Bosch nodded.
“Did you ever report what you saw to anyone?” Lourdes asked.
“Report what?” O’Connor said. “What’s the crime in getting on a plane?”
“Did they file a flight plan today?”
“They never file a flight plan. They don’t have to. They don’t even need to check in with the tower as long they’re flying VFR.”
“VFR, what’s that?”
“Visual flight rules. See, I’m here to provide radar to those who request it and to guide instrument fliers in or out if they need it. Trouble is, you mighta noticed we’re in California, and if it’s sunny out, you’re gonna go VFR, and there is no FAA rule requiring a pilot to make contact with the tower on a general aviation airfield. The guy flying the Caravan today? He said one thing to me, and that was it.”
“What was it he said?”
“That he was positioning for an easterly takeoff. And I told him the field was his.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it, except he said it with a Russian accent. I think because we have a westerly wind today, he was letting me know he was going down to the other end in case I had somebody coming in.”
“How do you know it was a Russian accent?”
“Because I just do.”
“Okay, so no flight plan means there’s no documentation of where he’s going or when he’s due back?”
“Not required at an airfield like this and for a plane like that.”
O’Connor pointed out the window as though the plane in question were hovering out there. Lourdes looked at Bosch. She was clearly surprised by the lack of security and control of who came in and out of the airport.
“If you think the days are wide open here, you should check this place out at night,” O’Connor said. “We close the tower at eight. It’s an uncontrolled field after that. People can come in and out as they please — and they do.”
“You just leave the runway lights on?” Bosch asked.
“No, the lights are radio controlled. Anybody in a plane can toggle them on and off. The only thing you have to worry about are the drag racers.”
“Drag racers?”
“They sneak out onto the tarmac at night and have their races. We had a guy coming in here about a month ago, flicked on the lights and almost put it down on top of one of those hot rods.”
They were interrupted by a call on the radio, and O’Connor turned to the console to handle it. It sounded to Bosch like a plane was coming in from the west. O’Connor told the pilot the airfield was his. Harry looked at Lourdes. She raised her eyebrows and Bosch nodded. The message between them was clear. They didn’t know if what they were asking about had anything to do with their investigation, but what they had just seen — several men and women transported from the clinic directly to a plane and then flown away without so much as a head count — was highly unusual, and the ease with which it was done was surprising.
O’Connor stood and leaned over the console to look through the windows. He picked up the binoculars and held them to his eyes as he looked out.
“We’ve got one coming in,” he said.
Bosch and Lourdes remained silent. Bosch was unsure if he should interrupt O’Connor’s observation and handling of the landing. Soon a small single-engine plane came gliding over the airfield from the west and safely landed. O’Connor wrote the plane’s tail number down on a log page on a clipboard and then hung it on a hook on the wall to his right. He then turned back to the detectives.
“What else can I tell you?” he asked.
Bosch pointed to the clipboard.
“You document every takeoff and landing that occurs during business hours?” he asked.
“We don’t have to,” O’Connor said. “But we do, yes. If we’re here.”
“Mind if I take a look?”
“No, I don’t mind.”
O’Connor took the clipboard back off the wall and handed it to Bosch. There were several pages documenting the comings and goings at the airport. The single aircraft that made the most takeoffs and landings had the tail number Bosch had written down earlier — the jump plane.
He handed the clipboard back. His plan was to officially reclaim it with a search warrant.
“Are there cameras on the runways and in the hangars?” he asked.
“Yes, we have cameras,” O’Connor said.
“How long is the video archived?”
“Not sure. I think a month. The LAPD was out here to look at video of the drag racing, and they went back a few weeks, I heard.”
Bosch nodded. It was good to know they could come back to look at video if needed.
“So, in summary,” Lourdes said. “This airport essentially has unrestricted access in and out. No flight plans required, no passenger or cargo manifests required, nothing like that.”
“That’s about right,” O’Connor said.
“And there’s no way to tell where that plane — the Grand Caravan — is heading?”
“Well, that depends. You’re supposed to fly with your transponder on. If he’s following the rules, then he’s got the transponder on and that will register as that plane moves through airspace from one ATC region to the other.”
“Can you get that in real time? Like right now?”
“No, we would need to get the unique transponder code from the plane and put out the request. Might take a day. Maybe longer.”
Lourdes looked at Bosch. He nodded. He had nothing more to ask.
“Thank you, Mr. O’Connor,” she said. “We appreciate your cooperation. We would also appreciate it if you would keep this conversation to yourself.”
“Not a problem,” O’Connor said.
Bosch and Lourdes waited until they were back in the car before discussing what they had learned in the last hour.
“Holy shit, Harry,” Lourdes said. “I mean, where the fuck’s TSA when you need them? Somebody could just get in a plane here, load it up with whatever they want, and fly it downtown or to a water reservoir or wherever and do who knows what.”
“Scary,” Bosch said.
“No matter what, we need to tell somebody about this. Leak it to the media or something.”
“Let’s see how it figures into our thing before we get the media crawling all over this.”
“Got it. But speaking of our thing, where to next?”
Bosch thought for a moment.
“Downtown to the Reagan. Let’s go talk to your medical board guy.”
Lourdes nodded and started the engine.
“Jerry Edgar. He told me he was LAPD back in the day.”
Bosch shook his head once in surprise.
“What, you know him?” Lourdes asked.
“Yeah, I know him,” Bosch said. “We worked together in Hollywood. Back in the day. I knew he retired but I thought he was selling houses in Las Vegas.”
“Well, he’s back here now,” Lourdes said.
11
The Medical Board of California had offices inside the Ronald Reagan State Office Building on Spring Street three blocks from the LAPD headquarters. It was a forty-five-minute slog in heavy traffic down from Pacoima. Along the way, Lourdes had called Jerry Edgar and said that she and her partner were on their way to see him. When Edgar balked, saying he had a meeting to attend and wanted to set up an appointment, she identified her partner as Harry Bosch, and Edgar couldn’t refuse. He said he would clear space in his schedule.
They parked in a pay lot and Edgar was waiting for them in the lobby of the state building. He greeted Bosch warmly but with an awkward embrace. It had been several years since they had been in each other’s company, professionally or otherwise. The last message Bosch could remember coming from Edgar was one of condolence about Bosch’s ex-wife several years before. Bosch had heard that his old partner had retired after that, but he had not gotten an invite to a retirement party, though he did not know if there had actually been one. Still, they had cleared several cases together while assigned to the homicide table at Hollywood Division. Now there wasn’t even a homicide unit in Hollywood. All murders were handled out of West Bureau detectives or RHD. Things change.