by David Dun
"Down farther," she told him on the cell. "That's good."
After he had killed the engine and gotten out of the truck, she ran out across the road.
He carried a hefty pair of cutters and came quite a distance from the runway to the fence.
It took sixty seconds or so for him to cut enough chain-link fence to let her through.
Grant wore a graying mustache and hair to match, and plenty of crow's-feet around his eyes. He had a sandpaper voice and a temper, she knew, although he rarely showed it with her.
"Probably violated a bunch of federal laws when I cut an airport fence," he said.
"I won't tell, if you don't."
They climbed in the pickup and drove back toward the hangar. They were very much in the open and she decided it would undoubtedly be proof of God's existence if no one stopped them.
"They came and took some parts," Grant said. "I can't make Ben's plane fly now."
"Oh man. That's bad."
"You can fly a Lake amphibian, can't you?"
"Are you kidding?" Haley said. "Landing those is a trick if you've never done it and I have always flown whatever Ben owned. It would be a miracle if I didn't submarine the nose or drag the tail in."
"Will I go to jail if I fly you someplace?"
"If they think I'm really a criminal, you might."
"You're no damn criminal," Grant said. "Did Sam shoot Crew?"
"No. He didn't shoot Crew," said Haley. "Frick did. Sam wouldn't shoot anybody, except in self-defense."
"You sure about that?"
"I'm sure. And I was there."
"This will help save Ben for sure?"
"And me. Yes," Haley replied.
"That's good enough for me. Where do we pick up Sam?"
"Caution Point."
"Oh, my God," the older man gasped. "At night? With this wind? At least you don't ask for much."
"Is it possible?"
"There's a little indentation, kind of a bay just this side of the point. We could try there, and if we don't make it, we'll probably be dead and we won't have to worry about it. I'm old. Maybe you better let me try it by myself."
"No way are you leaving me," Haley said. "I'd be greatly in your debt if you'd fly. I'm pretty sure I'd crash at night. But I'm going if you're going."
"All right," he said. And that was the end of it.
Haley felt more than a little guilty. "You don't have to do this, you know."
"I prefer to think I'm lucky enough to pull it off." Grant winked. "I've got my skunk tail in my back pocket and everything. Even my copper bracelet. 'Sides, I gotta live long enough to try some of Ben's invention."
That shocked Haley. "What do you mean?"
"You know I been helping Ben?"
"No. What have you been doing? I need to know."
"Well, it's highly confidential and Ben trusts me. I just figured-"
"That I knew?" First Sarah, now Grant. Who else? Haley wondered. "Not a word. Is there anything you can tell me?"
"Sometimes we fly people in and out to Orcas. The same people."
"How many people?"
"A lot of people."
"Ten, twenty?"
"More," Grant said. "But there's a dozen that they call project leaders. I see them the most often. But I don't know what they're doing, I swear."
She looked at him sharply.
"Well, I got the idea that it has to do with living a long time."
"What do you know, Grant?"
"There's this manifesto thing."
"A manifesto?"
"They whispered about it once," he said, "and I asked Ben, and he got all stern with me and told me to forget it forever. So I can truthfully say that I don't know where or what.
Now I'd appreciate it if you'd leave me with a little self-respect and not ask me any more."
It just keeps growing.
Rachael sat on the bridge of the Coast Guard Marine Protector-Class, eighty-seven-foot coastal patrol boat called the Orca. It was stationed in Bellingham and next to her sat a disbelieving officer by the name of Lieutenant Lew Stutz. He was a lieutenant and apparently it was unusual to get someone of any officer-grade rank on a holiday night at the Bellingham Unit, but this boat had an officer-grade skipper. He had a bit of Kirk Douglas about him and the fresh-faced look of youth. Rachael guessed he had big ambitions, and screwing this up wouldn't help. Her father was a successful local businessman and Rachael well understood life's food chain.
They had tied her uncle's boat in Fidalgo Bay, and she had seen in the young officer the possibility of reaching someone who mattered in the federal government, an opportunity that might not otherwise exist on a holiday weekend in the small town of Anacortes.
Using all her persuasive power, she had talked her way onto his boat for what she hoped would be a productive dialogue. Standard operating procedure would be to turn her over to police authorities at the dock, but she had forestalled that and had been talking and waiting for almost an hour.
"These men say you tried to run them down," Stutz said.
"They were following me," Rachael said. "They shot a flare pistol at me. I told you what I was doing. Doesn't it stand to reason someone might attempt to intercept me?"
An enlisted man came onto the bridge with a few papers and handed them to the officer.
For at least a minute Stutz studied the papers.
"The one thing you have going for you," he finally said, "is that two of the three men have criminal records. The odds are a little slim that two ex-felons were going with a third man for a boat ride after dark on a fall evening. However, the state police are very clear that your friends over on San Juan are wanted in a murder investigation. They have eyewitnesses to the shooting of two deputy sheriffs. We have a boat theft. Resisting arrest. And the gruesome murder of one Detective Ranken. The list goes on."
"Garth Frick is not a regular deputy."
"You're right, he's a sergeant. And an ex-detective in the big city."
