Pendergast pulled in front of the FBO with a squeal of brakes, sprang from the car, and ran as fast as his limp would allow into the low, yellow-painted building.
“Where is that plane headed?” he asked the lone airport administrator behind the desk, pulling out his shield. “It’s an FBI emergency.”
The man hesitated only a moment. “They filed a flight plan to Cancun.”
Cancun. Probably a false destination. However, it indicated the plane was headed south, over the border.
“Any other flights scheduled for this evening?”
“A Lear, incoming from Biloxi in ninety minutes. Is there something I can help you with—?”
But the administrator was talking to an empty room. Pendergast had disappeared.
Exiting the FBO, Pendergast ran back to the Mercedes and slipped inside. The plane was moving toward the runway now, its engine rumbling. A security fence surrounded the hangar and the taxiway; its set of chain-link gates was closed. There was no more time: Pendergast aimed the car at the gates and stamped on the accelerator. With a roar, the vehicle shot forward, taking out the gates and sending them tumbling onto the tarmac.
The airplane was just beginning to lumber down the runway, slowly picking up speed. Pendergast drew level with it and looked into the cabin. The pilot was striking: tall and very muscular, with a deep tan and perfectly snow-white hair. The person sitting in the copilot’s seat glanced out the window at the Mercedes. It was one of the joggers who had apprehended Helen in Central Park. Recognizing Pendergast, the man quickly drew a gun and fired out the window.
Pendergast sheared away from the shot, then swerved in close to the wing, placing himself in the shooter’s blind spot. As he adjusted the car’s speed to match that of the aircraft, he briefly considered circling in front to cut it off—but that might easily lead to the plane losing control. Helen was on board. Instead he edged the car even closer to the wing, still pacing it. Opening the door, he waited, his body tense—and then launched himself from the moving car onto the right landing gear assembly. His timing was just a fraction off target and he slid down the struts, feet dragging for a moment on the tarmac; with a mighty heave he pulled himself from the humming asphalt to a more secure position, wincing from the pain of his injured leg.
The plane was rapidly accelerating, moving upwards of thirty knots, and the wind whipped at his hair and clothes. Pendergast hoisted himself up the gear assembly until he was directly beneath the wing. He leaned forward, taking his gun from its holster. He could just make out the form of the jogger in the copilot’s seat; any view of the other passengers was blocked by the wing.
The end of the runway was in sight now, with nothing but switchgrass and swamp beyond; the pilot appeared to be having trouble compensating for the extra weight and drag. Pendergast leaned forward still farther. The jogger stuck his head out the window, peering back into the darkness, looking for him. Just as the plane became airborne, Pendergast took careful aim and—extending himself almost horizontally from the landing gear—shot the man full in the face.
The man screamed as his head snapped back. His body spasmed violently, involuntarily; the door flew open and the body tumbled outward, smacking into the tarmac like a side of beef just as the plane lifted off. Then the plane was airborne, skimming over the marsh below. The wheels would come up at any moment.
Pendergast thought quickly. The plane was already thirty feet above the ground. He holstered his gun, balanced himself on the horizontal landing strut beside the wheel, pulled a fountain pen from his pocket, and stabbed into the tiny flap of the fuel sump at the bottom of the cowling. Then—just as the hum of the wheel hydraulics began—he timed himself for a leap from the landing gear. Keeping himself at the correct entry angle, he hit the marsh with a terrific splash, plunging into the water and underlying mud.
+ Fifty-Three Hours
PENDERGAST SAT ON A STEEL STANCHION AT THE END OF Pettermar Airport’s runway 29-R. The night was dark and starless, and the only illumination came from the parallel lines of runway lights that led off toward the horizon. The fall from the plane had reopened his gunshot wound. He had managed to stem the flow of blood and done his best to rinse the foul mud away. It would need closer medical attention and antibiotic treatment, but right now he had more important things to do.
Over his shoulder, several hundred feet in the air, another light slowly became visible: an approaching plane. It resolved into a set of running and warning lights. A minute later, a Learjet 60 hurtled past some twenty feet over Pendergast’s head, its reverse thrusters screaming as it prepared to land, the wake turbulence of the jet’s passing hurling up a violent cloud of dust.
Pendergast took no notice.
He had searched the body of the jogger, which had come to rest hidden in the tall grass at the end of the runway. Nothing. There had been a flurry of activity on the airfield triggered by his bashing down of the gate. The police had come, searched the area, impounded the Mercedes, and gone. They had found neither him nor the body.
Now everything had returned to normal; all was quiet. He rose and, keeping well within the darkness of the grass, circled the airstrip to an ancient pay phone at the gas station on the airfield road, which—miraculously—worked. He put in a call to D’Agosta.
“Where are you?” came the voice from New York.
“Not important. Put out an APB on a Cessna 133 single-engine plane, call letters November-eight-seven-niner-foxtrot-Charlie. It was heading into Mexico with a flight plan for Cancun, but it will be forced to land within a—” he thought a moment—“two-hundred-mile radius of Fort Lauderdale, due to a slow leak in the fuel line.”
“How do you know it has a leak?”
“Because I introduced it. A hollow plastic tube, wedged into the fuel sump. There’s nothing they can do in the cockpit to reverse it.”
“You’ve got to tell me what the hell’s going on—”
“Call me back at this number when you get a hit.”
“Wait, Pendergast, Jesus—”
Pendergast hung up. He left the lighted area of the phone booth, retreating to the darkness of a vacant lot overgrown with palmettos. He lay down on the ground—the loss of blood had made him weaker—and there he waited.
Thirty minutes later he heard the phone ring. He got up, made it to the booth, his head spinning. “Yes?”
“We got a hit on that APB. The plane landed maybe ten minutes ago at a tiny strip outside Andalusia, Alabama. Tore up the landing gear, too.”
“Go on.”
“They must have called ahead, because a van was waiting. There was only one person on the field, a guy drinking coffee in the hangar. He saw a bunch of people bundle into the van, then they hauled ass, heading in the direction of the—” a pause—“Conecuh National Forest. Ditched the plane, left it right there on the runway.”
“Did the onlooker get the plates of the van?”
“Nah. It was dark.”
“Alert the Alabama Highway Patrol. And put out an APB at all the border crossings—they’re headed into Mexico. I’ll call you later. My cellular phone is out of commission.”
A reluctant pause. “You got it.”
“Thank you.” Pendergast hung up.
He sat perhaps another ten minutes, still motionless, in the humid darkness. Then he dialed another number.
“Yo,” came the high, breathy voice of Mime, the reclusive hacker of questionable ethics whose only contact with the outside world was Pendergast himself.
“Anything?”
“Dunno. It’s not much. I was hoping to get more before I called you…” His high voice paused dramatically, teasingly.
“I have no time for games, Mime.”
“Right,” said Mime hastily. “I’ve been listening in on the electronic eavesdropping of our friends in Fort Meade—monitoring the monitors, you might say.” He chuckled. “And they doscrutinize domestic calls and e-mails, you know, despite protests to the contrary. I isolated a piece of cell phone chatter that I think is from this group you call Der Bund.”