“I’ve been reading about it for years, so I guess it’s finally certified?”
“Just barely. This is the first one bought by the government; we’re anxious to see if it flies.”
“Oh, great,” Dino said. “We’re an experiment?”
“Relax, Dino,” Stone said. “The airplane has been through the whole gamut of tests, and only one has crashed.”
“Where can I get the nearest commercial flight?” Dino asked.
“Dino,” Lance said, “shut up, put your luggage in the locker, and get aboard.” Everybody started to climb aboard, but Lance pulled Stone aside. “I don’t want you to draw any inferences from what I said yesterday.”
“And what was it you said?”
“I said to let me know if you find Teddy Fay, and that I would take care of it. I meant just that. You should know that Teddy is dangerous when he’s cornered, and you are not equipped to deal with him.”
Stone felt his ears starting to get hot. “Lance, I’ve dealt with more cornered rats than you’ve had hot dinners. While you were sitting behind your desk at Langley or wandering around Europe, Dino and I were putting away heavily armed bad guys, whether they liked it or not, and we never needed help from the Central Intelligence Agency.”
“Calm down, Stone; this is a special case, and it has to be handled carefully. We don’t want this hitting the papers, or the president and the director could end up as collateral damage.”
“You’ve already explained that very thoroughly,” Stone said. “We’ll be in touch.” He turned around and got aboard the airplane, followed by a single pilot. “Mind if I fly right seat?” Stone asked.
“Not today,” the pilot replied. “Maybe on the return trip.” He began starting the engines and running through his checklist.
Stone shrugged, took off his jacket and found a seat. It wasn’t hard, because there were four seats and only one was available, facing aft, opposite Holly.
“I hope you don’t mind sitting there,” Holly said. “I sometimes throw up when I travel backward.”
“I’ll be fine here,” Stone said. He settled in and fastened his seatbelt. The airplane began to move.
“What were you and Lance talking about?” Holly asked.
“Oh, it was just the usual stuff with Lance, the control freak.”
“Well, he is that, but he’s good at it.”
“Great.”
The airplane turned onto the runway without slowing down, and a moment later they were in the air, climbing fast.
“Are you going to be able to recognize Teddy Fay?” Stone asked. “You’ve met him twice, is that right?”
“Sort of. The first time I met him at the opera, and he invited me to sit with him; since he had better seats than I did, I accepted. Problem was, he was well disguised. Second time, I’m not even sure it was him; it was an old man on crutches, with one leg.”
“Since there are no photographs, do you have any idea what he looks like?”
“He’s about six feet tall, slender, balding or bald. We had a sketch done with the help of people in Tech Services who had worked with him.” She fumbled in a large handbag and handed him a sheet of paper.
Stone looked at the face. “This looks like Larry David from the HBO TV show.”
“Everybody says that, so it must be true. He’s pretty bland-looking, so he disguises easily, and he’s good at it.”
“Is he likely to go armed?”
“I’ve no idea, but he certainly knows how to use-even build-weapons of all sorts.”
Dino and Genevieve looked at the drawing. “I’ve seen this before,” Dino said. “I doubt if it’s worth the paper it’s drawn on.”
“There’s something else you both need to know,” Holly said. “Every time we’ve gotten close to him, Teddy has always had a well-planned escape route. Expect him to be slippery.”
“How about Irene?” Stone said. “Is she going to be difficult to deal with?”
Holly dug out a photograph of a handsome woman, apparently in her early fifties, her brown hair streaked with gray. “She was an agency drone for a long time, working her way steadily up the ladder.”
“Do you know her?”
“I think I passed her once in a hallway at Langley,” Holly replied.
“Any chance she’ll recognize you? Or will Teddy, for that matter?”
“Stone, you didn’t recognize me, until I spoke to you.”
“Touché,” Stone said. “Will Teddy recognize your voice?”
“I don’t think there’s anything all that distinctive about my voice, do you?”
“I suppose not,” Stone said.
“For what it’s worth,” Dino said, “I didn’t recognize her either, even when she spoke to me.”
“The transformation is remarkable,” Stone said. “Like two different women.”
“For better or worse?” Holly asked archly.
“They’re both gorgeous,” Stone replied, diplomatically.
“I could get used to this,” Genevieve said waving an arm at the airplane’s interior.
“Don’t,” Dino replied. “Stone’s airplane isn’t as nice as this, and I can’t afford the rental on jets.”
“I’m going to get used to it, anyway,” she said, putting her head back and closing her eyes.
The pilot’s voice came through an overhead speaker. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “we’re at our cruising altitude of forty-one thousand feet, making a little over four hundred knots. We’ll arrive at St. Marks in three hours and forty-one minutes. The toilet is forward, if you need it; please remember to close the curtain.”
“What’s the cabin altitude?” Stone asked.
“A thousand feet,” the pilot replied. “The pressurization is very good.”
Stone picked up a magazine and read until he was drowsy, then he napped. He was awakened by the pilot’s voice in his head.
“Landing at St. Marks in five minutes,” he said.
In exactly five minutes, Stone felt the airplane touch softly down. A couple of minutes later they taxied to a stop, and the pilot shut down the engines and opened the door, which was forward of the wing, then he went back to the cockpit for something.
Stone was first off the airplane, and he found himself facing half a dozen uniformed police officers, all black, pointing guns at him.
“Get on the ground,” a man in plain clothes and sunglasses said.
“What?” Stone asked.
“Get on the ground!” There was the sound of guns being racked.
Stone got on the ground.
6
Stone heard the others being ordered down, then he felt cold steel pressed against the back of his neck.
“Identify yourself,” a voice said.
Stone was about to do that when he heard a car screech to a halt and the door open and slam. “Stop that!” a man’s deep voice commanded.
The barrel of the weapon left Stone’s neck.
“Help them up,” the driver of the car said.
Someone put a hand under Stone’s elbow and helped him to his feet, along with the others.
“These people are my guests.”
Stone turned and saw Thomas Hardy walking toward him, smiling, his hand out.
“Thomas, I’m very glad to see you,” Stone said.
Thomas shook his hand and gave him a hug. “Let’s get your luggage into the car,” he said.
The policeman wearing dark glasses stepped up. “I require to see their passports,” he said.
“Of course, captain,” Thomas said. “Stone?”
Everyone produced a passport and handed it over. The captain motioned to a policeman who ran over and made a desk of his back while the captain stamped each passport, then handed them back to their owners. “My apologies,” he said, then with a wave for his troops to follow, walked away toward the small terminal.
“Thomas, let me introduce my friends: this is Dino Bacchetti, who used to be my NYPD partner; his girlfriend, Genevieve James; and my friend, Holly Barker.” He felt an elbow in his ribs. “Oh, uh, I’m sorry, this is Ginny Heller.”