The Hot Pilots Page 2

  Eventually, however, the inevitable, simmering disagreements about GAT’s corporate direction finally boiled over, and when they did, it was only natural that someone as bright and talented as Tim Campbell would think that he knew best. Campbell waged a vicious stock battle to seize control of Skyworld. In 1933 Campbell walked away with Skyworld in his pocket, but Gold was able to make him pay dearly for his acquisition. Since that bitter parting of the ways the two men had remained overtly cordial, but Gold had never forgotten how Campbell had vowed to get even for the way that Gold had managed to win the final hand of their high-stakes, stock market poker game.

  In 1946 Campbell bought a huge block of stock in the aircraft building firm of Amalgamated-Landis, getting himself a seat on the board. He eventually took control of that company.

  Now, Gold knew that it was Campbell’s thirst for vengeance that was making Tim strain A-L’s resources in a come-from-behind sprint to build and market a jetliner. If the AL-12 could steal away the GC-909’s orders, GAT—and Herman Gold—would be ruined, and Campbell’s revenge would at long last be realized.

  “I guess we always knew that Tim Campbell was going to be able to leapfrog us when it came to technical features,” Don said broodingly. “But that’s only because Campbell bribed an airlines executive to hand over the 909’s spec sheets and blueprints,” he added angrily. “If Campbell hadn’t had GAT’s design to use as a jumping-off point he never could have caught up so fast—”

  Gold shrugged. “As Tim likes to say, there’s only one rule: ‘Don’t get caught.’ The bottom line is that considering his jetliner’s advanced features, it’s no wonder the airlines are willing to wait to buy the AL-12 instead of our 909.”

  “So what’s the answer?” Don asked, sounding dejected.

  “The interim answer is to do some fast redesigning …”

  Don burst out laughing. “You’re kidding!”

  “Do I look like I’m kidding?” Gold replied. “I’ve salvaged some of our initial orders—and stolen back a few from A-L—by promising to lengthen the 909’s existing fuselage to accommodate extra passengers. Our plane will still have less capacity than the AL-12, but at least some of the airlines are willing to accept the compromise because we can deliver units sooner, which means they’ll have a jetliner fleet faster.”

  “You said ‘interim solution,”’ Don reminded. “What’s your long-term strategy?”

  “We must get started immediately on a redesign,” Gold said. “I want a bigger, wider 909; an intercontinental version. I told the airlines boys we would have a proposal—a detailed three-view drawing, performance specs, projected cost, and delivery schedule—by the end of the month. In return, they promised to hold off confirming their orders with A-L.”

  “You want a new airplane designed within two weeks,” Don muttered. “My department will have to work around the clock—”

  “I don’t care what it costs,” Gold declared.

  “That’s good,” Don said dryly. “Because it’s going to cost a lot.”

  Gold waved the matter aside. “This thing between Campbell and me is personal. Maybe someday I’ll tell you about it…”

  Don nodded, smiling wryly. “Well, I guess I have some work to do …”

  “And we’d better get Rogers and Simpson on the horn and give them the good news,” Gold said sarcastically.

  “They’re not going to be happy,” Don agreed. “They busted their balls delivering the 909’s engines on time. Now they’re going to have to come up with something even more powerful …”

  “Just tell them what we need and the date we need it on,” Gold interrupted. “And if they give you any lip, tell them that if they can’t handle the job we’ll go to Pratt & Whitney, or GE—”

  “Herman, calm down!” Don said. “You’re pissed off at Tim Campbell. No need to take it out on the whole world.”

  “You’re right,” Gold sighed.

  Don abruptly frowned. “Shit! I forgot that we’ve got those meetings in Washington next week. And Horton said they were urgent—”

  “It’s the CIA’s style to call everything urgent,” Gold grumbled.

  “We can’t stand them up—”

  “You just like fooling around with all that top-secret stuff,” Gold teased.

