McCone And Friends

SOLO

“That’s where it happened.” Hy put the Citabris into a gliding turn and we spiraled down to a few hundred feet above Tufa Lake. Its water looked teal blue today; the small islands and gnarled towers of the calcified vegetation stood out in gray and taupe relief. A wind from the east riffled the lake’s surface. Except for a blackened area on the south side of Plover Island, I saw no sign that a light plane had crashed and burned there.

I turned my head from the window and looked into the forward part of the cockpit; Hy Ripinsky, my best friend and longtime lover, still stared at the scene below, his craggy face set in grim lines. After a few seconds he shook his head and turned his attention back to the controls. Putting on full throttle and pulling back on the stick, the small plane rose and angled in for the airport on the lake’s northwest shore.

Through the dual headsets Hy said, “Dammit, McCone, I’m a good flight instructor, and Scott Oakley was a good student. There’s no reason he should’ve strayed from the pattern and crashed on his first solo flight.”

We were entering that same pattern, on the downwind leg for runway two-seven. I waited till Hy had announced our position to other traffic on the Unicom, then said, “No reason, except for the one you’ve already speculated on: that he deliberately strayed and put the plane into a dive in order to kill himself.”

“Looked that way to me. To the NTSB investigators, too.”

I was silent as he turned onto final approach, allowing him to concentrate on landing in the strong crosswind. He didn’t speak again till we were turning off the runway.

“Ninety percent of flying’s metal and emotional-you know that,” he said. “And ninety percent of the instructor’s job is figuring out where the student’s head is at, adapting your teaching methods to the individual. I like to think I’ve got good instincts along that line, and I noticed absolutely nothing about Scott Oakley that indicated he’d kill himself.”

“Tell me about him.”

“He was a nice kid, in his early twenties. From this area originally, but went up to Reno to attend the University of Nevada. Things didn’t go well for him academically, so he dropped out, went to work as a dealer at one of the casinos. Met a woman, fell in love, got engaged.”

He maneuvered the plane between its tie-down chains, shut it down, and got out, then helped me climb from the cramped backseat. Together we secured the chains and began walking toward the small terminal building where his Land Rover and my MG were parked.

“If Oakley lived in Reno, why was he taking flying lessons down here?” I asked. Tufa Lake was a good seventy miles south, in the rugged mountains of California.

“About six, eight months ago his father got sick-inoperable cancer. Scott came home to help his mother care for him. While he was here he figured he’d use the money he was saving on rent to take up flying. There isn’t much future in dealing at a casino. And he wanted to get into aviation, build up enough hours to be hired by an airline.”

“And other than being a nice kid, he was…?”

“Quiet, serious, very dedicated and purposeful. Set a fast learning pace for himself, even though he couldn’t fly as much as he’d’ve liked, owing to his responsibilities at home. A month ago his father died; he offered to stay on with his mother for a while, but she wouldn’t hear of it. Said she knew the separation from his girlfriend had been difficult and she didn’t want to prolong it. But he came back down for a lesson each week, and on that last day he’d done three excellent takeoffs and landings. I had full confidence that I could get out of the plane.”

“And you noticed nothing emotionally different about him beforehand?”

“Nothing whatsoever. He was quiet and serious, just like always.”

We reached the place where our vehicles were parked, and I perched on the rear of the MG. Hy faced me, leaning against his Rover, arms folded across his chest. His eyes were deeply troubled, and lines of discouragement bracketed his mouth.

I knew what he was feeling: He took on few students, as he didn’t need the money and his work for the international security firm in which he held a partnership often took him away from his ranch here in the high desert country for weeks at a time. But when did take someone on, it was because he recognized great potential in the individual-both as a pilot and as a person who would come to love flying as much as he himself did. Scott Oakley’s crash-in his full sight as he stood on the tarmac at the airport awaiting his return-had been devastating to him. And it had also aroused a great deal of self-doubt.

I said, “I assume you want me to look into the reason Oakley killed himself.”

“If it’s something you feel you can take on.”

“Of course I can.”

