'Did you really?'
'Just for a second.'
'If I hadn't needed to go to the rest room so badly, maybe I would have.'
'Why didn't you?'
'I want to know everything there is to know about that ship before I walk away from it.'
She turned over the paper place mat in front of her, took a pen from the left sleeve pocket of her flight suit, and began making notes. She wanted to get down her impressions of flying the saucer while they were still fresh. The handling was excellent at low speeds but at large Mach numbers the saucer was almost impossible to maneuver. She wrote fast and quickly, scribbling thoughts as they came to her.
They were working on their second cups of coffee when a man parked outside, took a long look at the saucer, then walked over to it. He walked around it slowly, touching it, rapping on it, then he came over to the diner.
'Flo,' he called, 'what in hell is that thing across the street?'
'That you, Oscar?'
'Yeah. What's that thing across the street?'
Flo walked out of the kitchen carrying three plates. As she set them on the table before Charley and Rip, she said, 'That thing is a flying saucer, Oscar, you ignorant boob. These folks here flew it in from Mars.' She put two plates in front of Rip, one in front of Charley, then winked at her.
Charley tried to grin. She folded up the paper place mat and stowed it in a flight suit pocket.
'Don't you know a flying saucer when you see one, Oscar?'
'That's my first one this week, woman. How about some coffee?'
Rip picked up his knife and fork and went to work as Flo and Oscar bantered back and forth and the TV played in the background.
He was working on the second glass of milk when a deputy sheriff parked his patrol car out front and came inside. Soon a man parked a medium-sized farm tractor alongside the deputy's car and joined him on a stool at the counter. Oscar told them about the sign for the St. Louis amusement park and everyone tried to think up something witty to say about saucers. Meanwhile a small crowd of half dozen people had gathered by the saucer. Some of the people were from vehicles sitting at the pumps, but the rest were from pickups that had parked on the side of the road.
The television went back to the California meteor story as Rip gobbled the last of his potatoes. Charley had finished five minutes earlier and was watching him with an amused expression on her face.
She started to get out of the booth. 'I'll pay the bill while you finish,' she said, to his obvious discomfiture. 'Please! I'll do it. I've got some money.' Charley was amused.
'Just doesn't look right, a woman paying,' he muttered. He stood up, strolled casually to the register. Flo came over after a bit. She was figuring the bill when a picture of the saucer in flight came on the television behind her. 'Here's a curiosity,' the announcer began. 'This morning in Aswan, Egypt — '
Rip reached over and changed the channel on the television. A commercial came on. He smiled at Flo and handed her a fifty. 'Sorry, this is the smallest I have.'
'We're seeing more and more pictures of U.S. Grant these days, honey. I got change.'
Down the counter the deputy was telling an off-color joke.
Rip took his change, then lingered until Flo went down the counter to pour coffee.
'That was close,' Charley muttered. 'Somebody on that lake boat must have had a camera.'
'Let's mount up and start kicking, amigo.'
They sauntered out the door and across the street, two people with no place to go and all day to get there.
Ten people were standing around the saucer now and three more were looking at it as they pumped gas into their vehicles. The kid who worked in the filling station was telling them all about it, apparently. 'Here they come now,' he said. He addressed Rip as he walked up. 'Hey, buddy. Didn't you say this thing is going into an amusement park in St. Louis?'
'Yeah.'
'Is that Six Flags?' a woman asked. She had a baby in her arms.
'Well, I don't know, ma'am. Fella didn't say.'
'Sure looks real, don't it?'
'My dad saw a real saucer, one night, few years back,' said another.
'Where was that, Butch?'
'Out at the farm. Darn thing was hovering over the cows. Got 'em all upset, so it did.' The speaker continued, telling his rapt audience of the close encounter.
Charley walked once around the saucer, looking it over, then she went underneath and opened the hatch. As she climbed in, Rip said to the crowd: 'You folks might want to move back a bit, give us a little room here.' He ducked down, went through the hatch, and pulled it shut behind him.
Charley already had the reactor on.
