McKenzie glanced at the photos briefly and shoved them away. “What information are we talking about here?” he said. “Just because he robbed a couple of banks with the guy a year ago doesn’t mean he knows where Cummings is headed now. He could have changed plans.”
“My client knows where the Morris couple and Mr. Cummings are headed, and why they are going there.”
“You’re going to have to do better than that,” said McKenzie.
“Mr. Cummings set up a plan to escape the country some time ago,” said Underwood. “He is attempting to make contact with an individual who can provide him with false documents to do so. I think we have to assume that the Morris couple will now be included. Mr. Cummings spoke of this individual several times, and gave details to my client on the exact plan. And a name.”
McKenzie said nothing. “I’m still not convinced.”
Kelso spoke up. “Let me guess, Mr. F.B.I. guy. They’re heading north, right? Check it out. I know exactly where they’re going.”
Underwood touched Kelso on the shoulder. “That’s enough.”
McKenzie thought back to the agents murdered on the Forest Service road, as well as the ones killed in the helicopter crash. The bodies were now sitting in the local morgue. He hesitated only a moment and glanced over at the Federal prosecutor. “Give him what he wants,” he said.
Cosgrove looked at McKenzie in disbelief. “You can’t be serious? I can offer a reduced sentence perhaps, but full immunity? Not a chance!”
McKenzie stood up and spoke through gritted teeth. “Those people have killed six Federal officers, two rangers, and several state and local police officers. Give this asshole and his no-morals attorney what they want and get his goddamn statement.” He glared at Kelso hard across the table, who almost seemed to shrink within himself. “You steer us wrong and I’ll be back to see you. Even an attorney won’t help you then.”
“I’m noting that statement,” said Underwood. “Sounds like a threat against my client.”
“Take it any way you want, Miss Underwood,” said McKenzie. “You just better advise your client not to jack us around. I want everything he knows, every detail on Cummings, and he confesses to every crime he’s ever committed himself since he was in kindergarten.”
Underwood looked at Cosgrove. “So do we have a deal? Full immunity for my client in exchange for his full cooperation in your case against Cummings and the Morris couple?”
Cosgrove nodded. “Yes, yes.” He shook his head in disgust. “Full immunity if he cooperates.”
“Okay,” said McKenzie. He thrust a finger at Kelso. “You got what you wanted, lowlife. I want to know right now where Ben is headed and why.” He turned to Kelso’s lawyer. “I want his full statement faxed to me by midnight, but until then I need to know what he knows.”
Underwood leaned over and whispered in Kelso’s ear. He nodded.
“They’re headed for Seattle,” Kelso said. “Ben told me lots of times about a guy he knew up there who could fix him up with legit passports under phony identities. Good ones, but they cost a lot of money. And the guy is a weapons dealer, too. Ben always said he was going to use him to get out of the country.”
“What’s his name?” McKenzie said.
“Greg Wallace.”
“Where in Seattle?”
“Ben said he lived in the University District, you know, near the University of Washington. That’s all I know.”
“That’s it? That’s all you’ve got?”
Kelso leaned across the table. “Trust me. He’s going to contact this Wallace guy. He kept notes about him on a little paper tablet. Sometimes Wallace would call Ben on his cell phone, or he would call him. I never met this Wallace, but he’s definitely Ben’s go-to guy. We were supposed to bail out of the country after the next few heists, but we had a falling out, you might say. You searched his ranch, right? You ought to have that notebook already.”
McKenzie thought back to the list of items recovered from the ranch. Weapons, a few stray bills from bank robberies, a dressing table with wigs and makeup, and a host of other things. He didn’t remember seeing anything about a pad with written notes. They didn’t find it in the initial search, he thought. If this dirtbag is telling the truth, anyway. McKenzie stood up and hit the buzzer for the exit door. “I have work to do,” he said. “And I still want that statement by midnight.” When the guard didn’t show up immediately, McKenzie pounded on the door with his one good hand. “Guard!”
