Chapter 5

CHUCK - DAY FIVE - Friday

When I arrived at the patio with my family the next morning, the triplets rushed over to me, stuttering out a plea to be taken immediately to their daddy. Aunt Etta put her arms around their brother, Mike, while I hugged all three together while trying to give them large amounts of loving, calming thoughts. I assured them that their momma was with their dad and the other mommas, and that they would make sure that the doctors did all they could for him. Young Tom stared up at me with tears in his eyes.

"We know that Daddy's been hurt, and we love our daddy so very, very much."

As his brother and sisters murmured their agreement, everyone in earshot found themselves getting teary eyed too.

"I suppose the triplets can't sense their dad because the doctors have him heavily sedated," I very quietly muttered to Missy.

"You could be right," she whispered back. "Thank you for doing that. The triplets have been frantic most of the night, and it's been all I could do keep them even half calm."

I tried to project a thought to Mercy in Vegas, but then realized that Sue was phoning us.

The house phone rang just at that moment, and Beth grabbed it while pressing the speaker button as she did so.

Sure enough it was Sue, who immediately started to tell us all about Steve's condition. She confirmed that he was still under heavy sedation as the doctors were worried about a possible concussion. However, Mercy had assured them that he was OK, and although they obviously thought it very strange, they had agreed to give him another brain scan. If this was satisfactory, they would start bringing him around at midday. Assuming that he seemed to have all his faculties when they did, they might be in a position to release him later in the day. She would keep us posted.

Trying to project my love down the phone, I called out to her that all was well on the patio and we were all available if she needed anything done. She thanked us all before she hung up.

After making sure that the triplets had taken all of this in, I went over to get my breakfast sandwich & morning coffee.

Right, I thought. The first job is to get into the office and see what Wanda has ready for me – if anything. I also needed to write my report on the hostel incident, and send copies to Charlie and DC. They'd have to wait for Steve's...

Late that evening, Jimmy told me what had been happening in Vegas that morning.

After checking with the hospital, Jimmy had gone out to Mojave to get their Citation and move it to the main airfield where Sue's Lear was parked.

Meanwhile, Ben had visited the Farmers' bank. When he sent his card in with the name "Mojave" on the back, he was quickly taken to the bank's Director. When he revealed his errand, he immediately got a positive response. The bank, which was out a total of ten million dollars, obviously believed that they didn't really have any chance of getting it back again in the present, very uncertain economic climate. Ben also got the impression that the Director wasn't terribly happy with the borrower, and wondered if maybe Mr. Jackson had been a little mendacious in his dealings with the bank. After he had missed two payments, Ben was told, they had called the loans for default, and the time limit expired at 12:00 on the following Monday.

Ben offered to buy all the notes for 40 cents on the dollar, and to his surprise, this was immediately accepted.

The Director pointed out that the security provisions were somewhat unusual. Their lawyers had been satisfied that they were good; however in the circumstances, the banker recommended that Ben take the documents to the best lawyers in the city and get them to make preparations for every eventuality.

After a quick look at the indicated paragraphs, Ben agreed with the recommendation; but this did not deter him, however, and he immediately arranged to pay the agreed upon price.

Upon leaving the bank, Ben drove around to his local legal correspondents, and was promptly ushered in to see one of the senior partners. In no time at all, there was a whole team of experienced attorneys working on every aspect of the case, trying to identify which matters might require attention both prior to, and after the foreclosure meeting out at the airfield in three days' time.

My women always tried to help their friend, Metairie White, at the Federal Employment Exchange when she was short of staff to man the counters. It was Brandy's turn today, and she had only been at her window for a few minutes when she was approached by a middle-aged man with a military bearing. When he brought the forms back to her window, Brandy noted that he was Kurt Eccleston, an retired USAF officer with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. He was an experienced pilot, had commanded transport squadrons in both Iraq and Afghanistan (the former a Utility Squadron). After a series of staff appointments, he had taken retirement six months ago, and since then, had just slowly slid down the jobs ladder until he had been let go from a sleazy car lot the previous day.

