Fly by Night

by Ward Larsen

  He asked, “Where else will he focus his investigative efforts?”

  “Who knows. The guy only got here yesterday. Sometimes these things take months, even years.” Schmitt looked at him expectantly, as if anticipating some kind of reaction.

  Khoury said, “I think this inquiry will not last quite so long.”

  Bypassing that comment, Schmitt said, “Oh, yeah. And I sent those letters you mentioned.”

  “Letters?”

  “You know, to Ukraine. I am very sorry to inform you, blah, blah, blah. Those letters.”

  “Yes, of course. And you mentioned compensation?”

  “Just like you said. I told both families there was insurance, but that it would take some time to get a payment. I also told them we’d get in touch right away if any remains were recovered.”

  Khoury nodded, satisfied that this would keep the families quiet long enough.

  “To tell you the truth,” Schmitt added, “I never knew we had a life insurance policy. I should put that on our list of benefits for our next hiring advertisement.”

  “Do as you wish,” Khoury said dismissively.

  “And that reminds me—when can you authorize some hiring? Both those guys we lost were captains. I’m two short right now.”

  “We will hire replacements soon, but not until this investigation has run its course.”

  “I can’t wait that long to—”

  “Enough!” Khoury snapped. He was forced to put up with the moods of Jibril, the engineer, but this man was not so vital. “Do not forget, Captain Schmitt, that you serve in your position at my leisure.”

  Schmitt settled back into his chair. He fell quiet, yet still looked calm. The man was maddening.

  “This investigator, Davis,” Khoury asked, “will he expect to speak with me?”

  “Sooner or later.”

  “Let us choose later. Time is what we need. Tomorrow we will send him on a flight.”

  “One of our flights?”

  “Yes. The American captain and Achmed are scheduled to go out.

  It would give Davis a chance to see our operation—and perhaps keep him out of the way for another day.”

  “You want him to see how we operate? You sure about that?”

  “Do it!”

  Schmitt shrugged. “You’re the boss.”

  “Indeed I am,” Khoury said, his stare turning hawkish.

  With that, Schmitt made his exit.

  Rafiq Khoury eyed the door long after Schmitt was gone. He had always been good at reading men, and right now he had the impression that his chief pilot wasn’t telling him something. Even more, he didn’t like the idea of another American roaming about. Was Davis simply a nuisance? Or an opportunity? In either case, Khoury disliked what the situation demanded.

  He would have to tell General Ali.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  If the operations desk was the nerve center of a flying organization, the bar was its heart—or, in a good unit, its cirrhotic liver. No flying organization could operate without one. It might be situated in a squadron building, outside a main gate, or down the block from corporate headquarters. But there was always a preferred establishment.

  At FBN Aviation, it was at the back of the building, as far away from the business end of the operation as possible. Far from the front door where morality police from the Muslim-dominated government might walk in unannounced. Davis heard the bar before he saw it, raucous chatter and bad music. Over the entryway was a sign stenciled in big, colorful block letters: GUNS-R-US. Inside, Davis found a place like a hundred others he’d been in.

  The centerpiece was a heavy wooden bar with a scuffed brass foot rail, long enough for ten people to lean on. Different types of flying units had different emphases when it came to décor. A fighter unit would have had an inert missile hanging from the ceiling, maybe an ejection seat all bent to hell that somebody had used, then donated to the squadron as a keepsake. But a trash-hauler outfit was different. Traveling the world was their style, so the bar here had a kind of ram-shackle-voyager theme. There were neon beer signs from Japan and Belgium. Native artisan work from Africa and Asia. Pictures were nailed to the wall, poor quality amateur photographs stuffed crookedly into cheap frames. In one, two pilots were sitting on a mountain of ammunition crates, both holding rocket-propelled grenade launchers in mock firing position. Everything in the room had a story, and Davis decided that even if Bob Schmitt was an idiot, he’d at least gotten the bar right.

  At the moment, three men were bellied around the bar, two watching closely as the third drew on a cocktail napkin. When he finished, the artist held up his masterpiece and said, “And that, gentlemen, is how a surgeon performs a boob job.”

