Dead In The Water

CHAPTER 29

When Stone woke it was seven-thirty, and he jumped out of bed and into some clothes; he didn't want to miss Libby's departure, still harboring a lingering fear that she might not, after all, leave. He grabbed the letter to Arrington and ran toward the inn, zipping up his trousers. He arrived at the bar in time to see Thomas disappear around a corner, going toward the parking lot with some suitcases. "Thomas," he called, "where do you keep the Federal Express packaging?" "Under the bar,"Thomas called back. "See you later; I've got to get Mrs.Manning to the airport. We're running late."

"Just give me a minute to address…" But Thomas was gone. Stone grabbed a FedEx envelope and ran after him. Thomas was pulling out of the parking lot when he flagged down the car and jumped in the back seat. "Morning, Libby," he said. "I'll come to the airport with you, if you don't mind."

"Sure, why not?" she said. She was wearing the straw hat in which she had arrived.

"Thomas, have you got a pen?"

Thomas handed one back to him.

"Libby, I'd appreciate it if, when you get to Miami, you'd drop this into the nearest Federal Express bin for me. I want it to be in California tomorrow."

"Sure, glad to," she replied.

"Nothing you can fax?" Thomas asked.

"No, I want it delivered." He sealed the letter into the envelope and handed it to Libby, who put it into her large handbag. "You're sure this is no trouble?"

"Of course not; it's like mailing a letter-they have those bins all over the airport."

"I appreciate it," Stone said.

"Do you always drive this fast?" Libby asked Thomas, fastening her seat belt. "No, but we're running late, and I don't want Chester to leave you behind. He has to keep to a schedule."

"We were half an hour late arriving in St.Marks," she said. "Chester owes me. Besides, if you hadn't been delivering breakfast to somebody or other, we wouldn't be late. I was on time."

"I didn't know you offered room service, Thomas," Stone said.

"I took Jim Forrester up some food; took him his dinner last night, too, but he couldn't keep it down."

"He's sick?"

"As a dog. I tried to get him to let me call the doc but he said he'd be all right. He did look a little bet-this morning, but not much."

"He said something yesterday about not feeling

"At least he cleaned up after himself," Thomas said. "The maids hate it when folks get sick all over the place."

"Is there a bug going around?"

"He ate some conch from one of those street venidors in the capital yesterday. Don't you ever do that, Stone, not unless I point out the good ones."

"I promise." They raced into the airport and across the tarmac, where Chester was waiting next to his airplane with the baggage compartment standing open. There was one other passenger, a black woman, already aboard. Thomas hustled Libby's bags into the airplane and locked the compartment, then shook hands with Libby.

"You come back when you can stay longer," he said.

Stone shook her hand, too. "You find yourself a good broker and invest that money conservatively," he said to her. Her answer was drowned out by an engine starting. He helped her into the airplane, got her seat belt fastened, and closed the rear door.

Libby held up the Federal Express envelope and gave him a thumbs up, then she stuck it back into her handbag. The airplane began to move, and Stone stepped out of its way.

Thomas turned toward the car. "Let's go," he said; "I want to get back to work."

"Hang on just a minute, will you, Thomas?" Stone replied, watching the airplane. "I just want to be absolutely sure she's really gone."

Thomas laughed. "Glad to have her off the island, huh?"

"I can't tell you how glad." He pointed at the airplane. "Look, Chester must really be in a hurry; he's not even doing his run up check." The little twin was already rolling down the runway.

The two men stood and watched as Chester roared off the runway and got the landing gear up. The airplane turned north toward Antigua, visible in the distance across the channel separating the two islands. The early morning sun glinted on the water.

"There goes a happy woman," Stone said, waving. "Good-bye, Libby!" He turned toward the car. As he did, he noticed a change in the sound of the engines, and he looked back at the airplane. "What was that?" he asked.

