by Stuart Woods
“She and Adele have any problems?”
“No, Adele liked her.”
They were all silent for a moment.
“Would you like a drink?” Stone asked.
“No,” Stephanie replied. “We have to get back to Mother; she’s distraught. We just wanted to know what happened.” She thanked Dino and Stone, and she and Herbie left.
“This is going to be a tough one,” Dino said.
Stone couldn’t bring himself to disagree.
TWENTY-ONE
Stone worked through the week, clearing his desk. On Friday there was a memorial service for Adele at a small, nondenominational church on Lexington Avenue. A few people said nice things about Adele, including her nephew and niece. Stephanie was composed. David barely got through his part; tears ran down his face as he finished. A jazz quartet played a melodic, rather solemn piece, and the service broke up.
The Gunn family was lined up on the front steps, and Stone paid his respects. Herbie stood to one side, waiting for it to be over, and Stone walked over to him. “How are you, Herbie?”
“I’m okay, but everybody in the family is pretty broken up, and I don’t seem to be able to do anything to help.”
“Herbie,” Stone said, “has anyone in the family behaved oddly?”
“How do you mean?”
“I mean, has anyone done anything out of character, something you wouldn’t expect?”
Herbie thought about it. “Well, Stephanie has been pretty cold about the whole thing, and David has been crying, off and on. I would have thought it would be the other way around.”
“Is Stephanie normally a very emotional person?”
Herbie thought some more. “Only in bed,” he replied.
Stone went back to work.
Late in the afternoon Mike Freeman called.
“We closed on the sale of Strategic Air Services,” he said. “The new company is called Airship Transport. We’re meeting in my office early Monday morning. We’ll chopper up to Newburgh, New York, where the company is based, on the old Stewart Air Force Base. Bring your passport and clothes for a couple of days; you won’t need a necktie.”
“Okay. Mike, have you put the proceeds of the sale with Gunn yet?”
“No; we’ll deposit the check on Monday.”
“Put it in the bank until we get back from our trip.”
“Why?”
“I have some concerns about what’s going on at the Gunn company. His sister-in-law, Adele Lansdown, was murdered earlier this week, and I’m not yet certain whether that had anything to do with the business. I was going to put some money with them, but I’m holding off.”
“All right,” Freeman said. “I’ll hold off. We can talk more about this on the trip.”
“See you Monday morning, Mike,” Stone said.
They both hung up, and Stone went back to work.
Stone spent an idle weekend, sitting up in bed watching old movies and reading the Sunday Times. He didn’t even feel like dinner at Elaine’s with Dino.
On Monday morning, Stone packed a bag with rough clothes, put on a parka, and took a cab to the offices of Strategic Services. He walked into Mike Freeman’s office and was surprised to see someone he knew well.
“Hello, Holly,” Stone said, giving her a hug and a kiss.
“Hello, Stone,” she replied. Holly Barker was Lance Cabot’s assistant at the Agency, and they were old and close friends. “I’d like you to meet Todd Bacon, who’s going to run Airship Transport.”
A young man in his early thirties stood up and offered Stone his hand. He was about Stone’s size, but slimmer in the waist, and had short, sandy hair. “Hello, Stone. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“Good to meet you, Todd,” Stone said. He’d never heard anything about the guy.
“We’d better get going,” Mike said. “Your luggage is already in the van.”
They trooped downstairs, boarded a plain van, and were transported to the East Side Heliport, where a six-passenger twin-turbine chopper was waiting for them. They and their luggage boarded, the rotors turned, and they were on their way north. They had a spectacular view of the city as they moved up the East River, then crossed to the Hudson, north of the George Washington Bridge. They descended into what was now Stewart International Airport and landed next to the ramp before a huge hangar. The C-17 was being towed out onto the ramp, and Stone found its size overwhelming.
