“Sure,” said the man with a slight smile. “You’re the captain.”
Jim had raised the two forward sails, and as Neil headed there to help him with the anchor Jeanne appeared from below.
“Where’s Frank?” she asked.
“We’re meeting him in Crisfield.”
“And then?”
“Out to sea,” he replied, and as he moved forward he frowned at how simple those three words made it sound. He doubted they’d ever see Frank again, and their chances of getting past Norfolk to the ocean in one piece were probably small. He’d be happy if they made it to Crisfield without the wind dying or one of the outlaws shooting someone. But one step at a time. Jim came aft after making fast the main halyard.
“Take the wheel, Jim,” he said, “and put her on the port tack. I’ll handle the anchor.”
“I couldn’t stop them,” Jim burst out unexpectedly. “The guy in the wheelhouse said he’d shoot me.”
Neil nodded and thought of the man in the wheelhouse.
“He would have,” Neil said. “Now go.”
In five minutes Vagabond was laboring across the bay at six knots in a nice breeze. Neil found himself looking for Jeanne, but the wheelhouse remained empty except for Jim and the cold-eyed Buddha with the gun. With Vagabond moving again Neil felt almost content, even strangely happy. Then, looking aft, he saw that the cloud mass from Washington was still spreading; the sky directly above them was no longer blue. He watched it for a moment, feeling both angry and afraid, then went back to work.
Although the traffic between Crisfield and Salisbury had been thin, at the airport the parking lot was overflowing. There were three Maryland State Police cars and eight or nine policemen, but they seemed unclear about what they were supposed to be doing.
Inside the drab terminal, people were strangely quiet. The room was crowded, but what little movement there was, was slowed down, as if everyone were moving through molasses.
As Frank walked directly toward the door marked Manager’s Office he had to push his way through two long lines that stretched far out into the room from the ticket counter.
“I want to buy or charter a plane,” he said to the small, spare man seated at a desk who had invited him in when he knocked.
After looking at Frank for a moment, the man frowned down at the papers he’d been going through.
“All the regular charter planes are filled,” he said. “There are also twenty or thirty private planes operating out of this airport, and a few are unofficially selling seats to passengers. The going rate is five thousand dollars a seat.”
“Any of them going to New York?” Frank asked eagerly.
“None going north,” the manager replied. “Most are going to the Bahamas or the West Indies. One or two of the bigger ones to South America.”
“Then I want to buy a plane and hire a pilot.”
“No one will fly you to New York.”
“Money talks,” said Frank.
“Not very loud as far as heading north is concerned.” The manager squinted up at Frank. “May I ask why you’re so hot to get to what’s left of New York?” he asked.
“Family.”
“Ahhh,” the manager said and shook his head. “Well, I can’t help you. The private planes are housed in C and D Hangars at the west end of the field. If someone wants to sell a plane, that’s where they’d be.”
When Frank got to Hangar C, he came upon a flurry of activity: two small planes being worked on, one being pushed out of the hangar, and three or four clusters of people talking. Frank began asking people who might sell him a plane to fly north.
“There’s only one guy here I know of who said he’d let his plane go north if the money was right,” one man told him, “and that’s Tommy Trainer over in Hangar D.”
“How’ll I find him?” Frank asked.
“Little guy. Wears a natty white suit,” the man answered. “He owns the two-engine Beechcraft over in the back corner. But, buddy, you don’t think you’re going to make it north and back through what’s happening up there, do you?”
Frank wheeled and headed off toward Hangar D. Tommy Trainer was a flashily dressed little man with dark, slicked-down hair and an absurdly large cigar. He was checking his Beechcraft with a mechanic when Frank found him. After listening to Frank explain what he wanted to do, the little man just continued to stare at him and chewed lightly on his unlit cigar.
“Well, suh,” he said with the dignified drawl of a southern gentleman, completely at variance with his bookmaker’s appearance. “Ah’d like to help you, I really would. But I believe the general opinion is that it’s dangerous traveling north these days. I believe there’s just a bit of risk involved. Wouldn’t you agree, suh?”
“A lot of risk,” Frank said. “I’ll pay accordingly.”
“That’s right generous of you, suh, and I appreciate it. I’ll tell you what,” he continued in his southern drawl, “I can’t charter you my plane ’cause the insurance doesn’t cover it, you know, but I’ll sell you the plane. Let’s see. One hundred thousand dollars. How does that sound, suh?”
“What about a pilot?”
“I believe I might be able to obtain you a pilot for… yes, for another twenty.”
Frank, who sometimes quibbled over the price of a twenty-five cent sinker, felt a flash of anger. The beat-up plane couldn’t be worth more than twenty-five thousand dollars, and the pilot would be doing at most a half-day’s work.
“It’s a deal,” he said.
“In cash, gold, or silver,” said Tommy Trainer.
Frank frowned, his forward momentum checked. He looked at Tommy Trainer. Where the hell could he get the money?
“Where’s the nearest bank?” Frank finally asked.
“Bank!” Tommy Trainer exclaimed. “It’s a little late for banks, I’m afraid.”
Frank stared at him uncertainly.
“I’ll be back,” he said.
On the short drive from the airport into Salisbury, Frank realized that it wasn’t going to work. He needed a plane this instant, and the banking system, even at the best of times, was not used to producing a hundred and twenty thousand dollars in an instant. In these times…
The situation turned out to be worse than he had imagined. Most banks hadn’t even opened. The two that had were mobbed, with long lines outside their doors. And he realized, of course, that there was no phone or teletype contact with either of his New York City banks nor his bank in Oyster Bay.
“They’re not doing any banking business with anybody except their regular customers,” a man told Frank. “I doubt that there’s a single bank in the country today that doesn’t have the same policy.”
Defeated, Frank returned to his car and sat slumped in shock. He might be able to steal the plane, he thought, pay for it later. But he couldn’t fly it.
He supposed he could kidnap a pilot… . But gradually he realized that there was no way. He couldn’t get there by car. He couldn’t fly. He was stuck.
As he slowly drove back to Crisfield he felt disoriented by the succeeding shocks of the day. All his life he had been a doer, a man who faced problems squarely and set about solving them. His success in the world of New York City real estate was based partly on this ability to deal with problems as soon as they arose, to make fast decisions, and to get the job done. It also helped that he wasn’t afraid of risks. He enjoyed taking risks.
He had wanted to treat the unthinkable catastrophe of nuclear war as he would an emergency cash-flow problem, for the challenge of the war stimulated him, the logistical challenge of rescuing his wife, retrieving his financial position, surviving—all these got his adrenaline flowing, had him acting decisively, rationally, quickly.