by Janet Dailey
“I can’t say that I approve.”
“I’m not asking you to approve of what I’m doing. I’m asking if you’ll lease the manor house to me.”
After a long, considering look, Audra smiled softly, her eyes shining moistly. “I never could stand to see anything go to waste.”
Epilogue
A YEAR AND TWO MONTHS LATER,
HOUSTON POLO CLUB, HOUSTON, TEXAS
It was a sticky, humid Texas afternoon in May, and only a reluctant breeze stirred the heavy air. Standing alone on the grass sidelines away from the grandstand, Luz watched the white ball rolling parallel to the line toward her and the rider chasing it, his mount straining for every ounce of speed. With eyes hungry for detail, she studied the man in the saddle. Everything was so familiar about him; even if she hadn’t known Raul was playing in this exhibition match, she would have recognized him. But she had known.
The polo club had touted the ten-goal players who would be participating in the match being held in conjunction with the annual polo pony sale, and Raul was one of them. That’s why she had come to the game. Maybe it wasn’t fair to want to see him again after more than a year apart, but lately she’d been wondering if there was anything left between them. She had to find out. With four of her polo ponies consigned to tomorrow’s auction, she had the perfect opportunity.
She watched Raul guide his mount into position for a shot. His head came up, and she saw him take his eyes off the ball and, for a split second, look directly at her. The discovery splintered through her in little shock waves, but it was so brief that an instant later she thought she had imagined it. Then she saw him swing at the ball and miss an easy shot.
“Buchanan missed the ball. That’s something you aren’t going to see very often, ladies and gentlemen,” the announcer’s voice boomed over the loudspeakers. “But I guess it proves even ten-goal players can make mistakes.”
Raul had seen her, Luz realized. She had distracted him for an instant and thrown off the timing of his swing. A little hope sprang that maybe he’d want to see her. He reined in his horse and looked back at her. There was no one else around her, so she had to be the object of his gaze.
The play continued on the field with less than three minutes left in the game. After hesitating a split second longer, Raul wheeled his pony to pursue the play of the ball. Luz didn’t wait for the finish of the game. She started walking toward the end of the field, where a small pavilion stood, offering shelter to the players between chukkars.
When the final bell sounded, Luz stood beneath the shade of the awning and fingered the belt buckled around the waist of her slim four-pocket safari dress. She didn’t realize how nervous she was until she saw Raul riding off the field toward the pavilion. Dismounting at the picket line, he turned his horse over to the groom and shed his helmet, mallet, and knee guards, then picked up a towel to wipe the sweat from his face and neck. It was still in his hand when he walked toward her.
She was conscious of her heart-lift. He had changed so little, still a stirring sight in his white breeches and snug-fitting polo jersey, more tanned maybe, a few more lines, but his hair was just as dark and his eyes as blue as she remembered. She felt a little awkward being here like this, remembering the way she’d asked him to leave.
“Hello, Raul.”
“You are looking well, Luz.”
“Thank you.” She searched for words, trying to think of something else to say.
The other players rode by to their individual picket lines and called to Raul, some congratulating him for a well-played game and others chiding him for missing an easy shot. He acknowledged most of them with a curt nod, then reached to take Luz by the arm.
“Shall we walk?” he suggested.
“Yes.”
The pressure of his fingers on her arm was a pleasant sensation as he guided her away from the milling crowd of grooms, riders, horses, and bystanders. They walked toward the shade of the trees, where the initial preparations were underway for the traditional barbecue and dance to be held that evening under the club’s famous oak tree. Their steps slowed automatically when they reached the coolness of the shade. Luz was conscious of the silence that lay between them.
Raul broke it. “When did you leave Palm Beach? I heard this last winter that you had moved.”
“A little over a year ago. I live in Virginia now, at Hope-worth Farm. I’ve begun training polo ponies. That’s why I’m here.” One of the reasons, anyway. “I have consigned four ponies to tomorrow’s auction. So far I have two interested buyers who want to take some trial rides. I’m supposed to meet them at the barns in an hour.”
