Final Approach (28 page)

Rogers was nodding. “I guess. But Bill, what about the tape?”

Bill Hawkins reached over and took the cassette out of the recorder, looked it over carefully, and tossed it into the fire, turning back to Rogers with a puzzled expression.

“What tape was that, Forrest?”

As the word of the strange shooting in a farm driveway in Louisiana was slowly spreading toward New Orleans on Wednesday morning, Joe Wallingford was leaving the elevators on the eighth floor of the FAA building in Washington, headed for his office.

“Joe … wait a minute.” The voice came from behind him and Joe turned, recognizing the pleasing form of Beverly Bronson as she ran toward him down the central corridor which bisected the NTSB's floor.

“Have … whew, I'm out of shape … have you seen this?” Beverly thrust a sheet of paper with the FAA logo at the top into his hands. It was a press release, dated Wednesday morning and cranked out by someone a few floors distant in the same building, announcing that the FAA was asking the FBI to investigate the apparent theft of the cockpit voice recorder in Kansas City and the separate theft of the tower tape. In addition, it said, the possibility that the North America crash had been caused by purposeful radio interference was to be probed by a joint FAA-FBI task force.

“Jesus Christ! What is he
doing?”
Joe shook the release in Beverly's general direction.

“Who?”

“Caldwell. This bears the fingerprints of Bill Caldwell.”

“What, exactly, is going on, Joe?”

“Later, Bev.” Joe thanked her and stormed off to his office to dial Caldwell's number. According to his secretary, he was out until late afternoon, and no, she was not authorized to communicate his whereabouts, even to the NTSB. He slammed the receiver down then and headed for Dean Farris's office instead, finding the NTSB chairman in a grand state of excitement, a copy of the same press release in his hand.

“Joe, what do
you
know about this?”

“Mr. Chairman, we've never formally told Bill Caldwell a thing about the missing CVR—I'm assuming this came from him—but everybody on the investigation team knows the CVR is missing, and that certainly includes the FAA members. And, David Bayne and his people know. Theft
is
a dim possibility, but none of us can see how or why it could have been done. And, dammit, there's no way the FBI needs to be publicly dragged into that particular question at this point. We could use them on the other item, though.”

“He's trying to get our goat, of course,” Farris said, slamming his copy of the release on his desk. “Trying to picture us as incompetent … make an end run around us and get the FBI to do his dirty work in finding whether one of our people leaked that tape. What he's trying to do most of all, though, is protect his control-tower people by creating a diversion.”

Farris looked up suddenly, a mental tumbler finally falling into place. “What other item?”

“The electronic box in the 320 wreckage. Barbara Rawlson's team found a small electronic device of some sort, radio-related, in the flight-control wreckage of the 320. Airbus says it isn't supposed to be there. Might be a smoking gun, might not.”

“I hadn't heard. Does the media know?”

“Not yet. I told Andy to keep it very quiet. They were working on it last night. Apparently it's pretty smashed up.”

“I want to know the second you figure out what it is. Now, how about the tower tape?”

“I talked to Nick Gardner,” Joe began, “and he assured me the tape wasn't out of his possession and he knows nothing about it.”

“You believe him?”

Joe shrugged. “I have to.”

“Convince Caldwell he's innocent, then,” Farris said, pacing.

“I've already tried to get an appointment with him as you asked. He's out, though, or hiding behind his secretary.” Joe sat down in one of the large, leather wing chairs placed before Dean Farris's desk, but Farris kept prowling the office.

“Wonderful.” Farris mumbled the words as he faced the picture window and looked out across the Mall.

“There is,” Joe began, “something I probably should have told you involving Caldwell.”

Farris whirled, his face a picture of interest. “Oh?”

He related the Sunday phone call from Caldwell pressuring Joe to assure him flight-control failure wasn't involved in the crash, as well as the fact that he had not called the FAA associate administrator back as yet. “I was waiting to see if the issue resolved itself, and if not, I was going to talk to you first.”

