"Do you know if there's a Piper Cherokee Lance parked out here?" he asked.
The man looked around. "There's one over there," he said, pointing.
Burke's eyes followed his arm. "That red and yellow plane?"
"Yeah."
"Wrong color."
"Sorry, that's the only one I've seen lately."
Burke found the taxi driver waiting for him. He climbed back in and told him to head for the next FBO.
When he had struck out at the last place, he asked a plump, balding operations clerk if there was another airport in the area that he might check.
"Yeah, there's a couple of 'em. Westwego is across the river off the West Bank Expressway. Then there's Lakefront, up on Pontchartrain. You might try it first. It's a bigger operation."
The driver, whose smile grew wider as his meter clicked ever higher, took him back across town and up to the shores of the big lake that flanked the city on the north. At Lakefront Airport, he strolled out to the ramp and looked about for a blue Cherokee Lance. Still no luck. Discouraged, he walked across to the nearby hangar and entered the operations office.
"Can I help you?" a thin, black-haired man asked, his smile showing a mouthful of shiny, white teeth.
"I'm looking for Robert Jeffries, flies a blue Cherokee Lance out of Kansas City."
"You missed him by a couple of hours," the man said.
Burke's look was a curious mixture of pleasure and disappointment. Happy to have picked up Jeffries' trail, but frustrated that he was a bit too late. "Do you know where was he headed?"
"Panama City, Florida." He looked up at the clock. "Let's see, he ought to be landing there most any time now."
Finding no scheduled flights that would get him there any sooner, Burke rented a Chevrolet Caprice and headed east on Interstate 10. He kept a heavy foot on the accelerator as he pushed on toward Pensacola, then sped as fast as the traffic would allow along Highway 98 on into Panama City. It was four-thirty when he pulled into the rather limited confines of the Bay County Airport. He parked at a hangar just past the long, box-like terminal, and went inside.
"Robert Jeffries?" said the man at the counter, a blank look on his face at first. It had been a long day. "Oh, yeah. Cherokee Lance. He was in here this morning. Picked up a passenger."
"Do you know where he was going?" Burke asked.
"Sure. Back out to the island."
"Island?" Could the Jabberwock training site be on an island? As he thought about it, what better place could you find? Perfect isolation.
"Yeah, Oyster Island."
"Sorry. I'm afraid I don't know much about this area."
"It's a little island about thirty miles south of Cape San Blas. That's between Port St. Joe and Apalachicola. Come here, I'll show you."
He went over to a large mosaic of aeronautical charts on the wall, indicating a blip of an island that lay beyond the point that protruded southward about halfway along the coast of the Panhandle. Burke saw a warning box had been drawn around it with red grease pencil. "Restricted Area" was printed beside it.
"Is it a military base?" he asked.
"No, it's owned by a company that has some kind of weapons testing facility there. They don't use it all the time, but there's a NOTAM out on it now. It's on the hook over there if you want to take a look. Jeffries flies back in here every few days. I asked him about the place once and he said I shouldn't get too nosy. Seems they've got some kind of fancy system to detect anybody trying to get on the island. Don't want drug runners out there, he said."
It had to be the Jabberwock team base. The talk about a "device" and "birds" definitely took on a military flavor now. But how could there be a military operation underway on a Gulf Coast island that the NSA and the CIA had no knowledge of? What was the connection of two Bulgarian Communist agents? And the apparent effort to make it sound like a Mossad operation? Burke knew he had just uncovered the tip of a mostly-buried chunk of ice.
He handed over one of his Douglas Bell business cards. "I'm a private investigator. Company I'm working for is interested in Jeffries. I'd appreciate it if you didn't mention anything about this if he comes back. Here's a little something for your trouble." He handed over a fifty-dollar bill.
The man's eyes bulged. He pushed the business card back into Burke's hand and grinned. "I never heard of you."
Burke went over to check the file of NOTAMs—Notice to Airmen. He found the item indicating the Oyster Island restriction would be active from mid-May to mid-June. The restriction was up to twenty-five thousand feet, five miles on either side of the island. The Weapons Division of Pan West Industries would be carrying out tests of explosive devices. He was familiar with the PWI name, knew it was a conglomerate of defense-related companies.
