A Diamond in the Rough

by Marilyn Land

  “The account was actually acquired during the time Paul and I were in London after my father passed away. When we returned, he had hired three additional men in order to keep up with demand. I don’t recall exactly when the account was closed, but I am certain it was before Sidney died.”

  Jake rose to leave. “I’m sorry for your loss. I had no idea you and Paul were living in London or I would have tried to get in touch with you sooner. Thank you for seeing me and spending so much time with me. I really appreciate it.”

  He was deep in thought as he drove home. It had been years; the mystery of to whom they belong remained. Other than Phil Zeller, he knew of no one else who had known his uncles; no one who could shed any light on the diamonds. With no one left to answer his questions, how could he possibly see that the diamonds ended up with whom they belong?

  Phil Zeller did, however, verify his original thought that Ben and Sidney had cut and polished, if not all, a good portion of the diamonds.

  The United Kingdom’s initial interest in space was primarily military as was the case with other post-war space faring nations. The British government having obtained much of their rocketry knowledge from captured German scientists, performed the earliest post-war tests on captured V-2 rockets in Operation Backfire. Beginning in 1962, the Ariel program developed six satellites, all of which were launched by NASA.

  In November 1960, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was elected President of the United States. His proclamation: From Dream to Reality in 10 Years before a joint session of Congress on 25 May 1961, set the stage for an astounding time in America’s emerging space program.

  First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal before this decade is out of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth.

  The goal, fueled by competition with the Soviet Union was dubbed The Space Race. What was to ultimately become Kennedy Space Center grew from a testing ground for new rockets to a center successful at launching humans to the moon and back. Neil Armstrong’s one small step on the lunar surface in 1969 achieved a goal that sounded like science fiction just a few years earlier.

  At the dawn of the decade, the two-year old space agency was launching rockets along the east coast of Florida. Project Mercury already underway launched the first American, Alan Shepard, on a suborbital flight 5 May 1961—just a few weeks before President Kennedy’s bold proclamation. On 20 February 1962, John Glenn lifted off from Launch Complex 14 aboard an Atlas rocket to become the first American to orbit Earth.

  Zoe’s interest in aviation skyrocketed. She read each and every article on space exploration she could get her hands on. She followed America’s space program with great interest, and often discussed each new achievement by the American astronauts with Jake.

  America and Zoe had a new set of heroes—the Mercury 7 Astronauts.

  Zoe was not the only Lyons sibling who had a passion for flying; Adam had become just as avid. Harry enjoyed going on family holidays with Jake as their pilot, but he was more into sports, soccer in particular. He made the school team and led them to their first championship in recent years.

  They did, however, share a love for the game of tennis, which grew into a friendly competition that would last throughout their lives. The twins had their father’s blond hair and deep blue eyes, which were not in the least wasted on the young admirers they met at school dances; both were quite popular with the girls.

  In September 1961, two days after her birthday, Zoe earned her wings. They celebrated with a big dinner at the house.

  The following June, Zoe graduated at the top of her class. In August, Jake and Lexi accompanied her to the States where she became a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. With a degree in Aerospace and Aeronautical Engineering the possibility of becoming an Astronaut was good.

  From 1960 to 1962, twenty-five women reported to Lovelace Clinic, the aviation medicine hub that tested America’s first astronauts for Mercury 7. All of the women were professional pilots, several of whom ranked among the most distinguished pilots of their time; they underwent the same stringent tests endured by the men and many outperformed the Mercury 7.

  Those who passed the test were dubbed the First Lady Astronaut Trainees (FLATS)—the Mercury 13. Just days before reporting to the Naval Aviation Center in Pensacola, Florida, the women received telegrams canceling their training.

  In July 1962, they testified before a special subcommittee of the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, but the panel decided that training female astronauts would hurt the space program. The FLATS never flew in space.

  16 June 1963, Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space. She spent more time in space than all of the astronauts of NASA’s Mercury program combined.

  It would take twenty years and almost to the day, 19 June 1983, for the second woman to fly in space. Sally K. Ride became America’s first women astronaut, serving as a mission specialist on the Shuttle’s seventh mission.

  For the Lyons family, September was a month of celebration after celebration. It was Zoe’s eighteenth birthday; Harry and Adam turned thirteen. Their Bar Mitzvah was held at the new London Conservative Synagogue that had recently opened, and they hosted a lavish party at night for the adults and young people combined. Zoe flew home on Friday returning to school on Sunday in time for classes on Monday.

  When Adam turned fourteen, Jake gave him the same option he had given Zoe, his choice of instructors. He chose his father. Although he had flown with Zoe far more than he had with Adam, he was an excellent student. Like his sister before him, he knew the instrument panel, as well as the basics; he too having asked a million questions when they flew together.

  Harry had no interest in learning to fly. He was, however, quite interested in becoming a physician. He was fascinated by the strides that were being made in transplants—the human heart in particular. He decided he wanted to become a Cardiologist.

