106 – Maryland
They made seemingly random, futile efforts at conversation as the car drove south toward Maryland, efforts as unsuccessful as that of a fat old man attempting to chat with an attractive teenager sitting next to him on a long airline flight. Mostly, they navigated, Goldhersh running his finger over the fistful of maps they’d gathered, charting a course that took them through a hundred downtowns, avoiding interstates and toll plazas.
Shapiro grunted in reply to directions. His only conversation was the continuous one inside his head. During the hours of silence he heard a barely audible murmuring from the large man in the passenger seat, snatches of what sounded like Hebrew, in the singsong of Jewish prayers.
Only after they’d crossed the border into Maryland, just after midnight, were the two men able to touch on the purpose of their trip.
“I would change places with you if I could. You know that, don’t you,” Abram said. It was easier, safer speaking in the dark, speaking without having to look at the other person.
“I know that.” Shapiro almost laughed. “If we could change places, I’d probably let you go. I’ve pictured myself doing many things with my life, but never anything like this. If there were another option I’d take it, I’d try anything before this but, but ...”
Goldhersh waved his hands in the air, interrupting. His hours of silent prayer had placed him in an Old Testament state of mind. “Times come that call for drastic action, Ben. A time for Samson to destroy the temple, a time for God to flood the earth, a time to slay the tyrant,” Abram said, passion in his voice, sounding the biblical prophet he resembled.
“I know, I know, we’ve been through this,” Shapiro said. “It’s just that, well, that I’m a rational man about to commit what the whole world will know is an irrational act, an act of a madman, a monster.” He thought he’d convinced himself, intellectually, analytically that he was making the right decision. He was surprised at the doubt he heard himself expressing.
Am I afraid, he thought. He smiled to himself in the dark. Damn straight I’m scared. I’m about to kill myself.
“Ben, Israel is depending on you.” Abram sounded worried.
“Don’t worry, Abram, I won’t back out. I made my decision, we all made a decision. It’s the right decision. I know that. Fight evil. Do right. If not now, when. Use it or lose it. Shit. A stitch in time saves nine. I know.” Nonetheless, he heard a still, small voice urging him to reconsider, to give it more thought. Wait, the voice sussed, wait, it will all turn out for the best. It always does. Pollyanna Shapiro sought to seduce him. Wait. Stop.
They decided not to risk stopping to spend the night. “I stay up all night once a year for my science fiction movie marathon,” Shapiro joked to an incredulous Goldhersh. “I can stay up tonight and fly tomorrow. No problem. Piece of cake.”
As they drove on through the predawn morning, Goldhersh made no attempt to disguise his constant praying. Surprisingly, Shapiro found the sound comforting.
The glider club’s web site said it began tow operations at 10:00 in the morning. They would arrive well before then. They found an all-night diner at which they could pull the trailer between large trucks. They had three hours to spend there and did not want the unusual trailer, with the airplane’s tail jutting up at the rear, to attract attention.
The truck stop neon flashed Breakfast All Day Always Open.
Goldhersh was surprised that Shapiro ate only two slices of rye toast. No butter. He looked at the lawyer quizzically as the waitress walked away after taking their orders.
“Not to make light of it, but that isn’t much of a last meal,” the huge man said.
“Can’t eat before flying,” Shapiro replied. “You know on an airliner when the pilot comes on and warns that things could get bumpy? That’s the kind of turbulence gliders need to stay in the air. It gets awfully bouncy in my little airplane.”
He saw the skeptical expression on the other man’s face.
“Abram, I’m not getting cold feet.”
Goldhersh didn’t answer.
Shapiro ate only his toast and drank no more than two cups of burned coffee. Goldhersh called the waitress over every half hour to order more food for himself, and more coffee, to justify their three-hour sojourn in the vinyl booth.
Finally, Shapiro looked at his watch and gestured for the waitress. She totaled the bill and dropped it on the table.
“Sure you boys don’t want to wait around for lunch, now?” she said with a grin.
Goldhersh reached for the check, only to have Shapiro drop two twenty dollar bills on the table.
“My treat,” he said with a smile. “I’ve always been such a cheap skate of a tipper. Last chance to make it up.”
He tossed another twenty on the table and stood up.
In ten miles they reached a neatly painted white sign that said Mid-Maryland Soaring Society. The airfield was a wide grass strip with a sheet metal hanger next to a small wood building at the far end of the field. A small high-winged single engine airplane, a tail dragger with two wheels under the wings and a small wheel resting under the tail, the tow plane, sat next to the building.
They drove down the dirt road and parked next to a sign saying Visiting Pilots Welcome Aboard.