“Yes sir, do you know it?”
“Rather.”
“Well, we persuaded him, Buddy and I did, to let us take him in the “Lark”, and I thought I’d ask you about—well, the best route, and the sort of air we are likely to hit, or get hit by.”
“How do you expect to go?”
“Haven’t had time to consider it much, but I thought of going to Southern California and down that way, or shooting across Mexico,” Jim told him. The Don pressed a button and one of the men appeared.
“Bring me the atlas, if you please.” Presently an enormous book, its pages of fine quality paper, and the cover of light wood, which held the sheets together with clamps, was opened before them. The maps were the best the boy had ever seen and as he examined them he saw that land, water and air were all carefully charted so one could tell the depths of the sea, the proprieties of its surface, whether it was rugged or comparatively smooth, the direction of tides and under-water streams, also the force of the various winds and their usual course. Each section of the world was recorded in the most complete detail, and air currents marked clearly.
“Golly, what a set of maps,” he exclaimed in wonder.
“They are exceptionally fine and were compiled after years of the most careful study. Now, let me see, going directly across Mexico would seem like the better course, but I advise you to go to Miami, over the Keys, to Havana, to Belize in British Honduras (you’ll have no trouble finding people with whom you can talk), then to Panama, across and down the coast line to Lima. Cuzco is inland.”
“That sounds like a good route.” Jim examined the map carefully. “It gives us plenty of places to come down.”
“Yes. A part of the way the N. Y. R. B. A. air lines have mail and passenger service.”