War Clouds Gather

by Peter Watt

  ‘Thanks, old friend,’ Matthew answered, extending his hand in farewell. ‘I have every intention of returning in a few days.’

  ‘It wouldn’t have something to do with Miss Hatfield, would it?’ Cyril said with a sly smile. ‘I can see it in your face.’

  Matthew didn’t reply, only walked into his office, deep in thought.

  *

  ‘What did the captain speak to you about?’ James asked when Cyril joined him.

  ‘Nothing in particular, young Jim,’ Cyril lied. ‘Just that we have to get this bit back in the engine and make sure it’s working.’

  ‘Don’t ask me why but I think my . . . Captain Duffy is up to something dangerous.’

  Cyril looked hard at the young man. ‘Your father’s whole life has been spent living on the edge. I could tell you things that would make your hair stand on end. And why don’t you use the word he would so desperately like to hear you say?’

  James glanced down at the cement floor of the hangar with its oil stains and patches of sand blown in with the desert winds.

  ‘He could never find time to visit me and my sister,’ James tried to explain, although he realised his words were falling on deaf ears. The Canadian obviously kissed the ground that Matthew walked on.

  ‘Get over it,’ Cyril growled. ‘We have work to do.’

  James obeyed and the engine piece was expertly put back in place. Even as they worked James found himself thinking confused thoughts about his father. He had come to Basra to punish him with the guilt of deserting his children, but now he was having trouble keeping up his outrage. His father had been kind and even understanding towards him. Whatever his father was planning, James knew that he should be beside him in case he needed a hand. Needless to say, his father would not agree with this, but James also had the Barrington cunning in his blood that had made that side of his family very successful.

  ‘Is there any cargo to be loaded for the captain’s flight?’ he asked.

  ‘We already have the crates aboard,’ Cyril replied from the top of the ladder where he was working with a spanner to secure the engine part.

  James remembered the big wooden crates being loaded by some Iraqi workers. From what he knew, one of the crates was packed with army blankets. He broke into a broad smile.

  *

  Dusty, sore and tired, Donald slid from the saddle of his horse in front of the Glen View homestead. For the last three days and nights he’d been assisting with rounding up stray cattle in the property’s back blocks. The work had been from dawn until dusk each day. But when the sun set over the plains a fire was lit and food prepared and the cattlemen sat around the fire, joking, laughing and telling tall stories. Donald had been accepted into their circle for the way he had been able to take their banter about being the boss’s son; they could see that Donald was a fast and willing learner prepared to take falls from his mount and still get back into the saddle.

  Now he had returned to the station house he looked forward to a hot bath followed by the roast dinner he could smell cooking. He was met by Hector on the front verandah, holding a letter for him.

  ‘This came today,’ Hector said, handing the envelope to Donald.

  Mail was a precious item out here. Donald glanced at the handwriting and his face reflected his disappointment. It was not from Jessica but typed. He could see from the letterhead that it was from his father’s office.

  Donald secured his horse to a rail in the homestead yard, knowing that he was expected to attend to the sturdy stockhorse the moment he finished reading the letter. He ripped the envelope open and read the one page correspondence typed by one of the company’s secretaries.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ Donald swore.

  ‘Bad news?’ Hector asked, leaning on his walking cane.

  ‘If you’d asked me a couple of months ago,’ Donald answered, ‘I would have jumped for joy, but since then . . . well, things have changed. My father is directing me to return to Sydney to celebrate my twenty-first birthday. That means I assume control alongside him and, frankly, I do not relish such a position.’

  ‘Your birthday is next week, according to the station records,’ Hector said. ‘I told the boys and they planned something for you, which I would think was your first official drink. Maybe it’s a good thing that you’re returning to Sydney – the boys party hard when they have an excuse.’

  Donald shook his head. He walked over and undid the reins of his mount, then walked the horse to the round yard for a brushing down and thorough examination of its hooves, and anything else that might require checking after the three days in the scrub.

