Still, she loved Glenapp and the happy times her family had there, and should have drowned out any sorrow that remained. Elsie smiled and continued up the stairs, the Hinchliffes following her. At the landing, Elsie made a left, and in a moment all four of them were in a drawing room that was as big as the Hinchliffes’ house in Purley.
* * *
After tea, Ray took Joan outside to walk down to the lake, and Emilie and Elsie stayed behind to enjoy the fire. Despite the magnificent weather on their drive, a fog was coming in and it had turned chilly. Emilie, seven months pregnant, didn’t look like she was up for a trudge of a quarter mile, and opted to simply stay put and rest.
“I’m afraid the motor trip must have worn you out,” Elsie said sympathetically. “Sometimes I forget how long it takes to get here.”
“No, no,” Emilie laughed as she gently shook her head. “It was like this when I was pregnant with Joan. My ankles are swollen and it’s hard to get comfortable.”
“Oooh!” Elsie exclaimed. “Comfort is my game, Mrs. Hinchliffe. Please allow me to fetch you a silk footstool. I was nearly tarred and feathered this week because of my ‘preposterous use’ of them.”
“Oh, thank you,” Emilie said as Elsie brought over a large footstool from the other side of the drawing room and tucked it under Emilie’s feet. She began to unbuckle the left shoe and then the right. After the shoes were off, Elsie did indeed see the indentions the shoes had made on her guest’s swollen feet.
“I can rub them for you, perhaps take some of the discomfort away,” Elsie offered.
Emilie looked horrified. “Oh, no. I’m perfectly fine.”
“It’s quite all right,” Elsie assured her. “I was a nurse in the war. I did this sort of thing all the time. Your stockings are in much better condition than soldiers’ feet! I may be a bit rusty at it, but give me a moment.”
Elsie tried to remember the correct placement of her thumb, but after a few seconds she was at it like an old hand.
“Thank you,” Emilie said again, blushing with a slight amount of embarrassment. “You are so kind. And please call me Emilie.”
“Then please call me Elsie,” she said, smiling and tilting her head as she applied a small bit of pressure to Emilie Hinchliffe’s tiny right foot.
“So you were . . . a nurse?” she asked Elsie.
“I was,” she confirmed. “In the VAD. I was trained in France and was then transferred to Northolt, where I became a driver for the officers.”
“Northolt?” Emilie asked. “The Royal Flying Corps aerodrome?”
“That’s the one,” Elsie laughed. “I was bitten there, so to speak.”
“Ahhhhh,” Emilie laughed. “You know, Ray started hanging around an aerodrome as a boy and then took flying lessons as a teenager. Then he wanted to be an artist, and I thought he was quite talented, but here he is again with his first love, flying. Funny how it doesn’t let go, isn’t it?”
“Hooked teeth, I think.” Elsie smiled.
Another few seconds passed in silence.
“May I ask,” Emilie began cautiously, “why you never married?”
Elsie threw her head back and laughed.
“Oh, but I was,” she confessed.
Emilie immediately drew her hand to her mouth and a worried expression fell on her face.
“I’m so sorry,” she said from behind her fingertips. “Ray never said you were a widow.”
Elsie smiled with her lips tightly pushed together.
“No, no,” she said. “I can’t let you think that. I’m a scandalous divorcée. I was married to a fellow named Dennis Wyndham. One of my patients. A blighty one.”
“Dennis Wyndham, the actor? The stage actor?” Emilie asked.
“I’m surprised you know him,” Elsie said.
“I love the theater and film,” Emilie revealed. “I don’t get to go much now, but before Joan was born, I went frequently to matinees and such, especially when Ray was flying a lot for Imperial.”
She stopped for a moment and studied Elsie’s face.
“You’re Poppy Wyndham,” she said without any expression at all. “I loved A Dead Certainty. I saw it twice.”
“That was a lifetime ago,” Elsie said a little softly. “Movies! Can you think of anything sillier? I believe my father bought this castle to banish me to it and keep me from marrying Dennis.”
