“What kind of situation?” Davis asked.
“As I told you last night, the manifest given to us by TAC-Air listed twenty-one passengers and three crewmembers. I have personally reviewed the closed-circuit footage from the airport boarding area — in these days of terrorism, it is always one of our first orders of business, is it not? I can tell you without question that every one of those passengers boarded the airplane.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“I will put it to you as a question. What would you do, as an investigator, if you went through the wreckage and found two fewer passengers than are listed on the manifest?”
With those words, a barely discernible light flickered deep inside Davis. “You’re two bodies short?”
“All the seats remain intact — none separated during the crash. Two, however, appear to be vacant.”
“Which two?”
“I’d rather not say until things are more clear. We are still—”
Davis lunged and took a vise grip on the colonel’s forearm. “Which two?”
Marquez jerked his arm away. “My people are still pulling bodies clear!” he snapped. “Identification takes time. You know this is something we can’t afford to get wrong.”
Davis looked skyward and closed his eyes. “Yeah… I know. Sorry.”
“I realize this is difficult for you, Mr. Davis. When I have accurate information, I will let you know immediately. Until then, please answer my question. If you were missing two passengers, what would be your thoughts?”
Davis considered it and said in a monotone, “In a crash that was survivable it would give me hope. I’d think somebody made their way clear and walked off in a daze. I’ve had victims wander off and turn up in an emergency room miles from a crash site. I’ve had them take cabs and go home.”
“But this is remote, the middle of a jungle. And you saw the wreckage.”
Davis nodded, the hammer of despair swinging down again. “Yeah, I saw it. Nobody walked away from this one. The tail is gone, right?”
“Yes, we found the horizontal and vertical stabilizers still joined, roughly five hundred meters behind the main debris field in a stand of trees. It must have separated on the initial impact.”
“So there’s your answer. Somewhere in the top of a gumbo-limbo tree you’ll find your missing bodies.”
Marquez stood and began pacing, his small shoes silent over the naked concrete. Davis sensed his uncertainty.
“Yes,” Marquez said, “you might be right. On a more positive note, I can tell you we’ve recovered both the flight data and cockpit voice recorders. Both were mounted in the tail section, yet appear to be in good condition.”
“I’m glad to hear it. They’ll go a long way toward finding out what happened.”
“Let us hope so. There are a few other points I’d like your opinion on, Mr. Davis.”
“Shoot.”
Marquez gave him an odd look, his English evidently not going that far.
“Go ahead with your questions.”
Marquez hesitated, as if in a careful decision-making process. “Actually… I would prefer it if you viewed certain evidence directly. I don’t want to color your opinions. Are you feeling well enough to travel to the crash site?”
“Now?”
Marquez nodded.
His head felt like a split melon, and the idea of seeing the crash in broad daylight did not sit well. But his promise to Larry Green gave no alternative: he was on the hook to figure this out, regardless of what had happened to Jen. It had been an easy promise to make at the time.
He surveyed his malodorous surroundings. “I guess I can tear myself away for a few hours.”
“Very well. But I must impose one condition,” said Marquez.
“Condition?”
“Mr. Davis, you are clearly knowledgeable in our field. I need that kind of help. But you are also a willful man, and not formally under my command. Understand that if you play the cowboy again, I will send you home. This is my inquiry to run, is that clear?”
“Yeah,” Davis said. “Crystal.”
Marquez helped him stand, and new pain sites surfaced. Left shoulder, neck, lower back — the usual aches of a night spent semiconscious on damp concrete.
“By the way,” Davis said. “I am sorry about last night. If we see the guys I pushed around, I’ll say it in person.”
Marquez nodded but didn’t reply. He handed Davis a lanyard with rudimentary credentials — a stamped document with a picture that had been reproduced from his passport photo. As the colonel led to the door, Davis’ thoughts were deflected by what Marquez hadn’t said. They’d certainly identified some of the bodies by now, and if Jen had been among them he would have said so. It was the thinnest of straws, to be sure. But more than he’d had to grasp ten minutes ago.
Rubbing his neck, Davis said, “Colonel, let me ask you one thing.”
Marquez stopped.
“Those two empty seats… were the seat belts fastened?”
“The seat belts? My photographer forwarded a few pictures,” Marquez said as he considered it. “No. No, I’m quite sure they were unfastened.”
Davis followed the colonel out, and he nodded to the guard as he passed the threshold. He tried to ignore the jackhammer in his head and the cement in his limbs. Yet as he walked down the hall, ever so gingerly, the ember inside flickered once more.
SIX
An hour later Davis was riding to the same crash site in the same helicopter. Through the open door he saw the same metal skid, and made a silent promise not to jump when they arrived.
A morning mist hung heavy, restricting visibility to no more than two miles. As the Huey clattered onward, the forest ahead resolved and everything behind disappeared, making it seem as if they were traveling in a bubble — a sensation that was both disorienting and isolating.
When they arrived, he saw that the grass in the clearing had been flattened by dozens of takeoffs and landings, and a new path had been worn through the jungle, connecting to the wreckage field. He’d been told the nearest town with a name was an hour away, more when the weather turned disagreeable. In the coming days trucks would begin to roll in over logging roads, makeshift thoroughfares that would prove indispensable as loads of debris were hoisted from the jungle and hauled away, the final inglorious journey of TAC-Air Flight 223. Until then, every bit of evidence would be plotted and recorded for future reference. The most delicate work, that of recovering remains, was already under way.
The Huey set down in a flurry of dust, and before the rotors stopped spinning, a lieutenant trotted up to the chopper and began a lengthy discussion with Marquez. He handed over a hand-drawn diagram before turning away.
The colonel studied the drawing, and announced, “We have recovered nearly all the bodies. They will be transported by helicopter to Bogotá and kept temporarily in a hospital morgue.” He rattled the paper, his attention still divided. “This is a preliminary seating chart. We began with the assigned seating information provided by the airline, and then searched each body for documents — wallets, passports, boarding passes. Anything to confirm identity. Of course, we also cross-checked the basic information already on file, things like age and gender. All findings must be consistent.”
The professional in Davis tried to be impressed. The father in him wanted to tear the diagram out of the colonel’s hand. “Are you still two passengers short?” He didn’t breathe waiting for the answer.
“Yes. And one of the empty seats was assigned to your daughter.”
The weight of the world shifted ever so slightly — still on Davis’ shoulders, but perhaps at a more comfortable angle. The odds were only abysmal now, one in a hundred thousand. It was progress, of sorts.