OUT OF THE WARM skies of Arizona in the American great south-west came a huge aircraft; it flew over high mountains and wide rivers and huge lakes, over deep valleys where little grew, and over the lush green of the eastern states until it landed at New York’s Kennedy Airport, after flying over sea and houses, beaches and man-made lagoons.
All of this took some five hours.
Some of the passengers were tense and apprehensive before the wheels touched down, others were so used to air travel that they chafed only at the need to keep their seat belts fastened. The tension and the impatience vanished as the great machine taxied towards the gate which would lead its passengers to the airport building. The stewardesses pleaded for them to keep their seats until the aircraft stopped, and all did. But as the motion ceased it seemed as if every man and woman present leapt up, grabbed coats and hats and bags and tried to get into the gangway first.
In fact, a few, the wise ones, stayed in their seats, knowing that all would have to wait together until the baggage was brought from the bowels of the aircraft and placed on a slow-moving conveyor belt for passengers or porters to pluck it off. Fewer, elderly or infirm, waited until the crush was over and stewardesses and kindly fellow-passengers could help.
At last, only one passenger remained in his seat: a man.
He sat upright, his seat belt still fastened, but his chin nestled on his chest.
He appeared to be asleep; certainly he did not move.
For the steward and the stewardesses it had been a trying flight, for bumpiness over the great plains had made some passengers sick and others bad-tempered. The young man who did not move, however, had been a model passenger, hardly seen and seldom heard, and obediently keeping his seat belt fastened during the turbulence. Perhaps that was why he had been overlooked. Two stewardesses, coming from the front of the aircraft, neat-looking, nice-looking, picking up some odds and ends of equipment and magazines from the seats, saw him at the same moment.
“For heavens sakes,” exclaimed one, a brunette. “Some people can sleep through an earthquake,” remarked the other, who was a vivid blonde.
The brunette leaned across and touched the young man’s arm.
“Excuse me,” she said, “but we’re in New York.” The young man did not respond in any way.
“Sir, we’re in New York.” The girl’s voice rose. “We’re at Kennedy!” called the fair one, as if that announcement was enough to awaken the dead.
Still the young man did not stir.
“Betty —” the dark-haired girl began.
“Pauline —” began the other.
“You don’t think —”
“He can’t be!”
Suddenly, these two young women, used to every conceivable emergency in the air, were alarmed. The fair- haired one, also the prettier, went behind the passenger, gripped his shoulders and shook him, but had no effect at all.
“Wake up!” she cried in desperation.
At the front exit two or three men and another stewardess had gathered, laughing and joking as crews often do at the end of a flight. One man, tall, good-looking, peaked cap on the back of his head, noticed the two stewardesses’ concern and came along the gangway towards them. He was the captain, and technically responsible for what happened until the machine was handed over to the maintenance men for its check.
“Hi, there,” he called, half-way from the exit to the girls. “What’s going on?”
One girl turned to look at him, the other had only to raise her head. The dark-haired one answered.
“This passenger won’t wake up.”
“The flight must have exhausted him,” quipped the pilot. “Let me try.” He squeezed into the row of seats in front of the sleeping man and tilted his head backwards to reveal a long, bony face, a long, spade of a chin, a high forehead, a long nose with nostrils which had a distended look — and eyelids drawn, tight as shutters, over the large eyes.
It was an unusual face; the kind one did not easily forget.
The skin was tanned deeper than gold. The hair was cut short, making a kind of halo so fair it was like the stubble of corn. The pilot held the head up and gripped the man’s shoulder with his free hand, shaking it.
“Hey, there. Wake up, fella!”
The head bobbed under the shaking but there was no other movement.
The pilot’s expression changed, as if a shadow of apprehension fell upon him also, and he glanced from girl to girl. To his credit he did not utter the suspicion which had come into his mind, but looked round and called to the men at the front:
“Hey, fellas! We’ve got a sleeping beauty here. Come and take a look.”
They came . . .
Very soon a doctor arrived from the airport, for crews had to use extreme care when a passenger was unwell, and the certain thing now was that this young man was not simply asleep. He was unconscious, with a sluggish pulse. Strictly speaking, the pilot and the stewardesses could have gone off duty, after they had made their reports, but none of them did. Instead, as the passenger was wheeled on a surgical trolley away from the aircraft and by devious routes to the hospital —devious to make sure no other passenger saw him — the captain said:
“Come on girls, I’ll buy you a dinner. When we’re through we should know what’s going on.”
