Passenger 19

NINETEEN

Davis locked his forearms at right angles to stop the wing’s freefall. The weight was crushing and drove his elbows into the dirt, but his arms held, a wheel hovering inches over his nose. His legs scrambled for purchase as he tried to extract himself, but he was pinned under the wing, immobilized like a weightlifter under twice what he could bench press.

“Hey!” he yelled. “Help!” Davis was trying to think of the Spanish word when the wing began to spring up and down. He envisioned the scarred boot and its partner dancing over his head, stomping and heaving.

The wing wavered like a demolished building choosing which way to fall. His arms felt ready to snap. How much had he guessed? A thousand pounds, add the weight of a man — he had to be supporting half that combined weight. Worst of all was the movement, everything swaying erratically.

Davis felt a surge from deep within. It wasn’t a reaction to thirty seconds of desperate exertion, but rather three days of anger and frustration. A rage like nothing he’d ever felt rose within his chest. His arms began to move, slowly at first and then gaining momentum. The wing began to rise, but the boots only stomped harder, slamming down again and again. His arms began to quiver, and for a terrible moment Davis sensed a pause before his arms were locked vertically. He sucked in a quick breath, then heaved the last inches until his arms straightened fully. At that moment everything shifted. The burden suddenly became less, and he heard heavy footsteps running through brush. Receding.

Now what the hell do I do? Arms extended, the wing was frozen two feet over his face.

“Help!” he called again.

His arms began shaking uncontrollably, and Davis knew he only had seconds. He considered trying to roll free, but any movement would cause the death trap over him to collapse. If he lost his grip, even wavered for an instant, he’d be crushed like an egg under a hammer. His left arm began to buckle, and he shifted his shoulders to buy a few more seconds.

And then, salvation.

Someone outside was straddling his feet. Then a grunt, and the weight over him was suddenly halved. Davis kept his dead arms braced, but as the burden eased, he was able to shimmy until his hips were clear. He caught a glimpse of a man with a shoulder under the four-by-four. With a final heave, Davis pushed free and rolled away. His legs flew sideways, tripping the man above him, and the wing slammed down, grazing his scalp on its way to the earth.

Davis sucked in huge breaths, one after the other. Sprawled on the fern-clad forest floor next to him was Pascal Delacorte.

The Frenchman said, “Only a prop forward would find himself in such a situation difficile.” He was referring to the rugby position in which the most vital requirements were size, strength, and a particularly thick skull.

“Actually, yeah, that’s where I usually line up.”

“What were you doing under there?”

Davis almost said, investigating. He found himself staring at Delacorte’s boots. They were brown. He spun a finger in a wide circle, and said, “Did you see anybody else around here in the last few minutes? Anybody leaving in a hurry?”

Delacorte shrugged. “No, I was getting a drink at the tent when I heard your call for help.”

Davis nodded. “Thanks for coming.”

The two men locked hands, and levered one another up as they would have on a rugby pitch. The wing had settled flush to the ground, and Davis stared at it for a long moment. “My phone is still under there — I was taking pictures.”

“You should ask for help next time. You were in a very dangerous position.”

“I sort of have a knack for that.” Davis flexed his arms, and the feeling began to return. “Did you say there’s water over at the tent?”

“It is even cold.”

On reaching the canvas shade, Davis tried to cool down. He pulled a plastic water bottle from a cooler, cracked the seal, and began gulping. He worked his aching arms in circles. There was an abrasion on his scalp, and he ran a hand over it to find only a trace of blood. He looked around the tent and studied every face, looking for eyes that avoided his own. He listened to voices, searching for one that had minutes ago asked him what he was doing.

Investigating.

That had been his mission on arriving three days ago, a process that was in equal parts familiar and convenient. Solve the crash, find the daughter.

But it hadn’t worked that way. Not at all.

Three days into the investigation he was no closer to finding Jen. He had only learned where she wasn’t. He’d learned that someone in the States was using him, and probably also Larry Green. Playing them like tokens on a board game. To what end he had no idea, but it was apparently important enough that someone had tried to kill him.

Davis took a long, cool drink from his water bottle, and at that moment underwent a tectonic shift in mindset. His assignment in Colombia was no longer about an aircraft accident. Maybe it never had been. It was time for a new approach to finding his daughter.

