Nelson Demille - The Lion's Game

"No shit? I could've wound up there once if I'd run out of gas."

"Excuse me?"

"It's a long story. I'm not allowed to talk about it. Forget it."

"As you wish."

"Okay, if you open that door for me, we're outta here."

"Oh, one more thing. There has been a slight change in my plans that may necessitate some change on your part."

"Like what?"

"My company has ordered me to New York."

"Yeah? I don't like flying to New York, Mr…"

"Fanini."

"Yeah. Too much traffic, too much bullshit."

"I am willing to pay extra."

"It's not the money, it's the bullshit. Which airport?"

"It is called MacArthur. You know of it?"

"Oh, yeah. Never been there, but it's okay. A suburban airport out on Long Island. We can do that, but it's extra."

"Of course."

Satherwaite put his things down on the desk and looked for another chart on the shelf. He said, "Funny coincidence-I was just talking to a guy on Long Island. He wanted me to stop by-maybe I'll surprise him. Maybe I should call him."

"Perhaps a surprise would be better. Or call him when we land."

"Yeah. Let me get his phone numbers." Satherwaite flipped through a tattered Rolodex and extracted a card.

Khalil said, "Is he close to the airport?"

"I don't know. But he'll pick me up."

"You may take my rental car if you wish. I have a car reserved, as well as two motel rooms for us."

"Yeah. I was going to ask you about that. I don't share rooms with guys."

Khalil forced a smile and replied, "Neither do I."

"Good. As long as we got that straight. Hey, you want to pay up front? You get a discount for up-front cash."

"How much will this amount to?"

"Oh… now that it's MacArthur, plus the overnight and I lose some flight instructing time tomorrow, plus gas… let's say eight hundred in cash should do it."

"That sounds reasonable." Khalil took out his wallet and counted eight hundred dollars in cash, then added another hundred dollars to it and said, "Plus a tip for you."

"Thanks."

That was most of the cash that Khalil had, but he knew he would get it all back soon.

Bill Satherwaite counted the money and pocketed it. "Okay. Done deal."

"Good. I am ready."

"I gotta take a piss." Satherwaite opened a door and disappeared into the toilet.

Asad Khalil looked at the poster of the Great Leader and noticed the dart in the forehead. He removed the dart and said to himself, "Surely no one deserves to die more than this American pig."

Bill Satherwaite came out of the toilet, picked up his charts and bag, and said, "If there's no more changes, we can get moving."

Khalil said, "Do you have any beverages we can bring with us?"

"Yeah. I already put an ice chest in the plane. Got soda and beer-beer's for you if you want. I can't drink."

Khalil clearly smelled alcohol on the man's breath, but said, "Do you have bottled water?"

"No. Why spend money for water? Water is free." Idiots and fairies buy bottled. "You want water?"

"It is not necessary." Khalil opened the door, and they went out into the sweltering air.

As they walked across the hot concrete ramp toward the Apache parked a hundred feet from the office, Satherwaite asked, "What kind of business you in, Mr. Panini?"

"Fanini. As my colleague told you when he called from New York, I am in the textile business. I am here to buy American cotton."

"Yeah? You came to the right place. Nothing's changed here since the Civil War, except now they have to pay the slaves." He laughed and added, "And some of the slaves are Spanish and white now. You ever see a cotton field? Talk about shit work. They can't find enough people to do it. Maybe they should import some stupid Arabs to pick cotton-they love the sun. Pay 'em in camel shit, and tell 'em they can take it to the bank for money." He laughed.

Khalil did not reply, but asked, "Do you need to file a flight plan?"

"No." Satherwaite pointed to the clear sky as they continued their walk toward the airplane. "There's a big-ass high-pressure area across the entire East Coast-great weather all the way." Thinking he might have a nervous passenger, he added, "The gods are shining on you, Mr. Fanini, 'cause we've got a great day for flying all the way to New York and, probably, when we come back tomorrow, too."

Khalil did not need to hear this man tell him that Allah had blessed the Jihad-he already knew it in the depths of his soul. He also knew that Mr. Satherwaite was not flying home tomorrow.

As they continued to walk, Satherwaite said, as if thinking to himself, "I might check in with New York approach control radar when we cut across the ocean south of Kennedy Airport on the direct route to Islip. They'll keep us away from airliners inbound to JFK."

Khalil thought a moment of how he had been inside an airliner on that very route only a few brief days ago, yet it now seemed almost an eternity.

Satherwaite added, "And I'll call Long Island Tower for a landing clearance. That's it." Satherwaite waved his hand around the nearly deserted Moncks Corner airfield. "Sure as hell don't have to talk to anyone to depart from here," he said with a laugh. "Hell, there's no one around to talk to, except my own student out there in my own piece-of-shit Cherokee. And that kid wouldn't know what to say if I called him on the radio anyway."

Khalil looked out to where the pilot was pointing at the small single-engine airplane that was now lined up and descending toward the landing runway, wobbling slightly from side to side. He could see that the airplane very closely resembled the type that he had chartered out of Jacksonville with the female pilot. The memory of her crept back into Khalil's thoughts, and he quickly pushed her image from his mind.

They stopped at an old blue and white two-engine Piper Apache. Satherwaite had earlier untied the ropes, removed the control locks, and put aside the wheel chocks. He had also checked the fuel. That was all he ever checked, anyway, he thought, mostly because there were so many things wrong with the old airplane that it was a waste of time finding anything more. Satherwaite said to his customer, "I checked it all out before you got here. Everything's in tip-top shape."

Asad Khalil regarded the old aircraft. He was glad it had two engines.

Satherwaite sensed some concern on the part of his paying customer and said, "This is a very basic machine, Mr. Fanini, and you can always depend on it to get you there and back."

"Yes?"

Satherwaite tried to see what the prissy foreigner saw. The plexiglass windows of the 1954 airplane were a little dirty and crazed, and the paint on the fuselage was a bit faded-in fact, Satherwaite admitted, it was now hardly more than a hint of what it had previously been. He glanced at the foppishly dressed, sunglasses-wearing Mr. Fanini and gave him more encouragement. "There's nothing complex or fancy about it, but that means that nothing of importance can go wrong. The engines are good, and the flight controls are working fine. I used to fly military jets, and let me tell you, those things are so complex that you need an army of maintenance people just to launch on a simple one-hour mission." Satherwaite glanced beneath the right engine where a growing puddle of black oil had accumulated in the week since he'd last flown the Apache. "In fact, I took this to Key West and back yesterday. Flies like a homesick angel. Ready?"

"Yes."

"Good." Satherwaite threw his overnight bag on the wing, then with the charts under his arm, he climbed onto the Apache's right wing, opened the only door, and retrieved his bag. He threw his bag and the charts in the rear and said to his passenger, "Front or back?"

"I will sit in the front."

"Okay." Bill Satherwaite sometimes helped passengers up, but the tall guy looked like he could manage. Satherwaite climbed into the cockpit and maneuvered himself across the co-pilot's seat into the pilot's seat. It was hot in the cabin, and Satherwaite popped open the small vent window on his side, waiting for his passenger. He called out, "You coming?"