Voodoo Ridge (5 page)

Off our right wingtip, the sawtooth mountaintops of the Sierra Nevada beckoned as though dipped in powdered sugar. I was tempted to wake Savannah, to share the postcard view, but she looked so peaceful that I thought the better of it. She was, after all, sleeping for two. There’d be plenty of opportunities for sightseeing when we were a family. From perpetual foster child to the head of my own real clan. It had taken only more than four decades. I smiled inside.

A
family. So this is what serenity must feel like.

After more than two hours in the air, I hooked a right northeast of Sacramento, then followed the highway that wended up from the little Gold Rush-era burg of Placerville, to the airport at South Lake Tahoe. That way, even if visibility deteriorated, which it showed no indication of doing, I could reasonably minimize the chances of becoming personally acquainted with any of the area’s 10,000-foot peaks. The Sierra was a veritable graveyard of airplanes whose pilots disrespected Mama Nature and paid the price. The
Duck
and I didn’t intend to join them.

We were twelve minutes from landing, according to the Garmin GPS mounted on my steering yoke. Oakland Center had just instructed me to squawk VFR and change to the advisory frequency for traffic pattern entry at South Lake Tahoe, when something on the ground a mile or so ahead of us and slightly to the north glinted brightly, almost blindingly. It looked to me like a signaling mirror, like somebody trying to get our attention. Whatever it was seemed to be coming from deep in the pines between two jagged, granite crests.

“Where are we?” Savannah said, stretching her arms and yawning.

“About ten miles out of Tahoe. Nice nap?”

“Wonderful nap. Very restful. What are you looking at?”

“I’m not exactly sure.”

I banked left to get a better look, hugging mountainsides as close as prudence would allow.

Had we taken off from Rancho Bonita one minute earlier that morning, or a minute later, the angle of the sun would’ve been lower or higher, and I might not have seen what I saw. I wouldn’t have seen it had there been more clouds, as the weather gurus initially predicted, or had I been focused on my prelanding checklist, as I probably should’ve been. The Buddha believes that what happens in life happens for a reason. I still don’t know the reason I saw what I saw that morning. But looking down through the pines as I flew over them, I glimpsed a large piece of polished aluminum protruding from the snow.

It looked like the twisted, skeletal remains of an airplane wing.

“S
OUTH
L
AKE
Tahoe area traffic, Cessna Four Charlie Lima is five miles southwest of the field, descending through 8,000 feet. Crosswind entry, runway One-Eight, full-stop, South Lake Tahoe.”

I radioed our intentions and instinctively leaned forward in my seat, scanning the sky. If there were any other aircraft landing or departing the field, I couldn’t see them. The radio was silent. A good sign.

We turned base at pattern altitude. The view of Lake Tahoe off the
Duck’s
passenger side was spectacular. Whitecaps danced on water the color of gunmetal. Savannah gazed serenely out the window, smiling to herself. That was always one thing I loved about her, her willingness to let beautiful moments speak for themselves, rather than diluting them with the obvious, “Isn’t that beautiful?”

“South Lake Tahoe area traffic, Cessna Four Charlie Lima is turning final,” I radioed, “runway One-Eight, South Lake Tahoe.”

The
Duck
sniffed out the runway and settled onto the asphalt as gentle as a sigh. One of our better landings, if I do say so myself.

“You should think about being a pilot,” Savannah said, teasing me. “You’re not half bad at it.”

“Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll definitely give it some thought.”

I broadcast that we were “down and clear” of the runway, and taxied toward an arrow and a sign that said, “Transient parking.” A tall, gangly ramp attendant in his mid-twenties, wearing faded Levis and a florescent green safety vest over a hooded San Francisco 49ers sweatshirt, directed us to a tie-down spot in front of Summit Aviation Services, the local fixed-base operator. After I’d shut down the engine, he set the wheel chocks and began chaining down the
Duck’s
wings to the tarmac, then held Savannah’s door open for her.

“I’m Chad. Welcome to Tahoe,” he said, brushing his long, unkempt dirty blond hair out of his face. He had sallow eyes, ice blue. “Where’re you guys in from?”

I wanted to ask him at what point did people begin referring to both men and women synonymously as “guys?” But I didn’t.

“Rancho Bonita,” I said, “by way of Los Angeles.”

“Sweet. My girlfriend lives down in Rancho Bonita—actually, my
former
girlfriend. We still talk pretty much every day, though. One of those deals where we tell each other pretty much everything. No holding back. Maybe that’s why we broke up. Who knows, right?”

“Something to strive toward in any relationship, that degree of openness and emotional intimacy,” Savannah said, looking directly at me with one eyebrow raised. “Wouldn’t you agree, Logan?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“Maybe you know her,” Chad said opening the
Duck’s
baggage door and taking out our luggage. “Her name’s Cherry Rosales. She works at Nordstrom, the store downtown. Sells jewelry.”

“Actually,” I said, “I’m more of a Sears kind of guy.”

The air was cold enough that we could see our breath. Chad asked how long we planned to stay and whether we needed any recommendations on accommodations in the Tahoe area. Savannah gave him the name of the local bed-and-breakfast where she’d made reservations.

“As for how long we’re staying,” she said, “that all depends on how well my pilot and I are getting along.”

“We’re getting married,” I said, clarifying matters.

“Seriously?” Chad’s expression implied that people our age were as likely to croak from some incurable disease as they were to get hitched.

“Yeah. Seriously.”

“Hey, that’s totally cool. Congratulations.”

