by Simon Brett
‘Croydon Aerodrome,’ Twinks told the cabbie, ‘and drive like a cheetah on spikes!’
Blotto once again found himself lost in admiration for another of his sister’s skills. ‘How did you do it, Twinks? How did you know there’d be a cab there?’
‘Self-belief,’ Twinks replied. ‘It’s a trait I’ve inherited from our mother. Can you imagine any cabbie in London daring not to appear if the Mater whistled?’
Blotto was forced to admit that he couldn’t. There was a silence between them, then he said, ‘Not much fun being a Letter-Bearer for the League of the Crimson Hand, is it? Because as soon as you reach the point of uncaging the ferrets about something really important, you get coffinated.’
‘It does seem to be a hazard of the profession, yes.’
‘Mm. Incidentally, Twinks me old muffin . . . Why are we going to Croydon Aerodrome?’
‘Because I’ll lay a guinea to a groat that that’s where we’ll find your Lagonda.’
‘Toad-in-the-hole . . .’ murmured Blotto, impressed and excited. Then, after a silence, he asked, ‘What makes you think that, old greengage?’
‘Because of the clues that Davy ap Dafydd gave us.’
‘Oh yes. Right. Of course. What clues?’
‘The obvious ones,’ Twinks replied patiently. ‘He said he always met Gerhardt Sachs at Croydon Aerodrome.’
‘Yes, but he said it involved having small ads printed in the Daily Bugle. Surely you haven’t had time to do that since we’ve left the pub, have you?’ It seemed unlikely, but Blotto had long since learned not to underestimate his sister’s skills.
‘No, you prize cauliflower, of course I haven’t. But I’ve got a hunch . . .’
‘Have you? It doesn’t show. I mean, I’m sure I’d have noticed it when we played together as children if –’
‘No, Blotters, not that kind of hunch. I mean I’ve got an instinct that we’re on the right track. I’m sure the next stage of our investigation lies at Croydon Aerodrome.’
‘Oh.’ He had to admit to a little disappointment. He had been expecting Twinks to present him with a finely wrought chain of logic, which would prove irrefutably that the killer of Davy ap Dafydd – probably the same spoffing stencher who’d had the temerity to steal the Lagonda – was on his way to Croydon Aerodrome. But all she’d come up with was an instinct. Well, anyone could have an instinct. Blotto himself even had instincts from time to time. Though it had to be said that his track record for having instincts that were right was not nearly as impressive as his sister’s.
Still, Blotto was comforted by the possibility of being reunited with his Lagonda.
Twinks appeared to know her way around Croydon Aerodrome. She moved confidently through the pillared space of the main booking hall to an information desk, quickly scribbled a note and handed it to the uniformed woman behind the counter. ‘Tell him we’ll be in the cocktail lounge,’ she announced, and led her slightly bewildered brother to that destination.
Sadly, St Louis Steamhammers hadn’t reached from the Savoy to the suburban outskirts of Croydon, so they contented themselves with gin and tonics. When they were seated with their drinks, Blotto asked, ‘So who is this boddo you’ve fixed to rendezvous with?’
‘Perfectly amiable greengage called Jerome Handsomely.’
‘Where’d you meet him?’
‘At a ball.’ Twinks shrugged her slender shoulders.
‘Anything special I should know about him?’
‘No, don’t think so. He’s a pilot.’ The azure eyes were screwed up in an effort of recollection. ‘Oh yes, and he’s in love with me.’
That doesn’t narrow it down much, thought Blotto. Every spoffing man his sister met seemed to fall in love with her. The unperforated stamps in the collection were the ones who didn’t.
In a matter of moments Jerome Handsomely was with them. As he walked in he seemed to take over the entire cocktail lounge. Every eye instantly homed in on him. He was very tall, taller even than Blotto, which must have put him round the six-six mark. He had wavy black hair which he wore almost foppishly long, a luxuriant black moustache, pale skin and startlingly pale blue eyes. He wore jodhpurs and riding boots, and above the waist a sheepskin-lined leather blouson over a khaki shirt, at whose open neck fluttered a white silk scarf. From one nonchalant hand dangled a leather pilot’s helmet and a pair of aviator goggles.
