Judith Krantz

by Till We Meet Again

  Navigation, pinpoint navigation of absolute accuracy and precision, was, once you could fly, the next essential key to becoming a true pilot. It wasn’t as mysterious, Freddy thought, as she’d first expected it would be. Basically it meant flying with a knowledge of where she was at all times, knowledge gained by constantly reading the earth and its landmarks, instantly comparing that knowledge with the chart on her knee and resolutely staying on the magnetic compass headings she decided on before she set out. Winds aloft could push a plane off course in a few minutes of inattention, so Freddy watched with vigilance for checkpoints on the ground that should be coming up to the right, to the left or directly underneath her wings. If there was the slightest deviation, she immediately adjusted the compass to make a correction for the wind.

  As she passed over the little town of Ojai, which was exactly where it should be, Freddy allowed her mind to turn to the future. Starting tomorrow, she would begin her summer job, working six days a week at the Van de Kamp bakery at Beverly and Western. The chain of bakeries, which had started with a homemade candy called “Darling Henrietta’s Nutty Mixture,” now owned a hundred windmill-shaped shops all over Los Angeles. Her job began at six in the morning, when the bakery opened, and ended at two in the afternoon, when the afternoon-evening shift took over. Because of the inconvenient hours and the six-day week, she was well paid, twenty-five dollars a week, as much as a trained secretary could hope to make. To Freddy it meant that she would be able to fly several afternoons a week as well as on weekends.

  Freddy groaned. Her destiny was obviously bound to selling candy, cookies and cakes, all of which she loathed, but these sweet things seemed to be one of the few businesses that was Depression-proof. Still, daily suffocation in the smells of warm sugar became a minor matter when it meant money for her summer flying time and enough left over to begin, just to begin, only to begin, damn it to hell, to save for a down payment on a plane.

  Today she was enjoying the pure delight of flying Mac’s new ship, a bright yellow Ryan STA monoplane with a Menasco C-4 125-horsepower engine, a more powerful plane than the Taylor Cub, and one she’d only flown five times before. Her father had given her a string of real pearls for graduation, but her mother, blessings on her head, had come through with hard cash, enough to buy Freddy three of these long cross-country flights, of which today’s was only the beginning. The pearls were the first valuable jewelry she’d ever owned. Maybe, Freddy speculated, she could pawn them.

  She knew that she couldn’t expect any future financial help from her father. He was perfectly willing to buy her a set of expensive golf clubs, or membership in a tennis club-even bridge lessons, if that had been her fancy. Thanks to her mother, he had finally agreed not to formally oppose her flying, but he’d made it plain that he wouldn’t contribute a dime toward it, not even in the shape of a loan. He hoped, obviously, that by making it difficult for her, he’d hasten the moment when she lost interest.

  There didn’t seem to be any point in telling him that she was determined to own her own plane. The cheapest of the three leading low-priced planes, the Taylor, the Porterfield Zephyr or the Aeronanca Highwing, each cost almost fifteen hundred dollars, with a down payment of four hundred and fifty dollars. A fortune! Delphine had received a new, six-hundred-dollar Pontiac coupé for her eighteenth birthday, and it made her the envy of half the kids in the neighborhood. In car terms, wanting to buy an inexpensive airplane was like wanting to own a Packard, the most expensive car in America. Obviously, she had to find a second- or third-hand ship that she could put into shape, a ship that she could manage to get at a bargain price, on terms that would let her pay for it over a long time.

  If she didn’t own a plane of her own, Freddy asked herself, spying the peak of Big Pine Mountain right on course and beginning to gain altitude, what future was there for her in flying? More precisely, in racing?

  Racing. She knew that she didn’t stand a chance of being able to enter any of the speed dashes that covered a relatively short distance, with the planes going straight ahead full out, like racehorses. Nor could she enter closed-circuit races around fixed pylons. Only planes of far greater horsepower than one she could dream of owning stood a chance in any of the various speed races, and then only when they were flown by pilots with racing experience. During the past few years, interest in speed racing had grown so rapidly in the world of aviation that some records only stood for a few days before another pilot managed to surpass them.