Savannah said we’d need a rental car, to which Chad replied, “No problem.” I said that the
Duck’s
gas tanks would need to be topped off to which he offered the same response.

“Got your complimentary hot coffee inside, sodas, cookies, peanut butter pretzels, what have you. Feel free to help yourself. Marlene’ll hook you up with all the paperwork for the car and your fuel order. I’ll bring your bags in. Anything else I can do for you folks today?”

“You can call the local search and rescue team for me. I saw something when we were flying in. West, about 10 miles out, up in the hills. It looked like a downed airplane.”

“You’re shittin’ me. A downed airplane? Really?” Chad promptly apologized to Savannah for swearing and said he was trying to break the profanity habit.

No big deal, Savannah said. She’d heard worse.

“I haven’t heard of any planes missing for a while,” Chad said, “either coming in or going out of here, but, hey, you never know, right?”

“Could be it’s been up there for some time and nobody noticed,” I said.

The kid nodded, then snapped his fingers like he’d just thought of something.

“Hey, what if it’s Amelia Earhart?”

“Hey,” I said, tipping him a five-spot, “what if it’s not?”

T
HE AFOREMENTIONED
Marlene, Summit Aviation Services’ zaftig, forty-something receptionist, made Chad seem downright rude by comparison. She waived the overnight parking fee for the
Duck
because we were buying gas, and upgraded our rental car from a compact to a GMC Yukon at no additional cost. Then she brewed a fresh pot of coffee and insisted on serving us oatmeal cookies more freshly baked than the ones that had been sitting on her desk.

“And did I mention we have complimentary bicycles for your enjoyment?—though it’s probably not the best time of the year to go for a bike ride. Been pretty darned nippy around here.”

She leaned over the coffeemaker and poured us Styrofoam cups of hot joe.

The steam fogged the lenses of Marlene’s red-frame bifocals and made her brunette shag even shaggier. Her face was soft and full. I noticed faint dark rings obscured by makeup under both eyes. Natural shading, or the result of being punched? I couldn’t tell.

“So nice of you,” Savannah said. “Thank you.”

“Just trying to keep the customer satisfied.” Marlene smiled. “I believe that was a lyric in an old Simon and Garfunkel song, was it not?”

“I believe it was,” Savannah said.

My ex-wife caught my eye and winked subtly. She knew that I keenly distrusted overtly friendly people until such time as they’d shown their true colors—people like genuinely nice Mrs. Schmulowitz. Geniality, I’ve learned the hard way, often belies the blackest of instincts, hard-wired impulses that cruise sharklike behind cordial smiles, ready to surface at little provocation. I’ve known remorseless murderers who would’ve been perceived as “nice” by any definition when they were not out slaughtering innocents. I’ve personally removed a few of those “nice” people from the planet. But that was before I was introduced to the Buddha who is all about giving strangers the benefit of the doubt, including seemingly well-meaning receptionists.

“Another cookie?” Marlene said.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

The door opened and Chad came in off the flight line, holding his iPhone to his right ear.

“No, ma’am, I’m not the pilot. I just work here. The pilot’s right here.” He handed me the phone. “El Dorado Sheriff’s Department. They want to talk to you.”

The voice on the other end identified herself as Sergeant Somebody. I didn’t catch her name. She said she was the watch commander on duty. I told her what I’d told Chad, about what I’d seen, and approximately where I’d seen it. If I’d had any presence of mind, I told her, I would’ve noted the exact location on my GPS receiver, the latitude and longitude, and written it down. But I hadn’t.

“Nobody’s perfect,” the sergeant assured me.

What I’d seen was likely nothing, she said, but department policy compelled her to have the tip thoroughly investigated regardless. Was I willing to talk to a deputy in person? She could have one at the airport in about half an hour.

I was in no hurry, I said, and handed Chad back his phone.

“My lord, a plane crashed?” Marlene’s hand was over her mouth as she sat down behind her desk. “I hope everyone’s OK.”

“We don’t know if it’s a plane crash yet,” Chad said, delivering an invoice to her, documenting how many gallons of fuel he’d pumped into the
Duck
. “It
might
be a crash. Or nothing at all.”

I noticed a small, round spider web tattooed on the right side of Chad’s neck as he leaned across the counter to hand Marlene his paperwork. Web tats of any kind commonly convey that the bearer has done prison time, but Chad didn’t seem like the inmate type to me. I kept the observation to myself.

Savannah said she wanted to drive into South Lake Tahoe and check into the $300-a-night bed-and-breakfast that she’d carefully researched online and insisted on paying for because she knew I couldn’t. When I was done talking to the deputy, I would call her. She’d then come back to the airport and pick me up. Time permitting, after that, we would drive to Incline Village at the northeast end of the lake, on the Nevada side, and take out a sixty-dollar license at the Washoe County Marriage License Bureau. Then we’d stop in at the Dream-Maker chapel—where Tom Selleck, among many other Hollywood types, got married, according to Savannah—and retie the knot. No muss, no fuss, she said. I wouldn’t even have to change my clothes.

“You’re getting married? How romantic,” Marlene gushed. “You should’ve said something.” She waddled into a back room and returned seconds later with a box about the size of a Twinkie. It was wrapped in plain red paper with a silver ribbon tied around it. “A small token of congratulations from Summit Aviation Services. We get a lot of people coming up here wanting to get married. Tom Selleck got married up here, you know.”

“So I’ve heard,” I said.

“You can open it now if you want,” Marlene said.