“
Were
you, now? And just when would
that
have been?” The sarcasm dripped from his words, and Joe knew he was defenseless.

“I promise you I was not about to give him anything until we talked. I, uh, figured it was a ploy to put pressure on us—and on me—to make a critical decision he could blame on us in the event it was wrong.”

“Did he tell you to keep the call confidential, Joe?”

“Yes.”

“And you complied, of course!” Farris had gone from upset to anger, and it was directed squarely at Joe Wallingford.

“No … look, that was Sunday,” Joe explained hurriedly. “Monday we were going to talk to the captain. I figured the interview might clear up what happened enough so that I could tell you about the call, and then, with your approval, tell Caldwell to back off, that the idea of grounding this plane was ridiculous. I was not going to call him back without talking to you. I hadn't even seen the data recorder results at that time, and …”

The chairman glared at Joe as he made a fist of his right hand and pounded it into his left palm. “Goddammit, Wallingford, you work for the NTSB, not the FAA. Any extracurricular contacts from other high government officials you will relay to me immediately, is that clear?
Damn
you! You let me get blindsided!”

“I don't understand. How could you have been blind-side—”

“When Caldwell called me after the tower tape was leaked—before I called you—he was in a monumental rage, but he didn't say anything about the CVR, or about messing around in our investigation with talk of grounding the A320, or about his surreptitious call to you. Since I didn't know any of that—since you left me up here in the dark—I had to sit here and let him yell at me. I would have had some things to chew on
him
about if you'd filled me in.
Damn!”

“His call had nothing to do with the tower tapes. That was Sunday.”

Farris had paced behind his desk again. Now he turned to Joe, his hands clasped behind him in professorial fashion, his head down and shaking from side to side as if dealing with a hopeless idiot. “Joe, Joe, Joe.” He looked up with an exasperated expression. “You're way out of your league with someone like Caldwell.”

“Hey, I didn't call the man.” Joe was struggling to control rising anger mixed with apprehension.

“You're a technician, Joe. Caldwell's a politician and a Machiavellian administrator. You're no match for him.”

“God knows I'm not trying to be. I know I'm a technician. That's all I've ever wanted to be.” That was more emphasis than he intended, but it didn't matter. Farris was ignoring his answers anyway.

“Whenever Bill Caldwell interferes down here, he's up to something. There are always hidden meanings. For one thing”—Farris waved the press release at Joe—“he's trying to control events here and show everyone on the Hill that the FAA under Bill Caldwell is not going to be slow in properly investigating a possible assassination. He's trying to outflank us at every turn, and when he hears about that device you found …” Farris sighed disgustedly. “That's why I've got to stay on top of the political climate around this town, to keep us protected as a board—to keep you innocent little technocrats protected from the real world so you can do your work. If I don't see which way the wind is blowing, we'll all get blown away by it.”

Joe looked at Dean Farris with amazement. He really did believe his was a political position. Susan was right. But he was also, as she had pointed out, the boss. And Joe's professional life was in his hands. “Mr. Chairman, I apologize if I should have told you about his call immediately—”

“Damn right you should have.”

“Do you still want me to go talk to him, when I can catch him in, that is?” Joe asked the question hoping the answer would be no, but Farris surprised him.

“Yes, Joe, I do. Tell him to back off on the threats regarding the 320's flight-control system, that he doesn't understand how delicate things are at the moment and he's going way out on a limb. Don't, for God's sake, tell him about the new find.”

“He may already know,” Joe replied.

Dean Farris stopped, his long arm and bony finger still aimed at Joe. “You do agree there's no justification for grounding, don't you?”

“Not at this moment, though that could change. I mean, if it's sabotage, why ground it?”

“Well, until we know more, tell him to back off, that no grounds exist. And when you do, you tell him—if he asks—that you and I have not discussed this. Make him believe that his little extracurricular contact is safe.”