  However, there were cross-country races held around the Los Angeles area, in which planes flew from one refueling stop to another, toward a goal that might be hundreds of miles away. Each plane carried a handicap, based on its own best possible performance, so that the winner was the pilot who spent the least time in the air, the pilot who flew the smartest race, using the winds and the compass and the charts in the most astute way, the most precise pilot, the most ingenious pilot, the most resourceful pilot—and sometimes the luckiest.

  Damn, but she’d been born too late! Amy Johnson, the British pilot, whose career Freddy followed with passion, had taken up flying in 1928. When the girl from Hull had only seventy-five hours of flying time to her credit, she had taken off from Croydon, outside of London, in a tiny, fragile, secondhand De Havilland Moth, and headed for Australia. A sandstorm had forced her to make an emergency landing in the desert; on landing at Baghdad she broke a wheel strut; she lost a bolt en route to Karachi; she ran out of gas at Jansi, where she had to land on a parade ground amid a group of fleeing soldiers; she flew through a monsoon between Calcutta and Rangoon, where she had to replace her propeller with the spare one she had brought along with her. On her last lap, past Indonesia, she fought a sputtering engine and bad visibility over the Timor Sea to reach Darwin, where she was acclaimed as the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia, and became an international heroine.

  Now that was flying, Freddy brooded, and her hero-worship turned to wistfulness as she realized that Amy Johnson had accomplished her feat when she, Freddy, was only nine years old and had never even been up in a plane.

  Amy Johnson had followed her first triumph by establishing a light aircraft record from London to Tokyo and then, when an unknown pilot named Jim Mollison became famous by flying from Australia to England in nine days, she had met and married him. Their two-day honeymoon had been followed immediately by Jim Mollison flying the Atlantic from east to west, breaking a number of records on the way, while Amy was busy beating his own London-to-Cape Town solo record flight by eleven hours.

  What a glorious way to be married, Freddy thought with a sigh. She knew no one who would agree with her, but she was utterly beguiled by the idea of the two determined newlyweds setting off in different directions, each in pursuit of a new record to break. Lucky Amy Johnson, who’d met a man who understood the one thing she most cared about.

  None of the boys Freddy had met and dated in this last year had been interested in planes. She’d put Delphine’s advice to the test, and it had worked. However, being a good conversationalist had subjected her to too many dull life stories … it wasn’t worth being popular, in her opinion. Sure, she’d been kissed; several times in fact. No big deal, Freddy thought, shaking her head in disappointed memory of timid lips on timid lips, clumsy arms around equally clumsy shoulders.

  She’d allowed those kisses so as not to disappoint Delphine, but there were so many important things that she was too late for, Freddy grumbled to herself, as she scanned the horizon. It was all of six years ago that Ruth Nichols had broken the speed record of her friend and rival, Amelia Earhart; two years later, in 1932, Earhart had flown the Atlantic solo; in 1934 Marie-Louise Bastie of France became the first woman to fly a round trip to Tokyo from Paris; in September of 1935, Laura Ingalls flew nonstop from Los Angeles to New York, breaking Earhart’s record for that route by almost four hours.

  Oh shit, but hadn’t everything been done? Amy Johnson had flown a smaller and far less powerful plane than this Ryan more
than halfway around the world, and here, eight whole, long years later, where was she, Freddy, but right on course over the Twitchell Reservoir, a lousy manmade body of water, not an ocean or a sea or a desert or even a big river. At this rate she’d never get out of California!

  At the small San Luis Obispo airport, Freddy ate the sandwich lunch she’d brought along, and refueled, noting anxiously that aviation gasoline was twenty cents a gallon. When she’d finally earned her private pilot’s license, her mother had insisted on taking out and paying for personal accident insurance for her as well as public liability and property damage. Without the insurance, which cost an additional hundred dollars, she wouldn’t have been able to continue to fly, but Freddy had to pay for gas herself.

