The two girls hurried back to the stewardesses’ lounge. There they prepared the necessary report forms for the trip.
“Do I look all right, Vic?” Jean asked.
They both checked their appearance—a stewardess had to be perfectly groomed and turned out—before leaving the operations area of the building.
They hurried down a flight of stairs into Hangar One. In the vast high shed, Captain Jordan had two men in blue uniform with him. The five of them met beside a DC-7 which a repair crew was tuning up. The engines roared; Captain Jordan had to shout.
“Miss Vicki Barr, Miss Jean Cox, this is our first officer, Dan McGovern—”
The girls shook hands with their copilot, who was a large, quiet, serious-looking man.
“—and our navigator, Chuck Smith.”
Chuck Smith was young, small, and wiry, with an ingratiating grin.
“See you aboard,” they all said.
The two stewardesses went outdoors onto the windy airfield. A little distance away their immense silver Electra stood waiting for them. The plane was 104 feet long with a 99-foot wing span. Its sheer size took their breath away.