Girl with Wings

by Jennifer Bradley

  When Jessica’s mother came home and heard about the swaggie, she said, “Your Gran’s right. Times are getting tougher. We’re all right here on the farm. We’ve got most of the food we need on hand. But some people have nothing. I’ve just been to see Sammy Lee and I’m going to make the vegetable patch much bigger. He’ll take some for his shop and we’ll have some in case.”

  “In case of what?” asked Jessica.

  “Just in case there’re people who need it,” Mum said. “Your grandmother’s already finding more women seeking help from the CWA.” And that evening after dinner, her father went out to see the man and employed him for the summer to help with her mother’s new venture.

  The next few months proved her mother and grandmother correct. There were more unemployed men looking for food and as harvest time came around, the farm employed some of them for a few days to bring in the wheat. They slept in the drafty shearers’ quarters made of timber and iron with big windows to let night breezes cool the building down. Dad and the other farmers were too busy to think about an air pageant. Jessica kept up with her schoolwork and her afternoons with Mr McCutcheon and wished something more exciting would happen.

  One afternoon something did happen, but Jessica didn’t even call it interesting. When she got to the garage, a young boy was there too.

  “Jess,” said Mr McCutcheon, “you know Johnny Lee, don’t you?” She ought to — he was in her class at school - the slight, black-haired son of the local Chinese market gardeners. That was the only thing she knew about him, apart from the fact that he was good at mathematics. She’d probably not said a word to him all the years they’d been in the same class. She wasn’t sure why not. He was quiet and she just never knew what to say.

  “Yes, but what’s he doing here?”

  “Johnny is going to learn about engines too.”

  “Why? Does he want to fly too?” Jessica was outraged. This was hers alone … coming to the garage to learn about engines from Mr McCutcheon. She didn’t want to share it with anyone. Particularly not a boy, when boys were always encouraged to do things that weren’t considered ‘suitable’ for girls. Boys didn’t need the sort of help she did.

  “No, he wants to be an engineer. And they don’t have many engines at the market gardens. So his dad thought he could join you here.” She knew her parents would have called her attitude ‘dog in the manger’ so she silently simmered and was grateful that Mr McCutcheon didn’t expect her to teach him what she had learned over the past months. Life was never fair. She went to her bit of engine and swiped it, her teeth clenched. She slapped around for a bit, clattering and dropping things.

  Mr McCutcheon ignored her and showed Johnny what he wanted him to do. The three of them worked on in silence for awhile, then Johnny needed a rag that was above Jessica’s head on a shelf.

  “Come and get it,” Jessica muttered when he asked. He walked over, carefully chose one of the rags and lifted it down.

  “You,” he said softly, “are a stuck up little cow. You think you’re better than everyone else. You’re not; you’re just an ordinary little girl whose family happens to own a farm. Doesn’t make you better.” He walked away not looking at her.

  Jessica felt her face flare blotchy red, from fury or embarrassment. She felt like going home, but decided she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of driving her away. She was going to stay and learn about engines if it was the last thing she did and what’s more, she was going to be better at it than Johnny Lee. They’d see. She stuck it out that afternoon until it was time to go home, but she said nothing to either of the others. She stomped off to her bicycle, still furious.

  Her parents noticed her silence and lack of appetite at dinner, but neither said anything until they were washing up.

  Dad settled at the kitchen table with his tea and said, “All right, Jess. Spit it out. What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Rubbish. You’ve not said a word all evening. What is it? School? Mr McCutcheon? Something else go wrong?”

  Jessica took a deep breath. “Johnny Lee says I’m stuck up. And he’s coming to Mr McCutcheon’s with me.”

  Her parents looked at each other. “Which bit’s the problem?” asked her mother.

  “Both.”

  “Do you think you’re stuck up?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think so. Johnny says I think I’m better than everyone else. I don’t. I just … just don’t find it easy to speak to some people. So I don’t. I don’t think I’m better than them, I just don’t know what to say!”

  “What kind of people, Jess?”

  “People I don’t know. I don’t know if I should say hello, or wait for someone to speak first or what. It’s all right with family and people I’ve known since I was little. It’s just new people. That’s all.”

  “Well, how about you say hello and smile and leave it at that? Then they’d have to take the next move and you might find it easier to answer. Do you reckon you could try that?”

  “I s’pose.”

  “And Johnny. Give him a go at Mr McCutcheon’s. I reckon there’s room for both of you.”

  “It was my thing,” Jessica muttered, hoping they did not hear. Even if they did, her parents said nothing.

  She tried the next day by saying hello to Mr Gibson, the swaggie turned gardener. He was clean now and, dressed in some of her Dad’s old clothes, was laying paths in the new garden area.

  “Nice to see you,” he responded, with a smile. And she went back inside, feeling that she had achieved something.

  But still it did not rain.

  Chapter Ten

  She practised being polite to Johnny, but remained angry at his existence, not to mention what he’d said to her. Most of the time they worked in silence, each doing their own tasks. She felt that was an advance too.

  Christmas came and went without a drop of rain. Jessica was dragged into helping her mother and grandmother put together hampers and gifts for people in the town who were too poor to buy much for themselves. She also helped cut dried fruit for cakes, measure out flour and butter and collect fresh eggs.

