‘‘That’s almost certainly an accident,’’ Clete said. ‘‘Either that, or it isn’t Carázinho.’’
‘‘What else could it be?’’
‘‘Dallas, maybe,’’ Clete said. ‘‘I’m not too good at dead reckoning.’’
He put the Lockheed into a shallow turn to the west.
‘‘You’re not going to fly over it to make sure?’’ Ashton asked. ‘‘Don’t they paint the name of the town on roofs down here?’’
‘‘I wouldn’t be surprised if the Brazilian Army Air Corps is looking for us,’’ Clete said, growing serious. ‘‘By now I think it’s entirely possible that Wallace has had time to both decide I’m not going back there and to consider the best way to cover his ass. Telling the Brazilians that we’re overdue and probably lost would do that.’’
‘‘So would telling the Brazilians a crazy Argentine stole one of his airplanes,’’ Ashton said thoughtfully.
‘‘With a little bit of luck, we should find the highway,’’ Clete said. ‘‘If I stay a couple of miles to one side, we see them, and they can’t see us.’’
‘‘I’m impressed, mi Mayor,’’ Ashton said.
Five minutes later, Clete spotted lights moving slowly across the terrain. When he got closer, the lights divided into two, and he could just pick out the red glow of running lights.
‘‘I think we just found Route Sixty-six,’’ he said.
Once the glow of Ijuí faded, it was possible to pick up another glow. But as he approached this, it was obvious that it came from the lights in a far smaller town than Ijuí. São ngelo was larger than Ijuí; the glow it gave off should be larger.
Don’t panic. Don’t start running around looking for bright lights. You didn’t do anything wrong. There is an explanation for this.
The explanation came ten minutes later, when a glow appeared on the ground past the lights he thought had to be São ngelo.
That’s almost certainly São ngelo. What the other lights were was a small town, a village, not marked on the chart.
Final proof came thirty minutes later, when he saw a large glow where his chart showed him São Luis Gonzaga should be.
And then the glow dimmed, and then brightened, and then dimmed again and vanished.
Christ, there’s a low-level cloud cover down there!
‘‘Shit!’’ he said.
‘‘Something wrong, Frade?’’ Ashton asked.
‘‘Obviously, we’re getting into the soup,’’ Clete said. ‘‘Which means I have to drop down so that I can see the ground. The lower I go, the less distance I can see, and that chart doesn’t have altitudes on it. I don’t want to run into a rock-filled cloud.’’
‘‘I’m sorry I came up here,’’ Ashton said. ‘‘Sitting in the back, I could pretend I was on Eastern Airlines, about to land in Miami. Are we really in trouble?’’
‘‘That depends on what we find at five thousand feet,’’ Clete said as he pushed the nose of the Lockheed down into a shallow descent.
They broke out of the soup at 6,000 feet, but into rain, not the clear. The ground was again visible, if not as clearly as before. The problem now was how far the area of rain extended; if it was part of an electrical storm; and—if it was raining in Santo Tomé—what the rain would do to the dirt landing strip.
He leaned forward and looked out and upward through the cockpit window, then confirmed what he suspected by banking steeply and looking out the window by his side.
The three-quarter moon, which had been clearly visible from the time they took off, was no longer clear. They were entering some kind of soup, perhaps even bad weather. He was flying in the clear above clouds at 4,000 or 5,000 feet, and below a layer of clouds at maybe 15,000 feet.
The glow that had to be São Luis Gonzaga appeared again, faintly.
I have two options. I can stay on this course, dropping down to see if I can get under that cloud layer at 5,000, and follow the road—turning onto it—from São Luis Gonzago to São Borja. But to do that, I need the headlights on the road. If I can’t see them, I won’t know where the hell I am.
Or I can continue on this course, fly past São Luis Gonzaga, and try to find the Río Uruguay. If I can find the river, I can drop down to 500 feet and fly down the river until I hit São Borja and Santo Tomé. And if I get lucky, and there is, say, 1,500-feet visibility under the cloud layer, I can probably find that glow of their lights and just steer toward it until it breaks in two. The glow on the right will be Santo Tomé.
