Final Approach

by John J. Nance

  He had passed the airport an hour back, coming in from the Kansas side, and despite the horror of what had happened, he found himself drawn to return one more time. The parking lot there provided cover for the last item on his list.

  With an engineer’s meticulous care he found the right target in the long-term parking plaza, a car with a relatively flat rear bumper and a fresh license plate. Waiting for the right moment, he parked behind it, using his car as cover as he unbolted the plate with an electric screwdriver, stowing it under his seat by his .357 magnum. He backed up then, made sure no one was watching, and carefully sideswiped the rear of the same car, crushing the license plate bracket in the process before pulling away at a sedate speed, paying the small toll at the exit, and crossing the interstate, motoring into the farmland near Ferrelview until he found an unobserved spot by the road where he could install the purloined plate on his car. With the evidence of a crushed bumper back at the airport lot, the plate would be deemed an accident victim. He might have a week or so before anyone would list it as stolen. He would leave the front plate alone. For his purposes, it wouldn’t matter.

  The final task complete, Calley retraced his path to the interstate and headed south toward Louisiana. He would make the call in a hundred miles or so. He had already mailed the cassette tape.

  The Go Team—NTSB people only—had quietly assembled in the hotel lobby at Joe’s direction at 6 P.M. Sunday evening, all of them in casual clothes. From long experience Joe knew they needed to unwind, but there were victims’ families staying at the airport hotel. Smiling, joking NTSB investigators were the last thing a grieving relative needed to see—though that was exactly what the team needed to do. They could only internalize so much.

  The group took three of the rented minivans and headed in loose formation several miles south toward downtown Kansas City to a tavern and restaurant one of the team members knew and liked. Within a half hour the grim faces began to soften, the volume of the conversation and the volume of the liquor consumption becoming barometers of the relaxation process. Joe played host as long as he could, then passed the duty to Andy, making sure there were at least two stone-sober people, including Andy, left to drive back to the hotel. They were expected at Captain Timson’s bedside for an initial interview at 9 A.M. the following morning.

  Joe took one of the vans then and returned to the airport and the flight line, taking a flashlight and a cigar with intentions of walking along the taxiway amidst the wreckage. He needed time to think.

  The danger of fire was minimal, so lighting the cigar seemed a reasonable breach of caution. He seldom smoked, but after a good dinner and coffee, a cigar was a luxury he sometimes allowed himself.

  Joe found himself moving toward the point where the A320’s tail section had been found, the puzzle of the missing CVR box drawing him in, the question of sabotaged flight controls consuming his mental picture of what to look for in the wreckage. The tail itself sat on a flatbed trailer, but the bulk of the shattered fuselage remained on the ground, looking ghostly in the garish glow of the portable spotlights.

  Joe had stuffed his portable phone in the pocket of his coat before leaving the hotel, but when it rang suddenly, it took him by surprise. Somehow the solitude of the nighttime airport taxiway seemed safe from telephones. Obviously it was not.

  “Joe Wallingford? This is Bill Caldwell, associate administrator, FAA. We’ve met before.”

  “Sure, Mr. Caldwell. What can I do for you at this late hour?” Why the hell was he calling so late? The thought that he was going to apologize for the withholding of the FAA’s airplane crossed his mind.

  The FAA and the NTSB did keep tabs on each other, but this was highly unusual. Caldwell was the number-two man in the FAA.

  “I know you’re on a portable phone, so I’ll keep this brief. We’re concerned about the Airbus 320’s flight controls, and whether they can resist outside radio interference.”

  “You mean EMI, electromagnetic interference? Microwave and other shorter-wave radio energy?” Joe was not about to let Caldwell get the upper hand. He knew Caldwell’s reputation for digesting one briefing paper and becoming an instant technical “expert.”

  “Very good, Joe. We’ve got guidelines published, and so far the 320’s had no problem. But I need your help. Unless I can be sure that this accident did not involve either EMI vulnerability or some flight-control-system failure, we might have to consider certificate action while waiting for more information.”