“That’s terrible,” Emilie said.
“No, not really,” Elsie replied. “I wouldn’t have believed it at the time, but he was probably right. I lived out here alone for months with the staff, and I decorated most of the first floor to keep myself occupied before I was permitted to return to London.”
“Thus the footstools,” Emilie said. “But you married him anyway.”
“Eloped,” Elsie said carelessly. “And I broke my father’s heart, although when I left my husband, he forgave me quite easily. Without so much as one harsh word, as a matter of fact. The footstools come in quite handy, don’t they?”
“And Dennis . . .” Emilie started. “Where is he now?”
Elsie sighed. “I believe he’s headed for Broadway in some production or other,” she said. “I haven’t talked to him since the annulment. I saw a picture of him in the newspaper at his farewell party. He was draped all over Cecil Beaton.”
“Oh,” she said, nodding once. “They must be good friends.”
“I believe they are.” Elsie smirked.
Elsie heard loud boots in the hall, and suddenly there was Sophie, attired in all of Elsie’s best riding clothes. Severely handsome, she was worthy of a John Singer Sargent painting in her breeches.
“Ahhh, there you are,” Elsie said. “Sophie, please meet Mrs. Emilie Hinchliffe. Emilie, this is Miss Sophie Ries.”
Emilie leaned a little forward, as much as she could, and extended her hand as Sophie came around the sofa and extended hers.
“A pleasure,” Sophie said, giving Emilie one firm but simple shake.
“Indeed,” Emilie replied. “You’re the one who pays my husband!”
“I am, I am,” Sophie admitted, laughing and spreading her arms open before collapsing on the sofa next to Emilie and yanking off one tall black boot after the other.
“Don’t let those hands cramp up, Else,” she cackled. “Because I’m next.”
CHAPTER TEN
FALL 1927
Mabel Boll arriving in New York.
The weather held perfectly for the entire weekend, enough for a picnic at the beach and a stroll through Ballantrae, the village near Glenapp, sans Emilie. Elsie was delighted to catch up with the people in town, at the bakery, at the tea shop, at the small grocery store at the center of Main Street. While Joan gravitated toward the candy barrels, Mrs. Aiken, who owned the store, greeted Elsie with genuine pleasure, then called her over to a corner, where she spoke in hushed tones. Sophie, being brazen, moved forward and pretended to be looking at canned beans in order to overhear the conversation, and then, when she was satisfied, she joined Hinch and Joan in their search for the perfect lollipop.
After paying for the candy, Elsie bid good-bye to Mrs. Aiken and paused once they were outside the store.
“Would you mind terribly if I stopped us for a moment?” she asked. “I need to return to the bakery.”
Sophie shrugged and simply said, “Buy us something good!” as Elsie hurried off.
“What was that all about?” Hinchliffe said, unwrapping Joan’s candy.
“Well, I wasn’t spying, but I happen to have excellent hearing. Bit of a curse, really. Anyway, apparently the son of the baker’s assistant needs some sort of operation on his leg. It seems he’s injured it and will be lame if they don’t correct it,” Sophie said.
“Oh, so she’s gone back to give her condolences,” Hinch said.
“No,” Sophie said, with a little laugh. “She’s gone back there to pay for it.”
When Elsie returned several moments later with a broad smile, she had several apple hand pies in a sack,
and Joan immediately forgot about her lollipop.
Elsie didn’t say a word, and they continued down the street.
* * *
On the large dining room table that could seat thirty at Glenapp, Elsie and Hinch leaned over maps of the Atlantic, along with reports of tides, currents, and winds that he had used for his planned flight with Levine.
