“Okay. Mike, have you put the proceeds of the sale with Gunn yet?”
“No; we’ll deposit the check on Monday.”
“Put it in the bank until we get back from our trip.”
“Why?”
“I have some concerns about what’s going on at the Gunn company. His sister-in-law, Adele Lansdown, was murdered earlier this week, and I’m not yet certain whether that had anything to do with the business. I was going to put some money with them, but I’m holding off.”
“All right,” Freeman said. “I’ll hold off. We can talk more about this on the trip.”
“See you Monday morning, Mike,” Stone said.
They both hung up, and Stone went back to work.
Stone spent an idle weekend, sitting up in bed watching old movies and reading the Sunday Times. He didn’t even feel like dinner at Elaine’s with Dino.
On Monday morning, Stone packed a bag with rough clothes, put on a parka, and took a cab to the offices of Strategic Services. He walked into Mike Freeman’s office and was surprised to see someone he knew well.
“Hello, Holly,” Stone said, giving her a hug and a kiss.
“Hello, Stone,” she replied. Holly Barker was Lance Cabot’s assistant at the Agency, and they were old and close friends. “I’d like you to meet Todd Bacon, who’s going to run Airship Transport.”
A young man in his early thirties stood up and offered Stone his hand. He was about Stone’s size, but slimmer in the waist, and had short, sandy hair. “Hello, Stone. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“Good to meet you, Todd,” Stone said. He’d never heard anything about the guy.
“We’d better get going,” Mike said. “Your luggage is already in the van.”
They trooped downstairs, boarded a plain van, and were transported to the East Side Heliport, where a six-passenger twin-turbine chopper was waiting for them. They and their luggage boarded, the rotors turned, and they were on their way north. They had a spectacular view of the city as they moved up the East River, then crossed to the Hudson, north of the George Washington Bridge. They descended into what was now Stewart International Airport and landed next to the ramp before a huge hangar. The C-17 was being towed out onto the ramp, and Stone found its size overwhelming.
Stone grabbed his bag and followed the group to the rear of the giant airplane, where they simply walked up the lowered tail ramp and into the airplane. They deposited their luggage in bins as instructed, and Stone took a moment to look around. He was standing inside a cavernous space more than twenty feet wide and high. Ahead of them was an Airstream trailer, strapped down and with various cables and tubes attached. They walked past the trailer and found a dozen first-class airline seats bolted to the floor, then past that to the cockpit, which was big enough for two built-in, double-decker bunks and four jump seats behind the two pilots. The instrument panel was a maze of large glass screens, switches, warning lights, and circuit breakers. It was several times the size of the panel on Stone’s Mustang.
“Preflight’s all done, and we’re ready to go,” Mike said. “Take a jump seat next to me, Stone.”
Stone sat down, buckled in between Mike and Holly, and watched the pilots start the four engines and work their way through their checklists.
“This thing has four Pratt & Whitney engines,” Mike said, “each producing more than forty thousand pounds of thrust. We can carry more than a hundred and seventy thousand pounds of cargo.”
“How much runway are we going to need?” Stone asked, worried about what was available to them.
“The airplane can work out of a thirty-five-hundred-foot runway,” Mike said. “How’s that for short-takeoff performance?”
“Range and speed?”
“This is the ER, the Extended Range version. We can fly two thousand eight hundred miles without refueling. Today, we’ll refuel at an air force base at Lajes, in the Azores, then go on nonstop to Iraq. We should have a nice tailwind, too. Cruising speed is four hundred and fifty knots.”
The airplane began to taxi, with linemen at each wingtip, making sure they cleared any obstacles. Stone watched an airliner take off ahead of them and then, after a final cockpit check, they taxied onto the runway. The first officer shoved the throttles forward while the brakes were held, and when the engines reached full power, the captain released the brakes and the airplane moved forward faster than Stone would have thought possible, pressing him into his seat. They were in the air after a takeoff roll that seemed to take only seconds, and Stone put his headset on to keep out the noise. He could hear the captain talking to the tower, then to New York approach. Shortly, they were at flight level 290 and over the Atlantic Ocean.
“Come with me,” Mike said, unbuckling his seat belt.
Stone and Holly followed him to the Airstream, and he opened the door for them. Inside were four bunks, some comfortable chairs facing a large TV screen, and a galley.
“This is our rest area,” Mike said. “We’re flying with two crews, and the off-duty pilot and copilot can use the bunks in the cockpit.” He led them out of the trailer and pointed to what looked like a hotel laundry bin with canvas sides. “Our parachutes are in there. Has either of you ever jumped?”
“Once,” Stone said.
“I did airborne training in the army and got my wings,” Holly said.
“Getting out of this thing is real easy, should we have to,” Mike said. “All you do is strap the chute on, clip onto a static line at the rear, then just run off the lowered tail ramp. The rest is easy, depending on where you land.”
Stone thought about that for a moment. “I hope we won’t have to do that,” he said.
TWENTY-TWO
After they had cruised for a few minutes, Stone, Holly, and Todd Bacon followed Mike Freeman from the cockpit to the Airstream trailer, where they settled into chairs and Mike gave them a choice of movies. They settled on Casablanca.
It was quieter in the trailer, so they didn’t need headphones. A smaller screen next to the big one displayed a moving map, which showed them out over the Atlantic, with the tip of Long Island disappearing off the rear edge.
Stone hadn’t seen the movie for years, and he enjoyed it as much as the first time he’d experienced it. When the titles came up at the end, Stone checked the moving map, which showed another ninety minutes of flight time to the Azores. Todd and Holly got up from their seats and left the trailer, leaving Stone with Mike.
“Tell me about what’s going on with Jack Gunn’s business,” Mike said.
“I don’t know what’s going on there,” Stone said. “I only know that Jack’s wife’s sister was murdered a few days ago.” He told Mike about the aborted dinner party, the police investigation, and the people surrounding what had happened. “I can’t prove that Adele’s death has anything to do with the business, but I have a bad feeling about it, and I don’t want my money there until we know everything about her death. That’s why I recommended that you not deposit the proceeds of the sale of the company with Gunn.”
“Should we remove what we have with them now?”
“Do you have any sort of business insurance that would protect your investment?” Stone asked.
“No.”
“Then it can’t hurt to move your funds.”
Mike nodded. “I’ll call the office and get the process started.” He picked up a cordless phone from a credenza and called New York.
Stone dozed off in his reclining chair and only woke when the sounds of the airplane changed.