  Joe froze. The sound of jet engines winding down as a flight arrived at one of the terminals in the distance left a void of silence in the air and on the phone. If Airbus representatives could hear this conversation, he thought, they’d have coronaries. Caldwell was hinting at a possible grounding. Good God, just like the DC-10 grounding more than a decade earlier, a move which cost untold losses with questionable results.

  “I, ah, would think that this is a grossly premature discussion, Mr. Caldwell. I mean, we haven’t even talked to the flight captain yet. We have virtually no evidence or even rumored evidence that this involved the flight-control system.”

  “Joe, my people out there are telling me it might not have been windshear, and that the airplane nosed down on final, which may be a flight-control problem. Now, regardless of the controversial congressman on board, if it wasn’t windshear, and if it did nose over, we’re probably either down to the flight crew screwing up, or a flight-control glitch. If it’s the latter, I do not want the administrator blindsided. We’ve got a lot of delicate considerations here you don’t normally deal with, Joe, so what I’m asking you, in the interest of good relations, is that you keep this between you and me, and you tell me as soon as you know that this was definitely not flight-control trouble.”

  Joe couldn’t find his voice for a second.

  “Joe? You still there?”

  “Yes sir. I … I don’t know what to say to you, Mr. Caldwell.”

  “Joe, it’s simple. I’m asking you to call me the minute you’re sure one way or the other.”

  “But if I can’t, or don’t, tell you it was not flight-control failure or radio interference, you’ll move? You’re going to consider grounding all Airbus 320s nationwide?”

  “That’s the last resort, Joe, but I can’t run any risks if there’s even a chance these planes have a flight-control-system weakness. What do you think? Did it go where they aimed it, or did it wander off on its own and crash? That’s the question. I just need the earliest possible word.”

  Joe felt his temperature rising. This had to be a bluff. At this stage of an investigation, it was totally inappropriate for the FAA to leap to unsupported conclusions and act so rashly. If there were a shred of evidence it would be different. But why would Caldwell bluff the NTSB? And how dare he throw such a gauntlet at the Board’s feet!

  “How much time do I have to do the impossible, Mr. Caldwell?” Joe knew his tone was turning from respectful to acidic, but this request warranted it.

  “Well, I would certainly hope to hear from you within a few days.”

  “And if you don’t?”

  “I’ll have to draw my own conclusions and advise our administrator accordingly. But I know I can count on you, Joe. I know you’re shocked, but extraordinary problems demand creative solutions.”

  “Mr. Caldwell, there is no justification for considering a grounding.”

  “I’m not saying we’re going to ground it. Call me, Joe, when you can tell me there isn’t a control problem. I know Airbus is a good company with a good product, but unless their A320 meets all our standards, it won’t fly within our borders.”

  “Sir, we’ve got several large airlines flying scores of these planes.”

  There was a pause and a chuckle on the other end before Caldwell replied, “Perhaps they should have bought American planes, eh Joe?”

  There was no question he should call Dean Farris. Farris had a right to know about Caldwell’s intrusive request. But that call could wait for a day
or two, he rationalized. At least until they talked to the captain. If he was lucky, perhaps he could tell Caldwell what he wanted to know, and put the issue to bed quietly. Perhaps.

  7

  Monday, October 15

  A sudden gust of cold wind rocked the car as the nighttime thunderstorm broke overhead, and Walter Calley pulled his coat closer to stay warm, momentarily forgetting where he was. The sound of thunder crashed again nearby, drowning out the rumble of heavy truck engines which were droning all around him in the back lot of the truck stop. He had made it as far as Monroe, Louisiana, before sleep became unavoidable, and the crowded anonymity of a truckers’ haven had seemed a safe place to hole up for a few hours. So far that premise had been right.

  Walter reached out and started the engine again, longing for the heater to kick in and warm the car’s freezing interior. Maybe it was just fear causing him to shiver. He’d never felt quite so alone and outcast.

