"Persuit!" Chapter 3

Chapter 3

It was a considerably larger plane than Katie’s Schneider-Cup racer; a brand new, four-engine, Boeing-314 flying boat, one of Pan-American Airways famous Clippers; in this case the California Clipper.

In terms of accommodations, she was nothing like the flying cattle-cars that would one day become the airline-industry standard. Her passengers traveled in spacious seats, with enough leg-room for a Sequoia, and could move about as freely as they wished. There was a galley, there were sleeping berths, and there was even a passenger lounge.

Normally, the California Clipper wouldn’t be flying this route. In fact, she wasn’t supposed to be in service yet, period. But this wasn’t normally. The Schneider-Trophy Race was soon to get under way and anyone who was anyone was either on their way to Spontoon Island or already there. In the run-up to race-week, every one of Pan-Am’s flights to Spontoon was always booked solid -- and 1938 was going to be the biggest year yet. The demand for tickets had become so great that Pan-American’s president, Juan Trippe, had personally decreed that the California Clipper should start service to Spontoon Island immediately, and hang the fact that her official inaugural flight would become an anticlimax

Amongst the full complement of 74 passengers on board, there were two in particular with a keen interest in one of the competitors...and that was about the only thing they had in common.

The first was seated in the forward passenger cabin, languidly perusing a dog-eared copy of Aviation Monthly through platinum-framed spectacles. He was a bobcat of such florid complexion, he appeared to have pink facial fur. His name was Hodge J. ‘Fats’ Duquesne, and he was a high-ranking official with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

In years past, Hodge Duquesne’s nickname had been an ironic one. These days, it was more of an apt label, and woe to the new subordinate foolish enough to use it within his earshot. Duquesne was no stranger to airplanes. He had participated in several pioneering flights over the Andes, years ago, and had made the first non-stop flight between Seattle and San Diego.

But nowadays, when Duquesne traveled by aircraft, he always rode in the passenger cabin. Anyone wondering why, needed only to look at the empty left sleeve tucked into the side-pocket of his sharkskin jacket. In 1926, he had been giving a flying lesson to a young tigress when she had frozen up at the controls. In the crash that followed, she had walked away with only some singed facial fur and Hodge Duqesne had needed to be carried away.

No longer able to fly, the bobcat ha called in some favors to wangle a job with the US Department of Commerce’s new Aeronautics Branch. Once there, he rose quickly up the ladder, making aviation safety his fursonal holy grail His first targets were the so-called Flying Circuses, those itinerant troupes of daredevil fliers who traveled from city to city, thrilling the crowds with their feats of airborne skill and death-defying aerobatics. In 1927, he had bluntly confronted Ivan Gates, then the proprietor of the biggest and most well known of these troupes. “The day of the flying circus is over, Gates. They’re too dangerous -- for both pilots and the spectators. And we’re going after the oldest, largest, and most well-attended first. That means you.”

Hodge Duquesne was as good as his word. In 1929, hamstrung by the new welter of Federal Regulations, (regs that Duquesne frequently back up with a phalanx of federal marshals,) the Gates Flying Circus parked it’s planes and folded it’s tents forever. Three years later, a despondent Ivan Gates leaped to his death from the window of a New York City hotel. On hearing the news, Hodge J. Duquesne was unmoved. Better GATES should die than a member of his troupe or a spectator.

Besides, by then he had a bigger fish to fry...the most famous air spectacle of them all, the Thompson Trophy race.

But his time Duquesne had badly underestimated his opponent, the Thompson’s brilliant and charismatic organizer, Clifford Henderson...a fur with no small number of political connections himself. Almost every one of his proposed regulations, moving the crowds 200 feet further back from the race course, eliminating the simultaneous start, raising the altitude to 1500 feet, ended up strangled in red-tape.

“Where the HELL are we supposed to get pylons that tall?” Clifford Henderson had raged upon hearing of Duquesne’s last proposal. On the advice of his attorney however, he agreed to let a number of Duquesne’s minor rule changes go into effect. (a decision he’d one day bitterly come to regret.)

“It’s best to let him save some face, Cliff.” the lawyer had said, “He may be a bobcat on the outside, but on the inside he’s all elephant...he never forgets a slight.”

Indeed, Duquesne did not tend to let things slide. And that was the reason he was on board this flight to Spontoon Island today, a briefcase parked at his feet brimming with legal papers -- all of which referred to the past actions of a certain competitor in the upcoming Schneider Trophy competition.

Nobody made a laughingstock out of Hodge J. Duquesne.

NOBODY!

The other passenger of interest was seated in the central lounge, also passing the time by reading. He was a smallish raccoon in a linen suit, with close cropped hair and eyes that were at once both merry and intense...and he was just looking up from his copy of The Pilot’s Book of Everest at the approach of a young coyote pup.

“Excuse me, sir.” said the youngster with a cautious mixture of awe and enthusiasm, “But are you Major Jack Finlayson?”

The raccoon set his book aside, smiling from ear to ear. He knew what was coming of course. This was only the umpty-thousandth time a little boy or girl had made this inquiry. He didn’t mind; he’d always been a sucker for kits.

“Yes,” he said, “That’s me.”

The little coyote’s face lit up like a Broadway marquee.

“Oh, wow..it’s really you,” he said, and then seemingly from nowhere, he produced a model airplane. It was distinctive aircraft to say the least; short wings, a stubby body, and an almost nonexistent tail fin. Painted a gaudy red and white, it looked almost like a flying beer-barrel. On the fuselage, just below the tiny cockpit was the number ‘11' flanked by a pair of dice, one showing five, the other six.

“Will you sign my Gee-Bee R-1...please?” he asked.

Finlayson smiled even more broadly, and reached in his pocket for a marking pen. ( He had long since learned to carry one for just such occasions as this. )

“Who should I make it out to?” he said, pausing with the tip hovering just over the model’s surface.

“Billy.” said the coyote-pup, who looked as if he were about to float upwards right through the cabin roof.

“Okay,” said Finlayson, and then wrote on the plane’s fuselage, ‘To Billy -- I gave her the gun and she flew a like bullet...Jack Finlayson’

An older coyote appeared behind the youngster, a femme in her mid-30's.

“Now, don’t forget to thank the Major.” she said, laying a paw on her son’s shoulder.

“I won’t, mom.” said the pup, nodding upwards at her, vigorously, and then looked at Finlayson again, “Thank you, sir.”

“You’re quite welcome,” answered the raccoon, handing the little coyote back his model. The pup took it with trembling paws, as if it might suddenly disappear in a cloud of vapor. For a moment, Finlayson wondered what the youngster’s reaction would be if he were reveal what he REALLY thought of the Gee-Bee R-1; that it was the more than well-deserving of it’s grim sobriquet, the Flying Deathtrap.

Now the pup’s mother spoke directly to the raccoon.

“Are you entered in the Schneider this year?” she asked. The Major managed another smile while shaking his head.

“No ma’am. I’m officially retired from air-race competition.” He leaned in close, beckoning to the two of them with a crooked finger, and lowered his voice to conspiratorial whisper.

“But I’ll tell you the plane to watch, though.” he said.

“Which one?” the two of them asked, simultaneously.

Finlayson winked and said, “Keep your eye on the MacArran Aeronautics plane, The Little Engine.”

next

Aircraft references:
Boeing 314, California Clipper:
http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/boeing314.html

Gee-Bee R1:
http://www.fiddlersgreen.net/aircraft/racers/geebee/info/info.htm