  For much of recorded history, doctors saw the human heart as the inscrutable, throbbing seat of the soul, an agent too delicate to meddle with. This way of thinking changed with World War II. Dr. Dwight Harken, a young Army surgeon managed to remove shrapnel and bullets from some 130 soldiers’ chests without killing one.

  Buoyed by such successes in the postwar years, rapid advances in heart treatments laid the groundwork for open-heart surgery; ultimately by the 1960s, surgeons were ready to tackle hearts too far gone for repair with transplants.

  In 1964, a team of surgeons in Jackson, Mississippi, performed the first animal-to-human heart transplant on record—a chimpanzee’s heart into a dying man’s chest. It beat for an hour and a half but proved too small to keep him alive.

  By 1967, at least four surgeons were poised to try. On December 3rd, Dr. Christiaan Bernard of South Africa got there first, sewing the heart of a young woman killed in a car accident into the chest of a middle-aged man. After four hours of surgery, a single jolt of electricity started it beating. The patient survived the operation, but the immunosuppressant drugs used to keep his body from rejecting the new organ weakened him. Eighteen days after the operation, he succumbed to pneumonia.

  Dr. Christiaan Bernard, one in the same, who cared for Franz Schiller at Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town, South Africa, when he was an intern.

  June 1967, the Lyons family flew to Boston for Zoe’s graduation from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. Over lunch, she disclosed her plans were to come home to London for a month before returning to the States, having accepted a position with NASA in Houston, Texas. Although it had nothing to do with becoming an astronaut, she was over the moon.

  Lexi was happy for Zoe and tried not to show her disappointment. She had so looked forward to having her closer to home and spending mother-daughter time together again. Jake did not see it that way. He was so proud of her and the fact that she had
landed a job with NASA that distance was not a factor. After all, he could get on a plane, and in a few short hours be seated across from her at dinner; he planned to do just that. Three months later in September, Adam became the third licensed pilot in the Lyons family.

  Under Jake’s leadership, Eagle Aerodrome continued to grow and expand, while Joe ran the day-to-day business operations. Tommy Butler found his niche and was in charge of the flight school. Lexi, recruited to join a team researching and developing new inoculations for common childhood diseases, accepted and gave up her position as head of Pediatric Nursing at the hospital.

  They could not believe that time was passing so quickly. It seemed as though they awoke one day and their children were suddenly grown. The twins graduated in June and September saw them off to Cambridge University, the second oldest University in the English-speaking world regarded as one of the world’s top five institutions of higher learning.

  Considered the top medical school in the UK, Harry had applied and was accepted as a pre-med student, following in the footsteps of his grandfather Manny Portman, and his uncles Mark and Sam who had also attended Cambridge.

  Considered the top Aeronautical Engineering School in the UK, as well, Adam applied and was accepted. With Zoe in America, Jake and Lexi were secretly pleased that the boys were staying closer to home.

  Where had all the years gone? By the end of the decade, they chided each other about being an old married couple, although they were not yet fifty. They were content with their life, and came to view their empty nest situation as a good thing. With the children no longer living at home, Jake and Lexi found themselves spending more and more time at the cottage in the Cotswolds. For the first time in their marriage, they found themselves alone, just the two of them.

  News from Zoe was good; she loved her job at the Space Center, and she was seeing someone; someone she promised to bring to London on her next holiday so they could meet him. His name was David Handler.

  With Lexi no longer tied to erratic hospital shifts, and Jake’s time at Eagle coinciding with hers, they eagerly took advantage of the freed up time they now had. They flew together whenever the weather allowed, laughed together, prepared dinner together, and acted more like newlyweds than a long married couple.

  They made plans for the future; they decided the time had come to travel more. There was a lot of world out there they hadn’t seen. Lexi wanted to take Jake to Israel; Jake wanted to take Lexi to South Africa. They had never visited Europe, and there were a whole lot of States in America they hadn’t visited including the great State of Texas.

  British Airways Concorde made just under 50,000 flights and flew more than two and a half million passengers supersonically. In November 1986, a Concorde flew around the world, covering 28,238 miles in 29 hours, 59 minutes.

  Concorde used the most powerful pure jet engines flying commercially. The Aircraft’s four engines took advantage of what is known as reheat technology, adding fuel to the final stage of the engine, which produced the extra power required for takeoff and the transition to supersonic flight.

  Concorde’s fastest transatlantic crossing was on 7 February 1996 when it completed the New York to London flight in 2 hours 52 minutes and 59 seconds.

  A team of 250 British Airways’ engineers worked tirelessly, together with the relevant authorities, to ensure safety on board and Concorde was subjected to 5,000 hours of testing before it was first certified for passenger flight, making it the most tested aircraft ever.

  In April 1998 for their Fiftieth Anniversary, Zoe, Harry, and Adam booked Jake and Lexi on the Concorde from London’s Heathrow Airport to New York’s JFK where the entire Lyons Clan gathered to celebrate.

  On 24 October 2003, British Airways withdrew Concorde, bringing to a close the world’s only supersonic passenger service.

