“John! It moved!”
Berry leaned far out of his seat and stared down at the indicator on the copilot’s navigation radio.
They both looked at it for a long time, but the needle lay lifeless in the center of its scale. Berry saw too that the distance-to-go readout was blank.
“I thought I saw it move.” She tried to sound emphatic. “I was sure I did.”
“Nothing.” He straightened up in his chair. “Keep an eye on it.”
“Right.”
Berry settled back again. Everything on the instrument panel remained unchanged. Dead voice radios. Dead navigation radios. Amber autopilot-disengage light on. Heading of 131 degrees. Airspeed of 340 knots. Altitude of 900 feet. The only change was the fuel gauge, which had sunk below the one-eighth mark. Even if they spotted land now, it was going to be very close.
Berry looked up at the horizon. Nothing. The long, uneventful three-and-a-half-hour portion of the flight had raised their hopes, but now with land supposed to be in sight, the tension was beginning to show. He tried to calm the mounting uneasiness within him.
Sharon pointed to the horizon. “What’s that?”
Berry sat up and peered out the window. For the last half hour, every patch of low sea fog had become California, every hazy discoloration on the horizon had been San Francisco. Their imaginations and their hopes kept creating solid land out of each vapor, only to see it melt away as they approached. He stared at the low hazy line on the horizon and saw it move, then drift away as an ocean breeze caught it. “Nothing. More fog.”
“It might be the fog of San Francisco.”
“It might— What?”
“The San Francisco fog.” She looked at her watch. “It’s just past six. That’s nearly always the time that the fog rolls in during the summer.”
Berry looked at her. “Why the hell didn’t you remind me? Damn! What am I supposed to do if the airport is covered with fog?”
“Well . . . you can make an instrument landing, can’t you?”
Berry resisted the temptation to remind her of his meager qualifications. “No. A full instrument landing is out of the question.” He had no business in the Straton’s captain’s seat. There were more instruments in the Straton’s cockpit than there were combined in the last ten planes he had flown. “Damn, I should have headed north or south to another airport.”
Crandall reminded him, “Since we don’t know where we are, we may already be north or south of San Francisco.” She tapped her finger against the fuel gauge. “We’ll be lucky if we even see the coast. I wouldn’t worry about the San Francisco fog yet.”
Berry looked down at the gauge. One-sixteenth. “Yes. You’re right.”
“Maybe we can put it down near the beach,” she said as she stole a glance at him. “Can we do that?”
“I suppose. If we get that far, and if I see that the coastline is covered with fog, I’ll ditch it.” Berry knew that a ditching into heavy fog would be suicide “I’d like to try for the airport, but we would have to consider the people on the ground. . . .”
“Then don’t try it. Whatever you want to do is all right. Just take it easy. You’ll do the best you can when the time comes.”
“Right.” His nerves were becoming raw, and he hoped he had something left in him when the time came to put the plane down. From the first time he stepped into the cockpit and saw the disabled crew, he knew that, barring any midair catastrophe, he would have to put the Straton down eventually. That time—as the fuel gauges told him—was nearly here.
“It’s not always foggy.”
“What? Oh, right.”
“And when it is, the fog usually comes in slowly. We may be able to beat it. And sometimes it doesn’t get as far as the airport.”
“Good.” He noticed that no one offered to bet a dinner on it.
The Straton continued on its southeasterly flight path, the sinking sun casting the airliner’s shadow onto the smooth ocean in front of its port wing. Berry scanned the horizon for land, and watched for other aircraft or ships that might recognize that the airliner was in trouble. But they were alone.
“John! It moved again!”
He looked quickly down at the copilot’s panel. “It’s not moving.”
She stared at the navigation radio bearing indicator, but the needle was dead. “It did. There’s no question this time. I saw it. Damn it, I saw it.”
“Okay, okay.” Berry watched the needle carefully. He’d heard stories of desperate pilots who had wanted to see runway lights or encouraging indications from their instruments so badly that they hallucinated into existence whatever they needed.
“I saw it move.”
“Okay. Let’s watch it.”
They stared at it for a full minute. Berry picked up the radio chart and rechecked the frequency. The navigation radio in front of Crandall was unquestionably tuned to the San Francisco station. Berry turned and looked back at its indicator. “Still dead,” he said in a whisper, as if his voice would scare away the signal.
She said nothing.
As they both watched, the needle finally gave a small, barely perceptible bounce.
Sharon Crandall jumped in her seat. “Did you see it?”
Berry’s face broke into a wide smile. “I saw it. You bet I saw it.”
The needle began to bounce more vigorously as the navigation radio received the signal more strongly. The electronic pathway to San Francisco suddenly opened to them.
As the small needle quivered with the electronic impulse of San Francisco Airport’s directional beam, John Berry knew how all the lost and lonely aviators, seamen, and explorers felt when they laid eyes on the object of their search. “We’re heading home. Not much farther to go now.”
“John, we’re going to make it. I know it.”
“Our odds have certainly improved. Turn that dial. That one—until the needle centers.”
She did as he said.
“Okay?”
“Yes. Now read me the number that shows on the display.”
