The instant he reached Martha Brae River, he was to alter course 35 degrees southeast, to precisely 122 on the compass.
At this point he was on his own. There would be no more signals from the ground, and, of course, no radio contact whatsoever.
The coordination of air speed, direction, and timing was all he had … everything he had. Altitude was by pilotage—as low as possible, cognizant of the gradual ascent of the jungle hills. He might spot campfires, but he was not to assume any to be necessarily those of the survey. There were roving hill people, often on all-night hunts. He was to proceed on course for exactly four minutes and fifteen seconds.
If he had followed everything precisely and if there were no variants of magnitude such as sudden wind currents or rainfall, he would be in the vicinity of the grasslands. Again, if the night was clear and if the light of the noon was sufficient, he would see them.
And—most important—if he spotted other aircraft, he was to dip his right wing twice. This would indicate to any other plane that he was a ganja runner. It was the current courtesy-of-recognition among such gentlemen of the air.
The hills rose suddenly, far more rapidly than McAuliff had expected. He pulled back the half wheel and felt the updrafts carry him into a one-o’clock soar. He reduced the throttle and countered the high bank with pressure on the left pedal; the turbulence continued, the winds grew.
Then he realized the cause of the sudden shifts and crosscurrents. He had entered a corridor of harsh jungle showers. Rain splattered against the glass and pelted the fuselage; wipers were inadequate. In front of him was a mass of streaked, opaque gray. He slammed down the left window panel, pulled out the throttle, went into a swift ten-o’clock bank, and peered down. His altimeter inched toward 650; the ground below was dense and black … nothing but jungle forest, no breaks in the darkness. He retraced the leg from the Martha Brae in his mind. Furiously, insecurely. His speed had been maintained, so too his compass. But there had been slippage; not much but recognizable. He was not that good a pilot—only twice before had he flown at night; his lapsed license forbade it—and slippage, or drift, was an instrument or pilotage problem corrected by dials, sightings, or radio.
But the slight drift had been there. And it had come from aft starboard. Jesus, he was better in a sailboat! He leveled the aircraft and gently banked to the right, back into the path of the rain squall. The windshield was useless now; he reached across the seat and pulled down the right window panel. The burst of noise from the cross-drafted openings crashed abruptly through the small cabin. The wind roared at high velocity; the rain swept in streaking sheets, covering the seats and the floor and the instrument panel. The blackboard was soaked, its surface glistening, the chalk marks seemingly magnified by the rushing water sloshing within the borders.
And then he saw it … them. The plateau of grassland. Through the starboard—goddammit, right window. A stretch of less-black in the middle of the total blackness. A dull gray relief in the center of the dark wood.
He had overshot the fields to the left, no more than a mile, perhaps two.
But he had reached them. Nothing else mattered at the moment. He descended rapidly, entering a left bank above the trees—the top of a figure eight for landing. He made a 280-degree approach and pushed the half wheel forward for touch down.
He was at the fifty-foot reading when behind him, in the west, was a flash of heat lightning. He was grateful for it; it was an additional, brief illumination in the night darkness. He trusted the instruments and could distinguish the approaching grass in the beam of the forelamps, but the dull, quick fullness of dim light gave him extra confidence.
And it gave him the visibility to detect the outlines of another plane. It was on the ground, stationary, parked on the north border of the field.
In the area of the slope that led to the campsite two miles away.
Oh, God! He had not made it at all. He was too late!
He touched earth, revved the engine, and taxied toward the immobile aircraft, removing his pistol from his belt as he manipulated the controls.
A man waved in the beam of the front lights. No weapon was drawn; there was no attempt to run or seek concealment. Alex was bewildered. It did not make sense; the Dunstone men were killers, he knew that. The man in the beam of light, however, gave no indication of hostility. Instead, he did a peculiar thing. He stretched out his arms at his sides, lowering the right and raising the left simultaneously. He repeated the gesture several times as McAuliff’s aircraft approached.
Alex remembered the instructions at the field at Drax Hall. If you sight other planes, dip your right wing. Lower your right wing … arm.
The man in the beam of light was a ganja pilot!
McAuliff pulled to a stop and switched off the ignition, his hand gripped firmly around the handle of his weapon, his finger poised in the trigger frame.
The man came up behind the wind and shouted through the rain to Alex in the open window. He was a white man, his face framed in the canvas of a poncho hood. His speech was American … Deep South. Delta origins.
«Gawd damn! This is one busy fuckin’ place! Good to see your white skin, man! I’ll fly ’em an’ I’ll fuk ’em, but I don’t lak ’em!» The pilot’s voice was high-pitched and strident, easily carried over the sound of the rain. He was medium height, and, if his face was any indication, he was slender but flabby; a thin man unable to cope with the middle years. He was past forty.
«When did you get in?» asked Alex loudly, trying not to show his anxiety.
«Flew in these six blacks ’bout ten minutes ago. Mebbe a little more, not much. You with ’em, I sup’oze? You runnin’ things?»
«Yes.»
«They don’t get so uppity when there’s trouble, huh? Nothin’ but trouble in these mountain fields. They sure need whitey, then, you betcha balls!»
McAuliff put his pistol back in his belt beneath the panel. He had to move fast now. He had to get past the ganja pilot. «They said there was trouble?» Alex asked the question casually as he opened the cabin door, stepped on the wing into the rain, and jumped to the wet ground.
«Gawd domw! The way they tell it, they got stole blind by a bunch of fuckin’ bucks out there. Resold a bundle after takin’ their cash. Let me tell you, those niggers are loaded with hardware!»
«That’s a mistake,» said McAuliff with conviction. «Jesus … goddamned idiots!»
«They’re lookin’ for black blood, man! Those brothers gonna lay out a lotta other brothers! Eeeaww!»
«They do and New Orleans will go up in smoke!… Christ!» Alexander knew the Louisiana city was the major port of entry for narcotics throughout the Southern and Southwestern states. This particular ganja pilot would know that. «Did they head down the slope?» McAuliff purposely gestured a hundred yards to the right, away from the vicinity of the path he remembered.
«Damned if they was too fuckin’ sure, man! They got one a them Geigers like an air-radar hone, but not so good. They took off more like down there.» The pilot pointed to the left of the hidden jungle path.
Alex calculated rapidly. The scanner used by the Dunstone men was definitive only in terms of a thousand-yard radius. The signals would register, but there were no hot or cold levels that would be more specific. It was the weakness of miniaturized long-distance radio arcs, operating on vertical principals.
One thousand yards was three thousand feet—over a half a mile within the dense, almost impenetrable jungle of the Cock Pit. If the Dunstone team had a ten-minute advantage, it was not necessarily fatal. They did not know the path—he didn’t know it either, but he had traveled it. Twice. Their advantage had to be reduced. And if their angle of entry was indirect—according to the ganja pilot, it was—and presuming they kept to a relatively straight line, anticipating a sweep … the advantage conceivably might be removed.