“You were always good at handling young horses.”
“It’s a pity I was never as good at handling other things,” Luz murmured ruefully, then glanced upward into the spreading branches of the big oak. “I almost wish they still held the auction here under this ancient oak instead of at the new sales pavilion. I always thought it was unique.”
“Hector said I should tell you the house is wearing its shawl of ivy. He hopes someday you will come and see how good it looks.”
“How is he?” She smiled, and inwardly wondered how much of that invitation Raul seconded.
“He is fine.”
“When I learned you were going to be here in Houston, I hoped I’d have the chance to see you. I wanted to congratulate you on obtaining your ten-goal rating. I know how much it meant to you.” She offered to shake hands with him, but he held her hand and studied it.
“It was not a fair trade, Luz. Losing you and receiving the ten,” he stated.
A tightness gripped her chest. “I wasn’t sure you’d want to see me again, Raul.”
“You were the one who asked me to go.”
“I needed time alone to think. I went from my ex-husband to you with hardly any time in between to solve the riddle of who or what I was, or what I wanted.” She studied his proud, rugged face, finding it so achingly familiar. “You see, I was raised to believe I was worth something only if I had a man. I’ve been totally on my own for a year now, and I’ve learned to like it. Now I know I’m a person in my own right. I have a value.”
“I could have told you that.”
“But I had to find out for myself,” she said, just as she ultimately had to accept that she couldn’t shoulder the blame for Rob’s death. It was unlikely she could have prevented it even if she had known.
“Now that you have, what will you do?” He continued to hold her hand.
“I’m not sure. Sometimes it’s difficult to pick up where you left off.” Unconsciously she held her breath.
“Not for me,” Raul told her. “I have not seen you for almost a year and a half, but my feelings for you are stronger than before. I love you, Luz.”
Slowly she smiled as tears misted her eyes. “We never did get around to saying that to each other, did we?” There was a faint shake of her head, almost disbelieving it could turn out this way. “Raul, you deserve someone who can give you a home and a family. You’re young enough. You still have time to raise children. I’m forty-four years old. I can’t give you sons and daughters.”
“Children are not what I want. You are.”
She didn’t bother to wait to hear any more as she went into his arms, at last needing him because she loved him.
POCKET STAR BOOKS
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SILVER WINGS, SANTIAGO BLUE
JANET DAILEY
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from Pocket Star Books
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Silver Wings, Santiago Blue….
Prologue
SHE SAT AMIDST a framework of canvas and piano wire, her long skirts tied around her knees and her legs extended full length in front of her. No doubt her thudding heart competed with the reverberations of the 30-horsepower motor spinning the two propellers. When the wire anchoring the Wright Brothers flying machine to a rock was unfastened, the Flyer was la
unched five stories into the air, and in that wildly exhilarating moment Edith Berg nearly forgot to hold on to her seat.
Beside her Wilbur Wright was at the controls, dressed in his customary high starched collar, gray suit and an automobile touring cap. The flight over the Hunaudières race track in Le Mans, France, lasted two minutes, three seconds, and Edith Berg entered the pages of aviation history as the first woman to ride in a flying machine. It was all a publicity stunt to promote the reliability of the new Wright Flyer, an idea concocted by her husband, Hart O. Berg, a sales representative for the Wright Brothers.
The year was 1908 and Edith Berg was an instant sensation, her courage and daring applauded. The press loved the stunt. The French shook their heads and whispered among themselves, “That crazy American woman! And imagine her husband’s letting her do it!”
She wore a stunning flying suit of plum-colored satin, from the hood covering her raven hair to her knickers and the cloth leggings, called puttees, which wrapped her legs from knee to ankle. It was understandable that the all-male members at the Aero Club of America’s headquarters on Long Island would look at twenty-seven-year-old Harriet Quimby with open mouths, especially when she asked to be licensed as an aeronaut—a woman! (The government had not gotten around to accepting responsibility for licensing pilots and wouldn’t until 1925.)
