Jet ace, p.11
Jet Ace, page 11
“How do you think she’ll perform?”
Combs was only in his forties but he had snow-white hair, trimmed in a bristly butch. He ran his palms across the bristles, repeating the motion as if his hands were twin military brushes. “I’ll admit I’m nervous,” Combs said. “A hell of a lot depends on those bolts.”
“You think Jeffer’s theory is right?”
“Hell, I don’t know,” Combs shrugged. “Jeffer’s a smart man. He could be right. But, he could be wrong.”
“You still want the bigger vertical fin?”
“I still want it, but Jeffer doesn’t, not now leastways.”
Another of the company’s silver and blue Navions skimmed to the runway and taxied over to the apron. Thompson got out and then steadied the arm of a woman as she stepped down from the wing.
It was Dulcie.
Barth started walking toward them, noticing Jeffer was doing the same.
Thompson waved. “Mornin’, Barth!”
He was sober, but that was about all. He was unshaven and tired-looking, the creases pinching in deeply around his eyes.
Dulcie was fresh and perfect as usual, every dark hair in place, the line of her lips as symmetrical as if drawn with an artist’s pen.
She ignored Barth.
She slipped her arm through Jeffer’s. “Good morning, Raymond, darling. I phoned Thompson and asked him to bring me up. I hope you don’t mind.”
“He’s late,” Jeffer said.
“It’s all my fault,” Dulcie said. “I was still in the tub when he came by.”
“You’ll have to stay down here,” Jeffer said.
Dulcie pouted. “Can’t I go up in the tower?”
“No,” said Jeffer. “You’d be in the way.”
Jeffer turned away from them and walked back toward the F-120. Barth followed him and they went over the airplane together, checking the gleaming metal surfaces for minute cracks and distortions, inspecting for hydraulic, fuel and oil leaks. They saw that all the access doors and panels were secured and the various accumulator pressures were normal. Barth climbed the yellow ladder and studied the cockpit interior, checking particularly the connections for the mechanism that would eject the seat downward through the hatch in the floor. Everything looked satisfactory.
When he climbed down, Jeffer was standing near the ladder.
“Still want Thompson to fly her?” Barth asked.
“He’s more than competent,” Jeffer said.
“I’m a better flier,” Barth said. He made the statement flat, without conceit.
“Perhaps.”
They did not speak again until Thompson came from the hangar, cinching down the straps of his parachute. He wore the new Air Force M-1 pressure suit, with tight lacings from ankles to shoulders and a globe-like helmet with a clear plastic face plate.
“Check-offs finished?” Thompson asked.
“All okay,” Jeffer said.
“How’s the God damn tail look?”
“Perfect,” Jeffer said. “I watched the men install every one of the bolts.”
“Fair enough,” Thompson said. He clamped his fingers briefly on Barth’s arm. “Sorry about acing you out, but damn it I need the four thousand. No hard feelings?”
“You know me better than that,” Barth said. “Think you can handle her okay?”
“Sure.” Thompson rubbed the streaming perspiration from around his eyes. “I’ll be okay as soon as I hoist her off the runway.”
“Get up there and give her hell,” Barth said. “Good luck!”
They shook hands. Thompson’s palm was damp and cold and Barth could feel the tension in him, the pretest jitters that bothered every pilot just before a big one.
Barth and Jeffer watched Thompson climb to the cockpit, and then they turned and walked to the test tower. As they went up the wooden steps, they heard the enormous General Electric engine whine and scream through the various ignition and starting procedures.
The room at the top of the tower was brilliant with blue-green light from the tinted windows which formed its four walls. At the far end sat Old Man Gore, chief owner of InterContinental, plump and sweating in a white Palm Beach suit. On both sides of him were engineers and assistant engineers, all trying to appear at ease, smoking, some chewing gum and engaging in insignificant small talk.
They watched Thompson taxi slowly to the far end of the runway. The flight test engineer made notes on his work board and switched on the tape recorder which would record everything Thompson said over the radio.
