Top Gun (47 page)

The French anti-GAT hysteria finally began to abate four days ago, with the conclusion of the examination of the GC-600’s
wreckage and the recovery of the intact black boxes that re-created for the investigators the events in the cockpit in the
seconds before the crash. The Air Ministry released a statement supporting GAT’s assertion that the pilots had shut off the
safety controls. The investigation was closed with the GC-600’s reputation cleared, and orders for the jetliner again began
to filter into GAT, but only a trickle where initially there had been a flood.

Yeah, GAT was alive and well, Gold now thought, but that didn’t mean the company hadn’t taken some hits.

For one thing, its stock price had dropped dramatically in response to the controversy surrounding its new jetliner and its
fly-by-wire control system. That same control system ran the Stiletto, and a refined version of it was meant for the World-Bird
Project. Many nations that already flew the Stiletto grounded their aircraft and put their spare-parts orders on hold during
the investigation. Other countries outright canceled their orders for the fighter craft. What was even worse, some participants
in World-Bird where now evidencing doubt about whether they wished to continue their involvement….

GAT would eventually get back some of its Stiletto and GC-600 lost business. Gold knew, but no way would the company get back
all of it. What would happen with World-Bird it was still too soon to say. The worst thing of all, however, was that no matter
what GAT now did, there was no way it could erase the last glimmerings of doubt about the company from the minds of the world.
Like a man acquitted after a lengthy murder trial, GAT had come out of its ordeal vindicated, but with its reputation forever
tarnished. The bottom line was that GAT had been wounded. The wounds would heal, but slowly. GAT would walk with a limp for
some time to come.

Or maybe forever.
Gold brooded as he stepped out through the sliding door onto the deck.

“Was that the boys calling?” Linda asked.

“No,” Gold replied. His stepsons called home every Sunday from their prep school in New England. They would be home for the
summer at the end of the month, or, at least, home for the month of July. In August, they’d be off to sleep-away camp. “It
was Don,” Gold said.

“What did he want?” Linda asked sleepily. “God, you’d think he could get along without you for one Sunday morning.”

“He called to tell me Otto Lane’s detectives have got Icarus,” Gold said.

“What?” Linda sat up. “When? Who is he? How did it happen?”

“Once a journalist, always a journalist,” Gold laughed as he sat down beside her in a deck chair. “You left out ‘where?’ and
‘why?’”

Linda pretended to glower.
“Where
will be your behind connecting with my foot, and
why
will be because you’re not answering my questions.”

“Okay! I surrender! Interrogate me.”

“That’s better.” Linda nodded, sitting up. “First of all, how did they catch Icarus?”

“They didn’t. He turned himself in yesterday afternoon. It seems the guy—”

“His name?” Linda interrupted.

“Oh, sorry. His name is Virgil Holloway, and no, neither I nor Don has ever heard of him,” Gold elaborated. “He’s an associate
engineer—one out of a thousand—in our commercial aviation department. He told Otto Lane that he started this whole business
of leaking stuff about GAT over two years ago when he became angry at the company because his section manager gave him a negative
job rating on his yearly evaluation sheet.”

“And
that’s
what caused all this trouble?” Linda remarked in disbelief.

“Poor old Halloway didn’t get his seven-percent raise,” Gold explained. “He could have appealed his supervisor’s evaluation,
but he was too timid, too afraid to make waves and maybe lose his job, so he brooded in private. swearing his revenge upon
the scarlet and turquoise colors that had betrayed him.” Gold frowned. “It was all so stupid. So needless…”

“Talk about the mouse stampeding the elephant.” Linda shook her head. “But why’d he turn himself in?”

“Halloway was becoming increasingly distraught concerning the forged memo. His connection at the
L.A. Gazette
was threatening to leak on the leaker, if you’ll pardon the expression.”

“You mean the reporter who ran the story concerning the forged memo was threatening to reveal Halloway’s identity in retaliation
for Halloway having gotten his newspaper into hot water?”

Gold nodded. “I’ve heard that heads are going to roll at the
Gazette
over this.”

“No great loss to journalism,” Linda sniffed. “The
Gazette
never should have run that story without bothering to get second-source confirmation concerning the memo.”

