16 Souls

CHAPTER THREE

Summit of Longs Peak, 14,255 feet above sea level, 6:40 pm, August 14^th

The temperature had dropped maybe ten degrees, prompting Marty to pull on a thick sweater under his windbreaker. Still, all in all it was pleasant, the lengthening shadows of the Rockies beginning to stretch east toward Loveland on the high plains that James Michener had made so attractive in his seminal work, “Centennial.” Marty loved that book, and as he’d told more than a few friends, it was the allure of northeastern Colorado ignited by Michener’s tale that had prompted him to bid on the next assignment his airline posted for the Denver pilot base. Buying a house in Boulder wasn’t exactly living the dream on the prairie, but it was close. He’d been happy there, both as a bachelor, and then a married man, although without the kids he’d always wanted. Nevertheless, it had been a blissful existence that hadn’t been quite as blissful for his ex.

He winced at the pain of the breakup, and the agony it had been writing a goodbye note to her.

Marty poured himself some more cabernet, amused at the thought that he might imbibe too much, realizing, as he replaced the bottle, that his pack was buzzing. He pulled out the cell phone, wondering why he hadn’t turned off the ringer altogether. The screen showed a long list of missed calls, all of them from Judith Winston.

Dammit!

He’d forgotten about their planned phone call. He thought of sending a simple text: “Sorry to worry you, but goodbye,” but she’d get the farewell note he’d just written in the little leather journal soon enough.

The familiar sounds of a smaller jet reached his ears and he looked up to track a corporate Gulfstream as it flew westbound thousands of feet above the peak. The sounds, however, immediately yanked him back to the left seat of the Boeing 757, raising his heart rate and triggering the nightmare all over again: The tail of a Beech 1900 commuter appearing out of nowhere just ahead, the frantic attempt to dump the 757’s nose in time, the screech of tearing metal…

It was easier to think about his female lawyer, and especially the way he’d tried to torture her on their first meeting in May. Marty took another sip of wine and looked toward Boulder, recalling that morning as he reluctantly parked his car outside her office.

He remembered being puzzled as to why he was standing outside such a ritzy office building. This was an assigned lawyer, a public defender he had been ordered to see. Such people worked out of old store fronts or their mother’s basement, didn’t they?

But the address was correct, and with some confusion he’d pushed through the door into a corporate world of wealth and opulence he’d always been amused to visit.

It took thirty minutes and a desultory perusal of three fancy magazines before he was escorted into what resembled a board room. Marty took one of the oversized chairs and waited, somewhere between irritated and bored. He was aware the assigned lawyer was a woman. Probably some bespeckled little inge’nue, with her hair in a bun fresh out of law school and working a hundred hours a week as a drone hoping for partner status and a life someday. If he was dumb enough to let someone like that represent him, he’d probably end up in the gas chamber, or whatever Colorado used.

A door opened and Marty looked up in time to see Judith Winston enter the room accompanied by two male associates. The fact that she was beautiful had survived a concealment attempt — hair back, glasses, a stark business suit instead of girl clothes. Her honey blond hair alone was all but iridescent. Marty had to remind himself he was here to reject her, even insult her, but there was also something about the force of her commanding presence that left him off balance.

She had offered her hand as if forced to greet a leper, and when he’d given it a perfunctory shake, she withdrew and slid into the chair opposite his, already immersed in the paperwork. He half expected her to pull out hand sanitizer.

“You’re Martin Mitchell, correct?”

Why else would I be sitting here, Babe? he thought, suppressing the retort in favor of a single word response. “Yes.”

“All right. I, for some unknown reason bordering on insanity, have volunteered to represent you and have been so appointed by Judge Gonzales.”

“Got it. You’re fired.”

Her head came up slightly in surprise, but she forced her eyes back to the legal pad, an elegant pair of gold-rimmed half-glasses professionally balanced on her nose .

“Sorry, but I won’t permit you to fire me, primarily because I don’t work for you, I work for the judge,” she said, her voice matter-of-fact and devoid of any emotional ripple.

“Hey, in Colorado I have the right to fire my counsel! I checked on that.”

“Yes. You do. But you’ve claimed that you’re indigent and with your wild pushing away of everyone who’s tried to help you, if you insist, I’ll ask the judge to declare that you are of diminished capacity which would mean that you can’t fire anyone. Not that I wouldn’t appreciate being fired,” she added. “but the judge has made it clear he won’t let me withdraw. So, we’re stuck with each other.”

Her eyes remained on the papers.

Apparently, Marty thought, she was going to keep her distance by never looking at him.

“Look at me.”

“I have no desire to engage in a staring contest, Mr. Mitchell.”

“Captain.”

“Okay. Captain Mitchell.” She glanced up, quickly scanned his face and looked at her associates, who were doing their best to look obedient.

“Alrighty, then!” She said, eyes back on her papers. “Now that we’re past the ‘you’re fired’ nonsense, would you care to tell me why, if you’re determined to spend the rest of your life behind bars by mounting no defense, you don’t simply plead guilty?”

