The Boxcar Blues (40 page)

Jones checked her pulse to make sure she was
still breathing, then tied her up with a curtain cord. He then went
down to the parking lot, found a Hudson with the keys in it and
made sure there was room in the trunk for a body.

Jones wrapped a sheet around Rosemary and
carried her out to the car. After putting her in the trunk, he
drove to the airport. Wearing a ball cap, dark glasses and a
jacket, he went into the administrative offices of Aztec Airways.
He looked for Catwalk’s office, then waited in the lobby until the
secretary went to the restroom. When she was gone he walked into
Catwalk’s office.

The office was empty so Jones sat down
behind Catwalk’s desk. He was prepared to wait as long as he
needed.

Catwalk returned five minutes later. When he
saw Jones, he froze and felt his heart rate shoot up. He said,
“What do you want?”

Jones leaned back in the chair and put his
feet on the desk. “Well, Mr. Big-shot-pilot, I’ll tell you what I
want. I want a pilot to fly me to Mexico, so I can take a little
vacation.”

“
And if I
refuse?”

Jones grinned. “You ain’t gonna refuse,
because if you do, I’ll just leave that little girl of yours right
where she is and by the time they find her, she’ll be dead from
suffocation.”

Catwalk said, “You bastard. You’re
bluffing.”

“
Call your house. See if
anyone answers.”

Wearing the grin of a man who held all the
cards, Jones walked around the desk.

Catwalk dialed the phone and let it ring a
long time. Fearing the worst, he hung up and said, “Where is she?
What have you done with her?”

“
Oh, she’s fine for now.
And you can get her back. All you have to do is take one of your
airplanes and fly me to Mexico.”

Catwalk opened the drawer with is spare
pistol in it. He looked at the gun, then at Jones. Jones had the
gun in his jacket pocket aimed at Catwalk. He shook his head and
said, “I wouldn’t touch that pistol, or you’ll never see your lady
alive again.”

Catwalk thought this through. If Jones had
Rosemary, he had to do whatever Jones wanted. Anything else would
jeopardize her and Jones had no qualms about killing women. He
asked, “If I do this, when will you let her go?”

“
Oh, I’ll untie her when
we get in the plane. See, she’s going with us.”

Catwalk didn’t like that scenario, but he
had no bargaining power. He closed the drawer and said, “As soon as
I see that she’s alive and safe, I’ll get an airplane.”

The grin left Jones’ face. With a scowl he
said, “No, you black bastard, that’s not what we’ll do. You’ll get
a plane right now and once you tell me there is a plane available,
you get to see her. Do you understand?”

Catwalk said, “Yes, I understand.” He then
dialed flight operations. When a clerk answered, he said, “Charley,
this is Catwalk. Do you have a DC-3 available? I’m going to take
some people for a local flight.”

“
Thanks, Charley.” He hung
up the phone and told Jones, “There is a plane
available.”

“
Good. Now we can go see
your little lady. I sure hope she’s still breathing.”

CHAPTER FIFTY

While Jones and Catwalk walked through the
offices, on their way out of the building, the ex-con laughed and
gabbed like they were old friends. No one noticed that Catwalk
wasn’t laughing, or even smiling.

They walked to Hudson and Jones knocked on
the trunk. “You O.K., honey?”

Catwalk heard a muffled voice and figured
Jones had her gagged. He said, “Get her out of there.”

Jones showed him the gun in his jacket
pocket and said, “Not so fast, pal. She gets out when we’re at the
plane.”

Jones handed him the keys and said, “You
drive. You drive straight to the plane we’re going to be taking and
no tricks or I fill the trunk with bullets.”

Catwalk drove toward the DC-3 that Charley
said was all fueled, but not due to be put into service until the
next morning. He parked next to the plane and Jones opened the
trunk.

Catwalk saw Rosemary, bound, gagged, and
very scared. He reached in to lift her out of the trunk and said,
“I’m here, honey. Everything is going to be O.K. We’re going to
take a plane ride.”

Jones said, “Shut up and get in the
plane.”

Curly had tried calling Cat’s office, but
when he got no answer, he walked to it and asked Cat’s secretary,
“Where’s the boss?”

