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Extracts from a Diary
by Amelia Bourne-Phipps
-edited by Simon Barber-
7 July, 1937

Back Into Daylight

(Being the twenty-sixth part of Amelia’s Diary.
There seems to be a gap of 6 weeks since Krupmark Island
 where her attempt to get kidnapped to Kuo Han (searching for
the missing Pennington girls) seems to have been all too successful.
Presumably there was much of it Amelia did not want to pass down to posterity.)


Wednesday 7th July, 1937

Back to Spontoon! My first sight of the islands in far too long was Mount Kiribatori rising out of the cloud seas at dawn – Helen was at the controls of the DC2 we had “borrowed” from some furs who were not going to be chasing us via Interpol. Flying at fifteen thousand feet was chilly indeed and about the limit without oxygen but it was the best fuel altitude and we were down to our last twenty gallons by the time Kiribatori appeared. I must say, my heart raced at the sight.
 
    It was certainly something to wake the rest for. The sleeping accommodation was basic, just the rice-straw mats we had grabbed off the airstrip at Tanglon, but at least we had got rid of those hateful cages and such that the original owners had put in the back – “for transporting domestic livestock” as the aircraft’s documentation blithely put it. If nothing else, the aircraft was far better without the extra weight. In the back Maria and the rest were sleeping – I rather winced at the prospect of explaining them to Customs. I had set out with Molly to rescue Blanche and Cindy Pennington. One might say the mission was successful, depending on how one defines it. A photograph would apparently show Molly, Blanche and Cindy here – but it is really Miss Cabot, Chestnut and Silk who we have brought back.  Not actually the same people.

    Chestnut and Silk are disturbing enough if one knew them before; they are quiet, attentive and mildly interested in anything, which is not such a bad thing in itself. What their sisters will say is another matter. Miss Cabot is the big change – I recall those last days on Krupmark with her running wild with the flamethrower, laughing delightedly at the noise and flames. She still knows how to do that – nobody has lost any memories, but Miss Cabot says it is like being able to read them in a book someone else wrote, not her. The Dark Priestess skunk I battled at the end had considerably refined what was done to Henrietta, which was very wasteful of knowledge and talent. It is an improvement over Henrietta’s condition, but I hope the Priestess’s surviving mouse apprentice had not been taught that technique or the world is liable to be a rather more shadowy place as powerful furs pay whatever is asked put the method to their own uses. One would not have to be as ruthlessly pragmatic as (say) Ioseph Starling to imagine the uses it could have.

    Helen had radioed in to Spontoon air control by the time we could see the main lagoon, and after some surprised exchanges and a half overheard telephone call they cleared us straight into land. It was definitely a relief to head in and see the familiar sights below us, with the Songmark compound still standing (one had visions of a final devastating strike instigated by the departing Ave Argentum who have nothing left to lose) and the white tiled art deco dot of Mahanish’s standing out amongst the drab workshops and hard standings at the Eastern end. Helen swore she could almost scent the chilli.

    Getting onto the runway in the DC2 was an education in itself, as with fuel tanks nearly empty and a tenth of the designed passenger load (no seats, even) despite Helen’s best judgement the very streamlined aircraft “floated” in ground effect along a quarter of the runway when even Songmark’s Junkers 86 would have touched down two hundred yards further up the concrete. Dive brakes such as the Junkers possesses would be handy; everyone sneers at putting them on a dedicated postal aircraft and claims it is an obvious giveaway to it being covertly made for dive bombing, but today we could have certainly put them to good use.

    Hearing the wheels kiss the runway was music to my ears! We did not taxi back to the international air terminal and Customs house like the regular commercial flights, but as instructed by the tower switched off and sat on a hard standing out on the Easternmost end, with sand from the dunes blowing in the prop wash as we taxied in. It was suddenly very quiet as Maria opened the cargo hatch and main passenger door and we sat there, our snouts and ears drinking in the sensations of Eastern Island on a fine sunny day in tourist season. In the Westerly wind we really could smell the chilli at Mahanish’s. I could see Songmark’s Junkers 86D sitting outside its hanger four hundred yards away, and was sorely tempted to run over and meet the distant figures working on it. Our year are still meant to be here, next week being the final week of settling affairs before we scatter forever across the planet. Helen has again missed the solstice where she should have been Tailfast to Marti on Sacred Island – and we both missed our time there when hopefully we would have graduated as Spontoon priestesses. Rather a cut-price and “war emergency issue” type, but priestesses nevertheless.

