by Anne Stuart
He wouldn't drop it, of course. "It's out of respect for the affection I had for your father that I come to you, Angie. I wanted to warn you about one of your employees."
Angela's eyes flew open. What was the old scoundrel up to now? "Which one?"
Olker shook his head. "I'm not going to spell it out for you. A smart cookie like you can figure these things out. I just thought I'd drop you a little hint. One of your employees isn't what he says he is."
"Is anybody?" she countered.
Olker's fat face creased in malice. "I'm talking about running from the law, Angie. I'm talking about you maybe losing your license if the wrong people find out he's working for you. I'm talking about you maybe losing your life if the wrong people find out he's working for you."
Angela's back stiffened in sudden outrage. "I'm not going to listen to your threats, Charlie. There's nothing you'd like better than for me to lose my license, and deep down I don't think you'd give a damn if my life went along with it. So you go and tell anyone you please about the mystery crook who's working for me, and I'll deal with the consequences when they come. Unless you want to be straight with me."
Charlie's little pig eyes were dark with anger in his thick suet-pudding face. "I don't give nothing away," he said, sticking his thick, smelly cigar back in his mouth.
"Just threats and intimidations," Angela said. "Get your nasty cigar and your nasty face out of here, Charlie. Next time you set your fat shadow on my place, I'll be the one to call in the law."
"You'll be sorry, Angie," Charlie said, tossing his cigar away. Tossing it in the direction of an oil spill on the cement floor.
Sparks was ahead of him, stamping it out before disaster exploded in their face. "You heard the lady, Olker. Get out."
"Mighty bold, aren't you? I'm just wondering where her other brave employees are. Afraid to face me." With a chuckle that sounded more like a wheeze, Charlie lumbered out of the building.
Angela didn't move for a moment. "Maybe we should call the fumigators," she said in a meditative tone.
"You were swell, Angie. Simply grand," Sparks said. "Boy, the look on his face when you told him to take his fat shadow out of here was priceless."
"He had a point, though. Where are the others? Clancy and Parsons? I would have thought Clancy would have shown him the door the moment he showed his ugly face around here." She headed toward her office, expecting Sparks to follow.
He stayed put, clearing his throat nervously. "Uh, Parsons was working on the Percival. He said he didn't like arguments and he was going to keep low."
"That's fine." She dismissed him without a second thought. "All right, Sparks, spill it. Where's Clancy?"
"Gone."
For a moment Sparks's words didn't register. "Where?"
"To New York. I think he took the morning train, as near as I can tell."
"That's right, his plane was coming in by freighter some time today." Disappointment warred with relief. "What's the big deal, Sparks? We knew he was going to get it."
"Yeah, but we'd talked about me flying him east to pick it up."
"So he decided to take the train. A man's entitled to change his mind." Something about Sparks's miserable expression penetrated her determined optimism. "What is it, Sparks? What haven't you told me? Did he clean out the safe before he went?"
That stung Sparks into talking. "Of course he didn't. The guy might be a louse, but he's not that big of a louse."
"Okay, Sparks, drop the other shoe," she said with growing impatience tinged with dread.
"He cleared out everything else. His extra clothes, his charts, his tools. Everything's gone. I went by Tony's, to check his rooms, and everything's gone from there, too. He's taken a powder, Angie. He ain't coming back."
Angela took a deep breath, telling herself it didn't matter, telling herself that it was heartburn from her hangover tearing up her insides and nothing else. "All right," she said slowly. "We can deal with that. What flights have we got scheduled?"
"A lot. The work's really picked up since Clancy flew that shipment to Detroit a couple of weeks ago. People learned we can carry through with what we say we'll do."
"And we still will. Bring in the schedule and we'll see what we can do. I'll need to free up a few days as soon as I can, but I guess we can be flexible."
"You planning something, Angie? Clancy said you were, but you never said anything to me. I couldn't believe you'd confide in him and not tell me."
