Ken Follett - On Wings Of Eagles (1990)

They went down to the movie house. There were three films: two were porno movies and the third was Jaws II. Bill and Taylor got Jaws II. Paul and Coburn went in to see something about naked South Sea maidens.

Paul sat staring at the screen, bored and tired. The movie was in German, not that the dialogue appeared to count for much. What could be worse, he thought, than a bad X-rated movie? Suddenly he heard a loud snort. He looked at Coburn.

Coburn was fast asleep, snoring.

When John Howell and the rest of the Clean Team landed at Frankfurt, Simons had everything set up for a quick turnaround.

Ron Davis was at the arrival gate, waiting to pull the Clean Team out of the line and direct them to another gate where the Boeing 707 was parked. Ralph Boulware was watching from a distance: as soon as he saw the first member of the Clean Team arrive, he would go down to the movie theater and tell Sculley to round up the guys inside. Jim Schwebach was in the roped-off press area, where reporters were waiting to see the American evacuees. He was sitting next to writer Pierre Salinger (who did not know how close he was to a really good story) and pretending to read a furniture advertisement in a German newspaper. Schwebach's job was to tail the Clean Team from one gate to the other, just to make sure no one was following them. If there was trouble, Schwebach and Davis would start a disturbance. It would not matter much if they were arrested by the Germans, for there was no reason for them to be extradited to Iran.

The plan went like clockwork. There was only one hitch: Rich and Cathy Gallagher did not want to go to Dallas. They had no friends or family there, they were not sure what their future would be, they did not know whether the dog, Buffy, would be allowed to enter the U.S.A., and they did not want to get on another plane. They said goodbye and went off to make their own arrangements.

The rest of the Clean Team--John Howell, Bob Young, and Joe Poche--followed Ron Davis and boarded the Boeing 707. Jim Schwebach tailed them. Ralph Boulware rounded up everyone else, and they all got on board for the flight home.

Merv Stauffer in Dallas had called Frankfurt Airport and ordered food for the flight. He had asked for thirty superdeluxe meals, each including fish, fowl, and beef; six seafood trays with sauce, horseradish and lemon; six hors d'oeuvre trays; six sandwich trays with ham-and-cheese, roast beef, turkey, and Swiss cheese; six dip trays with raw vegetables and blue-cheese-and-vinaigrette dip; three cheese trays with assorted breads and crackers; four deluxe pastry trays; four fresh-fruit trays; four bottles of brandy; twenty Seven-Ups and twenty ginger ales; ten club sodas and ten tonics; ten quarts of orange juice; fifty cartons of milk; four gallons of freshly brewed coffee in Thermos bottles; one hundred sets of plastic cutlery consisting of knife, fork, and spoon; six dozen paper plates in two sizes; six dozen plastic glasses; six dozen Styrofoam cups; two cartons each of Kent, Marlboro, Kool, and Salem Light cigarettes; and two boxes of chocolates.

There had been a mix-up, and the airport caterers had delivered the order double.

Takeoff was delayed. An ice storm had dropped out of nowhere, and the Boeing 707 was last in the queue for deicing--commercial flights had priority. Bill began to worry. The airport was going to close at midnight, and they might have to get off the plane and return to the hotel. Bill did not want to spend the night in Germany. He wanted American soil beneath his feet.

John Howell, Joe Poche, and Bob Young told the story of their flight from Tehran. Both Paul and Bill were chilled to hear how implacably determined Dadgar had been to prevent their leaving the country.

At last the plane was de-iced--but then its Number 1 engine would not start. Pilot John Carlen traced the problem to the start valve. Engineer Ken Lenz got off the plane and held the valve open manually while Carlen started the engine.

Perot brought Rashid to the flight deck. Rashid had never flown until yesterday, and he wanted to sit with the crew. Perot said to Carlen: "Let's have a really spectacular takeoff."

"You got it," said Carlen. He taxied to the runway, then took off in a very steep climb.

In the passenger cabin Gayden was laughing: he had just heard that, after six weeks in jail with all-male company, Paul had been forced to sit through an X-rated movie; and he thought it was funny as hell.

Perot popped a champagne cork and proposed a toast. "Here's to the men who said what they were going to do, then went out and did it."

Ralph Boulware sipped his champagne and felt a warm glow. That's right, he thought. We said what we were going to do; then we went out and did it. Right.

He had another reason to be happy. Next Monday was Kecia's birthday: she would be seven. Every time he had called Mary she had said: "Get home in time for Kecia's birthday." It looked like he was going to make it.

Bill began to relax at last. Now there's nothing but a plane ride between me and America and Emily and the kids, he thought. Now I'm safe.

He had imagined himself safe before: when he reached the Hyatt in Tehran, when he crossed the border into Turkey, when he took off from Van, and when he landed in Frankfurt. He had been wrong each time.

And he was wrong now.

3_____

Paul had always been crazy about airplanes, and now he took the opportunity to sit on the flight deck of the Boeing 707.

As the plane flew across the north of England, he realized that pilot John Carlen, engineer Ken Lenz, and first officer Joe Fosnot were having trouble. On autopilot the plane was drifting, first to the left and then to the right. The compass had failed, rendering the inertial navigation system erratic.

"What does all that mean?" Paul asked.

"It means we'll have to hand-fly this thing all the way across the Atlantic," said Carlen. "We can do it--it's kind of exhausting, that's all."

A few minutes later the plane became very cold, then very hot. Its pressurization system was failing.

Carlen took the plane down low.

"We can't cross the Atlantic at this height," he told Paul.

"Why not?"

"We don't have enough fuel--an aircraft uses much more fuel at low altitudes."

"Why can't we fly high?"

"Can't breathe up there."

"The plane has oxygen masks."

"But not enough oxygen to cross the Atlantic. No plane carries that much oxygen."

Carlen and his crew fiddled with the controls for a while; then Carlen sighed and said: "Would you get Ross up here, Paul?"

Paul fetched Perot.

Carlen said: "Mr. Perot, I think we ought to take this thing and land it as soon as we can." He explained again why they could not cross the Atlantic with a faulty pressure system.

Paul said: "John, I'll be forever grateful to you if we don't have to land in Germany."

"Don't worry," said Carlen. "We'll head for London, Heathrow."

Perot went back to tell the others. Carlen called London Air Traffic Control on the radio. It was one in the morning, and he was told Heathrow was closed. This is an emergency, he replied. They gave him permission to land.

Paul could hardly believe it. An emergency landing, after all he had been through!

Ken Lenz began to dump fuel to reduce the plane below its maximum landing weight.

London told Carlen there was fog over southern England, but at the moment visibility was up to half a mile at Heathrow.

When Ken Lenz shut off the fuel-dump valves, a red light that should have gone out stayed on. "A dump chute hasn't retracted," said Lenz.

"I can't believe this," said Paul. He lit a cigarette.

Carlen said: "Paul, can I have a cigarette?"

Paul stared at him. "You told me you quit smoking ten years ago."