“Meanwhile, Otto Lane’s in-house GAT investigation was proceeding along,” Gold continued. “Halloway figured it was only a
matter of time until he was discovered, and that maybe things would go easier on him if he turned himself in to take his punishment.”

“So what happens now? I suppose Otto Lane has turned Halloway over to the police?”

“No…” Gold hesitated. “Otto waited to get our okay on that, and Don and I have agreed that there’s no point.”

“I don’t understand,” Linda said, frowning. “This man had been a thorn in your side for over two years. Why wouldn’t you want
to turn Halloway over to the law?”

“What would it accomplish?” Gold asked. “I mean, a trial would just stir up a lot of old news that GAT would just as soon
leave buried.”

“What about Halloway’s punishment?” Linda cocked her head, examining Gold with those big, beautiful X-ray eyes of hers. “You
feel sorry for him, don’t you?”

“Who? Halloway?” Gold hesitated, and then nodded. “I guess I do, a little. According to Otto Lane, Halloway’s a broken man
who wasn’t all that emotionally stable to begin with. Sure, at first Halloway thought he was great shakes socking it to us,
but as the months wore on, turning to years, his anger vanished and he found himself trapped in a web of his own making. He’s
suffered a nightmare of guilt, always looking over his shoulder, waiting for retribution.”

“Have you fired him?”

“We’re going to let him stay on at GAT,” Gold replied. “We’ll just steer him away from any security-sensitive projects. From
here on in, Virgil ‘Icarus’ Halloway will likely be one of our most loyal employees.”

Linda looked at Gold with great seriousness. “You know, there was a time in your life when you would not have been so merciful.”

Gold blushed. “Ah, your mother wears Air Force boots.”

She nodded slowly. “Yes. I think I shall take credit for working this change upon you. I’ve been a good influence.”

“Maybe you’ve softened me up in my old age,” Gold smiled.

“I take credit for softening up a
part
of you in old age,” Linda replied. “However, I take even greater credit for keeping another part of you
hard
in your old age.”

“Talk is cheap, lady,” Gold growled.

“Well, then”—Linda smiled languidly—”shall we retire to the boudoir, where I might work some magic upon you?”

“So soon?” Gold pretended to complain. “We just had a magic show this morning.”

“Time flies when you’re having fun.”

As they were walking into the house, Linda mused, “So the Icarus case ends with the culprit going scot-free.”

Gold shook his head. “I never said that.”

(Two)

Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles

27 June 1978

It was ten-thirty on a sunny Tuesday morning when Turner Layten drove along Sunset Boulevard, past Hollywood High, eventually
slowing to nose his Jaguar XKE convertible into the Sunset Burger Barn parking lot. The eatery was built back in the forties
as a giant replica of a triple-decker cheeseburger, with windows cut into the bottom half of the bun where the bubble-gum-chewing
carhops in their cheerleading skirts and roller skates had once placed and received their customers’ orders.

Of course, the carhops were long gone, so that now you had to get out of your car and go up to the windows to fetch your own
greasy garbage, Layten thought as he prowled the parking lot in his growling Jaguar, looking for Virgil Halloway’s beat-up,
orange Volkswagen Karmen Ghia.

But Halloway wasn’t here yet.
How irksome for the man to keep me waiting,
Layten thought. Especially since it had been Halloway who had called him, to plead for this meeting, claiming he had something
urgent to discuss.

Breakfast was over at the Burger Barn, and the lunch rush had yet to begin, so the lot was fairly empty. Over near the rest
rooms there was a dark-blue Ford Econoline van, its side lettered ACE DELIVERY. The van’s drivers were drinking coffee and
smoking cigarettes; goofing off on their employer’s time, Layten thought. The man behind the van’s wheel stared at Layten
as he drove by. Layten gave the slackard a scowl of disapproval, just to show the fellow that Layten knew what was what.

Other than the van, there were just a couple of nondescript cars: a white Chevy Impala hardtop and a green Ford something
or other. Each had a single, youngish man in a tie and jacket inside. Layten guessed they were salesmen, killing time until
their next appointments with a cup of coffee and the sports pages.

