"My God, how long have we been heading north?"

"No telling when the pilot turned off his London-to-New York course."

Another fear added to Rubin's aching confusion. Calamity was piling on calamity. The one-in-a-thousand chance of coming through alive had rapidly risen to one in a million. He had to make a desperate decision, the only decision.

"I'm going to bring her around ninety degrees to port."

"We have no other choice," Ybarra agreed solemnly.

"A few might survive if we crash on land. Near impossible to pull off a water landing on high waves in the dark, even by an experienced pilot.

And if by some miracle we set her down intact, no human dressed in street clothes could last more than a few minutes in a freezing sea."

"We may already be too late." The U.N. delegate from Mexico nodded at the instrument panel. The red fuel warning lights were flashing across the board. "I fear our time in the air has run out."

Rubin stared in astonishment at the telltale instruments. He did not realize that the Boeing flying 200 knots at 1,500 meters ate up the same amount of fuel as it did when flying 500 knots at 10,500 meters. "Okay we head west until she drops from under us."

Rubin rubbed his palms on his pants legs and gripped the control column.

He had not taken command of the aircraft again since climbing over the glacier's peak. He took a deep breath and pressed the "Autopilot Release" button on the control column. He was too unsure of himself to slip the Boeing into a bank with the ailerons so he used only the rudder controls to gently crab around in a flat Turn. As soon as the nose came onto a straight course he felt something was wrong.

"Rpms dropping on number four engine," said Ybarra with a noticeable tremor in his voice. "It's starving for fuel."

"Shouldn't we shut it down or something?"

"I don't know the procedure," Ybarra replied dumbly.

Oh, dear Lord, Rubin thought to himself, the blind leading the blind.

The altimeter began to register a steady drop. The airspeed indicated a decrease too. His mind strained beyond reason, Rubin tried to will the plane in the air rather than fly it.

He also tried to fight time as the distance between the plane and the sea slowly, relentlessly narrowed. Then, without warning, the control column began to grow sluggish and vibrate in his hands.

"She's stalling," shouted Ybarra, his stoic face showing fear at last.

"Push the nose down."

Rubin eased the control column forward, fully aware he was hastening the inevitable. "Lower the flaps to increase our lift!" he ordered Ybarra.

"Flaps coming down," Ybarra replied through pursed lips.

"This is it," Rubin muttered. "We're going in."

A stewardess stood in the open cockpit door listening to the exchange, eyes wide with fright, face pale as a sheet of paper.

"Are we going to crash?" she asked, barely above a whisper.

Rubin tensed in his seat, too busy to Turn. "Yes, dammit!" he swore.

"Strap yourself in."

She spun and nearly fell down as she raced back to the main cabin to alert the other flight attendants and passengers for the worst. Everyone realized there was no putting off the inevitable, and thankfully there was no panic or hysterical outcry. Even the prayers came softly.

Ybarra twisted in his seat and stared down the aisle. Kamil was comforting an older man who was shaking uncontrollably.

Her face was completely calm and seemed to bear a smiling expression of contentment. She was truly a lovely woman, Ybarra thought. A pity her beauty would soon be erased. He sighed and turned back to the instrument panel.

The altimeter was falling past two hundred meters. Ybarra took a great risk and increased the throttle settings on the three remaining engines.

It was a useless gesture born of desperation. The engines would burn their last few gallons of fuel at a faster rate and die sooner. But Ybarra wasn't thinking logically. He could not sit and do nothing. He felt he had to perform one final, defiant act, anything, even if it meant hastening his own death.

Five tormenting minutes passed as one. The black sea reached up to clutch the aircraft.

"I see lights!" Rubin blurted suddenly. "Dead ahead!"

His eyes instantly flicked up and focused through the windshield. "A ship!" he cried. "It's a ship!"

Almost as he shouted, the plane roared over the polar Explorer, missing the radar mast by less than ten meters.

The crew of the icebreaker had been alerted by radar to the approaching aircraft. The men standing inside the bridge involuntarily ducked as the airliner, exhaust from its two straining engines screaming like an army of banshees, swept overhead toward the Greenland coast to the west.

The roar filled the electronics compartment, and it emptied like a lake through a split dam. Knight took off for the bridge at a dead run with Pitt and Giordino right behind him. None of the men manning the bridge as much as turned as the captain burst past the door. Everyone was peering in the direction of the receding aircraft.

"What in hell was that?" Knight demanded from the officer on watch.

"An unidentified aircraft nearly ranmied the ship, Captain."

"Military?"

"No, sir. I caught a quick glimpse of the lower wings as she flashed overhead. She bore no markings."

"A spy plane maybe?"

"I doubt it. All her windows were lit UP."

"A commercial airliner," Giordino suggested.

Knight's expression became vague and a trifle irritated.

"Where does the pilot get off, endangering my ship? What's he doing around here anyway? We're hundreds of miles off commercial flight paths."

"She's losing altitude," said Pitt, staring at the blinking lights as they grew smaller in the east. "I'd say she's going in."

"God help them if they set down on this sea in the dark."

"Strange he hasn't turned on the landing lights."

The watch officer nodded his head in agreement. "Strange is the word. A pilot in trouble would surely send out a distress signal. The communications room hasn't heard a peep."

"You tried to raise him?" asked Knight.

"As soon as they came at us on radar. No reply"

Knight stepped to the window and gazed out. He dnimmed his fingertips thoughtfully for no more than four seconds. Then he turned and faced the watch officer.

"Maintain course, continue the grid pattern."

Pitt looked at him. "I understand your decision, but I can't say I applaud it."

"You're on a Navy ship, Mr. Pitt," said Knight sternly. "We're not the Coast Guard. Our mission takes first priority."

"There could be women and children on board that plane."

"The facts don't spell tragedy. She's still in the air. If the Polar Explorer is the only hope of rescue in this part of the sea, why no distress call, no attempt to signal us with his landing lights, no sign of preparations to ditch? You're a flyer, you tell me why the pilot hasn't circled the ship if he's in trouble."

"Could be he's trying for land."

"Begging the Captain's pardon," interrupted the watch officer, "I forgot to mention the landing flaps were down."

"Still no proof of an immanent crash," Knight said stubbornly.