Nelson Demille - The Lion's Game

Asad Khalil placed his bag on the wing, climbed up onto the skidproof surface, which was worn smooth, retrieved his bag, and slid into the co-pilot's seat, placing his bag on the seat behind him.

Satherwaite said, "Leave your door open a minute. Buckle up."

Khalil did as his pilot instructed.

Bill Satherwaite put on a headset, flipped some switches, then hit the starter for the left engine. After hesitating a few seconds, the prop began to swing around, and the old piston engine sputtered to life. Once the engine was running smoothly, Satherwaite hit the starter for the right engine, which fired up better than the left. "Okay… beautiful sound."

Khalil shouted over the sound of the engines, "It is very loud."

Satherwaite shouted back, "Yeah, well, your door and my window are open." He didn't tell his passenger that the door seal leaked, and it wouldn't be much quieter with it closed. He said, "Once we get up to cruise altitude, you can hear your mustache grow." He laughed and began taxiing out toward the runway. With the money in his pocket, he reflected, he didn't have to be overly nice to this greaseball. He asked, "Where'd you say you're from?"

" Sicily."

"Oh… yeah…" Satherwaite remembered that the Mafia was from Sicily. He glanced at his passenger as he taxied, and it suddenly dawned on him that this guy could be in the mob. He immediately regretted his high-handed manner and tried to make amends. "You comfortable, Mr. Fanini? Do you have any questions about the flight?"

"The time of the flight."

"Well, sir, if we get good tailwinds, which is what has been forecast, we'll be at MacArthur in about three and a half hours." He checked his watch. "That should put us on the ground about eight-thirty. How's that?"

"That will be fine. And must we refuel along the way?"

"Nope. I got extra tip tanks installed so I can go about seven hours, non-stop. We'll refuel in New York."

Khalil asked, "And you have no difficulty landing in the dark?"

"No, sir. It's a good airport. Airlines go there with jets. And I'm an experienced pilot."

"Good."

Satherwaite thought he'd smoothed things out with Mr. Fanini, and he smiled. He taxied the Apache to the end of the active runway. He glanced up and through his windshield. His student was going around again in the traffic pattern for Runway Twenty-three doing touch-and-go landings in the crosswind and apparently not having any problems. He said, "That kid up there, he's a student pilot who needs a double-ball transplant. You know? American kids have gone way too soft. They need a kick in the ass. They need to become killers. They need to taste blood."

"Is that so?"

Satherwaite glanced at his passenger and said, "I mean, I saw combat and I can tell you, when the Triple-A is so thick you can't see the sky, and when the missiles are cruising alongside your cockpit, then you become a man real fast."

"You have experienced this?"

"Lots of times. Okay, here we go. Close your door." Satherwaite ran up his engines, checked his instruments, then looked around the airport. Only the Cherokee was there, and he was no conflict. Satherwaite taxied the Apache onto the runway, pushed up the power, and they began to roll. The aircraft picked up speed and with half the runway remaining, lifted off.

Satherwaite said nothing as he made adjustments in his throttles and controls. He banked the aircraft and turned to a course of 040 degrees as the plane continued to climb.

Khalil looked out the window at the green countryside below. He sensed that the aircraft was more sound than it looked, and that the pilot, too, was better than he looked. He said to his pilot, "What war did you fight in?"

Satherwaite put a piece of chewing gum in his mouth and said, "Lots of wars. The Gulf was the big one."

Khalil knew that this man had not fought in the Gulf War. In fact, Asad Khalil knew more about Bill Satherwaite than Satherwaite knew about himself.

Satherwaite asked, "Want some gum?"

"No, thank you. And what type of aircraft did you fly?"

"Flew fighters."

"Yes? What is that?"

"Fighters. Fighter jets. Fighter-bombers. I flew lots of different kinds, but I ended up on something called the F-lll."

"Can you discuss that-or is it a military secret?"

Satherwaite laughed. "No, sir, it's no secret. It's an old aircraft, long since retired from service. Just like me."

"Do you miss this experience?"

"I don't miss the chickenshit. That means the spit-and-polish-like saluting, and everybody looking up your butt all the time. And now they have women flying combat aircraft, for Christ's sake. I can't even think about that. And these bitches cause all kinds of goddamned problems with their sexual harassment bullshit-sorry, you got me started. Hey, how are the women where you come from? They know their place?"

"Very much so."

"Good. Maybe I'll go there. Sicily, right?"

"Yes."

"What do they speak there?"

"A dialect of Italian."

"I'll learn it and go there. They need pilots there?"

"Of course."

"Good." They were climbing through 5,000 feet and the late afternoon sun was almost directly behind them, and that made the view ahead particularly clear and dramatic, Satherwaite thought. With the backlighting, the lush spring terrain took on an even deeper hue of colors, and created a clear line of demarcation against the distant blue of the coastal waters. A 25-knot tailwind added to their ground speed, so they might make Long Island sooner than he'd estimated. Somewhere in the back of Bill Satherwaite's mind was the thought that flying was more than a job. It was a calling, a brotherhood, an otherworldly experience, like some of those holy rollers in Moncks Corner felt in church. When he was in the sky, he felt better and had better feelings about himself. This, he realized, was as good as it was going to get. He said to his passenger, "I do miss combat."

"How can you miss something like that?"

"I don't know… I never felt so good in my life as when I saw those tracers and missiles around me." He added, "Well, maybe if I'd been hit, I wouldn't have felt so good about it. But those stupid bastards couldn't hit the floor with a stream of piss."

"What stupid… people?"

"Oh, let's just say the Arabs. Can't say which ones."

"Why not?"

"Military secret." He laughed. "Not the mission-just who was on the mission."

"Why is that?"

Bill Satherwaite glanced at his passenger, then replied, "It's a policy not to give out the names of pilots involved in a bombing mission. The government thinks these stupid camel jockeys are going to come to America and take revenge. Bullshit. But you know, the captain of the Vincennes -that was a warship in the Gulf that accidentally shot down an Iranian airliner-somebody planted a bomb in the skipper's car, his van-in California, no less. I mean, Jesus, that was scary-almost killed his wife."

Khalil nodded. He was very aware of this incident. The Iranians had shown, with the car bomb, that they did not accept the explanation or the apology. Khalil said, "In war, killing leads to more killing."

"No kidding? Anyway, the government thinks these camel jockeys could be dangerous to their big, brave warriors. Shit, I don't care who knows that I bombed the Arabs. Let them come looking for me. They'll wish they never found me."

"Yes… Do you arm yourself?"

Satherwaite glanced at his passenger and said, "Mrs. Satherwaite didn't raise an idiot."

"Excuse me?"

"I'm armed and dangerous."

Satherwaite continued, as they climbed through 7,000 feet. "But then, during the Gulf War, the stupid government wants good press, so they put these pilots on TV. I mean, Jesus, if they're afraid of the fucking Arabs, why are they parading these fighter pilots in front of TV cameras?-I'll tell you why-they wanted big public support back home, so they put these pretty fly-boys on TV to smile and say how great this war is, and how everybody loves doing their fucking duty for God and Country. And for every guy they had on, they had about a hundred broads-I kid you not. Parading the pussy in front of the cameras to show how fucking politically correct the military is. Jesus, if you watched the war on CNN, you'd have thought the whole war was being fought by pussies. I'll bet that went over big with the Iraquis. You know? Thinking they were getting the shit kicked out of them by a bunch of broads." He laughed. "Jesus, I'm glad I'm out of there."