Tail of the Storm

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Thanks to Mary Cockrell, my beloved sister-in-law and dispassionate counselor, whose help in putting the manuscript in final form was invaluable. I also thank Walter Sistrunk, Jr., for preparing the illustrations. Quotations of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry that appear on page vii and at the beginning of chapter 7 are taken from Wind, Sand, and Stars (New York: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1939), pp. 43 and 227.

In chapter 18, Charles Lindbergh is quoted from Spirit of St. Louis (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1953), pp. 301, 289, 296, and 302.

Some walls in the house were bare and in dire need of decoration, so we went out on a rare spending spree. But before going we made an agreement. I would pick out a painting that suited my fancy, and she would choose one to her liking. We would not judge one another's selections. Mine would hang in the study, hers in the bedroom.

Almost immediately I spotted mine from a distance. It was a bold painting of a magnificent three-masted bark running before the wind, sails billowing, seas breaking across her decks. Just standing there, staring at it, made you smell salt spray and hear the wind howling through the rigging. Yes, that was for me. The painting glowed with visions of adventure, challenge, and discovery.

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