Stuart Woods - Mounting Fears

Todd got onto his computer and logged into the Agency’s mainframe. He did a search for “Reported aircraft incidents” and narrowed it by date. He got a list of fifteen incidents. In one a small Piper had flown too close to a nuclear power plant in New York state; in another, a Beech Baron had made a wrong turn on departing Santa Monica Airport, in Los Angeles, and had had a near miss with an airliner. And in another, a light aircraft had filed a flight plan from the Cayman Islands, across Cuba and to Key West, then had disappeared from approach radar when only a few miles from its destination. A search had been conducted by the Coast Guard, but they found nothing.

Todd did a little more searching and found the daily logs of Key West Approach Control, which was operated by the Navy at its base on Boca Chica. There was a note that a Cessna had reported taking off from Marathon, fifty miles up the Keys from Key West, and was flying under visual flight rules to Sarasota. Todd then found the Sarasota Tower logs and noted that no light Cessna had landed there within the time frame for the flight from Marathon.

Todd went to the FAA registry, online, and entered the tail number of the Cessna: It had been registered to someone on Long Island… until the airplane had been totally destroyed while landing at East Hampton in fog.

Todd got out his atlas and checked the route. From Panama, it was due north to the Caymans, then to Key West, and he calculated the mileages. It was possible for a light Cessna, particularly with some ferry fuel aboard.

Todd left his office and walked down the hall to the embassy library, where he found an aeronautical chart for Panama. He found the international airport at Panama City, then, a few miles north, a private grass strip. He dug a large-scale map of the area from the stacks, then went back to his office, locked his safe and the door, put on his jacket, and took a cab home, where he had left his car.

Half an hour later, he found a little dirt road off the Colуn highway, with a sign with the outline of an airplane painted on it. He drove through the jungle for five minutes and emerged into a large, elongated clearing containing a grass airstrip of four to five thousand feet. There was a cluster of hangars at the near end of the strip, and in one of them Todd found an attendant, his feet on his desk, his head thrown back, a flying magazine resting on his chest, snoring loudly. He pinched the man’s toe, and he woke up, startled.

“Buenos dнas,” Todd said, smiling.

“Buenos dнas,” the man replied. He looked as though he may have had a few beers, and a glance into his trash can confirmed that.

“Speak English?” Todd asked.

“Yes, I speak,” the man said sleepily.

“How many airplanes are based here?”

“Maybe twelve, sometimes,” the man replied.

“How many Cessnas?”

“A twin, over there,” the man said, pointing at a tied-down aircraft, “one 172, over there,” pointing at another, “and one 182, in the hangar, there,” he said, pointing again.

“Can I see the one in the hangar, please? I’m interested in buying a 182.”

“Okay,” the man said. He led the way to the hangar, took hold of the door, and pulled up on it. “She’s out,” he said. The hangar contained only a motor scooter.

“When?”

“Dunno. They come, they go, sometimes when I’m not here.”

“You have fuel here?”

The man pointed at a pump.

Todd nodded and walked into the hangar and over to the scooter. He inspected it closely. It was very clean, as if it had been wiped down. He opened the little storage compartment and found a rag and a bottle of Windex. Then he walked around the hangar slowly, finding only two cans of motor oil and a few basic tools, which also looked very clean. He turned back to the attendant.

“What is the tail number of the airplane that lives here?”

The man shrugged. “N something,” he said. “I don’t remember the rest.”

N meant American registration. “Thank you very much for your help,” Todd said. “If the owner returns, would you ask him to call me about his airplane?” He scribbled his number on a page of his notepad and ripped it out.

“Sure, seсor,” the man said.

Todd drove back to Panama City, thinking all the way. His guess was that Teddy Fay was in Atlanta, looking for the Reverend Henry King Johnson, who was now a threat to the reelection of President Will Lee.

Todd went home and packed a bag, then called the international airport and chartered a CitationJet from a service the Agency did business with. He was now station head, and he had that authority. He called his number two and told him he would be away for a few days on business and available on his BlackBerry, then left a similar message with the ambassador’s secretary. No one would miss him, or even question him.

Todd strapped on a compact SigArms 9mm semiautomatic, got into his car, and left for the airport.

Barbara Ortegaleft her new office at the Justice Department a little after six and drove toward home. She stopped at a supermarket on the way and stocked up on groceries for her new house, and as she was waiting her turn at the checkout counter a headline in a tabloid newspaper on the rack next to her caught her eye.

VEEP AND HOTTIE CAMPAIGN MANAGER IN TRAVEL TRYST?

Barbara wanted to read the newspaper then and there, but she tossed it onto her pile of groceries and checked out. Once at home, she made herself wait until the groceries were put away before she opened the paper and read the text of the article.

“Vice President Martin Stanton, who has long had a reputation with the ladies, has been raising eyebrows among the press and staff on his campaign plane, and rumors are circulating about his relationship with his traveling campaign manager, Elizabeth Wharton. The lovely Liz, who is at least fifteen years younger than her boss, has been quartered nightly in several cities in a room adjacent to the veep’s suite, with a connecting door, and room-service deliveries to their separate rooms seem to have been coordinated.

“Vice President Stanton, until recently governor of California, has been rumored to have had regular liaisons with at least two California women over the past few years, and is in the middle of what some say is a contentious divorce from his wife of many years. Has Marty been seeking solace in the arms of the nearest beautiful woman?”

Barbara put down the paper, dug her secret cell phone out of her purse, sat down on the living room sofa, and called her lover. The phone rang a number of times before it was answered.

“Yes?” Stanton said.

“I think you know who this is,” Barbara said.

“Yes?”

“Have you seen this rotten… paper?”

“What are you talking about?”

Barbara picked up the paper. “The National Inquisitor.”

“I don’t know…”

“According to this vile rag, you are fucking your campaign manager, somebody named Elizabeth. Is that true?”

“I, ah, can’t really talk right now,” Stanton said. “Can I call you back?”

“I just want you to deny it,” Barbara said, seething. “Will you deny it right now?”

“I’m afraid I’ll have to call you back, and what with my schedule, it might be a couple of days before I can do that,” he replied.

“Don’t bother, you son of a bitch,” she said. “Don’t bother ever to call me again. I’ve torn my life apart for you, Marty Stanton. I’ve moved across the country, bought a house, found a new job-all just to be near you-and this is how you treat me?”

“I’ll have to say good-bye for now,” Stanton said, then hung up.

Barbara threw the cell phone at the opposite wall as hard as she could, shattering it.