After Layten had cruised the lot looking for Halloway, he parked in the rear corner of the lot, as far from the other vehicles
and the restaurant as he could get. His meeting with Halloway called for privacy, and besides, the grill smells wafting from
the Burger Barn’s ventilators were disgusting. He shut off his engine and waited. The sun was beating down, and, of course,
his white Jag’s black leather upholstry just soaked up the heat.
Should have gotten the cream-colored leather,
Layten chided himself.

He was wearing a blue-and-white-striped seersucker suit, pink cotton button-down shirt, and blue paisley bow tie: all from
Brooks Brothers, of course. It was just about the coolest outfit a man could wear and still be dressed in a businesslike manner,
but in heat like this even if Layten were stripped down to his boxers, he’d still be sweating like a pig. He wished that he
could remove his jacket, but a man had to make sacrifices when he carried a gun.

Where the blazes was Halloway?
Layten shucked his tan and green houndstooth-check cap to mop his brow. An underling had ought to know better than to keep
his superior waiting in this heat. Layten would speak to Halloway about it. Yes, he would lay down the law. That imbecile
Halloway could do with a little less of Layten’s velvet glove and a dash more of his iron fist.

Ensnaring Halloway a little over two years ago had been pathetically easy, Layten remembered. When Tim Campbell had presented
Layten with the task of infiltrating GAT, Layten had asked around among the engineers at the El Segundo Amalgamated-Landis
plant if they knew of any GAT engineering people dissatisfied with their careers. He’d told them that A-L was looking to hire
some engineering talent, so that if they knew of anybody at GAT who was looking to make a switch, that person should call
Layten’s office.

Every profession has a grapevine, an informal professional network where job information is exchanged, and so it wasn’t long
before the calls started coming in. Layten was forced to sit through an interminable number of phony job interviews before
a certain individual by the name of Virgil Halloway showed up. Within a few moments of meeting Halloway, Layten knew that
he had found his man.

Poor Halloway had come to the El Segundo office thinking he might be offered a job, and so he was, but not one like he’d expected.
During the interview, it had been child’s play to draw the fellow out. Layten lent a sympathetic ear and soon Halloway was
spilling his tawdry little tale of woe concerning how his talents were not being sufficiently appreciated at GAT. Halloway
wanted revenge upon GAT for slighting him, and Layten offered to pay the lowly engineer for exacting that revenge, cloaking
the endeavor in intrigue to inject a little excitement into Halloway’s miserable existence. At first Halloway leapt eagerly
to the task, but as the months wore on his anger cooled, as did the draw of the money Layten was paying him. After all, Halloway
could not actually spend his ill-gotten gains without drawing attention to himself. GAT, by that point, was trying to sniff
out Icarus’s identity. Eventually, Halloway came to Layten seeking to end their relationship. Halloway explained that he was
no longer angry at GAT, that all he now wanted was to remain working there in peace, that he would no longer spy on the company.

Layten couldn’t have that, of course; Tim Campbell would have been
tres
disappointed. Accordingly, Layten had been forced to discipline Halloway, threatening to expose him as Icarus if he didn’t
continue to do Layten’s bidding. Halloway didn’t like it much, but he did as he was told. He had no choice if he wanted to
save his own hide.

Things came to a head several Mondays ago when the GC-600 jetliner crashed at the Paris Air Show. As soon as Layten had heard
about the crash he’d summoned Halloway to this parking lot, where he’d played his trump card. He’d offered Halloway a managerial
position at Amalgamated-Landis—fat chance of that ever happening—if the man could come up with some incriminating dirt on
GAT in light of the crash. A day later, the ever-gullible Halloway produced his dynamite: a memo from Don Harrison to Steve
Gold admitting the GC-600 had dangerous structural flaws.

Tim Campbell was overjoyed when Layten presented him with a copy of the memo. Tim used his influence to pressure the
L. A. Gazette
into immediately running the story, but then it turned out that the memo was a forgery. Tim Campbell was livid over the news,
but nobody had been more flabbergasted than Layten himself. He never would have thought a little worm like Halloway could
have possessed the audacity to fake the thing.

In retrospect, however, the phony memo had more or less served its purpose, Layten now thought smugly. It had been more salt
poured into GAT’s wounds.