She brought over the stack of perforated paper, no more than five inches wide, and let the loose end fall. It reached down to the center console between the seats. Each small perforated section held a computer-typed message.
Berry scanned the messages hanging in her hand. “That looks like all of them.” He turned back and stared out the windshield. He could see Sharon’s reflection in the dark, wet glass, standing beside him, the paper trailing down from her hand as she read from it. He watched her for a few moments, her movements, her facial expressions.
Sharon refolded the messages. “We have to get back and expose these people.”
Berry nodded. If they died in the crash and the cockpit were destroyed, or if they put down at sea, the printouts would probably not survive. He turned to Crandall. “Give me those. Get life vests for all of us.”
Crandall opened the pouch on the bulkhead and handed out the orange life vests. She watched as Berry and Linda put on their life vests, then put one on herself. She took a first-aid kit from the emergency locker on the bulkhead and treated a small cut on Linda Farley’s forehead. She moved beside Berry. “Hold still. You have a lot of scrapes and cuts.”
Berry watched her as she dabbed antiseptic cream on his arms and face. “Where did you get that kit?”
“In the emergency locker.”
“What else is in there?”
“Not much. Most of the emergency equipment is in the cabins and lounges.” At the mention of the lounge, Crandall looked toward the cockpit door. She had, until just then, forgotten about what was on the other side.
Berry handed her the printouts. “Put these into Linda’s vinyl pouch on her life vest. Try to wrap them so they’re waterproof.”
Sharon Crandall understood that he was trying to prepare for the worst. She walked to the locker behind the observer’s chair, took out two items, and brought them up front to Berry. “This is a waterproof flashlight. These are asbestos fire gloves.”
Berry smiled. “Very good.”
Crandall unscrewed the end of the flashlight, removed the batteries, and stuffed the printouts into the empty battery case. She screwed the end back on and slipped the asbestos gloves over both ends of the flashlight. She wrapped the entire package securely with a length of bandage from the first-aid kit and placed it in the pouch fixed to Linda’s life jacket, then snapped it shut. “Linda, you know this is important. If anything happens to us, show this to…”
“A policeman,” said the girl.
Crandall smiled. “Yes. A policeman. Tell him it’s very important.”
She nodded.
Sharon Crandall sat back in the copilot’s seat.
Berry reached out and took her hand. He said to her, “No one can say you didn’t earn your flight pay this trip.”
She squeezed his hand and smiled. “When you first came aboard, I said to myself, ‘That guy would make a good pilot… ’”
“You noticed me when I came aboard?”
“Well… you were wearing blue socks with brown shoes.” They both laughed, then Sharon sat back and listened to the engines, and felt their power vibrate through the airframe. She turned back to him. “John, can you land it?”
Berry looked out the windshield. The rain was tapering off and the sky was becoming lighter. Below, the ocean seemed less turbulent. He glanced at the weather radar. It seemed less cluttered with images, and as far as he could determine, the weather to their front was clearing. “Depends on the weather in San Francisco.” He knew it depended a great deal on his ability. He glanced at the fuel gauges. “Depends on the gas, too. The afterburners drank it up. We’re eating it up now at this altitude. But we can’t use any fuel to climb back up there, and the weather at those altitudes might turn bad again.”
“Do you think we have enough fuel to make it?”
“I don’t know. Too many variables. But I’m willing to bet you a dinner that we at least see the coast before we run out.” Berry smiled to hide his real feeling. He knew what a sucker’s bet it was.
“I’ll bet you we make it to the airport. I want to go to the Four Seasons in New York.”
Berry nodded. “All right.” Then his smile faded. “Listen, if we have to ditch at sea, I’ll know in enough time and we can prepare ourselves. That close to the coast, we should be picked up.” But he wondered if they would go down near a shipping lane. He thought about the possibility of sharks but didn’t know how prevalent they were on the West Coast. He wanted to ask, but decided to wait until they were close. The more he thought about ditching in the sea, the more it seemed to be a beginning, not an end, to their problems. But something else was bothering him. Even a safe landing at San Francisco might not be the end of it. “Sharon, we’ve got to come up with a plan. Something for after we land in San Francisco.”
“What?” She was puzzled. To her, getting the damaged Straton safely to the airport was all they had to do. “What are you talking about?”
“These people,” he said, pointing to the data-link, “tried to kill us. They won’t stop just because we’ve landed.”
“That’s crazy.”
The two of them sat silently for a few seconds. Sharon wondered if Berry could be right. Perhaps she was making too little of it. She said, “If we land at San Francisco in one piece… well, we’ll have to be aware that not everyone on the ground is happy to see us.”
Berry nodded, and dropped the subject.
Berry looked around the cockpit. He was trying to anticipate every one of their needs, no matter which way things went. “Is there a life raft in the cockpit?”
“No. The rafts are all back there.” She paused. “But the inflatable escape chute from the emergency door doubles as a life raft. It’s not as big as the others, but it would be okay for three people.”
“Right.” He thought for a moment. “I think I can put it down into a smooth sea. Let’s go over the ditching procedures. Linda, listen to what Sharon-”
The alerting bell rang again.
TO FLIGHT 52: DO YOU READ? ACKNOWLEDGE. SAN FRANCISCO HQ.
Berry shook his head. “Those bastards. I’d love to tell them we’re sailing in and see what they have to say about that.”
Crandall stared at the message. “This is so… obscene. What kind of person does it take to do something like this? To try to murder people… innocent people who haven’t done anything…?”
Berry remembered his earlier thoughts about climbing above the weather. If he had the fuel, the oxygen, and the confidence to fly, he would have done it. That climb would probably have killed dozens more passengers. Berry wondered if he was really any better than the people in San Francisco HQ, whoever the hell they were. “Sometimes it’s a matter of expedience. It’s not personal, usually. Maybe we shouldn’t take it personally.”
“I take it personally.”
There were sounds coming from the lounge again, whining and moaning, some cries of agony from the injured, and the sound of scraping against the door. Berry heard someone striking the piano keys. For a moment he thought someone was trying to play.
Berry knew that everyone there would drown if he ditched at sea, and he admitted that he would do very little-nothing, really-to save any of them.
He took Sharon Crandall’s arm and turned her wrist toward him. “It’s two-twenty-four. We have a few hours before we reach the coast.” He tried to think in terms of what they would need for an airport landing. He looked down and made sure the autopilot was still engaged, then unbuckled his seat belt and slid out of the flight chair.
“Where are you going?”
Berry laughed involuntarily. “Not far, you can be sure.”
She smiled at her foolish question.
Berry knelt down behind the captain’s chair and slid his hand beneath it.
“What are you looking for?” Sharon asked.
“Charts. I need them for radio navigation signals.”