A heavy key rattled in the lock and the door swung open. McKenzie bumped the guard out of his way as he left.
When McKenzie returned to the mobile command post, he saw that his request for cooperation from the Air Force had been approved. The approval came in the form of an official fax from the Director of the F.B.I. The last line of the document noted that the Morris couple and Benjamin Cummings had now been promoted to number one on the F.B.I.’s Ten Most Wanted List.
“All right,” McKenzie said grimly to the group of Special Agents who had gathered inside the trailer. “Our perps just made number one. We have authority from the President and the Director to call out any help we need from the Air Force, because our perps have just been declared terrorists. That means the first whiff of information we get on these fugitives’ location, we call the nearest base to where that location is, and we ask for fighter support to force them to land, or shoot them down. Personally, I don’t care which. Everyone understand?”
There were murmurs of approval from the agents.
“Anything from Air Traffic yet?”
“No, sir,” someone answered.
“Well,” said McKenzie, “it’s been two and a half hours since they stole that airplane. My guess is they’re heading north and trying to stay below the radar. We have some good information that they’re probably headed for Seattle. Send out a general bulletin to all state, county, and local police in Oregon and Washington State. Ask them to keep an eye out anywhere in their jurisdictions where they think a small aircraft could make a landing. Like any small airstrips, for example. Those guys have to come down sooner or later, and when they do someone should be waiting.” He waved a hand in dismissal. “Now hook up this trailer and recall everyone from the field. We’re heading over to the interstate and moving this manhunt up to Seattle.”
Ben made another adjustment on the fuel feeds, trying to keep the aircraft in balance by burning fuel evenly from both the wing tanks and the auxiliary tanks. He shook his head.
“What’s wrong?” said Ray.
“We burned up a lot of fuel getting out of there. We’re not going to make it to Seattle on what we have.”
“Do you know where we are?” said Karen.
“I think we’re just south of the Washington-Oregon border, between Mount Hood and The Dalles. Look out the left window here. See it?”
Ray leaned forward and glanced out Ben’ window. The massive, white-capped silhouette of Oregon’s most famous mountain was easily recognizable. “How far can we make it before we have to land?”
“Maybe a hundred and fifty miles. Not quite enough to get to Seattle.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“Well,” said Ben, “I was raised in Washington. I’ve been on every Forest Service road from the Olympics to the east slopes of the Cascades. I think our best bet is to stay on the east side of the Cascades and land somewhere near Yakima on one of those Forest Service roads. Then someone will have to go into town and buy us a car. I’ll do it, because I know that area better than you do. And someone has to stay with the money and the weapons. Besides, it’ll be safer than if all three of us go.”
“What about the plane? We can’t just leave it in the road,” said Karen.
“We’ll run it off into the brush, or shove it off an embankment. Then we cover it up the best we can with dead branches. Up there, it might not be spotted for weeks, maybe months even.”
“Up where?” said Morris.
“I was thinking of Darland Mountain,�
� said Ben. “It’s just west of Yakima and there isn’t a lot of traffic on those Forest Service roads. I used to hunt out there. Some of those roads are flat enough and long enough to make a good landing. If I can hike into Yakima and pick up a car without having to steal it, we’ll have a better chance of getting to Seattle. Once we hook up with my connection there, we’ll be home free.”
Dale Smith glanced out the window of his Piper Cub and saw what he recognized as a Cessna 172 headed on a parallel course far below. That’s strange, he thought. Why the hell is he flying so far below the minimum for this area? Maybe the pilot was in trouble or something, and about to make a forced landing. He pushed the control yoke forward a bit and descended toward the other aircraft, continuing to match its speed and course. When he was about five hundred feet above them, he held position and watched. It was barely clearing the trees carpeting the foothills below, but it didn’t seem to be in distress. The prop on the Cessna was turning, and the pilot was flying straight and level, except for an occasional brief hop over a tall tree. Smith got close enough to read the N-number on the wings and quickly made a note of it on a writing pad sitting on the other seat.