‘Twinks!’ he cried in a voice which had not scaled the heights of Eton or Harrow, but had been to a perfectly decent minor public school for the terminally unacademic. ‘Gosh, aren’t you looking the absolute box of chocs! Just the sight of you flattens me like a whizzbang! I’m surprised vital parts of me aren’t scattered all over the lounge.’
Twinks of course remained seated during this encomium, but Blotto had risen politely to his feet, and for the first time Jerome Handsomely seemed aware of his presence. And he wasn’t best pleased with what he saw. ‘I say, who’s the tinkety-tonker? I must say I regard this as a bit beyond the barbed wire, Twinks. Summoning me to meet you when you’re sugaring away over G and Ts with some smarmed-up lounge-leech.’
Not giving Twinks time to offer any explanation, Jerome Handsomely turned on Blotto. ‘Now listen, you bally stopcock-twiddler! The view I take of your frattering with Twinks is dimmer than a mole’s in a coal-hole. And I demand satisfaction! I know duelling’s illegal these days, but we can find a crumpety corner of the airfield and do the business. To the death, of course! You can have the choice of weapons, you chicken-livered switch-clicker!’
Blotto said, ‘Erm,’ and looked to Twinks for support.
‘Jerome,’ she announced gracefully, ‘I don’t believe you’ve met my brother Blotto.’
‘Ah. Brother. Brother clearly in vision at ten o’clock.’ A genteel smile took over the pilot’s face, as he reached his hand across. ‘Absolutely snuffled-up to meet you, me old cheese straw.’
Tickey-tockey to meet you too,’ said Blotto, taking the proffered hand.
Polite relations restored, Jerome Handsomely turned back to Twinks. ‘Have you brought your brother along as a witness?’
‘A witness to what?’
‘Your agreeing to you and me getting meshed. Your waving the starter’s flag on our engagement.’
Twinks smiled apologetically. ‘Sorry, Jerome. I’m afraid my answer to that is the same as it has ever been.’
The pilot looked crushed. ‘Oh, wingless biplanes!’ he cried. ‘But, Twinks, you know I love you with all the trimmings, even down to the game chips and blackcurrant jelly.’
‘I know you do, Jerome.’
His pale brow darkened. ‘There isn’t another, is there? There isn’t another slimer who’s been slipping you the soft centres?’
‘No. There is no one else in my life of a romantic nature.’
‘But, mind you, every man she meets falls for her like a giraffe on an ice rink.’ Blotto thought he ought to mention that fact, but the look Jerome Handsomely turned on him suggested it might not have been such a good idea, after all.
‘Look, Twinks,’ the pilot began despairingly, ‘I love you more than a steeplechaser loves his bran. I’d lay down my life for you as readily as a lizard glumphs down a fly. Would that help, Twinks? Would it help if I laid my life down for you?’
‘I don’t really think it would help at all, Jerome. You’re going to be much more use to me alive than you would be dead.’
‘Oh.’ He was cast down for a moment. Clearly the thought of laying down his life had rather appealed to him, and it would take a moment for him to come to terms with being refused permission. But, after a moment of self-reconciliation, his expression brightened. ‘So, Twinks, you are saying that there is something you want me to do for you?’
‘There certainly is.’
‘Oh, giant aspidistras! That’s booming news! What is it?’ A new exciting thought came to him. ‘Is it something hazardous? Something which might possibly lead to my laying down my life for you in the attempt?’
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‘I don’t think it need be, no.’ At her words Jerome Handsomely looked so miserable that Twinks hastened to reassure him. ‘But it might well be that dangerous, yes.’
Instantly cheered, he demanded to know what service it was she required of him. Anything. Anything. And he reiterated that if the task did actually involve his laying down his life . . . well, that would be a real bonus.
Twinks moved quickly to practicalities. ‘We are looking for a man called Gerhardt Sachs. We believe he frequently flies into Croydon Aerodrome, though we don’t know in what capacity. But if we could track him down, it would be pure creamy éclair.’
‘When you say he “flies in”, me old iced bun . . . do you mean the poached egg’s a pilot?’
‘He might be. We don’t know.’
‘Because I know most of the away-chockers who’ve got pilot’s licences around this tea chest, and the name doesn’t tickle my memory glands.’
‘Maybe he uses another name . . .?’ Twinks suggested.