  The damn phone call he had made the day before still haunted him. There had been clicks on the line, which made no sense. How could they find him? Even he didn’t know which pay phone he was going to use until he pulled up in front of it. He was a sophisticated electronics engineer who understood computers and the technical gadgets professionals used to spy on other people. But for someone to spy on you, they had to know where the hell you were, and half the night he hadn’t known himself where he was.

  He had stayed on the back roads after the phone call to New Orleans, taking twice as long to work his way south, staying away from towns like Fayetteville and Shreveport, winding through mind-numbing little burgs and endless, unlighted, rain-slicked country curves on nameless two-lane blacktops, almost running out of gas before he found an all-night station in the mountains of Arkansas.

  Forrest Rogers had answered his home phone on the fifth ring, absolutely dumbstruck when Walter had snapped out his message.

  “Forrest, I’m in bad trouble. I need your help. I need you to come meet me Monday night, eight P.M., at the old place. You know where it is.”

  “What? What the hell are you talking about, Walter?”

  “Doesn’t matter. Just don’t say anything about where that is over this phone, or to anyone, and don’t let yourself be followed. I’ll tell you everything when you get there.”

  “Walter, where are you?”

  “I can’t tell you, Forrest. Someone might be listening.”

  Rogers had paused then, the puzzlement obvious at the other end of the phone. “What have you done, Walter? You sound like you’re running, and that scares me.”

  “I am running.”

  “Good God, from who? You running from the law?”

  “Forrest, just be there. Please.”

  “At least give me a goddamn hint!” Forrest sounded halffrantic.

  It was Calley’s turn to pause. Forrest was right. If the line was tapped, it was too late anyway.

  “You know I’ve been working in Kansas?” Walter said at last.

  “Yeah, I heard from our friends in Baton Rouge.”

  “And you know what just happened at Kansas City Airport Friday night. You have to know. All of Louisiana has to know.”

  “What are you saying, Walter? What the fuck are you saying? What have you done?”

  “It was me, Forrest. I can’t tell you any more till I see you. But I sent you a tape to be safe. I put the whole thing on a tape I mailed this morning. If anything happens to me, you’ll get the tape at your office. Man, believe it when the TV reports say that crash wasn’t an accident. Damn right it wasn’t an accident. You’re talking to the man responsible.”

  “Don’t … for God’s sake, Walter, you stay away from me, hear?”

  “No, no, Forrest! Whoa, man, you’ve got to hear me out! It’s not what you think. Larry was coming Friday because I called—I set it up. There were good reasons, Forrest, believe me. But I’m the only one who knows what really went down, and I can’t tell it if I’m dead. Please be there, man. We’ve been friends for too many years for you to run out on me now. Be there. Please.”

  “What do you mean, if anything happens to you?”

  “I can’t talk. Gotta go. See you tomorrow.”

  He had hated hanging up on Forrest, but an approaching car seemed to be slowing down as it headed for the roadside phone booth, and he had an uncontrollable urge to run.

  Some nine hours later the sight of a Louisiana state police patrol car cruising into the truck stop near Monroe brought Walter Calley back to the present. He watched the trooper from his protected vantage point between two giant eighteen-wheelers. The lawman found a parking spot by the restaurant and got out, apparently uninterested in anything but food.

  Or was he?

  Calley watched the trooper disappear around the front of the truck stop, wondering if there were others quietly searching the lot. Could they have been tipped off he was there? Was there a manhunt going on? The FBI, the CIA, the military police—any of them could be tearing up the landscape and hunting him by now.

  One thing’s for sure, he thought to himself, if they’re smart enough to find me, they won’t be wearing uniforms. They’ll walk up in civilian clothes and blow me away with an Uzi. There’s no way they can let me live. Only hope is to get them first.

  He turned off the ignition and listened, cataloging each raindrop as he watched and waited for anything suspicious, letting a half hour pass before he could bring himself to crank the engine again. He put the car in gear then and moved slowly back to the highway, never glancing at the restaurant, but feeling the trooper’s eyes following him.

