“Shelepin put up ten million dollars American for this hospital,” she said.
“He’s a rich Russian émigré,” Munoz said. “Maybe he’s an old Romanov?”
“Somehow, Tony, I doubt it,” she said. “He either left Moscow with a planeload of currency or he transferred it earlier.”
“You don’t think he’s a committed philanthropist?” McKenna asked.
“Not judging by his record.”
“So he got away with some cash, and he’s bankrolling all these little businesses and factories we looked at yesterday. The Kampucheans need the industries and the jobs. They slip him some favors in the way of tax breaks, and he reciprocates by endowing a hospital. He’s a changed man.”
“That’s not the way I see it,” she said.
“Gut feeling?” he asked.
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“Nice gut,” McKenna said, regretting the words as soon as he said them. He was falling back into old routines.
Pearson got to her feet and went back to her seat.
“You’re in big trouble, man,” Munoz said.
“You think so, Tiger?” McKenna said, feeling belligerent.
“She isn’t a MiG or Tornado you’re try in’ to shoot down. Got more class than that, amigo.”
McKenna went back to flying the airplane.
The Tonle Sap Lake, which fed the Tonle Sap River, was over a hundred miles long and twenty miles wide, appeared in the windscreen, and he trimmed in some down elevator and began a gradual descent. The jungle was thick, crowding the river, and to the north, the chart showed very few villages or townships.
Munoz was scanning the chart. “Hospital doesn’t even show here, Snake Eyes. You sure they’ve got a strip?”
“That’s what the guy in Phnom Penh said. We’re supposed to follow the east shore of the lake about two-thirds of the way up, then turn northeast. If we happen to see a village named Kompong Kleang…”
“There a sign on it?”
“Doubt it, Tiger. Then we go to one-three-five for seventy klicks. Lo and behold, there will be an asphalt strip.”
“Sounds like a heroin transfer point to me.”
“Maybe it is.”
“What’s it doin’ way out in the boonies?”
“The guys said these kids were bad off. Maimed from the war, all kinds of diseases.”
“Jesus, compadre, this is not how I want to spend my morning.”
Tony Munoz went back to his chart. “Got the village here. Put her a couple points to starboard, and we’ll take a shortcut.”
McKenna eased the yoke to the right and began to edge away from the lakeshore.
Ten minutes later, they found the village, and McKenna made a wide circle around it, coming out of the circle on the recommended heading.
Four and a half minutes after that, Munoz said, “Lo and behold!”
McKenna retarded his throttles and started a slow circle, continuing to lose altitude.
“Walter Reed, it’s not,” Munoz said.
McKenna leaned close to the side window and peered down. The runway took up most of a long, narrow clearing. He could see the red crosses painted neatly on the tops of dozens of small buildings spread about in the fringes of the jungle. Near one wall-less structure was a car park. He counted a half-dozen buses and a similar number of surplus army trucks.
“I wonder why the buildings are so far apart,” Munoz said.
“Maybe they isolate them by disease,” he said.
“I said I didn’t want to hear this”
Coming around to the north, McKenna said, “Runway looks all right to me, maybe a trifle short.”
“Can you be more objective than ‘a trifle?’”
“How about forty-two feet?”
“You’re the boss.”
He made his approach from the north, lowering the flaps and gear as they neared what he estimated to be the two-mile boundary.
Munoz called out the altitude and speed.
The Lear whisked over the last tall trees, McKenna hauled the throttles back, and the airplane settled onto the pavement with a hefty bounce or two.
“You get your pilot’s license from Sears?” Munoz asked.
“Ten dollars and ninety-nine cents plus tax and shipping.”
McKenna had the brakes on hard by the time they reached the opposite end of the runway, and they finally stopped ten feet short of the end of the asphalt.
“Guy in Phnom Penh must have been talking about some other Lear,” he said.
“I think we’re gonna get off the ground all right,” Munoz said. “We just won’t clear the trees, is all.”
McKenna turned the business jet around and taxied back up the strip. When he reached the midpoint, where a small parking area had been tamped into the earth with gravel and dirt, he turned off the pavement, taxied to the end of the park, then whipped the plane around in a 180-degree circle.
“Plannin’ on leavin’ in a hurry, Snake Eyes?”
“I don’t know what I’m planning, but this whole thing doesn’t feel right.”
McKenna shut down the engines, a stoic Pearson unbuckled herself, and the three of them used the airstep to make their way to the ground. It was hot, and a flurry of insects gathered quickly. The jungle was cut way back, but its chattering, clicking sounds were audible.
“There’s nothing here that scares away the monkeys or birds,” McKenna said.
“That’s reassuring,” Pearson said.
He heard an engine revving and turned to see a white Land Rover approaching from the north end. It too had a red cross painted on it.
It pulled to a stop near the tail plane, and a distinguished-looking man slipped from behind the wheel. He had long white hair combed back over his ears. He was tall and lean and dressed in tan slacks, a blue button-down shirt open at the throat, and a white lab coat.
“Hello,” he said in Russian.
McKenna didn’t acknowledge that he understood a few words in the language. He offered a blank stare, then said in English, “Good morning.”
“Ah, yes, hello.” The man’s English was clipped, learned in a British setting or from a British teacher perhaps. “What can I do for you, please?”
Pearson took over as the man surveyed the airplane, noting, McKenna was certain, the USAF identification number on the fuselage.
“We’re United States Air Force officers,” she said, producing her plastic-laminated ID card.
McKenna and Munoz dug into their pockets for their own cards.
“We’re attached temporarily to the United Nations, and we’re touring hospitals and clinics devoted to the care of children.” She handed the man the papers that supposedly attested to that fact.
“Ah, yes, I see. Colonel Pearson. Well, I am Doctor Geli Lemesh, the administrator here. If I had but known that you were coming, I…”
“We try, Dr. Lemesh, to arrive unannounced. We do not wish to have special preparations made for us.”
“Yes, of course. However, I do not understand the nature of your visit.”
“In recent years, the plight of children internationally has become a concern, and our organization hopes to learn where increased funding might most effectively be channeled. The excellent reputation of your hospital came to our attention, and we wanted to see it for ourselves. If that will not inconvenience you?”
The mention of increased funding was all that was required. McKenna also noted the doctors increased interest in Pearson’s pants suit.
Pang of jealousy?
Of course not.
“It is not an imposition at all, Colonel, not at all. I am at your disposal.”
“Simply, Doctor, we would appreciate a quick tour of your facilities.”
“I am happy to show you”
They all got in the Land Rover, Pearson in front with the administrator, and the doctor turned it around and headed up the slight hill toward the main cluster of buildings.