Her Last Flight(26)

He laughed. “Does it ever.”

“Aren’t you scared?”

“All the time. If you’re not scared, you’re not really alive, are you?”

“You’re not dead, either.”

“I don’t know. There are a lot of ways to be dead,” said Sam.

On Irene’s lap, Sandy curled in a ball, purring so loudly that the vibration tickled her legs. They were coasting down Laurel Canyon all by themselves, and the air smelled of cigarettes and gasoline. Already the sun was dropping behind the hills. Irene thought maybe she should ask him about the war, about the various ways you could be dead, the various things that could kill you. But that wasn’t what he meant, was it? Anyway, he didn’t want to talk about the war. He didn’t want to talk about the past, his or hers. So she asked about the future.

“And that’s it? You’re just going to fly stunts all your life, to keep yourself from getting bored?”

He crushed out the cigarette against the side of the car. “Until something better turns up. I guess I am.”

For the rest of the drive, he was silent, or almost silent, answering Irene’s questions with such a minimum of words, she gave up and played with Sandy instead, until they pulled up along the stretch of road where Irene’s Model T had sat all day. The surfboard was still there, tethered to the roof, too heavy to steal. Sam asked if she needed any help with the spark plug, and she said no thanks, she’d changed a hundred spark plugs. But he stood by anyway, propped against the side of the car, playing with Sandy. The kitten had found a loose button on his shirt. When Irene straightened from the engine, Sam straightened too. She wiped her hands on a rag and said that about does it.

Sam took his handkerchief and wiped at some smudge on her cheek. “You’re a real grease monkey, aren’t you?”

“When I have to be. Thanks for all your trouble. And the spark plug.”

“It was my pleasure,” he said gravely.

“No, it was mine. It was—it was something else.”

Over Sam’s shoulder, the sun melted into the ocean. He tucked the kitten into the crook of his elbow and took Irene’s hand. “I want to show you something.”

He led her right to the edge of the ridge, so that the dunes piled up at their feet and the ocean spread wide. A couple of surfers met the waves that tumbled over and crashed into the continent.

“That,” he said.

“That what?”

“That’s what I want to do.”

For an instant, she doubted him. She glanced sideways at his profile, which reminded her of a bird, the oceangoing kind, except that it was colored by the gold of the melting sun. Then she understood. “You mean Hawai’i again?”

“Farther than that.”

“Australia?”

He nodded. “California to Sydney.”

“You’d have to stop along the way.”

“Yes, of course. I’ve got it all mapped out. All I need is the airplane and the dough.”

“How do you get your hands on those?”

“Why do you think I keep flying stunts, Foster? Take up thrill seekers at five bucks each? Teach all those dumb accountants which way is up?” He set the kitten into the dune grass and lit a cigarette. “I’ve been testing Rofrano’s new ship. It’s just what I need. I mean, it needs some modifications, but it’s the right ship, all right. The only problem is, it’s going to cost thirty-five thousand dollars. Then you need the fuel and the equipment and all the permissions. So I need a sponsor.”

“You mean somebody like George Morrow.”

“Yes,” he said slowly. “Somebody like Morrow.”

“You know, I’d have thought Morrow would jump at the chance. You’re a national hero, aren’t you? He said it himself, it’s the publicity he wants, that money follows publicity.”

“But it’s got to be the right kind of publicity,” he said. “I didn’t make it to Hawai’i. I washed up. Anyway, the public wants something new. That’s what Morrow said to me, anyway.”

Together they stared at the settling sun. Irene’s palms were damp. She knotted her fingers together.

“I guess your wife will be wanting you home,” she said.

For a moment, there was nothing but the sound of the ocean, crashing below them. A couple of screeches from a diving seagull. When Sam finally spoke, he seemed to pick the words with care.

“My wife lives up in Oakland. She hates Los Angeles.”

“Oh.”

“It’s what she wants.”

“Well, what do you want?”

Sam finished his cigarette, dropped it in the sand, and turned to her. “I want to see more of my daughter, I guess.”

Irene stared at those serious blue eyes and thought, Sam Mallory. But it didn’t match, this face and that one, the one in the newspapers last summer. She tried to remember what Mrs. Sam Mallory had said in those interviews. Irene was pretty sure it had been something fulsome. She remembered thinking that Mrs. Sam Mallory rather liked being Mrs. Sam Mallory, mother of Sam Mallory’s small child, and played that role to its fullest. Something tickled her ankle. Tiny sharp teeth. The kitten. She thought of the white walls of Dr. Walsh’s office where she worked as a receptionist, the air that smelled of antiseptic, the way the doctor brushed up against her in the dispensary. She thought of Sam’s airplane rising to the sun.