The flight engineer spoke into his microphone. “Tower to Air Force No. 862. You are cleared for take-off.”
“Starting now.” Thompson’s voice came clearly from the twin loudspeakers in the tower ceiling.
At first the F-120 was just a silver dot near the edge of the desert horizon.
The dot moved along the runway, growing in size as it came toward.
It lifted from the concrete and Barth as always was impressed with the pure design of her — the long missile-like nose, the impossibly short wings, thin as plate glass.
The airplane flashed past the tower, the afterburner’s deep bellow making the windows vibrate crazily.
When it was less than fifty feet up, the airplane began turning left.
Barth went stiff in his chair because the airplane should not be turning at that altitude.
A scream burst from the loudspeakers, Thompson’s voice, screaming two words.
“I’m froze!”
It was incredible. The airplane continued to turn. Its speed was tremendous but the maneuver seemed to take forever. Wings canted, it shot past the No. 3 hangar, so close Barth was certain the plastic canopy had brushed the hangar flagpole. It kept turning at the same fantastic angle and then it struck the rounded roof of the No. 2 hangar. The airplane plunged through and for an insane moment Barth, seeing it emerge from the other side, expected Thompson to regain control and lift her safely up.
But it wasn’t the airplane that emerged. It was the engine, the enormously long General Electric engine trailing tatters of torn metal. Through the great gash in the roof, Barth saw the engine clearly, saw it shoot through the air like a meteor, flying on straight for five hundred yards before it struck the ground. The explosion came then, rocking the tower as the spewing fuel atomized, great bursts of flame blowing up through the hangar roof. Away out on the other side of the runway the engine reappeared, rocketing across the flat sandy surface, halting finally, a burning blob, a small lump of metal far out on the desert.
Someone in the tower cried out, a brief cry, cut off when it was only half-formed.
Someone else said, “Jesus Christ!” quietly.
No one moved for impossibly long seconds and then there was a frenzy of voices and a stampede as some of the engineers knocked over their chairs and ran down the tower steps. Barth stared at the hangar, seeing the heat curl the metal roof back like tinfoil. Oily smoke created a black floating tower in the sky. He remained in his chair, a man in a daze, watching the fire crews run from their red trucks and connect their hoses. A sky blue Cadillac ambulance arrived, but its attendants merely watched attentively, aware that their services were not needed.
In five minutes Hangar No. 2 was a caved-in hulk, still burning furiously, but the firemen had kept the flames from spreading to the other buildings.
A phone rang in the tower. It rang many times before Jeffer answered it. He said a few words, then hung up.
Barth turned and looked at him.
“We were lucky,” Jeffer said. “The hangar crews were on a coffee break. One man was slightly burned.”
“Thank God for that,” Old Man Gore said.
They were the only three in the tower. They watched, silently, but finally the words had to be said.
“Well,” said Old Man Gore, “what do we do now?”
Jeffer started to say something, stopped, then went on. His voice had no confidence.
“It was my fault,” he said. “I should have let Barth take her up. I killed him.”
“You S.O.B.,” Barth said. His voice was toneless.
“I gave Thompson the assignment for spite,” Jeffer said. “I won’t deny it. And he froze. An experienced man, but he froze.”
Jeffer covered his face with his hands and fell across the table, his thumbs digging at his temples. His shoulders trembled.
It was the first time Barth had ever seen Jeffer break. It was the first time he’d ever seen Jeffer display human weakness and he realized the strain Jeffer had been under was equal to his own. He suddenly felt something very much like respect for Jeffer.
“It wasn’t entirely your fault,” Barth said. “I could see Thompson was tired. I could feel the jitters in him when we shook hands. I thought it was the usual preflight shakes. I should have known better. I should have told you how two days ago he wanted to quit flying altogether. It’s as much my fault as yours.”
“Thanks, Barth,” Jeffer said. “I appreciate that.”
Old Man Gore pushed his chair back and got up. A dribble of tobacco juice from his cigar made a dry, neglected track on his chin.
