The Coffin Dancer (18 page)

After graduation she began the life of an unemployed pilot. Lessons, air shows, joyrides, an occasional left-hand seat assignment for a delivery service or small charter company. Air taxis, seaplanes, crop dusting, even stunts, flying old Stearman and Curtis Jenny biplanes on Sunday afternoons at roadside carnivals.

“It was tough, real tough,” she said to Roland Bell. “Maybe like getting started in law enforcement.”

“Not a world of difference, I’d guess. I was running speed traps and overseeing crossing-guard detail as sheriff of Hoggston. We had three consecutive years with no homicides, even accidental. Then I started moving up—got a job as a deputy with the county, working Highway Patrol. But that was mostly picking folk outa moonshine wrecks. So I went back to UNC for a criminology/sociology degree. Then I moved to Winston-Salem and got myself a gold shield.”

“A what?”

“Detective. Course, I got beat up twice and shot at three times before my first review ... Hey, be careful what you ask for; you may get it. You ever hear that?”

“But you were doing what you wanted.”

“I was that. You know, my aunt who raised me’d always say, ‘You walk the direction God points you.’ Think there’s something to that. I’m keen to know, how’d you start your own company?”

“Ed—my husband—and Ron Talbot and I did that. About seven, eight years ago. But I had a stopover first.”

“How’s that?”

“I enlisted.”

“No fooling?”

“Yep. I was desperate to fly and nobody was hiring. See, before you can get a job with a big charter or an airline you have to be rated on the kind of planes they fly. And in order to get rated you’ve got to pay for training and simulator time—out of your own pocket. Can cost you ten thousand bucks to get a ticket to fly a big jet. I was stuck flying props ’cause I couldn’t afford any training. Then it occurred to me: I could enlist and get paid to fly the sexiest aircraft on earth. So I signed up. Navy.”

“Why them?”

“Carriers. Thought it’d be fun to land on a moving runway.”

Bell winced. She cocked her eyebrow and he explained. “In case you didn’t guess, I’m not a huge fan of your business.”

“You don’t like pilots?”

“Oh, no, don’t mean that. It’s flying I don’t like.”

“You’d rather be shot at than go flying?”

Without consideration, he nodded emphatically, then asked, “You see combat?”

“Sure did. Las Vegas.”

He frowned.

“Nineteen ninety-one. The Hilton Hotel. Third floor.”

“Combat? I don’t get it.”

Percey asked, “You ever hear about Tailhook?”

“Oh, wasn’t that the navy convention or something? Where a bunch of male pilots got all drunk and attacked some women? You were
there?”

“Got groped and pinched with the best of ’em. Decked one lieutenant and broke the finger of another, though I’m sorry to say he was too drunk to feel the pain till the next day.” She sipped some more bourbon.

“Was it as bad as they said?”

After a moment she said, “You’re used to expecting some North Korean or some Iranian in a MiG to drop out of the sun and lock on. But when the people supposed to be on your side do it, well, it really throws you. Makes you feel dirty, betrayed.”

“What happened?”

“Aw, kind of a mess,” she muttered. “I wouldn’t roll over. I named names and put some folks out of business. Some pilots, but some high-up folks too. That didn’t sit well in the briefing room. As you can imagine.”

Monkey skills or no monkey skills, you don’t fly with wingmen you don’t trust. “So I left. It was all right. I’d had fun with the ’Cats, fun flying sorties. But it was time to leave. I’d met Ed and we’d decided to open up this charter. I kissed and made up with Daddy—sort of—and he lent me most of the money for the Company.” She shrugged. “Which I paid back at prime plus three, never late a day on a payment. The son of a gun ...”

This brought back a dozen memories of Ed. Helping her negotiate the loan. Shopping together for aircraft at the skeptical leasing companies. Renting hangar space. Arguing as they struggled to fix a nav-com panel at three in the morning, trying to get ready for a 6 a.m. flight. The images hurt as bad as her ferocious migraines. Trying to deflect her thoughts, she asked, “So what brings you to parts north?”

“Wife’s family’s up here. On Long Island.”

