"Are we ready?" she said brightly, slipping past them and nimbly hustling up the ladder to the control car.
Gunn gave Pitt a grim look. "You didn't tell us we were going on a picnic."
"Nobody told me either," Pitt said, gazing up at Jessie, who had turned and was framed in the doorway.
"My fault," said Jessie. "I forgot to mention that I'm your pilot."
Giordino and Gunn looked as if they had swallowed live squid. Pitt's face wore an amused expression.
He said, "No kidding."
"Raymond taught me to fly the Prosperteer," she said. "I've logged over eighty hours at the controls and have a license."
"No kidding," Pitt repeated, becoming intrigued.
Giordino failed to see the humor. "Do you also know how to dive, Mrs. LeBaron?"
"Sky or scuba? I'm certified for both."
"We can't take a woman," said Gunn resolutely.
"Please, Mrs. LeBaron," pleaded the crew chief. "We don't know what happened to your husband.
The flight might be dangerous."
"We'll use the same communication plan as Raymond's flight," she said, ignoring him. "If we find anything interesting we'll transmit in normal voice. No code this time."
"This is ridiculous," snapped Gunn.
Pitt shrugged. "Oh, I don't know. I'll vote for her."
"You don't really mean it!"
"Why not?" replied Pitt with a sardonic grin. "I firmly believe in equal rights. She has just as much right to get herself killed as we do."
The ground crew stood as silent as pallbearers, their eyes following the old blimp as she lifted into the sunrise. Suddenly she began dropping. They held their breath as the landing wheel touched the crest of a wave. Then she slowly bounced back into the air and struggled to rise.
Someone muttered anxiously, "Lift, baby, lift!"
The Prosperteer agonizingly rose a few feet at a time until she finally leveled out at a safe altitude. The ground crew watched motionless, staring until the blimp became a tiny dark speck above the silent horizon. They stood there when she was no longer in view, instinctively quiet, a sense of dread in their hearts. There would be no volleyball game this day. They all herded inside the maintenance truck, overburdening the air conditioning system, clustering around the radio.
The first message came in at 0700 hours. Pitt explained away the shaky liftoff. Jessie had under compensated for the lack of buoyancy caused by the extra payload Giordino and Gunn had placed on board.
From then on until 1400 hours, Pitt kept the frequency open and maintained a running dialogue, matching his observations with the transcribed report that was recorded during LeBaron's flight.
The crew chief picked up the microphone. "Prosperteer, this is Grandma's house. Over."
"Go ahead, Grandma."
"Can you give me your latest VIKOR satellite position?"
"Roger. VIKOR reading H3608 by T8090."
The crew chief quickly plotted the position on a chart. "Prosperteer, you're looking good. I have you five miles due south of Guinchos Cay on the Bahama Bank. Over."
"I read the same, Grandma."
"How are the winds?"