James Huston - Marine One

"Sure." Marcel took a large bowl-like cup out of a stack, poured coffee into it from an impressive coffeemaker, then reached under the desk and pulled out a quart of milk from a cooler and poured some into the coffee. "Thanks," I said as he smiled widely and handed me the cup. "So what you got, Marcel?"

Marcel ripped off his reading glasses and looked around to make sure nobody was listening. He lowered his voice and spoke to me quietly. "As you know, we are here as part of the investigation. To help the NTSB. I am looking at many things and am not making any conclusions. That's their job. I answer questions. But I think I also notice a few things that we have to deal with in the future.

"Come around here." He indicated for me to walk to his side of the desk. "I want to show you these photographs." He picked up one eight-and-a-half-by-eleven, glossy color print and handed it to me. He put his glasses back on, picked up a pen, and began pointing to a portion of the photo.

I couldn't tell what it was. "What are we looking at?"

"It is the inside threads of the main rotor blade that we found lying on the ground."

"Where it attaches to the rotor hub?"

"Exactly. Look closely."

I looked as closely as I could, but nothing jumped out at me.

"Here." He handed me the magnifying glass.

I glanced around the room feeling like I was about to do something improper and placed the photograph flat on the desk where there was good light. Marcel placed his pen where he wanted me to look. I looked carefully, moving the four-inch magnifying glass in and out until it was perfectly focused on the threads that held the main rotor blade to the rotor hub. The threads looked odd, like they weren't as clean or as precise as you would expect them to be. The threads showed slight bending, some discoloration, and a softness that I couldn't really understand. I placed the magnifying glass down and stood up straight. "What am I looking at here, Marcel?"

He almost whispered, "The threads. The threads are bent."

I shook my head indicating my complete lack of understanding. "And?"

"The threads are bent, you can see the force? The stress?"

"Sure. But I would assume they all have that. When the helicopter hits the ground, the blades flex down, putting a huge amount of force on their attachment to the rotor hub. That should stress the threads."

"No," he said. "This blade came off in the air. It was not attached when the helicopter hit the ground, remember?"

"Yeah, but we don't know where."

He shook his head as if I didn't understand, which was accurate. He said, "I do not know if this got the right chemical, the right coating. I'm afraid the coating for corrosion did not get put on this blade. If it didn't, and the blade came off in the air because it had corroded, it could explain everything! It landed by the crashed helicopter, yes, true. It would be one of those… 'ironies'?"

"That would be an irony. An unpleasant one. You think that's possible?"

Marcel shrugged and put out his chin. "You see, the blade threads are bent as if it came off going down, away from the helicopter. It probably came off while the helicopter was in the air."

I sat down in the chair Marcel had been sitting in. This case could be over a lot faster than I thought. "You tell the NTSB about this?"

"They haven't focused on the blade yet, they're too busy with other things."

"You gonna tell them?"

"I will answer whatever questions they ask."

"We need to get our own metallurgist to look at this as soon as we can."

"I don't want somebody from WorldCopter," Marcel said.

"I know just the guy. Used to be the head of the NTSB metallurgy lab."

"They will probably like that here," he said, glancing at the NTSB people.

"I don't think so. He thinks the people who work in the NTSB lab now are second-stringers. We'll have to play it very carefully."

"What about the tip weights? Any of them recovered yet?"

"No. This same blade is the one missing its end cap and tip weights. They could have come off in the air, which would cause a terrible vibration. The helicopter would come apart. That could make this blade come off in any direction."

"Well, exactly. If they don't find those tip weights, everyone will think that's exactly what happened."

"Yes, they could." I looked at him. "We have to find those tip weights. We have to show they're intact and they didn't cause the accident."

"If the NTSB didn't find them, it will be hard for us to find them."

"We have to. Otherwise this thing is going to land on our heads." I thought about the assembly of the tip weights. The small washers that balanced the rotating blade. "What about the nut that held the tip weights on? How can we prove there even was a nut?"

"Well, you couldn't rotate that blade for even thirty seconds without the nut holding on the tip weights. It would be out of balance immediately. The bolt at the end, where the tip weights go and the nut holds them on is bent. This blade hit something."

"So the nut and the tip weights could have come off when the blade hit whatever it hit."

"Yes, or the bolt could have been bent after they came off and as it fell. And the NTSB has not found any of these parts. If it was near the crash, they would be on the ground, in the mud. They have looked everywhere. They are not there."

"Oh, yes, they are. And we're going to find them."

I worked at my office late that night reviewing the Senate transcript that Morton had e-mailed me. As I paused for a moment and looked at the ceiling to soothe my burning eyes, the phone rang. I recognized Byrd's number. I put him on the speakerphone. "Hey, Tinny."

"Nolan, you came to the right place. Guess what I've got?"

"What?"

"A fine lady at the Pentagon who just happens to have access to all of Collins's personnel records. Turns out she went to Howard with my son. Used to go to his Omega Psi Phi parties, where he, of course, was the life of the party, just like his old man. She said she owed him. And since he wasn't around right now, his old man would just have to do. You believe that shit?"

"Tinny, you didn't ask her to take any federal documents, did you?"

Tinny responded as if he'd been hurt. "That would be wrong. I couldn't ask her to do that."

"You'd better not."

"Right. Just leave these things to me. You do your lawyer shit. You just don't like the dirty work. You probably let your gunnery sergeant take care of all the shitbirds in your squadron, didn't you?"

"What else you got, Tinny?"

"One other thing. This might be big. Got a contact in the Secret Service. Former Marine. May be our secret weapon."

"Why would someone from the Secret Service have any information?"

"This boy is the head of security at Camp David, my friend. He was waiting for the president on the night of the crash."

I sat up straight. "He could be the key to the entire thing."

"Exactly."

"Think he'll talk to us?"

"Let's just say he's unenthusiastic. Seems others in the government don't want anyone to find out who was at that meeting. Which, of course, makes me push all the harder. But he's not very pushable right now. I'll work it."

"What's his name?"

"No can do. He swore me to secrecy. Says he'll go stone-cold know-nothing and lie through his teeth if I even breathe his name to anyone. Especially you."

"He knows about me?'

"Well, I had to tell him why I was calling, didn't I? It's not like some investigator is going to just wonder about all this for his own good. He recognized you from the Senate hearings. Gotta run."

"Keep me posted."

"Oh, yeah."

As I hung up, the phone rang again. I checked the caller ID and saw area code 212. Only Kathryn would be up this late. "Mike Nolan," I said, answering the phone quickly.