Burke drove down the coast to Port St. Joe, a small town distinguished only by a few industrial plants and a port area off St. Joseph Bay. The stretch of highway beyond was a bleak, deserted area of sand and pine trees, not unlike the uninhabited wilderness he had encountered through much of Alaska. At Apalachicola, he found a sleepy little town with more facilities for boats and ships and a protected anchorage on Apalachicola Bay. By then it was time to find something to eat and a place to unload his travel bag. It would also soon be time to call Lori at one of her designated "safe" numbers.
Off the main highway, on the outskirts of town, he found a rustic looking motel that apparently catered to fishermen, judging from the name Angler's Inn. It was located on an inlet where fishing boats were docked and pickup trucks were as abundant as taxicabs outside a Manhattan hotel. The inn was a steel gray, rectangular two-story building with a balcony around the second floor. Locating the office in a separate structure in front of the inn, he stopped to inquire about a room.
"We pretty well stay full up this time of year," the leather-faced, graying proprietor said. A cardboard sign on the counter gave his name as B. A. Casteel. "But you're in luck. Just had a cancellation. Fella's truck had transmission problems."
"Sorry for him, but glad for me," Burke said.
Casteel nodded. "Way it usually happens, ain't it? Somebody's bad luck is somebody's good luck. How many nights you staying?" He wore blue jeans and a faded blue shirt with half a dozen pens and pencils jutting up out of the pocket.
"One for sure. I may need to stay a few more. That any problem?"
"Just let me know tomorrow. Long as you pay your bill, you can stay till doomsday for all I care."
Burke laughed. He filled out the registration form and signed it Douglas Bell. He handed over the first night's room charge in cash. Offhandedly, he asked, "Know anything about Oyster Island?"
Casteel pursed his lips. "No more'n anybody else. I've fished out that way. Grouper hit pretty good sometimes."
"Is that the island owned by Pan West Industries?"
"Yep. That's it."
"I heard they had some kind of system that tells if somebody tries to get on the island. Wonder what they've got out there that's so important?"
Casteel snorted. "Few buildings. One's a machine shop, they say. There's a runway for airplanes. That talk about a burglar alarm, or whatever, come from some teenagers. They tried to have a party out there one night a year or so ago. Soon as they started up the concrete ramp across the beach, these damned sirens went off and lights flashed on all over the place." He pronounced it "sy-reens." "You ain't wanting to go out there, are you?"
"No. Just curious," Burke said with a shrug. And Casteel promptly obliged by satisfying his curiosity.
"I was talking to old Scooter Peyton at Port St. Joe the other day. Said he rented his old LCM, that's a landing craft, to a man wanted to haul some stuff out to Oyster Island. Said the man looked like a city slicker. Scooter's a slippery old lizard. Said he socked the poor bastard with a big fee for that old scow." Casteel chuckled.
Burke found he was just inside the Eastern Time Zone line, so local time was the same as Washington time when he called Lori at Walter and Chloe Brackins' home. She told
him about the men with guns who had jumped her in the car, then fled as soon as they saw it wasn't him.
"That's one possibility I hadn't considered," he said. "But your diversionary tactic really did the job for me. I had no trouble getting back to my car."
Then he told her what he had learned about Jeffries and Oyster Island.
"This thing is getting pretty far out," she said. "How do you figure on pursuing it now?"
"I'll drop by Peyton's Boat Yard in the morning and see who rented the landing craft. May have been Jeffries. Maybe somebody else."
"Sure would be nice to get a look at what's happening on that island, wouldn't it? Too bad we can't ask the Agency to take a look with a spy satellite. Or get an old U-2 or SR71 to shoot from high altitude."
"Matter of fact, now that you mention it, there's a lot can be done with low altitude aerial photography," Burke said. "There are some new films available I've heard fantastic reports on."
"What about cameras?"
"We've had the optics for a long time. Just didn't have the emulsions to go along with the lenses."