“While any journey across the Atlantic is dangerous, the east–west faces more hazards than does the west–east,” he explained, his echo bouncing off the twenty-foot ceilings. “We’ll have a strong headwind against us. We’ll reach land closer to Newfoundland and then cross over Nova Scotia, where the occurrence of ice is more likely. That will be our biggest barrier. By flying in the early spring, hopefully most of that danger will miss us, but enormous gales still can happen. The westerly winds can get up to as high as forty-five to fifty miles per hour, beating against us, which will affect speed and fuel. We’ll burn more trying to fight those winds, but by then the plane will be much lighter because of the fuel we’ve already used, and it will be hard to fight that opposition. That’s where we will want the weight, but won’t have it anymore.”
“What can we do to balance that?” Elsie asked.
“Nothing.” Hinchliffe shrugged. “If we hit ice, we won’t want a heavier plane anyway. We just have to barrel through.”
“I see,” Elsie said, rubbing her hands together.
Hinchliffe stood up from the table and looked at Elsie.
“Miss Mackay, I want to be honest with you,” he said. “This is a very dangerous undertaking. It will not go smoothly. We will hit storms, we will encounter winds. While I have faith in both your and my abilities as pilots, there is a chance that we will not come back. I need you to understand that.”
Elsie nodded.
“We are at the mercy of things we cannot predict,” he added. “We won’t know what’s waiting for us until the second we meet it. If you feel uncertain, I want you to tell me. I can drum up another pilot in no time.”
“No, Captain Hinchliffe, that won’t be necessary,” Elsie assured him. “I have thought long and extensively about this flight, and it’s something I truly want to do.”
Hinchliffe nodded. “How far would your father go to stop our venture?”
“He would do absolutely anything to stop me,” she answered. “My father would never forgive me if he found out and would cut me off financially. There’s a precedent: he’s done it before, and involved both the army and the police. It was all very overdone, and was ridiculous enough to hit the newspapers. Does anyone know our plans?”
Hinchliffe shook his head. “No, no, just Emilie and myself on my end.”
“Let’s hope it stays that way all around,” Elsie said. “If word leaks out, can we be under agreement that I am merely financing your flight and not taking part in it? I don’t really see it as a lie, just a twist. Would you be willing to do that?”
“Certainly,” Hinch agreed, nodding. “I think that’s a sufficient plan. When we return to London, we should start looking at airplanes. If we spot one that needs specialization, that might take some time. Now would be the best time to do it.”
“I will follow your lead, Captain Hinchliffe,” Elsie replied.
* * *
“Now?” Ruth asked incredulously. “I have to do it now?”
“If you want to fly that plane at all, it’s got to be now,” the inspector said.
“You understand we are waiting for good weather,” she tried to explain. “So taking my pilot’s test might mess with that if we get a good report.”
“You can still take off,” the inspector said, then nodded to George, who stood next to Ruth with his arm resting on the American Girl. “If he flies. But you can’t touch that wheel. I’m sorry, Miss Elder, those are just the rules. You want to fly over the Atlantic, it’s my job to make sure you have a private pilot’s license. It’s a requirement.”
Ruth sighed harshly and showed not one hint of her battery of charm.
“Fine,” she conceded. “When?”
“You’ll need to schedule a physical exam first,” he said. “And then we will administer the skill test.”
Ruth looked him square in the eye.
“Mister,” she said, leaning a little bit forward, “I am twenty-three years old and I bet you I can outrun any man or dog on this airfield. I can touch my palms to the ground.”
Then, in an act of defiance, she did it.
“I can do a cartwheel,” she insisted, and as she spun like a star in the hangar, George thanked heaven she was wearing her knickers.
“And I can fly that plane,” she said, pointing at the aircraft that was going to make her famous.
“Great,” the inspector said. “Prove it. See you day after tomorrow.”
As soon as he had his back to Ruth, she stuck out her tongue and made a horrible face.
She turned and looked at George, her hands on her hips, then she stomped one foot.
“I don’t have lipstick on, do I, George?” she questioned angrily.
“No, you do not,” he replied, laughing to himself.
“Oh, I knew it!” she said, walking over to the plane and leaning her back against it with a slump. “It’s that Grayson. Mark my words. It’s Grayson. She’ll sabotage me any way she can. How else would that fellow know I didn’t take my test yet?”