“You gave up North Carolina for in-laws?” Percey nearly made a comment about how’d his wife lasso him into that but was glad she hadn’t. Bell’s hazel eyes easily held hers as he said, “Beth was pretty sick. Passed away nineteen months ago.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you. They had Sloan-Kettering up here and her folks and sister too. The fact is I needed some help with the kids. I’m fine pitching the football and making chili but they need other stuff than that. Like, I shrunk most of their sweaters first time I dried ’em. That sort of thing. I wasn’t averse to a move anyway. Wanted to show the kids there’s more to life than silos and harvesters.”

“You got pictures?” Percey asked, tipping back the flask. The hot liquor burned for a brief exquisite moment. She decided she’d quit drinking. Then decided not to.

“ ’Deed I do.” He fished a wallet from his baggy slacks and displayed the children. Two blond boys, around five and seven. “Benjamin and Kevin,” Bell announced.

Percey also caught a glimpse of another photo—a pretty, blond woman, short hair in bangs.

“They’re adorable.”

“You have any kids?”

“No,” she answered, thinking, I always had my reasons. There was always next year or the next. When the Company was doing better. When we’d leased that 737. After I got my DC-9 rating ... She gave him a stoic smile. “Yours? They want to be cops when they grow up?”

“Soccer players’s what they want to be. Not much of a market for that in New York. Unless the Mets keep playing the way they’ve been.”

Before the silence grew too thick, Percey asked, “Is it okay if I call the Company? I’ve got to see how my aircraft’s coming.”

“You bet. I’ll leave you be. Just make sure you don’t give our number or address to a soul. It’s the one thing I’m gonna be real muley about.”

chapter fifteen

Hour 8 of 45

“Ron. It’s Percey. How is everyone?”

“Shook up,” he answered. “I sent Sally home. She couldn’t—”

“How is she?”

“Just couldn’t deal with it. Carol too. And Lauren. Lauren was out of control. I’ve never seen anybody that upset. How’re you and Brit?”

“Brit’s mad. I’m mad. What a mess this is. Oh, Ron ...”

“And that detective, the cop who got shot?”

“I don’t think they know yet. How’s
Foxtrot Bravo?”

“It’s not as bad as it could be. I’ve already replaced the cockpit window. No breaches in the fuselage. Number two engine ... that’s a problem. We’ve got to replace a lot of the skin. We’re trying to find a new fire extinguisher cartridge. I don’t think it’ll be a problem ...”

“But?”

“But the annular has to be replaced.”

“The combustor? Replace it? Oh, Jesus.”

“I’ve already called the Garrett distributor in Connecticut They agreed to deliver one tomorrow, even though it’s Sunday. I can have it installed in a couple, three hours.”

“Hell,” she muttered, “I should be there ... I told them I’d stay put but, damn it, I should be there.”

“Where are you, Percey?”

And Stephen Kall, listening to this conversation as he sat in Sheila Horowitz’s dim apartment, was ready to write. He pressed the receiver closer to his ear.

But the Wife said only, “In Manhattan. About a thousand cops around us. I feel like the pope or the president.”

Stephen had heard on his police scanner reports of some curious activity around the Twentieth Precinct, which was on the Upper West Side. The station house was being closed and suspects were being relocated. He wondered if that was where the Wife was right now—at the precinct house.

Ron asked, “Are they going to stop this guy? Do they have any leads?”

Yes, do they? Stephen wondered.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Those gunshots,” Ron said. “Jesus, they were scary. Reminded me of the service. You know, that sound of the guns.”

Stephen wondered again about this Ron fellow. Could he be useful?

Infiltrate, evaluate ...
interrogate.

Stephen considered tracking him down and torturing him to get him to call Percey back and ask where the safe house was ...

But although he probably could get through the airport security again it would be a risk. And it would take too much time.

As he listened to their conversation Stephen gazed at the laptop computer in front of him. A message saying
Please wait
kept flashing. The remote tap was connected to a Bell Atlantic relay box near the airport and had been transmitting their conversations to Stephen’s tape recorder for the past week. He was surprised the police hadn’t found it yet.

A cat—Esmeralda,
Essie
, the worm sack—climbed onto the table and arched her back. Stephen could hear the irritating purring.

He began to feel cringey.

He elbowed the cat roughly to the floor and enjoyed her pained bleat.

“I’ve been looking for more pilots,” Ron said uncomfortably. “I’ve got—”

“We just need one. Right-hand seat.”

A pause. “What?” Ron asked.

“I’m taking the flight tomorrow. All I need is an FO.”