Stone grabbed his bag and followed the group to the rear of the giant airplane, where they simply walked up the lowered tail ramp and into the airplane. They deposited their luggage in bins as instructed, and Stone took a moment to look around. He was standing inside a cavernous space more than twenty feet wide and high. Ahead of them was an Airstream trailer, strapped down and with various cables and tubes attached. They walked past the trailer and found a dozen first-class airline seats bolted to the floor, then past that to the cockpit, which was big enough for two built-in, double-decker bunks and four jump seats behind the two pilots. The instrument panel was a maze of large glass screens, switches, warning lights, and circuit breakers. It was several times the size of the panel on Stone’s Mustang.
“Preflight’s all done, and we’re ready to go,” Mike said. “Take a jump seat next to me, Stone.”
Stone sat down, buckled in between Mike and Holly, and watched the pilots start the four engines and work their way through their checklists.
“This thing has four Pratt & Whitney engines,” Mike said, “each producing more than forty thousand pounds of thrust. We can carry more than a hundred and seventy thousand pounds of cargo.”
“How much runway are we going to need?” Stone asked, worried about what was available to them.
“The airplane can work out of a thirty-five-hundred-foot runway,” Mike said. “How’s that for short-takeoff performance?”
“Range and speed?”
“This is the ER, the Extended Range version. We can fly two thousand eight hundred miles without refueling. Today, we’ll refuel at an air force base at Lajes, in the Azores, then go on nonstop to Iraq. We should have a nice tailwind, too. Cruising speed is four hundred and fifty knots.”
The airplane began to taxi, with linemen at each wingtip, making sure they cleared any obstacles. Stone watched an airliner take off ahead of them and then, after a final cockpit check, they taxied onto the runway. The first officer shoved the throttles forward while the brakes were held, and when the engines reached full power, the captain released the brakes and the airplane moved forward faster than Stone would have thought possible, pressing him into his seat. They were in the air after a takeoff roll that seemed to take only seconds, and Stone put his headset on to keep out the noise. He could hear the captain talking to the tower, then to New York approach. Shortly, they were at flight level 290 and over the Atlantic Ocean.
“Come with me,” Mike said, unbuckling his seat belt.
Stone and Holly followed him to the Airstream, and he opened the door for them. Inside were four bunks, some comfortable chairs facing a large TV screen, and a galley.
“This is our rest area,” Mike said. “We’re flying with two crews, and the off-duty pilot and copilot can use the bunks in the cockpit.” He led them out of the trailer and pointed to what looked like a hotel laundry bin with canvas sides. “Our parachutes are in there. Has either of you ever jumped?”
“Once,” Stone said.
“I did airborne training in the army and got my wings,” Holly said.
“Getting out of this thing is real easy, should we have to,” Mike said. “All you do is strap the chute on, clip onto a static line at the rear, then just run off the lowered tail ramp. The rest is easy, depending on where you land.”
Stone thought about that for a moment. “I hope we won’t have to do that,” he said.
TWENTY-TWO
After they had cruised for a few minutes, Stone, Holly, and Todd Bacon followed Mike Freeman from the cockpit to the Airstream trailer, where they set
tled into chairs and Mike gave them a choice of movies. They settled on Casablanca.
It was quieter in the trailer, so they didn’t need headphones. A smaller screen next to the big one displayed a moving map, which showed them out over the Atlantic, with the tip of Long Island disappearing off the rear edge.
Stone hadn’t seen the movie for years, and he enjoyed it as much as the first time he’d experienced it. When the titles came up at the end, Stone checked the moving map, which showed another ninety minutes of flight time to the Azores. Todd and Holly got up from their seats and left the trailer, leaving Stone with Mike.
“Tell me about what’s going on with Jack Gunn’s business,” Mike said.