  It was one hell of an expensive passion, this way she felt about planes, and Freddy envied the women who had someone who supported them in their flying. Floyd Odium was behind his wife, Jackie Cochrane; Jean Batten, the great pilot from New Zealand, had been sponsored by Lord Wakefield, who had also helped Amy Johnson; Anne Morrow had her husband, Charles Lindbergh, to teach her to fly; and Earhart had the backing of her husband, the devoted George Putnam. Wasn’t there a man somewhere, rich and preferably very old, certainly not one with romantic inclinations, who would like to advance the cause of American aviation by paying her bills?

  No, there was not, Freddy answered herself. Perhaps there might have been, if she’d come along ten years ago, when women were first making their memorable marks in the air, but now the great days of the pioneers were past. Well, she might be too late for fame, but there had to be something left to do, and she was going to find it!

  She knew it as surely as she had always known she was going to fly. She’d been right about that, she thought, looking around the unfamiliar little country airport that she’d never seen before and that she had found without wasting a mile of sky, as if there had been markers and arrows hanging in the air.

  Last summer she hadn’t even started to learn how to fly, and now she was a full-fledged pilot. If she had the time, the maps, and the money for gas and food, she would take the Ryan straight up to Alaska or way down to the tip of South America. She could start this very minute, knowing nothing more than what she knew already. She knew enough to do it. That was the essential thing. The rest would fall into place—she’d make it happen somehow. Freddy thanked the boy who pumped the fuel, made a pass at combing her hair, and climbed back into the yellow Ryan with a light heart.

  Several hours later, Freddy was close to the approach to Dry Springs. The flight back had been so uneventful that she’d been tempted to take a few detours and stop at Santa Maria and Santa Barbara, just to enjoy the airport atmosphere and trade a little shop talk with whoever happened to be on the landing strip there, but she knew that Mac would have estimated how long her cross-country flight would take, and that he’d worry if she was late. She’d navigated so exactly, the winds had been so favorable, that she was a good twenty minutes before her scheduled time of return.

  There was still time, she realized, with a tense plunge of excitement. It was the perfect kind of day, with unlimited visibility. And she was still far enough from Dry Springs so that nobody would see her. There was not another plane in her neighborhood. It was destiny, Freddy told herself, clearly destiny, that had provided her with this chance to try something she’d been studying for months in her cherished pilot’s handbook by Jack Hunt and Ray Fahringer. She saw the introductory page to the “Acrobatic Phase” chapter of the book clearly in front of her. She’d memorized every word.

  First of all the student must understand that he is always “a part of the aircraft” the moment he fastens his safety belt. From that time on, regardless of what position the ship may assume, upright or inverted, the pilot is always sitting in the same position relative to the airplane … and the controls respond accordingly. This being understood, it is obvious that the pilot need only to “observe” where he is going and “fly” the aircraft. He has been doing exactly this in all of his normal flying…

  Well, what could be clearer than that? More reassuring?

  … the loop is the easiest acrobatic maneuver to perform as it is the least complicated of all … set the throttle at normal cruising RPM. Now, ease the airplane into a gentle dive … as soon as sufficient speed has been obtained, ease back on the elevators and begin the upward arc of the circle …

  She had flown a thousand loops in her mind, Freddy thought as she took the Ryan up to five thousand feet, an absolutely safe altitude at which to perform the maneuver. She could recite her handbook’s list of usual student faults backward and forward in her sleep. The clear diagrams were engraved on her brain. She hadn’t actually executed a loop. Not in a plane. But today she was flying the stock ship with the stock engine favored by Tex Rankin, the national aerobatic champion. Hadn’t Rankin himself said that precision aerobatics made for a safer pilot? And didn’t she owe it to herself to do something special to celebrate? Celebrate her graduation. Celebrate getting her pilot’s license last month. Celebrate today’s realization that she would not be intimidated by the towering figures of Amy Johnson and Earhart and Cochrane. Yes!