Brandy left her desk, and after failing to get Chuck on his cell, called Wanda and told her she was sending a man over whom Chuck needed to see. She then gave Kurt one of Chuck's cards and told him to go over to see this man who she knew would be interested right away. She would shelve his benefit application in the meantime.

When Kurt arrived at the Federal Building, he was sure that this was the wrong place; however the security men in the lobby took him through to the elevators and pressed the button for the top floor. When he got there and was given a seat and cup of coffee, he was even more confused. Just then, a man in his thirties came out, shook his hand and took him into one of the most luxurious offices he'd seen.

When I got into the office, Wanda told me that I had nothing to do but return Sam Nightfox's and the Marshal's calls before I wrote my report about the latest scrape I'd got myself into. She sounded almost cross with me, but this was belied by her smile.

I phoned Sam first.

"I thought you were ordered to lie low." He scolded me. "So you just went and got yourself involved with one of the nastiest incidents that the local Bureau has had to deal with in years, or so the Director tells me. The press out on the West Coast is really blowing a storm up about the whole thing, but at least your name hasn't been mentioned yet.

"The Director's very happy with the way you defused that inter-agency spat, by the way, and sends you his congratulations and thanks. Now - I've got the Marshal here and he wants to talk to you too."

I didn't even get the chance to protest that all I'd done was walk in a door and make a few phone calls.

"Hi, Chuck," the Marshal sounded his usual self. "I endorse everything Sam's just said, but please be careful. I had both the VA top brass here in DC, and a very senior general from the Pentagon, tell me yesterday how grateful they were that you managed to bring this out into the open. They apparently think the whole nasty business was about to be spread to other VA institutions out there.

"Anyway, well done."

That was the end of it – they just left me staring at the phone in my hand. John Scott could be a bit abrupt, but this was ridiculous.

I quickly wrote a short account of the incident, and sent it to Wanda for transmittal to everybody who needed a copy.

I had just started another cup of coffee, with my usual law enforcement donut, when Wanda came in and told me that I had a visitor who had been sent over by Brandy at the employment agency. I quickly finished the donut and went to wash my hands before going out to greet him.

After getting him seated, the man introduced himself as Kurt Eccleston. I'd just asked him for his resume and had started to read it, when I got a phone call from John Truant who was in Denver.

"Tank's come across a very interesting situation here in Denver," he told me. "It would be really good if you can get up here fast. We need these aircraft."

We were cutoff then, but John never blew hot air, so I asked Kurt if he had anything else to do that day.

"No," he replied, "I'm just hunting for a job."

"Right," I told him. "I've got to go to Denver on urgent business, so you might as well come too. We can talk on the plane."

After a quick call to Betty, we went down to my car.

The Citation's engines were already running when we walked up to it. Kurt watched me as I carried out a thorough preflight inspection, and when I told him to get into the right seat, he was obviously surprised with the fact that the plane was equipped to be flown by a single pilot, then by the plane's very speedy climb to our cruising altitude.

Since I hadn't had time to read his resume, I asked Kurt to tell me his career highlights.

"I went into the Air Force straight from college after partiipating in ROTC," he began. "After graduating flight school, I spent the next eight years flying the C-130 Hercules all over, including Antarctica. My squadron was one of the first to be detailed for Desert Storm, and after two years in Iraq, I got my first break. I'd served with General Hutchinson before, and he said hello one evening in the BOQ. Next morning, while I was carrying out my preflight for that day's mission, I was tapped on the shoulder by an HQ major, who told me that I'd been transferred and the officer with him was taking my mission.

...

"He took me to the General, who, after replacing my bars with oak leaves, told me that I was replacing the Commander of his Utility Squadron, who had just been hospitalized with a burst ulcer. Then, telling me not to do the same, he just said "Get."

Kurt paused, then continued.

"My new job was to run a collection of aircraft flying supply and personnel transport missions all over the country. I had some U-27 Caravans, U-17 Skywagons, and a few U-1 Otters, and for the last few months, a couple of Caribous too.

"At the end of that tour, I was rotated back stateside to a desk job at Command HQ, at Scott AFB, where I scheduled Starlifter operations. I got a conversion course on C-5 Galaxies, but I only flew one mission before being switched to C-141s, and I've been flying those or a desk ever since. Kosovo, Kabul, Karachi – you name it, I've been there."

