6 a.m.
`` These are the orders , '' he explained , and asked Ethel to spread out the papers on the chart case . The instruction sheet read : `` Fly twenty-eight minutes beyond the coast line , which will place you ten or twenty miles northwest of the town of Beaumont , where a fire of some sort will be lighted about 3 a.m. `` When you alight locate one or more farm houses and attach one of the enclosed notices to the door . `` This done , fly toward the Beaumont signal fire and assist in subduing the town and capturing all petroleum works in the region . `` At 6 a.m. , if petroleum works are safe , follow the lead of the red plane and fly northwest as far as Fort Worth , returning by nightfall to oil region . '' Ethel read the paper over and over as she held it down out of the wind by the dim glow lamp . She wanted to ask questions . She wondered what was expected of her .