Joe stopped and turned toward the reporter with a startled expression. Kell Martinson’s galvanizing revelation about the radar tracking unit had come only twenty minutes ago. Was this the same thing? “What,” Joe began, as calmly and condescendingly as he could manage, “are you talking about?”
The reporter relayed the conclusions from the Wilkins news conference. “Did you know there was radar equipment aimed at that airplane? Could that cause it to crash?”
That did it. Joe held up his hand and began retreating. “I’m making no statements until we have some idea what’s being said.” He pushed past them, rounding the corner and disappearing at flank speed down the hallway toward his office, the sound of disgusted voices behind him, the reflection of bright TV lights dimming as the crews turned them off one at a time—momentarily absent anyone to interview.
Dean Farris had ignored the first camera crew to leave the hearing room. A bit of coming and going by the media in the midst of a sunshine hearing was quite typical, but when the entire group began stampeding out the door, Farris had looked at the staff, who were looking right back at him with equal puzzlement. Susan Kelly had seen them take off after Joe, and she was working hard to keep from laughing at Farris and his increasingly desperate glances around the room. When the last TV crew had left the hearing, Farris called a recess. Dean Farris didn’t exactly live for the media, but he looked forward to open hearings where he could look chairmanlike and build his face-recognition factor with the American electorate.
Joe had already rounded the corner, heading for his own office, when he heard the chairman bustle down the hall behind him and accost the few cameramen who were moving their equipment, asking what had been going on and who had they been talking to. Joe knew the chairman would be pounced on by questions arising from the Wilkins media show down the street, and he’d probably wade right into them, after which he’d be looking for his IIC.
Susan Kelly found Joe first, calculating that he might have headed back down to his office. She was still suppressing giggles when she appeared suddenly in his path.
“You’re a bad boy, Joseph Wallingford. You took the media toy away from the chairman, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t intend to … you noticed, huh?”
“Noticed? The American departure from Saigon was more subtle. What are you up to?”
“That’s not my fault, Susan. I just looked in and they followed me. But … they … this thing is coming apart, Susan. We need to talk—quickly.”
She fell in step and they walked briskly toward Farris’s office, Joe relating Martinson’s visit, the presence of the radar unit, and the little he knew of the Wilkins news conference. He was glad of her company, and increasingly worried about Farris’s reaction.
She stopped Joe suddenly, pausing for a second while looking at him full in the face, surprised at her own reaction—at how good it felt to be around him. “Joe, remember what I said about Dean, how political he is? We can’t react to this like we’re prejudging the accident. Remember, he doesn’t understand the technology, so he’ll take his cues from you—and he’ll try hard not to let you know it.”
“I’ll be careful, Susan. But, I really don’t know what the hell we’ve got here. The radar thing is suddenly a very real possibility. Too real. It would answer a lot of questions.”
“True,” she replied, “but in the meantime, can we avoid being shoved into conclusions? The pressure is going to get unbelievable now, Joe. The entire U.S. government will become involved, including the White House, and they’ll all be looking to us as the technology experts to make a decision on who did what to whom. They’ll need that to counter Wilkins’s mob.”
“Well, the FBI is involved also,” Joe reminded her.
“Right. But ask yourself: are they competent to analyze the flight-control-system interference potential from a Department of Defense radar?”
“I see your point.”
“Joe, this is going to be an acid test of the NTSB in every way.”
13
Friday, October 19
The endless electronic beeps which had marked each heavily monitored heartbeat for nearly a week changed without warning to a steady tone—an alteration in the routine which brought sudden sound and motion to the quiet corridors of Truman Hospital as nurses and an on-duty physician materialized from nowhere, rushing into the room. The first officer of North America Airlines Flight 255, Don Leyhe, had entered the twilight zone of coronary arrest.
With the urgent efficiency of a well-choreographed dance routine at twice the speed, the medical people arrayed themselves on both sides of the bed, taking the proper precautions and pushing the proper voltages into the quiet chest, trying to coax his heart back into motion. As they worked, the copilot’s wife—numb with fatigue and grief and uncertainty—was summoned from a nearby family room. She entered within a minute, watching in detached fashion as they labored over her husband.
But Don Leyhe was not there and would not return, and after twenty minutes of intense effort, the formal pronouncement was made. Mrs. Leyhe turned and walked slowly to the corridor, a widow now, followed by a concerned nurse. There were no tears—she had cried more than her quota in the previous days and nights. But there was an extreme sadness, principally for him. Whatever had happened out there the previous Friday night, she knew the system he had trusted so implicitly had failed him, just as North America had failed to be the secure, happy, professional home for which he had left the Navy. Whatever had happened, North America had betrayed their trust.
Kell Martinson awoke with a start in the darkness of Cindy’s bedroom, the fact that it was her bedroom evident from the familiar scent of her perfume and the luxurious feel of her warm and silky body molded to the contours of his as they lay beneath the covers, his arm around her as she slept. Small sounds of contentment marked her breathing—small movements betraying her dreaming state. Their lovemaking was usually the best sleeping medicine, and it had worked well for her.
