“No hoax.”
“Okay. I don’t know where that leaves you. The boat looks to be in good shape. So it was buried recently. When could that have happened?”
“I don’t know. They couldn’t have done it without tearing up the area.” He was squinting at the ridge, shielding his eyes. “I don’t see how it could have happened.”
“Thing that baffles me,” said Moll, “is why. Why would anyone put a boat like this in the ground? That thing must be worth half a million dollars.” He folded his arms and let his gaze rest on the yacht. It was close to the house now, just off the driveway, mounted on the trailer. “It’s a homebuilt job, by the way.”
“How do you know?”
“Easy.” He pointed at the stern. “No hull identification number. It would be in raised lettering, like the VIN on your car.” He shrugged. “It’s not there.”
“Maybe this was built before hull numbers were required.”
“They’ve been mandatory for a long time.”
They hosed off the sails, which now hung just inside the barn door. They were white, the kind of white that hurts your eyes when the sun hits it. They did not look as if they’d ever been in the ground.
Lasker stood inside, out of the wind, hands in his pockets, looking at them. And it struck him for the first time that he had a serviceable boat. He’d assumed all along that someone was going to step forward and claim the thing. But on that quiet, bleak, cold Sunday, almost two weeks since they’d pulled it out of the ground, it seemed to be his. For better or worse.
Lasker had never done any sailing, except once or twice with someone else at the tiller. He squeezed his eyes shut and saw himself and Ginny gliding past the low hills of Winnipeg’s shoreline in summer, a dying sun streaking the sky.
But when he climbed the rise and looked down into the hole from which they’d taken it, peered into that open wound on the west side of his property and wondered who had put it there, a cold wind blew through his soul.
No use denying it. He was spooked.
The taffrail was supported by a series of stanchions. These also seemed not to be bolted or joined to the deck, but were rather an integral part of the whole. When, on the day before Halloween, a souvenir hunter decided to steal one, he had to saw it off. Nobody saw it happen, but Lasker responded by moving the boat into the main barn after dark each night and padlocking the door.
In mid-November Lasker was scheduled to fly the Avenger to Oklahoma City for an air show. Ginny usually went along on these occasions, riding in the gunner’s seat. But she’d had enough action for a while and announced her intention to stay home this time. Anyway, she knew the yacht was worth some money, and she didn’t like just leaving it in the barn. “Everybody in the world knows it’s here,” she told her husband.
Lasker laughed and pointed out that yachts were parked in driveways all the time and nobody ever stole one. “It’s not like a car, you know.”
She watched him fly overhead Friday afternoon. He dipped his wings, and she waved (although she knew he couldn’t see her) and went inside to tackle the laundry.
Six hours later she was relaxing in the den, watching an old Columbo, listening to the wind bleat around the house. Will was out, and Jerry was in his room playing with his computer. The occasional beeps and the rattling of the leaves were soothing, not unlike the sound of kids sleeping or the blender making milk shakes after school.
She got up during a commercial to get some popcorn. And looked out the window.
The night was moonless, but there was too much light in the curtains. She moved closer to the glass, which was permanently shut against the North Dakota climate and never opened, not even during the brief summer. The barn was slightly downhill from the house.
A soft green glow leaked through its weathered walls.
Someone was inside.
2
Oh, Hedy Lamarr is a beautiful gal,
And Madeleine Carroll is too.
But you’ll find, if you query,
A different theory
Amongst any bomber crew.
For the loveliest thing
Of which one could sing
This side of the heavenly gates,
Is no blonde or brunette
Of the Hollywood set,
But an escort of P—38’s.
—Author unknown, “Lightnings in the Sky”
The Lockheed Lightning gleamed in the late-afternoon sun. It was a living artifact, a part of the great effort against Hitler that could still take to the sky, that still looked deadly. The twin tail booms, the chiseled cockpit, the broad sleek wings all whispered of power. The machine guns and cannon concentrated in its nose had been abrupt and to the point. Its firepower was far more precise than the spread-wing guns of other aircraft of its time. You did not want to get caught in the sights of this aircraft.
“It’s not an easy plane to fly,” Max said. The P—38J had its own mind; it required a pilot willing to blend with its geometry. A pilot like Max, maybe. A pilot whose senses could flow into its struts and joints and cables and rudders.
“Doesn’t matter,” said Kerr. He took out his checkbook. “I don’t intend to fly it.” He threw the remark in Max’s general direction.
Kerr was tall and imposing, good-looking in a used-up sort of way, rather like Bronco Adams, the barnstorming pilot-hero of his books. The fictional Bronco flew his trademark Lockheed Lightning in and around WWII China through a series of high-octane, high-sex thrillers. Kerr wrote in a style that he liked to describe as the one-damned-thing-after-another school of literature. It was not surprising that he wanted to own one of the few P—38’s left in the world. “You’re not going to fly it?” Max asked, not sure he had heard correctly. “It’s in great condition.”
Kerr looked bored. “I don’t fly,” he said.
Max had read three of the novels, Yellow Storm, Night in Shanghai, and Burma Crossing. He’d enjoyed them, had not been able to put them down, and had been impressed with the author’s mastery of the details of flying.
“It’s true,” said Kerr. “I fake it. It’s easy.”
Max stared at him, outlined against the blue and white star on the nacelle. The plane wore a fresh coat of jungle-colored paint. Its K—9122 designation was stenciled in white on the fuselage, below the name White Lightning and the image of a whiskey jug. In 1943 it had operated from a field outside London, where it was part of a squadron cooperating with the RAF. Later it had escorted bombers on missions over Germany, a task for which its combination of range and firepower were ideally suited. In 1944 it had gone to the Pacific.
White Lightning had a lot of history. Max had tracked it down from Army Air Force records, had interviewed pilots and ground personnel, and now produced a computer disk. “Everything we could find is here. Pilots. Campaigns. Kills. Eight confirmed fighters, by the way. And two Hinkels. Bombers.”
“Good.” Kerr waved it away. “I won’t need it.” He uncapped a gold pen and glanced around for something to lean on. The port side tail boom. “You want this payable to you?”
“To Sundown Aviation.” Max’s company, which restored and traded in antique warbirds.
Kerr wrote the check. Four hundred thousand. The profit to the company would be a hundred and a quarter. Not bad.
The check was green, and the face contained a reproduction of Bronco’s P—38 in flight. Max folded the check and put it in his breast pocket. “Are you going to put it in a museum?” he asked.
The question seemed to surprise Kerr. “No,” he said. “No museum. I’m going to put it on my lawn.”
Max felt a twinge in his stomach. “Your lawn? Mr. Kerr, there are six of these left in the world. It’s fully functional. You can’t just put it on a lawn.”
Kerr looked genuinely amused. “I would think,” he said, “that I can do damn near whatever I want with it. Now, I wonder whether we can get on with this.” He glanced at the folder in Max’s hand, which contained the title documents.