Jocko left without saying another word.
Goose Bay was on the edge of nowhere. Before them lay a run of eight hundred and thirty miles, give or take another thirty because of the unreliability of charts. With full tanks and the underwing tanks they could fly sixteen hundred miles in still air. One of those 'piece of cake' jaunts to which Cromwell referred so often.
But the two pilots went over the weather reports from the ships at sea and Greenland stations with excruciating detail, checking temperatures and winds aloft, shifting
pressure zones, and then listening to the advice of the oldtimers who flew this part of the world the yearround.
'You'll never have a better time than right now,' Captain T. C. Hampton of the RCAF told them. 'You'll want to arrive at Narssarssuaq on the south lip of Greenland in daylight. Going in there at night is suicide. I'd recommend you go airborne at midnight or so. With your speed,' he smiled, 'you should get there with splendid visibility.'
They gathered their notes. Hampton leaned on the counter and studied them.
'Hard to believe Lindbergh did this only three years ago.'
'Assuredly,' Foulois told him with as much dignity as he could muster. 'But Lindbergh was mad, you know. He had only one engine and he was making the trip nonstop. He even fell asleep on the way and nearly splashed into the ocean. How he expected to stay awake with tea instead of coffee or good French brandy has never been explained.'
'Besides,' Cromwell added with a sniff of disdain, 'you'll remember he took the easy way home. On a ship with his flying machine neatly tucked away in a large box.'
'Have a good flight. Take care,' Hampton told them as if they hadn't said a word. Nothing would help matters.
Anyone flying across the North Atlantic was crazy.
Jocko lay spreadeagled on the cabin floor, legs braced against seats, his head and shoulders over the open space where the floor hatch had been slid aside. He looked downward through powerful binoculars. He wanted to convey the incredible sense of wonder he felt, but trying to talk in the engine thunder and wind howling past the open hatch was impossible.
The whales. Magnificent! He'd never seen so many, and even from three thousand feet he saw clearly as they sent white spray cascading above them when they broke the surface. The plane was well into the northern reaches, and icebergs appeared as floating white sentinels. The flight was pure magic to him. He'd already dismissed his apprehensions; if that woman was completely at home up here he could hardly be less so. He felt a tug on his leg, and glanced about to see Indy motioning to him. Jocko slid the hatch closed and joined Indy and Gale.
'You have the look of a teacher on your face,' he remarked to Indy.
'And yours is that of the student. The both of you,' Indy told him. 'You're right. School's on.' Indy removed the camera from about his neck. He opened a leather case and brought forth a duplicate of the Leica he'd been carrying.
'I want you both to be able to work these things without delaying a moment when you'll need them. I'll carry one, you two will switch back and forth, but either one of you must be ready to shoot at any time we're flying.'
Jocko had been studying the Leica. 'I've seen many cameras. This is something new, isn't it?'
'Test models. Dr. Franck obtained one for us, the other came from Doctor Pencraft in London. They both have the right contacts with Leica. Now, much of this is going to be completely new to you. It was to me as well, so let me start at the beginning.'
He went through his instructions with exacting stepbystep demonstrations.
'This model isn't on the market yet.
It's a Leica One with a factory model number One-B. We'll set up both cameras so they're identical in film, shutter speeds, everything.'
The Leica 1B was virtually a handmade model, a 35mm package that used 35mm film in a roll of twentyfour exposures. 'You load from the bottom. Normally each exposure for a camera like this must be wound by hand, using this winding and rewinding knob on top. But they've added a batterypowered autosystem so that as soon as you take one picture, the camera will set the film automatically for the next exposure. That way you can take pictures as rapidly as you work the button, here, and the film rotates into position for your next shot. Still with me? Good. Now, you won't have to set the system. Well, it will be different depending upon lighting conditions, but basically we'll keep things as simple as possible.'
He passed them a film roll. 'This is Plus X film. Its got an ASA of one hundred—'
'Which means?' Jocko asked.
'That's the film speed rating. Watch what I'm doing with the camera and where I leave the settings. That way you can doublecheck very quickly the way it's supposed to be with the long lens.'
'Long lens?' Gale said.
'You don't need to remember these things,' Indy told her. 'Besides, you can bone up with the instruction booklet later. What it all means is that with this lens, if something is a long ways off, this thing functions like a telescope and brings it much closer. Something that's a dot with the regular lens will be a closeup shot with this lens. What I want you both to do is to shoot scenes outside—beyond—the airplane.
Icebergs, any ships we see, coming down over Greenland. Keep a record of the settings and the conditions. Don't worry about wasting film. Use all you want until you're completely comfortable with the system. The first chance we get we'll have the film processed so you can compare what you've been doing with the results.
From that point on I expect you both to be whizzes with this thing.'
'Uhhuh,' Jocko said.
'You have a lot of faith in us,' Gale offered with a touch of sarcasm.
'Shouldn't I?'
Jocko said, 'You're hoping we'll find something specific to take pictures of?
I'm trying to stay one step ahead of what you're after.'
'Good point,' Indy said. 'And you're right. Something very specific.'