But not for him. He had tried to concentrate on the fullness of satisfying her and on losing himself in the quest, hoping she wouldn’t notice his preoccupation with other matters. But the kaleidoscope of his problems distracted him, and the two of them had been slightly out of phase.
The FBI agent had listened very carefully during their brief meeting at 9:00 A.M. Thursday. But then the agent had taken on the role of prosecutor, doing as so many prosecutors seemed to love to do in such a case: scare a potential defendant half to death. No, the agent had said, he would not guarantee that the investigation would be wrapped up with what amounted to Kell’s “confession.” Yes, he would promise not to call in the media, but he would make no special efforts on behalf of a U.S. senator. After all, the man had said with a tinge too much sanctimony, a public official must be treated like any other citizen. What next? Kell had asked, and the agent was noncommittal. There were “other aspects” he wanted to investigate before they decided that Kell’s presence in a restricted area at Kansas City Airport did not warrant some sort of prosecution. “Prosecution for what?” Kell had asked, and the answer had been vague, though he knew that the only real potential liability was a state charge for breaching the security area. A possible misdemeanor charge, however, was the least of his concerns.
Kell had entered the FBI building at the same moment the incendiary Wilkins press conference was breaking up in the Longworth House Office Building, with no inkling that the Wilkins staff had picked that moment to declare war on the United States government.
But Cindy had heard and was waiting for him in an advanced state of agitation when he returned to the office, and within minutes they were calling their own war counsel, Cindy pushing hard for a press conference of their own. He agreed only to call a quick meeting of the other Pebbles supporters on the Armed Services Committee. They would have to answer the Wilkins charges on behalf of the Air Force.
Kell closed the door to his office to return a missed call from General Roach. The head of
the Brilliant Pebbles program had called back Monday as promised after their meeting that morning, but he had relayed only more assurances that there had been no attempt to test the radar unit without explaining why it was being moved. Kell had made no secret of his dissatisfaction, and the general promised to seek approval to tell him more, then call later in the week. Apparently he was keeping the promise. General Roach came on the line abruptly.
“Okay Senator, I am now authorized to tell you that MAC was flying it to a more secure location than the factory where it was built. The factory is full of civilians. The unit was vulnerable. There was no testing involved.”
“You weren’t shipping it to the Pacific test range, were you?”
There was a lengthy silence before the general answered. “Where it was going is classified. Why it was going isn’t. Testing wasn’t involved.”
“But why the Kansas City Airport, General? You might as well have entered it in the Rose Bowl parade. That’s hardly secure.”
“It’s the closest airport to the factory that can handle a C-5B. Simple as that.”
“I sure as hell hope that’s the straight story.”
A tired sigh was audible over the line. “Senator, everything I have told you is true.”
By noon eleven angry committeemen and -women sat in Kell’s office, listening to his paraphrase of the general’s explanation and considering a political counterattack on Wilkins’s people. In the midst of it, Kell briefly considered confessing his presence at the airport. But they had staff members, and if just one leaked to the Wilkins camp, it would blow up in all their faces.
Kell caught Cindy’s eye at one point and shook his head ever so slightly. Now was not the time to tell them. She understood his message, but scowled at him in return.
When his office had emptied, they argued—professionally at first, then somewhat personally. She thought silence was a great mistake, a ticking bomb wired to his career. He was convinced they needed to choose the right moment, and that perhaps it wouldn’t come.
“You’re trying a cover-up, Kell. That always backfires.”
“No, I’m not. I’m thinking politically.”
“I’m the one who’s thinking politically,” she snapped as she hesitated on the way out the door. “I’m also thinking about what’s honorable and what’s not.”
Kell left the Hart Building in deep despair. He had stolen no money, nor violated any congressional ethics nor taken any bribes, but he was apprehensive that Cindy was right, and that his career—which had been without blemish—was about to unravel. More important at that moment was the fact that she wasn’t happy with him. Running back to her clandestinely after hours, then, had been an instinctive reaction, though they had made no arrangements for the evening. If nothing else, he owed her an apology. Their professional arguments were never supposed to spill over to the personal.
She had returned to the office on Tuesday playing her same cheerful and efficient role for public consumption, and then Tuesday night—and Wednesday night—she had wrapped herself around him, closing out the real world, and taking perhaps too much of a chance of discovery in the process. Though he had parked each of those nights a discreet distance away, he was becoming progressively bolder, parking closer and closer to her apartment.
Thursday evening, however, Kell had been anxious to make amends. He purchased a dozen roses and parked in front of her apartment in broad daylight, waiting for her when she drove up, hoping they could shut out the worries together again, though he knew instinctively it would be another fitful night for him. Now, in the predawn darkness of Friday morning, with Cindy blissfully asleep beside him, it seemed ridiculous that he couldn’t sleep as well. He certainly needed it.
Kell pulled his arm away from Cindy carefully, trying not to wake her, punching the button on his digital watch to activate a tiny light. The display showed 4:01 A.M.
At exactly 4:02 A.M. some 14 miles to the south, on the far side of Andrews Air Force Base, Joe Wallingford had snapped wide awake from a deep sleep. His subconscious mind had been searching for the missing voice recorder like a computer dutifully churning through mountains of data looking for a single fact.