"He's a criminal," she said quickly. "He's the witness, and he did the shooting in any gruesome deaths."
"It's not that simple," said Stutz. "The undersheriff is in the hospital alive and he figures he was shot by this stranger who has a driver's license in the name of Robert Chase and calls himself Sam."
"I know the undersheriff and he's a good man," Rachael said. "But Frick's tricked him."
She crossed her arms, knowing that she was signaling an end to her cooperation.
Hopefully, this would convince him to listen. "I want to see a state police officer or someone from the attorney general's office."
"I'd advise that you get a lawyer."
"I have no time for a lawyer. My friends will be killed."
"By whom?"
"By Frick! You're not listening to what I'm saying. Look, read this." Rachael held out the FBI memo. "Call Special Agent Ernie Sanders."
"I already read it and tried the agent. It's the middle of the night back there and, not surprisingly, he doesn't answer." The lieutenant shook his head, obviously unsure of how he should proceed-probably because he was obviously intrigued by both her and her story. "It's not an arrest record. It's a report." Stutz paused as if thinking.
"Think about this," she said. "If I'm telling you anything like the truth, if the fountain of youth is real, if there is a conspiracy, it could be the biggest thing in your career. On the other hand, if I'm a nut or just wrong, it will only be mildly embarrassing and it certainly won't follow you in your file."
"You're saying the upside to believing you could be tremendous, whereas the downside isn't that bad."
Stutz sounded skeptical, but Rachael could tell the argument had hit home. This guy was a no-nonsense, get-ahead career officer.
"All right," he said. "I'll try to get someone from the state police. You'll have to wait here on the boat."
Sam was huddled down in the forest. He heard the dog breathing hard, trampling through the bushes covering more ground in a few minutes th
an a man could cover in an hour. Although the dog was moving away on his circle that would take him back to the water, on the next swing he would probably run right over him. There wasn't enough charcoal in the forest to block his scent if the dog came too near. Unfortunately, he didn't know what too near was.
The dog was concentrating on the portion of the forest that lay between the gravel road and the water. Sam had to move deeper into the forest to the far side of the gravel road, and that would make it difficult for him to respond to the plane. It was a tough choice. If she landed and tarried, these men would come with their guns and it would be all over for Haley unless she fled. If she did that, he would be trapped on foot. None of it seemed good.
When Sam hit the road, he resisted the temptation to run down it. It would be an easy place for Frick's men to lie in wait. Instead, he crossed the road quickly, seeing no one, and walked about fifty yards inland. Then, watching the stars, he did his best to parallel the road. It was rough going. He could see nothing and had to hold his hands out in front of him, guiding himself through the tree trunks. The ground occasionally had holes and rocks protruding from the surface. His body hurt in so many places that at times it seemed one whole leg and his back were an interlocking maze of stabbing pains, muscle knots, and aches.
Lying flat on his back undisturbed became his fantasy.
After checking the stars a dozen times and traveling for fifteen to twenty minutes, he turned back toward the water and came to the edge of the road. Far down around a bend he saw what he figured was the faint cast of a flashlight beam against the trees. He supposed the dog was in that vicinity, working back and forth between road and beach.
Nearly dragging his stiff leg, he made it across the road and looked for the trail to the fire pit and found it. In the distance he heard the dog's handler calling the dog; then he heard a woof. Like scalding water on skin the realization came over his mind. The dog was coming closer. No sooner had he thought it, than the dog started whining and barking.
Uh-oh.
This was bad.
He had little time. First he picked up a stick and covered his knees to his shoes with charcoal as fast as he could. It took about thirty seconds. The dog was charging through the woods along the far side of the road, probably on his trail. It sounded as though he were casting about, trying to sift through all the charcoal. It would give Sam a couple minutes. What he was about to do would either save him or kill him. He found a piece of driftwood about the volume of four footballs. He could hide his head behind it; maybe it would help him float.
A large madrona tree stood just up from the rock line. It was nothing but a vague shadow. He felt for the base and, after turning the cell's ringer to silent, placed his phone, watch, and the papers in the bag under the duff right at the base of the tree. Then he found a big rock and put it atop, careful not to put too much weight on the cell phone.
With the first few steps the cold seawater lapped his ankles and immediately set them to aching. It was an ache powerful enough that he very much wanted to step out of the water and find relief. Even worse was the horrible burning from the cuts that he had encountered earlier. Although he tried moving quietly, the dog was coming ever closer, and with his stiff leg some splash was inevitable. It required only seconds to get to deep water. He was still far too close to land. Miserable from the cold boring into his body, probably cooling his vital organs, he winced at the sheer pain of it. He ducked underwater to take off his shoes. It took some fumbling.
The dog's yelps were frantic and the animal was due to break out of the forest.
Sam began swimming with one shoe on the stiff-legged foot and one off. With some effort he stuffed the one shoe into his belt so he could paddle. Placing one hand on the piece of wood, he used the remaining hand to sidestroke and his legs to create a crippled scissors kick. It was tough to swim at all with his sodden clothes. He tried to keep all movement beneath the surface. For some reason, the dog seemed to stop, perhaps running in tight circles, distracted by a scent. Then, after a short time, the dog started running again and soon burst out on the beach, barking. Hopefully, he wouldn't swim.