  As he worked he thought about leaving Glen View. He had initially resisted the exile, but he had eventually grown to love the rugged life so far from civilisation. The nights camped out under the stars and the serenity it brought to his soul was something he had never expected. He had fallen for the spirituality of the land, and was well and truly in its clutches. Besides, while he was at Glen View he was closer to Jessica in Townsville, and he had calculated that he could travel there to see her after the mustering was done. But the directive to return to Sydney had put a halt to all that.

  When he did return he would put it to his father that he should be given the family’s cattle stations to manage. He thought Hector would put in a good word for him.

  After leaving his horse in the yard, Donald walked past the graves marked with engraved stone tablets. He knew that an aunt he had never met was buried in one of the graves, alongside Patrick Duffy’s faithful servant of many years. Donald’s mother had told him that his father had exiled Giselle and her son David to Glen View. Giselle had died in the influenza pandemic of 1919, leaving her son in the care of her mother. For a moment Donald thought about his cousin. In a year David would also turn twenty-one and the companies would be overseen by the triumvirate of his father, himself and David. Donald wondered where his cousin was at this very moment.

  *

  Sean had convalesced at Louise’s apartment for as long as he could stand sitting around and doing nothing, but after a week he was desperate to return to his office and catch up on his backlog of cases.

  He sat at his desk going through a pile of papers, the occasional head popping around the corner to express how happy they were to have him back. Sean knew that he was popular with the staff and his colleagues, as he ran the office like that of a company commander in the army. He was firm, fair and friendly to all, regardless of whether they were the tea lady or office boy or one of the junior partners.

  Sean worked his way through the mail until he came to a telegram. He was annoyed that it had not been delivered to him when it arrived, but reminded himself that he had told no one of his stay with Louise. When he saw that it came from the Swiss Red Cross, his hands started to shake.

  Sean ripped open the telegram and read the few lines on it. For a moment he sat staring at the string of words, and then the tears began to roll down his cheeks. According to the Red Cross, it was ascertained through Nationalist sources that David Macintosh, a member of an International Brigade, had been killed in action weeks earlier.

  ‘Oh David,’ he whispered. ‘You were far too young to die so far from home.’ For several moments Sean was taken back to all those other young faces he had seen in death on the battlefields of France and Belgium. ‘And we are not even in a bloody war.’

  Sean eased himself from his desk and called to his articled clerk to tell him that he would be leaving the office for the rest of the day. In fact, Sean would find Harry Griffiths and tell him the bitter news and then the two of them would go to a pub and get roaring drunk, raising their glasses to the memory of the young man who was precious to them both. After that, he would find Louise and fall into her arms in his grief.

  22

  When Matthew was ready to fly out for Palestine he looked around for his son.

  ‘Have you seen James?’ he asked Cyril, who replied that the boy had said he was going with Tyrone in the lorry to fetch s
upplies from the docks at Basra. Matthew could see that the lorry was gone and felt disappointment that his son had not chosen to see him fly out.

  All checks done, Matthew fired up the three engines; when they were at their maximum revs for flight he taxied out onto the strip to wave goodbye to Cyril before turning the nose into the wind and taking off. The aircraft lifted from the ground and Matthew set his course west for the Holy Land.

  A couple of hours into the flight he peered through the cockpit window to see a dark cloudbank ahead of him. He realised that it was a storm front that had not appeared in the meteorological report. He looked left and right but could not see any break and glanced at his fuel levels. He was too far into the flight to turn back, and already the aircraft was feeling the first buffeting of the storm ahead.

  ‘Well, here goes,’ Matthew said loudly. It would be rough but the Ford was a hardy aircraft. The aircraft plunged headlong into the storm and Matthew immediately regretted that he had chosen to tough it out. The swirling winds alternatively lifted the aircraft and dropped it while Matthew fought with every ounce of strength to hold the controls and steer his aircraft. The physical strain began to take its toll, Matthew wished he’d taken his Canadian Cyril’s advice and brought Tyrone along as copilot. Another vortex hit. The Ford dropped a couple of hundred feet and one of the engines almost stalled. Matthew desperately tried to read his dials but in the dim light of the cabin this was almost impossible.

