RAYFORD Steele's mind was on a woman he had never touched. With his fully

loaded 747 on autopilot above the Atlantic en route to a 6 A.M. landing at

Heathrow, Rayford had pushed from his mind thoughts of his family.

Over spring break he would spend time with his wife and twelve-year-old son. Their

daughter would be home from college, too. But for now, with his first officer

dozing, Rayford imagined Hattie Durham's smile and looked forward to their next

meeting.

Hattie was Rayford's senior flight attendant. He hadn't seen her in more than an

hour.

Rayford used to look forward to getting home to his wife. Irene was attractive and

vivacious enough, even at forty. But lately he had found himself repelled by her

obsession with religion. It was all she could talk about.

God was OK with Rayford Steele. Rayford even enjoyed church occasionally. But

since Irene had hooked up with a smaller congregation and was into weekly Bible

studies and church every Sunday, Rayford had become uncomfortable. Hers was not

a church where people gave you the benefit of the doubt, assumed the best about

you, and let you be. People there had actually asked him, to his face, what God was

doing in his life.

"Blessing my socks off" had become the smiling response that seemed to satisfy

them, but he found more and more excuses to be busy on Sundays.

Rayford tried to tell himself it was his wife's devotion to a divine suitor that caused

his mind to wander. But he knew the real reason was his own libido.

Besides, Hattie Durham was drop-dead gorgeous. No one could argue that. What he

enjoyed most was that she was a toucher. Nothing inappropriate, nothing showy.

She simply touched his arm as she brushed past or rested her hand gently on his

shoulder when she stood behind his seat in the cockpit.

It wasn't her touch alone that made Rayford enjoy her company. He could tell from

her expressions, her demeanor, her eye contact that she at least admired and

respected him. Whether she was interested in anything more, he could only guess.

And so he did.

They had spent time together, chatting for hours over drinks or dinner, sometimes

with coworkers, sometimes not. He had not returned so much as one brush of a

finger, but his eyes had held her gaze, and he could only assume his smile had made

its point.

Maybe today. Maybe this morning, if her coded tap on the door didn't rouse his first

officer, he would reach and cover the hand on his shoulder—in a friendly way he

hoped she would recognize as a step, a first from his side, toward a relationship.

And a first it would be. He was no prude, but Rayford had never been unfaithful to

Irene. He'd had plenty of opportunities. He had long felt guilty about a private

necking session he enjoyed at a company Christmas party more than twelve years

before. Irene had stayed home, uncomfortably past her ninth month carrying their

surprise tagalong son, Ray Jr.

Though under the influence, Rayford had known enough to leave the party early. It

was clear Irene noticed he was slightly drunk, but she couldn't have suspected

anything else, not from her straight-arrow captain. He was the pilot who had once

consumed two martinis during a snowy shutdown at O'Hare and then voluntarily

grounded himself when the weather cleared. He offered to pay for bringing in a

relief pilot, but Pan-Continental was so impressed that instead they made an

example of his self-discipline and wisdom.

In a couple of hours Rayford would be the first to see hints of the sun, a teasing

palette of pastels that would signal the reluctant dawn over the continent. Until then,

the blackness through the window seemed miles thick. His groggy or sleeping

passengers had window shades down, pillows and blankets in place. For now the

plane was a dark, humming sleep chamber for all but a few wanderers, the

attendants, and one or two responders to nature's call.

The question of the darkest hour before dawn, then, was whether Rayford Steele

should risk a new, exciting relationship with Hattie Durham. He suppressed a smile.

Was he kidding himself? Would someone with his reputation ever do anything but

dream about a beautiful woman fifteen years his junior? He wasn't so sure anymore.

If only Irene hadn't gone off on this new kick.

Would it fade, her preoccupation with the end of the world, with the love of Jesus,

with the salvation of souls? Lately she had been reading everything she could get

her hands on about the Rapture of the church. "Can you imagine, Rafe," she

exulted, "Jesus coming back to get us before we die?"

"Yeah, boy," he said, peeking over the top of his newspaper, "that would kill me."

She was not amused. "If I didn't know what would happen to me," she said, "I wouldn't be glib about it."

"I do know what would happen to me," he insisted. "I'd be dead, gone, finis. But

you, of course, would fly right up to heaven."

He hadn't meant to offend her. He was just having fun. When she turned away he

rose and pursued her. He spun her around and tried to kiss her, but she was cold.

"Come on, Irene," he said. "Tell me thousands wouldn't just keel over if they saw

Jesus coming back for all the good people."

She had pulled away in tears. "I've told you and told you. Saved people aren't good

people", "they're just forgiven, yeah, I know," he said, feeling rejected and

vulnerable in his own living room. He returned to his chair and his paper. "If it

makes you feel any better, I'm happy for you that you can be so cocksure."

"I only believe what the Bible says," Irene said.

Rayford shrugged. He wanted to say, "Good for you," but he didn't want to make a

bad situation worse. In a way he had envied her confidence, but in truth he wrote it

off to her being a more emotional, more feelings-oriented person. He didn't want to

articulate it, but the fact was, he was brighter—yes, more intelligent. He believed in

rules, systems, laws, patterns, things you could see and feel and hear and touch.

If God was part of all that, OK. A higher power, a loving being, a force behind the

laws of nature, fine. Let's sing about it, pray about it, feel good about our ability to

be kind to others, and go about our business. Rayford's greatest fear was that this

religious fixation would not fade like Irene's Amway days, her Tupperware phase,

and her aerobics spell. He could just see her ringing doorbells and asking if she

could read people a verse or two. Surely she knew better than to dream of his

tagging along.

Irene had become a full-fledged religious fanatic, and somehow that freed Rayford

to daydream without guilt about Hattie Durham. Maybe he would say something,

suggest something, hint at something as he and Hattie strode through Heathrow

toward the cab line. Maybe earlier. Dare he assert himself even now, hours before

touchdown?

Next to a window in first class, a writer sat hunched over his laptop. He shut down

the machine, vowing to get back to his journal later. At thirty, Cameron Williams

was the youngest ever senior writer for the prestigious Global Weekly. The envy of

the rest of the veteran staff, he either scooped them on or was assigned to the best

stories in the world. Both admirers and detractors at the magazine called him Buck,

because they said he was always bucking tradition and authority. Buck believed he

lived a charmed life, having been eyewitness to some of the most pivotal events in

history.

A year and two months earlier, his January 1 cover story had taken him to Israel to

interview Chaim Rosenzweig and had resulted in the most bizarre event he had ever experienced