I tapped Buffy's thigh and pointed out the windscreen, she glanced up from the manual she was reading and looked where I was pointing; the distant line of land was just visible rising from the ocean. "Nova Scotia?" she asked.

"You're the one that is supposed to be navigating."

"If you flew the course I gave then it would be, but with you flopping around the sky like a wounded turkey…"

"I haven't been flopping around the sky!"

All I got was a grunt in response as she reached down and got the chart out of her Jeppeson case so she could verify our position once we got a little closer to land and could identify some features. The B-26 we were ferrying was a fast plane so it wouldn't be long. It had been a long flight from Baltimore, almost all of it over water. We hadn't been able to get a position check off of Nantucket or Cape Cod because of the massive fog banks to the west of us. We had dodged a couple of thunderheads along the way so we were a little uncertain of our exact position; dead reckoning was only so accurate.

I continued to scan the water around us and spotted a low lying island off our port wing, "Buffy, check the island to port."

She leaned forward in her seat to look around me and examined it for a few moments and then turned her attention to the chart and then back to the island, "Looks like Seal Island so you haven't gotten us too far off course, hold on…" she used her protractor to figure the course to Halifax, "… try 55 degrees magnetic"

"Try?"

She looked at me, "Yeah, try to hold it on that course and we should find the airport…"

I stuck my tongue out at her but banked us slightly to put us on the new course. Soon we were flying up the east coast of a large land mass. After a couple of minutes Buffy let out a sigh, "Well, we aren't lost! That's Nova Scotia; we should be seeing Halifax soon."

Then Buffy switched to the radio and I heard her calling Halifax, "Halifax Control, this is Sierra Tango Four Seven Three"

Almost immediately a male voice responded, "Sierra Tango, this is Halifax Control, be advised this airfield is closed to civilian traffic. Only military and scheduled commercial aircraft are permitted in the area."

I glanced at Buffy and saw the scowl on her face, "Halifax Control, this is United States Army Air Force B-26 Sierra Tango Four Seven Three requesting approach and landing instructions, we are approximately five minutes out."

There was silence for several moments and then the voice came back, "Sierra Tango, Halifax Control, uh… sorry about that… you are cleared for approach and landing, runway 34, no other traffic is in the area at this time, negligible winds, 1 to 5 miles per hour from the northwest, barometer 29.1"

"Halifax Control, Sierra Tango, roger we're cleared first in, negligible winds, barometer 29.1"

"Sierra Tango, Halifax Control, report on final."

I had picked up the airport and as we neared I turned southeast to parallel the runway and check for traffic before turning onto final. The B-26 was a hot twin engine medium bomber that we didn't get to fly a lot, I suspected part of Buffy's bad attitude was the fact she had lost the coin toss and was sitting in the right seat, the copilot's seat, while I had the pilot's seat. We both loved flying the B-26, even though it had a bad reputation and had acquired the nick name of the 'Widowmaker'. She wasn't really a bad aircraft, you just had to fly her hot and then she was a dream, but she landed a lot faster than most aircraft and too many pilots came in too slow - she didn't like to fly slow.

Five minutes later we were on the ground taxing behind a 'Follow Me' jeep over to a parking area near the airport terminal. I brought her to a stop as directed and we shut her down and then completed filling out the logs, Buffy completed the aircraft log and her own flight log while I concentrated on my flight log; since I had been flying most of the time I hadn't kept my log up to date during the flight. Once done I looked around outside of the plane, a couple ground crewmen were finishing securing the plane with chocks and tie downs and I saw an officer, I assumed the receiving officer, walking across the tarmac toward us. Other than that the place looked deserted although it was crowded with Army aircraft of all types, I guess late Sunday afternoon was not a busy time. I tapped Buffy on the shoulder, "About ready?"

"Yeah, be done in just a sec."

I reached up and popped the hatch release above my head and opened the hatch, by standing on my seat it was easy to climb out of the aircraft. A second later Buffy opened the hatch above her seat, she reached behind our seats and got our gear bags and Jeppeson cases and handed them up to me and then climbed out, we walked aft a couple of feet to where the ground crew had rigged a ladder and I climbed down from the plane.

