—Pierre-Jean de Béranger, L’Opinion de ces demoisellesBostonIt is early morning. The beer has been drunk, the meals have been eaten, the exuberant sounds that winners make when they win have been made, and now, drained out, are gone. It is quiet. Typewriters that hammered out word of our victory for an audience still hours away, backgammon boards, playing cards, have all been packed up and put away. The aisles of the plane are empty; the cabin, its overhead lights turned off, lies at dusk. For the thirty-five players, coaches, trainers, and journalists who make up this travelling band, yesterday is finally over. We sink back in our seats, suddenly weary. I close my eyes, then open them again and stare out at the night. From under the wing, a red aura of light flickers on and off hypnoti-cally. Down below, small unconnected islands of white and yellow light, the towns and villages of western Massachusetts, inch by several seconds apart. I lean forward and rest my head against the window, feeling its coolness, fogging it with my breath, blinking at the filigree landscape as it drifts beneath me.
