“The cost of the paint is two-point-three-million dollars, plus the weight of that paint on the aircraft is on average a hundred fifty-four pounds. That’s a weight savings of point oh three percent compared to the painted fleet. Now multiply that over the new MD-80s, Airbus 300s, and 757s, and that’s thirty-four less tons of weight we are carrying per mile, with an average itinerary of four hundred thirty-six miles and total revenue passenger miles of one hundred twenty-three billion, that’s one hundred sixty-three million dollars to this year’s bottom line and close to a one-point-five-billion projection over the life of the new fleet.”

“Riles, again,” Pat called to the bartender at Sweeney’s. He pulled at his button-down collar and loosened a dark blue company tie. A warm mid-September day in New York, and the far end of the bar was a stifled ozone of flat beer, ash, and stale piss. But that was no bother to Pat, who had time to kill before dinner with his cousin Bill. And with Jimmy Reilly behind the bar, he was killing time in familiar fashion—Sweeney’s, his old local, was a couple of blocks from the American offices.

God, I missed this place. How did I become some sort of out-of-town asshole? Pat blamed airline deregulation, which had hit in 1978, sending everything straight to hell. The unions became greedy, the management more so. Losses were cut, profits dwindled, the stock price yo-yoed, and American hubbed itself in North Texas, relocating the Malones from the Bronx to Dallas in the summer of 1982.

All morning had been cost-cutting reports and budget run-throughs. Markets were shaky again, ridership was down despite a host of up indicators, and then 3Q came in down 11 percent, 18 percent off capacity, and up 4.3 percent on expenses. That required the Pharaoh Crandall—a nickname Pat had coined with his coworkers—to convene the entire pyramid-building enterprise and figure out how to correct before the holidays and make the numbers “fly right.”

Reilly placed a fresh vodka on ice in front of Pat, with a napkin of three cents’ worth of olives, skewered by a tiny red sword to hilt and tang. It was a martini if you counted thinking about France as the vermouth. Pat took a long swig of relief. Sweeney’s had somehow kept the compressor going on its antediluvian ice machine, which spat out the good oval chips Pat liked to crack against his molars.