  You could learn a lot by hanging out in the bar of a flying unit. You could learn who was a good stick and who wasn’t. You could learn about wives and girlfriends, who gambled, and who went to church. And here, apparently, you could learn about boob jobs.

  One of the men noticed Davis and stared. Two other sets of eyes followed.

  The pilot-cum-plastic surgeon said, “You must be the crash dummy!”

  The accent was Deep South. Mississippi or Alabama. He was medium height, thick in the shoulders, and thicker still in the gut. Red hair curled over a chunky, freckled face that was blanketed in a twoday growth of orange stubble. His grin was easy, as wide as the Sahara.

  “Yeah,” Davis said, “that’s me. I’m here to inspect your keg.”

  “You came to the right place,” the man said. He ambled over and held out a hand. “Ed Boudreau, Deville, Louisiana. Damned glad to meet you!”

  Boudreau, Davis thought, from Louisiana. He remembered the jokes, Boudreau and Thibodeaux. A Cajun with a name like that didn’t need a call sign. He shook Boudreau’s hand.

  “Jammer Davis,” he said, “Washington Beltway.”

  “Well, come on in, Jammer. We heard you was nosing around here somewheres.”

  Boudreau went straight to a rack on the wall where a dozen steins hung on hooks. They all bore names or call signs, and an emblem that had to be FBN Aviation’s unofficial logo—an amateurish, hand-drawn DC-3 encased in some kind of coat of arms, and under that, spelled in block letters formed by bullets, FLY BY NIGHT. Boudreau picked out the mug labeled SCHMITT, a subtle indiscretion that told Davis a lot.

  Taking the commander’s mug was a serious breach of etiquette. Either Schmitt never drank here, or these guys really hated him. Maybe both. Boudreau filled the mug from a handled tap that was mounted into the door of the refrigerator, then slid the stein across the bar.

  “Thanks,” Davis said.

  Boudreau said, “I’ll do the honors. This is my buddy from Warsaw, Henri Podulski.”

  Podulski. Davis had seen the name on the scheduling board out front, and he’d expected a big, ugly lug. That was exactly what he got. The man was four inches shorter than Davis, but every bit as wide. His face was stony and impervious, pale blue eyes set above Slavic cheeks of polished marble. His massive head was shaved, and at the back were two big wrinkles where his skull and spine merged, like whoever had put him together had ended up a couple of vertebrae short. Davis would have pegged Podulski as former military, but not an airplane driver. More like a tank driver. Davis nodded and got a grunt in return.

  “And this,” Boudreau said, “is Eduardo.”

  That was it, just Eduardo. One name, like a Brazilian soccer player or something. It was probably on his pilot’s license that way. Eduardo at least shook hands. He was a snappy dresser, nice slacks and a coordinated button-down shirt. He had smooth olive skin and black hair flecked with gray, nicely trimmed. When he smiled Davis was nearly blinded. Eduardo didn’t look like a pilot either. More like the guy who’d file a pilot’s divorce papers.

  “So you’ll be looking into this accident?” Boudreau asked.

  “I guess somebody has to,” said Davis.

  “They were good men,” Boudreau offered, “we all liked ’em. Have you found out anyt
hing yet?”

  “About the accident? No, not much. I wanted to ask what you guys knew.” Davis said it lightly, but he was dead serious. Without the hard currency of forensic evidence, he was scraping for anything he could get. Every crash got pilots talking in the bar, a lot of brass-footrail experts with theories and rumors and whispers. Davis would listen to every one.

  He said, “I understand that this airplane went up for a maintenance check flight. Apparently there had been some work done on the ailerons. I was wondering—is there a procedure for that? You know, like a checklist you go through, steps to make sure everything is right?”

  Boudreau and Eduardo looked at the Pole, so Davis figured he must be the resident expert.

  Podulski said, “Yes.”

  After a long pause, Davis prodded, “Any chance I could see it?”

  The big guy didn’t say anything. Not yes or no or even go to hell. He just took a long pull on his mug, got up, and disappeared down the hallway. The guy had the charisma of a cast-iron skillet.