“I’ll pay you well.”

“For God’s sake, you don’t have to do that!”

“Look, McCone, you don’t ask your dentist friend to drill for free. I’m not going to ask you to investigate for free, either.”

“Oh, don’t worry, Ripinsky. Nothing in life’s free. We’ll come up with some suitable way for you to compensate me for my labors.”

My obvious starting place was Scott Oakley’s mother. I called to ask if I could stop by, and set off for her home in Vernon, the small town that hugged the lake’s north shore.

It was autumn, the same time of year as when I’d first journeyed there and met Hy. The aspens glowed golden in the hollows of the surrounding hills and above them the sky was a deep blue streaked with high cirrus clouds. In the years that I’d been coming to Tufa Lake, its water level had slowly risen and was gradually beginning to reclaim the dusty alkali plain that surrounded it-the result of a successful campaign by environmental organizations to stop diversions of its feeder streams to southern California. Avocets, gulls, and other shorebirds had returned to nest on its small island and feed on the now plentiful brine shrimp.

Strange that Scott Oakley had chosen a place of such burgeoning vitality to end his own life.

Jan Oakley was young to have lost a husband, much less outlived her son-perhaps in her early forties. She had the appearance of a once-active woman whose energy had been sapped by sadness and loss, and small wonder: It had been only two weeks since Scott’s crash. As we sat in the living room of her neat white prefab house, she handed me a high-school graduation picture of him; he had been blond, blue-eyed, and freckle-faced, with and endearingly serious expression.

“What do you want to ask me about Scott, Ms. McCone?”

“I’m interested in what kind of a person he was. What his state of mind was before the accident.”

“You said on the phone that you’re a private investigator and a friend of Hy Ripinsky. Is he trying to prove that Scott committed suicide? Because he didn’t, you now. I don’t care what Hy or the National Transportation Safety Board people think.”

“He doesn’t want to prove anything. But Hy needs answers-much as I’m sure you do.”

“Answers so he can get himself off the hook as far as responsibility for Scott’s death is concerned?”

I remained silent. She was hurting, and entitled to her anger.

After a moment Jan Oakley sighted. “All right, that was unfair. Scott admired Hy; he wouldn’t want me to blame him. Ask your questions, Ms. McCone.”

I asked much the same things as I had of Hy and received much the same answers, as well as Scott’s Reno address and the name of his fiancée. “I never even met her,” Mrs. Oakley said regretfully, “and I couldn’t reach her to tell her about the accident. She knows by now, of course, but she never even bothered to call.”

I’d about written the interview off at that point, but I decided to probe some more on the issue of Scott’s state of mind immediately before he left for what was to be his last flying lesson. After my first question, Mrs. Oakley failed to meet my eyes, clearly disturbed.

“I’m sorry to make you relive that day,” I said, “but how Scott was feeling is important.”

“Yes, I know.” For a moment it seemed that she might cry, then she sighed again, more heavily, “He wasn’t…He was upset when he arrived late the night before.”

“Over what?”

“He wouldn’t say.”

Sometimes instinct warns you when someone isn’t telling the whole truth; this was one of those times. “What about the next morning? Did he say then?’

She looked at me, startled. “How did…? All right, yes. He told me. Now I realized I should have stopped him, but he wanted so badly to solo. I thought, one time-what will it matter? All he wanted was to take that little Cessna around the pattern alone one time before he had to give it all up.”

“Give up flying? Why?”

“Scott had a physical checkup in Reno the day before. He was diagnosed as having narcolepsy.”

“Narcolepsy,” Hy said. “That’s the condition when you fall asleep without any warning?”

“Yes. One of my friends suffers from it. She’ll get very sleepy, drop off in the middle of a conversation. One time we were flying down to Southern California together; the plane was landing, and she just stopped talking, closed her eyes, and slept till we were on the ground.”

“Jesus, can’t they treat it?”

“Yes, with ephedrine or amphetamine, but it’s not always successful.”

“And neither the drugs nor the condition would be acceptable to an FAA medical examiner.”

