Fly by Night

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

At noon he took a break, spent thirty minutes in the boat drinking fresh water and massaging his aching arms. His hands were blistered, so the old man wrapped a fish-scented rag around the handle, securing it with string as only a seaman could.

Davis got back in the water.

Two hours later he spotted something, but it turned out to be an old sunken boat, thirty feet of metal and wood that had probably hit bottom back in World War Two. What remained of the hull was encrusted in sea life, a sarcophagus of soft coral and gorgonians that muted its shape. Even so, Davis had spotted the symmetrical outline. Spotted it by shape alone, just as he’d hoped.

Hours later — he had no idea how many — Davis needed another break. He gave the old man the cut signal and the little outboard went silent. As he swam to the boat, his arms were stiff and sore, but it at least felt good to use them in a new motion. Davis clung to the side of the boat like a huge limpet. There was no boarding ladder, but the old man had fashioned a rope with knots, and he hung it over the side. Davis waited to synchronize with the swells, then heaved himself up, happy to take the old man’s helping arm. He collapsed on the seat, and stripped the mask and snorkel from his head.

Davis sat with his elbow on his knees, exhausted and sore. The old man handed him a bottle of water. He imagined what the old guy must be thinking. Looking for airplanes in the ocean. The old salt would have been well within his rights to be laughing his ass off right now. But he wasn’t. His expression was dead serious, his eyes sharp behind a lifetime of cataracts. It was the same look that would be there when he needed a school of mackerel to feed his family. Briefly, Davis considered trading places with him. The fisherman was probably half Davis’ weight, and they’d get far better gas mileage. But that didn’t make sense. Davis knew what to look for, and the old man knew how to run the boat and the GPS, how to keep a tight search pattern. No, Davis was stuck, resigned to being dragged around for the rest of the day like a two hundred and forty pound baitfish.

He got back in the water reluctantly, going over the side like a man headed to some kind of aquatic chain gang. He vowed no more breaks. Davis didn’t know the time, but it had to be late afternoon. There were two hours of daylight left, maybe three. He decided he’d hang on as long as he could, until his arms and hands gave way, or until the sun set. When they began moving, he realized he was getting hungry. Below, he’d seen any number of nice hogfish and grouper, enough to make him consider the spear and sling he’d seen in the old man’s boat. They could stop long enough for Davis to hunt down a nice dinner. But there was a serious downside to that idea. Being dragged behind a boat in the open ocean, Davis decided the last thing he needed was blood in the water.

Churning through the waves, he began to have doubts. Had the Navy’s data been good? Was the search pattern tight enough to account for the visibility? Was the old man keeping a good track? It all weighed on him, even more than the salty ocean he was battering through.

An hour later Davis’ arms were like mush, his huge shoulders cramping. An hour after that — or was it two? — he could barely focus on the sandy bottom. His fingers began to slip. The sun was getting lower, and the bottom fifty feet below had begun to fade to green-gray obscurity. He gave it ten more minutes. His body was giving out. Then he gave it ten more. And that was when he saw it.

A DC-3 that looked like it was flying across the ocean floor.

There was no mistaking the shape. The still shadow of an almost fully intact DC-3 came out of the gloom like a ghost. Davis raised his arm and waved a frantic cut signal. He felt the line go slack, then looked up at the boat and gave the old man two thumbs-up. He was trying to think of a signal that would tell him to mark the spot with Mr. Gamun, but then he saw the skipper already fiddling with the device. The old guy really knew his stuff — a few waves or some current, lose the light, and their hard-won find could be lost in seconds.

Davis took a deep breath, piked his legs up, and free-dove down. For the first time today he could have used fins. Fifty feet was a long way to free-dive, beyond him for sure with bare feet. But even if he could only get halfway there, Davis wanted a closer look. The airplane was lying on its belly, the port wing fractured at midpoint but still attached, probably held in place by control cables and fuel lines. The starboard wing was missing entirely outboard of the engine mount. The fuselage was in good shape, only a few accordion-like wrinkles just forward of the tail and a misshapen cockpit that had clearly taken the brunt of the impact. All in all, a wreck in good shape, better than a lot Davis had seen. A wreck that had to be chock-full of clues as to what had happened.

