Making PHP abort a instruction after X amount of time

[JudgementDay]

I have a PHP if() instruction. Within this if() instruction is a curl string which talks to a payment gateway.

 

This gateway went down today, and caused my payment processing pages to hang. I am wondering if there is a way to make PHP abort a processing a instruction after a certain amount of time it runs?

[tobimichigan]

if (isset($go) {

    ?> HTML and text here. Blah blah <a href="http://gp.com/">link</a> etc. We'll also display the results of the form, because submit has been set.

<? } else { ?>

Display the form - the submit button hasn't been pushed yet.

<? } ?>

 

then exit.