“Perhaps he’ll take a nap, and I’ll tell him you were piloting,” Jim announced cheerfully. “Anyway, he’ll be glad we are nearer.”
“Sure. It’s over five hundred miles by a straight line, and we may hit a fog, or a bad wind. Those islands down there are the Keys. See how high you have to get to be out of sight of them.” Bob zoomed a thousand feet higher and the tiny dots were lost from their sight.
“That means that an inhabitant, if he has no glasses, can’t see us,” Jim remarked.
“Yes, but Cuba is three or four hundred miles long and a hundred wide. If we fly straight across it that will take at least twenty minutes, at top speed. Lucky there are no indicators in the passenger seat. You have to remember that Dad’s a pilot too,” Bob reminded his buddy.
“I don’t believe he’d object if he knew. I’ll tell him.” Jim took up the tube and spoke to his father. “I say Dad, we can make Montego in Jamaica easily before dark. Suppose we do that, then tomorrow we won’t have such a long hop.”
“Hump. I should be glad to cover the additional miles if you are sure that it isn’t going to be too much for you boys and the “Lark”. We do not want to be fool-hardy,” he answered.
“It’ll be easy, and the weather is great. We may as well take advantage of it as long as we can,” Jim explained.
“If you are all right when we fly over Cuba, why, go on by all means.”
“Good. We’ll make a raid on Mom’s baskets for supper.”
“I’m glad he knows,” said Bob, and Jim nodded his agreement.