Four Freedoms

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“How big a tube?” Henry Van Damme asked.

“Just over two feet in diameter.”

Henry, who was claustrophobic, shuddered.

18 / J O H N C R O W L E Y

“Crew has a sort of wheeled truck they can slide on to go from one

end to the other,” said the engineer.

For a while they gazed at it, the paper version and the model still

climbing. The dome of the forward crew compartment, pierced with a

multitude of Plexiglas panels, swelled from the slim body of the fuse-

lage like a mushroom cap from its stem but smoothed away under-

neath. A snake’s head, a.

“I hate the pusher engines,” Henry said. “They make the ship look

dumb.”

“They’re necessary to get the damn thing off the ground,” Julius

said, turning back to the specs unrolled before him. “Just that little bit

more lift.”

“I know why they’re necessary,” Henry said. “I just think necessary

should be elegant as well, and if it’s not it means trouble later.”

Julius, without nameable expression, raised his eyes from the rolls