  “Herman—What are we going to do about those meetings?”

  Gold pondered it. “Okay, I’ll go alone to Washington while you stay here and ride herd on the 909–1.”

  “The what?”

  “The 909-International.” Gold laughed over his shoulder as he began to walk back toward the hangar entrance. “I wish I could build them as easily as I name them.”

  (Two)

  Don Harrison was dialing Linda’s number at the newspaper when he was interrupted by the electrician foreman. Harrison wanted to give Linda the good news about how he was going to be in town next week, but the foreman said a wiring problem had him stumped, and his crew idled, so Harrison hung up the telephone and went to take a look. Then one thing led to another, and by the time he did get a spare moment to call Linda, he’d thought it over and decided against it …

  Linda had lately been mildly complaining that he was too predictable, so why not surprise her? Why not keep the fact that he was staying in Los Angeles his little secret? That way he could get some solid work done during the next few days, which would give him the excuse to goof off one night and show up unannounced at her apartment with a bottle of champagne in hand.

  It was unlike him—and exciting—to be so impetuous, but then it was also unlike him to have a swell girl like Linda. He began whistling merrily to himself as he went back to work. He was positive that she would enjoy the surprise, just as he’d enjoy the opportunity while Herman was away to spend some time with his girl.

  CHAPTER 2

  * * *

  (One)

  Malibu, California

  27 July 1954

  Steve Gold carried his sandals as he walked along the waterline, up to his ankles in the surf that broke in frothing bubbles on the sand. He pretty much had the beach to himself due to the day—it was a Tuesday—and the weather, which was overcast. Steve didn’t mind the fact that the beach was deserted. He liked being alone; always had. And a quiet beach was his favorite place, next to being in the cockpit of a fighter jet.

  Steve was twenty-nine years old. He was six feet tall and weighed 170 pounds. He had blond hair, cut moderately short so he could easily deal with it in order to look presentable, and squint lines etched vertically on either side of his nose and around his brown eyes, thanks to the long hours spent scanning the sky from various fighter cockpits. Steve was an Air Force lieutenant colonel and a fighter ace, with fourteen and a half confirmed Japanese kills during World War II, and six MIGs accounted for during the Korean conflict.

  The fifth MIG he’d shot down had been especially sweet because it had given him twenty and a half official kills: one half kill more than his old man had tallied during World War I, when Herman Gold had flown with the Red Baron.

  Actually, Steve had even more kills, but they weren’t official. Back in ’41 he’d flown a volunteer stint with the Flying Tigers in China, during which he’d knocked down five Japanese airplanes while taking part in one awesome and glorious dogfight over Rangoon. Unfortunately, the kills could not be added to his official tally because he’d only been seventeen years old. When the Flying Tigers had learned that he’d lied about his age in order to join up, they booted him home and wiped clean their records of any trace of him …

  Steve now grinned as he thought about how Pop still enjoyed busting his balls about that, ribbing him that if the kills weren’t official it was as though they’d never happened. Steve knew his father was just kidding; his old man was real proud of his son’s war record.

  Steve continued walking with his feet in the water. As he passed a retaining wall that divided the beach and had been blocking his view he saw that there was another person out here today, after all. It was a woman weari
ng a black bikini, a wide-brimmed straw hat, and sunglasses. She was semi-reclining in a white canvas sand chair, with her legs—nice, long, legs—stretched out on a red and white striped beach towel.