“The Air Force has got to have the F-120,” he said. “Potentially she’s still the greatest thing ever built. I don’t have to tell you we’ve got half the company’s capital in her. If the F-120 is through, then Intercontinental is through.”
Jeffer raised up from the table. He looked at Barth, his eyes dull.
“What do you say, Barth?”
“Put new bolts in the tail of another production model,” Barth said. “I’ll fly her tomorrow.”
“Good boy, Barth!” Old Man Gore said. “I knew you would!”
“Seven o’clock all right?” Jeffer asked.
“Fine,” Barth said.
He did not want to talk any more. He went out the tower door and down the steps. He looked for her in the security office. She wasn’t there, nor was she in the engineers’ lounge. Crossing the concrete floor, he found her standing at the east entrance of Hangar No. 3, gazing at the remains of Hangar No. 2.
Her face was white as milk.
“You’re the reason, aren’t you?” Barth said. “The reason he wanted the four thousand.”
She nodded, her features numb. “He wanted me to go with him to Mexico.”
“He was with you all night?”
“Yes.”
“You knew he had to fly this morning — but, of course, what you wanted was more important.”
She did not reply.
“You bitch!” he said. “You God damned bitch!” He hit her with the flat of his hand and the shock of it spun her sideways. Four red finger marks appeared distinctly in the skin of her cheek, but even then she did not cry.
Eighteen
* * *
HE FLEW FIFTY miles out into the desert, landing the Navion on the private runway adjoining the fifteen-acre ranch spread of the Joshua Tree Inn. Two attendants chocked the plane on the parking strip beside a Cessna and a couple of yellow Piper Cubs. Barth gave them each a dollar tip and walked through the heat to the Inn’s main building, three stories of thick brown adobe topped with a bright red tile roof. At the desk in the air-conditioned lobby, he registered for a private cottage midway between the swimming pool and the tennis courts. Then, because he did not want to be alone, he walked into the cocktail lounge.
A few civilians in shorts were seated at the horseshoe-shaped bar, outnumbered by the starched suntans of men from Edwards. He ordered a bourbon and water and struck up a conversation with two majors whom he’d worked with at the base. He spent the afternoon playing poker with them, lost eighty-five dollars and was grateful because they never once mentioned the F-120. When it grew cooler toward evening, he rented a towel and a pair of swim trunks and spent half an hour in the pool. After dinner he went to the cottage and forced himself to read page after page of formulae on velocities and shockwaves in a textbook he borrowed from one of the majors.
By eleven o’clock he was nearly drowsy enough to go to bed. As he unbuttoned his shirt, there was a rap on the door.
As soon as he swung the door inward, he regretted it.
Owen and Ica were standing on the small porch. Owen pushed the door further open and strode in, motioning Ica to follow.
“You used extremely poor judgment this afternoon,” Owen said. “I spent considerable time at Vivian’s waiting for you.”
“I told you I wouldn’t be there,” Barth said.
“As a result I have raised the price,” Owen said. “I want a minimum of $25,000. I can only assume that you have a secret bank deposit somewhere from your sale of the Princess Munchen bracelet.”
Barth laughed without humor. “How many times do I have to tell you I never saw that bracelet?”
“Don’t laugh at me,” Owen warned. “I’m in no mood for nonsense after all the trouble I had tracing you here from the base. Of course, you’ll pay. You have no choice.”
Barth laughed again. “Go ahead, threaten me. Waste more time. I don’t care any more. You and your blonde girl friend can go straight to hell.”
Ica spoke for the first time since entering the room. “I am not his girl friend.”
“Be quiet,” Owen said. He turned back to Barth. “What are you talking about?”
“You can’t damage me,” Barth said. “Spill everything you know to the F.B.I. and I won’t give a damn. Why don’t you phone L.A. right now?
Owen sat down on the bed. His eyes never left Barth’s face as he drew out a package of Chesterfields, held it against his side and pulled a cigarette free with his thumb and forefinger. He placed it in his mouth but did not light it.
