22
The Pilot ran his hand
over the aircraft’s wings as he completed his preflight check. The gas tanks were full. The antifreeze topped off. The bird was good to go. He walked down the runway, kicking away loose rocks.
Tonight was the final test flight. It was imperative that everything be rehearsed exactly as the day itself. Repetition brought precision, and precision, success. He had learned these rules the hard way. His body bore the scars of his ignorance. Retracing his steps to the plane, he rapped the wing twice for good luck, then headed indoors.
Many years had passed since he’d last flown a combat mission. Then, he’d been young, reckless, and handsome. A drinker. A womanizer. A man who shunned the Righteous Path. He glimpsed his reflection in the mirror. He was no longer young, no longer reckless. God knew, he was no longer handsome.
He couldn’t look at himself without remembering. The memories of that forsaken spot were never far from the surface, an ever-lurking phantasm cloaked in fear, guilt, and fire. He recalled the night in the desert. The high spirits, the promise of triumph, the certainty that God was fighting on their side. The side of the faithful. He could hear their voices in his ears. Friends. Comrades. Brothers.
And then, suddenly, there was the haboob, a vast cloud of violently swirling sand that rose from the desert floor a mile into the sky, enveloping them all, wreaking chaos and havoc, and worse.
The mission ended in flames. Eight men burned to death. Five more critically injured. He was among them, with third-degree burns covering seventy percent of his body.
In the days that followed—long days etched in pain and doubt—it came to him that he had been spared for a purpose. He had been given a second chance. The scars he carried were to remind him of that chance, to forswear his obedience unto Him. If the Almighty had robbed him of his physical endowments, He had gifted him with a spiritual awakening. He had drawn him close and spoken unto him. To make him one of His Personal Servants. An anointed one. All was for a purpose and that purpose was nigh.
The Pilot burned for the Righteous One. He lived only for His return.
Inside the ready room, he gathered the members of the crew. All linked hands.
“O mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository, the Promised One, that perfect and pure human being, the One that will fill this world with justice and peace.”
The circle broke up. Each man went to his post.
The Pilot approached the aircraft’s controls with trepidation. Much had changed since he’d last flown a combat mission. Instead of an array of dials and instruments, he faced a wall of six flat-screen monitors broadcasting the aircraft’s crucial functions. He slid into his seat and oriented himself. His hand took hold of the joystick, and he spent a moment getting a feel for it.
“Systems check complete,” said one of the technicians. “Ground link established. Satellite connection established. Video functional.”
“Affirmative.” The Pilot fired the engine. The lights on the control panel burned green. The single Williams turbofan engine turned over, revving smoothly as he pushed it through its preflight run-up.
The time was two a.m. Outside the cockpit, the night was pitch-black. Not a single light burned in the high Alpine valley where the test was to take place. He kept his eyes focused on the screen positioned in the center of the control panel, where an infrared camera mounted in the plane’s nose offered a grainy green-glow picture of the runway. It was like looking at the world through a soda straw.
“Requesting permission to take off.”
“Permission granted. Have a safe flight.
Allahu akbar.
God is great.”
The Pilot eased the throttle forward. He released the brake and the aircraft began to roll down the tarmac. At one hundred knots, he rotated the front wheel up and the plane rose into the air.
The Pilot studied the ground terrain radar. The valley was ringed by mountains, some as high as four thousand meters. The location was not ideal, but it provided the one essential element: privacy. He increased his speed to two hundred fifty knots and trimmed the ailerons. The aircraft handled deftly, with only a short delay in executing his commands. He banked to the right and found himself leaning with the aircraft.
“Execute Test One,” he said, after completing a circuit of the valley.
The Pilot studied his radar. A moment passed and a blip appeared. The target was six kilometers away, gaining in altitude. He hit the contact button and designated the blip as “Alpha 1.” The onboard computer charted a direct path to the target.
“Initiating target run. Contact in two minutes ten seconds.”
“Two minutes ten and counting,” said ground control.
The Pilot brought the aircraft in line behind the target. The blip moved closer to the center of the monitor. It was just a kilometer away and two hundred meters below him. Just then, the plane entered a bank of cloud. His vision disappeared. He checked a second monitor, offering infrared vision. There was no heat signature visible. A violent gust forced the nose down. A buzzer sounded. The stall warning. A bolt of panic ran along his spine. It was like the night in the desert all those years ago. He felt as if he were once again caught in the haboob.
Trust your instruments.