“One-three-nine.”
“Okay.” Berry faced the wheel and began steering the Straton through a shallow right turn until the compass heading of 131 degrees swung to the new heading of 139 degrees, then leveled out.
Sharon looked back at Linda Farley, who had maintained her usual silence. “We have San Francisco on the radio.”
“I don’t hear anything.”
She smiled. “No. It’s a . . . navigation radio. Like a compass. We know where the airport is now.”
“Do they know where we are?”
Berry spoke. “Not yet. But they’ll see us on radar soon.”
Linda Farley leaned forward in her seat and asked,
“Are you going to land the airplane, Mr. Berry?”
Berry nodded. “Yes, I am.” He paused. “But we might still have to land in the water. You remember what Sharon told you about landing in the water?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” Berry set his navigation radio from Salinas to San Francisco. “I’ll read it from here on. Look for land.” He adjusted the dials and watched as the distance-to-go meter began cycling into place. He looked at the readout and smiled. “San Francisco Airport dead ahead—ninety-three miles.”
“Ninety-three miles,” she repeated. “How much longer?”
“About fifteen minutes. What time is it?”
“Eight minutes past six.”
Berry nodded. “Well, we’ll be on the ground no later than six-thirty.”
“Oh, dear God, I can’t believe it.” Her voice became choked. “Oh, John—oh, God, I can’t believe it.” She put her face down into her hands and her body began to shake. “We’re almost home.”
“Yes,” Berry answered absently. He had let his eyes drift toward the fuel gauges. The needles were almost on the empty marks. He had gotten good at translating the graduations on the fuel gauges into flight time. By six-thirty, he said to himself, we’ll be out of fuel.
17
Hot lights always annoyed Edward Johnson, and today they seemed more annoying than usual. The long, walnut-paneled press conference room on the second level of the main terminal building was filled to overflow capacity with newspeople, camera crews, company officials. Everyone loved a disaster, reflected Johnson, except the people who were physically or financially involved. “Goddamn vultures,” he said.
“Lower your voice,” said Wayne Metz. Metz stood next to Johnson, trying to look inconspicuous, as though he had no direct connection with Johnson. “There are microphones in front of you.”
Johnson was feeling reckless. “Goddamn vultures.” There was such a din in the room, he didn’t think anyone could hear him if he shouted out a full confession. He mopped his brow and noticed with annoyance that half the lights had not yet been turned on. “It’ll be over soon.” He glanced up at the clock. 6:08. “These goddamned things never start on time.”
Hank Abbot, the Straton Aircraft Corporation representative, pushed his way through the crowd. “Hello, Ed. Bad break.”
Johnson glanced at him. “Yeah.”
Abbot turned to Metz. “Wayne Metz, right? Beneficial?”
“Right.”
“Bad break for you, too.”
Johnson broke in. “Have you notified your insurance carrier yet?”
Abbot looked at him for several seconds until he understood. “Hold on, Ed. One of those data-link messages mentioned a bomb.”
“Did you see the damage, Hank?”
“No, of course not, but . . .”
“Neither did an engineer. Do you think some half-hysterical, possibly brain-damaged passenger could tell the difference between a bomb blast and a structural failure?”
“Wait a damned minute—”
“If a wall or window blew out because the hull couldn’t handle the air pressure, that would be your problem, wouldn’t it?”
“Look, Ed, we’ve done business with Trans-United since before the war. On those rare occasions when an accident was caused by structural failure or faulty design, we’ve owned up and made good, but . . .”
“Sorry, Hank. No aircraft, no survivors, no one knows anything. I don’t think we should be speaking to each other at this time without counsel present.”
“You bastard.” Abbot stood in front of Johnson for several seconds, then turned abruptly and pushed his way to the back of the room.
Metz turned to Johnson. “God, you almost convinced me that it was his fault.”
“It was.” He looked closely at Metz. “It was.”
Metz nodded. “How will the government investigations be?”
“Not too bad.” Johnson didn’t think there was any way an investigating agency could unwrap the package in which he had sealed the Straton’s fate. As he had basically reminded Abbot, there was a saying they used in these things: No aircraft, no survivors, no one to hang—or everyone. “I spoke to the president,” Johnson said. He nodded toward a pleasant-looking man near the back wall. “He says your boss is pissed off at you.”
Metz nodded. “Yes. I just spoke to him. He was all right this afternoon, but he turned nasty when he got an idea of what the bill might be from Trans-United.”
“Does he have a check in the mail?”
“If he only knew how bad it could have been. Damn it, if he only knew what I did . . .” He looked around him. “I have to go to New York tonight. See him first thing in the morning. Christ. I hope we can stick the Straton people with this.”
“We have a good shot at it. And, Wayne,” he lowered his voice, “don’t even hint to Mr. Wilford Parke that his fair-haired boy helped deep-six the Straton for the good of the company—because if you do . . .”
Metz nodded. It had occurred to him, as he spoke to Parke, that he had committed mass murder for nothing. His days at Beneficial were definitely numbered. Johnson, on the other hand, seemed to be coming through this intact. “Life can really suck—you know?”
