Top Gun (2 page)

The screen began to cut back and forth from Herman to animated visual aids as he spoke.

“The GXF-66 is wrapped around a single Rogers and Simpson augmented turbofan engine rated at 23,000 pounds of thrust. The
GXF-66 has a service ceiling of over 50,000 feet, a tactical radius of 340 miles, and a ferry range of 2500 miles. She utilizes
the latest in Hotas, or ‘hands on throttle and stick,’ technology: the pilot, in the manner of a skilled typist or pianist,
will be able to operate his combat avionics, fly the plane, and fire his weapons without having to look at what his hands
are doing. The GXF-66’s armament includes a
20
MM
cannon, and she can accept all versions of the short-range Sidewinder and long-range Sparrow air-to-air missiles. In addition,
the GXF-66 is designed to use the French Magic and Israeli Shafrir AAMs. The Stiletto can also be utilized in the short-range
ground-attack mode, carrying beneath her wings up to 15,000 pounds of ordnance
—”

Herman paused. Don Harrison thought the old man’s smile was grand to see.

“But the GXF-66 was
BORN
to dogfight,”
Herman firmly declared.
“She was born tu
own
the sky!”

Don Harrison felt chills; at that moment, he could glimpse within that frail old man the World War I ace who’d downed twenty
Allied airplanes while flying with Von Richthofen, the Red Baron.

Herman continued:
“When we designed the GXF-66, we intended that form should follow function.”

Herman Gold then stepped aside, out of the light and into the darkness, so that only his voice could be heard as the music
built and the camera moved to lovingly caress the jet fighter’s lithe form.

“When we designed this fighter, we intended that she embody the timeless, elegant, lethal simplicity of her weapon namesake:
‘Stiletto’!”

There came a cymbal crash like a peal of thunder, while thanks to the filmmaker’s magic the fighter seemed to whirl like some
caged animal, so that her needle nose thrust out at the audience.

The screen went white. There was more applause as the lights came up in the screening room. Don Harrison glanced across the
aisle to where his brother-in-law, Herman’s son, Steve Gold, was sitting slumped in his chair.

Steve was an Air Force colonel in his late forties, but he looked much younger. He was tall and lean, with thinning, light-blond
hair worn moderately short, and squint lines etched vertically on either side of his nose and around his brown eyes, thanks
to the long hours spent scanning the sky from various fighter cockpits during his thirty years in the Air Force. Steve was
an ace several times over, a Medal of Honor winner with fourteen confirmed Japanese kills during World War II, and six MiGs
accounted for during the Korean conflict. Steve had also flown combat missions in Vietnam. Harrison happened to know that
his brother-in-law had “unofficially” bagged a MiG while flying incognito with the Israeli Air Force during the 1967 Six-Day
War, but that episode was part of Steve’s adventures while serving as an Air Force/CIA liaison. Understandably, Steve didn’t
talk about that part of his career too much. Currently, he was assigned to the Los Angeles Air Force Station at El Segundo,
where he acted as a liaison between the military and the aerospace industry.

“That’s all the film we have so far,” Harrison confided to Steve as the others began filing out of the screening room. “That
GXF in the hangar was just a mock-up. Later on, we’ll put in shots of the prototype in flight, once we’ve finished building
her, and we’ll be adding in sections on GAT Aerospace and our participation in the Skytrain European consortium.”

“You don’t have much time before the stockholders’ meeting in June,” Steve pointed out. He took a scarlet package of Pall
Malls from out of the pocket of his sky-blue Air Force uniform jacket and lit up a cigarette.

“I know, but we’ll make it.” Harrison smiled. “One thing we’re used to around here is deadlines.”

Steve nodded, looking pale as he exhaled cigarette smoke. “Damn, I wish that you’d warned me Pop was going to be in it.”

“Yes, I suppose I should have.” Harrison nodded, thinking that he had all along intended for Steve to be shocked by the sight
of his father up on the screen, hoping the experience would soften up Steve for the proposal Harrison intended to make. “Now
that I think about it, I see that it was thoughtless of me to surprise you like that….”

Steve seemed to wave the matter aside. “Pop looked terrible, didn’t he?”

“I didn’t think so,” Harrison fibbed to comfort his brother-in-law. “Actually, I thought the camera captured something of
Herman’s inner vitality.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” Steve smiled fondly. “Nothing Pop liked to talk about better than fighter planes.”