  Calley checked his watch as he headed west on the interstate, squinting to make out the time, which was 6:41 A.M., almost daybreak. He would turn south on U.S. 167. Alexandria was two hours away, and the old fishing camp he hoped Forrest would be heading to was on a lake near Marksville. He wanted to be there before noon to hide the car and dig in. The faceless men with the Uzis couldn’t be too far behind now.

  A warning buzzer erupted somewhere nearby as loud as a Klaxon, saturating his brain with overwhelming noise as Joe Wallingford struggled against unseen impediments to find the microphone and radio a warning. They must not take off! The smell of kerosene burned in his nostrils as he saw the airliner getting ready for what he knew would be a fatal attempt to lift off. The sight triggered primal feelings of helplessness and impending disaster, and as always, he could do nothing.

  Joe swung himself into a vertical position instinctively, reacting to the buzzer, sitting on the edge of the bed, his mind racing. The fact that he had been having that same recurring nightmare came slowly to his consciousness as the images evaporated from mind and memory. Usually he could not hold on to dreams, to remember them later and study them. They were gone in an instant like a puff of smoke, leaving only a vague feeling that something was unresolved.

  The blackout curtains in the pastel-and-oak hotel room held the darkness and night within, masking the first rays of dawn he knew must be visible outside, the rising glow of sunlight streaming over the airport terminal. Inside he could barely see a thing, the bathroom light failing miserably as a night-light. He had learned the hard way about sleeping in total darkness: years before he had chipped a tooth in a pitch-dark hotel room lunging from a bed into a hallway that turned out to be a wall. This morning it also took a few seconds to figure out where he was—a common problem on the road. Once, before they were divorced, he had teased Brenda one morning after returning from a long field investigation by patting her face in the dark and asking, “Where am I, and who are you?” She had not been amused.

  As he tried to focus, the distant aroma of aviation kerosene wafted around his head, propelled by the window air-conditioning unit. Most likely the source of the nightmare, he figured, or a contributing factor.

  Joe strained to read the offending clock as it continued to buzz, locating the control switch by feel and sliding it into silence as he noticed the digits indicating it was 6:30 A.M. Monday. He had called a meeting o
f the entire team for 7:45 A.M., and it wouldn’t do for the leader to be late. At 9 A.M. they were to interview Captain Timson.

  Joe fought his sleepiness with thoughts of relaxing in the shower, snapping lamps on one by one as he headed for the bathroom, wolfing down the piece of hotel chocolate left on his pillow the evening before, and finally resigning himself to sustained consciousness.

  The dream might be gone, but the memories of last night were there. Joe began the practiced rituals of morning, thinking about the litany of problems that had kept sleep at bay for hours.

  Cobwebs still filled his head as he adjusted the streams of water, letting the stinging sensation reacquaint him with a network of nerve endings numbed by fatigue and inadequate sleep. There had been no alcohol last night—he never drank a drop while on a field investigation—but it felt like a morning after. Moving deliberately with slippery feet, he stepped out of the shower at last, toweling dry as he appraised his browned but slightly shopworn body in the mirror, noting with pleasure the flatness of his stomach. Still a lot of muscle there, he assured himself, though he should get back to regular workouts. Ever since high school football he had been in reasonably good shape. His face bore the signs of weathering, a small network of lines and creases providing character of sorts, the flesh under his eyes beginning to sag a bit. Five foot eleven, one hundred sixty-five pounds, and about 80 percent of the originally issued crop of hair left up top. Not too bad for a guy of forty-five.

  Joe threw a towel around his shoulders and padded out to the TV, flipping it on and shoving the movie control box to one side in order to find the listing for the local network stations. It was 7:03 A.M. and the morning shows from New York would be focusing on the crash. He was still rummaging around in his bag for a fresh pair of undershorts when the overly familiar backdrop of the Kansas City Airport appeared on screen, a network aviation correspondent explaining the progress of the investigation. Sabotage was the main and growing theme, and the media was worrying it like a pit bull on a pet chicken.