The face of his companion, a likely enough youngster but with no considerable experience of record-distance work, was grave and a little drawn. Norris nudged him with his shoulder and grinned a reassurance.
“Buck up, bird!” he shouted above the synchronized beating of the engines. “In five minutes we’ll be over the hump or out of the world.”
But he was taking no chances. Every inch must count. He held on doggedly clear to the extreme corner of the field. Mechanics closed in when he finally shut the throttles down. They set their humid shoulders to the fuselage and swung the tail around.
Norris waved a hand.
“All clear?”
“All clear, sir,” came the answer.
He drove the throttles home, shoved the wheel forward, nudged the rudder bar, and cocked an eye on the wind-speed gauge.
“It’s cocktails in Panama or candles at Langstrom!” he yelled.
The XT-6 moved a foot toward the Canal—two—three—ten. Her tail began to rise. She set her nose on the low horizon and charged heavily down the fairway, roaring with the voice of eight hundred horse. The needle on the speed gauge trembled. It began to climb. It made thirty at the quarter mile. At the half it pointed fifty-five and still rising. When it reached sixty it hesitated and Norris stopped breathing. Then it moved on upward—slowly—slowly.
A quarter mile more of grace.