“No. Besides, there’s and even more potentially dangerous side to it: A high percentage of the people who have narcolepsy also suffer from a condition called cataplexy in which their body muscles become briefly paralyzed in stressful or emotional situations.”

“Such as one would experience on a first solo flight.” Hy grimaced and signaled for another round of drinks. We were sitting at the bar at Zelda’s, the lakeside tavern at the top of the peninsula on which Vernon was located. The owner, Bob Zelda, gave him a thumbs-up gesture and quickly slid a beer toward him, a white wine toward me.

“You know, McCone, it doesn’t compute. How’d Scott pass his student pilot’s medical?”

“The condition was only diagnosed the day before you soloed him. And remember, those medicals aren’t a complete workup. They check your history and the obvious-blood pressure, sight, hearing. They’re not looking for something that may be developing.”

“Still doesn’t compute. Scott was a good, responsible kid. Went strictly by the letter as far as the regulations were concerned. I can’t believe he’d risk soloing when he knew he could nod off at any time.”

“Well, he wanted it very badly.”

“Christ, why didn’t he level with me? I’d’ve soloed him without getting out of the plane. He could’ve flown with absolutely no input from me, but I’d’ve been there in case. Doesn’t count for getting the license, of course, but his mother told you he’d already decided to give it up.”

We drank silently for a minute. I watched Hy’s face in the mirrored backbar. He was right: It didn’t compute. He needed answers and, now, so did I.

I said, “I’ll drive up to Reno tomorrow.”

Scott’s former apartment was in a newish complex in the hills on the northeast side of Reno, high above the false glitter of the casinos and the tawdry hustle of the Strip. I parked in a windswept graveled area behind it and went knocking on the doors of its immediate neighbors. Only one person was home, and she was house-sitting for the tenant and had never heard of Scott Oakley.

When I started back to my car, a dark-haired man in his mid twenties was getting out of a beat-up Mazda. He started across to the next cluster of apartments, and I followed.

“Help you with something?” he asked, setting down his grocery bag in front of the door to the ground floor unit and fumbling in his pocket for the keys.

“The son of a friend of mine lives here-Scott Oakley. Do you know him?”

“Oh God. You haven’t heard?”

“Heard what?” I asked, and proceeded to listen to what I already knew. ‘That’s awful,” I said when he finished. “How’s Christy holding up?”

“Christy?”

“His fiancée.”

“Oh, that must be the redhead.”

“She and Scott were engaged; I guess I just assumed they lived together.”

“No, the apartment’s a studio, too small for more than one person. Actually, I didn’t know Scott very well, just to say hello to. But one of the other tenants, is downstairs neighbor, did say that Scott told him he wouldn’t be living here long, because he planned to marry some woman who worked at the Lucky Strike down on the strip.”

The Lucky Strike had pretensions to a gold-rush motif, but basically it wasn’t very different from all the other small Nevada casinos: Electronic games and slots beeped, and whooped; bored dealers sent cards sailing over green felt to giddy tourists; waitresses who were supposed to be camp followers, clad in skimpy costumes that no self-respecting camp follower would ever have worn, strolled about serving free watery drinks. The bars, where keno numbers continually flashed on lighted screens, bore such names as The Shaft, Pick ‘n Shovel, and The Assay Office.

I located the personnel office and learned that Christy Hertz no longer worked at the casino; she failed to show up for her evening cocktail-waitressing shift on the day of Scott Oakley’s death and had not so much as called in since. The manager wasn’t concerned; on the Strip, he said, women change jobs without notice as often as they do their hair color. But once I explained about Scott’s death and my concern for Christy, he softened some. He remembered Scott Oakley from when he’d dealt blackjack there, had thought him a fine young man who would someday do better. The manger’s sympathy earned me not only Christy’s last known address, but the name of one of her friends who would be on duty that evening in The Shaft, as well as the name of a good friend of Scott who was the night bartender in the Assay Office.

As I started out, the manger called after me, “If you see Christy, tell her her job’s waiting.”

