by Janet Dailey
“How did you learn to fly?” Cappy switched the focus to Marty Rogers.
“When my older brother, David, took up flying, I had to give it a whirl. One time up and I was hooked.” Her wide mouth quirked in wry remembrance. “My folks bought David a plane, a little Piper Cub. I mean he’s the number one son so he gets everything, right? I turned out to be an afterthought in more than one way.”
David had always had center stage from the time she could remember. She had grown up in her older brother’s shadow, worshiping him sometimes and violently resenting him other times. The competition between them was strong—as strong as the sibling love that bound them.
“Anyway—” Marty took a deep breath and plunged on. “David let me use his plane as long as I paid for the fuel. It was a helluva good deal for me.” She swore naturally and casually, managing to make it inoffensive. “You should have heard him when he found out I’d qualified for this flight training program the Army’s giving us. He was so damned green with envy.”
“Why is that?” Cappy knew she was expected to ask.
“With that plane of his, he thought he was going to have a leg up on everybody when he joined the Army. He figured with all his hours and experience he’d be a shoo-in for pilot training, but he couldn’t pass the physical.”
“I think we all sweated that.”
“Yeah, well, David’s on his way to Fort Bragg in North Carolina for paratroop training. He decided if he couldn’t fly planes for the Army, jumping out of them was the next best thing. Hell, I’m twice the pilot he ever thought of being and I know it.” Marty bragged without apology. “Not that my parents are ever likely to notice anything I do.” She paused a second, an indignant anger surfacing. “You know, David left a couple of weeks ago for camp, and for his last night home my mother used all of her meat-ration coupons on a steak for him! You know what I had my last night? Macaroni. It isn’t fair.”
“I know what you mean,” Cappy said with empathy.
“Do you have any brothers?”
“No, I’m an only child.”
“Lucky you. Your parents probably think anything you do is wonderful. Do you know how my father reacted when I told him I was going to take this training? I got this whole lecture that proper young women should be content to stay on the ground. He just couldn’t get it through his head that I’m twenty-four years old. I don’t need his permission.”
“I was forbidden to come,” Cappy replied.
“You’re kidding! I figured an Army father would be all in favor of it. Isn’t that something?” She sat back in her seat. “You ought to hear my folks carry on about the way I smoke and drink and date guys. Their precious son certainly is no saint. Where do they think I learned everything? Hell, I’m probably not an ideal daughter.” She hit a flat note. “But I can’t be what I’m not. Besides, there’s a war on.” Marty came back to her old form, husky and uncaring. “It isn’t fair that David gets to go and have all the excitement while I’m supposed to sit around and twiddle my thumbs.”
The driver slowed the taxi and Cappy glanced out the window at the guardhouse marking the entrance to the field. “Looks like we’re here.”
The taxi stopped in front of a long, slant-roofed building, squatting low to the ground and painted gray as if to match the clouds overhead. Military paint came in only three colors: battleship gray, olive drab, and khaki brown. Beyond were the barracks buildings, six of them marching by twos facing each other lengthwise in a north-south line. The hump-backed roofs of two hangars were visible. Atop one there was a tower of sorts that reminded Cappy of a widow’s walk, a flight of steps leading to it from the outside.
In addition, the recreation/dining room and ground school classroom buildings made the third side to the triangular layout of the field buildings with the hangars for a base line. A long stretched–out building ran parallel to one of the two intersecting runways. Windows lined the front of one end where the pilot’s “ready room” was located, the place where the trainees would await their turn to fly. The other end was divided into classrooms for their ground school courses. All the wooden, gray buildings were huddled by the runways, intertwined by taxi strips linking the ends of the runways with the flight line and hangars as well as with each other. From the air, Avenger Field resembled a crudely drawn map of Texas.
The driver set their suitcases on the hard-packed ground spotted with a few tufts of tenacious buffalo grass. Splitting the fare, Cappy and Marty each paid their share. He pocketed the money and gave them a wondering look. “It beats me why you gals would think you could take up this flying business. It ain’t natural, ya know.”