  Christmas day itself was scorching and the baked meal with steamed pudding was almost more than any of them could take. The midday meal was just family, but at night, as it cooled down, everyone on Argyle Station joined in a ‘pot luck’ tea. A couple of lambs were spit roasted and the women brought salads, bread, fruit and cake and leftovers. Mr Gibson proved a dab hand at cooking lamb. Everyone joined in, the adults sitting quietly on chairs and the children running around, playing ball games with Christmas gifts.

  Jessica didn’t join in as she had a new book. Aunt Louisa had sent her Frank Swoffer’s Learning to Fly and she was itching to read it. She found a patch of grass under a cherry tree and opened the first pages. A few paragraphs in, she realised it was going to be hard work. Angles of incidence, drag and lift. It might have been a foreign language. At least she knew what ailerons and flaps were.

  Flicking, she found whole sections on ‘spins’ — a disaster too common for pilots. Not only difficult, but scary too. She sighed. She was going to need help with this one. She looked up through the leaves to the sky, mentally counting the first stars and working out their directions. She saw cousin Charles organising the younger ones in some variation of cricket, and heard the shouts as the ball hit the bat. She watched her mother sitting and laughing with Aunt Velia, Elspeth drooping against the chair leg. It was strange for Mum not to be doing something.

  And she wished it would rain.

  In January, on the morning of her birthday, she woke early. In full summer it should have been bright, but the light coming through the curtains was dim. Puzzled, she rushed over to the window. Two seconds later, she ran into her parents’ bedroom, yelling. “Rain, rain, quick wake up, it’s rain!” Dancing around the room, she yelled, “So we can have an air pageant.”

  “And you don’t care what your presents are then?” Her mother lifted a tousled head from
the pillow.

  “Oh no, it’s rain! That’s a better present than anything I could imagine.”

  “I dare say there are many others who’ll agree with you,” said her father dryly. “I suppose we’re all up now? Happy tenth birthday, Jessica.”

  So the air pageant was going to happen, on the weekend of 5 and 6 April 1930, and the program was carefully drawn up. On the first day, there would be Formation Flying, Bombing Motor Car, Aerobatics, Amateur Pilot’s Handicap, Picking up Messages, Parachute Drop, Balloon Strafing, Crazy Flying and Aerial Combat. All that would take place between 1.30 and 5.00 pm on the Saturday. The second day was to be exactly the same program, but in the morning.

  They planned to charge 2/- for each adult, 6d per child and 6d per car. Jessica looked at the list her father brought home from one of the committee meetings. “And what can I do?”

  “Plenty — there’ll be enough work to keep us all occupied.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Narromine, April 1930

  The morning of Saturday 5 April began with the clear sky everyone had hoped for, with a couple of puffy clouds appearing against the metallic blue. The air had the crispness of early autumn. It was perfect. Jessica stuck her head out the window and then cheered. If the rest of the family wasn’t up yet, they should be. Today the air pageant would begin. As her dad promised, it had taken a lot of work: organising, advertising, arranging, talking to people, writing, phoning.

  It had seemed at times as if the weekend would never arrive. Jessica counted down the days in the diary her aunt had sent her for her birthday, with a message: “If you’re going to be famous one day, now’s the time to start your diary. It doesn’t have to be long — just jot down the important things that happen each day. Have fun!” When the diary got to ‘10 days to go’, she began to believe the pageant would really happen and that she was going to be involved in it.

  They checked the airstrip on Friday afternoon. It looked wonderful with its neat, flattened surface, framed by the farms around that had been brought to life by the four inches of rain in late summer. The red fields were ploughed and the sheep white after shearing. And the whole town looked festive. They didn’t hang banners or anything. It was just that everyone looked excited.

  Every bed for miles had been booked up and dozens of flyers and planes had wanted to come, so the Aero Club was certain it would be a success — as long as the weather was good. They expected people to start arriving early and Jessica and her father were due at the airstrip straight after breakfast.

  Jessica was so excited she could hardly sit down to eat so her mother packed a large picnic basket for her and her father and waved them off. She had intended coming, but she decided to stay with Elspeth who was still recovering from scarlet fever. Billy would be collected at lunchtime, to keep him from under everyone’s feet.

  “Come back a minute,” called her mother, as she dashed out the door. “Your hair. I’ll bet it hasn’t been brushed this morning.”

  “Aw, Mu-um …” It hadn’t, so Jessica wriggled as her mother ruthlessly dragged a brush through it, until the reddish brown bob looked neat. Her in-laws would never forgive Ellen if she had let Jessica go off looking like a ragamuffin.

  They drove the truck into the grounds and found a good parking spot. Already some of the committee had arrived and were pacing around, checking things and looking at their lists. The Scouts had set up their refreshment tent and were rushing around with water and Mr Stockham’s ‘flying-house’ was getting the alcohol ready. He was planning to offer ‘whisky appotentic, Wapitis wash, tail-spinning rum and loop the loop lager’.