The green-eyed writer for Leslie’s Magazine suggested the members let her demonstrate her flying skills. With considerable skepticism they watched Harriet Quimby climb into her gossamer biplane and take off. She flew over a nearby potato field, then banked the plane back to the field and set her aircraft down within eight feet of her takeoff point—setting a new record for the club in landing accuracy.
The date was August 1, 1911, and Harriet Quimby became the first woman to be licensed as an aeronaut. In a wry comment to reporters she said, “Flying seems easier than voting.” Not until 1920 would the Nineteenth Amendment be ratified, giving women the right to vote.
She sat cross-legged in the doorway of the fuselage while the flame-red, tri-motored Fokker airplane with gold wings, the Friendship, floated on its pontoons in the harbor off Burry Port, Wales. Her short-cropped hair was the color of the dune grass on Kill Devil Hill, site of the Wright Brothers’ first powered flight.
Captain Hilton Railey rowed alongside the Friendship and shouted to her, “How does it feel to be the first woman to fly the Atlantic? Aren’t you excited?”
“It was a grand experience,” Amelia Earhart replied, but she knew she hadn’t flown the Atlantic. Bill Stultz had been the pilot and navigator on the flight. “I was just baggage. Someday I’ll try it alone.”
That was June 18, 1928.
Four years later, on May 21, 1932, Amelia Earhart landed her red 500-horsepower Lockheed Vega in a farm meadow outside of Londonderry, Ireland. Exhausted, she crawled out of the cockpit and said to the staring farmhand, “I’ve come from America.” It was five years after Lindbergh had made his Atlantic crossing.
On January 12, 1935, Amelia Earhart accomplished another first in aviation history by becoming the first pilot, male or female, to successfully fly from Hawaii to the continental United States, landing her Vega at Oakland Airport in California. That feat was immediately followed by the first non-stop flight to Mexico City, then from Mexico City to New York.
As a women’s career counselor at Purdue University in Indiana, Amelia Earhart advised a group of female students, “A girl must nowadays believe completely in herself as an individual. She must realize at the outset that a woman must do the same job better than a man to get as much credit for it. She must be aware of the various discriminations, both legal and traditional, against women in the business world.”
Amelia had already encountered them in 1929 when Transcontinental Air Transport, later to become Trans World Airlines, asked her to become a consultant for them along with Lindbergh. While he flew around the country checking out new air routes, she traveled as a passenger, talking with women and lecturing various women’s clubs on the safety and enjoyment of flying.
At the Bendix Transcontinental Air Race in May of 1935, Amelia Earhart had the chance to meet newcomer Jacqueline Cochran, whose story would rival any tale by Dickens. As an orphan, her birth date and parents unknown, she was raised by foster parents in the lumber towns of northern Florida. It was a hardscrabble existence, and little Jacqueline often went shoeless. When she was eight years old, her foster family moved to Columbus, Georgia, to work in the local cotton mills, and Jackie worked, too, on the twelve-hour night shift. A year later, she had charge of fifteen children in the fabric inspection room.
She left the cotton mill to go to work for the owner of a beauty shop, doing odd jobs. A beauty operator at the age of thirteen, Jackie was one of the first to learn the technique of giving a permanent wave. She began traveling to demonstrate the technique in salons through Alabama and Florida, until a customer persuaded her to go to a nursing school even though she only had two years of formal education.
As a nurse, she worked for a country doctor in Bonifay, Florida, a lumber town, so much like the places where she’d been raised. A short time later, after delivering a baby under wretched conditions, she abandoned her nursing career and went back to the beauty business. She became a stylist for Antoine’s at Saks Fifth Avenue, both in his New York and Miami salons. In 1932, at a Miami club, Jacqueline Cochran met Floyd Bostwick Odium, a millionaire and a Wall Street financier. She told him of her dream to start her own cosmetics company. Odium advised her that to get ahead of her competition and to cover the kind of necessary territory she would need wings. Jackie used her vacation that year to obtain a pilot’s license, and subsequently the equivalent of a U.S. Navy flight training course.