That guy has a death wish, Smith thought. He switched on his radio and hoped the pilot below was tuned to the same frequency. “Unidentified Cessna N-739CT flying low, this is Piper Cub above you. Do you read?”
There was no response. “Cessna 172 N-739DT, are you in distress? Do you read? Over.”
Smith pushed the yoke forward and ventured lower, until he was flying side-by-side with the Cessna. He looked over into the cabin from about thirty feet away. Two men in the front stared back at him, expressionless. Smith eased the throttle up and moved ahead, twisting his head to get another look. There was a woman in the rear seat. Suddenly, he recognized their faces from the TV news. “Oh, shit!” His heart pounded in his chest. Trying to keep his cool, he waved at them and moved away, gaining altitude and turning to the right. He switched to the emergency frequency. “PDX control, this is November nine eight six Charlie Papa, do you read?”
“Nine eight six Charlie Papa, this is PDX tower,” came the reply from Portland International. “Go ahead. Are you declaring an emergency?”
“Negative, PDX. I want to report a Cessna 172 flying in a dangerous manner. And I believe the persons on board are wanted by the authorities.”
“Nine eight six, can you explain that please, over?”
“Roger PDX. I dropped down to look at them because they are barely above the trees about twenty miles east of Mount Hood. I recognized the pilot and two passengers as the same people who have been on the television news all week.” They’ll pull my ticket for this one, Smith thought. Probably think I’m crazy or drunk.
“Roger that, nine eight six. Can you see the aircraft’s N number from your position?”
“Roger that,” Smith replied. He read from his notepad. “November seven three nine Delta Tango.”
The voice on the other end at PDX suddenly grew serious. “November nine eight six Charlie Papa, do not approach this aircraft. It is a stolen aircraft and the people on board are being sought by the F.B.I. They are considered armed and extremely dangerous. Do you have heading and speed for this aircraft? Their transponder has been disabled. Over.”
“PDX, nine eight six. They are about five hundred yards north of my position and altitude...well; they are almost at ground level. Heading north.”
“Roger that, nine eight six. Suggest you change your heading at once and cease following them. F.B.I. is being notified.”
Smith quickly turned west and headed for Portland. The pleasure cruise was over, but he had one hell of a story to tell his wife later.
“Well, that’s it,” said Ben, pulling off his headset. “Told you he’d go for the emergency frequency, didn’t I? He’s got good fuckin’ eyesight, I’ll tell you that.” He looked over at Ray. “If I thought we could catch his ass, I’d put us up close to that son of a bitch and let you take a few pops at him.”
Ray turned around in his seat and looked out the rear window. “I can still see him. He has to be a couple of miles away by now. At least he’s not following us anymore.”
“Well, it won’t be long before the F.B.I. sends up the big boys to run us down,” said Ben. We have to get out of the air and back on the ground.” He saw the Columbia River just ahead, a wide, smooth-flowing expanse of blue water that divided Oregon and Washington. “Here we go,” he said. “Welcome to the Evergreen State.”
Special Agent Ryan McKenzie listened intently as an agent in the F.B.I.’s Portland office continued his report. McKenzie had switched the call to speakerphone so everyone else in the trailer could hear the news.
“...spotted at low altitude by a private pilot just east of Mount Hood and heading north,” said the agent. “Nothing on radar yet, but they are probably across the Columbia by now.”
“Any Air Force bases in that area?” asked McKenzie. “Anybody we can call up to give chase? Army, Navy, goddamn Coast Guard? I don’t care if it’s an Air National Guard guy flying a rubber-powered glider.”
