I looked over at Amos. He grinned at me.
I grinned back.
So far, so good. At least we were seaborne.
4.
A wave broke across the prow of the plane, throwing salt spray up on the window in front of me, as I came to the last item on the check list.
There had been almost a hundred of them and it seemed like hours since we'd started.
I looked down at my watch. It was only sixteen minutes since we'd left the dock.
I looked out the windows.
The six big engines were turning over smoothly, the propellers flashing with sun and spray.
I felt a touch on my shoulder and looked back. The radioman stood behind me, an inflatable Mae West in one hand and a parachute pack hanging from the other.
"Emergency dress, sir."
I looked at him.
He was already wearing his; so were the other two men.
"Put it behind my seat."
I looked across at Amos. He already had the vest on and was tightening the cross belt of the parachute.
He sank back into his seat with an uncomfortable grunt.
He looked at me.
"You ought to put it on."
"I’ve got a superstition about 'em," I said.
"If you don't wear 'em, you'll never need 'em."
He didn't answer, shrugging his shoulders as the radioman went back to his seat and fastened his seat belt.
I looked around the cabin.
"Secure in flight stations?"
They all answered at once. "Aye, aye, sir!"
I reached forward and flipped the switch on the panel and all the lights turned from red to green.
From now on, they'd only go back to red if we were in trouble.
I turned the plane toward the open sea. "O.K., men. Here we go!"
I opened the throttle slowly.
The big plane lurched, its prow digging into the waves then slowly lifting as the six propellers started to chew up the air.
Now we started to ride high, like a speedboat in the summer races.
I looked at the panel. The air-speed indicator stood at ninety.
Amos' voice came over to me.
"Calculated lift velocity, this flight, one ten."
I nodded without looking at him and kept opening the throttle.
The needle went to one hundred, then one ten.
The waves were beating against the bottom of the hull like a riveting hammer.
I brought the needle up to one fifteen, then I started to ease back on the stick.
For a moment, nothing happened and I increased our speed to one twenty.
Suddenly, The Centurion seemed to tremble, then jump from the water. Free of the restraining drag, she seemed to leap into the air.
The needle jumped to one sixty and the controls moved easily in my hands.
I looked out the window. The water was two hundred feet beneath us.
We were airborne.
"Hot damn!" one of the men behind me muttered.
Amos squirmed around in his seat.
"O.K., fellers," he said, sticking out his hand. "Pay me!"
He looked over at me and grinned. "Each of these guys bet me a buck we'd never get off the water."
I flashed a grin at him and kept the ship in a slow climb until we reached six thousand feet. Then I turned her west and aimed her right at the setting sun.
"She handles like a baby carriage." Amos chortled gleefully from his seat.
I looked up at him from behind the radioman, where I had been standing as he explained the new automatic signaling recorder.
All you had to do was give your message once, then turn on the automatic and the wire recorder would repeat it over and over again until the power gave out.