Well, I needed a little drink or two, so I asked Kate to sweet-talk the grandma flight attendant into alcoholic beverages.
Kate informed me, 'She won't serve us. We're armed.'
'I thought you said-'
'I lied. I'm a lawyer. I said, 'Trust me.' That means I'm lying. How stupid can you be?' She laughed.
I was stunned.
She said, 'Have a root beer.'
'I'm going to have a fit.'
She took my hand.
I calmed down and ordered a Virgin Mary.
The First Class meal wasn't too bad and the movie, starring John Travolta playing an Army CID guy, was terrific, despite a bad review that I recalled reading in Long Island 's Newsday, written by John Anderson, a so- called movie critic, whose opinion I trusted to be the exact opposite of mine.
Kate and I held hands during the movie, just like kids in a theater. When the movie ended, I put my seat back and fell asleep.
As often happens, I had a revealing dream about what I couldn't think of when I was awake. I mean, the whole thing just came to me-what Khalil was up to, where he was going next, and what we had to do to catch him.
Unfortunately, when I woke up, I forgot most of the dream, including the brilliant conclusions I'd come to. It's sort of like having a great sex dream and waking up realizing you still had a woody.
But I digress. We landed at LAX at 7:30 P.M., and for better or worse we were in California. This was either where we needed to be, or it wasn't. We'd soon find out.
BOOK V
California, The Present
Go then and slay a man I shall name. When you return my angels shall bear thee again to Paradise. And should you die, nevertheless they will carry you to Paradise.
The Old Man of the Mountain, a thirteenth-century prophet, and founder of the Assassins
CHAPTER 47
We deplaned first, went outside, and were met by an FBI guy from the Los Angeles office, who drove us to the police heliport where a waiting FBI helicopter flew us to Ventura, wherever the hell that is.
Everything on the ground looked like Queens, except for the palm trees and the mountains. We flew a few miles out over some ocean, I guess, then along the coastline with some hefty hills just to our right. The sun sat right above the ocean, but instead of rising, like it does on my ocean, it was setting. Is this place weird, or what?
Within twenty-five minutes, we landed at a heliport at the community hospital on the east side of Ventura.
A blue Crown Victoria sedan was waiting for us, driven by a guy named Chuck. Chuck was dressed in tan pants and a sports coat and wore running shoes. Chuck claimed to be an FBI agent, but looked like a parking attendant; FBI, California version. But they all think the same because they all attended the same Manchurian Candidate school at Quantico.
Chuck asked us lots of questions as he drove us to the Ventura sub-office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I guess they don't handle that many international terrorist mass murder cases in Ventura. In fact, Kate had mentioned on the plane that this office had been closed once and recently reopened, for some reason.
The office was located in a sort of modem office building surrounded by palm trees and parking lots. As we walked through the parking lot, I looked around. I smelled flowers in the air, and the temperature and humidity were perfect. The sun had almost set, but there was still a glow in the sky.
I asked Kate, 'What does the FBI do here? Grow avocados?'
'Adjust your attitude.'
'Sure.' I pictured the agents here with blue Brooks Brothers suits, sandals, and no socks.
Anyway, we went into the building, up an elevator, and found a door that said FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION. They had their round coat-of-arms on the door, too, which said JUSTICE DEPARTMENT, and showed the standard scales of Justice, balanced, not tipped, and the motto FIDELITY, BRAVERY, INTEGRITY. Can't argue with that, but I said to Kate, 'They should add, 'Politically Correct.''
She'd gotten into the habit of ignoring me and rang the buzzer.
The door opened, and we were met by a nice lady agent named Cindy Lopez, who said, 'Nothing new. We have three Ventura agents in the Wiggins house, joined by three agents from the L.A. office. There are two dozen L.A. and Ventura agents in the neighborhood, the local police have been alerted, and everyone is in radio and cell phone contact. We're still trying to locate Elwood Wiggins. We discovered from papers in his house that he flies for Pacific Cargo Services, and we visited them, but they informed us he's not scheduled to fly until Friday. But they mentioned he sometimes calls in sick on Friday. We have two agents at Pacific Cargo at Ventura County Airport in the event he shows up there. We've also assigned agents to locations where he's known to frequent. But we're developing a picture of this man as a free spirit whose movements are erratic.'
'I like this guy.'
Agent Lopez sort of smiled and continued, 'His girlfriend is also missing. They are both known to be campers, and it's very possible they're camping.'
'What's camping?' I asked.
Ms. Lopez looked at Ms. Mayfield. Ms. Mayfield looked at me. I said, 'Oh, like in the woods. Tents and all that.'
'Yes.'
'Do you have a cell phone number for Wiggins or the girlfriend?'
'Yes. For both. But no one answers.'
I thought a moment and decided that camping out was better than being dead, but not by much. I said to Ms. Lopez, 'It sounds like you did a thorough job.'
'I'm sure we have.' She handed Kate a message slip and said, 'Jack Koenig called from New York. He'd like you to call him back. He'll be there until midnight, New York time, then home.'
I said to Kate, 'We'll call him from the Wiggins house. When we have something to report.'
She said, 'We'll call now.'
'How'd you like to be talking to Jack here when Khalil shows up at the Wiggins house?'
She nodded reluctantly and said to Cindy Lopez, 'Okay, we'd like to go out to Wiggins' house.'
'We're trying not to show too much activity there.'
I replied, 'Then we'll sit quietly on the couch.'
She hesitated, then said, 'If you go, we would appreciate it if you stayed at least until the early morning hours.' She said pointedly, 'We're trying to set a trap, not have an open house party.'
I wanted to remind her that none of us would be at this juncture if it weren't for moi. But I resisted saying the obvious. You see how quickly a case can get away from you?
Kate, always the diplomat, replied to Agent Lopez, 'You're in charge, and we're not here to get in the way.'
Leaving Ms. Lopez to wonder why we were there. It's all ego, lady. I said, 'Ms. Mayfield and I began this case with the tragedy at Kennedy Airport, so we'd like to see it through. We'll stay out of the way when we get to the Wiggins house.'
