Hot Pursuit

by Stuart Woods

  “That’s why we have two engines,” Pat said.

  At SI, the autopilot switched to the next NDB, NA.

  “We can see to descend now,” Pat said. “Let’s get down to three thousand.”

  “Where the hell is the airport?”

  “Be patient, it will reveal itself to you.”

  Stone was anxious, but he descended. A few minutes later he looked out the windscreen and saw what looked like an elongated postage stamp in a valley ahead of them. “Is that it? That tiny thing?”

  “It will get bigger,” Pat said. “Now just aim for the runway. Slow down and let’s get some flaps in.”

  Now it was just an ordinary visual approach, Stone told himself. Try to relax. He slowed enough to get the landing gear down, which slowed them even more, but according to the approach lights, he was still too high. He steepened his descent. And then the runway—all six thousand feet of it—was under them and he was touching down. No sweat.

  He taxied to the nearly empty ramp, where a lineman and a fuel truck awaited them. As he taxied to a stop and waited for the nosewheel to be chocked, he saw a tiny Inuit girl in the cab of the fuel truck. She smiled at him, and he waved.

  They left the airplane with the refuelers and went into the terminal building and upstairs to where a young man and a beautiful Inuit woman manned the flight department. They got a new weather forecast and a clearance, then used the toilets and walked back to the airplane, which was now replete with fuel.

  Pat got out the departure chart and went over it with Stone. “What we’re going to do is take off in the opposite direction of our landing, because there are mountains in the departure direction. After takeoff, we turn right forty-five degrees for a minute or so, then make a standard-rate turn to the left, three hundred and sixty degrees, climbing all the time. We may need a second three-sixty to get to an altitude above the mountains. I’ll be comfortable at twelve thousand feet.”

  “Whatever you say,” Stone said. They had a slight tailwind, but the runway was slightly downhill, so they got off the ground easily. Stone made the first 360-degree turn, then, suddenly, they were in the clouds and could see nothing except the moving map in front of them.

  “Let’s do another three-sixty,” Pat said.

  Stone did so, and then they were above twelve thousand feet, heading for 310. Stone looked at the synthetic vision display in the panel and found a spectacular view of mountains and valleys in front of them. They broke out of the clouds at 180, headed for their first waypoint to Reykjavik. The winds had changed, and now they had a headwind. Their assigned Mach number was down to .64, and they seemed to be making poor progress.

  “Something’s wrong with the range ring,” Pat said, pointing to the multi-function display. Stone looked: it showed them with a dry-fuel range of about halfway to Reykjavik.

  “Oh, shit,” he said. “What’s wrong?”

  “The range ring is wrong,” she said. “Look at your fuel gauges.”

  Stone did, and they showed nearly full fuel. “Well, I believe the gauges, not the range ring.”

  “Let me try something,” she said. She brought up the fuel display and pressed a button labeled “sync fuel.” When Stone checked the display, the range ring was back where it should be—well past their destination. He breathed a sigh of relief.

  —

  ICELAND APPEARED before them in due course, and they flew the ILS 10 at BIRK, Reykjavik Airport. As they taxied to the ramp, Stone saw a Citation Mustang, like his old airplane, parked there.

  “I know that airplane,” Pat said. “I did the acceptance for the owner last year. He must be making his first transatlantic, too. Maybe we’ll bump into him.”

  They cleared customs and took a taxi to the Hotel Borg, an old hotel that had been redone in a stylish fashion set on a green square in the center of the city. They had dinner at an Indian restaurant around the corner, then got to bed.

  They didn’t run into the Mustang’s owner, and when they arrived at the airport the following morning, the airplane was gone.

  26

  MILLIE GOT BACK to the White House after lunch and found Holly in the mess.

  “How’d your fabulous lunch go?” Holly asked.

  Millie sat down and told her about what Lev Epstein had said.

  “So we have a suspect. Lev Epstein identified a likely man who was an assistant professor in the economics department and knows a lot about the Middle East oil industry. He never knew the man’s name, but I tracked it down through the department office: Jacob Riis. That’s almost certainly made up. It’s the name of a famous journalist, social activist, and photographer from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. That’s a good start. How do you want to proceed?”

  “I think we should kick it right back to Lev Epstein,” Millie said. “He’s got the manpower on the coast to run this down, and we don’t want to appear ungrateful for his help.”

  “All right, call him and tell him that, before the day is out, the president will call the director and request his counterintelligence unit to identify and locate Mr. Jacob Riis.”

  “Perfect,” Millie said.

  “And tell him to copy us on all his reports.”

  “Will do.” Millie ran back to her desk and called Quentin Phillips.

  “Special Agent Phillips.”

  “It’s Millie.”

  “Hi there.”

  “The president will call your director today and ask for your unit to be put on finding Jacob Riis. By the way, you know that’s not his name, don’t you?”

  “If it were, he’d be a very old man. How about dinner tonight?”

  “Not a bad idea, but I’ll have to call you back when I see what the rest of the day is like. Where?”

  “Your place?”

  “Nah.”

  “My place?”

  “All right, my place, but you have to bring food or have it delivered.”