Apparently the crowd heard the hum. They were stumbling backward now. Many were agape, too stunned to say anything. Rip waved at them through the canopy as Charley gently lifted the ship. The usual cloud of dirt and pebbles flew into the air.
She took the saucer up about ten feet and stabilized there as the landing gear retracted. The crowd below was scattering; several of the men were in full flight. The mother with the baby went onto her knees by the gas pumps, clutching the child fiercely. People poured out of the diner across the street. The deputy sheriff ran this way.
Rip waved at him as Charley eased the stick forward and pulled up on the collective. She soared over the cornfield by the diner and put the sun behind the saucer. 'Missouri?'
'Missouri.'
'Wish we had some charts.'
'I can recognize the rivers and stuff. I'll get us there.'
'Hold on,' Charley said and twisted on the throttle grip. The rocket motors hiccuped once, then lit with a pleasant roar.
'Yeah!' Rip shouted. The G's felt terrific.
Charley pulled the nose up and the saucer accelerated into the Indiana morning sky.
Chapter Nine
Like the million other Americans who happened to be watching television that August morning as they dressed or ate breakfast, General Bombing Joe De Laurio, U.S. Air Force chief of staff, stared in unbelieving amazement at the flying saucer zipping around on his television screen.
'Holy smokes,' he muttered through his toothbrush, which was still in his mouth.
When the camera zoomed in on the fighter chasing the saucer, he dropped the toothbrush. The quality of the picture was poor as the amateur Egyptian cameraman tried to zoom in and focus on fast-moving machines, but one glimpse of the telltale puffs of white smoke zipping back over the fighter's wing was more than enough for Bombing Joe — the fighter was shooting at the saucer. The general grabbed for the telephone.
'White House!' he roared at the operator when she came on. 'Get me the White House!'
The cameraman centered the saucer's exhaust flame in his viewfinder and managed to keep it there as the saucer went almost straight up, accelerating. The saucer got smaller and smaller until all that was visible against the heavens was the spot of light that was the flame from the rocket nozzles. Then the flame merged with the sun.
'Oh, my God!' roared Bombing Joe De Laurio and rushed for the uniform hanging in his closet.
The general was charging through his outer office on the Pentagon's E-wing when a junior staffer arrested his progress.
'General, you must take a moment to look at the television! A little town in Indiana — people there claim that a flying saucer was there this morning!'
Bombing Joe rocked with the punch. When he saw that video from Egypt, he was convinced. Now they're in Indiana? Was this an invasion?
'How many saucers?' he demanded.
'One saucer, sir. Two crewmen. Aliens. They wore gray, one-piece flight suits, ate a prodigious quantity of food…'
Bombing Joe stood speechless, rooted to the floor. Nothing in his thirty-six years in the Air Force had prepared him for this moment. He was trapped in a fevered nightmare, some weird, drug-addled Hollywood epic.
He pinched the back of his left hand. Yep, he was awake.
'The aliens paid for their meal with U
.S. dollars,' the staffer said, pointing at a man talking to a reporter on the television screen.
'They what?'
'Yes, sir. U.S. dollars. A fifty-dollar bill that the owner of the diner says is counterfeit. Then they got in the saucer and flew it the hell out of there.'
The light began to glow for Bombing Joe.
'Where is that UFO team that we sent to the Sahara?' he roared. 'I want answers right now or I'm going to eat somebody's head for breakfast!'
Egg Cantrell came by his name honestly, Charley Pine concluded. His body, neck, and head formed a perfect ovoid shape, marred only by his short, stubby legs. He waddled when he walked and his fat jiggled. A permanent layer of perspiration was beaded on his upper lip and brow. Buried in his fleshy face were quick, intelligent eyes.
'How do, ma'am,' he said and gave a short, nervous bow.
'Well, Unc, what do you think?' Rip stepped back and gestured expansively at the saucer.
Egg Cantrell quivered with joy as he regarded the saucer. He touched it, caressed it, fondled it, stroked it.
'Amazing,' was all he could find to say.