    Looking around the inside of the aircraft, I winced somewhat as I rehearsed what I was going to tell Saimmi and probably Mr. Sapohatan. We could not have saved Chestnut and Silk (they had been permanently altered before we ever arrived on Kuo Han, let along tracked them down) but Molly was … jolly unlucky. As Miss Devinski reminded the more enthusiastic of us so many times, a military unit expects to take casualties and still call it a victory but an Adventuress working with her friends does not. Ironically, it was probably Molly she said it to most often. The worst of it is, I even agreed with her going to that temple, not having all the facts. It is true enough that she ended up as far happier with her situation, but not in the way anyone would have wanted. Had she followed my notion of trying one’s best to enjoy what of the situation could be enjoyed and handle everything else in a spirit of enquiry, this would probably not have happened. Still, I had volunteered for that side of the mission and she had not – discovering we were actually legally bought was an awful shock. On the other paw, then I would not have encountered the skunk Priestess who would be alive and making more Silks and Chestnuts for anyone who would pay her.

    Helen and Maria were still in the cockpit checking the aircraft when we noticed the airfield ambulance driving up in a leisurely way without using its flashing lights or siren, and our rescuees were still sitting contentedly in the back. I blushed somewhat realising that in the open doorway I was sitting midway between the two groups – midway in more ways than one, having not come away entirely unscathed myself or at least unaltered. One must look on the bright side of things – at least no longer being in Songmark excuses me from the embarrassment of Mrs Oelabe’s medical musings, and indeed she would have rather a lot to say.

    We were not amazed to see Mr. Sapohatan stepping out of the back of the ambulance. After all, although our chase to Kuo Han was not his official business as no Spontoonies were involved, my dorm have been useful assets to him and he is gratifyingly pleased to see us all back. We were pleased to see him as well, Silk and Chestnut not having passports. A brief explanation of what had happened to half the party rather removed the smile from his muzzle. Molly might not be someone he formally requests missions of, but he has found use for her talents before. She is presumably just as skilled a shot as she ever was, but less likely to jump into close combat with both a grin and saw-backed bayonet fixed.

    I had been so preoccupied with getting back to Spontoon that I confess I had not thought of what to do or where to go next. We are no longer Songmark students, so that is out. Hopefully the Hoele’toemi family will be pleased to see us, though. Actually Albert had another idea for us; having given orders about putting the DC2 away in a hangar, he invited us to take a ride in the ambulance. One water taxi ride later we were on Moon Island at the hospital there, effectively quarantined. The Tourist season is now definitely in full flood with liners from across the Pacific filling every compatible berth on Casino Island; I noticed one named the “Chichibu Maru” registered in Osaka and another named “Suwa Maru” from Nagasaki. Possibly anyone brought up on rice and millet mash considers poi an exotic delicacy rather that a misapplication of wallpaper paste.

    It was useful after our exploits to be looked over by the medical staff there, who in a couple of hours passed us all as physically healthy – Helen and Maria were certainly suffering strain and nervous exhaustion, but a week’s escaping across the central mountain chain of Kuo Han is nothing a Songmark girl has much trouble with. There was a familiar snout, Doctor Munrohabe from the main Casino Island hospital, who has examined us before. She was the one who also examined Henrietta and Megan, and was both relieved and horrified at what has happened to three of us. Relieved in that Miss Cabot was what one could say mentally well-adjusted (re-adjusted might be a better word) even if she is no longer the same person. She agreed that if knowledge of this process gets out it will be an exceedingly hot property worldwide – and although she is sworn as a doctor not to harm anyone she was grimly satisfied when I told her of the Dark Priestess’s fate. One might say at my paws, although strictly speaking I never touched her. Regardless, I discovered that using the more extreme of the Warrior Priestess talents may be … messy.

    On Spontoon the local doctors have been brought up with the native religious traditions and have rather non-standard ideas of where they draw the line between medical and spiritual healing. She agreed Saimmi is Miss Cabot’s best bet, rather than anything the hospitals of Casino Island can offer. With that she left us.

    Considering it was not a mission he sent us on, Mr. Sapohatan was very keen to find out about our expedition. It was well into the evening when he nodded and left us carrying four notebooks of information that I expect will be the cause of ruin and desolation to some business-furs in Kuo Han and elsewhere. We are the first party ever to make it out of the “pipeline” still able to tell their story, he tells us. One load off our mind was his offering accommodation here on Meeting Island till we leave – and one of the interns brought in a satchel of mail that had been accumulating at Songmark for us. It is a relief to know Miss Devinski will not have to be writing “return to sender” on it.