The decision was made for him. As he dropped down, visibility worsened and the glow of São Luis Gonzaga vanished.
Rain began to beat against the cockpit windshield.
There was nothing to do but lose more altitude and pray that the clouds he was flying through were not rock-filled. The needle crept past 5,000 feet to 4,000 to 3,500.
A quick glance at the Hamilton confirmed his suspicion that by now he had flown past São Luis Gonzaga without seeing it.
He did not to have to remind himself that he was 3,500 feet above sea level, which was not the same thing as 3,500 feet above the ground; a chilling experience in the Hawaiian Islands—a pineapple plantation on Maui had suddenly appeared out of the soup fifty feet below him with his altimeter indicating 2,500 feet—had burned that detail of aviation lore permanently in his brain.
According to Delgano, the field in Santo Tomé was 950 feet above sea level. Call it a thousand. He was actually 2,500 feet above the ground.
Very, very slowly, he lost more altitude, until the altimeter indicated 2,500 feet. It was now getting turbulent, and, if anything, darker.
And then the cloud cover above him opened for a moment, and the light from the moon provided just a little more visibility. For a moment he could make out a light on the ground.
There was nothing to do but see what it was.
I will not go lower than a thousand feet! If I can’t get through this, I’ll just do a one-eighty and head back for Pôrto Alegre.
With the altimeter indicating a little less than 2,000 feet, the light he was approaching became clearer and then divided into two lights: red and green.
Navigation lights.
A boat! Or a ship!
It didn’t matter. If it was a boat or a ship, it has to be the river!
What he could not afford to do was lose those navigation lights. He dropped lower.
There was no longer any reason to look at the altimeter. Altimeters worked on atmospheric pressure, and there was a built-in dampening system. The altitude indicated on the dial was the altitude the aircraft had held two, three seconds —he had heard as many as seven seconds—before.
He could now make out the outline of the vessel he was approaching. It was a freighter, a vessel capable of sailing the high seas. He flashed over it no more than 200 feet over its masts.
‘‘I think you probably scared hell out of whoever was steering that,’’ Ashton said dryly.
Clete considered that.
Hell, yes, he had scared whoever was at the wheel of the freighter. He had turned off his navigation lights as soon as he broke ground at Pôrto Alegre. The people on the ship certainly heard his engines, but they couldn’t see anything, and it is virtually impossible to determine the direction of an airplane at night by the sound of its engines.
And then, all of a sudden, this great big sonofabitch with 2,400 unmuffled horsepower roars overhead at 220 knots.
‘‘Serves him right,’’ Clete said idiotically, and then started to chuckle, then giggle.
‘‘I’m glad that someone finds this situation amusing,’’ Ashton said, and for some reason Clete found that hilarious too.
He was laughing uncontrollably.
One part of his brain told him that what was happening wasn’t at all funny, that he was experiencing a nerve overload. But that was not enough to make him stop laughing. His eyes started to water.
He lost vision, and that frightened him, and as suddenly as it had begun—the instant he pulled b
ack on the wheel to pick up altitude—the hysterical laughter stopped.
And in that moment he saw a glow ahead. First it was a single, wide glow, and then, a moment later, it separated into two separate glows.
‘‘We’ll be landing in just a few minutes, ladies and gentlemen, ’’ Clete said. ‘‘Please put your seats in the upright position and check your seat belts.’’
‘‘That’s Santo Tomé?’’ Ashton asked.
‘‘I think so.’’
‘‘You are an amazing man, mi Mayor!’’
‘‘Tell me that again when I get us on the ground,’’ Clete said.
He steered to the right of the glow on the right, and two minutes later saw a small, very bright glow.
‘‘I think that’s the outer marker,’’ he said. ‘‘The bon fire.’’
He leveled off at an indicated altitude of 2,000 feet and flew directly over the fire. He punched the button on his Hamilton and watched as the sweep second hand made its way around the dial. When the smaller dial showed that he had flown four minutes, he made a one-minute, 180-degree turn.