Charley Pine grinned broadly and looked around the old army hangar with interest. She had slipped the saucer into the ramshackle wooden structure after Rip pushed the doors open. There was barely room for the saucer amid the junk that looked as if it were wearing the accumulated dust of centuries; old farm tractors, antique farming equipment, a Model A Ford, an Indian Chief motorcycle, and an Aeronca Champ were just some of the items in sight in this former Army Air Corps hangar, the only one still standing at what had once been a thriving World War II training base. Egg jackhammered the crumbling concrete on the runways years ago — now the runways were grass, perfect for little airplanes like Egg's Champ. Charley ran a hand along the Champ's prop as Rip told his uncle about the saucer.
When Rip had covered the high points, Egg remarked, 'You two have been on television, I think.'
'You mean Egypt? Yeah, that was us, getting water from the Nile to power this thing.'
'I mean L.A., St. Louis, Aswan, Egypt, and just now on CNN, some little burg in Indiana. They're going nuts in Indiana.'
'Are they now?' Rip's face looked almost angelic.
'I hope to shout,' said Egg Cantrell, his belly quivering. 'They had a genuine flying saucer right there in Upshur,
Indiana; dozens of folks saw it, three or four even got religion. One woman claims she served breakfast to two Martians in gray, one-piece flying suits. After they ate they paid with counterfeit money, left a three-dollar tip, strolled across the street like they were going to Wal-Mart, then blasted out of there like a bat outta hell.' 'Did they now?'
'The diner woman said they ate more food than any human could. Six eggs apiece, giant slabs of ham, a quart of milk each. When she said that ten minutes ago on the TV, I do declare, Rip, I thought of you.' 'I was mighty hungry, Uncle Egg.' 'I know, boy. You come by it honest. I spent my life in that condition.'
'Well, what do you think of the saucer?' 'Hell of a nice piece of machinery. God Almighty, it's nice. I just hope you and the lady here came by it legal.' 'Unc, I told you how we got it. Cross my heart. It was a stroke of pure luck that I saw the gleam where the rock had weathered. Honest sweat dug it out of that rock.' 'You think somebody'll be coming after it?' 'It's mighty valuable, all right.'
'Somebody or something, I should have said. It's like something from a dream… or a nightmare.'
'I don't figure whoever lost it originally will come back for it, but these days, who knows?' 'Never can tell,' Egg agreed.
'No one around here knows it's here,' Rip declared. 'We kept low the last forty or fifty miles, below radar coverage, right above the treetops, kept the rockets off. It was sorta tough finding this place in the rain, what with the clouds and all. If anyone saw us I doubt if they could figure out where we were going.'
'What do you say, young lady?' Egg asked.
'The Air Force will come looking before long. In a day or two, I think. Three at the most.'
'Uh-huh. Are you going to call 'em, tell 'em where to look?'
'Not just now. To the best of my knowledge, Rip is the lawful owner of the saucer.'
'Is he really, you think?' Egg asked shrewdly.
'I doubt it.'
'So do I, ma'am,' Egg said.
'Now see here, Uncle,' Rip said hotly, 'you're supposed to be on my side.'
'I am, I am,' Egg said. 'I know you didn't do anything immoral — I just think you have a legal problem.'
Rip set his feet and squared his shoulders. 'Possession is nine-tenths of the law, I always heard. I've got it and I intend to hang on to it. Whoever hopes to take it away is going to have to prove better title than mine.'
'Finders keepers, losers weepers,' Egg said thoughtfully. After another sideways appraisal of Charley Pine, he added, 'That'll have to do for now, I guess.'
Egg pointed toward the hatch hanging open under the saucer. 'Any way I can get up through that hole?'
'If you kinda suck yourself up, I reckon you can,' Rip replied, grinning. 'We got a little problem with the engines. They hiccup from time to time. Was hoping you could look at that.' With that Rip led the way under the saucer. Egg got down on his hands and knees to crawl after him.
'Uh, Mr. Cantrell. Mr. Egg. Before you go. Do you have someplace I could freshen up?'
'Why, I guess I'm forgetting my manners, Miss Pine. Go up to the house and help yourself. I'm a bachelor and the place is messy, but avail yourself of all the conveniences. Towels are in the closet.' 'Thank you, sir.'