“
I’m not sure, Curly. He
left a few minutes ago with that old friend of his. He didn’t say
where they were going.”

“
O.K., I’ll talk to him
later.” Curly walked a few steps, then stopped and turned. With
some trepidation, he asked, “Maggie, describe this friend of
Cat’s.”

When the secretary described the man she’d
seen, Curly knew at once that it was Jones. And he realized why he
was here. He said, “Are you sure you don’t know where they went?
Did Cat say anything?”

“
No. They just walked
out.”

“
Which door?”

“
Employees parking
lot.”

Curly ran for the door. Once outside he
looked for Cat’s car; it was still in his parking space. That meant
Jones had a car. They didn’t have much of a head start, but if they
drove off the airport, they could have gone anywhere and he’d never
find them. He walked into the parking lot and looked around the
field, looking for anything out of the ordinary. He saw the Hudson,
parked near a DC-3, where no cars were allowed. He knew immediately
that Jones was making Catwalk fly him somewhere.

He jumped into his car and tore out of the
parking lot, heading for the parachute loft. He had an idea, but he
needed time and he needed to get on the plane. Catwalk wouldn’t be
able to start taxiing for about five minutes. He hoped that was
enough time for him to put his plan in motion.

Jones herded Catwalk and Rosemary into the
plane. He told Catwalk, “All right, fly boy, get this thing off the
ground and don’t give me any stuff about having to get fuel. I
checked and found out that planes are always fueled right after
they land.”

Catwalk headed for the cockpit and said,
“We’ve got fuel, but these engines have to warm up before I can
start taxiing.”

“
Get ‘em started then. As
soon as they’re warm, we take off. Set your course for
Acapulco.”

Catwalk started engines, then went through
the checklist. While doing this, he frantically thought of how he
was going to subdue Jones without getting himself or Rosemary
shot.

Curly saw the engines turning on the DC-3.
He also noticed the door was still open so Catwalk wasn’t ready to
taxi yet. He prayed that he found Cat in the plane and not some
mechanic who was taking the plane for a maintenance test
flight.

He parked so Catwalk would see him from the
cockpit and walked toward the open door. Once he reached the door
he climbed the steps and entered the plane. He threw the parachute
he’d picked up into the plane and acted surprised when he saw Jones
and Rosemary sitting in the cabin.

Jones pointed the pistol at Curly and said,
“Hold it right there.”

Curly said, “What the hell are you doing
here?”

Jones walked up to Curly and said, “It’s
been a long time friend.” He then punched Curly in the jaw. “You
can go with us, pal, since I should have shot you back in
Dillard.”

Curly went down and Jones kicked him several
times, then said, “This is your lucky day, friend. You’ll get to
die with your good buddy and his lady.”

Rosemary yelled, “Oh, God help us!”

Jones yelled, “Shut up, bitch.” He then
yelled to the cockpit, “Let’s go, you ain’t gotta warm them engines
all day long.”

Catwalk stood up and looked back in the
cabin. When he saw Curly, with blood dripping from his jaw, he
said, “What brings you to the party?”

“
I remembered this plane
didn’t have any parachutes. I stopped by the parachute loft, but I
could only get one, so I dropped it off. It looks like my timing
wasn’t too good.”

Jones said, “Cut the talking.” He held the
gun on Catwalk, “Close the door and get this thing in the air.”

“
When I close this door
will you untie my wife?”

“
She gets untied when
we’re in the air.”

Catwalk closed the door and headed for the
cockpit. He thought about what Curly had said. He suspected Curly
was trying to tell him something, but what? He thought about the
parachute. They didn’t normally carry parachutes on the DC-3s, only
the older cargo planes. So why had Curly brought a parachute to
this plane, and why just one?

As he was tying up Curly, Jones yelled,
“What’s taking so long, Jackson?”

“
I’ve got to get clearance
to taxi.”

Jones walked to the cockpit and said, “God
damn it, you better not be pulling any of your shit or I’ll drill
that lady, just like I did her sister.”

Catwalk grit his teeth. He saw Sam going
down after being shot. The thought that Jones could easily do the
same to Rosemary made his blood run cold. It took every ounce of
resolve to keep him from grabbing Jones by the neck and pummeling
him. Instead he acknowledged ground control by saying, “Roger
ground, Aztec three-four-seven is taxiing to runway
three-four.”

