“Very well.”
“Do you have any preference? I mean where we’ll go?”
“That’s entirely up to you.”
He hesitated, then said, “Would you like dinner first?”
She thought amusedly: the “first” was a message — to make quite sure she understood what she was getting into.
“No,” Cindy said. “I haven’t time. I have to be somewhere else later.”
She saw Derek Eden’s eyes glance down, then return to her face. She sensed the intake of his breath, and had the impression that he was marveling at his own good fortune. “You’re the greatest,” he said. “I’ll only believe my good luck when you come out through those doors.”
With that, he turned away and slipped quietly from the La Salle Salon. A quarter of an hour later, unnoticed, Cindy followed him.
She collected her coat and, as she left the Lake Michigan Inn, drew it closely around her. Outside it was still snowing, and an icy, shrieking wind swept across the open spaces of the Lakeshore and the Outer Drive. The weather made Cindy remember the airport. A few minutes ago she had made a firm resolve: she would still go there, later tonight; but it was early yet — not quite half-past nine — and there was plenty of time — for everything.
A porter forsook the shelter of the Inn doorway and touched his hat. “Taxi, ma’am?”
“I don’t think so.”
At that moment the lights of a car in the parking lot came on. It moved forward, skidding once on the loose snow, then came toward the door where Cindy was waiting. The car was a Chevrolet, several models old. She could see Derek Eden at the wheel.
The porter held the car door open and Cindy got in. As the door slammed closed, Derek Eden said, “Sorry about the car being cold. I had to call the paper, then make some arrangements for us. I got here just ahead of you.”
Cindy shivered, and pulled her coat even tighter. “Wherever we’re going, I hope it’s warm.”
Derek Eden reached across and took her hand. Since the hand was resting on her knee, he held that too. Briefly she felt his fingers move, then he returned his hand to the wheel. He said softly, “You’ll be warm. I promise.”
7
Forty-five minutes before its scheduled departure time of 10P .M., Trans America Airlines Flight Two —
General preparations for the flight had been under way for months and weeks and days. Others, more immediate, had continued for the past twenty-four hours.
An airline flight from any major terminal is, in effect, like a river joining the sea. Before it reaches the sea, a river is fed by tributaries, originating far back in time and distance, each tributary joined along its length by others, either greater or smaller. At length, at the river’s mouth, the river itself is the sum of everything which flowed into it. Translated into aviation terms, the river at the sea is an airliner at its moment of takeoff.
The aircraft for Flight Two was a Boeing 707-320B Intercontinental Jetliner, registered number N-731-TA. It was powered by four Pratt & Whitney turbofan jet engines, providing a cruising speed of six hundred and five miles per hour. The aircraft’s range, at maximum weight, was six thousand miles, or the straight line distance from Iceland to Hong Kong. It carried a hundred and ninety-nine passengers and twenty-five thousand U.S. gallons of fuel — enough to fill a good-sized swimming pool. The aircraft’s cost to Trans America Airlines was six and a half million dollars.
The day before yesterday N-731-TA had flown from Dusseldorf, Germany, and, two hours out from Lincoln International, an engine overheated. As a precaution, the captain ordered it shut down. None of the aircraft’s passengers were aware that they were operating with three engines instead of four; if necessary, the aircraft could have flown on one. Nor was the flight even late arriving.
Trans America Maintenance, however, was advised by company radio. As a result, a crew of mechanics was waiting, and whisked the airplane to a hangar as soon as passengers and freight were disembarked. Even while taxiing to the hangar, diagnostic specialists were at work, seeking out the airplane’s trouble, which they located quickly.
A pneumatic duct — a stainless steel pipe around the affected engine — had cracked and broken in flight. The immediate procedure was for the engine to be removed and a replacement installed. That was relatively simple. More complicated was the fact that for several minutes before the overheating engine was shut down, extremely hot air must have escaped into the engine nacelle. This heat could conceivably have damaged one hundred and eight pairs of wires from the aircraft’s electrical system.
Close examination of the wires showed that while some had been heated, none apparently had suffered damage. If a similar condition had occurred within an automobile, bus, or truck, the vehicle would have been put back into service without question. But airlines took no such chances. It was decided that all one hundred and eight pairs of wires must be replaced.
The work of replacement was highly skilled, but exacting and tedious because only two men at a time could operate in the confined space of the engine nacelle. Moreover, each pair of wires must be identified, then connected painstakingly to cannon plugs. A nonstop, day-and-night effort was planned, with teams of electrical mechanics relieving each other.
The entire job would cost Trans America Airlines thousands of dollars in skilled man-hours and lost revenue while the big aircraft was unproductive on the ground. But the loss was accepted without question, as all airlines accepted such losses in pursuit of high safety standards.
The Boeing 707 — N-731-TA — which was to have flown to the West Coast and back before its flight to Rome, was taken out of service. Operations was advised, and hastily shuffled schedules to help bridge the gap. A connecting flight was canceled and several dozen passengers transferred to competitive airlines. There was no substitute aircraft. When it came to multimillion-dollar jets, airlines did not carry spares.
Operations, however, urged Maintenance to have the 707 ready for Flight Two to Rome, which was then thirty-six hours away from scheduled departure. An operations vice-president in New York personally called the Trans America base maintenance chief, and was told: “If we can get it ready for you, we will.” A top-notch foreman and a crack crew of mechanics and electricians were already on the job, all of them aware of the importance of finishing quickly. A second crew, to relieve the others through the night, was being rounded up. Both crews would work extra hours until the job was done.
Contrary to general belief, aircraft mechanics took a close interest in the operational flights of airplanes they serviced. After a complex job, or a rush one such as this, they would follow the progress of a particular airplane to learn how their work had stood up. It was a source of satisfaction to them when, as usually happened, the airplane functioned well. Months later they might say to each other, observing an airplane taxiing in, “There’s old 842. Remember that time … and the trouble we had with her. I guess we cured it.”
Through the critical day and a half following discovery of the trouble with N-731-TA, work on the airplane, though slow by its nature, continued as speedily as possible.
At length, three hours from Flight Two’s departure time, the last of the hundred-odd pairs of wires was reconnected. It took another hour to replace the engine cowlings and for an engine run-up on the ground. Then, before the airplane could be accepted for service, an air test was required. By this time, urgent calls from Operations demanded: Would N-731-TA be ready for Flight Two or not? If not, would Maintenance for Chrissake say so, so Sales could be informed of a possible long delay, and passengers notified before they left their homes.
His fingers crossed, and touching wood, the maintenance chief replied that, barring complications on the air test, the aircraft would be available on time.
It was — but only just. The chief Trans America pilot at the base, who had been standing by for just that purpose, test flew the airplane, barreling up through the storm to clearer altitudes above. He reported on return:
