“No, no … Of course not, Dr. York. I just wondered if it was really a Messerschmitt.” He smiled, charmingly, and winked at Senator Wargin. “You know how excited ladies can get—one plane becomes three. A biplane becomes a Messerschmitt. Maybe the sun was in her eyes on this ‘utterly cloudless day’? I’m sure she’s not lying, but maybe a little confused. That’s all.”
I set my glass down on the nearest table so I didn’t crack the stem in my fist. “Oh, Colonel Parker, you’re so clever! Why, that must be just what happened.” Laying my hand on my bosom, I turned to Nicole. “Don’t you think?”
She joined me, like the world’s best wingman. “I’m sure you’re right. And to think, all these years, we’ve been confused by the wreckage. Why, that prisoner must have lied about what kind of plane he was flying to make himself look good.”
“I declare! I think you’re right.” Turning back to Colonel Parker, I beamed up at him. “Thank you ever so much for straightening that out for me. I feel like such a fool.”
Perhaps that was a tactical error. His face had red blotches at the cheeks, and it wasn’t from embarrassment. He inclined his head. “Still. The danger you were placed in demonstrates why letting women near a combat zone was a mistake.”
“I’m curious, Colonel Parker. How would you have handled being unarmed? As a man?” Tactical mistake or no, this got right to the heart of the astronaut issue.
He held up his hands. “Look. You were clearly very fortunate. I’m just saying that you should never have been put in that position.”
“I agree. My plane should have been armed. As a woman, I’m smaller and lighter. That means that my plane needs less fuel and I handle G-forces better than a man.” That last was skirting the truth, because I was tall for a woman, and the ability to handle G-forces was more related to height and blood pressure. “In fact, I would argue that women should already be in the astronaut corps, for exactly those reasons. To say nothing of the fact that we’re trying to establish a colony.”
“And men are better suited to do that work.” He glanced around the room and parroted what Clemons had said during the press conference. “Christopher Columbus didn’t take any women on his voyage, did he?”
“That was about conquest.” Sweat beaded under my brassiere. “The pilgrims, on the other hand, did bring women. If you want to establish a colony, we need women in space.”
“I see no compelling reason for that.”
“Here’s a reason.” Nicole laughed, lifting her glass over her head. “Babies!”
Laughter bubbled around us, breaking the tension. Senator Wargin stepped forward and guided Parker away, chatting amiably about golf. Small kindnesses, sometimes, are the best ones. Nicole left her perch and came to join Nathaniel and me.
Standing, I picked up my glass and saluted her with it. “Sorry about that.”
“Please. I remember Grabby Parker from the war.” She took a sip of her champagne. “Have you met his wife?”
I shook my head. “We don’t socialize.”
“You’ll notice that she’s not here tonight. Not that I’m saying anything by that … I’m just noting that Mrs. Parker was invited.”
“Speaking of invitations…” I glanced at Nathaniel, who seemed content to stay with me rather than mingle. “I’m putting together an air show featuring women pilots. I don’t suppose—”
“Yes. If you’re about to ask me to fly, yes.” She held up her hand, diamond bracelet glittering. “Wait. Darn it. I need to check with Kenneth to be certain it’s okay. Politics and all. But I can usually talk him round. So, if there’s no conflict, then yes. ‘Might be confused,’ my aunt Fanny.”
“Swell!” That would delight Betty’s journalistic soul. Having a senator’s wife on our roster would make pitching an article about the air show to her editor at the National Times that much easier. And, as an added bonus, it meant I wouldn’t have to be front and center.
I spent a surprising amount of time in concrete bunkers. The smell of kerosene filled the air of the testing range, even in the control bunker; having the test range three miles away from 203,400 gallons of kerosene still seemed uncomfortably close. I rolled a pencil between my fingers, waiting for the static firing test of the new Atlas rocket.
This one was an easy assignment. All I had to do was calculate the amount of thrust and see if it would be enough to get a rocket into orbit. Any of the computers could have done it, but I was here because it was Leroy Pluckett’s project. Damn good engineer. Couldn’t keep his hands off the computers, but as his boss’s wife, I had very few problems with him.
Relatively few. He leaned over my chair, one hand sliding across my shoulders to rest on the chair back. “How’s it going, Elma?”
I sat forward so he wasn’t touching me. “Can’t do much until it fires.”
Across the room, one of the other engineers lifted his head. “Dr. Pluckett, we’re adding the liquid oxygen now.”
“Great.” He smiled down at me, and by “me” I mean my bosom. “Just let me know if you need anything.”
“Absolutely.” I tapped my pencil on the table, trying to draw his eyes away. “I should probably finish getting ready.”
“Can I help with—”
An explosion rocked the room.
Sound and heat roared through the bunker, carrying the stench of burning carbons. It wasn’t the first time we’d lost a rocket, by any stretch, but that didn’t make it any quieter.
Engineers flinched, throwing their hands up to plug their ears. I twitched away and nearly fell out of my chair as the thunder died, leaving just the distant crackle of a fire. Sirens joined the cacophony. Pluckett reached for me, as if he were trying to help, only his meaty hand “somehow” landed on my chest.
Standing, I straightened my skirt and stepped back from him. My pulse shook through my hands, as much from anger at Pluckett as from the explosion. “You’d best attend to your rocket. Or do you need me to calculate the size of the misfire?”
The weight of the bowling ball pressed against my palm as I stared down the lane. Letting out a breath, I advanced, swinging back, forward, and releasing the ball. It left my hand in a momentarily perfect line, then curved to the side to hit just off-center.
A split. Darn it. Again.
“You can do it, Elma!” Behind me, Myrtle clapped her hands. “You can do it.”
I spun back, skirt flaring around me, while I waited for the pinboy to clear the ones I had knocked down. “You’d think that a physicist would be better at this.”
With an arm around his wife, Eugene shook his head. “Theory and practice. Two different things. It’s like saying being a physicist should allow you to fly.”
“I can fly, thank you very much.” My bowling ball thunked against the end of the return trough and I stooped to pick it up, waving a little thank you to the pinboy who’d rolled it back. We had to remember to tip them well.
“Speaking of flying…” Eugene said.
Myrtle nudged his foot. “Let her bowl. I want to see the fireworks.”
“We’ll get you out in time to enjoy the Fourth.” Eugene shook his head and pointed his beer toward the lane. “And I’ll wait till after Elma’s turn for my question.”
“I’ll be fascinated to see where this segue takes us.” The Fourth was what had made me suggest bowling. After the Meteor, I found fire raining from the sky considerably less appealing. I turned back to the lane, where the pinboy had cleared the last of the pins and was safely perched on his high stool. He had a comic out, and even from here I could recognize Superman’s distinctive red-and-blue costume.