Flyaway

'Never mind that,' I said. 'I've found the body.'

'Oh!' He turned his head and looked at Paul, then turned back to me. 'Bad?'

'Not good. I haven't told Paul yet You know what he's like.'

'You'll have to tell him,' said Byrne definitely. 'He'll have to know and he'll have to see it. If he doesn't he'll be wondering for the rest of his life.' I knew he was right. 'But don't tell him yet. Let's get this figured out first.'

'What have you found?'

'If you look in the cockpit you'll see a brass handle on the left. It's a sort of two-way switch governing the flow of gas to the engine. In the position it's set at now it's drawing fuel from the main tank. It was in that position when I found it. Turn it the other way and gasoline is drawn from an auxiliary tank which has been built into the cargo, space here. Got the picture?'

'He was drawing from his main tank when he crashed.'

'That's it.' He fumbled in his gandoura and came out with the photocopies I had given him. 'According to this, the main tank holds 334 gallons which gives a range of seventeen hundred miles at three-quarters power — that's cruising. But Billson was in a race — he wouldn't be cruising. I reckon he'd be flying on ninety per cent power, so his range would be less. I figure about fifteen hundred miles. It's eighteen hundred from Algiers to Kano, so that's a shortfall of three hundred miles.'

'Hence the auxiliary tank.'

'Yeah. So he needs another three hundred miles of fuel — and more. He'd need more because he might run into head winds, and he'd need a further reserve because he wouldn't want to do anything hairy like finding Kano in the dark and coming in on his last pint of gas. At the same time he wouldn't want this auxiliary tank to be full because that means weight and that would slow him down. I've been trying to figure like Billson and I've come up with the notion that he'd put a hundred fifty gallons in this tank. And you know what?'

'Tell me.'

'That's just about enough to bring him from Algiers to here on the course he was heading.'

'You mean when he switched over from the auxiliary to the main tank his engine failed. Empty main tank?'

'Hell, no! Billson wasn't an idiot — he'd supervise the filling himself. Besides, there are gauges in the cockpit. The engine quit all right, but it wasn't because the tank was empty. I'd like to find out why.'

'How?'

'I'd like to open up the main tank. Think Paul would mind?'

'I'll ask him.'

Paul said he didn't mind; in fact, he developed an interest as Byrne stood with hammer in one hand and cold chisel in the other surveying Flyaway. 'I've been tracing the gas lines and I'd say the main tank is in this mid-section here — might even extend into the wing fillets. I'll start there.'

He knelt down, laid the cutting edge of the chisel against the fuselage, and poised the hammer. 'Wait!' said Paul quickly. 'You might strike a spark.'

Byrne turned his head. 'So?'

'The petrol…'

There ain't no petrol — no gasoline — in here, Paul. Not after forty-two years. It'll have evaporated.'

'From a sealed tank?' said Paul sceptically.

'No fuel tank is sealed,' said Byrne. There's a venting system. You try to pull gas from a tank without letting air hi and you'll get nowhere. It's okay, Paul; there's no fuel in here now.'

There was a clang as he struck the head of the chisel. He struck again and again and presently I went to help him by holding the chisel so he could strike a harder blow. But first I cautioned him to make sure he hit the chisel and not my hand. Slowly we cut a hole into the side of Flyaway and, oddly, I thought it an act of desecration.

The hole was about a foot by six inches and at last Byrne was able to bend back the flap of aluminium so that he could look inside. As he did so some brown powder dropped out to lie on the sand. 'Yeah,' he said. 'An integral fuel tank.'

'What's the powder?'

'You always get gunk in the bottom of a tank no matter what you do. The gasoline is filtered going in and filtered coming out but no gas is pure anyway, and you have chemical instabilities and changes.' He put his hand inside and withdrew it holding a handful of the powder. 'More in here than I would have thought, though. If I was Billson and entering a race I'd have the tanks scoured and steam-cleaned before starting.'

I looked at the handful of dried sludge as he put it to his nose. 'More than you would have thought,' I repeated.

'Don't put too much into that,' he advised. 'This is the first time I've looked inside a fuel tank. It ain't a job that's come my way before. There were over three hundred gallons in this tank and God knows what was happening to it while it was evaporating. Constant changes of temperature like you get here could have started all kinds of reaction.'

'All the same,' I said, 'I'd like to have a sample of that stuff.'

Then find something to put it in.'

I'm old-fashioned enough to use a soap shaving-stick and mine came in a plastic case. It hadn't seen much use in the desert and I'd grown a respectable beard which, Byrne told me, was flecked with grey. 'Pretty soon you'll look as distinguished as me,' he had said. I broke off the column of soap and we filled the case with the brown powder and I screwed the cap back on and, for safety, secured it with an adhesive dressing from Byrne's first aid kit.

By that time it was past midday so we prepared a meal. As we ate Paul said, 'When are we leaving?'

Byrne glanced at me and I knew the same thought was in both our minds — we had a burial detail to attend to. He said, 'Early tomorrow.'

I said nothing to Paul until we had finished eating and had drunk our tea. Then I put a new film in my camera because I wanted a full record. I said, 'Paul, brace yourself; there's something I must tell you.'

His head jerked and he stared at me wide-eyed, and I knew he'd guessed. 'You've found him. You've found my father.'

'Yes.'

He got to his feet. 'Where?'

'Not far from here. Are you sure you want to see him? Luke and I can do what's necessary.'

He shook his head slowly. 'No — I must see him.'

'All right. I'll take you.'

The three of us went to the cave and the tears streamed down Paul's face as he looked down at what was left of his father. There were still scraps of flesh and skin left attached to the bones but it was brown and mummified, and a few tendrils of hair clung to the skull which otherwise was picked clean.

I took some photographs and then we began to brush the sand from the skeleton. Underneath the thin layer of sand was rock so we could not bury Peter Billson. Instead we piled a cairn of stones over the remains, Paul sobbing all the time. Then we went back to Flyaway, Byrne carrying under his arm the tin box which had been next to the body. There were a couple of other things we had buried with Billson; two packets bearing the name of Brock, the pyrotechnic company. One contained flares, the other smoke signals. Neither had been used because a rescue plane had neither been seen nor heard.

Standing next to Flyaway Byrne held out the box to Paul. 'Yours,' he said simply.

He took it and then sat down on the sand and laid the box in front of him. He looked at it for a long time in silence before he stretched out with trembling fingers to open it. This was nothing like opening a Christmas present. There were a lot of papers inside.

In his last days Peter Billson had kept a diary, written in his log-book. I don't propose to go into this in detail because it is most harrowing. A proposal has been made that it be published in a future edition of the Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society. I'm against the idea. A man's mental agonies when facing death ought to be private.

There was Billson's flying licence, a sealed envelope addressed To my darling, Helen', a worn leather wallet, a pipe and an empty tobacco pouch, a Shell petrol carnet, a sheaf of bank notes — British, French and Nigerian, and it was strange to see the old big British five-pound note — and a few other small odds and ends.