  As he approached he saw her glance at him, and then look away in that kind of initially bored, disinterested way that he liked so much in women because it made things so much sweeter when he got their attention in bed. The closer Steve got, the better she was looking. He was figuring that it was worth a shot to try and strike up a conversation—

  And then he realized that he was looking at Linda Forrester—

  At that instant she gave him a double-take. He knew that she had recognized him by the way she quickly grabbed a book off her towel and ducked her head into it. It was obvious that she was just as flustered as he about this chance encounter, and like him, didn’t know what to do …

  He was still far enough away to credibly pretend that he hadn’t recognized her. He could just turn around and walk back the way he’d come, but that seemed cowardly. He wasn’t about to let her think that he was afraid to talk to her. On the other hand, he didn’t want to cause any uncomfortable awkwardness … At least, no more than they’d both already experienced with each other …

  So what the fuck was he going to do? He couldn’t just keep on walking past her, and pretend not to see her…

  He looked out at the ocean, and decided that the way out of this mess was to go for a swim. What the hell—He was feeling hot; a dip would be refreshing. It would also give Linda the chance to pack up and move away down the beach if she preferred not to talk to him. If she did so, he’d take the hint.

  But if she stayed …

  He shrugged off his terry-lined, shirt-jac, its pockets bulging with his car keys, wallet, and sunglasses. He put the garment down on the sand, took his cigarettes and lighter from the pocket of his boxer swim trunks, and laid them on top. He put his sandals on top of everything, and then ran out into the cold, clean water. When he was in up to his waist he pushed off, swimming with strong strokes until he was out beyond the point where the waves broke. He splashed around for a while, either floating on his back or treading water, watching the sun glint on the aquamarine sea as he thought about Linda Forrester.

  They’d met in 1947, on a sultry summer Friday afternoon in Washington, during the Senate B-45 bomber hearings. Steve had been a captain assigned to the Air Force’s Office of Public Information, and she had been a free-lance journalist, hired by Amalgamated-Landis to do a puff piece on their young engineer Don Harrison, who was in Washington to testify on behalf of the bomber he’d designed. Steve still remembered how happy he’d been when he’d found out that the relationship was strictly business between the bookish young engineer and the knockout brunette with shoulder-length curly hair and blue eyes to die for.

  The next day had been a Saturday. Linda had asked Steve if he wouldn’t mind showing her around Washington. The sight-seeing excursion had ended up in Steve’s apartment, and finally, in his bed. The spark they’d lit that Saturday afternoon back in 1947 had burned fitfully for five years. It wasn’t like they were boyfriend and girlfriend, or going steady, or anything like that. Hell, they’d only managed to get together for a weekend maybe half a dozen times a year. In between their get-togethers, he saw plenty of other women, and if he knew Linda, she saw plenty of other men, but somehow they’d always made the effort to get back to each other. Steve didn’t think it was love—at least it didn’t seem to him to be like the love they wrote about in books—but the sex had always been outstanding, as had their friendship …

  Funny how the relationship had always remained less than the sum of its parts, Steve now thought as he began to swim back toward shore.

  The end of the relationship had come two years ago, at Chusan Air Field in Korea, where he’d been serving with the 44th FIS, an F-90 BroadSword fighter-interceptor squadron. Linda, a senior correspondent for the Los Angeles Gazette, had been part of a contingent of reporters on a tour of the front. As soon as Steve had learned that Linda was on her way to Chusan he’d bribed an airman a couple of bucks to get the key to an out-of-the-way storeroom in Operations Center. He and Linda had enjoyed themselves on the cot he’d stashed in the storeroom. For that couple of days Steve had thought that life was as good as it could get: By day he’d had MIGs to joust with up in the sky, and by night there’d been Linda, waiting for him in the sack …

  It had been outstanding, all right, but during their third night Linda had gotten all mushy, starting in about how she loved him, and maybe they should be thinking about marriage … In hindsight, he guessed that he’d probably been a bit too emphatic about how marriage wasn’t likely. Not then, and not ever…

  Well, good old Linda hadn’t been much interested in joining him in the sack after hearing that. The contingent of journalists had moved on, Linda with them, and that had been the last Steve had seen or heard from her, except for her postcard from Japan a week or so afterward, letting him know in a couple of terse, scrawled sentences that the two of them were through, as if he hadn’t already gotten that message loud and clear…

  In the time since, he’d had no contact with her. It had been as if they’d never met. He’d been home in Los Angeles on leave for almost a month now, but it had never occurred to him to call her. Sure, he’d thought about Linda a couple of times … He guessed he even missed her … a little …

  But she’d been real clear about how as far as she was concerned they were through. He knew how to take a hint.

