High Flight

by David Hagberg

  At three in the morning, however, he was alone in his office, working at his computer. Despite his drunkenness and tiredness, he never felt more lucid. His words flowed like a mountain stream—clear, cold, precise, and very fast.

  He didn’t bother with his notes, or with the latest stack of reports from his analysts, but wrote simply and directly from his heart. The passion was on him.

  After this was sent to his six-thousand-plus subscribers the present relationship between Japan and the United States would change, and the change would be dramatic.

  ARE WE WAITING FOR ANOTHER PEARL HARBOR? his headline demanded. And he proceeded to tell his readers why another Pearl Harbor, this one possibly a strike on the Panama Canal, bottling the Atlantic fleet, would happen. Combined with an accident at the mouth of Tokyo Bay, which would keep the Seventh Fleet from striking, the Japanese MSDF would have a free, if short, reign over the western Pacific. Wiser heads would prevail, of course, and the little war would be stopped almost immediately, but not before Japan got what it wanted, which was economic control of the western Pacific basin.

  “It’s coming,” he warned.

  The NTSB took over an old TWA maintenance hangar across Dulles field from the terminal, well away from the public’s eye. Some of the wreckage had already been transported from the site three miles away, and investigators were piecing the airplane back together. It was hard enough making sense out of the tangled, burned wreckage without the intrusions of television cameras and press photographers. However, each day at noon, a media briefing that lasted exactly twenty minutes was held in one corner of the hangar. No one cared for the arrangement, but that’s the way the Board did things.

  Kennedy and Socrates showed up ten minutes after the briefing ended, just as Al Vasilanti and Malcolm O‘Toole were emerging from one of the office trailers set up at the rear of the hangar. Vasilanti had aged ten years in the last three days, but O’Toole was an ageless English bulldog, his long white hair and muttonchops in total disarray.

  “You just missed the press,” Vasilanti told them. “And it’s a good thing, because they’re starting to smell blood.”

  All four men shook hands, but Socrates couldn’t keep his eyes away from the remains of the P522 laid out in pieces like a corpse at a post-mortem. He shook his head. “It wasn’t my airframe’s fault,” he muttered.

  “It was an engine overheat again,” O’Toole said, following the engineer’s gaze. Pieces of that wing were still being picked up, whereas most of the starboard wing had been brought over and reassembled. The absence of the port wing and engine made for a stark conclusion.

  “The ceramic blades again?” Socrates asked sharply.

  “It would appear so, George. But I’ll swear by the Queen Mother that for whatever reasons the high-pressure blisk turbine overheated, the temperatures were well within our design parameters.”

  “But the blades broke down?”

  “Yes. It should not have happened, but it did. And it looks as if overheat was the case.”

  “Could it have been sabotage, Sir Malcolm?” Kennedy asked.

  “I sincerely wish it were, but I’ve found nothing to indicate that the cat’s been in the cream.”

  “What about the heat sensors?”

  “We’ve found nothing on the recording tape to indicate a malfunction of the port unit. Of course it was completely destroyed. But we’ve got the starboard unit on the bench.”

  “Anything?” Kennedy asked.

  Sir Malcolm shook his leonine head sadly. “Functions as designed.”

  “Then we’re back to 1990,” Socrates said bitterly.

  “With one important exception,” Kennedy interjected. “In ’90 it was our first crash. This is the second one, apparently from the same cause. That in itself gives us a starting point.”

  “Rolls goes back to the Gamma titanium aluminide for its blades,” Socrates shot back. “We must immediately ground the fleet and retrofit all the engines.”

  “That will take time and money, neither of which we can afford,” Vasilanti said. The remark was so uncharacteristic that it stopped everyone dead.

  “But, Mr. Vasilanti, think of the lives that might be lost,” Socrates protested, recovering first.

  “As long as the FAA does not issue the grounding order, we will quietly inspect each engine in the field. Our AOG teams can get the job done within the month. The airlines won’t object, and they’ll keep their mouths shut.”