He got up immediately and padded into his den, turning on the ceiling light and retrieving small plastic models of the Boeing 757 and 737 aircraft. He sat at the kitchen table then and began flying one at the other, checking the theory that had popped into his head.
What had eluded them was how the force of the collision could have propelled the A320’s voice recorder into some netherworld where none of his people could find it. It was too strong to be pulverized. Such high-impact boxes were designed to hit a mountain at cruise airspeed and still be identifiable and recoverable. So it had to have survived the crash and been thrown somewhere they hadn’t considered.
“The voice recorder simply isn’t there,” Barbara had said. “We sifted every molecule of the A320 wreckage.”
Joe pulled the 757 model to eye level and looked at the tail. The 757 was somewhat similar in appearance to the Airbus A320, but what caught his attention was the angle of the tail cone at impact, together with a mental image of the place where the CVR should have been in the ruined tail section, a missing, gouged area Barbara had pointed to last Saturday with consternation.
The memory of twisted aerospace rubble departing the Kansas City Airport on the back of several flatbed trucks played in his mind’s eye.
That was it! They couldn’t find the damn cockpit voice recorder because they had indeed spent all their time looking in the wrong place.
Joe noticed the time was 4:20 A.M. as he moved to the phone, grabbing his list of NTSB numbers and dialing Barbara’s home in Silver Springs, Maryland. She took five rings to answer, her sleepy voice asking who it was twice. But suddenly she too came awake.
“Barbara, if you feel up to it, get packed. I want you to take one of your people and get back to Kansas City this morning. I know where the cockpit voice recorder is.”
It was Friday afternoon in Dallas, and Jerry Harris was glancing at his rearview mirror for the umpteenth time, fully expecting a Dallas police cruiser to be on his tail. The light at Northwest Highway and Hillcrest obliged with a solid green, and he sped through, the spray of flowers on the right seat falling over again through the bumpy intersection. He knew his watch was showing ten minutes past two. He’d been checking that constantly as well. Going to funerals was not his style, but when senior management parcels out an assignment—even at the last minute—management trainees hesitate at their peril.
“How the hell did I end up doing this?” he muttered out loud as the entrance to Hillcrest Memorial Park came into view on his left. “Weiss. Weiss. Must remember the name.” North America had been dispatching its employees to attend the funerals of victims killed in the Kansas City crash which had occurred nine days before, and this was yet another. Having him buy and carry flowers that should have been sent ahead of time was a bit tawdry, though. He dreaded carrying them in.
Jerry pulled open the chapel door just as one of the funeral directors stepped out. “The Weiss funeral?”
The man looked surprised. “You’ve missed it. It was at one.”
“They told me two, they …”
“I’m sorry. You might catch them at the grave site, though. Far western end of the park. Only service in progress. Down at the Temple Emanuel end of the park.”
“Is this—was this—a Jewish service?”
“No sir. Methodist.” He thanked the man and dashed back to the car, shivering in the chilly breeze on what had become a clear, cold north Texas Friday. “Wonderful! They couldn’t even give me the goddamn time correctly.” He was muttering again and he knew it, but the tension was getting to him. Good grief, what a way to express condolences. Here, have some flowers, and sorry we killed your wife or husband. Next time we’ll show up for the funeral.
The black limousine was visible ahead amidst a sea of cars, and he parked as quickly and unobtrusively as possib
le, gripping the flowers and walking quickly toward the tent, noticing with a sinking feeling that it was over—everyone was standing and talking quietly, several people holding on to a man standing beside what appeared to be three graves. No one had told him this was a triple funeral.
Jerry Harris squared his shoulders and moved toward the man, facing him finally, pressing the flowers forward with the words he had practiced. “Sir, North America Airlines would like you to know how deeply sorry we all are for your loss.”
The man looked him straight in the eye, his face motionless. Jerry could hear the leaves on the adjacent trees rustling in the teeth of a sudden wind gust. All activity on either side seemed to stop as what he feared most happened: he had become the instant focus of everyone’s attention as they watched Weiss for a reaction.
Finally Weiss moved, his face softening just a bit, but his hand did not reach for the flowers, and Jerry wondered what to do.
The voice was soft and low and very controlled, and for a split second, Jerry didn’t realize who was speaking. “How old are you?”
“Uh, twenty-five, sir.”
“I know you mean no harm, but I don’t want your flowers.”
Jerry didn’t mean to stutter or stumble, but he couldn’t help it. “I … ah …”
“I saw you come rushing up here at the last second. Too little too late, just like your airline’s management. Too little, too late.”
“Well, sir …,” he began, trying to keep a steady tone.
Weiss’s right hand found his shoulder, his eyes boring into Jerry’s. “I don’t want your meaningless tribute. I want answers. Do you know what I’ve lost here?”
Jerry glanced to his right at the graves.
“That’s right, take a look, you didn’t even know, did you?” Weiss shook him slightly. “DID you?”
“No sir.”
“My wife Kim, my son Aaron and my son Greg. That’s what I’ve lost … because I trusted your airline with their lives.”
Final Approach Page 24