  As he swam back he resisted the temptation to see if she was still there. He wondered which way he’d bet if this were a wager: Would she stay, or leave? It wasn’t until he was striding out of the ocean, the breaking waves pushing at the backs of his knees, that he allowed himself to look. She was still there; still reading, or maybe pretending to be reading…

  It didn’t matter. She was still there, and that was all he needed to know.

  He slicked back his dripping hair, gathered up his things, and confidently walked toward her.

  (Two)

  The mid-morning sun was bright against the page of Linda Forrester’s book. After a couple of stabs at trying to concentrate she decided that she wasn’t in the mood for reading. She felt guilty as she tossed aside the copy of James Baldwin’s Go Tell It on the Mountain. Friends at the paper had been after her to read the book since it came out last year, but it was tough going at the beach.

  Anyway, it seemed like I spend my whole life generating print, or else absorbing it, she thought as she wiggled her toes in the warm, white sand. Today is supposed to be a time out…

  She closed her eyes, leaning back against the chair canvas, listening to the shrieking laughter of the gulls swooping above the crashing surf. As she baked in the sun she thought about going into the water. Maybe later.

  She sat up slightly, opening her eyes as she reached for her beach bag, and rummaged through it looking for her suntan lotion. It was then that she saw him walking toward her along the waterline. She didn’t recognize him at first, but merely registered his presence, thinking that he was a good-looking guy wearing a short-sleeved cabana top and matching bathing trunks in a yellow-on-black paisley print. From the way he moved she could tell that he was fit and athletic.

  It was as she was looking away that something clicked in the back of her mind: She did a quick double take, peering at him from over the top of her sunglasses. As he came toward her his image wavered like a mirage in the wriggling heat waves rising up off the hot sand.

  But of course he wasn’t a mirage, she thought, a little perturbed and a little pleased as she watched Steve Gold coming toward her. Nope, he was no mirage. A bit of a dream, he might be—although there’d also been nights since she’d seen him last when he’d been leading man in her nightmares—but today he was very real.

  As she stared at him now she was able to guess from the almost imperceptible falter in his stride that he’d also recognized her. She quickly snatched up her novel; the book wa
s on her lap upside down, but what the hell; he was still too far away to notice.

  She took quick peeks at him while she pretended to read. He was just standing there about thirty yards down the beach, shuffling his bare feet in the sand as he looked out at the ocean. She guessed that he was trying to decide if he should come over … She wondered what he was going to do—and what she should do if he did come over…

  She couldn’t figure out what he thought he was up to as he abruptly took off his jacket, emptied his pockets, and went slogging into the water. Then she realized that this was his way of giving her a chance to beat a retreat.

  What nerve! What ego! It’d be a cold day in Malibu when the likes of him could run her off—

  She flung aside her book and angrily smoked a cigarette while she waited for “The Creature from the Black Lagoon” to get tired of splashing around out there with his fellow cold fish, and come say hello. Finally she saw him swimming back toward the shore. She removed her straw hat and quickly ran her fingers through her tousled curls to fluff them out, thinking that she’d been wearing her hair shorter since she’d seen him last. She then plopped her book back on her lap, this time right side up.

  She watched as he shook the water out of his eyes, put on his top, and came swaggering over like the conceited lug that he was. He probably thought that she was going to be an easy touch just because he hadn’t managed to scare her off the beach. Well, she had news for him …

  “Hi there, blue eyes.” Steve grinned, coming up to her. “I thought it was you.”

  Linda pretended to go back to her book.”What the hell are you doing here?” she murmured, trying hard to sound like she didn’t in the least care.