“I don’t know what’s going on there,” Stone said. “I only know that Jack’s wife’s sister was murdered a few days ago.” He told Mike about the aborted dinner party, the police investigation, and the people surrounding what had happened. “I can’t prove that Adele’s death has anything to do with the business, but I have a bad feeling about it, and I don’t want my money there until we know everything about her death. That’s why I recommended that you not deposit the proceeds of the sale of the company with Gunn.”
“Should we remove what we have with them now?”
“Do you have any sort of business insurance that would protect your investment?” Stone asked.
“No.”
“Then it can’t hurt to move your funds.”
Mike nodded. “I’ll call the office and get the process started.” He picked up a cordless phone from a credenza and called New York.
Stone dozed off in his reclining chair and only woke when the sounds of the airplane changed.
“We’re descending into Lajes,” Mike said. “I’m going to go up and watch our landing.”
Stone followed him and they sat in the jump seats again. Through the pilots’ windows he could see an expanse of blue Atlantic, gleaming in the late-afternoon sunlight, and an island came into view. Stone spotted the long runway a few minutes out and watched the pilots as they slowed the airplane’s descent, then put in flaps and slats and lowered the landing gear. They landed smoothly and taxied off the runway, where a fuel truck was waiting for them.
“We’ll stay on the airplane,” Mike said, “to avoid having to clear local customs.”
An Air Force contingent did enter the airplane and check passports, though. An hour later they were climbing out of Lajes and heading for Gibraltar and the Mediterranean beyond. Once they were at altitude again, Stone went back to the trailer and lay down on a bunk. Shortly, he was asleep. He woke in time to get a look at Gibraltar, far below, then he had a dinner prepared by a caterer before they left Stewart, along with a glass of wine. Then he went to sleep again.
He didn’t wake up until Mike shook him.
“We’re landing in fifteen minutes,” he said.
Stone got up, washed his face and brushed his teeth, then went forward to a jump seat. The sun was up, and the airplane was descending at a much steeper angle than when they had landed in the Azores.
Mike spoke up. “We’re making a steep descent into Baghdad International, in order to give insurgents less chance of hitting us with missiles.”
“Missiles?” Stone asked. “Nobody mentioned missiles.”
“It’s less likely than it would have been a year ago, but we have to treat the place as a war zone. We won’t get off the airplane here, but I think you’ll find it interesting to watch what happens. There are two runways here, one of ten thousand feet and one of thirteen thousand. The airport is about ten miles west of the city.”
Stone couldn’t believe how steep the approach was. He tried to find the rate of descent on the instrument panel, but he was too far away to read it. He reckoned that they were falling out of the sky at the rate of at least eight or ten thousand feet a minute, with everything hanging out—landing gear, flaps, speedbrakes, spoilers, if the airplane had them. He had never seen a view of an airport out the pilot’s window like the one he could see now.
The airplane touched down, and immediately Stone was thrown against his seat belt as the engines were reversed. Shortly, they were off the runway, and Stone could see a fuel truck ahead of them, waiting. The airplane taxied up to the truck and cut its engines, as the tail ramp came down. Stone got out of his seat and followed Mike into the huge cargo bay. Immediately, forklifts began bringing in pallets of matériel. As soon as they were set down, the forklifts went back for more, and airmen secured each pallet with netting, cables, and rope. It was all incredibly efficient, and by the time the tail ramp had closed, the fuel truck was gone and the engines were starting. Stone noticed that the central area of the cargo bay, behind the Airstream, was empty. He followed Mike back to the jump seats.
“Where are we stopping for the extraction on the way back?” Stone asked Freeman.
“I don’t know,” Mike said. “Todd Bacon will tell us when we’re airborne.”
“What’s Bacon’s story?” Stone asked.
“All I can tell you is, he’s one of Lance’s people, he’s, at least, the titular CEO of Airship Transport, and he’s in charge of the extraction.”
“What’s Holly here for?” Stone asked.
“I get the impression that she’s here to watch Bacon,” Mike replied.
