5
Far off in the eastward distance an Air Force jet made a sound like slowly ripping cloth. The silent engine of the jeep made a pinging sound, heat contraction in the cold air. Watchman stood rocking heel-to-toe, considering the crippled remains of the airplane. The landing gear had collapsed on one side and it left one wing sticking up in the air at a high angle. The wind whipped at dried remains of foam where they had used the pressurized extinguisher to put out a fire-the starboard engine nacelle was blackened along half its length. Vickers had already got on the walkie-talkie and directed Cunningham to pass the word to get a team of technicians out here. That was all right; necessary procedure; but it wasn’t likely to find the fugitives for them. Watchman doubted the bank robbers had left any clues to their intended destination aboard; they’d done a thorough job of stripping the plane of everything usable-emergency water bottle, fire ax, maps. They had left several air charts behind, showing this morning’s weather and the radio navigation ranges of all stations in the tristate area, but the pilot had made no position-fix marks on his charts and there was no way to judge where they would plan to go, or where they had been planning to go before the plane had crashed.
Vickers came up from the jeep, new shoes creaking and squealing, and stood restlessly beside Watchman, bouncing on his arches like an athlete waiting to compete. After a while he cupped both hands around a match and hunched his shoulders to light a cigarette, blew smoke unnecessarily at the match and conscientiously put it in his pocket. “You know we may be jumping to conclusions. Maybe this wasn’t an accident. Maybe they planned it this way.”
“You think they planned to crash?”
Buck Stevens, ten feet away, got up from his haunches and came over. “What do you mean?”
“Look at it this way,” the FBI man said. “You get five or six professionals together and you lay out a plan to rob a bank. The bank itself is a pushover but there’s a hitch, there always. is-this time it’s the getaway route. Only one highway through town. So you lick that problem by using an airplane to make your getaway. But you also know the police are going to figure out that you used an airplane. You’re not going to have much more than half an hour before everybody in three states starts hunting for you in the sky. Radar, search planes, ground spotters-an airplane’s a very easy thing to spot and a very hard thing to hide, as long as it’s in the air.”
Buck Stevens said, “You’re saying they landed here on purpose. They planned it this way from the start.”
“It’s possible. Or take another possibility. Say this wasn’t the getaway plane at all.”
Stevens said, “No other planes have been reported missing. It’d be too coincidental.”
“Not if our bank robbers planted it here deliberately. Look, they knew we’d be looking for an airplane. So they’ve given us one. It’s possible they hired some out-of-work stunt pilot in California to crash-land here and make it look as if he had an engine fire. That fire could have been set after the plane landed, you know. Then the pilot walked away, knowing we’d find him sometime soon but knowing he wasn’t going to be in too much trouble-he was hired to do this, he doesn’t know any more than that. In the meantime while we’re chasing the son of a bitch the real fugitives are halfway to Mexico.”
Watchman said, “It’s a mite fanciful.”
“Sure it is. The whole caper showed imagination-making them all take off their pants.”
“I suppose you’ve just told Jace Cunningham to get the planes back in the air and keep searching for the real getaway plane.”
“That’s right. I admit it’s a long shot but it’s worth trying.” The polite smile rode smugly on Vickers’ satisfied face.
“It’s a cute theory,” Watchman said. “There’s only one hole in it”
Vickers’ smile coagulated. “Such as?”
“The way I read the signs, four or five men walked away from this plane. Probably five.”
6
The smile disappeared completely and instantly. Cigarette smoke trailed slowly from Vickers’ mouth and nostrils and whipped away in the cool wind. He said slowly, “You let me go all the way through with it before you stepped on it.”
“I always like to let a man say what’s on his mind.”
“I don’t like being made fun of, Trooper.”
“It’s an old habit. Hang around and you’ll get used to it.”
Buck Stevens said, “Wait, Sam.”
Vickers threw his cigarette down and ground it out under his toe, making the movement fierce and violent. “Trooper, let’s grant you’re clever, in your toe-in-the-dust way. Let’s grant you’ve got a sense of humor. I’ve seen all the movies where the Westerners let the dudes make jackasses out of themselves-maybe you think I’m that kind of dude. I’ve only been out here a few weeks, I’ve got things to learn. All right; but I’m a quick study and if I wasn’t capable of handling my job the Bureau would have replaced me with somebody who was.”
Buck Stevens reached for Watchman’s sleeve. “Sam, it’s no time to be a porcupine.”
Watchman shook his head. The wind across his face was sharp with chill: he turned his collar up against it and said in a hard clipped way, speaking each word as if he had coined it on the spot, “You’ve sent a lot of airplanes up into bad weather to hunt for something that isn’t there. You could have asked me before you went sprinting for that radio-you could have asked me first but you jumped right in the pool without looking to see if there was water in it. The super G-man-it doesn’t fit into your neat strategy to look for advice from a seminomadic food-gathering folk primitive. But this is still my home ground and nobody’s taken my jurisdiction away yet. Look-it was my friend who got butchered in that bank. And I can’t risk any more stupid…”
Vickers cut him off harshly:
“Let’s get this straight right now. I appreciate advice but the decisions are up to me-you know the statutes on Federal crimes as well as I do. We’re dealing with bank robbery, it’s an FDIC bank, and we’ve got attempted interstate flight. The ultimate responsibility is the Bureau’s. It’s not your case-it’s not a private war. I know the old man was an Indian and I could see the way that made a difference to your constable back there, but I’m not Cunningham and I haven’t got time to play that game with you. Don’t get thin-skinned with me. I don’t care if you’re red, black, or green. Your partner’s right-it’s no time to get contentious, we’re both on the same side. I understand your feelings. I understand about the old man. Hell, I had an Indian great-grandmother myself, I think.”
Oh God. You understand Innuns, yes indeed. That great-grandmother of yours was probably a Cherokee princess, wasn’t she. They always are. It you had time you’d tell me how you sympathize with the plight of the poor Innun and you’d pull out a Bible and flagellate yourself to atone for the sins of your ancestors against the red man- but right down at the bottom underneath all that crap you know for sure you’re just a little hit better than I am, don’t you, and you think…
Damn, he thought, quiet it down to a war whoop, Tsosie.
Vickers had stopped to glare at him but now added, “We need to get this straight right now-later on we may not have time to stop and get our chain-of-command sorted out. Ordinarily the Bureau doesn’t muscle in, we just ask politely for cooperation and we usually get it; but if you want to drag your heels you’d better let me know right now.”
“So you can pull rank?”
“Trooper, I represent the United States Government.”
Watchman laughed at him-brittle. “I’m not your ward, Great White Father.”
“I didn’t mean that and you know it.”
Watchman turned around, breathing hard, putting his shoulder to Vickers and contriving to deal with the sudden anger that had burst in him unexpected. He had never in his life been that kind of resentful Indian before: why now?