It was a pilot’s cardinal rule.
He remembered the collision. The jet fuel spraying over his body, incinerating his copilot. The horrid scent of burning flesh. His flesh.
Trust your instruments.
This time it was another voice speaking to him. A calm, unimpeachable voice.
Rely on me,
it said.
He pulled the joystick toward him and eased the throttle forward. Airspeed three hundred knots. The nose rose. Suddenly, he was through the cloud. Stars twinkled above him. His pulse eased, but he could feel the sweat sliding the length of his spine.
Once again, he took up position behind the target. At five hundred meters he armed the nacelle. The target came into view, looming like a great whale. He increased his airspeed and closed for the kill.
Three…Two…One.
The aircraft struck the target. On the monitor, the blip designated Alpha 1 disappeared.
“Direct hit. Target destroyed,” announced ground control. “Test completed.”
A cheer went up from the crew. This time the target had been a simulation generated by the computer.
The Pilot circled the valley and brought the aircraft in for a smooth landing. Climbing out of the cockpit, he crossed the control room and pulled back the curtains of a broad picture window. Outside on the road, the drone he had piloted by remote control sat on the tarmac. A team of men surrounded the aircraft and began to disassemble it.
The Pilot lowered his eyes and gave thanks.
Next time, it would be the real thing.
23
The clock read 4:41 a.m.
when Jonathan drew the car to the side of the road and killed the motor. Rain pounded the windshield. In front of him, a three-story stone and terra-cotta building sat cloaked in mist.
“But it’s not even open,” said Simone. “There’s no one here.”
Jonathan pointed out a pair of laundry lines strung from the second floor window. “The station manager lives above the office.” He put out an open palm. “You have it?”
Simone fished Sergeant Oskar Studer’s identification out of her purse. “What if he doesn’t believe you?”
“It’s five in the morning. The last thing in the world he’s going to do is question a cop who comes to his door. Besides, I can’t go flashing that ID in broad daylight unless I put on forty pounds, shave my head, and break my nose a couple times. Take a look. What do you see?” Jonathan held the ID next to his face. Simone moved her head backward and forward, squinting to focus on the thumbnail-sized picture. He gave her three seconds, then flapped the wallet closed. “So?”
“It’s too dark. I couldn’t see anything.”
“Exactly.”
Simone, however, was not so easily convinced. “But how do you know you’ll find something?”
Jonathan slipped the receipts from his pocket and tucked them into the ID holder. “No one sends that kind of money without a way of getting it back.”
Simone shook her head. Arms crossed, shorn of her earlier bravado, she appeared smaller, older, no longer his willing accomplice. “Really, Jon, I think we should wait.”
“Get in the driver’s seat. If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, take off.”
He opened the door and stepped into the rain.
“Sì?”
An unshaven man dressed in flannel pajamas stared bleary-eyed through a crack in the door. Jonathan held the policeman’s badge up so he could see it. “Signor Orsini,” he began in workmanlike Italian. “Graubünden Kantonspolizei. We need your help.”
Orsini snatched the identification from Jonathan’s hand and brought it near his face. His eyes snapped into focus. “What is it that it can’t wait until morning?” he asked, his gaze going back and forth between the ID and the man standing in front of him.
“It
is
morning,” said Jonathan, grabbing the ID right back. He crowded the doorway, forcing the station superintendent to step back into his home. “A murder. A fellow officer. My partner, in fact. You may have heard about it on the news.”
He waited for Orsini to comment on the photograph, but Orsini only looked peeved. “No, I didn’t,” he said. “No one called me about this.”
Jonathan barreled on, as if he couldn’t be bothered by who had or hadn’t called. “A few hours ago we discovered that bags belonging to the suspect were sent on a train originating from your station. We have the baggage receipts. We need the name of the individual who left them with you.”
“You have written authorization?” asked Orsini.
“Of course not. There wasn’t time. The murderer is headed in this direction.”
The news didn’t affect Orsini one way or the other. “Where’s Mario? Lieutenant Conti?”
“He asked that I come directly to the station.”
Orsini considered this, as he sniffed and hitched up his pajama bottoms. “Give me a minute.” The door closed.
Orsini emerged five minutes later, hair neatly combed, face washed, dressed for the day in gray trousers and a porter’s sturdy blue jacket. Jonathan followed him around the outside of the building to the ticket office.
A minute later, Orsini was seated at his desk, tapping the numbers of the baggage receipts into his computer. “Let’s see…sent to Landquart…bags picked up yesterday afternoon.