Christy Hertz’s address was in a mobile home park in nearby Sparks. I’ve always thought of such enclaves as depressing places where older people retreat from the world, but this one was different. There were lots of big trees and planter boxes full of fall marigolds; near the manager’s office, a little footbridge led over a man-made stream to a pond where ducks floated. I followed the maze of lanes to Christy’s trailer, but no one answered her door. None of the neighbors wee around, and the manager’s office was closed.

Dead end for now, and the friends didn’t come on duty at the Lucky Strike for several hours. So what else could I do here? One thing.

Find a doctor.

Years before, I’d discovered that the key to getting information from anyone was to present myself as a person in a position of authority-and that it was easy to do so without lying. Most people, unless they’re paranoid or have something to hide, will cooperate with officials; their motives may range from respect to fear, but the result is the same. I tailored my approach to the situation by first driving to the public library and photocopying the Yellow Pages listings for physicians. Then, in a quiet corner of the stacks there, I went to work with my cell phone.

“My name is Sharon McCone. I’m an investigator looking into the cause of a fatal aviation accident that occurred two weeks ago near Tufa Tower Airport, Mono County, California. The victim was a student pilot who reportedly had been diagnosed with narcolepsy; the diagnosis wasn’t noted on FAA form eight-four-two-zero-dash-two, so we assume it was made by a person other than a designated examiner. Would you please check your record to see if Scott Oakley was a patient?”

Only five people asked if I was with the Federal Aviation Agency or the National Transportation Safety Board. When I admitted to being a private investigator working for the victim’s mother, two cut me off, citing confidentiality of patient records, but the remainder made searches. All the searches came up negative.

Maybe Clark Morris, Scott’s friend who tended bar at the Lucky Assay Office, could steer me toward the right doctor.

Evening on the Strip: the sun was sinking over the Sierras and the light was golden, vying with the garish neon and coming up a winner. The sidewalks were crowded with people out for a Saturday-night good time-or looking for trouble. A drunken guy in cowboy garb bumped into a middle-aged couple and yelled an obscenity. They stared him down until he slunk off, muttering. I spotted three drug deals going down, two of them to minors. A trio of young Native Americans, probably fresh off one of the nearby reservations, paid an older, cynical-eyed man to buy them a sixpack. Hookers strolled, lonely men’s gazes homing in on them like airplanes to radar transmitters. And on the curb a raggedly dressed girl of perhaps thirteen hunched, retching between her pulled-up knees.

I thought of Hy’s ranch house, the stone fireplace, the shelves of western novels and Americana to either side of it. Of the easy chairs where we should now be seated, wineglasses to hand. Of quiet conversation, a good dinner, and bed…

“Scott’s doctor?” Clark Morris said. “I don’t think he had one.”

“He must’ve gone to somebody for his student pilot’s medical exam.”

“Excuse me a minute.” The mustached bartender moved to a couple who had just pulled up stools, served them Bud lights, and returned to me. “You were asking about the medical exam. I think he got it in Sparks-and only because he had to. Scott hated doctors; I remember him and Christy having a big blowup once because he wouldn’t get a yearly physical.”

The cocktail waitress signaled that she needed an order filled. Morris complied, poured me another glass of wine when he came back.

“Thanks. The reason I’m asking about the doctor is that Scott saw one the day before he died-”

“No way. He took Christy on a picnic that day, out at Pyramid Lake, one of their favorite places. They left real early.”

“Well, maybe his mother got it wrong. It could’ve been the day before that.”

“I don’t think so. Scott was working construction in Sparks all that week.”

“Oh? He wasn’t dealing cards anymore?”

“That too-at Harrah’s. He needed the money because he wanted to get married. He was going to talk to Christy about setting the date while they were on their picnic. He really loved that woman, said he had to marry her before it was too late.”

“Too late for what?”

Morris frowned, than spread his hands. “Damned if I know.”

Lynda Collins, Christy Hertz’s friend, wore one of the camp follower costumes and looked exhausted. When the time came for her break from her duties in The Shaft, she sank into the chair opposite me and kicked off her high-heeled shoes, running her stockinged toes through the thick carpet.

