By now the bridge was at a standstill. Wolfe and Henderson looked back toward Manhattan and saw a sea of gawkers craning for a better look. “Get him in the car,” ordered Wolfe.
Henderson shoved Kenner toward the driver. “Put him in the goddamn car,” he echoed. The driver did as ordered and eased the Town Car through traffic. Kenner sat docile and perplexed between the old man and the thug. The brush with death, if that’s what it had been, must have scrambled his brains for the moment, because-liver spots or no-the world’s oldest living mafioso now looked, strangely and hideously, like himself as an old and breathless man.
A half-hour later, in Hangar 17 at La Guardia Airport, Henderson escorted the fucking clone, Dr. Frederick Wolfe and the Vieques ruedical personnel into the waiting C-20. The plan was either for Henderson to return with the others in the C-20 or to arrive later in the Learjet, depending on how quickly Russell made it back to the airport. Russell was running late, so Henderson watched the medics put Kenner into the same half-coma they had put Jance’s clone into the last time they had done this. Once this was accomplished, he gave a curt wave to Wolfe and shut the plane’s door from the outside. Actually, he was relieved not to be traveling with Wolfe. Even though Barrola would be doing the entire procedure, with Wolfe himself on the table, the arrogant old prick was already shifting into his exalted pre-op mode, a state of mind Henderson was glad to be spared. As he stepped away from the C-20, the co-pilot of the Learjet came over and tapped him on the shoulder. “Excuse me, sir. I’m afraid our pilot, Captain Culpepper, has come down with a godawful case of the runs. “Where is he?” asked Henderson. Another screw-up? He had had a bellyful. “He’s in the pilot’s lounge claiming he wants to die. Something he ate down in Bogota, I guess. There’s no way he’s gonna fly tonight, sir.” “You’re kidding, right?”
“No, sir. But we’re still a go. This plane practically flies itself. I’ll get you there just fine by myself. I just wanted you to know.” Henderson looked him up and down. This guy had cow college written all over him. “What’s your name, son?” “Second Officer David Anspaugh, sir.”
“Well, Second Officer David Anspaugh, you damn well better get us back to Vieques without a hitch, because if you don’t, I’m going to pull your rectum out through your brainpan, is that perfectly clear?” Anspaugh’s face lost all color, except for two irregular red patches on his cheeks. “Perfectly, sir.” “Excellent,” said Henderson, staring the kid down until the co-pilot turned and scurried back to his airplane. Shaking a Camel out of his pack, he watched Wolfe’s C-20 taxi away He would wait for Russell another ten minutes; it would be pretty clear by then something had gone to hell in a hand basket and he would have to go back and check things out at the abduction site. Seals didn’t leave their men behind, and neither would he. Besides, Russell already had two strikes against him, and after a series of fuck-ups, men were apt to get loose-lipped. If he had to, he’d wax Russell before he turned up in the National Enquirer spilling his guts for a couple grand and a shot at Gerardo. Henderson walked back toward the Learjet, now realizing that he had better inform this squirrelly pilot that he wouldn’t be taking off right away, otherwise the kid might idle for an hour and overheat his engines. All he had to do was sterilize the apartment and come back-an hour and a half, tops, even in this traffic. But what was keeping Russell? He tried the walkie-talkie, but got only static. He also tried Russell’s cellular and got no answer. It was starting to eat at him.
He climbed into the Lear and found Anspaugh sitting in the pilot’s seat, looking as petrified as a civilian on his first solo. “You sure you can fly this thing?” Henderson asked. “Yes, sir!”
He stepped closer. The young man’s face looked positively green. “You sure as hell don’t look like you can. You getting the runs, too?” No , sir.
“Then what the hell’s wrong with you?”
Anspaugh’s head ratcheted one notch to the right. Henderson turned and found himself looking down the barrel of Russell’s 9mm service Beretta. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, it was Jance.
“You know I’ve got nothing to lose here, right?” said Peter. “Please sit down.” “Fuck you.”
