Daughter of Eve
Capt. John Riordan
John Riordan was a character of characters. He joined the company on 8 September 1948, and I was frequently his first officer. Our first flight was on 7 April 1949 in VR-HDA or Nikki, (Niki) our plush DC-3. The routing was Kai Tak to Calcutta by way of Haiphong and Mingaladon.
We arrived over Dum Dum in Calcutta, during the worst thunderstorm of my youthful career. Through the static we were instructed to join the holding pattern, over which the clouds, pregnant with moisture, were pissing axe handles.
This was my first experience of rain so heavy it was running up the windshield. Between flashes of lightning, I pondered how an engine that operates on a fuel-air mixture continued to do so when deprived of air. My pondering was answered when the port engine cut out followed by the starboard one. What a frightful silence is silence and more so at 5,000 feet with neither engine earning its keep.
Suddenly our hands were everywhere, pushing this and pulling that, but those lazy drowned donks maintained their silence.
Without warning our powerless airliner nosed into a patch of clear sky. Below us shone the lights of the sprawling metropolis of Calcutta and the runway of Dum Dum. With a shout of triumph John turned towards that amber-lighted haven, while with an ear splitting roar both engines returned to full power. I guess any further withdrawal of their labour might be construed as counterproductive. Again we had outwitted the power of nature but my top priority was a change of smalls!
We arrived over Dum Dum in Calcutta, during the worst thunderstorm of my youthful career. Through the static we were instructed to join the holding pattern, over which the clouds, pregnant with moisture, were pissing axe handles.
This was my first experience of rain so heavy it was running up the windshield. Between flashes of lightning, I pondered how an engine that operates on a fuel-air mixture continued to do so when deprived of air. My pondering was answered when the port engine cut out followed by the starboard one. What a frightful silence is silence and more so at 5,000 feet with neither engine earning its keep.
Suddenly our hands were everywhere, pushing this and pulling that, but those lazy drowned donks maintained their silence.
Without warning our powerless airliner nosed into a patch of clear sky. Below us shone the lights of the sprawling metropolis of Calcutta and the runway of Dum Dum. With a shout of triumph John turned towards that amber-lighted haven, while with an ear splitting roar both engines returned to full power. I guess any further withdrawal of their labour might be construed as counterproductive. Again we had outwitted the power of nature but my top priority was a change of smalls!
Track into Dum Dum
Airport, Calcutta
We booked into a suite in Calcutta’s palatial Grand Hotel, a magnificent edifice now run down and living on past glories. Ever mindful of his crew’s comfort John offered me the bedroom. With a tear in his eye he stated that he would rough it on the couch in the reception room. I tumbled into bed and before I could remind myself it had been a long day Morpheus released me yet again from my dreams. Dressing quickly I bounded into my skipper’s quarters.
There an Anglo-Indian girl lay dressed in nothing but skin, and writhing in abandon was biting on the knuckles of her right hand in a vain effort to suppress her moans. John must have been breathing through his ears as his face was buried in her voluptuous folds.
Why wasn’t I surprised? That Lothario would make it at the North Pole, but this Daughter of Eve possessed dexterity far beyond the requirements of her profession as her left hand industriously raped the pockets of his discarded pants.
With a gentle slap on the wrist I rescued John’s trousers from her grasp, detecting a small-disappointed flicker in a winking eye that said, ah well, you can’t win them all! Obviously, she tempered light-fingered artistry with realism and I returned to my lonely quarters to sulk!
Shortly afterwards John staggered into my quarters asking about his daks. My finger pointed to them hanging over a chair. With a sigh of relief he struggled into them saying he was off to eat and would I join him. As an afterthought he added there would be a lady guest. He hoped I wouldn’t mind!
When I arrived at his table he introduced me to the same boudoir nymph who was now exquisitely sari-wrapped. He described her as an old member of the family. With a gracious nod and demure lowering of the eyelids she assured me the pleasure was hers. I gulped at her choice of words.
I then experienced a moment of regret. Had I interfered with some of the perks of her profession? Perhaps so, but then my resolve hardened for I had a vested interest as my out-station allowance was in one of those pockets.
Riordan’s reputation for the pursuit and conquest of femininity provoked jealousy among us less successful operators. He had no distinguished characteristics, but he possessed a strong face with lines between the brows that indicated an inquiring mind. A deep weathered groove on either side of an aquiline nose extended to a heavy moustache. This bristled fiercely whenever a beauty hove in sight. Then one with a fine-pitched ear might hear, It’s time to give the ferret a run.
The casual undress of the mess revealed him as unusually well endowed. There was a story that he had escaped just ahead of the flashing blade of a Maharaja’s chief knackerer. It seems John was taken in flagrante delicto with the boss’s once favourite Maharanee, but always the gentleman, he defended the poor girl. Her beastly husband had tied himself up with a younger member of the harem, ignoring the needs of his sensitive and loving wife. John saw himself not an interloper on another’s preserve, but as a bringer of succour to one tyrannically oppressed and thoroughly believed his cause a worthy one!
There an Anglo-Indian girl lay dressed in nothing but skin, and writhing in abandon was biting on the knuckles of her right hand in a vain effort to suppress her moans. John must have been breathing through his ears as his face was buried in her voluptuous folds.
Why wasn’t I surprised? That Lothario would make it at the North Pole, but this Daughter of Eve possessed dexterity far beyond the requirements of her profession as her left hand industriously raped the pockets of his discarded pants.
With a gentle slap on the wrist I rescued John’s trousers from her grasp, detecting a small-disappointed flicker in a winking eye that said, ah well, you can’t win them all! Obviously, she tempered light-fingered artistry with realism and I returned to my lonely quarters to sulk!
Shortly afterwards John staggered into my quarters asking about his daks. My finger pointed to them hanging over a chair. With a sigh of relief he struggled into them saying he was off to eat and would I join him. As an afterthought he added there would be a lady guest. He hoped I wouldn’t mind!
When I arrived at his table he introduced me to the same boudoir nymph who was now exquisitely sari-wrapped. He described her as an old member of the family. With a gracious nod and demure lowering of the eyelids she assured me the pleasure was hers. I gulped at her choice of words.
I then experienced a moment of regret. Had I interfered with some of the perks of her profession? Perhaps so, but then my resolve hardened for I had a vested interest as my out-station allowance was in one of those pockets.
Riordan’s reputation for the pursuit and conquest of femininity provoked jealousy among us less successful operators. He had no distinguished characteristics, but he possessed a strong face with lines between the brows that indicated an inquiring mind. A deep weathered groove on either side of an aquiline nose extended to a heavy moustache. This bristled fiercely whenever a beauty hove in sight. Then one with a fine-pitched ear might hear, It’s time to give the ferret a run.
The casual undress of the mess revealed him as unusually well endowed. There was a story that he had escaped just ahead of the flashing blade of a Maharaja’s chief knackerer. It seems John was taken in flagrante delicto with the boss’s once favourite Maharanee, but always the gentleman, he defended the poor girl. Her beastly husband had tied himself up with a younger member of the harem, ignoring the needs of his sensitive and loving wife. John saw himself not an interloper on another’s preserve, but as a bringer of succour to one tyrannically oppressed and thoroughly believed his cause a worthy one!
