me back."

"Yes, Dennis, but what do you see? Do you hear me? What do you see?"

"Let me tell you something, Harry," he said. "They aren't going to
work. They're not wrecked or anything. I just know they aren't worth
sweet damn all. Like when Campbell had it. He knew it was going to
happen. You can trust the machines just so long. After that, you're
batty to lay anything on them at all. But can you see the screen?
There it is again. We're turning into view. I can see the earth now.
The whole of it."

There was silence then. We looked at the screen but saw only the
spotty blackness. I looked from the screen to the speaker overhead,
then back at the screen. I looked about the control room. Everyone was
doing his work. The instruments all were working. The computers were
clicking and nobody looked particularly alarmed, except one other
pilot who was there too, Forrest. Maybe Forrest and I pictured
ourselves in Lynds' place. Maybe we both had the same premonitions.
Maybe we both held the same dislike and distrust of the rest of them.
Maybe a lot of things, but one thing was sure. The papers would never
get hold of this story, and because of that, Bannister and the rest of
them didn't really care a hang about Lynds or me or Forrest or any of
the others that might be up there.

* * * * *

It seemed an age passed until we heard Lynds again. The tape later
showed it was no more than half a minute. "Bannister, can you hear
me?" he said suddenly. "Bannister, do you know what it feels like to
be tied into a barrel and tossed over Victoria Falls? Do you? That's
what it's like out here. Not that you care a damn. You'll never come
up here, you're smart enough for that. Give me a paddle, Bannister,
that's what I want. It's no more than a man in a barrel deserves. It's
black out here, black and there's nothing to stand on. The earth looks
like a flat circle of light and very big, but it doesn't make me feel
any better. These buggies of yours won't be any use to anybody until
you let the pilot do his own work. I crashed once, in a Gypsy Moth,
with my controls all shot away by an overenthusiastic Russian fighter
pilot near the Turkish border. Coming down, I felt the way I do now.

"Look at the instruments and remember, Bannister. My reflexes are
perfect. There's nothing wrong with me. I could split rails with an
axe now, if I had an axe. An axe or a paddle. Harry, I'm not getting
back down in one pie