"I'm planning something. And the only person I talked to about it was Parsons. A flier can't keep secrets from her mechanic, can she?"
"A flier shouldn't keep secrets from her best friend, either. It's the Newfoundland-to-Havana run, isn't it?"
"Not hard to guess. I didn't know it was so obvious."
"It wouldn't be to someone who wasn't around when Ramsey bought it. I figured you'd be trying it sooner or later. I just hoped you'd forgotten about it."
"It's not that dangerous a run," Angela protested.
"It's over a hell of a lot of open water." Will Parsons appeared from the darkened hangar. "Why don't you just try for the coast-to-coast record?"
"Flying to break records is always dangerous. Hell, flying is dangerous," Angela said.
"Watch your language, missy," Parsons reproved.
"Stop sounding like a father," Angela shot back, ignoring the old man's sudden wince. "I'll say anything I damned well please. And I'm not changing my mind about this flight. I'm past the point where I want to fly all over the country just to break records. This is just something I have to do, and I don't have to explain it to anyone!"
"Sure, Angie," Sparks said.
But she'd already gone, storming past the two men into her office and slamming the door behind her. The day had gone from bad to worse, but at least one good thing had come from it. Clancy was gone, and she was damned glad of it. Damned glad, she repeated to herself, casting a mutinous glare toward the hangar and Parsons's reproving figure.
She sank down at her desk, leaning back in the oak swivel chair and closing her eyes. A second later she sat forward again, staring at the top of her cluttered desk.
There were her silver evening sandals, her heels encrusted with mud. Beside them lay her gloves and the slightly crumpled check from Cousin Clement.
She hadn't even realized it wasn't still in her possession. She stared at it, horror filling her as she realized how close she came to letting it all slip through her fingers, and all over some man who wasn't worth spit.
There was a note beneath her shoes, brief and to the point. His handwriting was distinctive, thick slashes that reminded her of the way he talked, the way he moved, quick and definite.
Don't make that flight, Red. Breaking records is for suckers.
She crumpled up the note in her hand and tossed it into the wastebasket. "Trusting people like you is for suckers, Clancy," she informed the trash. "You can read about it in the papers." And very carefully she smoothed the wrinkled check, concentrating on it. It took all her indignation to keep from diving into the wastebasket and picking Clancy's note out. He was gone, out of her life for good. The sooner she started appreciating that fact, the better.
*
Clancy had never bothered to name his plane. He'd been superstitious about it. The twin-engine Fokker was the fourth airplane he'd owned, and he'd named all the others. They'd all crashed with him aboard. Some superstitious part of him told him that as long as he didn't name the Fokker, he'd be safe.
She was in sorry shape, though, one of her wings damaged, her Wasp engines a mess, her Sperry autopilot nonfunctioning and the radio shot. He had her trucked to a tiny airport on Long Island, and while he looked her over, he wondered why he'd bothered to spend the money having her shipped up from South America. It might have made more sense to simply cut his losses and go from there. He'd have no trouble picking up the kind of lucrative work that would enable him to buy a new plane in no time at all.
Instead, he'd gone to work for a
penny-ante operation for a fraction of what he could have gotten anywhere else, suckered by a pair of blue eyes and a hard-luck story Angela was too proud to tell him.
It was the same with the Fokker. She was a beautiful lady, down on her luck right now, but he couldn't see putting her out to pasture. She deserved a break just as much as Angela Hogan did.
He just wished he could forget about Angela. He'd put her behind him, along with his quixotic gesture of taking her safely home that last night, but when he least expected it, she'd come back to haunt him.
He couldn't even manage to drum up any interest in the local female talent around Long Island and Manhattan. Some of them looked like Angela, but they didn't talk like her, didn't have her quick intelligence or fierce determination. He gave up trying, gave up doing anything but working on his plane with the local mechanic, a decent enough boy without Parsons's intuitive brilliance.
Clancy left Angela in a hell of a mess, whether she knew it or not. Things were going to come crashing down on that pretty little head of hers, people that she trusted were going to betray her. While she kept planning her fool stunt of a flight, the very people she needed to count on were lying to her.