  The AOG—Aircraft on the Ground—team had been Boeing’s idea. Airplanes grounded because of maintenance problems were bad publicity. So Guerin, like Boeing, fielded rapid-deployment teams of experts who could go anywhere at a moment’s notice and fix virtually any problem. Each team had available to it at least one P522 equipped as a flying spare-parts store, machine shop, and electronics repair facility. On more than one occasion an AOG team had completely rebuilt a jetliner that had been so heavily damaged in an accident or hijacking or shelling by a military force that the owners had already contacted their insurance carrier to find out where the carcass should be scrapped. In many cases it was the insurance company that contacted Guerin.

  “It will take us some time to supply you with replacement blades,” Sir Malcolm said.

  “I didn’t say that we were replacing the blades. We’re going to inspect each engine. Top to bottom.”

  “For what?”

  “Booby traps. Bombs. Remote-control devices on the fuel ports or air intake ducts.”

  He had their attention now. Especially Socrates and Sir Malcolm.

  “It would answer some fundamental questions, that,” the British engine designer said.

  “Our AOG teams will go out with a pair of brand-new engines from stock so there’ll be no chance they will have been tampered with. We’ll work one airplane at a time. Yank the old engines, replace them with the new, and before we move on, tear down the old engines. Sooner or later we’ll come across another plane ready to blow.”

  “If there is another,” Sir Malcolm said. “It has been seven years between incidents.”

  “There’ll be another,” Kennedy interjected. “Possibly more than one.”

  Vasilanti eyed him sharply.

  “What?” Sir Malcolm asked.

  “We can’t assume that this crash is an isolated incident. Certain facts have come to our attention that lead me to suspect that something like this will happen again. Very soon.”

  “Then I agree with George, ground the fleet. In the meantime, what are these certain facts, David?”

  “I’d rather not say at the moment.”

  “These are Rolls-Royce engines. We too have a reputation to maintain. Good Lord, man, think of the consequences if another of your birds goes down. Think of the lives lost.”

  “We have,” Kennedy said. “Which is why we’re glad that you’re here. If anyone can find out how those engines are overheating, it will be you and George.”

  Sir Malcolm looked at Kennedy shrewdly, his lips pursed. “There’ve been rumors floating about that your company may be under attack. A hostile takeover of one sort or another. Any validity to this?”

  “Possibly,” Kennedy said carefully. This was not Rolls-Royce’s fight, although the company would suffer if Guerin went under. But, if Rolls were to be officially notified that a major problem was looming on the horizon, the British government—which controlled the company—might withdraw as Guerin’s primary engine supplier. That in itself would spell disaster.

  “Would there be a connection to this business?”

  “We hope not, Sir Malcolm, but that too is a possibility we cannot ignore.”

  “What a cockup,” the Brit said. “Then we’d best shake a leg and keep it in the family.”

  The riots that began in Tokyo’s Akasaka District the next morning had not been planned. Japanese newspapers and television over the past month had been filled with grisly stories about a young Japanese woman on vacation in New York who was raped and killed in Central Park. It w
as the eleventh murder of a Japanese citizen visiting the United States in three years, and the public was sick to death of the mindless violence. The neo-fascist organization Rising Sun, which wanted control of the Diet and wanted to take Japan back to a pre-World War II condition of international military might, took full advantage of the growing crowds in front of the Suntory Building and nearby New Otani Hotel. The organization, which was an offshoot of the old Red Army faction, was superb. Within twenty minutes of hearing the news, the co-founders and leaders Shotoro Ashia and Takushiro Hatoyama were exhorting the crowd with bullhorns that their enemy was very near. Only blocks away, in fact, in Minato-ku at the U.S. Embassy.