He could now see a faint line of small glowing spots stretched off at right angles to the wooden bonfire. He turned and carefully lined up with the ‘‘runway.’’ He flipped on the LANDING LIGHT switch, retarded the throttles, and lowered the flaps to twenty degrees.
Where the hell is the little fire that’s supposed to tell me where the wind is?
There it is! I’m flying into the wind!
This final approach looks perfect.
That’s probably wishful thinking.
What I should do is fly around again and make sure I know what I’m doing.
But on the other hand, I’m not likely to make another accidentally perfect approach like this one if I do.
He reached up to the quadrant and pulled down the lever with the representation of a wheel on it.
He felt the additional drag immediately.
The green GEAR DOWN AND LOCKED indicator light did not go on.
Christ, I’m going to have to go around!
I got this far, and now the gear’s going to give me trouble?
The green GEAR DOWN AND LOCKED indicator light came on as he flashed over the bonfire, his hand preparing to shove the throttles forward.
He took his hand off the throttles and put it on the wheel.
The wheels touched, and bounced him back into the air.
He flared again, and this time the wheels stayed on the ground.
He applied the brakes and felt the Lockheed start to skid.
He corrected, but not before he had left the ‘‘runway.’’ Both lines of pots filled with gasoline burning in sand were to his left.
The rumble from the landing gear was frightening.
He tried the brakes again. They seemed to work for a moment, and then the Lockheed started to skid again.
He looked at the airspeed indicator. As he watched, the needle dropped abruptly to zero.
That doesn’t mean we’ve stopped; it means we’re going less than forty miles an hour.
He pushed on the brakes again, and this time they worked.
The Lockheed lurched to a stop, at the last moment turning slightly to the left.
‘‘I’ll be damned!’’ Captain Maxwell Ashton III said.
‘‘Oh, ye of little faith!’’ Clete said, and started to shut the engines down.
‘‘What this means, you understand, mi Mayor,’’ Ashton said, ‘‘and I will never forgive you for this, is that I can never again make a long-shot bet. I have used up my life-time ’s allocation of long-shot luck in the last two hours.’’
Clete felt a sudden chill.
He put his hand on his chest and found that he was sweat-soaked. And then his hands and knees began to tremble uncontrollably.
You’re a brave and intrepid Marine Aviator? Bullshit!
‘‘What happens now?’’ Ashton asked.
‘‘I’m afraid to get up,’’ Clete said. ‘‘There is a strong possibility that I have pissed—or worse—my pants.’’
He became aware that he had not turned off either the landing lights or the main buss. As he reached for the switch he saw a dozen or more horsemen, in rain-slick ponchos, approaching the airplane from the right.
He turned off the main buss, unstrapped himself, and left his chair.
‘‘Wait here a minute,’’ he said. ‘‘The people who expect me here do not expect you, and I’ll have to come up with some sort of explanation.’’
When he opened the cabin door, he saw Capitán Delgano walking up to the plane. He was hatless, his hair plastered to his head by the rain, and wearing a poncho.
‘‘I had just told Coronel Porterman that you probably couldn’t fly through this,’’ Delgano said, gesturing toward the sky.
‘‘Well, I made it,’’ Clete said.
‘‘This is not a Beechcraft C-45," Delgano said.
"This is a Lockheed C-56," Clete said. ‘‘Something got screwed up."
‘‘I see,’’ Delgano said, visibly displeased.
‘‘I have passengers aboard,’’ Clete said.
‘‘Passengers?’’ Delgano parroted.
‘‘People I am going to fly to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo,’’ Clete said.
‘‘You said nothing about passengers!’’
‘‘No, I didn’t.’’
‘‘You smuggled people into Argentina?’’ Delgano asked, but it was an accusation, not a question. ‘‘An OSS team, no doubt?’’
‘‘I have five civilians with Brazilian passports aboard,’’ Clete said.
‘‘I consider that a breach of our agreement,’’ Delgano said. ‘‘They will, of course, have to be interned.’’
‘‘If you intern them,’’ Clete said, ‘‘this airplane will not leave the ground again.’’
