CHARLES NEWMAN
581
The other stews were passing up and down the aisle, absorbing
the leers and fears, relating the captain's anticipation of turbulence.
"Please stay seated," they were saying. Corinne saw it was getting
darker. They were going faster than the sun.
It
wasn't good enough.
"We're going down now, mama."
"Yes,
dear, we're going down."
"Where to?"
"When we get home, we'll go to the filling station and get
some
steaks."
"I don't want to go down."
"You can't fly all day. You can't fly any more than to home."
"But 1don't want to go down ."
"You didn't want to go
up
before . Maybe you'll grow up to
be
an astronaut."
"Are we down now, mama?"
"Not yet." The stew passed a hot dog to the kid.
"Oh, now you've got mustard all over. Wipe it off."
"No."
"Shut up or I'll leave you here ... you want to
be
left here?"
"No. "
"You want to take the bus home all by yourself?"
"Will Daddy
be
there?"
"We just said goodbye to daddy. He's in Newark.
Be
a big boy.
Be
a man now. Or you'll have to find your own way home . "
Corinne lay back. There wasn't much she would have added to
that bit. What man had ever forgotten it?
It
wasn't the sort of thing
one could
be
intelligent about. Well, there was something nice about
flying, really, about the futility of giving contrary directions at such
a height, etc., where fear and toughness were all of a piece. Not at all
like coming back from a party with Fred, grinding your teeth in the
swerving car, wearing out an imaginary brake pedal with a toeless
pump from the death seat. The trees which line the road in Fred's
wandering lights are the same color as our fuselage. . .
The child was stamping now. And the man beside her had evi–
dently succeeded in singing himself to sleep, for he was slouched
heavily on her shoulder, an enormous two-tone brogue like a fallen
plinth against her calf.
She was just about to request a change in seating when the cock-
