Gregg Loomis - The Julian secret

Of course, that meant there were times when he had nothing better to do than pretend to be checking on the bird. Truth was, he'd rather be wiping-down the leather upholstery on this Gulfstream V than sitting around the house, having his wife think up things for him to do. Besides, the boss appreciated the fact that the man who flew the plane took time to putter around it at no extra charge.

He had just confirmed that the ice maker in the forward galley had been fixed and was descending the steps into the brightly lit and antiseptic private hangar. He was surprised to see a man in mechanic's overalls walking toward the plane. He thought he was the only one with a key to the hangar.

"Excuse me," Burt said, unable to think of anything more original. "Can I help you?"

The mechanic was startled. Obviously, he hadn't known Burt was there. "Yeah, I guess. You the one squawked the…" he consulted a sheet of notebook paper, "the digital altimeter readout?"

"Nope, haven't requested any repairs. And I'd be the one to do it."

The mechanic stepped back, taking his time reading the N number along the Gulfstream's fuselage. "Oh shit, says here four-six Alpha, not six-four Alpha. Guess I got the wrong plane. Sorry."

Burt watched him let himself out of the hangar, almost certain he had locked it on the way in. Even more puzzling was the mistake as to aircraft. There were only two other G-Ss based here at Charlie Brown, and neither had a number ending in Alpha. Must be a new guy or a transient airplane. Burt had thought he knew all the avionics repairmen.

Strange.

Burt shut the airplane's door and walked across the ballroom-smooth cement to the single door, being careful to lock it behind him. For him, as a pilot, a break in normal routine was disturbing. Anything not readily and satisfactorily explained was to be distrusted. Even so, he wasn't sure what made him pull into an empty parking spot between the airport's exit road and the fixed-base operator's avionics repair building.

Inside, Mary Jo, the receptionist, looked up at him. With pictures of her grandchildren on her desk, she felt safe in flirting with every flyer that came her way. "Well, well, it's Burt Sanders," she cackled. "Come to take me to some deserted isle in his wonderful flying machine. Hold on just a minute, Burt. I gotta go get my contraceptive kit."

Burt smiled sheepishly, still not used to her ribald humor. "actually, it's something a lot less fun, Mary Jo. You got a G-S based here or transient with numbers ending in four-six Alpha? Mebbe one with problems with the readout on the digital altimeter?"

She looked at him over the top of rimless glasses. "I can tell you flat out, we got no such animal. Your§, your foundation's plane, is the only G-S we service. Other two on the field use someone else, that other FBO." She sniffed as though personally affronted, as indeed she was. "Now, about you 'n' me takin' a little trip..,,"

Burt retreated as gracefully as possible. "I'll ask the boss, Mary Jo. Thanks."

He got back into the Honda, still uncertain what, if anything, he should do. He was already turning onto I-20 when two things jumped out of his memory to hit him like a pair of mental sledgehammers: The man in the hangar had been carrying something resembling a toolbox. Sophisticated avionics weren't repaired like a car, where the mechanic climbed under the hood. The offending equipment was removed from the aircraft and repaired and tested on the bench at the repair facility. Second, the maintenance ladder, the one used during periodic inspections or repairs to reach the higher parts of the aircraft, had been moved across the hangar.

To do what he said he'd come to do, take the altimeter out, the man would only need a couple of Phillips head screwdrivers, not a tool kit.

So, what was in the tool kit?

The digital altimeter was accessible from the instrument panel in the cockpit, which you entered after walking up steps and into the passenger cabin.

So why was the ladder moved?

When in doubt, pass the problem up the line. Burt fumbled his cell phone out of his pocket and punched in a number from memory.

A few minutes later, Lang Reilly was staring at the telephone on his desk as though reproaching it for the problem. The chief pilot had quite possibly prevented someone from tampering with the foundation's G-5. The man had been suspicious initially, enough to return to the hangar, where he found, once again, it was unlocked after he had secured it.

No, there had been no signs anyone had been tinkering with something. But then, an expert would hardly leave smudges of dirty fingerprints on the instrument panel.

Lang sighed as he thumbed through a well-worn personal directory and dialed the number for FAA Security at Charlie Brown. He explained what had happened to a disembodied recording and then touched the number the machine designated to speak with a flesh-and-blood representative of the FAA. The result was as predictable as it was frustrating: canned music interspersed with assurances of his call's importance and the Agency's intent to deal with the problem as soon as someone became available.

Reilly could feel his blood pressure rise. What could he expect from a government who considered general aviation security to be a wire fence with a gate that opened by punching in four digits? Admittedly, most general aviation aircraft weren't going to bring down another World Trade Center, but the Gulfstream was nearly as large as an airliner.

He hung up.

Opening his center desk drawer, he reached in to release the catch on the false back and groped around until he found what he was looking for. He put it on the desk, a disk made to screw into the speaker part of most pay phone receivers. It was one of the few toys he had taken from the Agency, a random modulator that made a voice over a telephone impossible to identify, either by a listener or a voice-wave measuring device. He put it in his pocket and walked out of the office for the elevators. There were three pay phones in the building's lobby.

Slightly less than a half hour later, Sara-stood in the doorway, clearly perplexed. "Lang, there's a man on the phone wants to speak with you, an emergency. Says he's with the Transport Safety Administration. We have any business with…?"

Lang put down the file he had been reading and suppressed a grin. "I'll take it."

The Transport Safety Administration, another of the alphabet-soup bureaus that had sprouted like weeds after 9/11. This one's principal purpose seemed to be to harass commercial air travelers while refusing to conduct politically incorrect searches of profiled persons from places that spawned terrorism. Better to let a bearded, wild-eyed mullah in flowing robes through security and frisk an eighty-year-old grandmother than risk the ire of the liberal media.

The TSA had taken heat lately from the number of fake bombs journalists had slipped by it, incursions into "restricted" areas, and items stolen from baggage.

Like any government entity, Lang figured, this one would catapult itself into an opportunity for favorable publicity.

"Lang Reilly," he said as he picked up the phone. "What might I do for my government today?"

Lang was at the hangar in twenty minutes, watching a swarm of uniformed agents buzz like bees protecting a hive. Each inspection plate was carefully removed by FM-certified airframe and power-plant mechanics, and the cowling was being removed from both engines. Several ladders rested against various parts of the fuselage.

The chief pilot, Burt Sanders, saw Lang and came over, a worried expression on his face. "I hope they can get the plane back together in time for the next flight."

Lang turned to watch two German shepherd dogs sniff the landing gear as a uniformed agent stood on tiptoe to peer into a wheel well. "Better to be a little late than take a chance."