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Something had changed after the narrowly averted demise of G-ERTI at St Petersburg. Carolyn had a new fire in her belly as she tackled MJN's debts, going so far as to bring Douglas on board as her marketing officer in her determination never ever to let Gordon hang G-ERTI's tail fin over his mantelpiece. Martin had a new spring in his step as he began to own his confidence as a pilot, a man who could land a plane on one engine in a nasty cross-wind without so much as ruffling a hair.
And Douglas, well, he had a growing realisation that it was time to stop resenting the loss of his Air England glory and start enjoying all the bizarre peculiarity that was his MJN family. Which was why, for the first time in all his years of employment, he had the MJN crew, plus bonus Hercules, over for dinner. He had redecorated the entire house since Helena had packed her bags and left and he finally felt ready for company.
"Douglas, a word if you please." Carolyn's voice floated down the staircase.
"Honestly Carolyn, you are not supposed to summon me in the comfort of my own home," Douglas said as he joined her on the landing.
"I was on my way to the loo and I just happened to see--"
"Right, that would be the guest loo on the ground floor and here you are upstairs going through the bedrooms?" said Douglas with a smile.
"I just happened to see that you have some interesting decor in your bedroom," she finished tartly.
"Oh yes, aren't they lovely? They're the reason I became a pilot really." Douglas strolled into the bedroom to admire the prints he had hanging on the wall opposite the bed. "Helena had some awful modern art, I wanted to put up something different. I've kept that calendar ever since I was given it by an uncle all those years ago. So I decided to have them framed."
They stood together looking at the twelve calendar prints from 1965, each one showing a lovely young stewardess posed into front of one or other model of plane.
"I was a stewardess at the time, all of eighteen years old," commented Carolyn, looking at the slim girls in their pencil skirts and fitted jackets.
"And I was a precocious twelve-year-old who'd never seen anything so utterly glamorous and sizzlingly sexy as those lovely ladies. That was the first time it occurred to me that being a pilot might be a fine choice of career."
Carolyn looked at the pictures again, her eyes lingering on Miss April, with her blonde hair artfully curled and her ample bosom straining provocatively against the buttons of her jacket. She wasn't the tallest of the girls or the slimmest, but she had a cheeky twinkle in her eye and an amused curve to her mouth that suggested joys of flying too naughty to mention. A young woman with the world at the feet, who had yet to know of the trials of life that lay ahead.
She glanced quickly over at Douglas but he didn't seem to have realised what - or who - he was looking at. It saddened her to know that all that youthful promise had been lost beyond recognition.
"It was all so long ago," she said, trying not to sound too wistful. "A whole world long since gone. None of them will look like that now, not half a century later."
"Hopefully they've all led good long lives," replied Douglas as they turned to leave the room. As he stood aside to let her go through the door, he continued with a sly smile, "You know, Miss April has always been my favourite."
Carolyn froze. "Really? Always?"
"Oh yes, when I was young she looked so delightfully naughty while having an air of being able to take charge, I did have a few very steamy fantasies about her. But now, what I really like about her is knowing that that young stewardess will one day be owner and CEO of her very own charter airline."
"Oh! So you did know."
"Of course, I know everything." Douglas smiled at her, and suddenly, impulsively, he took her hand and brought it up to his lips. "And I know that Hercules Shipwright is a very lucky man."
His grin broadened as he continued, "And, if I may so, given Miss April's fearsome temper, a very brave one!"
"Douglas!" Against her better judgement she was laughing with him, and over a space of forty-seven years Miss April's eyes were twinkling once again.