“Yes.”
He showed her to an adjacent office and spoke with an operator before handing the receiver over. “The operator is ready to put you through.”
Janie thanked him and pulled a note from her purse. She found the number in Switzerland she was looking for and relayed it to the operator, emerging several minutes later to find the inspector waiting.
“You are smiling, Miss Bretsen. There was good news?”
Janie nodded, relating the story of Janna Levy’s near-fatal car crash and her parents’ desperate race across the Atlantic the day before and the obstacles that Meridian and the air traffic system had thrown in their way.
“Their daughter regained consciousness shortly after they arrived at her bedside, and the doctors think she has a chance to make it now,” Janie said. “I can’t begin to tell you how very relieved I am.”
“Unusual, that an airline employee would be so moved by concern for her passengers,” the inspector said. “Especially these days.”
In a row of seats less than fifty feet from where Janie had spent nearly two hours answering questions, Martin Ngume’s right elbow was slipping off the edge of an armrest. Once again the sudden motion jolted him awake.
He rubbed his eyes and sat up with cotton in his head, looking at a nearby clock.
Four hours, he thought. Four hours since we’ve landed, and I should be arriving in Cape Town right now instead.
The memory returned of following the other passengers from the Meridian 747 into an overcrowded waiting area where everyone had been questioned one by one.
He could see the phone booth across the waiting area. Someone in the phalanx of police and airline representatives had promised in heavily accented English to help make a call to South Africa in the morning. There would be no point in the middle of the night. No one would be hanging around the little store in Soweto to answer a dusty public phone, let alone be able to tell him anything else about the fate of his mother.
Martin turned to an equally sleepy man next to him.
“Do you know when we’ll be able to fly on to South Africa?”
The man shook his head and sighed just as the PA system came alive.
Mr. Martin Ngume, would you please identify yourself to the agent standing at the door? Mr. Martin Ngume.
For a moment, Martin thought he was still dreaming. He was reliving his summons to the podium back in London so many hours ago.
But, no, this was a different voice.
Martin pulled himself up from the chair and waved, and an agent moved rapidly toward him.
“You are Martin Ngume?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Would you follow me, Mr. Ngume? There’s a telephone call for you.”
“For me? But who …?” a jolt of dread shuddered through his mind as he followed her, the distance traveled blurring the time it took to be ushered into a small office and handed a receiver.
“Hello?”
“Martin? Is that you?” a familiar male voice asked in an excited tone.
“Yes. Phillip?” The image of one of his roommates flashed through his head. “Is this Phillip?”
“Who else, man? I’m here at the apartment. We saw you on CNN after hearing your flight was in trouble, or everyone had hijacked it, or something, and, well, anyway, I’m sure glad you’re okay. It’s taken an act of Congress to get this call through.”
“I am fine, Phillip, but … I still know nothing about my mother, and it’s going to take that much longer now to get to Soweto.”
“She’s fine, Martin. Believe me.” There was chuckle in Phillip’s voice.
“I would like to believe you,” Martin replied, “but it is very frightening when an old woman disappears and no one knows where she’s gone or what’s happened to her.”
“Well, guess what, roomie? We know where she’s gone and we also know she’s just fine, though worried about you.”
Martin let the words sink in. “You … you know? How? You have talked to her? You got through on the telephone?”
“No. I mean, yes, we talked with her. I’m pretty sure it was she.”
Martin closed his eyes and shook his head. His ears were playing tricks on him, making him hear what he’d like to hear.
“You’re not positive, then, Phillip? What did her voice sound like?”
“Martin, is your momma a small black lady, very distinguished-looking, with a big, broad smile?”
“Well … yes, but why … I’m not understanding you.”
“You remember that article about you in the paper?”
“Yes.”
“Well, some softhearted rich guy here in Chicago was apparently touched by what you said about attending college for your mom, and he decided she ought to be able to come to Chicago now, rather than later. He paid some Cape Town lawyer to arrange things, and when the lawyer wrote your mom, she kind of dropped everything … right, Mrs. N?” he said off to the side. “Yeah … she’s nodding. When she got the lawyer’s letter, she left without telling anyone and took the train to Cape Town and just arrived here in a limo a few hours ago looking for you. It was all supposed to be a surprise. Here. Let me put her on.”
“Martin?” At the first sound of her voice, Martin felt his eyes welling up and tried to fight the reaction, but it was no use. The cold feeling that he would never see her again had been in his gut for so many hours and the relief he felt now was so strong, he felt himself sobbing quietly as his mother continued talking excitedly about her great adventure.
“You have made wonderful friends, Martin,” she was saying. “They have bought me one of those hamburgers and made an old woman feel very welcome.”
“Stay there, Mama,” he said, finally laughing through his tears. “I’m coming. I’m coming home to you in America, and we have much to talk about.”
CHICAGO
FIVE WEEKS LATER
Deputy Assistant United States Attorney Debbie Randall sat in the comfortable backseat of the hired Town Car, pointedly ignoring the disapproving look from her colleague as she concentrated on the papers in her lap.
“Can’t you just enjoy the ride and talk to me?” Alex Brownlee complained.