    Having our debriefings and health checks finished, we were free to go! Actually I was worn out, as were Maria and Helen after the chase across Kuo Han in the rainy season and then the pursuit across the Pacific. I am sure Saimmi will know we are back, as will the Songmark staff by now.
Our rooms are in the inner crater of the hospital where Megan was staying before she got restless and went over the fence awhile ago. There is plenty of space here, for a sad reason - the inner hospital was laid out ten years ago to house the survivors of the Gunboat Wars such as Jirry's Aunt Milini and they are going year by year being mostly frail by reasons of their age and injuries. The Papeete Influenza cost the veterans here over a dozen of their number; at Songmark though we are as strong and healthy as anyone three-quarters of us were knocked flat on our tails for a week but at least we all got up again. Still, having cast a thought to the previous inhabitant of the freshly repainted and aired room I relaxed and appreciated having a room to myself with a pile of correspondence; an experience I have not had in awhile.

    Molly rarely received letters, but she had two issues of Criminal World awaiting that I thought I had better take charge of as Miss Cabot did not seem interested and it is not the kind of thing one wants to leave lying around. Had the Ave Argentum proved that magazine delivered to at least three Songmark subscribers, it would have been far better ammunition than anything they did manage to find against us. It is intriguing to read as ever, especially the very well-written comics pages starring "Rick Traceless" that very handsome and square-muzzled international master criminal who could serve as a textbook illustration for the word “amoral.” He frequently shakes his head over senseless violence, commenting that furs should find a way to get paid for their efforts. This issue he is demonstrating how to rob a safe-deposit vault and is up against a pair of typically grotesque lawmen guarding it, "Badge-face" and the modern New England puritan Inspector Marblehead. Actually the strip has as much practical advice as more conventional trade magazines. I do not need warning that leaving one's enemies to supposedly perish in over-elaborate death traps involving melting ice blocks or magnifying glasses igniting powder trains with the rising sun, is a bad move that rarely works as intended.
 
    The articles were disturbingly fascinating, with detailed discussions of “The Ponzi scheme updated” and “Style and finesse in working the Long Fraud”. Actually it is quite a useful textbook in spotting what to avoid, rather like our first aid manuals are full of pictures of things one really does not want to see happen to oneself or one’s friends.
 
Still – the magazine as a whole is in surprisingly standard format despite its subject matter. On the way through the public part of the hospital there was a waiting room well stocked with other pulp magazines such as “Three-fisted Mutant Detective tales!” and “Exciting but tragically short stories of Volcano exploration”. There really are pulp magazines for everything these days, and if anyone thinks of a gap in the market however obscure it is rapidly filled as fast as the community of hack writers can scribble and the presses roll. Who would have thought “Aviation leak and Spicy technology” would find so many readers? I glanced through it and the tale of the crashed air freighter on a hill above and upwind of an unsuspecting city with six tonnes of highly unstable 1918-surplus weaponised Vindaloo paste gradually eating its way out of its lead-lined containment flasks was truly frightening.

    I was getting ready for an early night, the first time in weeks we have been able to sleep in safety, when Maria knocked and entered. She was holding a freshly decoded telegram from her Uncle, which fortunately has just arrived yesterday rather than six weeks ago as it might have done. He wants her back in Italy as soon as she has finished in Songmark – and he means immediately, “prontissimo” being the word he used. In fact from the way he phrased it, Maria says she can either head straight for Europe or start looking for a husband and a longhouse on Spontoon as her Uncle has funded her for three years and wants to start getting some return on his investment; his patience is not unlimited and he absolutely demands her back.
 
    Maria says the decoded message mentions the sudden urgency is because Il Puce’s young geologists have found something extremely important out in his Libyan colonies following her advice to search the hinterlands via airships and autogiros. The Italians have held that territory for thirty years but never properly surveyed it before. There could be anything out there; the locals would recognise the classical metals but even nowadays I doubt wandering camel-riders would recognise radium or tungsten ores.

    So – just when we arrived, at least one of us will have to vanish! Fortunately we have a week or so grace before our Songmark timetable was due to finish. I think I will have to head towards Europe along with Maria, needing to resolve my unwanted inheritance as Lady Allworthy. I think at least my Kuo Han experiences may have given me an idea about that. It is an ill wind that blows no good.


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