The Fly Boys (51 page)

Susan Greene was busy typing a report for Don Harrison. As usual, his writing style left a lot to be desired, so Susan was
doing a little revision work as she typed; just smoothing out the sentences as she worked.

The clacking of her typewriter’s keys was the only sound in the department. It was only four o’clock in the afternoon, but
it was New Year’s Eve. Most of the designers had never come back from lunch, and that handful who had returned had left early.

The department’s telephones had been pretty quiet during the morning, and absolutely mute all afternoon. The lack of interruptions
had allowed Susan to become engrossed in her work, so that when the telephone on her desk began to ring, it startled her.

“Mr. Harrison’s office,” she answered.

“Yes, is he in?” a familiar woman’s voice began. “It’s…”

“Yes, I know who it is,” Susan said, doing her best to sound pleasant and businesslike. Just a moment, please.” She buzzed
Don on the intercom. “Your lady friend on line one….”

“Thanks, Suzy,” Don said.

Susan heard Don say, “
Hi, honey. Is the champagne chilling
?” And then she resolutely went back to her typing to drown out his voice.

She’d thought that her first date with Don back in May had boded well. They’d had dinner at Donde’s, a romantic Italian seafood
place in Santa Monica. Donde’s had been her choice because it had been her and Blaize’s favorite neighborhood place back when
they were living in that little walk-up by the pier. Going there with Don on their first date had been an exorcism of sorts
for Susan. She’d meant to exorcise Blaize from her immediate thoughts so that she could see this man Don Harrison with eyes
unclouded by her late husband’s image.

Of course she would always love Blaize. Just as she would always eat and breathe and sleep, loving Blaize was a condition
of her existence. But she’d come to the conclusion that she could also love another man. Maybe this new love would not be
as pure as her first. Maybe it would never penetrate into the marrow of her bones, but it would be a real love, in any case.

So she’d taken Don Harrison to Donde’s, and that first night, over pasta with shrimp and white wine, she’d talked about her
husband the English test pilot, the RAF fighter ace, the war hero posthumously awarded his own country’s Victoria Cross, and
a Distinguished Flying Cross from the United States.

Don was a good listener. He asked the right questions to keep her talking, and pretty soon they were laughing together over
the latest antics of her ten-year-old son, and then, miraculously, the talk about the past was exhausted, and there she was,
sitting across from a man and talking to him about herself, and enjoying it.

Susan realized that she’d been typing the same line over and over again, and quit in disgust. Her mind was no longer on her
work. The walls of Don’s office were so thin, and the department was so quiet. She could clearly hear his laughter, even if
his words did remain an unintelligible murmur.

Thinking back on that first date at Donde’s, she now supposed that it had been inevitable and probably for the best that she’d
had too much wine and let slip who her parents were.

Don had laughed and laughed. He’d said that he didn’t mind dating the boss’s daughter, and then he’d asked if she and Robert
might like to go for a drive along the shore the following Sunday afternoon.

Maybe that’s the problem: that I let my son intrude on the relationship too soon
. Susan now brooded.
Or maybe the fact that I’m the boss’s daughter matters to Don, after all
.

Or maybe she had just wanted this relationship too much; queered it somehow by pushing too hard. Don was a bit too much the
repressed gentleman for that (as Blaize had been, but without Blaize’s wildly romantic streak).

Whatever the reason, or reasons, their burgeoning romantic relationship was soon stalled. Susan had thought that maybe she
could get things back on track, but then this woman from out of Don’s past had called. Evidently this Linda Forrest knew just
how to go about ensnaring a man.

Or maybe the chemistry was just right between them?
Susan thought.
But what’s the point of wondering on the why of it? Some people hit it off together and others don’t, and that’s that
.

She tried her best to ignore Don’s laughter as he chatted with his new flame. For the past few weeks the two lovebirds had
been giggling on the telephone together half a dozen times a day.

She quickly resumed typing as she heard Don hang up the telephone. A few moments later he came out of his office wearing his
hat and carrying his briefcase.

“Suzy,” he scolded her good-naturedly. “It’s New Year’s Eve, for Godsakes—”

“I just want to finish this report, Don,” she said, keeping her eyes trained on her typewriter.

“Don’t you have plans for this evening?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said evenly, glancing up at him. “I have a date.”
With my son
, she added silently.

“Good!” he nodded.

He didn’t seem the least bit jealous. It was clearly hopeless, and what did she care? Leave him to Linda Forrest and good
riddance, she thought. He was losing his hair anyway.

“I want you to go home early, and that’s an order, got it?”

“Got it,” she smiled sweetly.

“Oh, and Suzy—” He came close and bent toward her to give her a kiss on the forehead. “Happy New Year,” he murmured.

And why the hell this stodgy, bumbling, balding man’s touch should affect her so, she had no idea.

“Happy New Year to you, too, Don,” she said brightly.

She watched him as he walked away from her and out of the department. And then she slid a fresh sheet of paper into her machine
and went back to her typing.