“I could,” Debbie replied, her eyes still on the charging papers for the murder prosecution of one Brian Logan, “but before we meet this informant, whoever he is, I want to review the case.”
“It’s simple, Debs,” Alex said, letting his eyes wander along the pleasing lines of her body. “Fired physician gets so angry at an airline, he decides to club the copilot to death in cold blood.”
Debbie looked over at him and shook her head. “It’s anything but simple. It’s a tragic case of blind rage and sudden opportunity, and while they’ll claim insanity, in the end we’ll convict him.”
“It’s going to be a tough case without the copilot’s body,” Alex said.
“That problem may be going away.”
“You mean … the guy we’re meeting may know something?”
She nodded and looked up, recognizing the area. They were still about ten miles from Palwaukee Airport, a private field north of O’Hare.
“All I know,” Debbie continued, “is that our boss took a call a few hours ago from someone who was in flight to Palwaukee. Our fearless leader said that since you and I are the firebrands who pushed him to approve this prosecution in order to make a statement about air rage, we’re the ones who need to go interview this guy.”
“It’s not just a statement about air rage, Deb. We’re prosecuting a doctor who murdered an airline crew member.”
“Well, you know the boss’s reluctance to let us file these charges in the first place was due to the lack of a body. The Nigerians have been searching for three weeks and have turned up no trace of it,” she said.
“I still wish we were nailing Logan for air piracy, Debbie. That would be more fun to prosecute.”
“Oh yeah, great fun to have a case that’s dead on arrival. Let’s see, not enough evidence, most of t
he passengers are contradicting the charges, the captain is unsure of what happened, and all we really have against Logan are the cockpit voice recordings of what he said on the PA system and on the interphone demanding that the Cape Town flight go to Cape Town.”
“He tried to take over the jet by force, Debs,” Alex said. “We’ve had this argument before.”
“Yeah, we have. And he’ll say he had no intention of taking over anything; he was just verbally lashing out. After all, he ordered the captain to fly to where the captain was supposed to fly anyway. That’s a pretty lame hijacking. You ever have a jury start snickering at you and keep on until they all break out in a belly laugh and fall out of their chairs?”
“No,” Alex said, having trouble suppressing a smile at the ludicrous image.
“Trust me. It’s not fun.”
A sleek corporate Gulfstream V was slowing on the runway just as they pulled up to the private jet terminal.
“Is that him?” Alex asked. Debbie consulted a small notebook and nodded. “I think so … if I’m reading the tail number correctly. It’s all letters instead of the usual numbers, whatever that means. It may be British registry. And he’s early.”
She looked around, making note of the other cars and people apparently waiting for the same arrival. There were two customs agents standing next to a limousine.
Debbie craned her neck in the other direction, trying to discern the identity of several individuals waiting near the door of the lounge.
“We’re evidently not the only ones meeting him,” she remarked.
The Gulfstream braked to a halt, and the engines began winding down as the forward stairs were lowered. The two customs inspectors climbed aboard and disappeared, but one of them returned within thirty seconds and walked directly toward the driver’s side of their car.
“You have some people from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in here?”
“That’s us,” Debbie called out.
“Good. They need to see you aboard.” He turned and walked back to the Gulfstream without explanation, as Debbie and Alex left the car and followed.
The smell of rich leather was redolent as Debbie entered the alcove of the private jet. The customs man pointed to the right, and a strikingly beautiful black woman in a flight attendant’s uniform escorted them into the luxurious interior where a casually dressed man was waiting.
Debbie extended her hand and introduced herself.
“Good,” the man said. “I appreciate your coming.” He shook hands with Alex as well and motioned them to sit down.
“May I ask your name?” Debbie said.
“First,” the man began, “I want to know if you’re the lawyers handling the prosecution of a Dr. Brian Logan?”
They both nodded and he continued. “I also want to know what you could have charged him with, what you have charged him with, and why.”
Debbie hesitated and glanced at Alex as the man spoke again.
“Look, you’re only out here because the head of your division wanted you to come cooperate with me, and I guarantee I’ve got the most important information you’ve had yet in this case. So please answer my questions.”
Debbie sighed and nodded as she went through the various potential charges they could have filed, and the decision to prosecute Logan for first-degree murder.
“He’s been charged and arraigned, and released on bail, but with the exception of not having Abbott’s body to complete the evidence, we have a solid case with a prime eyewitness.”
“That would be the senior flight attendant, right?”
“Right.”
“Judy Jackson?”
Alex and Debbie exchanged glances as Debbie nodded. “Yes.”
“I would have expected Meridian to have fired Jackson by now for a whole bunch of reasons.”
“That’s correct and they have,” Debbie said. “But the reasons don’t diminish her credibility as a witness to Abbott’s murder.”
“Really? Well, folks,” the man continued, “truth is, even though Judy Jackson certainly believes she’s got it right, she’s dead wrong. Brian Logan did not kill or harm Garth Abbott in any way.”
Alex leaned forward, his hands clasped, his face displaying a carefully practiced look of disapproving skepticism.