He emptied the bottle and crushed it in his hand. On his way to the trash bin he registered six men under the tent and two outside. He checked every pair of boots. Davis didn’t see the ones he wanted.

The photographs registered on the computers of the G Street office within minutes of Davis taking them. The man and the woman called the CEO to their office, in line with a new directive that anything from Colombia was to get his personal attention.

Strand walked through the door seconds later. “What have you got?”

They all looked closely at the pictures, but no one knew what they were looking at. It was obviously some section of the crashed airplane, photographed from various angles. Sheet metal and tubing and dirt. A pair of grass-encrusted wheels.

“Is that all there is?” Strand asked.

“Yes, sir,” said the woman. “The GPS link confirms that the pictures were taken at the crash site.”

Strand gave her a withering look. “Well there’s a nugget of brilliance.”

That comment hung in the air until the man said, “He hasn’t used his phone to make a call in nearly twenty-four hours.”

Strand shifted his gaze across a table full of equipment and cables. In a more circumspect tone, he said, “Meaning what?”

“Well… he’s using the phone to take pictures, so we know he’s got it with him in the field.”

“What’s unusual about that?”

“Nothing on its face,” said the man, “but yesterday we noticed he stayed in his room for an unusually long time in the evening. We didn’t pick up anything on the open mic, and the camera was pointed toward the ceiling the whole time. We figured he was asleep. But… it is possible he went out.”

“We don’t know that,” the woman argued, continuing their earlier disagreement.

“I thought we had his door logged.”

“We lost that signal yesterday afternoon. Apparently the hotel’s computer crashed. We had nothing to do with it,” she added defensively.

The male tech said, “It’s been a while since he used the phone to contact his boss at NTSB.”

Strand thought about it. “Maybe because he’s got nothing worth reporting.”

Staring at the photographs of the wheels, the man said, “No. I definitely think Davis is onto something. These pictures prove he’s making progress. But he’s keeping the NTSB in the dark about it.”

After a moment of silent contemplation, Strand asked, “Why would he do that?”

They all considered the question, and it was the woman who sighed as if relenting. “Only one reason,” she said. “Davis knows someone is watching him.”

Delacorte went missing, then showed up ten minutes later holding Davis’ phone.

“You said you lost it under the wing. It took some digging, but voila!”

Davis took the handset. “Thanks.” He used a wad of napkins from the makeshift dining table to wipe the case clean. When he hit the power button the screen came to life. “Looks like they gave me the hardened model — must have known I’d drop an airplane on it.” He looked at the tiny camera lens, expressionless, before sliding it into his pocket.

“So what were you doing under the wing?” the Frenchman asked.

“I wanted to see the landing gear.”

“You suspect a mechanical problem?”

Davis hesitated. “I’ll explain later. What have you been working on?”

“The main fuselage is my area of expertise.”

“The fuselage? I haven’t heard anybody suggest a failure of the pressure hull.”

“True,” said Delacorte, “but there is still a great deal to learn. We design not only to avoid accidents, but also to ensure survivability in a worst case scenario such as this. The ARJ-35 is a relatively new variant with an updated design. The structural integrity relies on composite fiber mated to a metal alloy framework. I’ve been analyzing the post-crash integrity of the hull, to see if it withstood the crash as we hoped.”

“Good luck with that. But it leaves me with the hard part — figuring out why the airplane crashed in the first place.”

“I do not envy you,” said Delacorte. “So often these days it is the human element, and that can be difficult to prove.”

“Like you can’t imagine.”

“I should get back to work. I was going to take the next flight back to Bogotá, but I’ve been told the helicopter is grounded due to weather at the airport. It will be hours before the next departure, and by then there will be a queue — it might take two or three trips to find a seat. Perhaps I will see you later tonight.”

“Right.”

Delacorte turned to leave.

“And Pascal—”

The Frenchman turned.

“Thanks again for your help.”

Delacorte waved amiably before walking off toward the debris field.

Davis looked up at churning gray sky that was plotting more afternoon mayhem. The idea of sitting in the jungle for another four hours didn’t sit well. He had what he’d come for, and with it a new theory, albeit a theory that provided only a partial solution. To make it complete he needed help, and he wasn’t going to get it here in the field, nor from the likes of Marquez or Echevarria. He needed to talk to Anna Sorensen.

Which meant getting back to Bogotá as quickly as possible.