  “What time?”

  “Seven-thirty, subject to later confirmation.”

  “Great!”

  “Now go tell Lev he’s on the case. It’ll make you look good if he hears it from you before he hears it from the director.”

  “Done. See you at seven-thirty, subject to confirmation.”

  Quentin walked quickly down to Epstein’s office. “Please tell him I need to see him,” he said to the secretary, Betty.

  She buzzed her boss and got him admitted. “Why is he seeing you, instead of your supervisor?” she asked Quentin.

  “It looks like I may be reporting directly on this one.”

  “I’m impressed,” she said.

  Quentin found Epstein tapping away at his computer. He took a seat and waited.

  “Okay,” Epstein said, “what now?”

  “The president is calling the director requesting counterintelligence to handle Mr. Riis.”

  “I figured,” Epstein replied. “You know that’s not his name, don’t you?”

  “I know who Jacob Riis was.”

  Epstein’s secretary buzzed. “The director, on line one.”

  He picked up the phone. “Good afternoon, Director.”

  He listened, nodding to himself. “Yes, sir, I understand. Special Agent Quentin Phillips, a Harvard man.” He listened some more. “Right away, Director. Good day, sir.” He hung up. And turned to Quentin.

  “Betty has a ticket to San Francisco and a travel voucher for you. You’re on an early plane tomorrow. Take the night off and collect your reward from Ms. Martindale. The AIC out there will assign a couple of rookies to you. I want to know who and where Jacob Riis is. Get out.”

  “Yes, sir!” Quentin replied, bolting for the door. “How did you know—”

  “I said get out.”

  As he passed out the door, Betty held out an envelope for him. “Good luck,” she
said, then went back to her computer.

  Quentin glanced at his watch as he ran back to his desk. He had time to pack and get to Millie’s place; he could leave for the airport from there. The phone was ringing as he reached his cubicle. Millie confirmed.

  —

  MILLIE GOT HOME at six, an unheard-of hour for her. She vacuumed, dusted, and changed the sheets and washed three days of dirty dishes, then she showered, washed her hair, and put on a short dress, not bothering with underwear. She filled the ice bucket with cubes and sat down to wait. Her doorbell buzzed. He was not late. She opened the door to find him holding a suitcase and a briefcase.

  “Going somewhere?”

  “To dinner,” he said, brushing past her and setting down his load. “The food will be here in half an hour. Can I have a drink, please?”

  “Sure, what’ll it be?”

  He took her face in his hands and kissed her. “That, first,” he said, “then scotch, rocks.” He kissed her again.

  “So what’s the luggage for? I hope you don’t think you’re moving in.”

  “Just for the night,” he said. “I’ve got a seven AM flight for San Francisco, car coming at five.” He tried to kiss her again, but she fended him off with his drink.

  “Take a slug of that and sit down,” she said, pointing at the sofa, then poured herself a scotch and sat down beside him. “So you’re on the case, then?”

  “I’m in charge of it. They’ve assigned two agents to me out there. This is one hell of a break for me, Millie, and I have you to thank for it.”

  “You certainly do,” she said, “and don’t you forget it.”

  They were halfway through their drinks when the doorbell rang. Quentin answered it and traded some cash for two large paper bags of food. “I hope you like Chinese,” he said, kicking the door shut behind him.

  “Love it,” she said. “Have a seat at the table, and I’ll make it look like I cooked it.”

  —

  WHEN THEY HAD FINISHED, Quentin made short work of her dress, which she had counted on, and they flailed about in the throes of first-time sex for the better part of an hour.

  When they had caught their breath and her head was on his shoulder, she said, “I hope you don’t think we’re going to make a regular thing of this.”

  “Not unless you can get loose to come to San Francisco,” he said. “If not, then you’ll have to wait until I’m back for it to become a regular thing.”

  “I don’t think I’ll be able to manage San Francisco,” she said. “I’m too new to the job.”

  “Then I guess it’ll have to be phone sex,” he said, kissing her and rolling over on top of her.

  27

  THREE THOUSAND MILES and a big time change away, Stone and Pat were using their time well, at least until room service interrupted them by turning up with breakfast. They managed to climax everything just in time for the knock on the door.

  “The front desk has booked you a cab in ninety minutes,” the waiter said, putting the tray and a paper bag with their sandwiches on the bed, then retreating.

  They breakfasted greedily, showered, packed, and were downstairs with the bill already paid when the cab turned up. Half an hour later Stone sat in the cockpit, running through the checklist while the fuel truck did its work and Pat filed their flight plan. By the time she got in and closed and locked the cabin door, Stone had his clearance from the tower and had one engine running. Now he started the other. He listened to the latest recorded weather, then asked for a taxi clearance. Five minutes later they were climbing to flight level 410 and headed toward an invisible intersection halfway to Scotland.

  At noon, local time, they ate their sandwiches and settled down for the last hour of the flight. Scotland was under its permanent national cloud cover, but Stone sighted land on the synthetic vision display. “Land, ho!” he said.

  “I knew you were going to say that,” Pat replied.

  “It’s what you’re supposed to say, isn’t it?”