“Anyway, there was no choice in the matter,” Harrison continued. “Herman insisted upon being in the film.”

Steve nodded. “Almost like Pop knew he was about to die.”

(Two)

GAT Executive Offices/Administration Complex

Colonel Steve Gold murmured, “Every time I walk in here, I still expect to see him sitting behind this desk.”

They’d left the conference center, traveling via electric golf cart along the half-mile of roadway beneath the California
sun to the executive office complex, and were now entering Pop’s huge office.

No, strike that,
Steve Gold thought. It was Don’s office now, as it had been unofficially since Pop had retired, and officially since Herman
Gold had passed away in his sleep, succumbing to his third heart attack, a little over six months ago.

“You know, I appreciate the way you’ve left things here just the way they were when the office belonged to Pop,” Steve Gold
said, looking around at the wall-to-wall, moss-green carpeting, and the sofa and armchair groupings upholstered in supple
burgundy leather. Custom-built display cases loaded with mementos highlighting Pop’s decades in the aviation business lined
the oak-paneled walls beneath ornately framed oil-painting landscapes and commissioned oil portraits of successful GAT airplanes
in flight. In one corner, a glass case held scale models of every airplane designed and built by Gold Aviation and Transport.

“Hey, I kept things the way they were for myself.” Don smiled ruefully as he ushered Gold to an armchair and then took his
place behind the big marble-topped desk. “Keeping it all like it always was comforts me. It makes me think that maybe Herman’s
spirit is still around to help me guide the company.”

The bank of telephone lights on Don’s desk was flashing like small-arms fire. Don pressed a button on his intercom, said,
“Hold all calls,” and the lights quieted down.

“The only change is that now you’re totally in charge,” Gold said.

“Yep.” Don leaned back in his thronelike leather chair. “Is that a problem for you?”

“I’m not sure,” Gold admitted, eyeing his brother-in-law. Don was fifty, tall and broad-shouldered, with baby-fine blond hair
that he wore combed back from his high domed forehead, and wide-spaced hazel eyes that missed nothing from behind the lenses
of his gold-rimmed spectacles. In days past, Don had been an academic type who favored beards and baggy tweeds, but since
taking over the company Don had cleaned up his act: his custom-tailored navy-blue double-breasted suit, pale-blue shirt, gold
cuff links, and maroon silk tie radiated authority and power.

“You know,” Harrison was saying, “there have been times since Herman died when I’ve been working here all alone late at night
and I thought I heard his voice calling me….”

“Mom says the same thing,” Steve said, shaking his head. “I tried to talk her into putting the Bel-Air estate up for sale
and moving into an apartment. I told her it’s no good rattling around all alone in that big old house with nothing but the
servants and her memories to keep her company.”

“Erica will never sell that place,” Don declared. “For the same reason, I haven’t changed the office decor. Neither of us
wants to bid Herman farewell.”

Steve sighed. “You know, I promised Pop that he’d see me make General….”

“You can still keep that promise,” Don began.

“Maybe, but the notion has kind of paled since Pop died,” Gold mused, remembering the conversations he’d had with his invalid
father in the garden at the house in Bel-Air. “Pop always wanted it for me more than I ever wanted it for myself. As far as
I’m concerned, being a general just means a bigger paperwork headache. And generals don’t get to fly their own planes, which
is pretty much the only reason I’m still in the Air Force.”

“You can be a general and fly all the airplanes you want,” Don said. “Right here at GAT.”

“Huh?”

“Steve.” Don leaned forward, planting his elbows on his desk. “Your father had always wanted you to come into the business,
right?”

“Well, sure…”

Don nodded. “Well, now’s the time. I need you. These past six months since he died have been hell. I can’t run this company
all by myself.”

“Of course you can’t, Don. Nobody can!” Gold comforted. “But you’re not alone. You’ve got yourself a goddamned office building
full of executives and managers.”

“I need more than a bunch of yes-men following me around like baby ducklings in a row.” Don scowled. “I need
you.
Just like your father needed
me
after he lost Teddy Quinn.”