He told Jones, “We’re taxiing now.”

Jones said, “Good job, Jackson. Next stop
Acapulco.” He then went back to the cabin where Curly and Rosemary
were tied up in their seats.

Catwalk taxied slower than normal to give
himself time to think. Once at the runway, he went through his
magneto checks twice. What had Curly been trying to tell him?

Finally, he couldn’t stall any longer. He
called the tower, “Albuquerque Tower, this is Aztec
three-four-seven ready to depart runway three-four, VFR to the
south.”

“
Aztec three-four-seven,
Albuquerque. Wind three-two-zero at seven, runway three-four,
cleared for take-off. Left turn out of traffic
approved.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

Catwalk took off and followed the Rio Grande
River southbound until he picked up the El Paso range station. He
then crossed El Paso and tracked outbound due south. As he flew he
thought of ways to overcome Jones, but most of his plans were
flawed. He considered climbing to a higher altitude until Jones
passed out from lack of oxygen, but that would affect everyone else
and he couldn’t tell them to go on oxygen without Jones knowing
it.

He thought over and over again about the
parachute Curly brought to the plane. Surely there must have been a
reason behind it. So what was Curly’s plan to put it to use? Why
only one chute; their parachute loft had forty or fifty chutes on
hand, but Curly brought only one. Who had he planned on using
it?

Having Rosemary along complicated things. If
it was just him and Curly, he could throw the plane around and they
could take their chances of getting shot while jumping Jones. After
losing Sam to a wild gun-shot, he wasn’t going to do anything to
jeopardize Rosemary. This made the task of overcoming Jones that
much harder, and if they didn’t find a way to subdue him, they were
goners. He had no doubt when they reached Acapulco, Jones would
kill the three of them. Catwalk couldn’t envision Jones turning
them loose to return and tell the American authorities where he
was. He leveled off at eighty-five hundred feet with these thoughts
racing through his mind.

Catwalk unfolded his chart and plotted his
course and fuel range. The coast by Acapulco was notorious for
storms, so he decided to land short in Guadalajara and refuel. This
too could cause problems. Lately, the purity of the Mexican fuel
was suspect and cases of contaminated fuel were not unusual. He
thought of his forced landing many years ago in Raton Pass. Down
here, however, there were stretches of hundreds of miles with
nothing but hills, so a flat landing area may be harder to find
down here than it was in the pass. And, they only had one
parachute, so….

Then it hit him like a bolt of lightning! He
knew why Curly brought only one chute. A plan started to take
shape. He prayed that he and Curly were thinking along the same
lines — their lives depended upon it.

He looked back in the cabin. Curly was tied
up and gagged in a window seat halfway back in the cabin. Rosemary
was sitting on the other side of the cabin a few rows behind Curly.
It didn’t look like she was tied up or gagged, but probably tied to
her seat. Jones was three rows further back, where he could keep an
eye on both of them. With everyone tied up or bound to their seats,
they’d have to outsmart Jones; there would be no overpowering
him.

Thirty minutes later, after thinking over
the plan, that he hoped Curly shared with him, Catwalk gave the
control yoke a few quick turns, causing the aircraft to roll to the
left and right twice in each direction.

Upon feeling the aircraft roll, Jones stood
up and walked up to the cockpit. He said, “What’s wrong, fly
boy?”

“
Nothing, just some clear
air turbulence. It’s not unusual over these hills and you’ll
probably feel more of it before we reach Acapulco.” Catwalk then
created some more turbulence by turning the wheel slightly. While
doing so he gave the appearance of fighting the aircraft to keep it
straight and level.

He told Jones, “It’s getting rough. You’d
better sit down and fasten your seat belt.”

“
You just fly the plane
and get us there, Jackson. Don’t worry about me.”

Catwalk continued his charade of fighting
the plane. Finally, Jones turned and walked back to the cabin. As
soon as Jones had his back turned on him, Catwalk looked back at
Curly and pointed at Jones. He then made the gesture of pulling a
parachute ripcord. Curly nodded once, very slowly. Convinced that
he and his partner were on the same wave length, Catwalk sat down
and continued to “fight” the aircraft.