Vixen 03 Part 14

"Okay, let's take what we know to be true," said Steiger. "The aircraft with serial number 75403 exists not where it is supposed to. But nonetheless it exists.

"And I think we can safely a.s.sume the original crew sits down there in the wreck," Steiger continued. "As to the extra body, perhaps the report neglected to mention his status. He might have been a last-minute a.s.signment: a backup engineer or even a mechanic'who strapped himself to the cargo rings just before the crash."

"Then how do you justify a difference in uniform? He was wearing khakis, not Air Force blues."

"I can't answer that any more than you can say for certain that he was murdered long after the crash."

"There lies the catch," Pitt said evenly. "I've got a solid idea who our uninvited guest is. And if I'm right, his demise by person or persons unknown becomes a fundamental certainty."

Steiger's eyebrows raised. "I'm listening," he murmured. "Who do you have in mind?"

"The man who built this cabin. His name was Charlie Smith, Con-gresswoman Loren Smith's father."

Steiger sat there silently for a few moments, digesting the enormity of Pitt's statement. Finally he said, "What proof can you offer?"

" Quite literally bits and pieces. I have it on good authority that Charlie Smith's obituary says that he was blown to smithereens in an explosion of his own making. All that was ever found were a boot and one thumb. A nice touch, don't you think? Very neat and precise. I must keep it in mind the next time I want to do somebody in. Set off a blast, then as soon as the dust settles throw a recognizable piece of footwear and a slice of the victim's most identifiable anatomy at the edge of the smoking crater. Friends later identify the boot and the sheriff's department can't miss with a positive ID once they pull a print from the thumb. In the meantime I've buried the rest of the body where hopefully it will never be found-My victim's death goes down as an accident and I go merrily on my way."

"You're telling me the skeleton in the aircraft was missing a boot and a thumb?"

Pitt merely nodded an affirmative.

At half past nine Giordino was ready. He started by lecturing Pitt and Steiger as he would a cla.s.s of high-school chemistry students. "As you can see, after more than three decades of submersion, the vinyl cover, because it's organic, is virtually as good as new, but the paper inside has nearly returned to pulp. Originally the contents were mimeographed-a common process prior to the miracle of Xerox. The ink, I'm sorry to say, has all but disappeared, and no laboratory on earth can bring it back, even under supermagnification. Three of the sheets are hopeless cases. Nothing vaguely legible remains. The fourth looks like it might have contained weather information. A few words here and there refer to winds, alt.i.tudes, and atmospheric temperatures. The only sentence I can partially decipher says 'Skies clearing beyond Western slopes.' "

" 'Western slopes' indicating the Colorado Rockies," said Pitt.

Steiger's hands gripped the edge of the table. "Christ, do you have any idea what that means?"

"It means O3's flight didn't originate from California, as stated in the report," said Pitt. "Her departure point must have been east of here if the crew was concerned about weather conditions over the Continental Divide."

"So much for data sheet number four," said Giordino. "Now then, compared to the rest, sheet five is a veritable treasure trove of information. Here we can faintly make out several word combinations, including the names of two crew members. Many of the letters are missing, but with a bit of elementary deduction we can figure the meanings. Look here, for instance."

Giordino pointed to the sheet of paper, and the other two leaned in closer.

A re ft omm nd r: Ma ay on VI nde

"Now, we fill in the blanks," Giordino continued, "and we come up with 'Aircraft commander: Major Raymond Vylander.' "

"And here's the combination," said Pitt, pointing. "This spells out the name and rank of the flight engineer."

"Joseph Burns," Giordino acknowledged. "In the lines that follow, the missing characters are too numerous to guess their intent. Then, this." Giordino pointed farther down on the paper.

ode n me: ix n 03

"Cla.s.sified call sign," injected Pitt. "Every aircraft on a security flight is given one. Usually a noun followed by the last two digits of the aircraft's number."

Steiger fixed Pitt with a look of genuine respect. "How would you know that?"

"Picked it up somewhere," Pitt said, shrugging it off.

Giordino traced over the blank areas. "So now we have 'Code name: something 03.' "

"What nouns have 'ix' in the middle of them?" Steiger mused.

"Chances are, the missing letter after* is e or o."

"How about 'Nixon'?" Giordino suggested.

"I seriously doubt that a mere transport plane would be named after a vice-president," Pitt said. " 'Vixen 03' seems closer to the mark."

"Vixen 03," Steiger repeated softly. "That's as good a shot as any."

"Moving right along," said Giordino. "Our final decipherable sc.r.a.p on the fifth sheet is 'E-blank-A, Rongelo 060 blank.' "

" 'Estimated time of arrival, six in the morning at Rongelo,' " Steiger translated, his expression still incredulous. "Where in h.e.l.l is that? Vixen 03 was scheduled to land in Hawaii."

"I only calls 'em the way I sees 'em," said Giordino.

"What about the sixth sheet?" Pitt asked.

"Pretty slim pickings. All gibberish except for a date and a security cla.s.sification near the bottom. See for yourself."

rders d te anu ry 2 , 954 Aut or z d y: r It r B s TO SE R T COD 1A

Steiger hovered over the indefinite wording. "First line reads 'Orders dated January, sometime between the twentieth and twenty-ninth, 1954.' "

Pitt said, "The second line looks like 'Authorized by,' but the officer's name is lost. The rank of general fits, though."

"Then comes 'Top-secret code one-A,' " said Giordino. "You can't get a cla.s.sified rating any higher than that."

"I think it safe to a.s.sume," said Pitt, "that someone in the upper echelons of either the Pentagon or the White House, or both, released a misleading accident report on Vixen 03 as a cover-up."

"In my years with the Air Force I've never heard of such an act. Why instigate a flagrant lie over an ordinary aircraft on a routine flight?"

"Face facts, Colonel. Vixen 03 was no ordinary aircraft. The report states the flight originated at Travis Air Force Base, near San Francisco and was scheduled to land at Hickam Field, in Hawaii. We now know the crew was heading for a destination named Rongelo."

Giordino scratched his head. "I can't recall ever hearing of a place ; called Rongelo."

"Nor I," said Pitt. "But we can settle that mystery as soon as we lay ?our hands on a world atlas."

"So what have we got?" asked Steiger.

"Not much," admitted Pitt. "Only that during the latter part of January, 1954, a C-ninety-seven took off from a point either in the eastern or midwestern section of the United States on a top-secret flight. But something went wrong over Colorado. A mechanical malfunction that forced the crew to ditch the plane in the worst terrain imaginable. They got lucky, or so they thought. Miraculously avoiding smas.h.i.+ng into a mountainside, Vylander found an open clearing and lined up the Stratocruiser for an emergency landing. But what they couldn't see- remember, it was January, and the ground was undoubtedly covered with snow-was in grim reality a lake frozen over with ice."

"So when the aircraft's momentum slowed and its weight settled," said Steiger vacantly, "the ice parted and she fell through."

"Exactly. The tidal surge of water into the broken s.h.i.+p and the staggering shock of the cold overwhelmed the crew before they had a chance to react, and they drowned in their seats. No one witnessed the crash, the water refroze over the grave, and all traces of the tragedy were neatly erased. The ensuing search discovered nothing and Vixen 03 was later concealed behind a phony accident report and conveniently forgotten."

"You've written an interesting plot," said Giordino, "and it plays well. But where does Charlie Smith come into the story?"