‘Booming good notion! “Gerhardt Sachs” might not be top of the favourite names round Croydon Aerodrome after the last dust-up in Europe.’
‘That’s what I was thinking,’ Twinks agreed.
‘Do you know what the sausage-muncher looks like?’ asked Jerome.
‘Afraid we don’t. Never seen him.’
‘That’s a bit of a knuckle-cracker. Do we have any other clues as to how to spot the target?’
‘Well . . .’ said Blotto, who had been silent for rather a long time. ‘The stencher might have driven here in a stolen Lagonda.’
‘Great dithering dragonflies!’ exclaimed Jerome Handsomely. ‘If you’d said that straight away, I could have taken you there quicker than a doctor’s bill. Come with me!’
‘You can take us to Gerhardt Sachs?’ asked Twinks.
‘If he’s still here, yes. But his crate was being prepped, so he may have twanged off the tarmac by now.’
‘But can you take us straight to my Lagonda?’ asked Blotto, who had different priorities from his sister.
‘Quick as a whizzbang’s wake,’ asserted Jerome Handsomely. ‘Just take my lead in the tango.’
As the pilot strode off, again followed by every eye in the cocktail lounge, Blotto murmured, ‘Toad-in-the-hole, Twinks. That boddo’s slang’s a tough rusk to chew, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, Blotto me old biscuit barrel, greengages who’ve been through the Royal Flying Corps seem virtually to have invented a language of their own.’
‘Well, it’s a bit of a candle-snuffer. Why can’t he uncage the ferrets in normal English like you and me, Twinks me old banana box?’
17
Into Thin Air
Jerome Handsomely strode through life as if he always knew where he was going, and that was the way he swept through Croydon Aerodrome with Blotto and Twinks in his wake. Avoiding the marked routes for paying travellers, he ushered them through door after door marked ‘Private’ and they were soon out by the hangars that didn’t belong to commercial airlines. There it was that wealthy daredevils parked their crates.
There wasn’t much activity, most of the planes being tucked up for the night in their hangars. But the throbbing of a propeller drew their attention to a small plane out on the tarmac. Its undercarriage lights were on, and it appeared to be readying for take-off.
‘Great repeating radishes!’ cried Jerome Handsomely. ‘It’s a Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel!’
‘A what?’ asked Twinks.
‘Latest technology from the sausage-munchers. Two-seater – booming crate! Don’t like their crocking politics and I’ve had a lifelong aversion to sauerkraut, but when it comes to engineering, they paddle a different canoe. You see, it’s only got one wing.’
‘Oh,’ said Blotto, ‘isn’t that a bit awkward?’
‘In what way, me old poached egg?’
‘Well, doesn’t the spoffing thing fly round in circles? I mean, that’s what happens when you’re out shooting. You wing a bird and it kind of spirals down in a –’
‘No, no,’ Jerome Handsomely interrupted. ‘It’s only got one wing that goes right across. As opposed to two, which is what a biplane has.’
‘Ah.’ Blotto appeared to lose interest.
‘But in that kite over there, Jerome,’ asked Twinks excitedly, ‘do you believe that Gerhardt Sachs is the pilot?’
‘It’d match the carpet, wouldn’t it, for him to have a Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel . . . given his name?’
‘Yes, but . . .’ Twinks suddenly realized that Blotto was no longer with them. He’d drifted away and was looking into the middle distance. On his face was a look popularized in stained-glass windows by saints who have just been vouchsafed a private glimpse of the Almighty.
‘Blotto, Blotto, what is it?’
He pointed. His sister moved closer, to a position where she could see, beyond the Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel, the sight that had beatified her brother’s features. It was the Lagonda.
‘Well,’ she said, ‘that proves there’s a connection between The Three Feathers and Croydon Aerodrome. I’d lay a guinea to a groat that the pilot of that plane is Gerhardt Sachs.’
As she said the words, the engine note from the Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel changed and they saw the plane beginning to move towards the runway.
‘Great slithering sea snakes!’ said Jerome Handsomely. ‘We’ll catch the slimer. Quick! My crate’s prepped and as ready to go as a cougar who’s just dined off a coiled spring.’ He started to run towards the only other plane on the tarmac, an Accrington-Murphy Painted Lady Biplane.
Twinks was about to follow him when she saw that Blotto was hurrying in the other direction. ‘Where are you going?’
