The Lost Coin

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CHAPTER 4  The Interrogation

Steve finally made a showing, along with Sue. Sam was surprised. He wondered if it was his mother’s doing. As they talked, the strain in their relationship hung thick in the room.
Steve took the chair in the corner while Sue sat close to the bed.
“How are you feeling?” Sue asked. “It looks painful.”
“It’s getting better,” Sam replied. “I can feel improvement each day. I don’t turn down any drugs.” He tried to laugh but grimaced in pain. Sue stroked his arm.
“They say you’ll be in for at least a month,” Steve said. “Buddy, you really did it this time. Pretty lucky they say.”
“I don’t know what this time means,” Sam replied already feeling the heat. “It could have happened to anyone.”
“Only someone that charged headlong into something they didn’t know anything about,” Steve retorted.
Sam’s ears started to turn red. Steve had only two modes of talking, both of which Sam hated. The principal’s lecture tone, which he was about to get, or the teacher’s condescending tone.
“What’s with this flying thing anyway? What’s it going to do for you? It seems like you just graduated, finally got a worthwhile job, might be able to salvage some kind of a decent life after wasting it so far, that you’d focus on that a while before getting all these wild notions. How about St. Paul’s? Father David thinks you’ve abandoned the faith. He’s been praying for you. What if you had died without the church? Maybe this excess energy that’s suddenly come upon you could have been better used there serving the church.”
Sam’s pain was swallowed up by his anger. He tried to raise his head to get a direct bead on Steve. Sue could see his face starting to turn crimson and astutely intervened.
“I’m sure you can do it all,” she said. “The prospect of flying an airplane is something that always excited me, but I never had the nerve.”
“Since when?” asked Steve. “I didn’t know that.”
“Well, hon, there may be a few things you don’t know about me. I might be a little more on the wild side than you give me credit for,” she replied and winked at Sam.
“Whatever,” he said rolling his eyes. “Look, we have to go. I’ve got a meeting I need to be at. Good to see you. Get well.”
Another meeting, thought Sam. He needs to come up with something more original.
“Besides, I understand you have some other visitors coming this morning. If you don’t like my questions, I’m pretty sure you won’t like theirs.”
Sam new he was talking about the NTSB. He supposed they had been to the crash site analyzing all the evidence. He could have saved them a trip. Pilot error. Plain and simple. Maybe some alcohol involved, but only if they had proof.
“Thanks for coming,” Sam said. “Thanks, Sue.”
Steve wondered what he was thanking Sue for as he beckoned for her to come.
“You’re welcome, Sam,” Sue said. “When you get better you need to start making your mother’s Sunday dinners. That will fix you right up.”
“I know it. I will.”
The NTSB was waiting. These people, Sam heard, were very acute and their questions directed toward specific types of answers. They would record the entire interview. They had already interviewed Sam’s flight instructor, George Sherman. “Sherm” was not allowed to have contact with Sam until the interview process was completed.
They had been out to the site of the crash and interviewed the farmer. The wreckage was extricated from the field. They could not find any issues with the structure, the power plant, or any navigation systems. Weather was not a factor that day, nor was traffic control. That only left the pilot.
It should have been one of their easier deductions, Sam thought. Dumbass student pilot.
After Steve and Sue left, two agents knocked on the door.
“Come in,” Sam said.
“Hi. Samuel Season?”
“Yes,” he replied. “Call me Sam.”
“Hi, I’m Sharie Morgan. I’m the lead investigator in this incident and this is my colleague Jeff Smith. We’re from the NTSB.”
“I’ve been expecting your visit,” Sam said.
“Do you feel like talking?” she asked. “I know you have severe injuries.”
“I’m okay,” he said.
“Great, Sam. We appreciate it. Just so you know, we will be recording this interview. Is that okay with you?”
“Yes,” he replied.
They took the two chairs and pulled them up close to the bedside.
“To start, according to your log book, you have fifteen hours total with four of those hours solo. Is that correct?” She asked while her Jeff took notes and operated the recorder.
“Yes.”
“So, how were you feeling that day?”
Well, okay. I had a few things on my mind, but . . . nothing that would have prevented me from being okay to fly.”
“Any alcohol before the flight?” She maintained steady eye contact.
Sam knew he was made here. He was sure they took blood samples, but he knew it had to be close to zero by the time of the accident.
“The night before,” he replied.
“Heavy?”
“Not exactly moderate,” Sam said losing eye contact. “But my mind was clear that afternoon.”
“Okay,” she said dropping it, “and you were practicing a power takeoff stall when this happened? Correct?”
“Yes.”
“So please walk me through what happened.”
“Well, I did it exactly as I was taught. Everything seemed to be working according to the textbook. I set the trim to takeoff, pushed the throttle to full power, kept nosing it up adding more and more right rudder as the attitude increased until it stalled. I recovered perfectly. I was quite pleased with myself. Maybe smug. Then something happened. I literally just dropped from the sky, rotating in a spin. I . . . I guess I wasn’t paying attention to my airspeed and, well . . . I suppose it’s not a guess, I went into another stall and was taken off guard.”
“Were you ever trained on how to recover from a stall or spin?”
“Sherm, I mean George Sherman my instructor, demonstrated one time how to get out of a spin. He went through the whole thing. He stalled it, the nose dropped into a spin. He pushed on the right rudder to stop the rotation and pulled the nose up. Is seemed so easy when he did it. But when it happened to me, alone, it didn’t work. The only reason I leveled off at all was doing the opposite.”
“I see. Sam, we could not help but notice when we examined the plane that the throttle was still pushed all the way in. Do you think your body hit it on impact and pushed it in? Do you know how it would have gotten that way?”
Sam thought for a second. His eyes widened. The revelation struck him with a sickening feeling in his stomach.
“I guess I do know how it got that way. I never pulled the throttle back,” Sam replied as his face turned red as a beet.
“Why not, if I may ask?”
“It happened so fast,” Sam said embarrassedly. “I just reacted. In the wrong way apparently. Stupidity to be more accurate.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself. I wouldn’t call it stupidity. You would have needed a lot more training to say that. You survived. That doesn’t happen often; actually it never happens under these circumstances. You only have seconds to correct and somehow, well . . . here you are. So, tell me. We’ve never seen this before. How did you level the plane off at full throttle and not simply crash nose first into the ground. Sorry to be so graphic, but that was what we would have expected.”
Sam went through his last Hail Mary machinations, counterintuitively turning the plane in the direction of the spin and how it turned into a deep diving spiral sounding like a dive bomber over WWII Germany. He leveled off close to the ground with no time to gain altitude before he went bush hogging through that tree windbreak.
He had their attention. Jeff stopped taking notes. They both listened intently, heads tilted and jaws partially open, as they traded slight glances with one another. Sam detailed his one point landing, tobogganing into that freshly plowed field before upending into the double gainer with a twist as Mo described it.
“That’s quite a colorful way to describe a life threatening crash,” Sharie said. “Good you have a sense of humor. Now, before the crash, tell me one more time how you handled the controls.”
Sam reiterated what happened, how he turned the plane into the direction of the spin and how he started to regain some control.
They asked more questions, but they sounded like the same ones just rephrased. When they were sure the story wouldn’t change, they finished the interview.
“Well,” Sharie said, “you are one lucky . . . well . . . I’m not sure if that is the correct way to categorize it, either lucky or something else. I’ll be honest with you, Sam. I believe everything you’ve said, but it’s hard. However, I have no alternative. Here you are. Evidence enough. Someone was apparently looking out for you. It had to be the way you described so I will simply say I have seen something I have never seen before. And that is unusual in this job. But, then again, we don’t get to interview everyone, if you know what I mean. All this will be reflected in our final report, which should come out in about thirty days. You can now have contact with Mr. George Sherman if you wish to discuss the incident and continue your career as a pilot.”
“Well, I’ve had plenty of time to think about my career, and . . . maybe . . . I’m thinking maybe I’m more of a land lubber.”
“That is not an unusual life choice change in these circumstances,” she laughed. He held out his left hand to both of them. They exchanged handshakes and made their way out the door still bewildered.

