“High up where?”
“High enough in the bureaucracy to be above suspicion, if there is anybody that high,” Pace explained.
“Normally, I’d say Lund.”
“He’s on the list. Besides, he hates my guts. He’d never help if I’m involved.”
“I can’t believe Lund could be turned, or that he’d reject his responsibilities because of a personality clash. But if we rule him out, I guess I’d recommend going to Ken Sachs.”
“The NTSB chairman.”
“Ken’s solid.”
“What makes you think he’s not involved?”
“He’s not working this accident. Why would he be?”
“Okay,” Pace said with a little reluctance. “I think we should see him together. The story will be more credible if he hears this from two people, especially if one of them’s you. Do you have the time to talk to him?”
“I can arrange to be away for a few more hours.”
“Let’s call from your room.”
“Why not from the car phone?”
“Car phones can be intercepted,” Pace said. “That paranoid enough for you?”
“Appropriately so, I’m afraid,” McGill replied.
They locked the Mercedes and walked toward the motel entrance, unaware that thirty feet away, in a battered blue Ford van they might have recognized from Saturday night had they noticed it, two men watched their every move.
In McGill’s room, Pace called Sachs and learned he was in a meeting. The reporter left a message and the number and said McGill would wait in his room for the chairman to return the call. He stressed it was urgent that the two speak as soon as possible.
“I think Mr. Sachs will be able to return Captain McGill’s call in about an hour,” the secretary said.
Pace then checked in with Wister and told him where he was and what was in the works. Wister told him not to worry about a story for the next day, that Schaeffer wanted him relieved of all other duties until the Sexton matter was resolved.
Then there was nothing to do but wait.
“We’re making a terrible mistake if you’re wrong about Sachs,” Pace said to the pilot.
“I’d stake our lives on Ken Sachs being clean,” McGill said.
Involuntarily, Pace grimaced. We might be doing just that, he thought.
An hour and ten minutes later, the phone rang. McGill picked it up. It was Sachs.
“Sorry to bother you, Ken, but something real important has come up at Hangar Three, and if what I suspect is true, Steve Pace and I have to talk to you as soon as possible, today if you can manage it… We’re out at Dulles, but we could be at your office in an hour or so… Yes, it does… I can’t go to him. There’s a possibility he’s involved, and what we’re talking about is serious business… Screw channels, Ken. We’re talking about conspiracy, murder, and God knows what other felonies. If Lund’s involved, talking to him is the last thing I want to do… Yes, I’m damned serious… Because Pace is as much a part of this as I am. Ken, please! Hear us out, and then if you want to throw us out of your office, you can pitch us all the way across town.”
McGill looked at Pace and rolled his eyes.
“Well, cancel the damned meeting. The budget’s not going anywhere. And frankly, if what we believe is true, and if it isn’t stopped right here, there might not be any NTSB to budget for… You’re goddamned right, I’m serious… One hour, right. Thanks.”
McGill slammed the receiver down. “Goddamned bureaucrats,” he swore.
At four o’clock that afternoon, Pace and McGill arrived at the secretary’s desk outside Sachs’s office. The wait for Sachs to call back and a late-afternoon traffic snarl downtown had McGill out of patience. He snapped at the receptionist, “Captain McGill to see the administrator. He’s expecting us.”
The secretary, who recognized Pace immediately since his beat brought him to her desk often, was taken aback by McGill’s tone. But she reckoned him not a man to challenge.
“Mr. Sachs, a Captain McGill and Steven Pace to see you,” she said into the intercom on her telephone console. “Yes, sir.” She replaced the receiver and looked, pointedly, Pace thought, at him alone. “Mr. Sachs says he’ll be with you shortly.”
And shortly it was. She no sooner finished the sentence than his office door opened and the NTSB chairman stood there, obviously uncertain of what he was getting into, regarding the two visitors with a mixture of curiosity and apprehension.
“Come in,” he said finally.
Sachs was a man who wouldn’t draw a second glance in a crowd of two. He looked Mediterranean, with the olive complexion, dark-brown eyes and prominent nose, yet his name indicated Germanic ancestry. Sachs was relatively young, in his mid-forties, but his thick dark-brown hair was receding. One day he would wind up with no more than a fringe.
Pace liked the NTSB chairman and accepted Mike’s assessment that Sachs was a man to be trusted. But he came out of an airline background—as a vice-president of something for United—and Pace wasn’t certain how that would affect his attitude about the story he was about to hear.
They hadn’t started off on the right foot, that was certain. Sachs wasn’t pleased by McGill’s push for the late-afternoon appointment, and he said so.
“I have a lot of respect for you, but I don’t like being bullied, and I don’t like pulling end-arounds on the other board members,” he said. “Vernon Lund is absolutely trustworthy, and he’s the board’s rep. If something’s wrong, he’s the man you should be talking to. I’m also annoyed that Steve is here, although it’s nothing personal, Steve. But the press has no place in an NTSB investigation until we’re ready to announce our findings.”
“Steve isn’t here because he pushed his way in, Ken. He’s here because circumstances dragged him into a situation no one could possibly have foreseen. Before you make judgments about what this is or isn’t about, you should hear him out.”
Sachs turned to the reporter. “What’s the bottom line?” he demanded.
Pace wished again he felt more certain about Sachs’s loyalties.
“That somebody’s trying to cover up the real reason for the ConPac crash, and members of your highly respected go-team are up to their armpits in the conspiracy,” the reporter said bluntly.
The chairman blinked in disbelief. “That’s preposterous,” he said. “I’ve never heard such drivel in my life. A conspiracy? Cover-up? Jesus, what have you guys been smoking?”
“Maybe you’d better hear the whole story, Ken,” McGill suggested.
“It’d better be a damn sight more substantial than what you’ve given me so far.”
They started with Pace’s chance meeting with George Ridley. Each told the part of the story with which he was most familiar. Sachs’s expression alternated between disbelief and horror. He didn’t interrupt, but he never lost interest. His eyes shifted from one to the other as they took turns speaking. When Pace came to the end, to the identification of Antravanian, Sachs fell back in his leather chair as though he’d been hit in the face. He hadn’t heard earlier of the engineer’s death. Pace thought he saw a hint of glistening in the chairman’s eyes.
“I knew Mark well,” Sachs said, barely above a whisper. “My God, this is unbelievable.” He swallowed hard. “I wonder why somebody, didn’t call…” His voice trailed off.
“Even though his death appears as a cause-unknown accident on police records, off the record, the Virginia cops are treating the case as a possible homicide,” Pace said.
“And you suspect Lund’s involved?”
“That’s no more than a concern at the moment,” McGill said. “I braced him this morning about how a key member of the key group on this investigation could disappear on a Saturday night and on the next Wednesday morning still not be reported missing. He was more defensive than concerned, and that bothered me. Call it a hunch. I didn’t want to take this to him.”