He wished he could have warned her, but no one likes the bearer of bad news. It would have been a case of shoot the messenger. Besides, Angela was determined to handle things her own way, and the smartest move he ever made was to get away from her and let her do just that. She wouldn't want him interfering in her life, giving her advice. She was probably dancing for joy that he'd taken off.
It took longer than he expected to get the Fokker in decent working shape. Longer, and more money. By the time she was ready to fly again, he was flat broke. He knew what he wanted to do. Now that the Pacific Ocean had been conquered, the fledgling airlines were getting ready to start transatlantic flights. He wanted to be there. He wanted to fly DC 3s, probably the sweetest of the bigger planes; he wanted to conquer the dark, dangerous Atlantic until it was no more important than a puddle. He had the talent and he had the contacts. All he had to do was make the call and the future would be in his hand.
The damnable thing about it was, he wasn't ready. Three times he picked up the phone to call New York. Twice he hung up. The third time he started giving the operator the Chicago exchange before he chickened out. After that he knew.
He wasn't going to start flying the big ones until he took care of unfinished business. Angela Hogan wouldn't go away, even though he'd tried to wipe her out of his brain. The only thing left for him to do was go back, clean up the mess that was about to descend on her chestnut head and say goodbye. Maybe then he could get on with his life.
On Friday morning, June 8, he took off for Chicago with his newly refurbished Fokker purring like a well-fed kitten. And on her fuselage was a name printed in bright red letters. Angel.
*
"What the hell do you want?" Angela snarled as Parsons poked his head in the door.
"Watch your language, girly," he said mildly enough. "You've been like a bear with a sore paw the last few days."
"I'm tired," she said, recognizing the defensive note in her voice but unable to do anything about it. "Who wouldn't be with the schedule we've been following? Trust Clancy to leave us in the lurch like that."
"You miss him, don't you?"
She stubbed out her cigarette. "I miss having another pilot around that I can trust. Period."
"If you say so. I can find you another one."
She stared at him, trying to pierce through the thick glasses to read his expression. "You can?"
"I have contacts. People who aren't afraid of the likes of Charlie Olker. Good fliers who're tired of barnstorming and would appreciate a decent berth. All I have to do is make a few phone calls. That is, if Clancy isn't coming back."
She refused to allow herself a moment of hope. "He's not coming back," she said flatly.
"Then should I make those phone calls? You're going to need backup if you want to make that flight."
She knew he was right. Knew she had no reason to procrastinate. "Tomorrow," she said.
She couldn't tell with his full beard, but she thought the old man might be smiling. "Tomorrow," he echoed. "I'll check with you first."
God, was she so transparent? It was a waste of energy to keep denying it. "Check with me tomorrow," she agreed with a rueful smile. "You still haven't told me what you came in here for. Anything up?"
"Your sister's asking for you."
"Constance? What's she doing here in the middle of the day? She's supposed to be working. Even jobs at Woolworth's are hard to come by nowadays."
"I don't know. But she's crying her eyes out on Sparks's shoulder right this minute."
"Oh, God," Angela gasped, leaping from her chair.
"Watch your language," Parsons muttered as she raced past him out into the hangar.
The sight that met her eyes was momentarily terrifying. Constance was enfolded in Sparks's burly arms, sobbing loudly. Her flowered dress was bedecked with a black arm band of mourning, and Sparks's expression was equally grim.
Clancy, Angela thought, her mind immediately jumping to the one person who'd claimed it for the last few days, few weeks. She ran across the cement floor of the hangar, her booted feet ringing loudly, telling herself it couldn't be him, that Constance wouldn't be crying over a man she'd scarcely met,
"What in heaven's name has happened?" she cried breathlessly.
"Oh, Angie!" Constance wailed, releasing Sparks and flinging herself in Angela's arms. "Such a tragedy! Too young to die. Too young!"
