Dead in the Water

two islands. The early morning sun glinted on the water.
    “There goes a happy woman,” Stone said, waving. “Good-bye, Libby!” He turned toward the car. As he did, he noticed a change in the sound of the engines, and he looked back at the airplane. “What was that?” he asked.
    Thomas looked at the airplane, now out over the water. “He’s just reducing power after takeoff. It’s only a few minutes’ flight, and he has to start slowing down if he wants to make Antigua on the first pass.” Thomas frowned. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing. Smoke was trailing from the airplane’s left engine.
    “Looks like Chester’s got a problem,” Stone said. “He must have already shut down the engine.”
    “I see flames,” Thomas said.
    Stone shielded his eyes from the morning sun. “So do I,” he said. The airplane began a rapid descent toward the water.
    “Why doesn’t he return here?” Thomas asked.
    “He’s trying to blow out the fire,” Stone said.“When I was training for my license, that’s what I was taught to do with an engine fire, a power-on descent, to blow it out.” The airplane seemed to be headed straight down into the sea, and then it leveled off. “The fire isn’t out,” Stone said. “He’s going to ditch in the water.”
    “Jesus help him,” Thomas said.
    “If the engine doesn’t blow and he can get the airplane down, they’ve got a good chance.” He looked at the wind sock; it was standing straight out. “There’s going to be a chop on the surface, though. Put her into the wind, Chester.”
    The airplane was flying level, just off the surface of the water now.
    “Why doesn’t he put her down?” Thomas asked. “He’s still flying.”
    “He’s bleeding off air speed; he’d built up a lot on the descent. He wants to touch down right at stall speed, as slowly as it will still fly. Look, he’s raising the nose now; he’ll be down in a second.”
    “I hope he’s got a raft,” Thomas said. “It’s going to take a while to get to him.”
    “Surely he has; he’d have to. Here comes touchdown; don’t stall the thing, Chester!”
    The nose came up some more and the airplane headed toward landing. Then a wing dropped, touched the water, and the airplane cartwheeled, breaking into pieces.
    “Oh, shit,” Stone said, watching as the wreckage scattered over the water.
    “Come on,” Thomas called, running for the car. “I know a man with a boat.”
    Stone jumped into the car and Thomas, driving likea madman, headed out of the airport and along the coast road. “There’s a little fishing settlement along the coast, right near where Chester went down,” he said.
    “Thomas,” Stone said, “nobody on that airplane is alive; don’t kill us in the bargain.”
    Thomas slowed a little. “Somebody might have made it,” he said.
    “They might have if he’d gotten the thing down in one piece,” Stone said quietly. “But when it broke up, that ended it. Anybody alive would be unconscious, and anybody unconscious would have drowned by now.”
    “Still,” Thomas said. He threw the car into a left turn and careened down a short dirt road, screeching to a stop at a small dock. A man was already taking in the lines on a fishing boat. “Henry!” Thomas yelled, “wait for me!” He and Stone jumped onto the moving boat. “You saw the plane?” Thomas asked the skipper.
    “Everybody saw the plane,” Henry replied. “We’re goin’, but cain’t be nobody alive out there. How many folks was on it?”
    “Three, including Chester.”
    “Chester gone,” Henry said. “They all gone.”
    Twenty minutes later they saw the first piece of wreckage—a wing tip, floating on the surface; then smaller bits of flotsam.
    “Look,” Thomas said, pointing to some woven straw in the water. “That’s Libby’s hat, I think.”
    “There somebody is,” Henry called out, pointing and changing course. “Peter, get the boathook!” His crewman got the tool and ran forward as Henry slowed the boat. “It’s Chester,” Thomas said.
    “He’s missing an arm,” Stone said quietly.
    It took fifteen minutes in the swells to get a line around the body, and Stone was feeling a little queasy from the motion. He had seen enough bodies as a cop to be unruffled by the sight of Chester. The body aboard and covered, they patrolled the area for another two hours, but, except for the floating wing tip, which they brought aboard, found nothing larger than Libby’s hat. A police