Lost City [antikvár]

PrologueThe French Alps, August 1914High above the soaring majesty of the snowcapped mountains, Jules Fauchard was fighting for his life. Minutes before, his plane had slammed into an invisible wall of air with a force that jarred his teeth. Now updrafts and downdrafts were tossing the light aircraft about Hke a kite on a string. Fauchard batded the gut-wrenching turbulence with the skill that had been drilled into him by his strict French flying instructors. Then he was through the rough patch, luxuriating in smooth air, unaware that it would nearly prove his undoing.With his plane finally stable, Fauchard had given in to the most natural of human impulses. He closed his weary eyes. His eyelids fluttered and drooped, then slammed shut as if weighted down with lead. His mind drifted into a shadowy, uncaring realm. His chin slumped onto his chest. His limp fingers relaxed their grip on the control stick. The diminutive red plane wavered drunkenly in what the French pilots called a perte de vitesse, or loss of way, as it slipped off^ on one wing in a prelude to a tailspin.Fortunately, Fauchard's inner ear detected the