Once I was on the ground Buffy threw our bags and the Jeppeson cases down to me and then climbed down herself, we walked up to the receiving officer, a Captain, and came to attention as I saluted, "Lieutenants Thompson and Summers, delivering B-26 41473 to Halifax as ordered."

The Captain stared at us in shock for a moment then shook himself and returned my salute, "Afternoon ladies, haven't seen any like you before."

"Raised in a monastery sir?" Buffy snarked.

"Uh, no," confusion clear on his face, then comprehension, "No, I meant women pilots up here."

Before Buffy could come up with some other biting remark I put in, "They've just cleared us for flight operations outside the US, you'll probably be seeing more of us now, sir."

"Oh, okay."

I handed him the clipboard with the aircraft receipt, "Would you sign for the aircraft sir?"

He nodded and signed the forms, I took one copy and stuffed it in my case and gave him the rest of the copies along with the rest of the paperwork for the aircraft, "Can you tell us where the op center is so we can check in and get our quarters?"

"Uh, I don't know what they'll do with you…"

"Typical," Buffy said, "You'd think someone…"

I slugged her, hard, on the arm, before she said something she would later regret. She was still pissed about what had happened to her Top Gun school and she wanted to take something out on somebody. I had also learned in the little over a year we had been together that she was not very tolerant of the prejudices against women that were prevalent and she could get herself into more trouble than it was worth without much thought. I had also learned that I had to hit the damned Slayer hard in order to distract her; I guess the force I hit her with startled the Captain, "Lieutenant!"

"She's dense, like a mule you know, you have to hit them with a two by four to get their attention."

Buffy scowled at me but then grinned, "Don't worry, sir. I'm used to it by now; she has to vent her frustration somewhere since I'm always beating her."

"Buffy!"

"Barb!"

I gave up and turned back to the Captain, "Ops center sir?"

He pointed to a large building a hundred yards down the flight line, "In there, just follow the signs."

I raised my hand in salute, Buffy following along, "By your leave, sir?"

He nodded and returned the salutes, "Dismissed, Lieutenants."

We grabbed our stuff and walked over to the building the Captain had pointed out and followed the signs into the operations center. Like the rest of the airfield the place seemed deserted, we walked up to a long counter; I was looking around when Buffy's voice rang out, "HEY! ANYBODY HOME?"

A moment later I heard a chair scrape and a grizzled old sergeant came out of one of the doors behind the counter, he started as he saw us, and then came over to the counter, "Uh, sorry miss, wasn't expecting anybody in today."

"Well, we're here sergeant. We need to sign in and we'll need quarters for tonight or until we get a flight out."

"Uh, yes ma'am? You're attached to?"

"We're ferry pilots; we just brought in a B-26." His eyes went wide with shock, "Get used to it; there will be a lot more of us around."

"Yes, ma'am," he looked around, confused, like he couldn't figure out what to do, then comprehension came to him and he reached under the counter and brought out a clip board, "The base commander wants all ferry pilots to fill out this form in case something comes up and they need to reassign flights. I'll contact the duty officer and find out about your quarters while you fill it out."

I looked at the form on the clip board he handed to me, it simply asked for name, rank, and aircraft types you were qualified for so I filled in it in, "Thompson, B.; 1st Lt.; B-25, B-26, P-36, P-38, P-39, P-40, C-47." Then handed the clip board to Buffy, she filled in her information, the same as mine, and then put it back on the counter.

The sergeant was on the phone and not seeming to accomplish much, "Sergeant?"

He covered the mouth piece before answering me, "Yes, ma'am?"

"If you can just certify 'no quarters available' we'll go into town and find a hotel, I assume they have such a thing in this town?"

He nodded his head and talked on the phone for another minute and then hung up and came back, "The Major said that would work best, I can call the duty driver and he'll give you a ride into town and you can get a taxi in the morning to get back out here. All ferry pilots are supposed to be in the Ops Center by 5AM for their assignments, there's bus service but I don't think it's running that early."