“You? I don’t think that’s a good idea, Perce.”

“You have anybody?” she asked shortly.

“Well, the thing is—”

“Do you
have
anyone?”

“Brad Torgeson’s on the call list. He said he had no problem helping us out. He knows about the situation.”

“Good. A pilot with balls. How’s his Lear time?”

“Plenty ... Percey, I thought you were hiding out until the grand jury.”

“Lincoln agreed to let me take the flight. If I stayed here until then.”

“Who’s Lincoln?”

Yes, Stephen thought. Who
is
Lincoln?

“Well, he’s this weird man ...” The Wife hesitated, as if she wanted to talk about him but wasn’t sure what to say. Stephen was disappointed when she said only, “He’s working with the police, trying to find the killer. I told him I’d stay here until tomorrow but I was definitely making the flight. He agreed.”

“Percey, we can delay it. I’ll talk to U.S. Medical. They know we’re going through some—”

“No,” she said firmly. “They don’t want excuses. They want wheels up on schedule. And if we can’t do it they’ll find somebody else. When are they delivering the cargo?”

“Six or seven.”

“I’ll be there late afternoon. I’ll help you finish with the annular.”

“Percey,” he wheezed, “everything’s going to be fine.”

“We get that engine fixed on time, everything’ll be
great
.”

“You must be going through hell,” Ron said.

“Not really,” she said.

Not yet, Stephen corrected silently.

Sachs skidded the RRV station wagon around the corner at forty miles per hour. She saw a dozen tactical agents trotting along the street.

Fred Dellray’s teams were surrounding the building where Sheila Horowitz lived. A typical Upper East Side brownstone, next door to a Korean deli, in front of which an employee squatted on a milk crate, peeling carrots for the salad bar and staring with no particular curiosity at the machine-gun-armed men and women surrounding the building.

Sachs found Dellray, weapon unholstered, in the foyer, examining the directory.

S. Horowitz. 204.

He tapped his radio. “We’re on four eight three point four.”

The secure federal tactical operations frequency. Sachs adjusted her radio as Dellray peered into the Horowitz woman’s mailbox with a small black flashlight. “Nothin’ picked up today. Got a feeling that girl’s gone.” He then said, “We got our folk on the fire escape and floor above and below with a SWAT cam and some mikes. Haven’t seen anybody inside. But we’re pickin’ up some scratching and purring. Nothing sounds human, though. She got cats, remember. That was a feather in his cap, thinking of the vets. Our man Rhyme, I mean.”

I know who you mean, she thought.

Outside, the wind was howling and another line of black clouds was trooping over the city. Big slabs of bruise-colored clouds.

Dellray snarled into his radio. “All teams. Status?”

“Red Team. We’re on the fire escape.”

“Blue Team. First floor.”

“Roger,” Dellray muttered. “Search and Surveillance. Report.”

“Still not sure. We’re getting faint infrared readings. Whoever or whatever’s in there isn’t moving. Could be a sleeping cat. Or a wounded victim. Or might be a pilot light or lamp that’s been burning for a while. Could be the subject, though. In an interior part of the apartment.”

“Well, what do you
think?”
Sachs asked.

“Who’s that?” the agent asked over the radio.

“NYPD, Portable Five Eight Eight Five,” Sachs responded, giving her badge number. “I want to know what your opinion is. Do you think the suspect is inside?”

“Why you askin’?” Dellray wanted to know.

“I want an uncontaminated scene. I’d like to go in alone if they think he’s not there.” A dynamic entry by a dozen tactical officers was probably the most efficient way to utterly decimate a crime scene.

Dellray looked at her for a moment, his dark face creased, then said into his stalk mike, “What’s your opinion, S&S?”

“We just can’t say for sure, sir,” the disembodied agent reported.

“Know you can’t, Billy. Just gimme what your gut’s telling you.”

A pause, then: “I
think
he’s rabbited. Think it’s clean.”

“Hokay.” To Sachs he said, “But you take one officer with you. That’s an order.”

“I go in first, though. He can cover me from the door. Look, this guy just isn’t leaving
any
evidence anywhere. We need a break.”

“All right, Officer.” Dellray nodded to several of the federal SWAT agents.

“Entry approved,” he muttered, slipping out of hipster as he spoke words of law enforcement art.