“Nothing close by, sir. There’s Yakima Firing Range. They have helicopters, but they’re an hour away. Nearest air base is actually Fairchild up in Spokane, and that’s our best shot. They’ve just scrambled a pair of F-16’s with AESA radar capability and should reach the Columbia River area in less than thirty minutes. They won’t be able to hang around long before refueling, though. They’re going to afterburners to try and make time. We’ve also sent up two helicopters out of PDX, but they don’t have much chance of catching up to that Cessna. We’ve alerted all the local police departments along the east Cascade slope line, but it’s a sparsely populated area of the state. The city of Goldendale is the only place of any size between their present position and Yakima. The local PD there is sending up a helicopter in a few minutes. Maybe they can spot them.”
McKenzie slammed his fist onto the desk in frustration. “Shit!” The command post trailer, which was now being towed behind a large truck and on its way north, rocked a bit as it hit a bump on the freeway. McKenzie glanced out the window. They were coming into the outskirts of Portland. “All right, all right. Do what you can. We’ll be stopping at the Portland office in about fifteen minutes. And relay a message to those Air Force guys. If they can confirm the identity on that Cessna, they can shoot the son of a bitch out of the sky. You got that?” He cut off the call and addressed the six other agents riding with him in the trailer. “You heard him. We were right. They’re probably trying to get to Seattle and hook up with that Wallace guy.”
One of the agents was on a cell phone in the back of the trailer. He ended the call and groaned. “Shit.”
“What is it?” said McKenzie.
“Your snitch down in Eureka was either lying or just wrong.”
“That Kelso guy? What do you mean?”
“Seattle PD and some of our guys kicked down Greg Wallace’s door up in the U-District. Turns out he was in the same company over in Iraq as our perps. But he’s clean. He’s going to the UW on his G.I. benefits. Studying law. Says he hasn’t seen either of the men in years.”
McKenzie nodded. “Figures. Another dead end. Call that prosecutor down in Eureka and let him know Kelso’s information is bogus.” He thought back to what Kelso told him about a notebook hidden somewhere at Cummings’ ranch. A notebook containing the real information on his escape plan. He probably didn’t trust Kelso with the real information and lied to him about his contact guy in Seattle, McKenzie thought. McKenzie knew a dozen F.B.I. agents were busy with axes and crowbars right now tearing Cummings’ ranch house and outbuildings to pieces looking for the notebook and any possible evidence, but there was no word yet on results. Someone was supposed to call if they found anything.
McKenzie walked up to a map posted on the wall showing Northern California, Oregon, and Washington. Pins were stuck into it in several spots, with Post-It notes attached to most of them. He tapped a finger on a spot a
long the Columbia River. “All right. We know they were here a few minutes ago and heading north. We’ve got jets coming southwest out of Spokane, here...” He pointed to another spot. “And helicopters moving in from Portland and Yakima...here, and here. We need to call out the National Guard guys, the State Patrol, and anyone they can spare from the Yakima Firing Range to set up roadblocks along every highway north of the Columbia River and south of Yakima. It’s time to pen these guys in and take them down once and for all. Start making the phone calls.”
“We have to get out of the air,” said Ben. He was scanning the ground a few hundred feet below, looking for a place to land.
“I can see a town out to the right a couple of miles,” said Morris.
“That’s Goldendale,” said Ben. “Damn it. It’s too open around here to put down without being seen. This plane has to be all over the news. Every local is going to know who we are the minute we touch down.”
“What do you want to do?”
“Is there an airport in Goldendale?” said Karen, from her seat in the back.
“Airport? Sure? But they’ll know who we are as soon as they see our N-number. Cops would show up in two minutes.”
“They might not expect it,” she pressed.
Ben thought for a moment. “Take out your smart phone. Quick.”
Karen dug it from her purse and turned it on. “Okay.”
“Can you get a signal? You got internet?”
“Let me see. Wait...yes.”
“Google on Goldendale Airport and see what comes up.”
She did as he asked. “There’s a link to it. I’m trying it now.”
“Hand me the phone.” He reached back and took it from her. The information on the airport was already on the screen.
Airport use:
Open to the public
Activation date:
06/1958
Sectional chart:
SEATTLE
Revenge Story Page 15