“I guess we’re all just a little crazy,” Marty informed him with mock seriousness at his male prejudice against females and flying.
It sailed right by him as he turned away, shaking his head. When Marty glanced at Cappy, she was wearing the same slightly exasperated expression. The common bond brought a smile to each of them. A feeling of adventure and excitement ran high in Marty’s veins. As the taxi rumbled away, it suddenly ceased to matter how cold and forlorn the day was. This was the chance of a lifetime and there wasn’t a damned thing that was going to stand in her way. She could tell Cappy Hayward felt the same way.
“This is it.” Marty looked at the administration building before them.
“Let’s go in.” Cappy hoisted her heavy bag and started for the door, her deeply blue eyes agleam.
Accustomed to being the one in the lead, Marty faltered a second before she followed the calmly assertive brunette. As Cappy opened the door, the cold wind rushed inside to announce their arrival to the large group of women already gathered in the big room. The sudden draft swirled through the blue-gray smoke hanging in layers close to the ceiling. Heads turned toward the door to protest the gust of cold air, then remained in the same position to eye the newcomers. But the lull in the conversation didn’t last long as Cappy and Marty were quickly absorbed and the buzz of female chatter reached its former level.
It seemed natural that since they had arrived together, they would stay together. They worked their way through the massed clusters of women until they found a patch of unoccupied floor and set their suitcases on it.
Throughout the room, luggage was put to a variety of uses—racks for coats to be draped on, backrests for those seated on the floor, and narrow seats for others to sit on. Marty shed her heavy winter coat and laid it across the top of her suitcase while she glanced at a trio of women only a couple of feet away.
“Hi.” She wasted no time getting acquainted, untroubled that Cappy Hayward exhibited no such eagerness. “Marty Rogers from Michigan.”
“Hey, I’m from Chicago,” piped up a girl with dark hair. “Whereabouts did you fly?”
“Out of Detroit mostly.”
“Where are you from?” The question was directed at Cappy, acknowledging her presence on the periphery of the group.
“Cappy Hayward, Washington, D.C.” She identified herself with the close-mouthed crispness Marty had already begun to expect from her.
“Is that where you did your flying?”
“No. I logged most of my hours out of Macon, Georgia,” she replied.
“Oh?” The dark-haired woman nearest to Marty had been an interested listener, half sitting and half leaning on her suitcase. Marty blocked her view of Cappy, so she straightened to look around her. “Are you from there originally?” The girl’s soft, drawling voice revealed her southern upbringing, silky and sweetly refined. But it was her size that startled Marty—she was so much shorter than the rest of them.
“I’ll be damned,” Marty exclaimed under her breath. “You must have just made it above the minimums.”
“I squeaked through by an eighth of an inch.” She laughed. “Five foot two and five-eighths. It was a good thing they measured me in the morning or I wouldn’t have made it.”
“How do you see over the control panel? Hell, for that matter, how do those short legs of yours reach the rudder
pedals?” Marty poked fun at her in a jesting manner. “You must sit on a stack of pillows.”
“Only two.” She pointed to a pair of cushions, secured with a strap to her suitcase handle.
Noticing the initials MLP on the suitcase, Marty couldn’t resist asking, “What does MLP stand for—Mighty Little Pilot?”
“Mary Lynn Palmer,” she corrected, offering an applecheeked smile at Marty’s razzing yet managing to convey a ladylike air.
“Hello, Mary Lynn.” With her handshake, Cappy managed to inject a modicum of manners. “My father was stationed in Macon five years ago. He’s career military, a major in the Army Air Corps.”
“In that case”—Chicago spoke up—“let me officially welcome you to the Three hundred nineteenth Women’s Army Air Forces Flying Training Detachment—more familiarly known as the Three hundred nineteenth W.A.A.F.F.T.D.” They were designated as Class 43-W-3, meaning they would be the third class of women to graduate during the year 1943.