"But how would you manage it without flying over the island? You could ignore the Restricted Area, of course, but that would ring alarms with the people on the ground."
Burke considered that for a moment. "One way might be to use a hand-held camera. Fly by the island off to one side and shoot down at an angle."
"Could somebody like an aerial mapping outfit do it?"
"They should have the proper aircraft and equipment. That's an area of photography I've never really delved into. I don't know any of the players."
"Let me check it out for you in the morning. I'll give you a call."
PORT ST. JOE
Chapter 32
Burke found Scooter Peyton in his usual place, feet propped on the desk in his cramped office. He figured Scooter for a contemporary of B. A. Casteel, with thick, unruly gray hair and skin like elephant hide, the result of too many years on deck under a merciless sun. Now he was probably content with giving cursory supervision to the marina business and swapping yarns with his cronies at a local bar. Port St. Joe boasted a museum marking the site of Florida's first constitutional convention, but its real claim to fame was as one of the state's most popular salt water fishing centers.
"I'm Doug Bell," Burke said, handing over one of his CIA-furnished business cards.
Peyton read the card soberly, where the "Private Investigator" line lurked beneath the name, then focused a pair of red-rimmed eyes onto his visitor. Apparently the sun hadn't been too kind to his eyes, either. "You don't look like Magnum," he said.
Burke smiled. "I would if I could take off about twenty years and forty pounds. Guess I'd need to stay down here awhile, or go out to Hawaii to get that tan, though."
"Don't know what to do about the years," Peyton said, "or I wouldn't look like this. But you wanna work off some pounds? Get yourself out in a boat and do battle with a feisty marlin." He swung his feet down and motioned to a nearby chair. The finish on its seat was worn down to the bare wood. "I got a hunch you didn't come here to talk about years and pounds, though. What you after?"
Burke sat down. "I understand you rented a landing craft recently for use in hauling something out to Oyster Island."
Peyton squinted at him. "Now who told you that?"
"B. A. Casteel."
"Hmph! That old fart always talks too much about other people's business." Then he grinned, showing a missing tooth on one side. "But like he said, I did rent that old tub for once. Guess maybe I talked too much about it. But you know how a feller likes to brag a little bit now and then."
"Don't we all. Would you mind telling me who rented the boat?"
Peyton shrugged, then dug into a battered metal filing cabinet beside the desk. It was becoming obvious that he, like Casteel, enjoyed talking about other people's business. "Ain't no secret, I suppose. Here it is. Let's see, Blythe Ingram. Should've remembered that. Ain't never heard a name like that before."
Burke wrote the name on his pad.
"Said he used to be a Marine," Peyton said. "Damn fool, if you ask me. I wouldn't take that boat out that far. Spray over that flat bow'd damn near drown you."
"Where's he from?"
"Houston, Texas. Didn't look no more like a cowboy than you do like Magnum."
Burke laughed. "Did he say he was a cowboy?" Keep it light, he thought. Keep the old man talking.
"No, said he worked for PWI. What is it? Pan something-or-other."
"Pan West Industries?" Burke prompted him.
"Yeah, that's it."
"What was he hauling out there?"
"Just vehicles, I believe he said. Equipment for some kind of tests. You after this Ingram feller? What'd he do?"
"Just a routine check. Sort of like a bank does when they make you a loan."
Scooter snorted. "Damn bank better not nose around in my affairs. I don't need their money, anyway."
"When is Ingram planning to return the boat?"
Peyton consulted the paper again. "This Saturday."
Lori called him at the Angler's Inn at mid-morning. She had found what appeared to be his best bet. There was a firm in New Orleans called Aerial Photomap, Inc. Its majority owner and president, Kevin McKenzie, had a reputation as an experimenter with new materials and techniques. They were located at Lakefront Airport, the place where he had picked up Jeffries' trail.
"Good job, Lori. I'll head over that way right now. You might do a little quiet research on Blythe Ingram of Houston. He's some kind of higher up with Pan West Industries."
"The company that owns Oyster Island?"
"Right. He's the man who rented the landing craft."