At the same time that Jacqueline Cochran Cosmetics, Incorporated, was born with Odium’s help, Jacqueline Cochran aviatrix came into existence. In 1934, this striking brown-eyed blonde made her debut in air-racing circles with the England-Australia competition. Engine troubles forced her to land in Bucharest, Rumania.
In the Bendix Transcontinental Air Race of 1935 which saw both Earhart and Cochran competing, Earhart took off in the middle of the night with the rest of the starters. Cochran’s Northrop Gamma was next on the ramp for takeoff, when a heavy fog rolled over the Los Angeles airport. The plane ahead of her roared down the runway and disappeared into the thick mist. The sound of a distant explosion was immediately followed by an eerie light that backlit the fog. Her reaction was instinctive, her nurse’s training taking over. Jackie jumped in her car and followed the fire truck down the runway. Both arrived too late to do the pilot any good. By the time the fire was put out, the pilot was dead.
Jackie stood beside her aircraft while the tow truck dragged the burned and twisted wreckage off the runway. The fatal crash left everyone a little stunned, including her. A government aviation official was standing not far away from her and she heard him say he thought it was suicide to take off in that fog. The realization that she was next in line sent her running behind the hangar so no one would see her when she vomited.
When her legs quit shaking, she placed a long-distance call to New York and talked to her ardent backer and now her fiancé as well, Floyd Odium. “What should I do?”
But Odium couldn’t tell her, ultimately advising her that it came down to “a philosophy of life.” At three o’clock that morning, Jacqueline Cochran made a blind takeoff, her fuel heavy aircraft barely clearing the outer fence which ripped off the radio antenna hanging below the plane’s belly. She spiraled up through the fog, flying by compass only, to gain altitude to clear the seven-thousand-foot mountains inland from the coast.
Amelia Earhart came in fifth in the race, but an overheated engine and dangerous vibrations in the tail of the Northrop Gamma forced Jackie back to the starting line at Los Angeles.
May 10, 1936, was the wedding day for the slim-built, sandy-haired Floyd Odium and the glamorous and gutsy blonde Jacqueline Cochran. The homes she’d never had as
a child became a reality as they purchased an estate in Connecticut, a ranch near Palm Springs, and an apartment in Manhattan overlooking the East River. Aviation had long been a love of Odlum’s, so his interest went beyond being merely a supporter of his wife’s career. Among his many holdings were the Curtiss-Wright Corporation and the Convair Aircraft Company. So it wasn’t surprising that the Odlums helped finance Amelia Earhart’s around-the-world flight.
On June 1, 1937, they were in Miami to see her off on that last, fateful trip. Before she left, Amelia gave Jacqueline a small American flag made of silk—which became a symbolic “transfer of the flag,” in military jargon, when Amelia Earhart vanished without a trace. Speaking at a tribute to the famous woman aviator, Jacqueline said, “If her last flight was into eternity, one can mourn her loss but not regret her effort. Amelia did not lose, for her last flight was endless. In a relay race of progress, she had merely placed the torch in the hands of others to carry on to the next goal and from there on and on forever.”
That year, Jacqueline Cochran won the women’s purse in the Bendix Air Race and finished third overall. On December 4, 1937, she set a national speed record, traveling from New York to Miami in four hours and twelve minutes, bettering the previous time set by the millionaire race pilot Howard Hughes. The following year, Jacqueline Cochran won the Bendix Race, covering the distance of 2,042 miles in eight hours, ten minutes and thirty-one seconds—nonstop! Her plane was the P-35, a sleek, low-winged military pursuit-type aircraft. She set a new cross-country record for women, and in 1939 broke the women’s altitude record. She received her second Harmon Trophy, the highest award given to any aviator in America, presented to her in June by the First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt. She kept flying, setting records, and testing new designs and new equipment.
