Ranklin saw that logic immediately. Most military debacles were traceable to breakdowns in communication. “You remember telling me Falcone was also interested in the lightweight Lewis guns? – well, he’s got hold of a couple. Could he be thinking of armed aeroplanes?’
O’Gilroy gave this proper thought, as well. “I’d think not this aeroplane. ‘T would be easier with seats one behind ’tother, so the feller at the back had the gun and a good field of fire. But I suppose ye can do anything, put yer mind to it.”
Ranklin nodded absently. It was a perfectly reasonable, patriotic thing for a rich senator to be finding arms for his country (and buying the manufacturing rights to them, presumably with an eye to becoming richer). But there was neither law nor reason that said the senator had to be any good at judging those arms. God knew the British Army had been landed with some civilian-picked horrors in its time.
At the back of the shed, Falcone and Andrew were bending over a work-bench signing documents. They straightened up, grinned at each other, and shook hands. Corinna took Andrew’s share of the paperwork and tucked it into her hand bag.
“One thing, mind,” O’Gilroy added thoughtfully. “When I met Falcone in Brussels, he was looking at a Bleriot that a Belgian feller had altered some ways by himself. I’m thinking why not go to France for a proper Bleriot? Or Farman or Deperdussin? Then he comes here and still don’t go to Sopwith or Avro or Bristol, the big boys, he comes to Mr Sherring. Now he’s good,” he said loyally, “but nobody’s heard of him.”
“Perhaps,” Ranklin said, “Falcone’s looking for a dark horse to back. Or perhaps he can get the aeroplane and rights at cut price compared with the big boys . . . The trouble is, we’re just out of our depth in these matters.”
O’Gilroy smiled lopsidedly. “But we’re good at being suspicious.”
Ranklin nodded. Only – were they being suspicious for good reason, or because, if Jesus Christ came back to Earth, they’d demand to see his passport?
Shortly before four o’clock, there was a mechnical buzz from the field, a human buzz from the crowd, and they wandered out of the shed to watch the display. Ranklin moved alongside Falcone and asked: “Have you seen any more signs of, ah, followers?”
“Nothing, nothing.” Falcone was in a cheerful mood.
“And did you ask the local police to-”
Falcone waved the idea away. “Your idea to move to a new hotel was enough. I am sure I am safe here.”
Certainly it was difficult to imagine danger among that sunny crowd, but Ranklin gave the nearest spectators a glare nonetheless. Watching the sky, they didn’t notice.
A biplane – a Farman, O’Gilroy said – was already aloft, apparently carrying a photographer to snap the Great Event. At four o’clock Pegoud, with an upturned moustache, white sweater and leather motoring helmet (the description was Corinna’s: with her height and a manner that melted those in front like a death-ray, she had a better view), trundled out in his strengthened Bleriot with heightened king-post (the description was O’Gilroy’s) and whirred into the air.
As it spiralled upwards, Ranklin dared to ask: “What’s actually so marvellous about flying upside down?”
Andrew gave him a condescending smile. “Just it’s never been done before – except by guys a few seconds before they got killed. If he can get into it – and hold it there and get out of it okay – it’s one hell of a big step forward. I mean really historic. For airplanes as much as pilots.”
Knowing Ranklin’s range of knowledge better, O’Gilroy said: “How d’ye suppose a bridge would work if ye put it across a river upside down?”
Ranklin considered. Although he’d cited bridge-building to Corinna, he hadn’t taken the thought far enough. Bridges, after all, stayed where they were put.
The now-distant monoplane seemed to level out – “At about three thousand feet,” O’Gilroy reckoned, with a glance at Andrew – then began to spiral down. Abruptly its nose tipped down, tucked right under, and the machine levelled – more or less – upside down. There was a huge gasp from the crowd. The distant whirr of the engine stopped, but Ranklin’s artillery experience of sound and distance told him Pegoud had probably stopped it before his inversion.
The crowd hushed as the aeroplane continued, gliding gently down. And then the nose toppled further, the machine curved down – and was flying upright and level again. The engine popped and whirred into life. The crowd roared, Andrew was cheering wildly, and around Ranklin the spectators bunched and swayed. Falcone leant on his shoulder, grunting something, then flopped forwards onto the concrete. Fantastically, the handle of a knife, thrust through a piece of paper, stuck from a dark red stain spread on his back.
“Get a doctor!” Ranklin screamed. “Ambulance!” Uncomprehending faces turned towards him, then looked down. The immediate crowd drew back, leaving him kneeling by Falcone and trying to rip the jacket and shirt from his back, and looking – instinctively, in an emergency – for O’Gilroy. He’d vanished.
O’Gilroy had taken a couple of steps away from Ranklin to get a clearer view of the aeroplane past a woman with a sunshade. He’d been half aware of a smaller man easing past towards Falcone’s broad back, although he hadn’t thought of it that way at the time, and then heard Ranklin’s shout. Everybody around was looking down, except one woman staring open-mouthed away to the left. Following her look, O’Gilroy caught one glimpse of a short man, in a dark grey suit and wide-brimmed hat – slipping through the crowd. He took fast strides towards him.
He lost the man but kept to the direction, past the Aero Club and across the grass towards the cars parked along the motor track. The crowd, which had come to see a spectacle in the air, had had no need to bunch up as at a racetrack or stadium: it was scattered lumpily in groups, easy to zigzag through. He glimpsed a small man in a dark suit, but he was bare-headed, and dark suits were as common as the tweeds he wore himself.
Then he saw the wide-brimmed foreign-looking hat, abandoned on a picnic basket. And when he again saw a dark suit going in the right direction, it was topped by a more English flat cap.
The man was strolling now, and O’Gilroy thought Right, I move up, casual like, parallel to ye, then cut across, not catching yer eye – and I’ve got ye. He was unarmed, but had no intention of trying to grab the man or saying something stupid like: “I arrest you in the name of . . .” He would just hit him as hard as he could, one wallop out of the blue, and let things sort themselves out from there.
Then he realised the one man had become two, and that changed things. The second, also in a dark suit but with a brown felt hat, was taller and thicker. He wasn’t going to attack two men, but two were easier to follow – unless they split up. But they were foreigners, likely to stick together and on main routes in a strange place. Staying off to one side rather than behind them, he matched their ambling, unsuspicious pace, and began to think ahead.
Probably they were heading for the exit, the railway station and London, as most of the crowd would eventually. He could call for help to the policemen at the gate, but O’Gilroy mistrusted policemen. They expected only the normally unexpected; he’d probably just get himself arrested.
He thought of his own appearance. The road outside would be crowded, but not many would be leaving at the height of the show, so he must assume he’d be noticed. The trick was not to be seen. He was respectably dressed – Ranklin would have taken it as a slight to Corinna if he’d worn his messing-about-with-aeroplanes clothes – and trying to vary his appearance by taking off his jacket or cap would just make him obvious. So forget looks, think of behaviour.
If they were indeed heading for the station, he could go ahead of them; people seldom think of being followed from in front. He decided to risk that and strode out, purposeful yet unhurried, to reach the gate first.