Midas

“I understand that you can’t give me the information I want. But just tell me if you have it. This way, I won’t have to bother you anymore and I can go to your supervisor and try to get it. If you don’t even have it, then I won’t pursue it.”

“We don’t have it.”

She was lying. He was absolutely positive. He hadn’t counted on that. He’d thought she wasn’t smart enough to lie.

“Are you sure about that?” he said.

“Well.” Her voice broke the word into two, maybe three syllables. And she waited a long time before uttering her next sentence. “Could you ask another question?”

“What?”

“Ask another question. On that same subject.”

“What kind of question should I ask?”

“Oh gosh, I don’t know how to say it. I shouldn’t really help you too much, should I? But this doesn’t seem very fair.”

“You want me to ask you a question that’ll help you give me a better answer? Is that what you’re saying?”

“I don’t think I should say anything else,” Cherry decided. “Even if this is a murder investigation.”

“All right, all right, hold it.” Justin closed his eyes. She said she didn’t have the information on the tail number. But she wanted him to ask more about it. What more is there to know? Something similar? A number close to the one I gave her? No, what good would that do? She has it or she doesn’t have it, right? What’s another alternative. You have it, you don’t have it. . Bingo! “You had the information. You had the file. But you don’t have it anymore, is that right?”

“That’s very possible,” she breathed. “Uh-huh.”

“Who took it?”

“Well, it’s not really paper anymore, you know. So you can’t just take it. .”

“Okay. Cherry, who transferred it? Or erased it?”

“I don’t think I can really tell you that.”

Justin bit down on his lip until it turned white. She wants to help. She’s trying to help. Think, think, think. “How about this?” he asked. “Who has the authority to remove a file from the computer system? Not this file. Not the file for tail number NOV 6909 Juliet. I don’t want to know who has that file. But who can remove any file? Can you?”

“Oh no,” Cherry said. “I could get in a lot of trouble for that. I can only do that when someone tells me to.”

“So your boss can tell you to do that?”

“Well, not really,” she said now, and her words were very breathy now, as if she were starting to realize that she was getting in too deep. “I mean, he could, I guess, but he would get in trouble, too. We’re not allowed just to alter or delete a file. I think it’s against the law.”

“Well, how about his boss, then?”

“Oh, his boss could do that. She’s probably allowed to take any file she wants out. She sure should be, anyway.”

“And who’s your boss’s boss, Cherry? Can you tell me who that is?”

“Well, sure. There’s nothing wrong with saying who the chain of command is, is there?”

“No, there isn’t.” He waited. Silence. “So who is your boss’s boss, Cherry?”

“Martha Peck.”

“Uh-huh. And what’s her job exactly?”

“You don’t know Martha Peck?” Cherry was astonished.

“I’m afraid not.”

“She’s the head of the FAA.”

“In Oklahoma City?”

“No. Uh-uh. She’s all the way in Washington, D.C.”

Justin let this sink in for a moment. “Someone in Washington told you to get rid of the file?”

“I never said that, did I?” Cherry sounded extremely worried. “I never said we got rid of that file!”

“No, you didn’t,” Justin reassured her. “You absolutely didn’t.” He could feel her relax. “I just have one more question, Cherry. That’s it. Then you can go back to work.”

“What is it?”

“The file you weren’t told to remove. When was that?”

“Four days ago.” He could hear her bang something, presumably with her fist. “That was a trick question!” she said. “That wasn’t fair!”

Four days ago.

Someone got rid of the pilot’s file the day before his plane crashed.

Somebody knew what was going to happen.

No. More than that. Somebody with clout knew what was going to happen.

“Thank you very much, Cherry. I appreciate all your help.”

“Damn it!” she said. “And have a nice day.”

7

Around six that evening, Justin left his third or fourth message, he couldn’t remember which, for Chuck Billings at the Fisherman Motel. Soon after that, all five members of the East End police force appeared at the station. Gary Jenkins said that they’d decided they should take Justin out for a drink. Maybe even dinner if he was free.

“Not to celebrate exactly,” Gary said. “’Cause, you know. . But to kind of celebrate.”

“I wouldn’t mind a kind of celebration,” Justin said. “But I’ll do the treating. My first official act.”

Nobody argued, and within fifteen minutes they were a block down from the police station at Duffy’s Tavern. Justin liked Duffy’s because it was the last remaining place in East End-or anywhere in the Hamptons as near as he could tell-that hadn’t gone upscale. For that matter, it seemed not to have changed at all in twenty years. It was a no-frills bar. If you wanted to eat there, you got a tuna fish sandwich wrapped in plastic and a bag of potato chips. Their wine list had two listings: red and white. But Donnie, the bartender, made sensational martinis, and he didn’t stint on the shots of liquor. Duffy’s was dark and quiet. There was often a sports event playing on the TV over the bar. There was a dartboard and some strange game where you tried to swing a piece of string with a metal loop attached to it onto a nail embedded in a wooden beam. That’s what passed for serious entertainment at Duffy’s.

By 8 P.M. that night, the place was crowded. And the entire East End police force was reasonably bombed.

They weren’t rowdy, the way they usually were. Duffy’s as a whole was subdued, had been since the bombing. The guys on the force were doing the same thing everyone else in the place was: slowly sipping beer or tequila or scotch or bourbon, talking about life and death and the present and the future, while half listening to Charles Barkley on TNT.

At some point, Mike Haversham said to Justin, “I think that guy over there knows you.”

“Of course he knows me,” Justin said. He was feeling a little wobbly. “I’m the police chief. What’s he wanna do, buy me a drink?”

“I don’t think so,” Haversham said. “He just kinda seems to like starin’ at you.”

Justin nodded, as if this made perfect sense, then shifted in his seat so he could turn around and look at his admirer. As soon as the man came into his line of sight, Justin’s posture straightened, his eyes hardened, and his lips twisted into a small but distinct smile.