“ So you know a lot of cops.”
“ Bet I know someone on every force in America” Harpine said. “I got a computer database full of contacts.”
“ We’re going up in my plane. You want to hitch a ride?” Rick said. He didn’t want Chief Harpine on the plane with him, but more than that, he didn’t want the man sitting in a lonely motel room watching the news, then calling up some of his many contacts.
“ When you leaving?”
“ That’s up to Mr. Mitchel. He’s the pilot for the first leg.”
“ I’ll go by the flight school and pick up that logbook,” Mitchel said. “Then I’ll grab a few things and meet you at the plane.”
“ You know where it is?” Rick asked.
“ Old One-Six-Tango, yeah I know were she is. Heck, I know where every plane on this field is.”
“ Bob spends his life at the airport,” Katherine said.
“ Yeah, some nights I even sleep on the couch in the back room at the school. Since the wife died, doesn’t seem much reason for going home.”
“ Hey, what’s with the bird?” Chief Harpine said twenty minutes later as he climbed into the back of the plane.
“ A racing pigeon I picked up for J.P. Donovan,” Rick lied, not wanting to explain.
“ There’s a rumor going around that you’re sweet on his mama,” Harpine said.
“ Just a rumor, Chief,” Rick said, but he wondered if that wasn’t a lie, too. He brushed the thought from his mind as he walked around the plane, checking the flaps, oil level, rudder, ailerons and the fuel, making sure there was no condensation in it.
“ You seem to know your way around a plane,” Mitchel said.
“ Yeah, well, I’ve preflighted this one enough, I could do it in my sleep.”
“ I’ll bet you could fly it in your sleep, too. You just need a little confidence.”
“ Checking it over and taking it off are two different things,” Rick said, feeling a slight tingle at the base of his spine.
“ Don’t worry about it, you’ll be fine,” Mitchel said, climbing in the right side of the plane. Rick heard the older man grunt as he pulled himself in. “These old bones don’t do anything anymore without aching and hurting,” he said.
“ I’ve got a few aches and pains of my own.” Rick strapped himself into the pilot’s seat, turned the master switch on, visually checked the flaps from the inside of the plane, like he’d done earlier, by flipping the flap switch up and down. He rotated the yoke, checking the ailerons, moved the foot pedals, checking the rudder, then he looked at Mitchel.
“ Mixture,” Mitchel said.
Rick set it for full rich.
“ Carb heat off,” he said.
Rick set the carburetor heat.
“ Fuel gauges.”
Rick checked them, saw that both tanks were full. He gave a silent thanks to Christina.
“ Prime the engine.”
Rick pushed and pulled on the throttle, a strong, quick three times.
“ Ignition.”
Rick started the plane.
“ Oil pressure.”
Rick checked it and saw it climb into the green arc.
“ Brakes on and bring it to about a thousand RPM.”
Rick tapped the brakes and pulled out the fuel control knob till the tach needle climbed up and settled at a thousand RPM.
“ I already checked the weather,” Mitchel said, “clear with about five knots coming out of the west.”
Rick looked at the wind sock, sure enough a slight wind was blowing right down the runway.
“ All right,” Mitchel said, “we’ll fly directly over Los Angeles International, through the VFR corridor, at fifteen hundred feet.”
“ What’s that?” Harrison Harpine asked from the back seat. Rick thought he sounded tense.
“ According to VFR, that’s Visual Flight Rules, private pilots and their small planes are allowed to over fly the airport northbound at that altitude. We’ll be too high to interfere with traffic landing and taking off and too low to interfere with commercial traffic passing overhead,” Mitchel said.
“ So we’re going right over LAX? I’ll be right on top of the big jets?” Harpine said.
“ Yes, sir, right on top of them,” Mitchel said.
“ Hot damn, wait till I tell the boys.” He didn’t sound tense anymore, more like a child going for ice cream.
“ I’m going to dial in the Gormon VOR.” Mitchel bent forward, turned the knob on the VOR radio. “We’ll fly that fix as soon as we’re over LAX. All you have to do is keep the needle centered and it’ll guide you safely through the pass in the mountains and out of the L.A. Basin. I’ve got all the frequencies for the stations all the way to Bakersfield, but they’re really not necessary, because we can fly the highway.” Interstate 5, a road straight as an edge, cut through California from L.A. through Bakersfield to Sacramento and beyond.
Five minutes later they were through with ground control, through with the runup, through with the controller in the tower. The engine was purring, the prop was turning, the plane ahead had just lifted off and then Rick was facing down the four thousand feet of runway, trying to slow his rapid heartbeat.
“ Everything seem familiar?” Mitchel asked.
“ Yeah,” Rick said.
“ Nothing out of order?”
Rick ran his eyes over the controls, made a last check of flaps and rudder. “Nothing.”
“ Then you’re ready.”
“ Hey, wait a cotton pickin’ minute. What’s going on around here?” Harpine piped up.
“ Calm down, Mr. Harpine, we’re getting ready to take off.”
“ Does he know how to fly this thing or what?”
“ Not now, Mr. Harpine,” Mitchel said.
“ No! Now’s the time. Turn this thing off. I want out!” The smooth syrup was gone from his voice. He was shrill now.
Rick stomped on the brakes, pulled the throttle all the way out.
“ No, I want out!” Harpine shouted.
Rick released the brakes and the plane responded, shooting down the runway like a horse given its head.
“ Stop!” Harrison Harpine screamed.
“ Shut up, Mr. Harpine!” Mitchel screamed louder. Then to Rick, “Start your roll at about seventy or seventy- five.”
Rick kept his concentration on the long runway. In an instant it would be too late to abort. He looked at the airspeed indicator. Forty, forty-five.
“ Let me out of here!”
Fifty, fifty-five.
“ Sweet Mother of God, I’m going to die!”
Sixty, sixty-five and he started to ease back on the yoke.
“ Shit, shit, shit, stop it!”
Seventy, and he pulled back a touch harder.
“ You’re both under arrest. Stop this now! You are under arrest! This is an order!”
Seventy-five and Rick felt the wheels start to leave the ground as he pulled back a little harder.
“ Now, motherfucker! Shut it down!”
Eighty, eighty-five and he pulled back more. They were well past the point of no return.