Other than the two years in Baghdad, I've been in the Military Airlift Command and its successor, the Air Mobility Command, until I mustered out six months ago. Since then, I've had no success in finding any job that lasted for more than a few weeks."

Kurt asked me about CS&S, as he had seen the logo on all the airpark buildings. He told me he was impressed at all the activity around the hangars and the variety of well maintained aircraft types he'd seen as we taxied along the runway. Was all that part of CS&S, he asked? He said his good impressions were reinforced when he saw how my Citation performed – he'd never before flown in anything as fast as this that wasn't a fighter."

At this point my cell sounded,

"Hello, it's FBI Charlie from CA," the caller started, but the reception was so bad that I quickly gave him the Sat phone number and told him to call me on that.

"It's Charlie again," he continued, after he'd transferred the call. "Where are you?"

"Flying at forty thousand feet over the Ozark Mountains at the moment," I replied.

Kurt suppressed a chuckle.

"I thought you were home in Tampa?"

"I was 90 minutes ago," I teased him, "Now I'm halfway to Denver. But enough joking – how did you make out?"

"It turns out that your Ms Brady was the ringleader – she's now singing as fast as she possibly can to try and cop a plea, fortunately. I think we caught everything before it got too big – she definitely had ambitious plans – you arrested the other players when you arrived, and I think all we need to do now is look at a few suppliers. Some of them must be in on it, too.

"I brought Sheriff Burns in. He is cooperating fully, and has the area screwed down tight. There's press everywhere, but they can't get any closer to the farm here than a quarter of a mile. The VA had to spread the casualties around various facilities, so it's not surprising that the news quickly got out."

"I know you've been talking to the Director," I replied. "I hope he told you I'm supposed to stay under the radar?"

"Yes he did, so don't worry, we've got that covered. Look, I've got my opposite number from the VA standing here alongside me. He wants to talk to you."

A different voice came on the line,

"Deputy Johnson? I hope we get to meet real soon so that I can personally thank you for both your quick response and the sensitive way you handled this horrid affair. It is more than shocking to discover that we have had the equivalent of a Nazi concentration camp undiscovered here for goodness knows how long. That foul woman was apparently "grooming" the staff at another of our homes so she could do the same thing there. Do you know that she actually kept all those poor men heavily sedated so they couldn't protest?

"Thank you, Sir. I look forward to meeting you. I need to consult with you too, as to what we can do with these men in the future. Our top psychiatrist tells me that despite their despicable treatment there, he believes that if they can be returned to your farm, their recovery will be much more rapid."

He terminated the call, and I was forced to explain to Kurt what lay behind all this at some length.

Next, I told him something about CS&S, our new 737-700 fleet, and the rapid growth of the last few days. When I asked him if he was interested in working for us, Kurt's response was an emphatic "Yes. When can I start?"

After we landed, we taxied past John's 737, which was being loaded with the last Hiller and the bigger L-4. After we shut the Citation down, Star, who'd flown right seat on the freighter, rushed over to inquire about Steve.

After I'd quickly told them what I knew, John told me why he had asked me to come. He had found out that the story Tank had heard was true. If we wanted the aircraft, the man to see was a Colonel Jarvis who commanded the Colorado Army National Guard air units.

After two phone calls and an introduction from the FBI Bureau chief, we were invited out to visit the Colonel, who was at his home on the edge of town. Our welcome was quite effusive, the reason for that becoming clear when we entered the man's office.

Pointing to a framed piece of paper, the Colonel beamed at me.

"It's a real pleasure to actually meet you at last." He said. "I flew right seat during our recon mission last year in support of your multi-agency, multi-service anti-terrorist operation."

The picture frame held a copy of my signed commendation, which Kurt read with interest.

The Colonel confirmed that what I'd been told was actually correct. It was a mad world when he had to send ten serviceable helicopters off to be scrapped, just because there wasn't enough money in the budget to have them reconditioned and sold.

"Since you're here," he continued, "I presume you're interested in buying them?"