  Suddenly Matthew was aware that James had appeared at his shoulder and was already strapping himself into the seat beside his father.

  ‘Where the bloody hell did you come from?’ Matthew exploded angrily, guessing that James had stowed away and recovering from the shock at seeing his son.

  ‘I thought sitting back there you might need some help,’ James replied calmly, shouting to be heard over the roar of the engines and the raging storm. Outside the sky was punctuated by brilliant flashes of lightning coming dangerously close to the little plane.

  ‘You can keep your attention on the dials,’ Matthew said, grateful for his son’s help, but afraid that if anything happened they would both go down together. This thought alone made Matthew determined to use every bit of flying skill he had. So long as the aeroplane remained in one piece he would get them through the fierce storm.

  ‘What am I supposed to see?’ James asked, staring at the panel.

  ‘You make sure all those needles stay where they are,’ Matthew shouted. ‘If any vary dramatically, you tell me. You can also keep an eye on the horizon for any breaks in the storm.’

  James nodded and alternated between watching the vital dials and searching the blackness for any sign of light. Suddenly he grabbed his father’s shoulder and pointed out a tiny break in the storm. Matthew nodded and heeled over his aircraft to fly it towards the opening his son had spotted. Although the wind still buffeted the aircraft, Matthew could see the sun beyond and continued flying into the break until the storm was behind them and they were in clear skies again.

  Matthew was exhausted but quickly calculated a new route to bring the aeroplane back on course. ‘Take the controls and keep her straight and level on the bearing you can see on the compass there,’ he said and James immediately placed his hands on the controls.

  Matthew unstrapped himself from the seat, stretching his weary limbs before going to fetch the thermos and sandwiches Cyril always packed aboard. He returned and was satisfied to see that his son was competently keeping them on course. Through the cabin window the sun was setting across a vast region of sand dunes, and on the horizon they could see rocky hills.

  Matthew unwrapped the sandwiches and handed one to his son. ‘Curried egg,’ he said with a wry grin. ‘Not the best choice in a confined cabin, I’m afraid.’

  James accepted the sandwich with one hand and bit into it.

  ‘I’ll take the controls and give you a chance to have a coffee,’ Matthew said.

  ‘Okay, Father,’ James said, reluctantly letting go of the controls and taking the mug of hot coffee offered by Matthew.

  For a moment Matthew wondered if he had heard his son properly. Had he actually called him ‘Father’? Matthew did not want to say anything in case he had heard wrong. Still, it would not get his son out of a severe reprimanding for choosing to stowaway on Matthew’s dangerous mission. The rest of the flight went without incident and just after sunset Matthew saw the lights of an airstrip outside Jerusalem. They had arrived and the vital stage of extracting Diane and at the same time eliminating the German agents was at hand.

  *

  Sir George Macintosh had been informed that his hated nephew, David Macintosh, was reported killed in the Spanish civil war. A news reporter wanted his reaction to the young heir’s tragic death.

  Needless to say George expressed his view that it was a terrible thing such a promising young man had been killed in the prime of his life, but he could not help adding that it was a shame his nephew had elected to fight for the communists against the freedom-loving forces of General Franco. It was well known that the Republican forces were massacring members of the Spanish church along with many innocent men, women and children; however, little was being said in the local newspapers about the Nationalists executing men, women and children with their aerial bombardments and firing squads.

  And now Donald had arrived home to take his rightful place as one of the heirs to the financial empire. The illness was progressing in George’s body and despite his reservations he knew he must mentor his only son. George was surprised to see how much the months at Glen View had changed his son. He had lost the softness of the easy life and was tanned and lean. He sported a faint scar over one eye and his hands were toughened by the long hours of hard manual work expected of a stockman.