“So who hired you?” she asked. “It couldn’t’ve been that no-good bastard of a stepfather of Christy’s, trying to find out where she’s living now. I know-poor, wimpy Scott.”

“You haven’t heard about Scott?”

“Heard what?”

“He’s dead.” I explained the circumstances, watching the shock register in Collins’ eyes.

“That’s awful!” she said. “I wonder why Christy didn’t let me know? I wonder if she knows?”

“I take it you didn’t like Scott?”

“Oh, he was all right, but he couldn’t just let go and have a good time, and he was stifling Christy. The flying was the one real thing he ever did-and look how that turned out.”

“I understand he and Christy went on a picnic at Pyramid Lake the day before he died.”

“They did? Oh, right, now I remember. Funny that I haven’t heard from her since then, I wonder how Scott took it?”

“Took what?”

“Christy was going to break it off with him when they were up there. She met somebody else while Scott was living down at his mom’s place-a guy from Sacramento, with big bucks and political connections. Since Scott got back, she couldn’t get up the nerve to tell him, but she had to pretty soon because she and this guy are getting married next month. God, I hope she let Scott down easy.”

Again there was no answer at Christy Hertz’s mobile home, but lights shone next door. I went over, knocked, and the woman who responded if she’s seen Hertz recently.

“Oh no, honey, it’s been at least two weeks. She’s probably on vacation, planning her wedding. At least that’s what she told me she planned to do.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“It was…Yes, two weeks ago last Thursday. She was leaving with that good-looking blond-haired boy. I guess he’s the lucky fellow.”

“Did she take any luggage?”

“She must have, but all I saw was a picnic hamper.”

The park office was closed. I stood on its steps, debating what could be a foolhardy move, then doubled back to Hertz’s. The lights still shone next door, but to the other side all the trailers were dark. I went that way and checked Hertz’s windows till I found one that was open a crack, then removed the screen, slid the glass aside, and entered.

Inside I stood listening. The mobile home had the feel of a place that is unoccupied and has been for some time. I took my flashlight from my purse and shone it around, shielding the beam with my hand. Neat stacks of magazines and paperbacks, dishes in a drainer by the sink, a well-scrubbed stove top and counters. My impression of Hertz as a tidy housekeeper was contradicted, however, by a bowl of rotting fruit on the dining table and milk and vegetables spoiling in the fridge.

A tiny hallway led to a single bedroom and bath. The bed was made and clothing hung neatly in the closet. In the bathroom I found cosmetics and a toothbrush in the holder and a round compact containing birth control pills. The date above the last empty space was that of the day before the picnic at Pyramid Lake.

On my way out I spotted the glowing answering message light on the answering machine. “Christy, this is Dale. Just checking to see how it went. I love you.”

“Christy, are you there? If you are, pick up. Okay, call me when you get this message.”

“Christy, where the hell are you? For God’s sake, call me?”

“Okay, let me guess: You patched it up with Scott. The least you could do is tell me. But then you couldn’t tell him about me, now could you?”

“I’m giving you one more chance to explain. If you don’t return this call within twenty-four hours, that’s it for us!”

Christy Hertz hadn’t been too wise in her choice of either man.

I’d never been to Pyramid Lake before, but as I stood on a boat launching ramp on its western shore, I felt as if I’d come home. Like Tufa Lake, it was ancient and surreal, the monolith from which it had taken its name looming darkly; on the far shore clustered domes and pinnacles very like the tufa towers. A high, milky overcast turned the still water to silver; a few boats drifted silently in the distance; above, the migratory waterfowl wheeled, swooping low in their quest for food.

The lake was some thirty miles north of Reno, surrounded by a Paiute Indian reservation. Upon my arrival I’d driven along the shore to Sutcliffe, a village whose prefab homes and trailer parks and small commercial establishments seemed to have been scattered beside the water by some gigantic and indiscriminate hand. There I’d shown the picture Scott Oakley’s mother had given me to clerks in grocery stores and boat rental and bait shops-anywhere a couple on a picnic might have stopped-but to no avail. At the offices of the Pyramid Lake Tribal Enterprises-whose function seemed to be to sell fishing licenses-I was advised to try Saltby’s Bait and Tackle, some ten minutes north. But Saltby’s was closed, and I was fresh out of options.