  Davis stared at the other two. His expression asked, Is he always like that?

  Eduardo said, “Henri was close to the Ukrainians. He has lost two friends.”

  Boudreau agreed, “Yeah, don’t mind him. Things have been a little tense around here since the crash. You understand.”

  Davis took a pull on his beer and nodded. He understood all too well.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Podulski came back, sat down behind his mug, and sent a three-ring checklist sliding across the bar.

  Davis picked it up. It was the size of a hardcover book, with heavy bond pages that were dog-eared and worn. He flipped to the index, then to a page at the back titled: Aileron and Balance Tab Rigging Certification Procedure. Davis read through it once. It was more straightforward than the convoluted title implied, just a few basic steps. Roll right, check the trim, roll left. Simple stuff.

  He asked Podulski, “You ever do one of these checks?”

  “Once or twice.”

  “How long did it take?”

  “Five minutes. Perhaps ten.”

  “So why would these guys have been airborne for half an hour before they crashed? I mean, why would they even fly out over the Red Sea? Seems to me, you’d just take off, climb a few thousand feet over the home drome, do the checklist, and then land. Ten minutes, fifteen tops. When they crashed, those guys should have been right here pulling their second round.”

  Davis waited. Got silence. Probably because they were all wondering the same thing. When an airplane crashes a lot of questions get asked, but nobody has a more vested interest in finding answers than the other pilots in that flying organization. The guys who had to keep flying the same equipment with the same procedures. With a twist of his wrist, Davis sent the checklist spinning back across the bar toward Podulski.

  Boudreau put a hand to his stubbled chin, gave it a rub—Davis could actually hear the coarse grinding noise—and asked, “Is it true you and Schmitt have a history?”

  “Yeah,” Davis said. “Is that a problem?”

  Ed Boudreau from Deville, Louisiana, grinned. He went to the refrigerator, pulled out a tray of cold cuts, cheese, and sliced tomatoes, then a loaf of bread from under the bar.

  “Help yourself, Jammer.”

  Davis didn’t hesitate. He built a tall sandwich, a three-layer stack that barely fit into his mouth.

  “There’s no love lost around here when it comes to Schmitt,” Boudreau said. “I was the last one to fly that airplane, had her up the day before the crash. There wasn’t anything wrong with those ailerons. And there was no write-up in the logbook about them.”

  None of the others looked surprised at this revelation. So they had been talking.

  “That would mean the write-up is bogus,” Davis surmised in a serious tone. The tone he would have used if he didn’t already know this. “So maybe somebody put that gripe in the logbook to make it look like the airplane had been in for maintenance.”

  “That’s what we think,” Eduardo said.

  “But why?” Davis asked.

  Podulski, his voice a stony rumble of consonants, said, “Maybe as reason for this airplane to go up on quick flight.”

  “It gives a nice tidy cause for you to hang your investigation on, don’t it?” Boudreau added.

  Eduardo put in his two cents. “It is almost like someone expected this airplane to crash.”

  “Sabotage?” Davis said. “I don’t know, guys. Where’s the motive? Those old airframes can’t be worth anything. I’ll bet they’re not even insured. Not to mention the fact that you lose two good pilots. I don’t see any upside to that theory.”

  No answers. Three quiet pilots. Davis had come in not sure how to play this crowd. So far, they’d been willing to help. Even more encouraging, they seemed to be smelling a lot of the same foul odors he was. Davis decided to press further.

  “Any of you guys been out to FBN Aviation’s hangar?”

  “Nobody goes there,” Eduardo said. “It is strictly off-limits.”

  “I delivered an airplane there once,” Boudreau said, “about three months ago. They sent me Stateside to pick one up from long-term storage in Mojave. Hopped it back here and left it at the hangar.”

  “Did you put it inside?” Davis asked.

  “No. Just left it on the ramp out front. I ain’t never seen them doors open, not even once. But that airplane was gone the next morning, like it had just been swallowed right up.”

  “Do you remember the tail number?”

  “It was an oddball, X something. Got the full number in my pilot logbook.”

  “X-ray Eight Five Bravo Golf?” Davis asked.