The prospect of turning over a few more rocks along the trail to Jabberwock brought a note of excitement to her voice. "I'll get onto it. You'll call tonight at the appointed hour?"
"You can set your watch by it."
Before leaving, Burke stopped by the office, paid in advance and told Casteel he'd be staying until Saturday.
Aerial Photomap had its own building adjacent to the airport. It was a prefabricated metal structure painted sky blue, with lots of windows. There were equipment rooms, labs specially designed for processing and printing the wide film used in photomapping, an operations center for flight crews and the usual offices. Except for McKenzie's, which was anything but usual.
Burke was ushered into the office, where he immediately faced a wall dominated by a large replica of Aerial Photomap's logo, an "AP" superimposed over a stylized version of a long-lensed aerial camera. Another wall featured striking aerial photographs and sections of maps mounted in unusual shapes. In a corner that flanked the windows, McKenzie had his desk, a wood-based creation with a white plastic top in the shape of a seven-foot square. A cutout in the center provided room for his chair, with a hinged panel permitting access. The section normally at his back held an array of high-tech equipment. McKenzie was clearly an innovator, a man who liked to stretch horizons and bend light into bold new shapes.
"Have a seat," McKenzie said, taking Burke's business card. He appeared to be early forties, tousled flaming red hair, dressed casually in a T-shirt emblazoned with the AP logo and pants with large black and white checks. He had the unkempt look of an eccentric professor, the kind you'd expect to find with smoking beakers in a chemistry lab. "Burke Hill." He twisted his mouth. "I feel like I ought to know you."
It was a calculated risk, but Burke thought it better to use his real identity with McKenzie. The card identified him as a professional photographer. He had spent quite a bit of time during the long drive from Apalachicola fashioning the complicated cover story necessary for this phase of the effort to unmask Jabberwock. It was part truth, part half-truth, part fiction. He no longer felt any qualms about the necessity for such subterfuge. It seemed obvious that national security was involved now, though as yet he had no real handle on the threat. What he was doing was an extension of the job Cam Quinn had given him. The
fact that he was no longer under contract to the CIA made no difference. It was now a moral imperative.
"I've had my work in The National Geographic, Smithsonian, a number of other publications," Burke said.
McKenzie nodded. "I'm sure I've seen it. But that doesn't...oh, well. What brings you here?"
"In the first place, you were recommended to me as a man on the cutting edge of technology."
He grinned. "I've been known to run an experiment now and then. What did you have in mind?"
"Before becoming a professional photographer, I was an FBI agent for several—"
"That's it! That's how I knew you." McKenzie's eyes beamed. "It's been twenty years ago at least. I was a freshman at Cal-Berkeley. It was back in the protest years. They had found a bomb at Lawrence-Livermore Labs, and the evidence pointed toward somebody in my dormitory. You were one of the agents who questioned us students."
Burke shook his head, rather bemused. "I was there all right, but you've got a better memory than me. I don't remember you." The man's looks could have changed considerably in that amount of time, he realized.
"I wouldn't expect you to remember me. I was probably one of dozens you talked to that day. But I was really impressed. Here I was, a little old Louisiana boy, being interrogated by a real FBI man. I can say, happily, that's the only time I've had that experience."
Burke rummaged through his memory. "Seems like we finally turned up two boys who confessed."
"That's right. I didn't know either of them, fortunately. But that was exciting." He smiled at the thought, then wrenched his attention back to the present. "Say, I'm sorry about interrupting. Go ahead with what you were about to tell me."
"No problem. In fact, it'll probably save us some time, since you won't have to verify my background. The reason I'm here is kind of complicated, but basically this is the story. I was approached by a government agency, which must remain nameless, but it's defense related. They're concerned about activities going on at a weapons testing facility owned by one of their contractors. For reasons they chose not to explain, but doubtless having to do with security considerations, they didn't want to use their own people in the investigation. They hired me to check out this island off the Gulf Coast south of Apalachicola, Florida. They made it kind of tough on me, though, by not wanting to involve any of their own people or equipment."
Beware the Jabberwock (Post Cold War Thrillers) Page 21
