As usual, I wake up in a sweat a few hours later. To pass the time, I reach for the newspaper clippings my old friend Bill sent me, the ones about Howland and Australia and the scandalous Honolulu photographs that apparently drove Mrs. Mallory to attempt her own life. Eventually I fall asleep again and rise at nine. Lindquist is gone. I snatch some coffee from the kitchen and bicycle down the highway, right through Hanalei, until I reach the village of Kilauea and the post office on the main road, which serves more or less the same variety of purpose here. The woman at the counter doesn’t seem to recognize me. I ask if I can send a telegram. She hands me the form, and I tap the pencil against my lips a few times before I compose the message.

BILL YOU BIG LUG STOP HOW ABOUT PULLING ALL YOU CAN FIND ON GEORGE MORROW STOP SEND TO YOURS TRULY CARE OF KILAUEA POST OFFICE STOP HAWAII BEATS ALL STOP WISH YOU WERE HERE STOP MUCH LOVE JANEY

III

Flying with me is a business. Of course I make money. I have to or I couldn’t fly. I’ve got to be self supporting or I couldn’t stay in the business.

—Amelia Earhart

Aviatrix by Eugenia Everett (excerpt)

October 1936: California

Irene had wired ahead to George:

LAND BURBANK APPROX 5PM STOP NO PRESS STOP REPEAT NO PRESS STOP LOVE ALWAYS IRENE

When the airplane rolled to a stop outside Hangar A, however, Irene looked out the cockpit window and saw four or five men in shabby blue suits gathered respectfully at the corner, holding their notebooks and their cameras. A couple of flashes went off. Landon took off his radio headset and turned to Irene. “I guess your public awaits,” he said.

“I’m sorry. I told him not to call the press.”

“No such thing as bad publicity, right?”

Irene unbuckled the safety strap and reached for her kit bag. “Thanks for the lift,” she said.

“Any time. Sorry about the race.”

“Those are the breaks. At least the ship’s not a write-off.”

“She’ll take some fixing, though.”

Irene ran a brush through her curls and dug out a tube of lipstick. “She will.”

The autumn sun was already dipping below the hills to the west. Landon opened the hatch and a couple of flashbulbs went off, a couple of voices called out in greeting. George bounded up the stairs first, tore off his hat, greeted her with an embrace and a kiss, prompting a few more flashbulbs and a photograph that would appear in the Burbank Daily Review the next morning, page four, and the Los Angeles Times, page eleven. He drew back and held her by the shoulders. His expression was one of fatigue and relief, and for a moment the exhausted Irene just absorbed the familiar air of him, hair oil and shaving soap and a distant note of cigars.