"How long will it take?" Norma asked.
"I'll have to make half a dozen bounces. The first one won't be for nearly six hours.... We won't be able to land until sunup."
Norma bit her lip. "But that's...."
"We won't have much time. We'll have to try to get to Bud ourselves."
When the time came, he turned to her. "I've got to hit the atmosphere now. We'll have to strap down."
Numb with tension, she sat in one of the shock-chairs and buckled herself in. Then, in his chair before the panel, Herb adjusted the buckles and waited the few remaining minutes. "This will be the worst," he said.
The ship hit the upper gases—gases, made by speed into an iron curtain; and as the air clawed at the strange shape of the ship, and as the interior cooling system whined into overdrive, he fought against wild, erratic movements, firing precious fuel to brake and stabilize.... And then they were free, and shooting away along a shortened and slower ellipse.
Finally they were well into the atmosphere, but they were very high, too high to be more than a speck, so high that the sound spread too thinly to be heard on the surface.
"I'll set down outside Washington," Herb said. "Somewhere outside, where we can get away from the ship before they get there to start asking questions."