“Obviously, you wouldn’t understand,” he shot back. “You and the rest of this stupid legal system already think I am guilty.”

She looked at him now, fixing him with an uncomfortable, emotionless gaze. He could actually feel the loathing.

“Captain Mitchell, what I do know is that you are technically guilty of the specific charges the DA has filed. You made a conscious decision to do what you did. Your company ordered you not to try it because people would be killed. You did it anyway, knowing the consequences, and they were dead right. People died as a result of your conscious, premeditated decision.”

“Hey! Regardless of which choice I made, people were likely to die!” he shot back.

“Understood. Nevertheless, this out-of-control idiot DA wants to ride your conviction to higher office. What happened, unfortunately, can be viewed by criminal law — and a jury — as murder, although the death penalty is not on the table.”

He began to get to his feet. “Thank you kindly, ma’am, but we’re done.”

“Sit down, Captain Mitchell.”

“Screw you, lady.”

“Wow! Such an irresistible invitation. But I’m no lady, I’m your lawyer, so if gender is a problem for you, get over it. We’ve got bigger issues on our hands.”

Marty remained on his feet, calculating the path of least resistance. He wanted to leave and slam the door behind him for effect, but something about her attitude was keeping him in place, and that didn’t make sense.

He turned back to her. “Counselor, I don’t care about your gender. I don’t care if you’re a lesbian, a shemale, or a hermaphrodite on heroin. I don’t need your so-called help and I don’t want it, and, as I said, we’re done here. If the damned judge wants to throw me in jail for contempt, what the hell. I’m already more dead than any corpse you’ve ever encountered.”

“Why?”

“What?”

He could see real anger in her eyes. “Sit your ass down right now, Captain!”

He should have barked back, but instead he shrugged and pulled out an adjacent chair. “If it pleases your majesty.”

“Answer the question. Why? Why are you dead? Why do you want to give up? Are you that furious with being prosecuted, or is this some kind of pitiful survivor’s remorse?”

“What, now you’re a psychologist?,” Marty snapped, “Because, lady, I’ve been rejected by the best.”

“Wrong answer. Why?”

“You don’t give up, do you? Don’t you get it? The mere act of criminally prosecuting an airline pilot in the United States for doing his job the best way he could and for using his blanket emergency authority is so horribly assaultive and third-world banal and wrong… there’s just no way to respond other than to say that I will not play your damned game. If America is dead and justice is dead, do what you may. I don’t care. I refuse to play. Clear enough?”

“Not even close,” Judith responded. “Tell me what happened.”

“What?”

She cocked her head slightly and almost smiled as she sat back. “You didn’t understand the question, Captain?”

“Give me one reason why I should go over everything with you? You’re not even on my side. What did you take this case for, anyway? To make headlines? Are you some sort of an associate on the make in this law firm?”

“I’m a full partner.”

“Really? Well then, this must either be some sort of exile for you, or you’ve got an angle. In any event, lady…”

“Judith.”

“Excuse me?”

“I have a name, Captain Mitchell,” she sighed in practiced contempt. “You may call me ‘Judith,’ or ‘Ms. Winston, or ‘Counselor.’ You may not call me ‘lady,’ ‘ma’am,’ or for that matter, ‘honey,’ ‘darling,’ ‘sweetheart,’ or ‘babe,’ and no matter how upset you might get, you may never use the ‘C’ word or refer to me as ‘bitch.’ Clear?”

“Clear enough… Ms. Winston.”

“Thank you, Captain Mitchell. Now, please, tell me what happened.”

He snickered. “You don’t know?”

“Of course I know, in gross terms, but I haven’t heard the full story from my client. So maybe we could rectify that before the next ice age.”

“And, what? You’re going to get me off?”

“Probably not. But we’ll see. I’ll do my best.”

Marty sat forward, almost leering at her, his index finger stabbing the polished surface of the conference room table.

“And that, Ms. Winston, is my story as well. Plain and simple.”

“Excuse me?”

“I did my best. And now some slimeball DA wants me in prison. One hundred fifty-three people inside that 757, fourteen on my wing, and most of them made it home because of my decisions.”

“Not all made it home.”

“That’s true…” he began, his voice choking off the remaining words. He swallowed hard and fought to re-compose himself. She could hear the deep, ragged breath as he forced his eyes back to hers. “I did my best. I tried my best to save everyone… every one.” His eyes flashed with anger and impatience, his temper rising like an over-stoked fire. “You getting this?” Suddenly he was on his feet again, eyes blazing. “YOU GETTING THIS? I did my goddamned best with the hand they dealt me, and I will NOT be second guessed by someone who wasn’t there!”“

“You also climbed your jet to the wrong altitude.”

The words stopped him cold, and Marty sank back into the chair like a deflating balloon, his fingers drumming an absent tattoo on the table before looking up at her, his voice noticeably subdued.

“Yes, we were at the wrong altitude.”

“We? Not ‘I’?”

He shrugged.

“Then tell me your story. All of it.”