“You should know better than to try to bluff me,” he said.
“I’ve no reason to bluff,” Barth said. “Thompson was killed today. That leaves me as the only qualified man to fly the F-120. The F.B.I. will let me finish the test, even if they have to send a man along with me on the ride.”
Owen drew a cigarette lighter from his pocket. “They won’t let you within ten miles of the base. You’ll be in jail within — ”
Without using it, Owen stuffed the lighter back in his pocket. His face had grown pale and the familiar look of pain was in the deepening fines around his mouth. He spat out the unlighted cigarette and began massaging his arm with his fingertips.
“For years I’ve lived with this pain. Years without end, Johann, ever since the day you triggered those machine guns! No man has ever endured such pain, such — ”
“It’s all in your mind,” Barth said. “Any doctor will tell you — ”
“There is nothing wrong with my mind,” Owen’s voice rose. His hand went into his pocket and came up with the small pistol. “I could kill you for saying that.”
Barth did not move. He gazed at the pistol, saw Owen’s hand tremble, but he was not afraid.
“Kill me,” he said, “and what happens to your chances of getting money from me?”
There was a flicker of doubt in Owen’s eyes and Barth knew his point had hit where it hurt. He realized he should have taken the pistol away from Owen long before this.
“Give me the gun,” he said. “Hand it over or I’ll break your God damn neck!”
He took a step toward Owen, but Owen turned away. Barth seized Owen’s shoulder but found Ica suddenly in the way, blocking him.
“Leave him go!” she said.
Owen broke loose. Ica opened the door and they passed through quickly together, Owen pushing the pistol back into his pocket.
Barth let them go. Closing the door, he locked it, sat down in the watermelon pink frieze chair and picked up the textbook on shock waves. But concentration was out of the question now and he laid the book aside, certain he’d made a mistake. He should’ve stalled Owen along as he’d done previously, promising him more money. Owen might be irrational enough to call the F.B.I. simply from spite. It was difficult to predict what Jeffer would do if contacted by the F.B.I. Thompson’s death had softened him, but that did not necessarily mean he would continue to be human.
It was a long night. Barth got into bed and lay in the darkness with his eyes open, listening to the hum of the air conditioning unit in the ceiling. More than once he was on the point of going to the cocktail lounge and drinking himself into drowsiness, but he was not willing to risk the possibility of having a hangover at 7 A.M. He switched the bed lamp on and forced himself to read the entire textbook and when he finished he went back through the earlier chapters and memorized long, complicated forms of algebraic theory. He recited the theories over and over to himself and finally fell asleep long after three o’clock.
When the phone rang, he came instantly awake.
“Hello,” he said.
“Good morning, Mr. Barth,” said the night desk clerk. “This is your call for five-thirty.”
Barth rose and took a shower. He dressed, but did not shave because he’d neglected to bring along a razor, and left the cottage.
Except for a counterman who slouched wearily behind a wrinkled newspaper, the coffee shop was deserted. Barth had two cups of coffee, black, and walked out to the runway.
When he lifted the Navion off the concrete strip, the sun was rising over the Inyo Mountains, its long rays turning the desert Joshua trees into pink statues with upraised arms. Already the sun was a ball of red heat and for an instant it seemed to resemble the flaming engine of Thompson’s F-120 when it burst from the hangar. He looked away from it and concentrated on his flying.
He flew directly to Edwards. As he landed he was unable to ignore how different the north base looked with Hangar No. 2 leveled. He noticed that the new production model of the F-120 was on the apron, a cluster of mechanics at work on its tail.
When he walked into the dispatch building, Jeffer was standing near the desk, talking on the phone. His face was haggard but so furiously intent Barth knew something critical was being discussed.
“I see,” Jeffer said.
Barth walked to his locker, certain that Jeffer was talking to Owen. He opened the metal door quietly so he could hear what was being said.
“It’s the first I’ve heard of it,” Jeffer replied.