  The district, bounded on the northwest by the Akasaka Palace and grounds and to the east by the Imperial Palace, was a warren of federal government buildings, international business offices, and foreign embassies. They were in billionaires’ row, and there were more foreigners per square hectare here than anywhere else in Japan. Which was perfect, so far as Rising Sun was concerned.

  The second step, after agitating the rapidly growing crowd, was to produce an old woman who purported to be the mother of the girl killed in New York’s Central Park last month and the young woman who’d been killed yesterday in Yokosuka.

  The girls were sisters, Hatoyama claimed. The old woman’s only daughters. Both of them brutally murdered by savages.

  Timing the old woman’s appearance perfectly, Rising Sun was able to hold the crowd from marching on the U.S. embassy until the media showed up so that everyone would know what was happening here, and why. When CNN arrived the crowd began its march to Minato-ku.

  U.S. Consular Officer Philip Webb was on his way into work and had to skirt the still-growing early crowd, which he estimated to contain at least ten thousand people. He was off by a factor often, but he did get their purpose and destination right and managed to get into the embassy compound about five minutes ahead of the first wave.

  On hearing what was coming their way, Marine Lieutenant Lloyd Robinson, chief of the A.M. security watch, called his CO, Major Bob Richards, CIA Assistant Chief of Station Stephen Pelham, and Special Assistant to the Ambassador Judy Bromme, who was the only ranking officer around this morning who could speak Japanese.

  The crowd, still orderly despite its size and motivation, filled the streets immediately surrounding the embassy and spread in all directions as far as the eye could see. One official estimate placed the final number of people at one million. No one doubted that figure. Softly the crowd began to chant a single word, low, and menacing for its gentleness.

  “What are they saying?” Lieutenant Robinson asked nervously from his post within the gates.

  “Wakarimasen, wakarimasen,” Judy Bromme repeated the ominous chant. She was frightened. “It means ‘I don’t understand.’”

  “They don’t understand what?”

  “I don’t know, but I think we’d better find out.”

  Washington’s rush-hour traffic was in full swing.

  McGarvey waited for Dominique Kilbourne to come out of her office just off Thomas Circle a few blocks from the Russian embassy, and he followed her across the street to the parking lot where she kept her car. It was already dark, cars and buses ran with headlights, and the streetlights had come on. She walked as if she were tired, and yet she was wary, even jumpy. He’d seen the same sort of attitude in field officers who’d lost their nerve, or who’d gone over the edge … or who were hiding something.

  She turned and waited for him to catch up. “I saw you standing out here,” she said. “Has the Board found anything yet?”

  “No,” McGarvey said. He’d spent most of the day at Dulles at the crash hangar. It was depressing. “How are you holding up?”

  “I’m keeping busy, if that’s what you mean,” she said defensively. “But I sent your CIA goons away. I got tired of them following me around.”

  “Do you still keep all your lights on at night?” he asked, cruelly. He wanted to get to her, cut through her bullshit.

  “That’s right. And I bought a gun, so I suggest the next time you want to see me you call first. I can’t guarantee I won’t get jumpy and pull the trigger by mistake.”

  “I could talk to your brother. He’d probably pull you out of here, no matter what you’d say about it. He thinks that you should be in Portland with him anyway. Kennedy would give you a job.”

  She laughed derisively. “I talked to him this afternoon. It’s funny, you know, because he doesn’t like you. He thinks that you’re sleeping with me.”

  When she was excited color came to her cheeks. She was flushed now. He decided that she was beautiful.

  “I could arrange to have you arrested and forcibly taken out of Washington.”

  “It won’t happen,” she said. “Do you want me to tell you why?”

  “All right.”

  “Because you’ve come here to ask for my help.” She looked back across the street. “The Japanese are demonstrating in front of our embassy in Tokyo right now. Did you know that?”

  “No.”

  “They think we’re a violent people. They want us to get out of Japan. Which is funny, if you think about what they did during the war. Their emperor is still apologizing to the Chinese.”

  “Now you’re afraid of them.”