  ‘Take a seat,’ George said by way of greeting. ‘We have a lot to talk about now that you have turned twenty-one. I believe that you chose to go out to dinner with your mother instead of attending the event that your sister and I organised for you.’

  ‘I didn’t want you to go to any trouble for the occasion,’ Donald replied and his father sensed defiance in his excuse for missing the dinner George and Sarah had organised that included business acquaintances and prominent members of Sydney society. George had fumed when his son had not shown although he had been informed of the function. George had lied to those who sat around the table that his son had taken sick but had wished them all his thanks for attending. Not that those at the party minded as a bountiful and excellent meal was provided – along with copious amounts of alcohol and cigars.

  ‘I will not abide such obvious rudeness in the future. If you choose to act petulantly you will experience my real wrath. Do you understand?’ George reprimanded sternly.

  Donald, sitting across the library from his father, stared back. ‘I am sorry if my behaviour did not meet your high expectations, but I have not seen my mother for some time, and I felt that she had first claim to celebrating my coming of age, Father.’

  ‘Your first duty is to the family’s future,’ George retorted. ‘Duty first and personal feelings second. On Tuesday the board meets and you will take your seat alongside me. Sarah is doing fine work for the company and I expect the same from you.’

  ‘I will be at the office on Tuesday,’ Donald said, rising to his feet.

  George watched his son leave the room and sensed that his plan to send Donald to Glen View had changed him in ways that were not entirely desirable. His son seemed to have a more confident air about him, which might make him difficult to control. Still, under George’s firm hand, he just might shape up to be a worthy captain of the family’s financial enterprises.

  *

  True to his word, Donald appeared in the boardroom on Tuesday and was warmly welcomed by the company directors.

  ‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ he said as he took his seat beside his father at the head of the long table. ‘I will once again express my sincere apologies for not attending the party my father organised for
my twenty-first birthday. I believe most of you attended and had a good time.’

  ‘Hear, hear,’ was chorused in the room. ‘Jolly good show.’

  George was pleased at the way his son had shown contrition to the board members and settled back to review the matters before the monthly meeting. Each item was announced and votes were taken. George was pleased to see that Donald seconded his suggestions. Maybe exile to Glen View really had matured Donald, George mused.

  ‘Mr Tom Duffy has yet again entered a tender to purchase the Queensland property, Glen View,’ the secretary said, drawing attention to a matter on the agenda. He was an older member of the board and had served under Patrick Duffy before working exclusively for George. ‘It is an extremely generous offer and according to our stock and station agent well worth accepting.’

  ‘I propose that we accept Mr Duffy’s offer,’ Donald said quietly and suddenly all eyes were focused on him.

  ‘That will never happen,’ George snapped and turned to his son with fury in his eyes. ‘Why would you even entertain such a thing?’

  Donald had already guessed that his proposal would not be seconded by anyone on the board, given his father’s long-standing antipathy to the idea. But he felt motivated to stand up for Tom Duffy, whom he had been deeply impressed by. Or perhaps it was to gain Jessica’s attention. Either way, Donald knew that his would be the only dissenting voice.

  ‘I have had the honour of meeting Mr Duffy,’ Donald replied. ‘And he has good reasons to wish to purchase Glen View. Although the property made a modest profit in the last financial year, Mr Duffy’s offer is more generous than anyone else is likely to offer. I feel that the money obtained from the sale might help a couple of our other companies that need an injection of capital at this time.’ Donald could see a couple of heads nodding in agreement.

  ‘No Duffy will ever own Glen View,’ George snarled. ‘Not so long as I am alive, and if anyone is foolish enough to second my son’s proposal, I will use my position as chairman to veto any attempt to vote on the issue.’ George’s outburst elicited the obedience he desired. Those who had nodded their heads at Donald’s proposal looked sheepish and stared at the highly polished table top.