It was a little after nine on Thursday morning. Steven Gold, nude, was lying on his back, his head propped up with pillows
in the big double bed of his tastefully furnished, moderately expensive hotel room. The room was exactly like the endless
series of other moderately expensive hotel rooms he’d been in over the last few months. When he’d first opened his eyes a
half hour ago, he’d had no idea where he was.

But now he knew he was in Chicago, he thought as he sipped the tepid room-service coffee, and smoked a Pall Mall. The cigarette
tasted terrible. He hadn’t even brushed his teeth yet. He reached over to the bedside nightstand and dropped the smoke into
last night’s ice bucket, which stood next to last night’s empty scotch bottle.

In a couple of hours he had to be cleaned up and in his dress uniform. He had his speech to give to the Greater Chicago Federated
Boys’ Society. After the speech, it was over to city hall to receive the key to the city from the mayor, and say a few words.

Then the press conference for the local papers. The reporters would shout the same old questions: “
What do you think about Ike being the President-elect
?” and “
How do you think the war’s going
?”

Pretending never to have heard those questions before was bad, but trying to sound fresh giving the speech was the worst.
The speech was titled, “How I Captured Yalu Charlie.” It was one part truth and all the rest bullshit; scripted for him by
the Air Force’s Office of Public Information.

He’d already given the speech twenty-two times; first as an exclusive to
PhotoWeek
magazine, and then in front of civic and church organizations all across the country. He would probably give it another fifty
times before he was done.

The speech was full of stuff about how he’d knocked down the blue lightning MiG on behalf of the Flag, and Liberty, and Mom’s
Apple Pie. Now, he wasn’t a dummy. He knew why it had to be that way. Hell, he couldn’t get up there and tell the audience
the whole grisly mess concerning Mikey DeAngelo,—that Lieutenant Colonel Steven Gold was in reality a maverick fighter jock
who had blithely broken the rules in order to avenge his buddy’s death and in the process almost turned the world into one
big Hiroshima.

The same way he knew all that, he knew he was damned lucky not to have been court-martialed and imprisoned. Hell, he
would
have ended up breaking big rocks into little ones if good old Vladimir—AKA Yalu Charlie—hadn’t gone and knocked himself out
of the sky by flying into the BroadSword’s debris.

Yeah, I’m lucky
, Steve thought, staring at the ceiling cracks as he lit another smoke. But it still got to him, having to say that phony
speech over and over. At some point during the intervening months since he’d been reassigned from Korea to Washington, D.C.,
what had really happened that day in the sky over Bao Kung Cheng had faded from his own mind, to be replaced by the contents
of the speech.

That had made Steve feel all hollow inside. It had made him feel like maybe the commendation he
should
have received was not the Medal of Honor, but the Academy Award for Best Actor in a film called “The Korean War.”

But the war, and your popularity on the rubber-chicken circuit ain’t going to last forever, Stevie boy. So then what?

He knew that he had his present slot for as long as he wanted it, but the problem was he didn’t want it at all. It had been
a kick at first to be back in Washington with the title of Special Spokesman for the Air Force of Public Information, but
what it entailed was hanging around the Hill waiting to have his picture taken with influential politicians, just like the
last time. He sure as hell didn’t want to do that for the rest of his career, assuming the Air Force wanted to let him. But
then what else
was
there for a twenty-nine-year-old light colonel with a high school equivalency diploma?

This war isn’t going to last forever
, Steve thought again, and had to grin. It was probably too much to hope for
another
one to come along anytime soon.

He kicked out of bed, heading for the shower.

He had some extended leave time coming once his speaking engagements were fulfilled. Maybe he’d spend it at home in California,
he mused. It would be good to get to know his father again, Steve thought. God, they’d been close when he was just a kid.

And then, who knew? If things worked out, maybe he wouldn’t make a career out of the Air Force after all.

Steve had always resisted the notion of going to work at GAT, in part because he didn’t want his father to take him for granted,
and in part because he didn’t want the world to think that he’d gotten his job through nepotism. But now he was beginning
to think that maybe he
could
make a niche for himself at GAT. Maybe he could do some kind of spokesman job for GAT the way he’d been doing for the Air
Force.

It was worth thinking about, Steve decided. Maybe he’d end up working with Pop, after all….

America rises to dominate the skies. And Gold Aviation and Transport has given it the wings to do it. Now, in the face of
spirited competition and the winds of a coming war, proud patriarch Herman Gold fights to keep his gift for daring innovation
alive and conquer the fear that times are passing him by. For soon, in the conflagration of World War II and its unsettled
aftermath, the torch will be passed to a new generation…a galaxy of passionate and bold young men and women bound to a great
legacy, but tempted by their desires. Theirs will be the glory of a new world that rushes from jet age to space age – and
offers yet undreamed-of challenge and triumph.

WINGS
of
GOLD

BOOK II THE FLYBOYS