Gold busied himself lighting a Pall Mall in order to buy time to think. Teddy Quinn had been with Pop since the beginning,
even before there was a Gold Aviation, when Pop was running a fledgling mail and freight air-transport company operating between
Los Angeles and San Francisco. For over thirty years, Teddy had been Pop’s chief designer, his sounding board for new ideas,
and his best friend, until Teddy passed away in 1951. Pop, emotionally distraught over losing Teddy, had tried to go it alone,
but even then GAT was too much to handle for just one pair of hands, no matter how capable. Without a copilot, GAT was suffering
a severe downturn in productivity, never mind the fact that the company’s heart and soul, its Research and Design Department,
was drifting leaderless. When Pop was finally able to bring himself to begin his search for Teddy’s replacement, it didn’t
take him long to realize that if he wanted the best there was only one choice: Donald Harrison, in those days aviation’s boy
wonder. In 1951, Don agreed to leave his position in charge of R & D at Amalgamated-Landis, another of the giant concerns
that made up California’s aviation industry, to join the GAT team. Don came aboard as chief engineer in charge of aviation
research and development, but it wasn’t long before he was Pop’s right-hand man.

“It’s as important to me as I’m sure it is to you that we keep family control of this business,” Don was saying. “Someday
I intend to bring my own son Andrew into GAT.”

Gold had to grin. “I know Andy is precocious, but I very much doubt that the world is ready for a sixteen-year-old aviation-industry
executive.”

“I
did
say someday,” Don reiterated, smiling.

“Well, you have another son.”

“I
have
thought about Robbie….”

Gold waited expectantly. Robert Blaize Greene, thirty, was Don’s stepson, Steve Gold’s sister’s son by her first marriage
to World War II RAF fighter ace Blaize Greene, who was killed in action. Robbie was a Vietnam veteran, an Air Force captain,
and recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Silver Star. Steve Gold had always been extremely close to his nephew,
but the bonds of affection between them had been further strengthened in 1965, when Robbie had risked his own neck on Gold’s
behalf by flying Rescue Combat Air Patrol when Gold had been shot down over North Vietnam.

“Well?” Gold asked. “Have you made this offer to Robbie?”

Don frowned. “You know as well as I do that there’d be no point to that,” he said impatiently. “Robbie and I have never truly
gotten along…. I don’t know, I guess the kid blames me for taking his father’s place in his mother’s heart, or some such tomfoolery.”

Don was blushing. Gold, feeling awkward, and sorry that he’d brought up the subject, said, “You know that’s one point over
which Robbie and I part company. As far as I’m concerned, you’ve always done your level best to be a good father to that kid.”

“Thanks,” Don said, almost gruffly. “Anyway, Robbie’s got a fine career still ahead of him in the Air Force. There’ll be time
enough for him to come into the business once he’s established a reputation and some clout in the industry.” He winked. “Like
his uncle Steve.”

“I admit I’m getting a little antsy in the Air Force,” Gold began. “There’s no wars to fight….”

“What the hell,” Don said pointedly. “Face facts, Steve. You’re too old to fight ’em even if there were some wars around.”

Gold wistfully chuckled. “I can’t argue that. But I guess I’ve had my share of furballs.”

“That you have,” Don remarked, smiling. “But you’ve got an even bigger challenge than any war waiting for you right here at
GAT, if you’re willing to take it on. I need you to help me overcome the Defense Department’s resistance to the GXF-66 Stiletto.”

“You’re kidding!” Gold said, shocked. “Are you telling me the brass doesn’t want that fighter? She looks like a beauty to
me.”

“She is a beauty, Steve,” Don declared adamantly. “Unfortunately, the DOD’s procurement teams can’t objectively evaluate her.
Their vision is too clouded by bad memories concerning the F-110.”

“Goddamn…,” Gold cursed. Back in the late 1960s, Pop had harbored high hopes for the twin-seat, F-110 fighter bomber he’d
dubbed the Super BroadSword, but the over-engineered airplane loaded with the latest in black-box technology had turned out
to be a gremlin-plagued disappointment, and the Air Force canceled its contract after receiving just a few units. “Sometimes
I think that damned airplane killed Pop,” Gold said bitterly.

“I hear you.” Don looked somber. “Herman had suffered setbacks before and had always been able to overcome them, but not the
Super BroadSword. Your father just never seemed to be able to bounce back from that failure.” Don brightened. “Until R and
D came up with the prototype design for the Stiletto. Herman really perked up when he saw those specs. I think your father
wanted the Stiletto to be his swan song, Steve. I think he wanted his last airplane to be a fighter pilot’s kind of war bird:
a fighter to follow in the tradition of the original BroadSword….” Don paused. “Hell, a fighter to follow in the tradition
of Herman’s Fokker Dr. I, the triplane he flew when he was serving with the Red Baron.”