They’d been in the air sixteen hours and fifteen minutes. He tracked as well as he could the approximate distance covered against fuel remaining and consumed. Finally he put down another small x two hundred miles off the Windward Islands of the Lesser Antilles. That was not close enough but was the best he could do under the circumstances. He decided to keep the information to himself for the time being. No one would have believed him anyway. The spot he had marked was much too far off their scheduled course.

Suddenly the captain asked him, “How much fuel do you figure we have left?”

“Enough for another hour.”

There was a greater rush of air through the ventilators, and they felt the cold touch of the storm.

“Then you’d better tell our passengers what to expect if we don’t find some place to land in that time,” the captain said.

“I don’t have to,” the navigator replied grimly. “I was with them a while ago. They’re sweating it out. One old guy especially. He’s had a death-grip on his seat since takeoff, when there wasn’t a ripple in the air.”

“Get the life jackets on them anyway. Brief ’em what to do if we ditch.”

“And use your most professional manner,” the copilot joined in, his voice high and strained despite his attempt to be funny. “No dramatics. As the operations manual says, we must instill confidence in the passengers and make ’em believe that the crew knows exactly what’s to be done. Don’t ever let ’em know we’re as scared as they are. It’d never do.”

“That’s enough,” the captain ordered angrily. The soft pink and yellow lights of the flight deck disclosed the beads of perspiration on his forehead. “Stay back there with them,” he told the navigator. “When I flash on the NO SMOKING sign we’ll be headed for the water. Brace yourself and hang on for good then.”

The navigator unbuckled his seat belt and left his stool, the floor heaving beneath his feet. He went as far as the black curtain separating the deck from the crew cabin before turning around. “I—I guess we can’t do anything about our cargo,” he said.

The captain laughed grimly, and when he spoke his eyes were still glued to the instrument panel. “You’ve got a big heart for the company, worrying about our payload when you might be going for a swim yourself.”

“I wasn’t thinking about the freight. It’s the rest.…”

“We can’t do anything for sixteen thousand pounds of horses,” the captain said. “They don’t make life jackets that big.”

The navigator parted the curtain. “I guess not,” he answered, “but there’s one horse in particular a lot of people are going to miss. His name is the Black and I guess he’s about the most famous horse in the world.…”

NIGHTMARE
2

The crew cabin on the other side of the black curtain was small, functional and very noisy since the pounding engines were only a few feet away. A coffee pot and dishes clattered in the galley and a piece of soap slithered in the wash basin. Opposite the galley were two bunks, empty except for strewn uniform caps, ties and jackets. Strapped overhead was a rolled, uninflated life raft and in a compartment beside it were three yellow life jackets.

A door opened into the passenger cabin, where most of the seats had been removed to make room for cargo.