Atlantic Fury by Hammond; Innes Page A

his hand over the mouthpiece. ‘There are two of them there and they work it in shifts. Hello. That you, Cliff? Well now look, laddie, drum up a decent forecast, will you. Ronnie Adams is on his way over to see you and he doesn’t like the look of the weather … Yes, Himself – and he’ll raise hell if the flight’s off. Okay. And there’s a Mr Ross in my office. Wants to see you … Yes, Ross.’
    â€˜Donald Ross,’ I said.
    â€˜Mr Donald Ross … Aye, I’ll send him over.’ He put down the phone. ‘Yes, Cliff’s on the morning shift. You’ll find the Met. Office right opposite you as you go out of the main gate. It’s below the Control Tower, facing the landing apron. And I’ll tell Major Braddock you’re here as soon as he gets back from Leverburgh.’
    I wished then that I hadn’t given my name. But it couldn’t be helped. I zipped up my windbreaker, buttoning it tight across my throat. It was raining harder now and I hurried out through the gate and along the road to the hangar. Pools of rain lay on the parking apron where an Army helicopter stood like some pond insect, dripping moisture. The bulk of Chaipaval was blotted out by a squall. Rain lashed at the glistening surface of the tarmac. I ran for the shelter of the tower, a raw concrete structure, ugly as a gun emplacement. Inside it had the same damp, musty smell. The Met. Office was on the ground floor. I knocked and went in.
    It was a bleak dug-out of a room. Two steps led up to a sort of dais and a long, sloped desk that filled all the window space. The vertical backboard had a clock in the centre, wind speed and direction indicators; flanking these were schedules and code tables, routine information. The dust-blown windows, streaked with rain, filtered a cold, grey light. They faced south-west and the view was impressive because of the enormous expanse of sky. On the wall to my right were the instruments for measuring atmospheric pressure – a barograph and two mercury barometers. A Baby Belling cooker stood on a table in the corner and from a small room leading off came the clack of teleprinters.
    The place was stuffy, the atmosphere stale with cigarette smoke. Two men were at the desk, their heads bent over a weather report. They looked round as I entered. One of them wore battledress trousers and an old leather flying jacket. He was thin-faced, sad-looking. His helmet and gloves lay on the desk, which was littered with forms and pencils, unwashed cups and old tobacco tin tops full of the stubbed-out butts of cigarettes. The other was a smaller man, short and black-haired, dressed in an open-necked shirt and an old cardigan. He stared at me short-sightedly through thick-lensed glasses. ‘Mr Ross?’ He had a ruler in his hand, holding it with fingers stained brown with nicotine. ‘My publishers wrote me you would be coming.’ He smiled. ‘It was a good jacket design you did for my book.’
    I thanked him, glad that Robinson had taken the trouble to write. It made it easier. The clack of the teleprinter ceased abruptly. ‘No hurry,’ I said. ‘I’ll wait till you’ve finished.’
    â€˜Sit down then, man, and make yourself comfortable.’ He turned his back on me then, leaning on the tubular frame of his swivel seat to continue his briefing. ‘… Surface wind speed twenty to twenty-five knots. Gusting perhaps forty. Rain squalls. Seven-eighths cloud at five hundred …’ His voice droned on, touched with the lilt of his native valleys.
    I was glad of the chance to study him, to check what I knew of Cliff Morgan against the man himself. If I hadn’t read his book I shouldn’t have known there was anything unusual about him. At first glance he looked just an ordinary man doing an ordinary routine job. He was a Welshman and he obviously took too little exercise. It showed in his flabby body and in the