The waitress came by, and one of us ordered a double bacon cheeseburger, and the other ordered a Cobb salad, whatever the hell that is.

My beeper went off, and I looked at the number. Not surprisingly, it was Tom Walsh. “I’ll call him.”

“No, I’ll call him,” Kate said.

“Let me handle this. He likes and respects me.” I dialed Tom’s cell phone, and he answered. I asked, “Did you page me?”

“Yes, I paged you, and Kate, and I called you both. You were supposed to call me when you landed.”

“We just got in. Headwinds.”

“According to the pilot, you’ve been there almost an hour.”

“There was a long line at the car rental. More important, what’s the word on Harry?”

“Nothing yet.” He briefed me on nothing, then said, “I want you to drive to the regional headquarters of the state police in Ray Brook. That’s a few miles from Saranac Lake. Make contact with a Major Hank Schaeffer, commander of B Troop, and coordinate the search operation with him. You can offer your services and expertise, such as they are, and offer to participate in the search.”

“Okay. That’s it?”

“For now. Meanwhile, we’re going through channels to see if we can get a few hundred troops from Fort Drum to participate in the search. That will speed it up considerably. Tell Schaeffer we’re still working on that.”

“Will do.”

“Call me when you’ve spoken to Schaeffer.”

“Will do.”

“Okay, is Kate there?”

“She’s in the ladies’ room.”

“Tell her to call me.”

“Will do.”

“What are you doing now?”

“Waiting for a double bacon cheeseburger.”

“Okay… don’t hang around the airport too long, and don’t ask anyone there any questions.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just get over to the state trooper headquarters ASAP. And don’t even think about going to the Custer-”

“I understand.”

“All right. Nothing further.”

I hung up, and Kate asked me, “What did he say?”

I sipped my coffee and went back to the printouts. “He wants us to go to the Custer Hill Club and see if Bain Madox is there, and talk to him, and see who else is there.”

“He said that?”

“Not in so many words.”

“Did he want me to call him?”

“At your convenience.”

She was getting a little impatient with me and said, “John, what the fuck did he-?”

“Here’s the deal. Nothing new on Harry, Walsh wants us to make contact with the state police, help in the search, and not snoop around the airport.” I noted, “Too late for that.”

“I didn’t hear anything about going to the Custer Hill Club.”

“Why don’t you go see the state police? I’ll go to the Custer Hill Club.”

She didn’t reply.

I said to her, “Kate, we were sent here as a pro forma response to the disappearance of one of our guys from the Task Force. We’re here to get the bad news, or the good news, if and when Harry is found. This is just protocol. You know that. The question for you is, Do you want to take a reactive, or pro-active, role here?”

“You have a way of putting things… let me think about it.”

“Do that.”

The food came, and the double bacon cheeseburger looked like it could give you a heart attack if you touched it. The Freedom Fries had a little American flag stuck in them.

Kate asked, “Do you want some of this salad?”

“I found a slug in a salad once.”

“Thanks.”

Before I could get my minimum daily requirement of fat, the guy from Enterprise came into the café and handed Kate a stack of photostated car-rental contracts. He said to her, “I get off-duty at four, if you want me to show you around. Maybe we can have dinner. I put my cell-phone number on my card.”

“Thanks, Larry. I’ll call you later.”

He left.

I said, “You put him up to that.”

“What are you talking about?”

I didn’t reply and called for the check so we could get moving as soon as Max showed up.

I took another bite of my cheeseburger, and Max came into the café, spotted us, and came over. She said to Kate, “Here’s all the contracts from Thursday to tomorrow, including returns. There’s, like, twenty-six. It’s a big weekend.”

Kate replied, “Thank you. And please don’t mention this to anyone.”

“Sure.” She looked at me and said, “You’re a lucky guy to have a wife like this.”

My mouth was full of burger, and I grunted.

Max left, and I swallowed. “You put her up to that.”

“What are you talking about?”

I shoved some Freedom Fries in my mouth, stood, and said, “Okay, let’s go.”

Kate put the papers in her briefcase, I put twenty bucks on the table, and we left the café. I said, “If you’re not coming with me, go to Hertz and get yourself another car. The state police headquarters is in someplace called Ray Brook, not far from here. Ask for Major Schaeffer. I’ll call you later.”

She stood there, wavering between following Walsh’s orders and her recently expressed opinion to him that the world had changed.

Finally, she said, “I’ll go with you to the Custer Hill Club. Then, we go to the state police headquarters.”

We exited the terminal, walked to the car-rental lot, and found the blue Taurus. I drove to the side of the terminal building where the general aviation operations were and parked the car. “I want to see if GOCO has a corporate jet and if they use this airport.” I handed her the road map and said, “Call the county police and see if you can get directions to the Custer Hill Club.”

I went into the building, where a guy sat at a desk behind the counter playing with his computer.

I asked him, “Can I get a ticket to Paris here?”

He looked up from his computer and replied, “You can go anywhere you want if you own, lease, or charter a plane big enough. And you don’t even need a ticket.”

“I think I’m in the right place.” I held up my credentials and said, “John Corey, Federal Anti-Terrorist Task Force. I need to ask you a few questions.”

He stood, came to the counter, and checked out the creds. “What’s up?” he asked.

“Who am I talking to?”

“I’m Chad Rickman, operations officer.”

“Okay, Chad, I need to know if there’s a private jet that uses this airport, registered to the Global Oil Corporation. GOCO.”

“Yeah, two Cessna Citations, new models. Any problem?”

“Are either of the jets here?”

“No… in fact they both came in yesterday morning, about an hour apart, fueled up, then a few hours later they took off.”

“How many passengers got off?”

“I don’t think there were any. We usually send a car out to the aircraft, and I’m pretty sure it was just the flight crew.”

“Did any passengers get on after they refueled?”

“I don’t think so. They came in, topped off, and a few hours later they flew out.”

“All right… where did they go?”

“They don’t have to tell me where they’re going-they have to tell the FAA.”

“Okay… how do they tell the FAA? Radio?”

“No, phone. From here. Actually, I overheard both pilots filing a flight plan to Kansas City, departing thirty minutes apart.”

I thought about that, then asked, “Why would they be going to Kansas City with no one on board?”

“Maybe they only had cargo,” Chad replied. “I remember two Jeeps met them here and put some stuff on board.”

“What did they put on board?”

“I didn’t see.”

“These are passenger planes, right? Not cargo?”

“Right. But they’ll hold a little cargo in the cabin.”

“I still don’t understand why two jets flew in empty and flew out with a few pieces of cargo, both of them going to the same place.”

“Hey, this guy who owns the planes-Bain Madox-owns the fucking oil wells. He can burn all the jet fuel he wants.”

“This is true.” I asked, “Was Kansas City their final destination?”

“I don’t know. That’s the flight plan I heard them file on the telephone. That’s probably about their cruising range, so maybe they’re going on from there. Or maybe they’re coming back here.”