Peter’s left hand came around and caught Henderson flush on the jaw. With a snort of surprise, the colonel sank to the floor. Peter took out his Combat Folder, cut a pair of seat belts free and bound Henderson’s hands behind his back. He lifted him into a leather seat and locked him in with its seat belts. That accomplished, he gave a whistle. Beatrice and Elizabeth emerged from the lavatory. “Keep an eye on our friend,” he said, passing the Beretta to Elizabeth. Peter went to the co-pilot and stood behind him. “Let’s go. No cute transmissions. If you indicate in any way that things aren’t normal,” he said in his best Clint Eastwood voice, “I’ll cut your head off and put it in your lap.” He glanced at Beatrice and Elizabeth, both of whom were wincing at his attempted machismo. “Please don’t do that,” said Anspaugh.
“Just follow the flight plan and get us to Vieques.” “No problem.”
“There better not be.”
19
LEARJET 94838
The Learjet made its way down the East Coast straight as an arrow, past Atlantic City, Philadelphia, Cape May, Chesapeake Bay. Peter watched the copilot closely, attempting to anticipate Anspaugh’s moves in the cockpit. Though the Learjet was more complicated for him to deal with intellectually, physically he could sense when the plane needed trim or an adjustment of throttle. He was thinking like Peter but flying by the seat of his pants, as a pilot would. As Hans would, he thought.
I’ve even started to talk like him, he reflected wryly. Well, all right. Whatever it takes. You borrowed his body for the wrong reasons. Now you’re using it for the right reasons. He looked back at Beatrice and Elizabeth. Their presence gave him strength, even as it filled him with remorse. You wanted them here and you need them here, but what if you start to hemorrhage again? Could they see this through on their own? Would they want to? Beatrice shared his hatred for what they had let themselves become-but Elizabeth? What had she ever done to deserve this? Nothing. But she was here nonetheless, this gritty, determined, beautiful woman. God help me, he thought, I love them both. He straightened in his seat, forcing himself to watch the sky. They were coming up on Norfolk, so he kept a weather eye out for air traffic out of the naval base there. Thus far the sky had been clear of anything threatening, but he knew an F-14 could appear in a heartbeat or down them without even being seen. Beatrice approached, offering a mug of coffee. “Where’d you find that?”
“Big thermos in hack. All the pleasures of home.” “How’s Elizabeth holding up?”
“She’s doing fine.”
“Is she having any second thoughts?”
“Plenty, I’m sure. How about you?”
“Oh, I’m feeling fairly addled. It occurs to me that I haven’t slept in three days.” He took a swallow of coffee and nudged the co-pilot with his foot. “Want some?” “Yes, please,” said Anspaugh. It was the first time he had uttered a word since takeoff. “You wouldn’t try to throw hot coffee at me, would you?” “No, sir.”
Peter looked at Anspaugh for a moment, wondering what he was thinking. Whether he would, if he knew, have an opinion one way or the other about what his government was up to. “You know what they do to people down there on Vieques?” “No, sir, and I’m not sure I want to.”
“Well, it isn’t good, and I ought to know-I used to do it. God’s work, I used to think it was. Once you tell yourself that, you can get away with anything. B., would you please get this gentleman some coffee?” “I will,” said Beatrice, “if you’ll stop annoying him.” “Was I annoying you?” said Peter.
“No, sir.”
“It’s a dangerous world,” said Peter.
“Yes, sir, it certainly is.”
“The people who say that generally want to make it more dangerous. At least in my experience. The coffee,” he said to Beatrice, who was beginning to trade looks with Elizabeth, still seated across from the unconscious Henderson, beyond the cockpit door. As Beatrice went back into the cabin, Peter faced front again, feeling shadows move across his mind. Concentrate, he thought. Calculate. They weren’t that far behind the C-20, so they had a decent chance of getting to Vieques before the operation robbed Kenner of his brain. He was determined not only to save Kenner, but deny Wolfe another fifty years. If he had that much time to continue his mischief, he might actually secure immortality for himself. But how to get from the Vieques airport and onto the base to do that? Wolfe would certainly have alerted the troops, especially once both Russell and Henderson turned up missing. That would put the entire installation on full alert. Even with an ally on the inside, it would be impossible to get past the gate. And his only ally, Alex Davies, was hiding out God knows where. “Anspaugh,” he said, “you can get a radio transmission from this thing onto a telephone line, can’t you?” “This aircraft has a telephone, yes, sir. “But that would be monitored, wouldn’t it?” “No, sir. This is a secure telephone.”