Clarke offsprings, so our foundation inherited a hell of a lot of wealth. Actually billions, counting real estate and securities.”
“Sounds simple enough,” Chandler said.
“It was. But it didn’t stay simple. A woman turns up, files a civil suit claiming she is the common-law wife of the old man’s son, and she’s pregnant, and her baby is going to be Clarke’s direct descendant. Claims this baby will be old Clarke’s grandchild. She wants the fortune for her kid. You with me so far?”
“I think so,” Chandler said. “But I don’t think I’d want to be her lawyer. And how does this diamond you mentioned come into it?”
Plymale sipped his drink. “If you want to hear this, be patient. Otherwise I call my driver and give you a ride back to my plane. What’s your choice?”
“Sorry,” Chandler said.
“This woman had a bundle of love letters from Old Man Clarke’s kid. The handwriting matched John Clarke’s, according to the experts. All are addressed to the claimant. They express joy at their impending marriage, and make some undisguised reference to their previous sexual encounters. In the last of those letters, he says he’ll be flying home from Los Angeles the next day and he’s bringing her a wonderful diamond engagement ring, and they’ll have a fancy wedding. Get married before the kid arrives.”
Plymale took another sip.
Chandler raised his eyebrows.
“He knew he had a kid coming, it seems,” Plymale said. “He was going to make it legitimate. Luckily for our Plymale law firm, he just waited too long. Then he got on the wrong airplane.”
“So they didn’t make the fornication legal, did they? Or you wouldn’t need me to find that wonderful diamond. Am I right?”
“Partly right. John Clarke got on Trans World Airlines Flight 2 at Los Angeles International Airport. Flight 2 took off at nine A.M. en route to Kansas City, then on to New York. The potential bride claims that she waited for him at the airport. Waited and waited and waited, with a roomful of other nervous people. Finally, the TWA folks announced the plane was missing. Advised them to leave a telephone number at the desk and go home and wait in comfort. Promised to call when the plane was located.”
“Let’s see,” Chandler said. “Was that about when hijacking airplanes was very popular? Did the plane turn up in Cuba?”
“The crash was in June 1956. Way too early for Castro and all that.”
“Oh.”
“It was a Lockheed Super Constellation. You old enough to remember them? Four prop engines and a tail with three rudders sticking up. A day later they spotted that funny-looking tail in Arizona, down in the Grand Canyon, and what was left of the cabin upstream a quarter mile or so. And the rest of it scattered here and there up and down the cliffs.”
“So you’re telling me Clarke was killed then, I guess, but the diamond not found on his body? Is that it? What happened to the Constellation? Struck by lightning or what?”
“Struck by a United Airlines Douglas DC7. That one had left Los Angeles about five minutes earlier, both of them flying at about twenty-one thousand feet, both headed to the East Coast. Storms all around. Nobody knows how it happened, but the investigators guess one of the pilots, maybe both of them, swerved to give the passengers a better look at the canyon. Anyway, a hundred twenty-eight people were killed. Everybody aboard the planes. Worst airline disaster in history up to that time. Bodies scattered up and down the cliffs, all torn up, some of them burned. The planes weren’t located until the next day. Then they couldn’t get the old-fashioned copters they had then into the canyon due to the canyon winds. Some medics were parachuted down, I’m told, and then they got some mountain climbers to help.”
Plymale stopped, peered at Chandler. “You never heard about this?”
“It was old news before I was born.”
“Well, back then it was the biggest story of the year.” Plymale chuckled. “Quite a show. Not many people flew those days. Took trains. And flying was expensive. One of the planes was mostly hauling serious big shots. A vice president of General Motors, for example, an ex-ambassador, CEO of another Fortune Five Hundred corporation, top level of the social class. Not just the tourist-ticket trash you see now. Very important families involved. One of them even hired some Swiss mountain climbers and had them flown over to see if his daughter’s body could be found. A week later they were still hunting pieces of the planes and trying to match body chunks. Hauled them out in bags, in bits and pieces.”
Plymale sipped. Chandler waited. Now the old bastard would finally get to the diamond. Probably he wasn’t going to ask any more about that homicidal mistake Chandler had made in Portland. Probably it was forgotten now. Even by that homicide detective. A cold, cold case. He sipped his drink. Enjoyed the breeze. Someday he’d be able to afford this lifestyle without putting up with this arrogant treatment.
“Luggage raining down, too,” Plymale said. “Suitcases, handbags, those little pet-carrier cages. They found one with a bulldog in it. One with a parrot. Scattering down like a sort of weird hailstorm.”
Plymale laughed, enjoying this. “Imagine that. I’d like to have seen it.”
“Clarke, too?”
“What?”
“Did John Clarke fall, too?”
“Now, that’s a dumb question,” Plymale said. “Everybody fell. Pilots, copilots, stewardesses, men, women, children, at least two babies. Some still in the planes, some doing a free fall.”
“Did he have the diamond he was bringing for his bride?”
“Probably. He said he was bringing it. He was on the plane when it left LAX. No way to get off.” He rattled what was left of the ice in his drink, looked at the glass, shook his head.