Angela put her arms around Constance's hysterical figure, looking to Sparks for guidance. Belatedly she realized it wasn't grief creasing his rough-hewn face, it was discomfort. "What's happened?" Angela asked again, more calmly now. "Who crashed?"
Constance lifted her tear-stained face indignantly. "Is that all you ever think about? Your stupid airplanes? No one crashed."
Relief flooded her. "Then who died?" she asked evenly.
"Jean Harlow!" Constance wailed.
"Jean Harlow?" Angela echoed blankly. "The actress?"
Constance simply cried louder, and it took all of Angela's self-control not to give her weeping little sister a good hard shake. "That's...a real shame," she said instead, forcing herself to sound sympathetic.
"You ever meet this Harlow dame?" Sparks demanded, still confused.
"Of course not!" Constance said damply. "I just worshipped her from afar."
"So did I," Sparks said with the faint trace of a leer.
"Oh, you men!" Constance dismissed him. "I'm so unhappy, Angie. I had to leave work when I heard about it."
Angela cast about in her mind for something soothing to say. "Well, why don't you take the car and go home and have a nice cup of soup and a nap? You'll feel better afterward."
"You're so strong, Angie. So brave."
Angela controlled her irritation. "Look at it this way, Constance. You'll simply have to go to Hollywood and take her place as the blond bombshell."
She expected at least the trace of a laugh from her watery sister. Instead Constance nodded, intent. "You're right, Angela. You always know the right thing to say."
The tight rein Angela was keeping on her recently volatile temper was coming close to snapping when Parsons suddenly appeared from the doorway of the hangar. "I don't suppose any of you noticed, but there's a bright red twin-engine Fokker circling overhead. Looks like he's getting ready to land, but I haven't been able to raise him on the radio."
Angela released her sister abruptly. "Isn't Clancy's plane a...?"
"Yup."
She moved to the door, peering out into the cloudless June sky. It was Clancy, all right, she knew it in her soul, in her blood. No one flew like that, with just that combination of grace and daring. She turned away, afraid the others would notice her reaction. "I'm going back to the office. I've got work to do and I've already wasted enough time. Let me know who it is when they land," she said calmly
.
There was no missing Parsons's grin this time. "Sure thing, Angie. Shall we tell Clancy you missed him?"
"I'll cut your heart out," she said calmly, and turned on her heel, ignoring her tearful sister, stomping back toward her office without checking to make sure Clancy landed safely. He didn't dare crash. She'd kill him if he did. She was probably going to kill him anyway, but she wanted him in one piece for the execution.
Chapter Fourteen
Angela turned up the radio, loud. It was Artie Shaw's orchestra playing "The Man I Love," not the best song to blast through her untidy office, but she didn't have much choice. If she'd turned to another station, like WLS, she could have ended up with another rendition of "Harbor Lights." Or, even worse, Bunny Berigan singing "I Can't Get Started."
She smoked four cigarettes, one after another. She shuffled twelve bills, wrote checks for three of them and then had to tear them up. She listened to the news, including the latest flash about Jean Harlow's death and the Duke of Windsor's honeymoon in Venice with his American bride. She listened to F.D.R.'s latest plan for economic recovery, she listened to the Andrews Sisters singing about Ovaltine. And she waited for Clancy.
She smoked three more cigarettes, until her throat was raw and her eyes stung and smoke hung heavy in the crowded office. She wrote two more checks, ripped them up, tried balancing her checkbook and came out two dollars and fifty-three cents in the red. She tried again and came out with three dollars plus change in the black. She slammed her checkbook shut, changed the station on the radio and listened to "Amy Andrews, Girl Reporter." And she waited for Clancy.
Two hours later Sparks poked his head in the door. "We're heading over to Tony's. Wanna come?"
"Where's Constance?" She didn't look up from the girdle advertisement she was studying. What she meant was, where's Clancy?
But Sparks never was very good at reading her mind. "She went home hours ago to enjoy a period of mourning. She took the car, by the way."
