"Yesterday, I began a seventy-two-hour look-back on the crew," Davis said. "The first officer was here in France for the week preceding the flight, so my efforts concentrated on the captain. I flew to Houston and interviewed both his wife and his flight surgeon." He decided to get the worst out of the way. "Earl Moore had his license pulled just over a year ago. Alcohol. He went through rehabilitation and got his medical back."
"And since then?" Bastien prodded.
Davis paused. "His flight surgeon thinks that Moore may have had a problem last week."
"A problem?" another voice asked. They were all looking at him like he was a suspect juggler — everyone waiting for the balls to drop.
"He may have had a run-in with the law. Possibly for an alcohol related offense. Let me stress that none of this is confirmed yet."
"Yes," Bastien said, as if the cosmos were aligning with great precision. "This would go with the rest."
"The rest of what?" Davis asked.
Bastien said, "We have interviewed several employees at the hotel where Moore was staying. The bartender there, a young woman, remembered Moore well. There is record of a significant bar tab on the night before our incident. I will provide you with a list of names and specifics, Mr. Davis, for your further pursuit."
Davis frowned. "Do we have anything from toxicology yet?" he asked.
"The body was…" the Frenchman hesitated, "in poor condition. But yes, forensic blood alcohol tests are ongoing."
"Blood alcohol tests," Davis repeated, his voice flat. He scanned the faces in the room, looking for suspicion. He saw none. "Am I the only one who finds this whole line of thought distracting?"
No replies.
"Even if Moore had alcohol in his system," Davis reasoned, "its not the kind of thing that will make an airplane dive straight down from thirty-eight thousand feet. There are a lot of other things to consider. For example, carbon monoxide in the blood. If they lost pressurization, you'd have excess CO."
"Of course, yes, Mr. Davis," Bastien said with a shooing motion of his hand. "A full postmortem will be performed."
A voice in back asked, "What about Moore's personal life?"
Davis, still the only one standing, thrust his hands in his pockets. That way he wouldn't lunge for any throats. "He and his wife split up last year. Their divorce was nearly final."
"So—" someone else suggested, "the man was under some amount of stress."
"Stress?" Davis queried. "He used to land jets on aircraft carriers in the middle of the night."
"But that is different," Bastien argued.
"Is it?" Davis shot back.
There was a pointed silence, a pause that announced the imminent departure of civility.
Bastien ended the impasse. He redirected the discussion to more mundane matters, bland queries about medical licenses, Earl Moore's travel to France, and sleep cycles. Then he covered what the local team had discovered regarding the first officer's seventy-two-hour history. There wasn't much.
Davis made a conscious effort to ratchet down. The target was off his back for the moment, and while he wasn't happy about having been set up, he didn't need to alienate everyone in the first thirty minutes.
Bastien finally ended the ambush by saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, I suggest we break for lunch. It will provide a good chance for us to circulate these ideas, and perhaps get to know one another." He seemed to look to Davis for approval.
With all the control he could muster, Davis nodded and said, "Sure, Terry. Sounds like a plan."
Bastien cringed at the Anglicized stomping of his name. He said coolly, "Dr. Bastien, if you don't mind, sir. We try to keep things as professional as possible."
"Okay. But you can just call me Jammer."
Lunch was nice. Roast duck in wine sauce, poached oysters, and jam-bon persille. Presented with the usual selection of salads, cheese, breads, and pastries, it was offered in a buffet that stretched the length of a twenty-foot table. Included was a sampling of wine from the surrounding regions — Burgundy, Bordeaux, Champagne. Good food, casual atmosphere, alcohol at midday, and an investigator-in-charge still posing for photos as he pranced through it all. If there was an Apgar score for newborn investigations, Davis thought, this one would rate a flatline zero.
All the same, he knew now wasn't the time to start grumbling about a lack of urgency — or the high level of interest in Captain Earl Moore. Soon maybe, but not yet. Instead, Davis made an effort to work the room and meet as many of the investigative team as he could. He shook hands and tried to remember names. He was wearing his old Air Force-issue bomber jacket, and the side pocket filled up with business cards until he felt like a walking Rolodex. In one-on-one chats they seemed a reasonable bunch, more agreeable than in the "team-meeting" crossfire he'd just faced.
Aside from those he'd already met, there were dozens of new faces, representing the usual mix of government entities and corporate nameplates. Engineers, pilots, insurers, reinsurers, mouthpieces for individual companies. A lot of smart people, some wanting to get to the bottom of the crash, others only here to act as dummies for their corporate ventriloquists. It was quite the U. N. Davis must have heard a dozen different languages by the time he'd cracked the last crab leg on his plate. Of course, English would dominate the investigation, but most of that would be heavily accented. So when he heard a woman's voice with a straight Midwestern slant, Davis locked on.
She was standing by the bread basket, a trim thing with flaxen blonde hair pulled back hard in a ponytail — the way women did when they didn't have to worry about dark roots. From where he stood, she had a great profile. Wanting to be sure, he discreetly took a few steps to change his aspect and looked again. Still great. Probably just on the far side of thirty, she was dressed in dark slacks and a loose sweater, no attachments or baubles. Very basic. She was smiling, nice and patient, while an Oriental guy, Korean maybe, stood next to her butchering his consonants.
Davis edged over and heard, "America very big place. I study engineering there at jojotek."
The woman kept smiling, but her eyes were a blank.
Davis had spent a year in Korea. He said, "The Yellow Jackets."
The Koreans eyes lit. "Yes, yes!"
Davis turned to the woman. "Georgia Tech."
She smiled again. Probably meant it this time. "Of course."
"You go there?" The Korean asked Davis.
"No, no. I went straight into the seminary."
The man looked befuddled, and he eyed the collar of Davis' polo shirt. The top two buttons were undone. With the conversation suddenly at loggerheads, the man politely excused himself and went back to the buffet.
Her smile was definitely the real thing now. She said, "Thanks. He was nice, but—"
"A little hard to understand? Some guys can be like that."
She sipped orange juice from a glass. "You don't say."
"Jammer Davis," he said, holding out a hand.
Her handshake was good — not flimsy, but also not one of those girls-can-go-to-the-gym-too statements.
"Anna Sorensen."
There was that voice again. There was something about it. Rich, with a slightly nasal tone, the words clipped and precise. Davis turned his head to one side and read an identity badge that looked a lot like his. It was hanging from a lanyard, centered on her chest. "Anna V. Sorensen. S-o-r-e-n-s-e-n. Perfect!"
"What do you mean?"
"You've got eight letters after the K"
"So?"
"So I could call you V-8."
"A nickname?"