But there was nobody in it, then. A little over a month before, it had
seemed to Joe that ejection seats were the most useless of all possible
pieces of equipment to have in a space ship. He'd been as much mistaken
as anybody could be. With an ejection seat, a jet pilot can be shot out
of a plane traveling over Mach one, and live to tell about it. This
crumpling cabin fell fast, but Joe stuffed Mike in an ejection seat and
shot him out. He and the Chief dragged Haney to a seat, and then the
Chief shoved Joe off--and the four of them, one by one, were flung out
into a screaming stream of air. But the ribbon-parachutes did not burst.
They nearly broke the necks of their passengers, but they let them down
almost gently.

And it was quite preposterous, but all four landed intact. Mike, being
lightest and first to be ejected, came down by himself in a fury because
he'd been treated with special favor. The Chief and Joe landed almost
together. After a long time, Joe staggered out of his space suit and
harness and tried to help the Chief, and they held each other up as they
stumbled off together in search of Haney.

When they found him he was sleeping heavily, exhausted, in a canebrake.
He hadn't even bothered to disengage his parachute harness or take off
his suit.




6