“I can't—”

“What, lie? You can't tell him that?”

“I'd prefer not to.”

Farris looked Joe in the eye for perhaps the first time in their conversation. “I'm not going to order you to lie, Joe. But try not to let on that I know he called you.”

“Why?”

“Intelligence, man. Draw him out. What the hell is he up to? Is it what I think? Is he trying to draw a smoke screen around the FAA's role in all this? And if so, why is he so frantic? I've got to know—fast—and you're the guy who can find out.”

Bill Caldwell took the phone call in the den, at his wife's small Chippendale desk. She had answered the call, a surprised look crossing her face as she informed him that North America's CEO wanted to talk with him immediately and sounded upset.

“Hello.”

“Bill Caldwell?”

“Yes.”

“David Bayne. Sorry to call you at home, but I've had a disturbing phone call from one of my vice-presidents in Kansas City.”

“Oh?”

“Look, I'll be brutally frank with you, Bill.” The uninvited use of his first name put Caldwell instantly on guard as Bayne continued. “My man overheard one of your FAA people in a restaurant booth behind him this evening talking about his orders from Washington, supposedly from your office, and that they were to take the position that North America was at fault in this crash because our pilots knowingly flew into windshear. He also said you've issued a press release announcing that you've asked the FBI to investigate several things, including the possibility of radio sabotage, even though no one has any evidence of sabotage, including Congressman Wilkins's staff.”

Bill Caldwell could feel his temperature rising and cautioned himself to tread with care.

Bayne continued, his voice betraying anger. “Now, because I believe neither you nor the administrator would ever tilt an investigation, I discounted it. I still discount it, though you have some personnel in Kansas City who need straightening out. I'd appreciate some assurance from you, and I ask this apologetically, but also as the man responsible for the welfare of this company, for your personal assurance that the FAA is not in any way trying to push or shove the NTSB to prejudge this accident against our people just to protect the FAA's interests.”

Bill Caldwell mentally counted to ten, absolutely enraged at the gall of Bayne to make such an accusation, directly or obliquely. “David, in no way do you need such assurance, because you already have it. You know, someone leaked that control-tower tape yesterday, and we were mightily embarrassed about that. Naturally, we can't help but wonder. I have to assume that whoever did that was trying to put our people in a bad light with technical conversations the public will misinterpret. You see, I could ask you similar questions about that one, considering it's no secret North America would be well served by a finding of air-traffic-control error—which we do not think occurred.”

“Now you're accusing my people, Bill? Hah.” There was a brief pause before Bayne continued. “Well, actually, I suppose that's fair, considering I suspect your people.”

“Nice of you to recognize the mutual problem,” Caldwell said acidly, “but what do you propose we do about it?”

There was a protracted silence from Dallas before Bayne replied, “I just want to make sure we leave this investigating team alone to make their own decisions without pressure. Your people start coming to windshear conclusions, its going to beg the question of who did or did not tell our crew about the presence of windshear, okay? Nothing will be accomplished by that type of fight.” Clever, Caldwell thought, very clever. Bayne obviously wanted to start a public fight over exactly that: windshear. Which meant he already knew windshear wasn't the cause. It was a classic diversionary tactic, but this time the FAA wasn't going to fall for it. “David, let's both look into this and keep in touch.”

“Fair enough.” They ended the call with the same correct and feigned friendliness. Bill Caldwell hesitated less than a second before raising the phone again and punching in the number of his lieutenant in Kansas City, instinctively aware that from Dallas, David Bayne was doing the same thing with his people—the opening shots of what could become a war between the airline and the Agency.

“Johnson? This is Bill Caldwell. I want you to get the entire FAA team together, and also the tower chief, and tell them from here out to keep their damn mouths shut and understand that North America is going to do everything they can to argue about windshear in the media, so they can then pin this crash on us for not giving them enough information. I want everyone on their guard, you understand? And I want to know by sundown who leaked that fucking tape!”