Linda Carlton was almost half-way across the ocean when her Aunt Emily learned that she had started. The older woman had been away from home all that day, visiting relatives in the country, peacefully enjoying the lovely spring weather, and little thinking that her beloved niece was having the greatest adventure of her life. Miss Carlton returned after supper to find her brother waiting for her with the awe-inspiring news.
Smiling with an effort, he held up the newspaper to her startled eyes.
"BEAUTIFUL YOUNG GIRL TAKES OFF IN SOLO FLIGHT FROM NEW YORK FOR PARIS," she read in glaring print. Underneath were her niece's name and age, and a brief account of her record thus far in aviation: the date of her winning her private pilot's license, her membership in the "Caterpillar Club," her course at the ground school in St. Louis.
"You mustn't faint, Emily," said Mr. Carlton. "It isn't done by women now-a-days, you know."
His sister laughed, which was exactly what he wanted her to do. These older people must be as brave as Linda herself.
"Linda's going to get there all right!" he assured her triumphantly. "You wait and see!"
And, in spite of Bess Hulbert's recent disaster, everybody else who knew her said the same thing about Linda Carlton. When that young lady started out to accomplish anything, she usually put it through.
Yet when the news came over the radio that she had actually arrived in Paris, strangers and friends alike went wild with delight. At last here was a triumph for the feminine sex that could not be disputed. A girl of eighteen had flown alone, in less than a day and a half, across the Atlantic to France! All the world was ready to pay her homage, the kind they had paid to Lindbergh a few years before.
Unlike Lindbergh, however, Linda Carlton was not greeted upon her arrival at Le Bourget by any great crowd. Perhaps the people had been disgusted by the Lightcaps' deception, or perhaps the reporting stations had lost trace of the Bellanca among so many airplanes over the Channel.... So, without any ostentation, the lone pilot taxied along the field, and shut off her motor, just as if she were an ordinary flyer, visiting from England.