“But you’ll be giving her a big boost, you know.”
“What of it? She can’t challenge me next year. And four years after that she’s welcome to run for the top. That’s what she’s been after all along, right?”
“Right.”
“So let her have it. After I’ve finished my second term.” He yawned again. “Now I’m going to bed. G’night, Norm.”
The two men rose to their feet. “Good night, Mr. President,” said Norman Foster.
“Christ, I’m pissing blood!” Harry heard Monk’s frightened roar as he sat strapped tightly into his seat in the narrow compartment. Taki Nakamura, facing him, looked startled.
The plane was bouncing, jinking as they bit into the storm clouds. The thumping made Harry’s swollen nose hurt.
“We’ll have a doctor waiting for you when we land, Monk,” Harry shouted, feeling embarrassed, almost ashamed.
“What the hell did you do to him?” Wally Rosenberg asked.
“Kidney punch,” Harry mumbled.
“He break your nose?” Angel Reyes asked.
Harry started to shake his head but winced with pain. “No. I don’t think so.”
“Your eyes are swelling up,” Nakamura said, her face etched with concern.
“Yeah,” said Harry.
Rosenberg chuckled softly. “You’re gonna look great for the photographers, Harry. Two black eyes.” He laughed mockingly.
The plane lurched so badly all four of them clutched their seat arms.
I’ll look great for the photographers, Harry thought. If we land okay. If we don’t go into the drink and drown.
“Got Misawa’s beam,” O’Banion reported.
Colonel Christopher answered, “Great! Pipe it to me.”
She heard the thin, scratchy tone of the airfield’s radio location beam. We can ride in on it, Karen thought. Even if the weather’s zero-zero at the field, we can home in on the beam.
“Getting nasty,” Kaufman said, his voice high, nervous.
“Yeah.”
They were in the storm now, bouncing and lurching in the turbulence of the thick black clouds. Lightning flashed every few seconds. Hold together, baby, Karen crooned silently to the plane. Just a little bit longer. Hold together and we’ll get home. Just a little bit longer.
“What’s the ceiling at Misawa, Jon?” she asked into her lip mike.
“Checking,” Lieutenant Sharmon answered. Then, “Eight hundred and lowering. Raining hard.”
“Obie, get Misawa traffic control and tell them to clear a runway for us.”
“Already did that, Colonel.”
“Good.” We’ll make it, she told herself. But we’ve only got one shot at it. With the condition this bird is in, we won’t be able to go around and try a second approach if we goof the first one. I’ve got to make it on the first approach. Got to.
Charley Ingersoll knew it was bad news when three doctors came into his room with a clerical-collared minister accompanying them. They all looked like they were going to a funeral.
“Martha?” Charley asked before any of them could open their mouths. “My kids?”
“They’re fine,” said the oldest of the doctors. “Really?”
“Really. They’re right here in this hospital, being treated for exposure. But they’ll be released later today and they’ll come to see you.”
Charley was sitting up in bed. One of the IV drips had been removed from his arm, but the other one was still connected. Charley had tried to figure out which of his toes they’d taken off, but he couldn’t tell by wiggling and the bedclothes covered both his bandaged feet.
Suddenly all the breath seemed to gush out of Charley, as if he’d been holding it in for a year. He felt light- headed, like he was drunk or high or something.
“You saved their lives, Mr. Ingersoll,” said one of younger doctors. He didn’t look happy about it, though.
“They’re okay,” Charley said, his voice shaking. “That’s the important thing.”
“The same snowplow that found you picked up your family a little farther up the road,” said the older doctor. “You were semidelirious, but you kept telling the driver that your family was stuck in a snowbank.”
“You saved them,” the other younger doctor said, almost in a whisper.
“Then everything’s okay,” Charley said, hoping it was true.
“Well,” said the older doctor,
“Whattaya mean?”
Looking very unhappy, the doctor explained, “We did some routine tests on the blood samples you gave us —”
“Gave you?” Charley snapped. “I didn’t give you no blood samples.”
“You were unconscious when you were brought in. We took blood samples as a matter of course. Strictly routine.”
“So?”
Glancing at his two younger colleagues, the doctor said, “The routine screening we did indicates that you have . . .uh, cancer.”
“Cancer?” Charley yelped. “Me?”
“Prostate cancer.”
Charley sat there gaping at them.
“It’s apparently in the early stage,” said one of the younger medics. “It’s definitely treatable.”
Charley had heard about prostate cancer. They cut it out of you and then you can’t control your bladder or even get an erection anymore.
The other younger doctor produced a thick sheaf of papers. “These are forms you’ll have to sign.”
“Sign?” Charley echoed.
“For the tests and therapy. Maybe surgery.” He put the wad of papers on the nightstand by Charley’s bed.
The older doctor put on a phony smile. “Well, in an hour or so your wife and children will visit you.”
Then he turned and headed for the door, trailed by the two younger docs.
Charley stared at the minister, who reminded him a little of the pictures he had seen of Jesus: a little bit of a beard, sad, sorrowful eyes. And he remembered when he’d been freezing out in the snow that he’d asked God to save Martha and the kids even if it meant taking him.
“Reverend,” Charley asked, feeling lost and bewildered, “why does God give with one hand and take away with the other?”
The minister shook his head. “The Lord moves in mysterious ways, Mr. Ingersoll. But it’s all for the best, believe me. Trust in the Lord.”
“Yeah,” Charley said. “Sure.”