  “Only if you’re on a boat.”

  “I don’t see the difference.”

  They passed over the northern coast of Scotland a few miles from the closest airport, Stornoway, and they were handed over to Scottish ATC. The controller, for reasons Stone could not fathom, seemed to have an Italian accent. With ten minutes left on their three-hour flight plan they passed Birmingham and were given vectors to the Instrument Landing System at Coventry, but they popped out of a cloud with the airport in sight and made a visual approach.

  Stone set down on the six-thousand-foot runway and came to a stop, but he couldn’t see a taxiway.

  “There’s no taxiway,” Pat said.

  He spoke to the tower and was told to reverse-taxi to the first exit, and when he did so, he found a small group of people waiting on the ramp, among them a large man leaning against a Jaguar XJ sedan. The Mustang they had been seeing along the way was parked on the ramp with nobody aboard.

  “That’s my client Johnny MacDee,” Pat said, nodding toward the man with the car. “You’ll like him.”

  Stone liked him immediately; he was warm, bluff, and welcoming. Pat made the introductions. “Where’s your airplane?” Pat asked.

  “My CJ4 arrived this morning at the Citation Service Center at Doncaster, north of here, for the pre-buy inspection,” he said. “It’s going to be there for a week or so. I’m sorry for the delay,” Johnny said, “so by way of apology, I’ve arranged for you to stay in the Jaguar suite at the Taj Hotel, in Buckingham Gate, London. You’ve already cleared customs.” The driver of the car got out. “This is Tony Ridgeway, who will be your driver while you’re here. If you want to get out of town, you can ditch him and take the car. I’ll keep you posted on the progress of the inspection, and, Stone, the folks here will hangar your airplane while you’re here, if you like.”

  “I certainly like,” Stone said. He unloaded their luggage, Tony put it into the Jaguar, and after turning off the airplane’s battery and installing the engine covers, they were on their way to London, with Tony driving swiftly and smoothly through the English countryside.

  —

  IN LONDON they drove past Buckingham Palace and down a street into a central courtyard, surrounded by the hotel. Stone didn’t know the Taj; he usually stayed at the Connaught, but when they were shown into the Jaguar suite, he didn’t mind the change. They had two bedrooms, a living room, dining room, kitchen, and study, all of it filled with Jaguar mementos. Their butler, Sergio, explained that Jaguar owned the hotel, and that the company’s design department had decorated the suite.

  Stone’s cell phone rang. “Hello?”

  “It’s Dino. You alive?”

  “Don’t I sound alive?”

  “How was the transatlantic?”

  “A piece of cake. I had a good copilot.”

  “We’re leaving tomorrow night,” he said. “We’ll be at the Connaught.”

  “I’ve got a better idea,” Stone said. “Cancel the Connaught, and when you arrive, tell your driver to take you to the Taj Hotel, in Buckingham Gate. We’ve got a large suite. Trust me, you’ll love it.”

  “Whatever you say, pal. I always unquestioningly accept your recommendations of hotels and restaurants.”

  “Is Viv going to fly back with us?”

  “No, she’s staying in London for ten days, doing some work for Strategic Services.” Dino’s wife, Viv, was a retired police detective, now an executive of the second-largest security company in the world. “I’m going to be here for the better part of a week, too, meeting with various security people in the government. If you have to be back soon, you’ll have to fly home alone.”

  “I don’t need that. I’m good for a week here, anyway.”

  “See you the day after tomorrow, then,” Dino said, and hung up.

  —

  THAT EVENING, Tony drove
Stone and Pat to Langan’s Brasserie, an old favorite of his. The place was as crowded as ever, and Stone insisted that Pat order the spinach soufflé as a first course, which came with hollandaise sauce flavored with anchovy.

  “I’ve never tasted anything quite like it,” Pat said. “Good choice.” They both had the Dover sole and a good bottle of white burgundy. The only distraction was from a drunk at the other end of the restaurant who was singing, dancing, trying to disrobe, and, in general, making an ass of himself. Finally, the management came to his table and, apparently, requested his immediate absence; he was shepherded out of the restaurant by two men from his table, followed by the rest of his party.

  “That’s a relief,” Stone said. “I feel sorry for the people at the adjacent tables.”

  “I know the guy,” Pat said. “His name is Paul Reeves, and he’s the owner of the Mustang we’ve been seeing in our travels. I’m just glad he didn’t see me.”

  “I’m glad, too.”

  “I have another reason for being glad,” Pat said. “One of the two men who got him out of the restaurant was Kevin Keyes.”

  “Oh, shit,” Stone said.

  “Who do we call about that?”

  “Hang on a minute.” Stone got up and walked quickly from the restaurant. As he came out the front door a large, old Daimler limousine drove away from the curb, down the block, and turned a corner.

  Stone went back inside and called Robert Miller.

  “Miller.”

  “It’s Stone Barrington, Bob. I’ve just seen Kevin Keyes.”

  “Great! Where?”

  “In Stratton Street, London.”

  “London, Ontario?”

  “London, England. He just drove away with a man named Paul Reeves, an American, who was roaring drunk and got thrown out of a restaurant.”