He pulled himself down, kicking and stroking until his lungs strained. He got close enough to see what he really wanted — the tail number. It was there in big black lettering, no mistake. X85BG. They really had found it.

Davis turned upward, heaved an explosion of air at the surface like a whale after sounding. He floated for a few seconds and took in the wreckage, mentally mapping the layout. He used his internal compass to determine that the airplane was pointed east. Final orientation wasn’t necessarily a good indicator of heading at the time of a crash, but right now Davis would take any scrap of evidence he could get.

Bobbing in the Red Sea, he stared at the wreckage through the thick faceplate of his mask, wondering how he was going to get closer. He gave particular attention to the cockpit. Davis knew who hadn’t been flying that night — the two Ukrainians. According to Boudreau, no other company pilots were missing. So who the hell was down there? he wondered. A pair of FBN’s homegrown Sudanese pilots? It was just one more thing that didn’t make sense. He paddled back to the boat and clung to the side. The old man looked at him eagerly, expectantly, then put his arms out like wings and pantomimed a zooming airplane.

“Yeah,” Davis said with a nod. “Airplane.”

The old man smiled his broken toothed smile.

The weather gods were still smiling as the boat approached the village, the evening breeze driving tranquil, rolling swells of blue. The outline of the coast was fading, little more than disjointed groups of lights that resembled an arrangement of golden gems strung on some unseen necklace. The sun had faded, but for Davis its effects lingered like a thermal hangover — his back was sunburned, and his body encrusted in salt residue from evaporated seawater.

Nearing the beach, he spotted Antonelli. She was standing there in hospital scrubs and tennis shoes, waving like you would at an arriving cruise ship. Davis gave a truncated wave in return, his shoulder and arm muscles having locked up on the return to port. The old man motored straight onto the beach and two young boys came to put round logs under the wooden hull, a poor man’s roller system. Davis and the old man got out, and they all pulled the boat above the high-tide line. Antonelli gave a hand, as she was prone to do.

She said, “You look exhausted.”

“Rough day at the office.”

She held out a small canvas bag. Davis took it and found four water bottles inside.

“Thanks.”

He passed one to the old man who took it and smiled appreciatively. Davis twisted the cap off another, sucked down half the bottle in one draw. It was cool and fresh. He squirted some on his face and wiped away accretions of sweat and seaweed and Red Sea salt. He held out the bag and offered one to Antonelli.

“No” she said. “I never drink from any bottle that doesn’t have a cork.”

“Right.”

“Did you have any luck?” she asked.

“It took all day, but yeah — we found her.”

“That’s wonderful!”

“It’s a start.”

“What will you do next?”

Davis eyed the old man who was busy securing the engine. “I’ll need to hire him again tomorrow. And ask him if anybody around here has scuba gear.”

Antonelli did. The old man stared at Davis with his weathered grin, then started talking. He went back and forth with Antonelli for a full minute before she gave Davis his answer.

“There is another fisherman who has some gear. He charges a lot when the others lose nets or traps in deep water.”

Davis jerked a thumb toward the old man. “I already gave him all my money.”

“I told him I would cover your debts with a loan, but only if the gear can be had at a reasonable price — all, of course, at very unreasonable rate of interest to you.”

“Thanks again.”

“Not at all,” she said. “And by the way — the medicine you retrieved for us has already saved one life today.”

“Glad to hear it. So are we still on for dinner?”

“Of course,” she said, coming closer.

Davis had always had a lousy sense of smell — not a bad way to go through life in his opinion — but right now it was working, registering a curiously inspiring mix of perfume and iodine.

Antonelli tugged on the ragged old T-shirt she’d found for him. Davis had put it back on for the ride to shore, but it was nearly shredded after a day at sea on a frame two sizes too large. She said, “The dress standards here are casual, however I will insist on something better.”

“Half an hour?” he asked.

“Done.”

She walked away, and Davis watched her go. The sway of her hips, the flow of her hair in the breeze. The old man caught him looking, and smiled like old guys did anywhere.

Davis grinned back and made two gestures. He pointed to his own eyes, and then a rounded movement with his hands toward the east. See you in the morning.

The old man nodded enthusiastically. Davis had the distinct feeling he was beginning to enjoy this little sideshow.