“God, what a mouthful,” Marty commented, then informed the others, “If you want the lowdown on anything, just ask Cappy here. She knows just about everything.”
“How soon do you think they’ll make us a branch of the military? They’re talking of bringing the WAACs in—and the Navy women, too.” The girl from Chicago took Marty at her word.
It was on the tip of Cappy’s tongue to say, “When hell freezes over if my father is to be believed,” but she suppressed that urge and responded with military tact. “So far, we’re only an experiment. The two classes that started ahead of us three months ago in Houston haven’t graduated yet. On paper, it looks good to train women pilots to ferry aircraft so men can be released for combat duty. Until we prove we are capable of doing that, the jury is out.”
“It gripes me the way men think we can’t fly as well as they can, given the same training,” Chicago complained, but there was a hint of reservation in her voice, as if she might have some misgivings of her own.
“Don’t you know it’s because all females are scatterbrained, too flighty to fly?” Marty retorted.
“Well, I’m just glad an airplane doesn’t know whether it’s being flown by a man or a woman,” the third member of the trio said, a comely blonde who slouched in an attempt to diminish her nearly six-foot stature.
Just then, Marty’s eye was caught by the sight of a tall, very fashionably dressed woman threading her way through the lounging clusters of females. Marty had always believed that she carried her height well, but this auburn-haired woman moved with an almost regal grace.
“Who is she?” Marty discreetly gestured toward the stately redhead with a small nod of her head.
“She’s really something, isn’t she?” the shy blonde replied with a trace of envy in her voice.
“She looks like she stepped out of the pages of a Paris fashion magazine,” Marty murmured.
A second later, the woman stopped beside two huge steamer trunks set next to the wall. A full-length leopard-skin coat was draped negligently across one of them. The woman used it as a cushion to sit on and crossed her long, silk-clad legs.
“Good God,” was Marty’s stunned, blasphemous comment. When the woman slipped a cigarette into the end of a long silver holder, it was too much for Marty. “I’ve got to meet her. She can’t be for real.” She looked expectantly at the others. “Are you coming with me?” she challenged them, but didn’t wait for a reply.
Curiosity prompted all of them to trail after her, assuming a guise of nonchalance. A wide bracelet glittered with jeweled brilliance around the woman’s wrist, and the blonde whispered to Chicago, “Do you suppose those are real diamonds?”
No one, not even for a minute, believed anything about her was phony. When she noticed them strolling so casually her way, her glance slid away as if to snub them. Then she turned back, her chin lifting a fraction of an inch while a cool smile edged her red, red lips.
“Hello.” A very cultured and smooth voice greeted them.
“Hi, I’m Marty Rogers. We couldn’t help noticing you sitting over here by yourself.” Her glance went to the big trunks in obvious question.
“I’m Eden van Valkenburg from New York.” She extended a slim, manicured hand in greeting. Her long nails were painted the same bright red shade as her lipstick.
For a second, Marty wondered if she was supposed to curtsy over the proffered hand. But when she shook it, the returning pressure was firm and definite. It gave Marty a second’s pause.
“Let me introduce you around. This is Cappy Hayward. We arrived on the same train,” Marty explained. “Her father’s an Army man so if you have any questions, just ask her.” There were no more handshakes, just exchanges of polite and curious smiles. “Mary Lynn Palmer is from Mobile, Alabama. And—Chicago, I don’t know your name.”
“Gertrude Baxter, but everybody calls me Trudy.” She ran a hand over her limp hair, a self-conscious gesture in reaction to the stylish and obviously very sophisticated woman before her.
“I’m Agnes Richardson—Aggie.” The awkwardly tall blonde bobbed her head in quick introduction, then couldn’t keep from gushing, “I just love your outfit.” She gazed enviously at the powder-blue wool dress with its padded shoulders and full, draping skirt.