  PART FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  His eyes came to rest on the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. Her flaming red hair came to her shoulders, framing her face and accenting her blue-gray eyes that seemed to be looking directly at him. He wanted to look away; he tried to look away; but he was mesmerized. It seemed like forever, as he stood caught in her gaze.

  There were no symptoms until the cancer had reached an advanced stage and spread to other parts of her body. She first noticed that she was losing weight but attributed it to her recent lack of appetite and her busy schedule organizing plans for their annual family holiday.

  From believing he was the last surviving Lyons to reuniting with Lexi and their daughter, the family had grown to twenty-six. The children and their spouses had blessed them with eight grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

  Many years had passed since Jake declared the last week of December the annual gathering of the Lyons Clan for all to be together welcoming in the New Year, and it quickly became their family tradition. No matter where they were or what was going on in their lives, it was their mandate; no one dared to disappoint them by not showing up.

  Jake and Lexi planned each get-together, and they seemed to get better every year as they celebrated all over the globe. The choice of New York City was a hit with everyone. Despite having returned from a week of non-stop festivities that included fabulous meals, high calorie desserts, and snacks galore, her clothes hung loosely on her thin frame; the scale confirmed her fears that she continued to lose weight.

  Her annual physical was scheduled for month’s end. She rang up the doctor’s office and arranged for blood work prior to the visit as she normally did. Receiving a call from his office days later, she learned he had scheduled her for an MRI at the hospital.

  When the day of her appointment arrived, Jake accompanied her. They planned to make a day of it by having lunch in the City. When Dr. Whitman asked to speak with them after the examination, they grew apprehensive. The news he delivered was not good.

  She was diagnosed with Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer. Having spread to the liver, it was inoperable. She could opt to have chemo treatments, but it would only buy her a few months at best, and her quality of life for whatever time she had would more likely deteriorate than improve.

  Dr. Whitman leaned back in his chair. “Throughout my career as a physician as much as I cherish helping people, I detest delivering devastating news. I’ve known you both a long time, and I want you to know that my recommendations to you are the same I would give my family.

  “I would pass on Chemo; the side effects are more often worse than the progression of the cancer. As a nurse, I don’t know how much exposure you’ve had to cancer patients, but each case is different. I would estimate that you have three to six months with no treatment. Use that time for you, Jake, and your family with a clear mind for as long as you can.

  “I would like you to come to the office in two weeks so we can monitor you; we’ll make the visits closer when I feel it necessary.”

  They left Dr. Whitman’s office hand in hand neither speaking.

  When Jake headed towards where they had parked the car, Lexi stopped. “Where are we going for lunch? You’re not trying to get out of wining and dining me, are you?”

  Jake couldn’t help smiling; Lexi was still Lexi. “Never! Your wish is my command; where to Lady Lyons?”

  They had lunch at the Savoy. Somehow, they seemed to gravitate to the place that eternally united them. Afterwards, they walked around London, stopping at the Tea Shoppe where Jake had found her and Zoe, or as Zoe put it, she and Lexi had found Daddy. It was still there after all these years. A breeze had picked up and the air had grown chilly; they decided to head to the car and drive back to the cottage.

  There were no tears; Lexi wouldn’t hear of it. They agreed to take time for themselves doing all their favorite things and thinking things through. They clung to each other making love night after night. They laughed and joked as they recalled so many wonderful times, and thanked God for their family. They felt blessed
.

  While on holiday, they learned that Zoe and her husband David were moving to England. Their two sons, both married with children of their own were remaining in the States. Since they were due to arrive in early February to look for a place to live, it seemed a good time to tell the children. Telling them in person was important; they had recently been together before they learned she was sick, but Lexi preferred to speak to them face-to-face so they could see that she had come to terms with the devastating news.

  At times, it was hard to believe that Lexi was dying. She had stopped losing weight, and although she had no appetite, she found herself eating at least some of the various offerings Jake placed in front of her. He plied her with proteins, vegetables, and best of all calorie-laden desserts in an effort to maintain her weight and possibly gain a little.

  Two weeks had passed, and her appointment with Dr. Whitman went well. He confirmed that her weight was holding steady, her coloring was good, and her latest MRI showed very little progression of the cancer. He inquired if she was eating regularly; if she was experiencing pain; if she was sleeping well; if she was tired. She answered, “No. No. Yes. No.”

  They left the doctor’s office, and suddenly Jake turned and picked her up in his arms and twirled her around. “I would say that was a good visit, a positive visit, a visit that needs to be celebrated. I have a surprise for you that I have to admit, I planned in advance simply because I Love You Lexi Portman Lyons; I’ve always loved you; I always will.”

  He had booked a suite at the Savoy for the night. Dinner reservations at the newly opened Polpetto; tickets at Charing Cross Theatre to see A Tale of Two Cities Musical, and a stop at the Tea Shoppe just for the two of them; it was perfect. They walked back to the hotel, Jake’s arm pulling her close protecting her from the chill in the air. They were happy; they were content; they were Jake and Lexi.