Basta!
Too late. Once the bags are picked up, the file is automatically deleted. I can’t help you.”
Orsini’s look of resignation infuriated Jonathan. “Is there another record of the transaction?” he demanded. “Maybe when the customer purchased the ticket? This is a murder we’re talking about. Not a stolen purse. Get me that name!” He slammed his palm against the table.
Orsini recoiled, but a moment later he was banging at the keyboard like a madman. “Tickets were paid in cash…had to fill out a receipt…hold on….” Standing, he pushed past Jonathan to a row of filing cabinets. Humming nervously, he pulled out sheaf after sheaf of bundled receipts, examining each in turn before tossing them onto the table next to him. Suddenly, he slapped his fingers against a chosen receipt. “Got him!”
Jonathan stood at his shoulder. “Who is it?”
“Blitz. Gottfried Blitz. Villa Principessa. Via della Nonna.” Orsini’s voice was plumped with victory as he studied the receipts. “So, are you happy now, Officer?”
But when he turned around, he found his office empty.
Jonathan had already left.
24
Marcus von Daniken paced
inside the passenger terminal at Bern-Belp airport. A Sikorsky helicopter sat on the tarmac as a crew completed deicing the rotors. Word had come from the tower that the weather was clearing over the Alps and that they had a window of sixty minutes to get over the mountains to the Tessin before the next front arrived and effectively partitioned the country once again between north and south. Flying was not von Daniken’s cup of tea, but this morning there was no other choice. An eighteen-wheeler had overturned at the northern entrance to the Gotthard Tunnel and traffic was backed up twenty-five kilometers.
An announcement was made to board the helicopter. Reluctantly, he left the warm confines of the terminal, followed by Myer and Krajcek. “How long?” he asked the pilot as he climbed aboard.
“Ninety minutes…if the weather holds.” The response was accompanied by the offer of an air-sickness bag.
Von Daniken strapped himself in tightly. He looked at the white paper bag on his lap and muttered a short prayer.
The helicopter landed
at an airfield on the outskirts of Ascona at 9:06. Throughout the flight, violent headwinds had buffeted the chopper like a ping-pong ball in a lottery machine. Twice the pilot had asked if von Daniken wished to turn back. Each time, von Daniken merely shook his head. Worse than his nausea was the suspicion that Blitz was at that very moment packing his bags and hightailing it across the Italian border.
The phone number listed on Lammers’s agenda had come back as belonging to one Gottfried Blitz, resident of the Villa Principessa in Ascona. A call had alerted the local police to von Daniken’s imminent arrival. Instructions were given that under no circumstances should anyone attempt to contact or arrest the suspect.
The engine moaned, then died altogether. The rotor blades slowed and bent under their weight. As von Daniken placed his foot onto solid ground, it was all he could do to keep from falling to his knees and kissing the tarmac. Come hell or high water, he was driving home in an automobile.
Lieutenant Mario Conti, chief of the Tessin police, stood at the edge of the helipad. “You will ride with me to Blitz’s house,” he said. “I believe your assistant is already there.”
Von Daniken made a beeline for the waiting automobile. The engine noise was still rife in his ears, and he wasn’t sure if he’d heard the lieutenant correctly. “My assistant? These are my men: Mr. Myer and Mr. Krajcek. No one else from my office is working this case.”
“But I received a call from Signor Orsini, the manager of the railway station, earlier this morning saying that he had been visited by an officer who had come to inquire about the bags. I assumed he was working on the same case as you.”
“Exactly what bags are you talking about?” asked von Daniken, pulling up sharply.
“The bags that were sent to Landquart,” Conti explained. “The officer informed Signor Orsini that they belonged to the suspect in the killing of the policeman yesterday.”
“I’m not investigating the killing of the policeman in Landquart. I didn’t send anyone to speak with the station manager.”
Conti shook his head, his cheeks losing their pallor. “But this policeman…he showed his identification. You’re certain you are not working together?”
Von Daniken ignored the question, driving to the heart of the matter. “What exactly did this man want?”
“The name and address of the man who had originally sent the bags.”
Von Daniken started walking toward the car. His pace quickened as it came to him. “And that man’s name was—”
“Blitz,” said the police chief, almost jogging to keep up. “The man you are looking for, of course. He lives in Ascona. Is something wrong?”
Von Daniken opened the passenger door. “How far is it to his home?”
“Twenty minutes.”
“Get us there in ten.”