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one’s view from a convertible car, of the space where doors were supposed to be, and I watched with interest as the airstrip slid beneath us and as finally we were airborne. In moments, the airstrip was far behind us, but the cooling breeze I had anticipated failed to appear. We had climbed to about five or six hundred feet, and there we were, and it gave one a very uncomfortable feeling. We had passed over the white, salt-like expanse of flat where the airstrip was located, and now we were in a region of rolling sand hills, remarkably high sand hills, for it often seemed that we only cleared the tops of them by inches. Then the navigator left the control room and slid back to me along the wall.
    â€œWell, sir,” he said cheerfully, “it’s funny, but there seems to be something wrong with the balance.”
    â€œThe what?”
    â€œThe balance. You see, it’s how you load a plane. Now these C46s are marked off for all sorts of army loadings. For example, the marks here on the wall show you just how to load an armored car or a jeep or fifty millimeter guns—all sorts of things that you would be loading with, but of course not Coca Cola.”
    â€œNo, I imagine not Coca Cola,” I repeated.
    â€œOf course, you couldn’t expect them to think of everything. We just had to use our own judgment loading these bottles, and it’s surprising how heavy they are considering that they are empty. We can’t seem to get any altitude at all, and it’s obvious that there’s something wrong with the balance. So the pilot wondered whether you would crawl back to the tail of the plane with me and that might alter the balance a little, so we could make altitude.”
    I looked at the open doors and then at the sandhills, and then I nodded and asked a foolish question about parachutes.
    â€œYou don’t have one? Well, that’s strange, and it’s against regulations too, but it wouldn’t be much use at this altitude. There should be an indraft at the doors.”
    As we crawled back to the tail, I made a mental note to ask him what had happened to the doors, and whether they purposely flew without them or whether they had left them somewhere because a piece of whatever strange cargo they might have been carrying then had extruded; but I never did, and to this day the mystery of the doors remains unsolved. Anyway, we crawled far, far into the tail, where we crouched in the lee of a rising mountain of Coca Cola crates, but apparently the balance was still off, and craning his neck to see, the navigator admitted that we were making no more altitude than before.
    â€œSuppose we both go up to the control room now,” he suggested. “It may need weight forward.”
    We edged our way back to the control room, joining the pilot and the co-pilot; and in spite of the fact that both of them were that type of young men who are apparently incapable of concern about anything, a faint aura of worry was beginning to gather about them. My own feeling was far more than a faint aura.
    â€œNow isn’t that something,” the pilot said to me.
    â€œJust can’t make any altitude,” the co-pilot said.
    â€œIt’s the balance,” the navigator said.
    I offered my opinion. “It’s the damned Coca Cola bottles. No plane was ever made that could carry this many Coca Cola bottles.”
    â€œThey are empty, sir,” the pilot said gently.
    â€œThe plane isn’t empty. The plane’s full.”
    â€œYes, sir. I meant the Coca Cola bottles are empty. “We did estimate the load as well as we could.”
    â€œIt’s not the load, it’s the balance,” the navigator insisted.
    â€œThe trouble is,” the co-pilot added sadly, “that there is nothing in the C46 manual about Coca Cola bottles. Nothing at all. You just have to guess.”
    â€œThe trouble is,” I put in, “that sooner or later we’re going to run