Thomas looked at the airplane, now out over the water. "He's just reducing power after takeoff. It's only a few minutes' flight, and he has to start slowing down if he wants to make Antigua on the first pass." Thomas frowned. "What's that?" he asked, pointing. Smoke was trailing from the airplane's left engine.

"Looks like Chester's got a problem," Stone said. "He must have already shut down the engine."

"I see flames," Thomas said.

Stone shielded his eyes from the morning sun. "So do I," he said. The airplane began a rapid descent toward the water.

"Why doesn't he return here?" Thomas asked.

"He's trying to blow out the fire," Stone said. "When I was training for my license, that's what I was taught to do with an engine fire, a power-on descent, to blow it out." The airplane seemed to be headed straight the sea, and then it leveled off. "The fire isn't out," Stone said. "He's going to ditch in the water."

"Jesus help him," Thomas said.

"If the engine doesn't blow and he can get the airplane down, they've got a good chance." He looked at the wind sock; it was standing straight out. "There's going to be a chop on the surface, though. Put her into the wind, Chester."

The airplane was flying level, just off the surface of the water now.

"Why doesn't he put her down?" Thomas asked. "He's still flying."

"He's bleeding off air speed; he'd built up a lot on the descent. He wants to touch down right at stall speed, as slowly as it will still fly. Look, he's raising the nose now; he'll be down in a second."

"I hope he's got a raft," Thomas said. "It's going to take a while to get to him."

"Surely he has; he'd have to. Here comes touchdown; don't stall the thing, Chester!"

The nose came up some more and the airplane headed toward landing. Then a wing dropped, touched the water, and the airplane cartwheeled, breaking into pieces.

"Oh, shit," Stone said, watching as the wreckage scattered over the water.

"Come on," Thomas called, running for the car. "I know a man with a boat."

Stone jumped into the car and Thomas, driving like a madman, headed out of the airport and along the coast road. "There's a little fishing settlement along the coast, right near where Chester went down," he said.

"Thomas," Stone said, "nobody on that airplane is alive; don't kill us in the bargain."

Thomas slowed a little. "Somebody might have made it," he said.

"They might have if he'd gotten the thing down in one piece," Stone said quietly. "But when it broke up, that ended it. Anybody alive would be unconscious, and anybody unconscious would have drowned by now."

"Still," Thomas said. He threw the car into a left turn and careened down a short dirt road, screeching to a stop at a small dock. A man was already taking in the lines on a fishing boat. "Henry!" Thomas yelled, "wait for me!" He and Stone jumped onto the moving boat. "You saw the plane?" Thomas asked the skipper.

"Everybody saw the plane," Henry replied. "We're goin', but cain't be nobody alive out there. How many folks was on it?"

"Three, including Chester."

"Chester gone," Henry said. "They all gone." Twenty minutes later they saw the first piece of wreckage-a wing tip, floating on the surface; then smaller bits of flotsam.

"Look," Thomas said, pointing to some woven straw in the water. "That's Libby's hat, I think."

"There somebody is," Henry called out, pointing and changing course. "Peter, get the boat hook His crewman got the tool and ran forward as Henry slowed the boat. "It's Chester," Thomas said.

"He's missing an arm," Stone said quietly.

It took fifteen minutes in the swells to get a line the body, and Stone was feeling a little queasy from the motion. He had seen enough bodies as a cop to be unruffled by the sight of Chester. The body aboard and covered, they patrolled the area for another two hours, but, except for the floating wing tip, which they brought aboard, found nothing larger than Libby's hat. A police boat joined them.

"I reckon we go in now," Henry said.

"How deep is the water out here?" Stone asked."

"Deep. We outside the hundred-fathom line." He pointed to their position on his chart.

"How much of a search will there be?" Stone asked.

"You're looking at it, I expect," Thomas replied. "I reckon the two women must still be in the fuselage, but there's no National Transportation Safety Board to go after the wreckage and the bodies, not down here in the islands. They're gone." They headed back toward the dock with their grisly cargo.

Stone thought about Libby Manning and her newfound wealth, which she would never spend.