  Several planes were already on the ground. Jessica recognised the three Military War Service Wapitis, which were going to give a display first up. There were a couple of Avro Avians and several Gipsy Moths, but she was more interested in the Wapitis as she’d never seen one before.

  “Dad, Dad, can I go over and see them, please?”

  “Of course. Just keep some distance, will you? And BE CAREFUL!”

  The planes towered over her, but up close, looked very fragile. They were dual control biplanes, with large tails, painted their original silver with black markings. Jessica sidled up to a wing and stroked it. She wondered what it felt like to fly one. Probably by the time she was old enough, they’d be out of date. Already they were a kind of curiosity, but so beautiful.

  She sighed. “You like them?” The voice from behind her belonged to a man dressed in a leather flying suit, except for his helmet. His goggles were perched on top of his head. Jessica looked up at him with a smile. She had been practising her father’s advice about strangers, particularly to let them speak first.

  “Yes, it’s beautiful.”

  “Lieutenant Moir at your service. Are you one of the local pilots?”

  Jessica giggled. “No, not yet, but I want to be one day.”

  He took her seriously. “I’m sure you will be, if you really want to. Do you want to sit in her?”

  “Oh, yes please.” Jessica was glad her mother had made her a split skirt so that she could clamber up and down things. It was silly that trousers for girls were still frowned on, although she had heard that women fliers were designing outfits that made flying easy.

  Lieutenant Moir held out his hand and Jessica took a step towards him, then onto the wing. He lifted her up until she could climb into the back seat, then he climbed up into the front one. It smelled strange, the leather seats perfumed with some kind of cleaning stuff, the oil from the engine, the scent of the sizing from the wings. In front of her were some dials and not much else. Her feet didn’t quite touch the floor.

  “See the joystick in front of you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, just grab hold of it and imagine you’re steering the plane.”

  “Can I? It’ll be safe?”

  “Of course, Madame Pilot.”

  So she did. Moving it forwards, then back, then sideways. The Wapiti didn’t move with her, but she could feel its strength. She was going to have to grow a bit to handle one of these.

  Lieutenant Moir let her play for what seemed like ages and then gently suggested it was time to check the engine. “Pilots must always check the engine before every flight.”

  She nodded. “Yes, I’ve been learning how to work on engines.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh, yes. If I’m to be a pilot, I need to know that.”

  He laughed. “You must really be serious, lassie. I’m sure you’ll be a pilot one day.” He helped her back down and she ran off to tell her father about the Wapitis. Other planes were beginning to taxi in and her father’s attention was taken up by his duties, but he found time to grin at her excitement.

  “Now, how about going to help Mr Carter over there. He’s checking on the planes as they arrive. I’m sure he could do with a hand.”

  The rest of the morning was spent running messages, helping members of the committee and generally looking at the planes as they arrived. She was introduced to pilots: “This is Jessica, our youngest member. She’s going to be a flyer one day.” Jessica wasn’t very sure about this. At first she had been thrilled, but after a while, she noticed that some of the men seemed to find it a bit of a joke. Little Jessica, the Aero Club mascot. She suspected that many of them thought — like Charles Kingsford Smith — that girls really shouldn’t be pilots. It wasn’t what they said; just facial expressions. She shrugged. They’d learn.

  By lunchtime, the visitors’ cars began to arrive and were directed into lines in the parking area. Dad went home to collect Billy and Jessica sat down with the picnic basket. She was famished. She watched the queues, cars and people, as they came through the gate, dust wafting from their wheels. Excited families were milling towards the viewing areas, exclaiming at the planes they could see on the ground. She had never seen so many people and cars in one place in her life. A few small — and bigger — boys headed off to look more closely at the planes, but as the starting time was drawing
near, everyone had to watch from a distance.

  She saw Johnny Lee working at a desk with one of the committee, checking in pilots. She waved at him. They still did not speak much but it would be rude to ignore him.

  Dad arrived back and Billy, unimpressed by the idea of flight, headed off to look at the cars. In a few minutes he was back, his face alight with enchantment. “Oh, Dad, it’s a Lancia Lambda, 1927 and it’s the most beautiful thing in the whole world.” Dad duly admired the car, just enough to satisfy Billy and to keep him occupied until the entertainment began.

  Chapter Twelve

  Promptly at 1.30pm the first event began. Jessica watched her Lieutenant Moir lead the group of three Wapitis as they taxied for takeoff. The buzz of their revving engines covered almost all sound from the ground. Everyone’s face followed their path as they lifted and soared into the sky above the airfield. The planes formed a triangle and circled above the watchers, then one by one, they began to dive. Whirling, circling down out of the blue they came, engines roaring, to just above the heads of the crowds.

  Deafened by the noise and thrilled to be so close, the audience couldn’t take their eyes off the three biplanes, their large tails hovering almost close enough to touch. Each of the planes swooped about three times, until the audience became used to it and then they zoomed off into the distance, to return more quietly, land and come to rest as the next event was ready.

  Jessica was so busy keeping her eye on the Wapitis that she almost missed the start. Two men got into a car, wearing bright tin helmets and began to drive around the airstrip. Eyes forward, they drove, right into the path of the planes ready for takeoff. As everyone watched the car, the roar of a plane engine took them by surprise.