Pace confessed, “I have another reason for calling.”
“Why did I know that?”
“You remember the conversation we had at Dulles the morning after the accident?”
“Right after I left Lund? Sure.”
“You remember we talked about a certain senator who might be overstepping?”
“Yep. You wanted me to keep an eye on him for you.”
“Well, not quite. I suggested if you saw anything suspicious, I’d like to know.”
“I remember. I haven’t seen anything. On the other hand, I haven’t been looking.”
“There’s reason to look now.”
“What?”
Pace could hear the sudden interest in Ridley’s voice, so without naming names, he told him the story of Tim Hogan’s girlfriend. He was shocked when Ridley named the names for him.
“Hey, everybody knows she’s bedding Hogan, and everybody knows she’s squeezing him for info,” Ridley said. “It’s not unusual, man. Every time somebody on the Hill gets involved with a fucking journalist, it’s expected that tales will be told. It’s part of the scenery up here. Makes for damned juicy gossip.”
“No question,” Pace agreed. “But in this case, it wasn’t gossip she was looking for.”
“I see where you’re going with this. She finds out stuff the senator doesn’t know, stuff the senator’s very important constituent wants to know before it hits the papers. Senator has a mole in the chicken coop who can make him look like he’s wired to good sources, so he uses her boyfriend’s pillow talk to bolster his own stock with the homies. What a grungy thing to do.”
“Who knows what other excesses the man might be capable of?” Pace suggested.
“It’s worth further examination,” Ridley concurred.
“Discreetly, of course.”
“I’m always discreet,” Ridley replied.
And Pace broke up, laughing so hard he didn’t hear the Senate aide slam the phone.
39
“Good morning. I’m Frank Greshhold, and this is AP Network News. Could someone fake the cause of a major aviation disaster? That is the astounding report this morning in the Washington Chronicle. The story discloses there are serious doubts about the conclusion by the National Transportation Safety Board that a bird strike caused the April 17th crash of a ConPac 811 jetliner at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C. That crash killed 334 people, making it the worse aviation disaster in U.S. history. The Chronicle reports that NTSB computer simulations of a hawk flying into a Converse Fan engine conclude most of the remains of the bird should have gone around the engine and harmlessly out the back. However, technicians calibrating the amount of material found inside the engine say there probably is enough to account for the whole bird. NTSB sources quoted by the Chronicle say while the evidence is circumstantial, it is a virtual statistical impossibility for the accident to have occurred as originally believed. They told the newspaper they are working under the assumption there could have been tampering with the engine after the accident to make it appear bird ingestion caused the crash when, in fact, the real cause could be much more sinister. An incredible story unfolding in Washington, and we’ll stay on top of it for you all day. More, after this…”
Steve Pace reached over and turned off the alarm, remembering as he did so the last time the ConPac crash had been the lead story on the AP radio news. That was the ghastly day Justin Smith scored heavily on him. Well, friends, score this one for Steve Pace, unassisted. He thought Justin would have been proud.
He rolled onto his back, and his right arm flopped across the empty expanse of the other half of his bed. It hit cool sheets instead of the warm Kathy-body he wished for. She was in Boston, consulting with dear old Dad. There was no way Joe McGovern would tell her to give up an open-ended career in politics to set up housekeeping with a newspaper reporter, for chrissake. “Keep your eye on the ball and swing through nice and smooth,” old Joe would tell her. “Never lose sight of the objective. Don’t let anything distract you.”
Pace felt a blue mood bumping against his professional jubilation. He made an almost physical effort to force it away. He concentrated on what he had to do today, mostly keeping in touch with Ken Sachs and staying on George Ridley’s ass.
He tossed the covers aside and was about to get up when the phone rang.
“Steve, it’s Clay Helm. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“You didn’t. What’s up?”
“Your stock, for one thing. We got a match.”
“The paint?” Pace’s stomach muscles tightened, and he pulled himself into a sitting position, feeling a new adrenaline rush.
“The very same. The blue matched the spectrograph of the sample our tech found on Antravanian’s car, and the yellow flakes your reporter chipped off the truck matched the base color of the burned car.”
“Does that prove intent?”
“Not in and of itself. But since the same blue van was at the scene of the accident later, with its occupants videotaping the recovery of the body, and it was nearby when Mike McGill was killed, and again when you were beaten, the commonwealth attorney has more than enough to take to a grand jury. You and Jill will have to be witnesses.”
“That’s a problem,” Pace said with a frown. “You’ll have to take it up with Avery. I know I can’t volunteer to appear. I think you’ll probably have to subpoena us and be ready to fight off the paper’s attorneys.”
“Understood. We’ll do what it takes. I thought if you happened to be fishing for a story, the paint match might give you something to write.” Pace could hear the smile in Helm’s voice.
“Oh, I think I’ll be able to put it to some use,” he replied. “Have you talked to Lieutenant Lanier about it yet?”
“Yeah, last night. He says the U.S. attorney in the District wants a grand jury, too. That would mean two grand juries gnawing at the same bone. And, ah, I shouldn’t be telling you this, so I didn’t. Understand?”
“Sure.”
“You should check with the Justice Department. If these murders were committed to abet a conspiracy to cover up the cause of a commercial plane crash, they’re going to be coming in with the heavy hitters.”
“Justice knows what you’ve got?”
“Yes. And what the NTSB has.”
“FBI?”
“You got it.”
“Can you narrow it down any further? Like a name?”
“I’d start with the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.”
“Stan Travis.”
“The very same.”
“The very same Stanley Eastman Travis III who once said the public should never have any access to any information about federal criminal investigations?”
“That’s the man.”
“Gee, Clay, thanks a lot.”
“My pleasure.”
Pace was in the office before Schaeffer and Wister came in, so he walked down the stairs to see if Suzy O’Connor was around. She was. Pace wondered if she ever went home.
She was scanning a variety of morning papers. Pace plopped down in the lone chair beside her desk. Without an audience of her own staffers nearby, she skipped her usual theatrics and smiled at him.
“I’d ask you how you’re doing, but it’s fairly clear from your front-page run you’re doing fine,” O’Connor said.
“Yeah, things are looking up,” Pace replied.