Sam paddled to keep afloat, knowing the cold would soon kill him. If he ended his life drowning in order not to kill a dog, maybe his decision would count for something, but it would be a dumb decision, nonetheless.
Now the dog was nearly hysterical in his barking. Sam swam into the night, slowly heading toward Shaw Island, knowing the swim was over a mile and that he would never make it. However far he swam from San Juan Island, he would have to swim back. So far that was about sixty yards and growing.
Men arrived on the beach and he guessed he was now probably eighty yards distant. He was too far from shore to see at night with an ordinary flashlight.
"Come on, Roamer."
Sam assumed that was the dog and thought it a good name.
"Maybe the guy went in the water," a second searcher said.
"If he did, he's dead now. That'll freeze your nuts in no time and your brain in just a few minutes longer. He can't survive."
"Not necessarily."
Oh yes, necessarily, thought Sam. You try it.
"Go ahead, Larry, jump in," said the dog handler. "Swim out there a quarter-mile and let me know if you see him."
"We could call for the boat," Larry said, chastened.
"Oh yeah. And leave the harbor unguarded on a dumb hunch. Come on, Roamer. Let's go look up here."
Sam hoped they didn't take the dog too near the madrona tree. Roamer would smell his personal items in an instant.
The dog barked and the man kept insisting. Finally the man with the water theory lost.
"Look at Roamer now. He's back in the damn fire pit. That guy's not in the water. See, he's back to circles again."
Sam was getting numb. A nap sounded good. Just give up and sink and be done with it.
He thought about the sigh that kills, and about the microbes that live thousands of years and people who do not, and methane disasters and nuclear triggering. One certainly seemed to have nothing to do with the other. If Haley didn't arrive quickly, he might never know. Actually he might never know even if she did.
He went under and had to struggle to get another gasp of air. But there was no air. He took some big strokes and at last he broke the surface. If he died, he would miss the answer to the most incredible riddle of his life. They'd left the beach more confused than the dog. If it hadn't been for the stupidity of the handlers, the dog would have beat him.
Now the ocean might beat him.
Sam began swimming toward the beach, thinking only that very few jobs were worth his life.
This one might be.
CHAPTER 28
The Lake amphibian 270 turbo was, in essence, a flying marine hull. Like larger amphibious aircraft, the entire body of the plane landed in the water. It had a single engine that sat up on a pylon on top of the plane. It would carry four people in relative comfort, land on the water or at an airport with equal facility, and was FAA certified.
Haley and Grant looked over the south end of the airport and saw only one deputy pulling through the gate near the fueling station.
"They were all over this place," Grant said, "but I think they've moved on to the houses.
They don't know about this amphibian. It belongs to my brother and, to tell you the truth, I haven't flown it all that much."
"Uh-oh," Haley said. "How many water landings?"
"Unassisted?"
"What's that mean, 'unassisted'?"
"Without my brother touching the controls."
"Have you ever flown it alone?"
"No, but I've made unassisted landings," Grant said.
"How many?"
"Well, what difference does it make?" he said. "I'm here and we're going, unless you want to fly it."
"Let's just go."
"That's the spirit." Grant went one door down from the end of the hangar row immediately adjacent to the main passenger terminal and q
uickly unlocked the hangar door while Haley remained hidden inside his shop hangar. Once he had the doors open and the plane out, she ran out and jumped in.
Grant didn't bother with a preflight inspection.
Without hesitation he cranked up the engine, applied full power, and began a takeoff roll with no lights on.
"Can you see?" she asked.
"Not well," he muttered, and hit the lights. They illuminated the cop.
As if someone had jolted the deputy, he hit the gas, spun the tires, and pulled around as if considering whether to drive into them. But he was slightly off center to their left and, in a couple seconds, they would miss him by a few feet. Turning on all his lights and his siren, he waited like the lone bowling pin in the second frame.
"Damn it." Grant kept it at full throttle. They gained speed, aiming for a space between the hangars at the far southern end of the runway.
"You're not going to make it." Haley thought of the cop car, the tethered planes, the hangars, and the chain-link fence at the end of the taxiway.
"The hell I'm not."
They were passing through forty knots; they needed to hit sixty.
"You'll never clear the planes." She gripped her armrests.
The cop wasn't moving, probably in love with his life.
"Hope he knows I can't stop," Grant mumbled.
Now it appeared the deputy was backing up. Grant eased back on the yoke, lifting the front wheel. The stall warning went off as their right wing shot over the cop's hood.
"Whew," he said. Then the plane staggered into the sky, missing the cop car and the planes by inches, but the hangar roof by quite a few feet.
Haley's stomach was upset, but she was alive.
Grant's legs were visibly shaking.
"Cop probably pissed his pants."
"I almost did," Haley said.
Immediately they turned over the harbor and were beyond it in seconds, dropping down to two hundred feet.
"Grant?" she shouted. "How did Ben keep this secret with so many people? And why did he keep it from me, when so many others knew?"
Grant glanced at her. She knew it was unwise to be firing questions at him now.
