Flying finish / Бурный финиш. Книга для чтения на английском языке

I’d taken off on the main tanks and the gauges now stood at half-full. I switched over to the auxiliaries and they also were half-full. And half empty, too. The plane had been refuelled at Milan that morning, ten centuries ago. It carried… I thought searchingly back to Patrick’s casually thrown out snippets of information[517] the first day I flew with him… it carried twelve hundred United States gallons, giving a range of approximately eighteen hundred miles in normal conditions with a normal load. The load, though unconventional, was normal enough in weight. The condition of the weather was perfect, even if the condition of the pilot wasn’t. Nine hundred miles from Marseilles would see me well over England, but it wouldn’t take much more than four hours at the present speed until the tanks ran dry and it would still be too dark.

There was just one thing to be done about that. I put my hand on the throttle levers and closed them considerably. The airspeed fell back from two-twenty, back through two hundred, one-eighty, steadied on one-fifty. I didn’t dare go any slower than that because one thing Patrick hadn’t told me was the stalling speed[518], and a stall I could do without. The nose wanted to go down heavily with the decreased airspeed and I was holding it up by brute strength, the wheel of the control column lodged against my whole left forearm. I stretched my right hand up to the trimmer handle in the roof and gave it four complete turns, and cursed as a piece of shirt which was sticking to the furrows and burns unhelpfully unstuck itself. The nose of the plane steadied; ten thousand feet at one-fifty knots; and blood oozed warmly through my jersey.

A hundred and fifty knots should reduce the petrol consumption enough for me to stay in the air until long enough after dawn to find an airfield, I hoped. It also meant not four hours ahead, but more than five: and I’d had enough already. Still, now that I knew roughly where I was going, the plane could fly itself. I made small adjustments to the trimmer until the needle on the instrument which showed whether she was climbing or descending pointed unwaveringly to level, and then switched in the automatic pilot. I took my hands off the wheel and leaned back. The D.C.4 flew straight on. Very restful.

Nothing happened for several minutes except that I developed a thirst[519] and remembered Rous-Wheeler for the first time since takeoff. Still on his knees, I supposed, and extremely uncomfortable. His bad luck.[520]

There was water in the galley only five or six steps behind me, cold and too tempting. Gingerly I edged out of my seat. The plane took no notice. I took two steps backwards. The instruments didn’t quiver. I went into the galley and drew a quick cup of water, and went back towards the cockpit drinking it. Clearly the plane was doing splendidly without me. I returned to the galley for a refill of the cold delicious liquid, and when I’d got it, nearly dropped it.

Even above the noise of the engines I could hear Rous-Wheeler’s scream. Something about the raw terror in it raised the hair on my neck. That wasn’t pain, I thought, not the sort he’d get from cramp anyway. It was fear.

He screamed again, twice.

One of the horses, I thought immediately. If Billy hadn’t boxed them properly… My newly irrigated mouth went dry again[521]. A loose horse was just too much.

I went back to the cockpit, hurrying. Nothing had moved on the instrument panel. I’d have to risk it.

The plane had never seemed longer, the chains and racks more obstructing. And none of the mares was loose. They weren’t even fretting, but simply eating hay. Half relieved, half furious, I went on past the packing case. Rous-Wheeler was still there, still kneeling. His eyes protruded whitely and his face was wet. The last of his screams hung like an echo in the air.

‘What the hell’s the matter?’ I shouted to him angrily.

‘He…’ his voice shrieked uncontrollably. ‘He… moved.’

‘Who moved?’

‘Him.’ His eyes were staring fixedly at the blanket covering Patrick.

He couldn’t have moved. Poor, poor Patrick. I went across and pulled the rug off and stood looking down at him, the tall silent body, the tumbled hair, the big pool of blood under his down-turned face.

Pool of blood.

It was impossible. He hadn’t had time to bleed as much as that. I knelt down beside him and rolled him over, and he opened his yellow eyes.

Chapter Eighteen

Hed’ been out cold[522] for six hours and he was still unconscious. Nothing moved in his eyes, and after a few seconds they fell slowly shut again.