The airplane was already rolling down the runway, using a lot more of it than on previous takeoffs. The pilot rotated, and the airplane began to climb steeply. Stone looked out a side window and saw something flying toward them, leaving a trail of smoke. Before he could speak someone yelled, “Missile at two o’clock!”
Stone was thrown hard against his seat belt, and the airplane picked up speed and turned first right, then left.
“Clean miss!” the copilot yelled, and they began climbing again.
“Holy shit!” Stone said. “That’s the first time I’ve ever been shot at in the air!”
“Me too,” Mike said. “I think ‘holy shit’ pretty much covers it for me, as well.”
“Are we safe yet?”
“Who knows?” Mike replied.
The airplane continued its steep climb, and gradually Stone’s grip on the armrests of his seat relaxed.
Todd Bacon appeared in the cockpit. “Okay, everybody in the trailer,” he said.
TWENTY-THREE
Stone, Mike, Holly, and Todd Bacon sat in the reclining chairs, and Todd unfolded a map. The first thing that struck Stone was that it was not an aeronautical chart but a Michelin road map.
“All right,” Todd said. “We’re going to land in northern Spain to extract a longtime fugitive and return him to United States jurisdiction.”
“By extract,” Stone said, “do you mean extradite?”
“Extradition is impossible,” Todd replied.
“How come?” Mike asked.
“All right, I’ll tell you the whole story,” Todd said, “or at least as much of it as I know.”
“We’re all ears,” Mike said.
“The man’s name is Erwin Gelbhardt, born in Germany sixty-eight years ago, brought to the U.S. at age eight and later naturalized. His father was a German diplomat, and the child grew up as his father served in Egypt, Spain, Saudi Arabia and Iran, and the U.S., where he retired and remained. As a result the boy, who had already displayed an affinity for languages, picked up those four languages, as well as his native German and English. He learned French in school.”
“A bright kid,” Mike said.
“Very bright. He was educated at Choate, Yale, and Harvard Business School, graduating at each school near or at the top of his classes. After getting his MBA he took a little over a million dollars, inherited from his mother, and during the next decade, turned it into more than a hundred million dollars made from various businesses in North, South, and Central America. Wherever he did business he specialized in corrupting local officials, up to and including intelligence officials and heads of state. He had a lot of cash to throw around, since he paid little or no taxes in the United
States, despite his American citizenship.
“Eventually, the IRS came after him in a big way. He was arrested as his private jet landed in Key West on a flight from Cuba, and as soon as that became known, people began to come out of the woodwork with information about other crimes he had committed in the countries where he operated. A line formed for extradition to half a dozen countries.
“He was held without bail, but during a lunch break at his trial, he went to the men’s room and vanished. No one yet knows how he got out of the courthouse. He left the country on a cargo plane headed for Algeria, and, we think, on arrival there he had extensive cosmetic surgery to alter his appearance.
“After that he went into the arms business in a big way. He had money hidden in Swiss and other banks around the world to fund his enterprise, and, operating under various names, he supplied weapons, small and large, to third-world countries and insurgencies around the globe. In recent years he adopted the name Pablo Estancia and, using his language skills, affected a Spanish accent in whatever language he spoke, which by that time numbered ten or twelve, including Chinese, Arabic, Urdu, and various Middle Eastern tribal dialects. He moved across borders with impunity with multiple passports and IDs and made himself the indispensable man with Islamic insurgencies of all stripes, including Al Qaeda and the Taliban. You have a picture of him now?”
“Pretty much,” Mike said.
“Why are you holding a road map instead of an aeronautical chart?” Stone asked.
“Because we’re going to land tonight on a road.”
“A road?” Stone asked, horrified. “No ordinary road could ever support the weight of this airplane, loaded as it is.”
“That’s not necessarily true,” Mike said. “The load will be spread over triple-tandem landing gears, and many tires.”
Stone didn’t know what triple-tandem meant, but he got the idea. “And will we be able to take off, too?” he asked.