*****
Sam lay there staring at the ceiling. What a grueling day so far, he thought. Glad that’s over with. His thoughts turned to Mo. She would be in soon. She had become quite a flirt, and he enjoyed that. Maybe she likes me, he thought. He suspected she made more visits than protocol required. He waited eagerly for her visits.
Before he could finish his thought, Mo stepped in. Her smiling face always energized him making him forget his pain. She was very petite, standing maybe about five foot two, less than a hundred pounds, he guessed. Her pale face was set off by her dark hair and big brown eyes with an aquiline nose that added just the right measure of character. But what really grabbed him was her seemingly constant enthusiasm for life. It was contagious. She was never without a witty quip and a smile. He couldn’t help but admire her.
“How we feeling today, Captain?” she giggled.
“Not all that shipshape,” he replied. “I’m thinking of resigning my commission.”
“Tough day, huh? They were in here a long time.”
“Yeah. They did their job, for sure. They left no detail uncovered,” he said.
“Well, nothing wrong with staying an earthling,” she laughed. “Get those feet planted firmly on the ground.”
“I think you are having too much fun in my pain,” Sam said. “Shouldn’t you be more sympathetic? Isn’t that what nurses are supposed to do?
“Ha,” she laughed. “I know you aren’t in that much pain. I took care of that. Although, that will be a’changing soon. Need to wean you off. But you ought to be delighted. To make it through something like that . . . wow! There’s no doubt someone has plans for you.”
Sam was perplexed at that statement. Who was this nebulous someone everyone kept referring to?
“I suppose,” Sam said, “whoever someone is. I’m not sure who or what that is. And . . . well, yeah . . . I do have plans. I just graduated, got my first real job. Yeah, I’d say I have plans.”
Mo just smiled. “Well there are your plans and then there are ‘other’ plans.”
“What do you mean?” Sam asked.
“Oh, you’ll figure it out.
Figure it out? Sam thought. First his grandfather says these cryptic things and then Mo. How is it everyone seems to know something I don’t? And all the strange things happening. The old man in the alley. That shape shifting silver coin which keeps getting lost and showing up at the weirdest times.
Sam looked around and realized it was lost again. It really was the lost coin.
Mo looked at her watch. “Sorry, no time for any more clichés. Gotta make my rounds. I’ll check back with you before my shift ends. By the way, I met John and Molly after they left. They sure are nice. They invited me over. Hope you don’t mind.”
“No, no, no,” Sam said excitedly. “That’s great. And think how well that will work. I’ll be out of here in a few weeks and we can move to home care. See’n as how we’re neighbors and all, you and me. What do you think of that?” He smiled sheepishly.
She grinned ear to ear. “That could be arranged, I believe . . . but it will cost you. I’ll have to check the rules regarding nurse-patient relationships.” She laughed one more time and was gone.
“I’m looking forward to it,” Sam said to an empty room. All his inhibitions were gone. There was nothing intimidating about this beautiful girl. He was disarmed totally and completely—and very happy.