  Freddy cautiously put the Ryan into a dive, and as soon as she’d reached a proper speed she began to pull the nose of the plane upward. Gradually she pushed the throttle until it was fully advanced, so that she obtained maximum power. A hundred and twenty-five inexhaustible horses were at her command, galloping forward at the lightest pressure of her hand. What bliss, after hours of meticulous navigation, with its pure, austere mathematical pleasures, to make this rushing, heart-pounding leap into the sky.

  She held the Ryan in the arc of the circle, and as it reached the partially upside-down position, she threw her head back to observe the nose of the ship cross the horizon. She was a kid on a swing who can go over the top, who can escape the limitations of gravity for one blinding moment of elation. As the Ryan completed the loop and swung upward again, recovering, Freddy found herself laughing with the giddiness of a child, yet in total control of the ship. She did another loop. And another. And another. Only after a dozen loops could she persuade herself to stop, and then only by remembering how close she was to Dry Springs.

  Soberly, flying like an elderly gentleman out for a Sunday drive, except for the uncontrollable grin on her face, she gradually lost altitude and made her usual immaculate landing. She looked around at the field. All was quiet. Several other fliers were fussing about, some of them taking off for a sunset spin, and others putting their planes to bed, but at the hangar of McGuire’s school there was no one to be seen. She tied down the Ryan and started toward the office, swaggering like a pirate as she hummed “Till We Meet Again” in triple time. She was filling out her logbook as she heard the Taylor Cub land and its engine shut down.

  “Just what the hell do you think you were doing!” Mac yelled as he burst furiously into the office, his hand raised to hit her. Freddy drew back, terrified, putting his desk between them, and he lowered his hand. “Answer me!” he shouted, violent in a way she had never believed he could be.

  “I was practicing … loops,” Freddy stuttered.

  “How could you dare try a stunt like that! You could have killed yourself, you stupid, stupid kid, don’t you understand that?”

  “The book says …”

  “What damn book?”

  “My Student Pilot Handbook … Mac, it’s all in there, everything, every detail.… I knew exactly how to do it, it’s the easiest maneuver in the book, I took every precaution, and the ship is suitable for doing the toughest aerobatics.…” Her words were stopped by the look of murderous rage in his eyes.

  “God damn you, Freddy. Nobody, nobody is ever allowed to start doing stunts without an instructor and without a parachute! You weren’t even smart enough to know that every plane that was up this afternoon within fifty miles could see you clearly, you dumb, arrogant kid! I’ve never witnessed such an exhibition of criminal carelessness! You could lose your
license for what you did. You could have blacked out and crashed, you damn fool! The Ryan goes 280 miles an hour at the bottom of the loop. Did you happen to know that detail, Freddy? God damn you to hell!” Mac folded his arms, his fists clenched, his lips tight, and glared at her while he waited for her answer.

  Freddy looked around the bare office wildly for a place to hide, and not finding one, threw herself against a wall to hide her face. She was helpless to stop the tempest of wrenching sobs that overcame her. He was right, she was utterly wrong, and she had nothing to say for herself. All she felt was the most shameful, utter humiliation. It would be meaningless to say she was sorry. The crime was too big. He hated her. Crushed by most bitter guilt she wept harder and harder, beating her fists against the wall in useless, abject remorse. Finally, after long minutes, Freddy put her hands in front of her face and began to stumble out of the office as quickly as she could, needing only to get to the sanctuary of her mother’s car.

  “Back in here!” Mac roared. She didn’t stop. She couldn’t take any more of his rage. He pounced on her, turned her around, and forced her hands down from her face. “Are you ever, ever going to do that again?” he demanded.

  She couldn’t speak but she shook her head in a way that left no room for doubt and pulled away, moving in the direction of the car. He grabbed her again. “You’re not going to drive anywhere till you get hold of yourself, for Christ’s sake. Come on, sit down and stop it!”