The saloon. Heads covered with bristles, gray iron bristles, and yellow heads, and bald, ripe heads were bent over the instruments and maps. Swiftly, with a glance, I gathered them in with my eyes, off I ran, back along the long passage, then through the hatch into the engine-room. There it was hot from the red tubes, overheated by the explosions; a constant roar⁠—the levers were dancing their desperate drunken dance, quivering ceaselessly with a barely noticeable quiver; the arrows on the dials.⁠ ⁠… There! At last! Near the tachometer, a notebook in his hand, was that man with the low forehead.

“Listen,” I shouted straight into his ear (because of the roar), “Is she here? Where is she?”

“She? There at the radio.”

I dashed over there. There were three of them, all with receiving helmets on. And she seemed a head taller than usual, wingy, sparkling, flying like an ancient walkyrie, and those bluish sparks from the radio seemed to emanate from her⁠—from her also that ethereal, lightning-like odor of ozone.