than he had ever been while at the controls of an airplane. The pressure-leak on Flight 7 from Tokyo seemed like a minor glitch in comparison to this situation. His heart was beating slowly and heavily in his chest, like a funeral drum. He swallowed and heard a click in his throat. Flight 29 passed through 30,000 feet, still descending. The white, featureless clouds were closer now. They stretched from horizon to horizon like some strange ballroom floor.
"I'm scared shitless, mate," Nick Hopewell said in a strange, hoarse voice. "I saw men die in the Falklands, took a bullet in the leg there myself, got the Teflon knee to prove it, and I came within an ace of getting blown up by a truck bomb in Beirut - in '82, that was - but I've never been as scared as I am right now. Part of me would like to grab you and make you take us right back up just as far up as this bird will go."
"It wouldn't do any good," Brian replied. His own voice was no longer steady; he could hear his heartbeat in it, making it jig-jag up and down in minute variations. "Remember what I said before - we can't stay up here forever."
"I know it. But I'm afraid of what's under those clouds. Or not under them."
"Well, we'll all find out together."
"No help for it, is there, mate?"
"Not a bit."
The 767 passed through 25,000 feet, still descending.
7
All the passengers were in the main cabin; even the bald man, who had stuck stubbornly to his seat in business class for most of the flight, had joined them. And they were all awake, except for the bearded man at the very back of the plane. They could hear him snoring blithely away, and Albert Kaussner felt one moment of bitter jealousy, a wish that he could wake up after they were safely on the ground as the bearded man would most likely do, and say what the bearded man was most likely to say: Where the hell are we?
The only other sound was the soft rii-ip... rii-ip... rii-ip of Craig Toomy dismembering the in-flight magazine. He sat with his shoes in a deep pile of paper strips.
"Would you mind stopping that?" Don Gaffney asked. His voice was tight and strained. "It's driving me up the wall, buddy."
Craig turned his head. Regarded Don Gaffney with a pair of wide, smooth, empty eyes. Turned his head back. Held up the page he was currently working on, which happened to be the eastern half of the American Pride route map.
Rii-ip.
Gaffney opened his mouth to say something, then closed it tight.
Laurel had her arm around Dinah's shoulders. Dinah was holding Laurel's free hand in both of hers.
Albert sat with Robert Jenkins, just ahead of Gaffney. Ahead of him was the girl with the short dark hair. She was looking out the window, her body held so stiffly upright it might have been wired together. And ahead of her sat Baldy from business class.
"Well, at least we'll be able to get some chow!" he said loudly.
No one answered. The main cabin seemed encased in a stiff shell of tension. Albert Kaussner felt each individual hair on his body standing at attention. He searched for the comforting cloak of Ace Kaussner, that duke of the desert, that baron of the Buntline, and could not find him. Ace had gone on vacation.
The clouds were much closer. They had lost their flat look; Laurel could now see fluffy curves and mild crenellations filled with early-morning shadows. She wondered if Darren Crosby was still down there, patiently waiting for her at a Logan Airport arrivals gate somewhere along the American Pride concourse. She was not terribly surprised to find she didn't care much, one way or another. Her gaze was drawn back to the clouds, and she forgot all about Darren Crosby, who liked Scotch (although not to excess) and claimed to be a perfect gentleman.
She imagined a hand, a huge green hand, suddenly slamming its way up through those clouds and seizing the 767 the way an angry child might seize a toy. She imagined the hand squeezing, saw jet-fuel exploding in orange licks of flame between the huge knuckles, and closed her eyes for a moment.
Don't go down there! she wanted to scream. Oh please, don't go down there!
But what choice had they? What choice?
"I'm very scared," Bethany Simms said in a blurred, watery voice. She