There was the other possibility, of course-the female pilot, seeing the front page of the newspapers, might actually realize who her passenger had been… Undoubtedly, he should have killed her, but he had not. He had spared her life, he told himself, not out of pity, but because of what Boris and even Malik had said about too many killings. Boris was not only cautious, but also too concerned about the lives of the enemies of Islam. Boris had not wanted to gas the aircraft full of people, for instance, and had called this "an insane act of mass murder."
Malik had reminded him, "Your former government killed over twenty million of your own people since your revolution. All of Islam has not killed that many people since the time of Muhammad. Please do not preach to us. We have a long way to go to equal your accomplishments."
Boris had not replied to this.
As he drove along 1-95, Khalil put these recollections out of his mind, and thought once again of Paul Grey. He had not died as well as the brave General Waycliff and his brave wife. Yet, he had not died begging for his life. Khalil thought perhaps he should try a different method with William Satherwaite. They told him in Libya that the former Lieutenant Satherwaite had experienced some misfortunes in life, and Boris had said, "Killing him might be doing him a favor." To which Khalil had replied, "No man wants to die. Killing him will be as pleasurable for me as killing the rest of them."
Khalil looked at his dashboard clock-it was 3:05 P.M. He looked at his Satellite Navigator. Soon he would be leaving 1-95 for a road called ALT 17 that would take him directly to the place called Moncks Corner.
Once again his thoughts returned to the morning. These dealings with the female pilot had a disturbing effect on him, but he couldn't completely comprehend what had caused him such indecision and confusion. There were good reasons to kill her, and good reasons not to kill her. He recalled that she had said to the woman behind the counter, "I'll be back to take care of the Piper."
Thus, if she hadn't returned, they would be looking for her, and for him. Unless, of course, the woman behind the counter had the thought that her pilot and her customer decided to… be together. Yes, he could see that thought in the woman's face and the way she acted. However, the woman eventually might become concerned and call the police. So perhaps it had been better not to kill the female pilot.
As he drove, a vision of the pilot filled his mind, and he saw her smiling, talking to him, helping him into the aircraft-touching him. Those thoughts continued running through his mind, even as he tried to rid himself of her image. He found her business card in his pocket and looked at it. It had her home phone number written in pen above the business number of Alpha Aviation. He put the card back in his pocket.
He saw his exit at the last moment and swerved into the right lane, then onto the exit ramp for ALT 17.
He found himself on a two-lane road, much different from the Interstate. There were houses and farms on both sides of the road, small villages, gasoline stations, and pine forests. A compatriot had traveled this route on Khalil's behalf some months ago and reported, "This is the most dangerous of roads because of the drivers who are insane, and because of the police who have motorcycles and who watch everyone pass by."
Khalil heeded this warning and tried to drive so as not to attract attention. He passed through a number of villages and saw a police car and a motorcycle in two of them.
But it was a short distance to his destination-60 kilometers, or 40 miles, and within the hour, he was approaching the town of Moncks Corner.
Bill Satherwaite sat with his feet on his cluttered desk in a small concrete block building at Berkeley County Airport, Moncks Corner, South Carolina. He had the grimy handset of a cheap telephone cradled between his ear and shoulder, and he listened to Jim McCoy's voice at the other end. Satherwaite glanced at the anemic air-conditioner stuck through the wall. The fan was clattering, and a trickle of cold air was coming out the vent. It was only April, and it was already close to 90 degrees outside. Damned hellhole.
Jim McCoy said, "Have you heard from Paul? He was going to call you."
Satherwaite replied, "Nah. Sorry I couldn't get on the conference call Saturday. Had a busy day."
"That's okay," said McCoy. "I just thought I'd call you and see how you were doing."
"Doing fine." Satherwaite glanced at the desk drawer beneath where his feet were propped up. In the drawer, he knew, was a mostly full bottle of Jack Daniel's. He glanced at the wall clock: 4:10 P.M. Somewhere in the world it was past 5:00 P.M.; time for one small drink-except that the charter customer was supposed to be here by 4:00 P.M. Satherwaite said, "Did I tell you I flew down to see Paul a few months ago?"
"Yes, you did-"
"Yeah. You ought to see his setup. Big house, pool, hangar, twin Beech, hot and cold running babes." He laughed and added "Shit, when they saw my old Apache coming in, they tried to wave me off." He laughed.
McCoy took the opportunity to say, "Paul was a little concerned about the Apache."
"Yeah? Paul's an old lady, if you want my opinion. How many times did he piss us off wasting time checking everything a hundred times? Guys who are too damned careful get into accidents." He added, "The Apache passes FAA inspection."
"Just passing it on, Bill."
"Yeah." He kept staring at the drawer, then swung his legs off the desk, sat upright in his swivel chair, leaned forward, and opened the desk drawer. He said to Jim McCoy, "Hey, you really got to get down there and see Paul's setup."
In fact, Jim McCoy had been down to Spruce Creek a number of times, but he didn't want to mention that to Bill Satherwaite, who'd been invited just once, though Satherwaite was only about an hour-and-a-half flight time away. "Yes, I'd like to-"
"Incredible house and stuff. But you should see what he's working on. Virtual fucking reality. Jesus, we sat there all night drinking, bombing the shit out of everything." He laughed. "We did the Al Azziziyah run five times. Fucking incredible. By the fifth run, we were so shit-faced we couldn't even hit the fucking ground." He broke into peals of laughter.
Jim McCoy laughed, too, but his laughter was forced. McCoy really didn't want to hear the same story again that he'd heard a half dozen times since Paul had invited Satherwaite down to Spruce Creek for a long weekend. It had been, Paul told him afterward, a particularly long weekend. Up until that time, none of the guys had quite understood how much Bill Satherwaite had deteriorated in the past seven years since they'd last gotten together in an informal reunion of the flight crews from the squadron. Now, everyone knew.
Bill Satherwaite caught his breath and said, "Hey, wizo, remember when I waited too long to kick in my afterburners, and Terry almost climbed up my ass?" He laughed again and put the bottle on his desk.
Jim McCoy, sitting in his office at the Cradle of Aviation Museum on Long Island, didn't reply. He had trouble connecting the Bill Satherwaite he had known with the Bill Satherwaite at the other end of the line. The old Bill Satherwaite was as good a pilot and officer as there was in the Air Force. But ever since his too-early retirement, Bill Satherwaite had been on a steep glide slope toward the ground. Being a Gadhafi-killer had become increasingly more important to him as the years went by. He told his war stories incessantly to anyone who would listen, and now he was even telling them to the guys who flew the mission with him. And every year these stories got a little more dramatic, and every year his role in their little twelve-minute war got a little grander.
Jim McCoy was concerned about Bill Satherwaite's bragging about the raid. No one was supposed to mention that they'd been part of that mission, and certainly no one was supposed to mention other pilots' names. McCoy had told Satherwaite numerous times to watch what he said, and Satherwaite had assured him that he'd only used their radio code names or first names when he discussed the raid. McCoy had warned him, "Don't even say you were on that raid, Bill. Stop talking about it."