“I’m sure he checked, Ruth,” George said. “You’ve been in the papers every single day since we got to Roosevelt Field. People want to know about you, and with that kind of coverage, nothing is going to go unnoticed, especially if you don’t have your pilot’s license. You should have taken it in Florida, anyway.”
“I know, I know,” she admitted. “I was just in such a hurry to get here. I thought we might be able to just take off without all of that nonsense.”
“Oh, Ruth,” he said, shaking his head. “Lipstick can’t solve everything.”
“Oh, George,” she mimicked. “Of course it can.”
* * *
If Grayson had turned Ruth in to the Department of Commerce, which regulated pilots’ licenses, as Ruth suspected she had, well, then, the girl who was sure she could outrun a dog was going to use it to her advantage. With Grayson hovering in the shadows of her own nearby hangar, Ruth loudly called for a press event the day after that, shouting as boldly as her lungs allowed, “Who wants to see Ruth Elder get her pilot’s license?”
If Grayson wanted to cause a spectacle, she was sure going to get one.
Ruth, without even doing a cartwheel, passed the physical with ease, and the next day the inspector showed up as promised with a clipboard and a pair of his own goggles.
Ruth, sporting deep-crimson lipstick, turned to him and said sweetly, “Oh, silly! You don’t need those. We have a closed cabin. With a heater. And a cigar lighter, if you like.”
Then she smiled, her curls bouncing under the lipstick-matching silk scarf around her head, what the press was now calling “Ruth Ribbons.”
“No, no, let’s take that one,” the inspector said, pointing to the plane Ruth trained on that Cornell had brought up from Dixie’s. Open double cockpit, not nearly as easy to handle, bearing a hand-painted sign that declared: Ruth Elder Pilot. It seemed so primitive compared to the American Girl. And wearing a flying cap was definitely going to mess up her hair.
“Great!” Ruth said, feigning enthusiasm. “I love that old plane.”
“I’m Frank, by the way,” he said, and extended a hand.
“Ruth Elder,” she offered, and returned his firm handshake.
“Well, let’s see what you got,” he said, and headed toward the old plane parked on the side of the hangar.
“Frank?” she called, and saw the inspector stop. “How about we take a picture for the boys first, just in case I’m as bad of a pilot as you think I am?”
She struck that signature Ruth smile and posed next to Frank Jerdone, whose picture would be on the front page of many papers the next day.
&nb
sp; “Come on, let’s go!” she said as she kept the smile and marched off toward the old plane with Frank following her.
Luckily, this was the same temperamental plane George had made her take off and land in so many times that Ruth knew all of the tricks of the craft and made it look smooth and easy. During the check ride, Frank the inspector requested that she tell him every preflight operation she was performing, and had her taxi, ascend, descend, and turn in almost every direction. He called out for instrument readings, such as altitude, and asked that she cruise at a normal speed and then at a slower one. He asked her to stall and recover from it, quizzed her on emergency procedures and equipment malfunctions, and finally had her make a crosswind landing, then a regular landing, after which the reporters cheered and gathered around the plane. Ruth pushed up her goggles and sat on the edge of her cockpit while Frank Jerdone leaned over and showed her the near-perfect score, then smiled for the cameras.
* * *
Mabel Boll had been spending a majority of her time in New York either sleeping in her Park Avenue town house; downing champagne and tapping her foot at the Cotton Club, where Duke Ellington was playing; drinking at the Plaza; or lunching at the Russian Tea Room. Thankfully, Jenny Dolly, one half of Broadway’s famous and remarkably untalented Dolly sisters, had been in the city for several months with a bit part in a musical brought over from London, so Sardi’s was the place to be until early in the morning.
What she hadn’t been doing was seeing Levine. He called every day, but Grace was watching his every move. Levine had lost his spark, it was worth noticing. Gone was his fire, and instead he whined about being home too late, going someplace where he might be photographed, or anything that might set Grace off to filing divorce papers again.
Crossing the Horizon Page 16
