waving as they grew tiny with distance, I thought maybe this race wasn’t plane against plane or crew against crew. It was man against world. That’s why people were so quick to cheer, or whisper excitedly behind their hands as we walked by. After all those years at war, we were all on the same side.
Chapter 18
ADELAIDE, 1968
‘Wait a second,’ says a new bloke along the bar, spilling his beer in his eagerness to interrupt. ‘So you’re telling us the crews didn’t all take off from England at the same time? What kind of race is that?’ I haven’t seen this lad before, so I reach out my hand to introduce myself. But another bloke cuts in: ‘Hey, hey, hey. Don’t you be talking to Wal like that,’ he says, jabbing an angry finger. ‘Show some respect.’ I raise a hand to calm things down. ‘S’alright mate,’ I say, ‘It’s not the first time I’ve been asked that.’ I smile across at the new lad, lift my glass in welcome. ‘Really, we were racing against time and that thirty-day deadline. And for the glory of being the first men to fly across the planet.’ Delvene rests her elbows on the bar. ‘Must have been so excitin’, Wal, seeing all those wonderful places you only ever read about.’ I nod. Respond with the usual ‘Mmmm,’ into my scotch. But in my mind I think, ‘No. It was not exciting.’ Very quickly it became terrifying and dull and exhausting and bloody hard work. Sometimes I couldn’t even think straight.
RAMADIE, NOVEMBER 20TH 1919
There was a Jonah on the plane. His name was Keith Macpherson Smith.
The curse of Keith nearly smashed us into rocks off the coast of Greece. It almost hurled us against a jagged mountainside on the island of Crete. It bogged us. It delayed us. It broke a drought over Palestine with torrential rain so hard it scrubbed our faces raw.
When a desert wind began whipping up the orange dirt of Ramadie, I couldn’t look at Keith for the bitterness I felt. His flat tone of voice. His dark glaring eyes. His constant questioning and running me down. He was not a nice man. He was a negative force.
In the first week of the race, we’d somehow made it down the boot of Italy and over the Mediterranean via Crete to Cairo and into Mesopotamia.
Ramadie was less than 60 miles short of Baghdad, and we’d come in to land right near some old trenches and machine gun posts from the war. We’d flown over a lot of the old battlefields since leaving Cairo two days earlier. Romani. Gaza. Ramleh. I had mixed feelings about seeing it all. Sadness, yes, lots of that. Remembering the screams of that poor young bloke who’d lost both his legs but could feel his feet on fire. But I also felt an odd kind of bond with the place, because of the friends I’d made down there. Young Bernie, who had so much life ahead of him, all lost at Gallipoli. Ando the young aircraft rigger who showed me around on my first day with No. 1 Squadron and became a good mate, mostly because he was single and enjoyed hearing Helena’s news almost as much as I did. And then there was Westy. Westy with his stammer, always going on about the Saints. I promised myself I’d turn up at a St Kilda footy match one day and push through the crowd until I found him. We’d drink ourselves stupid. I’d thank him for changing my life when he told me to t-t-t-toughen up and apply for the Flying Corps job, even after Copping said I’d fail. An Indian cavalry regiment was stationed at Ramadie now. Tough as nails, they were, too. We anchored the Vimy with ropes and organised to have two men guard her near the workshop.
A huge red sun was nearing the horizon when we left the mess, our bellies stuffed with curry and rice. We’d all been savaged by bed bugs a few nights earlier on Crete, and I was desperate to splash myself with cool water to calm
the itching before I collapsed into a bunk. But as we walked across the aerodrome for a quick check of the aircraft, the wind started picking up and little squalls of dust rose across the plain. Then a gust blew through, nearly knocking us off our feet, and we realised the wind had changed direction. The Vimy was facing the wrong way. If we didn’t turn her around she might flip over.
We sprinted toward her in the rising gale, sand whipping at our faces still raw from the hours of flying through torrential rain over Palestine.
As the two guards shouted the alarm, a wire on the Vimy broke with an almighty twang and the ailerons began flapping so wildly I thought they might tear right off the wings. Dozens of men appeared from across the base, holding the ailerons down while Ross had us fire up the engines so he could turn the Vimy into the wind.
Ross rubbed Marmaduke II’s tiny head for luck and jumped down from the cockpit, yelling something that got lost to the wind. He was still wearing his goggles to shield his eyes from the swirling sand, and handed Keith his pair too. He bellowed in Benny’s ear for us to do the same, and then told us to get a few Indian blokes to help lash tarps over the cockpits and engines.
The wind was howling. The wires were shrieking. Men were running in all directions, bodies bent into the gale. Somewhere a door banged furiously.
I ran into the workshop to find more rope, and heard Keith yelling to Ross: ‘How do we keep her down? Ropes won’t hold her.’
I grabbed Ross and shouted in his ear. ‘El Mejdel! We used men to weigh down the planes …’
That miserable Christmas Eve, when Benny and I sat hunkered down, back to back in the mud, trying to stop an RE8 from getting whisked away to Jerusalem.
‘Yes!’ Ross thumped my back before turning to shout into the ear of the CO. Within minutes, 50 men were weighing down the wings and lower fuselage. Scarves shielding faces, heads buried in arms as they settled in to wait out the storm.
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