  “That’s right, and it’s your fault. You pointed out what they were capable of doing to us. Now every time I pick up a newspaper or watch a television news show, or even go home to my apartment, I think about them.”

  “It’s not the Japanese government, or even the people, only one group of old men.”

  “What difference does it make who does it if you are violated?” She stepped closer so that he could almost feel the heat radiating from her. “They’re not so far off the track. We are a violent people.”

  “What happened that night in your apartment?”

  “It got broken into. You found the bugs.”

  “Did you recognize them? Were they Japanese?”

  She turned on her heel and went across the parking lot to her low-slung yellow Corvette. It suited her.

  McGarvey followed her, even more worried than before. She was a woman with a purpose, which in this situation was very dangerous. She had no real idea to what depths of savagery people could sink.

  “What makes you think I came here to ask for help?” he said.

  “If you really wanted me out of the way, you would already have arranged for my arrest, and I would have been whisked out of Washington to some safe house in the country. Isn’t that what you people call those kinds of places?”

  “Maybe I’ll do it myself.”

  “No.”

  “I don’t want to see you get hurt. Can’t you understand that?”

  She unlocked the car, but before she opened the door she gave him a wan smile. “What do you want, Mr. McGarvey?”

  “Do you know anybody at Japan Air Lines?”

  “Yes.”

  “I want you to arrange a meeting for me as soon as possible.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “I want to know if they are interested in purchasing a major block of shares in Guerin Airplane Company.”

  She held her breath, and her eyes widened.

  “Tell them that Guerin is not interested in dealing with Mintori. At least not at this time.”

  “Do you know what you’re saying? Have you talked to David?”

  “How soon can you arrange the meeting?”

  “They’ll never agree to talk to you. You’d be wasting your time, and you’d be placing Guerin in a difficult position. Do you have any loyalties?”

  “They were Japanese, the two men who broke into your apartment that night, weren’t they?”

  Dominique opened the car door.

  “If the Japanese are implicated in the plane crash, it would make you a material witness to an act of international terrorism. I know some people who would very much like to talk to you about that.”

  “I’ll set
up your meeting tomorrow,” she said.

  Edward R. Reid’s Georgetown home was set back in a copse off R Street. From the rear windows he could look across Oak Hill Cemetery and the Potomac River, on the other side of which was the embassy of Japan. The irony was not lost on Reid, who stood in the darkness at his bedroom window, a glass of whiskey in hand. At long last he had his cause célèbre and the means to do something about it.

  A small noise in the corridor caused him to turn around, and his stomach did a slow roll, the liquor rebounding sourly. Bruno Mueller stood at the doorway, his slight figure outlined by the dim light filtering from the stair hall.

  “Good evening, Mr. Reid,” the assassin said pleasantly.

  “What are you doing here?” Reid asked breathlessly. “How did you find this place?”

  “You mistrust the telephones, and we must talk before I leave. As for finding your house, such things are very simple.”

  Reid’s hand shook as he set his drink down. He reached for the table lamp.

  “No light, please,” Mueller cautioned.

  “What do you mean, leaving? Where are you going? Are you quitting?”

  “No, I am not quitting. Louis has completed his studies, and now it is time for the next phase.”

  “What are you talking about?” Reid asked. He was losing control of the operation.

  “Louis and I will go to San Francisco. He tells me that he needs further information from InterTech. Information that he cannot obtain via computer. In the meanwhile, Glen will travel to Portland to see what he can find out at Guerin Airplane Company.”

  “Traveling together like that will be risky.”

  “Yes, it will be.”

  “If you’re recognized, everything that I have worked for will be jeopardized.”

  “Yes,” Mueller said. “You would probably be arrested. But then you must have considered that possibility very carefully before you embarked on this scheme. Before you hired me.”

  “I don’t know,” Reid said indecisively. He’d not planned on seeing anybody this evening, so he’d not controlled his alcohol intake. He was drunk, and it was difficult for him to focus.