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Chapter Six

The next Sunday morning, Dad woke Jessica up early. “Come and have some breakfast, then we can go down to the airstrip.”

“Why?”

“It’s a surprise.” The airstrip, about two miles north of Argyle Station, was an ordinary, flat piece of land, graded smooth for planes. Narromine was one of the first towns on what was called the New South Wales plains, about 280 miles west of Sydney. To the east, one could see the occasional hill which gradually became the Blue Mountains of the Great Dividing Range. This day the strip was crowded with people as they waited for a plane to land, watching westward for the first sight of wings against the clouds. To the west, it was completely flat; nothing appeared to break the monotony — apart from trees — between Narromine and the horizon.

In summer the view was often hazy with the red dust that arose with any wind, but today the broad expanse was clear. Jessica’s mother said it was so flat that your feet seemed to be sucked over the horizon if you watched it, like being at the end of the world.

“Who is it, Dad?” Jessica was jumping up and down with excitement.

“It’s Mr Lester Brain, with the photos of the Southern Cross after they found it in Western Australia.” The whole nation had been holding its breath when Charles Kingsford Smith’s plane disappeared on a flight from Australia to England. With their emergency supplies stolen, they lived on water from a muddy creek and some baby food for days before they were found. Many people had given ‘Smithy’ up for dead when the plane was sighted with Kingsford Smith and his crew.

Mr Brain was on his way to Sydney with the photos and had stopped to refuel. Everyone in Narromine who was interested in aviation had taken the opportunity to meet the plane and see the photos. Jessica, being short, needed her father to lift her up to see Mr Brain climb down from the plane, photos in hand, but she was able to catch a good glimpse of some of them.

“Lucky to survive that,” said someone behind her. “Smithy’s invincible.”

Mr Brain did not stay long and was soon taxiing for takeoff. Jessica joined in the farewell waves. When the crowd was thinning, Dad took her hand and went over to a group of men talking together. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I’d like to introduce my daughter Jessica, who wants to be a pilot when she grows up.”

“Crikey, Angus, you do start them young, don’t you?” The other two laughed.

“Yes, Tom, but it was all her idea. So how can we help her?” Tom Perry and Bowden Fletcher were aviation personified in Narromine. Mr Perry had given the land for the airstrip and Mr Fletcher, who had flown in the War, wrote a weekly column for the newspaper. They knew everyone in the district with an interest in planes. They looked at each other and then at Jessica. Neither laughed or called her a little girl. She returned their scrutiny.

After some time, Mr Perry spoke. “What do you think, Bowden? Introduce her to Max McCutcheon and the inside of an airplane engine?”

“Yes, I think that’d be the ticket.”

So Jessica became a girl apprentice to Max McCutcheon and two afternoons a week she went to his garage on her way home from school and began the messy and complicated business of learning about engines. Her mother made her a couple of overalls from plain curtain fabric and her father bought her a notebook so she could record things she needed to remember as she became familiar with carburettors, tappets, propellers and the roles of oil and petrol.

That night, her father asked her mother, “Is this my fault? Would Jessica be interested in flying if I hadn’t dragged her to watch planes from the time she was a baby?”

Ellen shrugged, dragging the brush through her hair. “Maybe, but whatever caused it, she’s keen. Remember that toy plane she took to bed with her?”

Angus brightened, “Yes and left all the dolls higgledy-piggledy on the floor.”

“So, don’t worry about it. All right?”