Two weeks later Mrs. Whitley presented me with a large table of hand written numbers, within which the pressure values were embedded. There was nothing in the way of a print-out in those days, and graphics was just an impossible dream. I returned to my office, and, like a Victorian engineer, leaned over a drawing board to plot the pressure. It looked rather funny. Near the front, on the top of the airfoil, Mrs. Whitley had predicted a huge negative pressure peak. It looked like Vesuvius rising out of the plains. It was clearly unacceptable. I took the graph into Dr. Lachmann?s office and waited silently. He made all the decisions for the research office, as with his old Jagdstaffel. Ours not to reason why.
?This vill not do,? he said.
?Yes, sir, I agree with you.?
?You must fix zis, Lissamann,? he hissed. One could hear the double ?en? as he made my Cornish name sound totally Teutonic. I know he would have liked it to have been ?Unter-Leutnant Lissamann?.
?What do you suggest sir, ? I asked meekly.
?Zat?s for you, Lissamann. You have zis advanced degree from America.?
?Yes, sir,? obediently. ?I?ll do my best?.
I returned to the office, dismayed and depressed. I had no experience, and didn?t know that in engineering one is almost invariably wrong the first time. One of the older chaps, who was ex-RAF and knew wings, came to the rescue. He had nothing like my credentials, but ten times my sense.
? Can?t possibly be that way, Peter. The bloody girls have got it wrong!?
With this dangerous thought I went to Mrs. Whitley. This was a sensitive matter, so I tried to be tactful.
?Is it possible, Mrs. Whitley, that there could be some small error here??
?No, Mr. Lissaman, it is not possible. My girls have never made a mistake.?
She slammed the door shut. I couldn?t check two weeks of calculation by six girls myself. It was a daunting problem. It worried me for a week, especially as Dr. Lachmann asked me every day how I was progressing.
One day, inspired by the dreamy spring weather, it occurred to me to check the ordinates of the airfoil. A revelation! One of the ordinates, just where the pressure had been so uncouth, was listed as 9.243 instead of 2.943.
I dashed through to Mrs. Whitley.
?Mrs. Whitley, your girls made a mistake. They used 9.2 instead of 2.9!?
?They wouldn?t have done that Mr. Lissaman. They never do.?
?Well, don?t worry who did it. Let?s just change the numbers and re-calculate.?
?I don?t think my girls should do that, Mr. Lissaman.?
?Well, I wish you would, Mrs. Whitley?
I retired to our Research Office.
Three days later I went back. Mrs. Whitley was adamant.
?They did it right the first time, Mr. Lissaman,? she said stubbornly, ? and the answer's the same. They did it just the way you said.?
She produced the original input sheet. There, in my own handwriting, was the offending ordinate: 9.243!
?You wrote it like that,? she said. ?My girls did it right, and they?re not going to spend another two weeks and miss their tea just because you changed your mind. We certainly won?t do it again. We did it right the first time.?
The long-suffering Mrs. Whitley had arrived at her sweet moment of revenge.
This was depressing, deeply. It was, literally, back to the drawing board. I sharpened some 6H pencils, leaned over the board, and laid out the airfoil I had specified. It had a huge bump on the top. There it was, large as life -- a colossal kink in the supposedly streamlined shape. I took the airfoil shape into Dr. Lachmann.
? What do you think of this aerofoil, sir??
?Horrible, horrible, Lissamann,? he declaimed. ?Zat must be the problem?.
?Yes, sir, that?s what I thought it might be.?
?Vell, ve?ll just have her change it.?
?An excellent idea, sir, but I?m afraid she won?t?
?She von?t! Vy not Lissamann??
?She says she did it right the first time, sir. She refuses to do it again. At least not for me.?
?Since ven vas Mrs. Whitley designer of ze RAF nuclear bomber force??
?Since this morning, sir,?
?Come vith me, Lissamann.?
We marched back to the Calculator Office, I a respectful step behind the great man. Mrs. Whitley was all aflutter with pride and gratification. ?What can we do for you, Dr. Lachmann??
?Vell, it?s this ridiculous aerofoil Lissamann brought you.? She eyed me vindictively, so delightful to have him drop the ?mister?.
? It is totally unsatisfactory. But, as a result of your careful calculations, ve have an idea for an improved design.?
?The girls will be very proud of that, Dr. Lachmann. They worked so hard on this.?
?Zo, I vil send Lissamann in vith my new design.?
?We?ll be honored to do it for you, Dr. Lachmann.
When we got back he said, ? Take zem in some new ordinates, und, Gott in Himmel, make zem schlict.? I knew the German word from my Caltech days. It meant very smooth, to a special degree. I complied, and sent the new airfoil back.
Mrs. Whitley?s pressures on the new, smooth airfoil looked perfect. The wind tunnel tests confirmed its excellent behavior. It was decided to use it on the new models of the Victor. Everyone was delighted. Aerodynamicists like to sign their work ? airfoils in those days were, after all, an art form. I asked Dr. Lachmann if I could put my name on the new airfoil.
?Zat vill not be necessary, Lissamann,? he said, as though he were responding to the butler?s offer of another brandy. Those were authoritarian days.
Some time later we were discussing the performance of the new Victors.
?Do you think we could get Mrs. Whitley to design some more aerofoils for us?? I asked.
?Ach, you English. Always making jokes,? he responded.
?Better than always making war,? I replied.
He looked at me and smiled, but grimly. We were in England, I was descended from generations of English yeomen who had fought for, and laughed at, that sceptered isle. He was a refugee. There was nothing else he could do.