‘‘Colonel Martín told me you were dangerous, and that I should not trust you,’’ Delgano said, and then, as if he had just made up his mind, added: ‘‘I will intern them.’’
‘‘The presence of my passengers in no way changes our arrangement. I will teach you how to fly the aircraft . . .’’
That’s bullshit. That would really be a case of the blind leading the blind.
"... and make it available to the G.O.U. as I promised.’’
That’s bullshit too. There’s no way he could fly this airplane by himself. If the G.O.U. wants this airplane, I’ll have to fly it.
‘‘Nevertheless, your ‘passengers’ will have to be interned, ’’ Delgano said. ‘‘Or if not interned, sent back across the Río Uruguay. That would be probably be best, for all concerned.’’
‘‘I think you’re overstepping your authority, Capitán. I don’t think you have the authority to do anything that will keep this airplane from flying to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo tomorrow.’’
Delgano considered that.
‘‘What am I to tell Coronel Porterman?’’ he asked.
Clete decided Delgano was thinking out loud.
‘‘I suggest you tell him that there has been an unexpected development,’’ Clete said. ‘‘That it will be necessary to quarter five people overnight—for reasons that are none of his business.’’
‘‘You are asking me to lie to a superior officer, Mayor Frade. That is dishonorable.’’
‘‘How would you categorize your behavior toward my father, Capitán? And what was it you said to me, at Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, about ‘people in our profession being sometimes required to do things that are personally repugnant’?’’
Delgano met Clete’s eyes. There was cold anger, even hate, in them.
Christ, we got this far, and now this self-righteous sonofabitch is going to screw everything up.
Delgano turned and walked away from the aircraft without saying anything.
So what do I do now?
I can’t really refuse to fly this thing to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo; I gave Martín my word that I would. And if this goddamned coup d’�
�tat fails, I don’t want Mart ín and Rawson and Ramírez and the rest of them stood up against a wall because I didn’t provide them a means to get out of the country.
Delgano said, ‘‘send them back across the Río Uruguay. ’’ If that happens, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. If I can get the radar sent back with them, we wouldn’t be any worse off than we were yesterday.
Clete saw Delgano, faintly, standing beside a man on a horse.
That’s probably Coronel Porterman.
Delgano walked back to the Lockheed.
‘‘Your ‘passengers’ will take the horses of the guard detail, ’’ Delgano said, ‘‘and be accommodated overnight in the transient officers’ quarters.’’
‘‘I’m not sure my passengers know how to ride,’’ Clete thought aloud.
‘‘Excuse me?’’ Delgano asked, somewhat incredulously.
‘‘Just a moment, Capitán,’’ Clete said, and turned to walk back up the aisle to talk to Ashton.
He immediately bumped into him; he had come down the aisle to see what was going on.
‘‘I’ve never been on a horse in my life,’’ Ashton said in English.
‘‘You heard all that?’’ Clete asked.
Ashton nodded.
‘‘And I’m not comfortable with them guarding our stuff,’’ Ashton said. ‘‘So what we’ll do is that I will stay aboard—’’
‘‘No,’’ Clete said. ‘‘I don’t want Coronel Porterman to get the idea we don’t trust him.’’
‘‘I don’t trust him,’’ Ashton said.
‘‘If they want to take the radar away from us, there’s nothing we can do to stop them,’’ Clete said. ‘‘We will accept his hospitality.’’
‘‘You trust the guy you were talking to?’’
‘‘Yes, I do,’’ Clete said, hoping there was more conviction in his voice than he felt.
‘‘OK,’’ Ashton said. ‘‘Your call, Major.’’
Thirty minutes later, a wagon drawn by a matched pair of white-booted roans took aboard four passengers and headed through the rain toward the barracks of the Second Regiment of Cavalry.
Saddled horses had been brought from the stables along with the wagon, for Clete, Enrico, and First Lieutenant Madison R. Sawyer III, Infantry, Army of the United States, the only member of Ashton’s team who said he could ride.
Blood and Honor Page 57