  “Yeah, I think that was it. Haven’t seen her since.”

  “I saw it on the ramp yesterday,” Davis said.

  After a silence, Boudreau remarked, “So it’s back in service.”

  “Apparently.”

  “Doesn’t an X prefix mean experimental?” Boudreau asked. “That airplane was weird, had all kinds of strange avionics. Flew funny too. Mushy and slow.”

  Davis figured the “new” X85BG didn’t fly that way. He wondered if these guys would notice, if any of them would figure out that the tail numbers had been switched. He decided they would. In such a small company, each airplane was unique, with its own scars and quirks. More than ever, Davis wondered what had happened to the real X85BG. It all made his head spin.

  He finished his sandwich and put together a second, two tiers this time. Davis hadn’t realized how hungry he was. He was knifing mustard out of a jar when the silence was broken by an authoritative voice.

  “Room, ten-hut!”

  In an instinct bred from four years at a military academy, not to mention a career of service, Davis’ spine stiffened. But he didn’t stand to attention.

  Bob Schmitt laughed as he came into the room.

  Schmitt headed for the bar. “If it isn’t the great Jammer Davis. You figure everything out yet, cowboy?”

  Davis took a bite of his sandwich, and said with a half-full mouth, “Not yet. But I will.”

  Schmitt went to the rack and looked for his mug, but didn’t find it. Because it was in Davis’ hand. Schmitt pulled another off the rack, one bearing the name Stan. Drinking from a dead pilot’s mug. From the corner of his eye, Davis saw Podulski snarl and flex, like a rottweiler who’d just spotted the UPS guy nearing the front door. Thinking the Pole might go after Schmitt, Davis started a little internal debate about whether to let it happen. It was an interesting conundrum, with lots of pluses and minuses. In the end it wasn’t an issue. Podulski grabbed his mug and headed for the door. Eduardo followed.

  Davis looked at Schmitt and said, “You really have a way with your men.”

  “Go to hell.”

  Boudreau got up to leave.

  Schmitt pointed a finger at him. “Hold on, Boudreau!”

  The Cajun paused.

  “Have you seen your assignment for tomorrow?”

  �
��Not yet. Where am I going?”

  “Down range. Central Congo.”

  “Not another one of them danged jungle airstrips,” Boudreau grumbled.

  “You’ll find it.”

  “Finding it ain’t the trouble.”

  Davis waited to hear what was the trouble, but that never came, because when Schmitt pulled the tap the keg only ponied up half a beer before it started spewing foam. He looked like he might pop an aneurysm.

  “Dammit!” he said. “This thing’s dry again. Who the hell is snacko?”

  “I think it’s Achmed,” Boudreau replied.

  “Well get his ass in here.”

  Boudreau disappeared down the hall.

  Pilots in a small organization always had additional duties. The bottom rung on the ladder was snacko. You kept the bar stocked, emptied an honor box full of quarters and dollar bills, went to the store and bought beer nuts and Twinkies. And most importantly, you kept the keg up to speed. Never fail on that, because if you screwed up, you didn’t get fired. You kept the job longer.

  “Who’s Achmed?” Davis asked.

  “One of our local copilots, a miserable kid. When he gets his hands on an airplane it’s like a kite in a tornado.”

  “So what are you hauling down to the Congo?”

  Schmitt laughed, and said, “Hell if I know, I never see the contracts. We get tasked to haul God knows what to God knows where. Load, fly, and don’t ask questions.” Schmitt took a sip of his beer, got an upper lip covered in foam. He wiped it on a sleeve.

  “That doesn’t bother you?” Davis asked. “What you might be delivering?”

  “Screw you, Jammer. It’s all legal in my book.”

  “Guns and ammo? All aboveboard?”

  “It can be.”

  After a long pause, Davis said, “What goes on out at FBN’s hangar?”

  Schmitt looked at him suspiciously. “That’s the second time you’ve asked about that.”

  “And that’s the second time you haven’t answered.”

  “If I was you, I’d let it go. Khoury’s people keep that place under lockdown. Nobody goes near.”