"Okay, sergeant, we'll be back on time." I held out a copy of my travel orders and showed him where to fill in the information, it was something we were used to doing since most of the military bases we flew into didn't have accommodations for transient, for that matter any, female officers. He filled out the required information and signed for the missing Major and did the same to Buffy's orders. Then he was back on the phone to get the duty driver.

He finished with his second call and came back and grabbed the clip board and glanced at what we had filled in, his eyes went round again, "You're qualified for all these types?"

Buffy nodded, "And several more, but you wouldn't have any of them up here."

I asked, "Is there a head where we can change?"

"I think there's a ladies bathroom over in the civilian terminal…"

Buffy snorted, "I'm not walking all the way over there, it doesn't look like there's anybody around, where's your head?"

He pointed to a door off to the side of the large room, and Buffy grabbed her bags and headed for it, I grabbed mine and followed after her, I looked back over my shoulder at him "We'll be out in a minute, you don't need it do you?"

He shook his head no and I followed Buffy into the head. I got out of the parachute that was still hanging on me and then took off my leather jacket, flying boots, pants and shirt. Then I stripped off the long underwear I wore, cockpit heaters were not always reliable. I opened my gear bag to get out a fresh uniform. Buffy was adamant about avoiding skirts as much as possible, she said they were for dressing up and not for work as far as she was concerned, so she refused to pack any in her gear bag. Instead she had gotten, and convinced me to get, some nice men's uniform pants and shirts and then we had them tailored to fit us. Those plus our leather flying jackets and an overseas cap completed her version of a well uniformed female officer, so far no one had called us on it. Probably because no one knew what the hell female officers were supposed to wear, at least not on the military bases we were on.

We used the facilities and then stowed our flying clothes in our gear bag and collected the rest of the stuff and headed back out. By that time another sergeant had shown up, the first one turned to us as we got back to the counter, "Your driver is here, ma'am."

"Thank you, sergeant," I held up the parachute I was carrying in one hand, "where should we check in this gear?"

"Uh, No one's in the equipment building now. I guess I can call the duty officer and find out…"

"Never mind, we'll just keep it with us," I turned to the new man, "Is there a decent hotel in town?"

"Yes ma'am, several that used to cater to the tourist traffic, not much of that anymore so they always have rooms available."

"Well, take us to a nice one, preferably not too far away."

It was a ten minute ride to the hotel, an early twenties three story brick building by appearances. The driver let us off in front, no doorman but I suspected they didn't have the business any more to justify one because there was a porter's station by the door. We walked into the deserted lobby and over to the registration counter, Buffy looked around, "Is this entire town deserted?"

I rang the bell; I was beginning to agree with her, I don't think I had seen more than half a dozen cars and even fewer pedestrians on the ride into town. In a moment an elderly man in a grey suit came out of a back room, "Can I help you gentle… Uh, ladies?"

"We need a room, preferably two beds, for the night, maybe longer."

"Oh, uh, all our rooms have only one bed. But we could add a cot."

"How big?" Buffy asked.

"Uh, how big what?"

"How big is the bed? King, Queen?"

I tried to kick her ankle; she was using terms from her time again, "Uh… I don't understand, Miss?"

Before she could speak again I spoke up, "Is the bed a double or single?"

"Oh, they're all doubles, of the best quality."

Before I could say anything Buffy turned to me, "We share or you get the cot. I'm not going to sleep on one of those da… darn things if I don't have to."

"We'll take a room and a cot, you'll take US currency?"

He nodded, "It seems like that's about all we get nowadays."

"Is there a restaurant you would recommend nearby?"

He nodded, "Just down the street."

We dropped our stuff off in our room and had a leisurely dinner, it was quite good and we stuck with the local fish so we didn't have to try to deal with rationing issues. We returned to the hotel and got a decent night's sleep, the cot wasn't that bad.

5