‘My Lagonda,’ he replied almost pathetically.
‘But we’ve got to follow Gerhardt Sachs!’
‘I’ll follow him in the Lagonda,’ her brother insisted.
‘Blotters, the Lag is a wonderful car. It can do many things, but the one thing it can’t do is fly.’
‘But I could follow the stencher on the roads.’
‘Which would be all fine and sprightly, if he followed the line of the roads. Which I think he’s very unlikely to do.’
Reluctantly, Blotto accepted the force of her argument and the two of them ran, resplendent in their evening wear, towards Jerome Handsomely’s Accrington-Murphy Painted Lady Biplane. He already had the propeller turning as they clambered up and into the narrow cockpit. Ahead of them on the tarmac they could see the tail-lights of the Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel as it lifted off the runway.
‘Right, Jerome,’ Twinks commanded, ‘follow that plane!’
18
Aerial Pursuit
‘I’d have thought,’ said Blotto pensively after they had been flying for about ten minutes, ‘that it’d be jolly difficult to follow another plane without the boddo driving the spoffing thing knowing that he was being followed. I mean, the sky’s quite a big place, isn’t it? And dashed empty. So there’s not much to hide behind except the odd cloud.’
‘Ah yes,’ the pilot replied. ‘But what you have to take into account, me old propeller-winder, is that the sausage-muncher ahead of us doesn’t suspect that he’s being followed.’
‘Wouldn’t he have seen you taking off?’
‘No, I was too far behind. And I didn’t have any of my lights on when I twanged my crate off the tarmac. What’s more, I’ve switched off all my radio proggers and plumbing, so the tinkety-tonker won’t be able to detect us that way.’
‘Isn’t that rather dangerous?’ asked Twinks.
‘Of course it is! But life without danger is like a mince pie with no brandy butter. Taking off in a crate when you haven’t got at least an even chance of not coming back is about as exciting as a game of patience in a girls’ dormitory. And by the way, Twinks, you know you only have to say the booming word and I’ll happily lay down my life for you.’
‘You did mention that, yes.’
‘Well, it’s still a
good offer. Just say the word and I’ll be absolutely snuffled-up to do it. Piece of cake caning yourself when you’re up in a crate. Just take your hands off the helmrod and a few minutes later you’re Pilot Flambé in a field. If you’d like me to do it, me old iced bun . . .’ He took his hands off the instruments by way of demonstration.
‘No!’ Twinks’s shriek did at least make him once again take hold of the controls. ‘There’s something you’re not taking into account, Jerome.’
‘Great dithering dragonflies! What is it?’
‘While you would be so generously laying down your life for me . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘. . . you would also be laying down two other people’s lives as well. It wouldn’t just be Pilot Flambé in a field. It’d be Blotto and Twinks Flambés in a field too. So your laying down your life for me would be as much use as a tail-curler to a Manx cat.’
‘Ah, hadn’t thought of that particular knuckle-cracker. Booming good point, Twinks. Have to save laying down my life for you till a more crumpety occasion.’
‘If you wouldn’t mind, Jerome me old Labrador. I think at the moment you’re much more use to me with your life kept tinkling on rather than being laid down.’
The pilot acknowledged the wisdom of her reply by nodding his head and saying, ‘Trucky-trockle.’
‘Tickey-tockey,’ Blotto confirmed.
There was a silence. They all looked ahead, eyes fixed on the distant red pin-spots of the Frimmelstopf Fliegflügel. The fog-muffled lights of London had been left behind them, but though the night was now clear, the darkness prevented them from seeing the beautiful English countryside over which they were flying.
‘Without your instruments,’ asked Twinks, ‘have you any idea in which direction we’re flying?’
‘We’re going more or less due west.’
‘How do you know that?’
Jerome Handsomely’s eyes flicked up to the sky above him. ‘Stars, Twinks. The oldest navigation aid of them all. If it’s good enough for Jason and his booming Argonauts, then it ticks the clock for me too.’
Twinks too looked up. The stars seemed clearer than they ever had before. She felt a little surge of romantic soppiness. Thank goodness Blotto was there. She was in the kind of mood when, if alone with Jerome Handsomely, she could possibly even succumb to his blandishments. He was a dashed tasty slice of redcurrant cheesecake, after all.