A sound made me turn away from the water. A rusted-out white pickup, coming this way. It pulled up next to the little store, and an old man got out; he unlocked the door, went inside, and turned the Closed sign over to Open. I hurried up the boat ramp.

The man had longish gray hair and a nut-brown complexion weathered by years of harsh elements, and the reception he gave me was as one of his own. My great-grandmother was a full-blooded Shoshone, and my looks reflect her part of the family gene pool; sometimes that’s a hindrance, but it can also be a help.

I showed him Scott’s picture. “Two weeks ago Thursday, did you see this man? He would’ve been with a redheaded woman-”

“Yes. They’ve come here many times. They always rent one of my motorboats and take a picnic to the east shore.”

“And you’re sure about the date?” He nodded. “What time did they get here?” He reached under the counter and produced a rental log, ran a gnarled finger down the listing. “Ten in the morning. They brought the boat back at four-a long time for them.”

“When they brought it back, who returned the keys and paid?”

“The young man.”

“Did you see the woman?”

He considered. “No. No, I didn’t.”

The only other thing I needed to ask him was how to find the office of the tribal police.

The tribal police located what was left of Christy Hertz’s body at a little after three that afternoon. It was concealed in a small cavern fashioned by the elements out of a dome on the east shore, and beside it lay a bloodstained rock. Her skull had been crushed.

I could imagine the scenario: Scott pressing her to set a wedding date; Christy telling him she already had one, but with someone else. And Scott-the good kid who took life so seriously, who worked hard at doing the right thing and now couldn’t understand what he’d done wrong-striking out at her. Striking out in blind anger, because everything he cared about was being taken from him.

After he hid the body, he went through the motions-returning the boat, driving down to Vernon as scheduled. When he was unable to conceal his distress from his mother, he’d come up with a lie that would made his suicide look to be an accident. And then he’d taken the Cessna trainer around the pattern at Tufa Tower-three times, perfectly, so Hy could get out of the plane. Perfectly, so he could end his own life.

The next afternoon I was at the controls of the Citabria, and Hy rode in the backseat. I put it into a steep-banked turn, keeping the tip of the left wing on Plover Island, where Scott had crashed and burned.

Through our linked headsets, Hy said, “A decent kid is pushed too far, kills somebody he loves, and then kills himself. He was so intent on dying and such a good actor that I hadn’t a clue.”

“And now his mother will have to live with what happened.”

“At least she’s got the comfort of knowing he tried to spare her.”

“Small comfort.”

“Dammit, McCone, why don’t suicides think of the people they’ll be leaving behind?”

For a moment I didn’t speak, concentrating on fighting the winds aloft, trying to keep the wingtip centered on the island. It’s an exercise in directional control you learn during flight training, and normally I enjoy it. Not today, though, not in these winds.

I gave up on it and headed south, to check out the obsidian domes at the volcanic field. “Ripinsky,” I said, “suicidal people are very self-involved, we all know that. And a lot of them, like Scott, just plain don’t want to take responsibility for their own lives.”

“So they crap up everybody else’s life too.”

I put on full throttle and pulled back on the stick; instead of flying over the domes, I’d taken it way up. Practice some aerobatic maneuvers. Nothing amused Hy more than being along for the ride when I managed to turn a simple loop into something that resembled a corkscrew. And he badly needed to be cheered up right now.

“You know,” I said, “it occurs to me that a life lived well is a lot like a solo flight. You accept responsibility, do the best you can, and go on from there.”

I glanced back at him; he nodded.

“And that’s enough philosophizing for today,” I added.

I leveled off, pulled back on the stick, and pushed the throttle in all the way. The plane shot upward on the vertical. In ten seconds, I had him laughing.