The small house wasn't messy, of course. As Charley suspected, Egg Cantrell was a fastidious housekeeper. Everything had a place and everything was in it.
Charley Pine went straight to the bathroom and took a long, hot shower. With her flight suit in the washing machine, she retired to Egg's guest bedroom, a cozy nook with a television. On the walls were frames containing flint arrowheads, dozens of them, perhaps a hundred. Each arrowhead was neatly labeled.
Rain from a turbulent gray sky spattered on the windowpane. She got under the covers and surfed television channels.
On CNN she found what she was looking for. Yes, the network was showing the video from Egypt one more time. Then there were more interviews with the citizens of Upshur, Indiana. Charley looked at her watch. Lord, she and Rip had blasted out of there just two and a half hours ago and already the place was famous.
She sat in bed watching the citizens express their wonder and awe at the abilities of the saucer. Ordinary people who had seen an extraordinary thing. The adventure seemed to affect each of them in a slightly different way; some were thoughtful, others exuberant, some frightened, some angry or resentful.
One, the lady at the diner, Flo, was thankful:
'Of all the places on God's green earth they could have lit, they picked this one. I always thought Upshur was special, and now I know. I am so happy this happened.'
'Why?' the interviewer asked.
'That flying saucer gave us something besides ourselves to think about, reminded us that there's more to life than our little bean row.'
Charley flipped channels, found some government type explaining that flying saucers were figments of people's imaginations. 'There is no scientific proof whatsoever that flying saucers exist,' the scientist on television argued. 'The Air Force has been investigating sightings for fifty years and has come up with exactly nothing.'
'They found what they were ordered to find, buster,' Charley Pine growled and flipped the channel again.
More talking heads, offering opinions about what this 'rash' of saucer sightings might mean. One woman was plainly nervous. 'Aliens' might already be here, she explained.
Another scoffed, insisted that what was being reported were top-secret Air Force test vehicles. 'The government never tells us the truth,' she said. 'They know and won't tell.'
Charley flipped off the television finally and laid her head back on the pillow. She was tired but not yet
sleepy. What had she gotten herself into? Would the Air Force demand that Lockheed Martin fire her? For flying the saucer? For not calling to tell them where she was? Would the publicity ultimately make it impossible for her to get a test-flying job anywhere?
She thought about Rip, who was down at the hangar with his Uncle Egg, two boys playing with a new and exotic toy. Rip hadn't a clue about the extent of the stir the saucer had caused… would cause.
Perhaps Rip was taking all this the right way. He didn't really care what other people thought. He didn't care about the talking heads on television or their carefully crafted opinions. Nor did he care a fig about the Air Force.
How did Australians get involved?
Maybe she should take a tip from Rip, ignore all of this.
She unfolded the diner place mat and read her notes.
The saucer flew very, very well across an amazing variety of flight regimes. That had been no accident, she well knew. The designers of that ship knew precisely what they were doing.
Staring at the notes, Charley Pine could once again feel the ship in her hands, feel the rudder pedals under her feet, feel the power of the rocket engines. She looked out the window with blind eyes, thinking about how it had been. With a blanket wrapped around her, she went looking for paper. In Egg's little office she found a notebook.
Back in bed she wrote quickly, with a sense of deep purpose, trying to capture all of it. Never in her life would she get another chance to fly such a unique machine. No two ways about that!
Finally her eyelids became heavy. She lay back on the pillow and slept.
'Oh, wow, Rip! This thing is something else!' Egg Cantrell marveled at the extraordinary engineering manifest in the saucer, the way things fit together, the tidy, neat solutions to problems.
Egg was wedged into the engineering spaces. When they had first come aboard, Rip had pulled the power knob out to the first notch, firing off the reactor. Amid the computer displays and cabin lights, Egg stood in awe. Rip secured the reactor before the men entered the engineering compartment.
Now, wedged between machines, Egg tapped on the walls, looked at each component, examining everything with his flashlight. He did so with a sense of curiosity and wonder.
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