“By what authority do you make that assertion, sir? What evidence do you have?”
“Me,” the man said. “I’m the authority.”
Alex sat back in the chair, shaking his head and scowling. “You arranged to bring two very busy assistant U.S. attorneys all the way across town to hear nothing more than a personal opinion?” He turned to Debbie and began rising from the chair. “This is absurd. Let’s get out of here.”
“Wait,” she said, her hand out in a stop gesture, her eyes studying the man across from her. “What, exactly, do you mean that you’re the authority?” she asked.
“Don’t you need Garth Abbott’s body before you can prosecute Logan?”
“No. Well, I mean, certainly it would help to have the body, but …”
“Good. Because I know exactly where it is.”
Both lawyers exchanged wide-eyed glances as Alex sat on the edge of the plush swivel chair. “Where?”
“Here.”
“Here?” Debbie asked. “Aboard this airplane?”
He nodded. “Yep. Right in front of you.” He reached down and pulled up his left pant leg, revealing a combination brace and cast as he watched their expression. “I’m Garth Abbott, and as the old saw goes, reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.”
Carol Abbott had been ready for hours, sitting in their living room with several friends arrayed around, none of them understanding the depth of the turmoil inside her, none of them aware of the sharp words that had passed between husband and wife the last time they’d talked.
Garth’s satellite call had come unannounced from somewhere over the Atlantic, a bolt from the blue that sliced through the acrid guilt of the way they had parted. But he hadn’t died, and now he was here, and yet, the confusion in her heart was mixed with utter relief whirling around through the weeks of anguish and the mourning of a husband she’d all but decided to leave anyway.
He came to her now from the front door on a crutch, his left leg in a brace, his right leg marginally working, throwing the crutch to the rug as he grabbed her and held her tightly. He tousled her hair as he nuzzled her neck and kissed her before pulling back to look into her troubled eyes.
“I thought …,” she started, unable to finish.
The others began crowding around, and he accepted their hands and their hugs and let Carol guide him to the couch as the questions began and he raised his hand to try to slow the barrage.
“The report we got said your leg had been shattered, Garth. They thought … that doctor they charged with murdering you thought you’d bled to death.”
He shook his head. “I was bleeding pretty badly when I slipped off the ladder, but the bullet didn’t get an artery. Turns out it was the damned government forces who shot me, not the rebels. I got caught in a counterattack.”
“So they left you dying on the runway,” one of the men said.
“Not ‘they,’ Keith,” Garth said, looking at one of his fellow Meridian pilots. “‘He.’ Our old buddy, Phil Knight.”
“You do know they fired him?”
Garth shook his head. “No. I guess I’m not surprised. I was ready to kill the bastard myself, especially when I lay there watching that aluminum overcast we’d been flying in rumble past me and take off without me. I can’t tell you what that felt like. I couldn’t believe it! Utter betrayal, utter abandonment.”
“The whole airline was in shock, Garth,” Keith said.
“So was I. But you know something? It took me all these weeks to figure this out, but it’s true. The fault was more Meridian’s than Phil Knight’s. What the hell were they doing dumping an unprepared domestic captain into the international division? Where were the training and the checking? They
led him to the slaughter, and I don’t intend to be quiet about it.”
“What happened when Knight left you there?” Carol managed.
“There was a counterattack to the counterattack,” Garth said. “After I watched the aircraft leave, I heard one of soldiers who’d shot me walk over to see if I was dead. He kicked me in the ribs and turned me over, and I tried to look dead and not react to the pain. My eyes were open just a little bit, and I could see him take aim at me again, but a shot came from nowhere, and he keeled over dead. Suddenly, this same huge, barrel-chested rebel commander I’d dealt with right after we landed came over and scooped me up while his men were laying down covering fire in all directions. I think it was the pain from moving my legs that finally knocked me out. Anyway, I woke up three days later in a little field hospital to find this same man, General Onitsa, sitting there smiling. Turns out he’s a physician and surgeon, and he more or less put me back together.”
“But … how did you get out of there?” Carol asked.
He told them about the ransom demand and the ten million paid, and the fact that Onitsa had become a wealthy man in the past few years effectively looting the government and toying with their forces as he pressed his rebellion.
“I don’t know if he’s morally bankrupt in what he’s trying to do or not, but he’s a gentle guy when he wants to be, and very intelligent. The government forces went berserk for weeks afterward looking for us … for him, I mean. That’s why he said he couldn’t let me call home. He has satellite phones, connections, equipment … I mean the man’s an electronics junkie. He plans his attacks on a Palm Pilot and a laptop! He promised to fly me home in his private jet as soon as he could, and he kept his word.”
“You mean, that Gulfstream …?” Keith asked.
Garth nodded. “That’s his, through an appropriately murky string of companies, of course.”
Fatigue was clearly taking its toll, and when the retinue of friends departed at last, leaving them alone, Carol nestled restlessly in Garth’s arms on the couch as she tried to decide what to do and what to say. With the other voices quieted, she could hear the appropriate strains of a sad piano solo wafting through the house from the stereo she’d turned on hours before.
Turbulence Page 41