“Tell me about it.” Johnson wanted nothing more out of life at that moment than a drink and a good night’s sleep. He wanted to get into his car, drive out to the beach, check into a motel, and get far away from this airport.
A voice yelled out, “Two minutes!” Evidently, they were going with live TV coverage rather than videotapes.
For Metz, the television and press coverage was a foreign and overwhelming event and a further addition to his problem. He hoped Johnson could handle it. He had a sudden desire to disappear into the shadowy corners of the room. “Should I move farther away?”
“How about Brazil?”
“I mean—”
“Stay here. Just step back out of camera shot, but don’t get too far.”
Metz had a sudden inspiration. “I wouldn’t mind answering questions. I could say something.”
“Don’t try to save your job on my time. I might have enough trouble saving my own. Step back.”
Metz stepped back. He could see that Johnson was still volatile, but he knew that as soon as he settled down, he would begin to think in terms of helping Metz save his job. He had no choice, really. The two of them were in it together.
“One minute!”
Johnson took a cigar out of his pocket and lit it. He looked around the room. Kevin Fitzgerald stood with Trans-United’s public-relations man and a few other executives. The president stood with the chairman of the board and presumably God stood beside them both, though Johnson’s irreverent eyes could not see Him. Everyone had agreed that this conference was too important to be left to the public-relations people, and too sad an occasion to have the president’s face and name associated with it. Bastards. He straightened his tie and wiped his brow.
“Thirty seconds!”
Johnson looked at the clock. Twelve after six.
A TV technician shouted from across the room. “We’re ready, Mr. Johnson.”
Johnson nodded. He turned and faced the cameras squarely as the last of the bright lights were turned on.
Metz stepped even farther back from Johnson. Out of nervous habit, he felt inside his sports jacket for the data-link messages, as a man feels for his wallet, and his heart jumped when his fingers found nothing. Then he remembered, with some embarrassment, that he and Johnson had stopped on the access road between the Trans-United hangar and the administration building to burn them. They were no more than a pile of ashes now. But, still, his fingers went deeper into his inside pocket. He had the sudden, irrational fear that he had somehow left one of them in his pocket, and that the TV camera would suddenly swing around and zero in on it like an X-ray zeroing in on a suspicious spot. His fingers felt the line at the bottom of his pocket. He patted his other pockets quickly. He saw Johnson giving him an annoyed look. Calm down. Almost over.
A young woman with a clipboard called out, “Mr. Johnson, watch for the red light.”
Johnson glowered at the production assistant. “I know that.”
“Right. Begin with your prepared statement, then we’ll go into the Q and A from the newspeople.”
“Fine.” It seemed to Johnson that the newsmen—or newspeople, as they called themselves—were literally licking their lips over the assignment to cover the first air crash of a supersonic transport. If the bastards only knew the story they almost had.
The camera’s red light came on.
“You’re on.”
Johnson cleared his throat and put on an expression that was appropriate to the gravity of the first sentence he could speak. “Ladies and gentlemen, I regret to announce that Trans-United Flight 52 has apparently crashed at sea. The flight, a Straton 797 supersonic airliner, left San Francisco International Airport this morning at eight-thirty A.M., on a nonstop flight to Tokyo. Onboard the aircraft were 302 passengers and a crew of fourteen. Approximately midway across the Pacific, there was an in-flight emergency, the exact nature of which is unknown but apparently involved the hull—the fuselage . . .” Fuck Abbot, “. . . and cabin pressure was lost. The aircraft turned around and headed ba
ck to San Francisco.” Johnson paused and took a breath. “What you may have heard concerning a passenger piloting the aircraft is true.”
There was an excited murmur in the room, and Johnson could see pencils moving and cameras clicking away at him. He continued, “Because of a malfunction in their voice radios, we established contact with them via data-link—a computer screen for typed messages. The last message was received from Flight 52 at approximately one P.M., San Francisco time. Since then—”
A wall telephone rang loudly in the back of the quiet room.
Johnson glanced up at it with unconcealed annoyance, and saw Kevin Fitzgerald pick it up. He glanced at the production assistant who was motioning him to continue. “Since then, an extensive search-and-rescue operation has been mounted by military and civilian authorities. . . .” Johnson saw that Fitzgerald was speaking excitedly into the telephone, and something inside him signaled a warning. “Flight 52 had . . . still has not been found as of this moment . . . and if they were still flying . . . their fuel would probably have been consumed by now . . .” Fitzgerald had motioned for the president and the chairman of the board. What the fuck is going on back there? “And is still . . . that is . . . we have many of the relatives and friends of the passengers here at the terminal . . . in our lounge . . .” Fitzgerald was speaking into the phone and relaying a message to the people around him. There was a stir in the back of the room. “And the chief pilot, Captain Kevin Fitzgerald . . . has been with the passengers . . . the passengers’ relatives . . . constantly . . . until now. The search will continue until—”
“Wait!” Fitzgerald held the phone in his hand and was signaling to Johnson.
Johnson dropped his cigar on the floor and stared at Fitzgerald.
Everyone turned toward the back of the room.