ON a crisp, bright fall day a tiny white sports plane knifed its way through the sky at close to two hundred knots true air speed. As it neared a private airport which served a medium-sized Midwestern city, the pilot applied the carburetor heat, pulled back on the power, and dropped below the deck of broken cumulus clouds which hung like a layer of thick cotton puffs a mile above the ground. As soon as the plane entered the air below the clouds, it began to buck sharply in the rough air. A stiff wind was blowing and the frequent sharp gusts kept the pilot busy holding the little ship on course.
When a particularly strong thermal caused the plane to jump sharply in the air, the pilot leaned his head back and laughed. He had a lean narrow face and, although he was only twenty-five years old
