the one in the red shirt did go away. Warwick, the bald man with the big false teeth, walked over to Craig and bent down. Craig let his eyes close all the way.
"Hey," Warwick said. "Hey, you 'wake?"
Craig lay still, eyes closed, breathing regularly. He considered manufacturing a small snore and thought better of it.
Warwick poked him in the side.
Craig kept his eyes shut and went on breathing regularly.
Baldy straightened up, stepped over him, and went to the restaurant door to watch the others. Craig cracked his eyelids and made sure Warwick's back was turned. Then, very quietly and very carefully, he began to work his wrists up and down inside the tight figure-eight of cloth which bound them. The tablecloth rope felt looser already.
He moved his wrists in short strokes, watching Warwick's back, ready to cease movement and close his eyes again the instant Warwick showed signs of turning around. He willed Warwick not to turn around. He wanted to be free before the assholes came back from the plane. Especially the English asshole, the one who had hurt his nose and then kicked him while he was down. The English asshole had tied him up pretty well; thank God it was only a tablecloth instead of a length of nylon line. Then he would have been out of luck, but as it was one of the knots loosened, and now Craig began to rotate his wrists from side to side. He could hear the langoliers approaching. He intended to be out of here and on his way to Boston before they arrived. In Boston he would be safe. When you were in a boardroom filled with bankers, no scampering was allowed.
And God help anyone - man, woman or child - who tried to get in his way.
9
Albert picked up the book of matches he had taken from the bowl in the restaurant. "Exhibit A," he said. "Here goes."
He tore a match from the book and struck it. His unsteady hands betrayed him and he struck the match a full two inches above the rough strip which ran along the bottom of the paper folder. The match bent.
"Shit!" Albert cried.
"Would you like me to - " Bob began.
"Let him alone," Brian said. "It's Albert's show."
"Steady on, Albert," Nick said.
Albert tore another match from the book, offered them a sickly smile, and struck it.
The match didn't light.
He struck it again.
The match didn't light.
"I guess that does it," Brian said. "There's nothing - "
"I smelled it," Nick said. "I smelled the sulphur! Try another one, Ace!"
Instead, Albert snapped the same match across the rough strip a third time... and this time it flared alight. It did not just burn the flammable head and then gutter out; it stood up in the familiar little teardrop shape, blue at its base, yellow at its tip, and began to burn the paper stick.
Albert looked up, a wild grin on his face. "You see?" he said. "You see?"
He shook the match out, dropped it, and pulled another. This one lit on the first strike. He bent back the cover of the matchbook and touched the lit flame to the other matches, just as Bob Jenkins had done in the restaurant. This time they all flared alight with a dry fsss! sound. Albert blew them out like a birthday candle. It took two puffs of air to do the job.
"You see?" he asked. "You see what it means? Two-way traffic! We brought our own time with us! There's the past out there... and everywhere, I guess, east of the hole we came through... but the present is still in here! Still caught inside this airplane!"
"I don't know," Brian said, but suddenly everything seemed possible again. He felt a wild, almost unrestrainable urge to pull Albert into his arms and pound him on the back.
"Bravo, Albert!" Bob said. "The beer! Try the beer!"
Albert spun the cap off the beer while Nick fished an unbroken glass from the wreckage around the drinks trolley.
"Where's the smoke?" Brian asked.
"Smoke?" Bob asked, puzzled.
"Well, I guess it's not smoke, exactly, but when you open a beer there's usually something that looks like smoke around the mouth of the bottle."
Albert sniffed, then tipped the beer toward Brian. "Smell."
Brian did, and began to grin. He couldn't help it. "By God, it sure smells like beer, smoke or no smoke."
Nick held out the glass, and Albert was pleased to see that the Englishman's hand was not quite steady, either. "Pour it,"