Mary V had centuries of dependent womanhood behind her, and must be excused.
Johnny wished that he had warned her about the peculiar tendency of the air currents to follow the contour of the ground.

He climbed as high as Bland had climbed at first, hoping to escape the abruptness of the waves such as he had studied patiently from charts, and which he had felt when they flew over arroyos and rough ground.

He did not want Mary V to be alarmed, but the noise of the motor made speech impossible, so he let the explanation go for the present.

Mary V was sitting exactly in the center, grasping rather tightly the edges of the pit as a timid person holds fast to the sides of a canoe.

Sitting so, she did not look in the least like a young woman who has just compelled a man at the point of a revolver to do her bidding.