“Thank you. Actually, I feel slightly overdressed.” The frank admission caught them all by surprise.
None of them thought she would say what they were all thinking, but the proud gleam in Eden’s brown eyes should have warned them. She knew it was better to verbalize their thoughts for them than to let them talk behind her back.
“Do you?” Marty replied, always quick with a whiskey-voiced retort. “It’s the cigarette holder. It’s a bit too much, don’t you think?” It was a gibe meant to sting. Marty had never cared for people who thought they were somehow better than everyone else. The air crackled briefly with a sparking antagonism.
“Are both these trunks yours, Miss van Valkenburg?” Cappy quietly inserted the question between them.
She was slow to turn her attention away from Marty. “Yes, they are.” She met the pleasantly interested look and found nothing threatening in the inquiry. “I felt I should bring only what I absolutely needed.”
For a stunned second, no one could say anything. Even Marty waited for the redhead to smile at the little joke she had made, then realized the woman was dead serious. The discovery seemed to hit them all at the same time. Beside her, Chicago choked on a gasp of laughter that brought on a coughing spasm.
“You did bring an evening gown, didn’t you?” Marty asked with a straight face.
“No.” Eden van Valkenburg appeared taken aback by the question as she warily searched the faces of the other women. “Will I need one?”
“Oh, God,” Marty muttered, and she swung away, missing the flare of anger in the redhead’s expression.
A hush was spreading across the long rec hall. When it reached their small group, they all turned to find the cause of it. An officer in an Army uniform had entered the building. Once he had the attention of the entire room, he introduced himself as the base commander, and told them what to expect over the next twenty-six weeks while they learned to fly “the Army way.” It wasn’t a heartening speech as he ominously warned that two out of three would “wash out”—fail to graduate. It became very clear they were going to be subjected to military rules and disciplines, with demerits issued for any infringements.
As he briefly listed some, he came to “… profanity will not be tolerated …”
“Oh, damn,” Marty murmured under her breath, and the blond-haired Aggie Richardson tittered with laughter.
Chapter II
BY THE TIME the five girls retrieved their luggage and joined the queue at the linens window, they were near the end of the line. In a definite break with what Cappy Hayward regarded as Army tradition, the women were being allowed to choose their roommates—or baymates, since the barracks were divided into bays, each with six bunks. The five of them—Cappy, Marty Rogers, M
ary Lynn Palmer, Trudy “Chicago” Baxter, and Aggie Richardson—had decided to share a bay and take potluck on who would make up the sixth.
“I guess we have to get used to shuffling in these damned lines,” Marty muttered.
“That’s the Army way,” Cappy replied.
Aggie inched closer. “I wonder where that rich van Valkenburg girl is?” She looked down the line of females to see if she could find her.
“She’s probably trying to find a bellboy to take her trunks,” Marty joked, then shook her head. “Can you believe her? If it wasn’t so damned funny it’d be pathetic.”
“You didn’t give her much of a chance.” The accusation was made in the softly drawling Alabama accent of Mary Lynn Palmer.
From anyone else, Marty might have bridled at the reprimand, but from this dark-haired, dark-eyed woman, she didn’t take offense. Despite their brief acquaintance, Marty was ready to swear there wasn’t a mean or spiteful bone in Mary Lynn’s body.
After thinking it over, she conceded, “Maybe I was quick to judge her. But I wasn’t really trying to make fun of her.”
“Oh, weren’t you?” Chicago chided.
“Maybe I was, but the situation was so damned comical.” Marty defended her behavior while hinting that she sometimes went for the joke without considering the feelings of the person who was the butt of it.
“Maybe she plans to write a book on what to wear when you go to war,” Chicago suggested with a quick laugh.
As the line moved along, they each had their turn at the linens window and received their sheets, pillowcases, and blankets. Loaded down, they headed for the row of barracks.
“All the bays are alike,” Cappy Hayward informed them. “Anybody have any preference for location?”