"Did you see the accident?"

Gruber shook his head violently, chewing hard at his gum, jaw moving like a piston. "No. No no no. I was in the terminal. I only came out when I heard people shouting. And then I saw-" His voice failed him again.

Liam raised his voice. "Did anyone else see what happened?"

No one had, or weren't saying if they had. "Does anyone know how it could have happened?"

Wy said, "He must have primed the prop by hand."

"What?" Liam still couldn't look at her directly. He looked at Gruber instead.

Gruber swallowed again, Adam's apple bobbing in the open throat of his shirt. "I guess she means Bob must have pulled the prop through by hand."

Liam looked again at the prop. At his height it was nearly eye-level. Despite the rays of the early evening sun peering through the break in the clouds, a light rain was falling. The blood on the tips was beginning to run, coalescing into fat red drops that fell with audible plops to the mangled flesh of the man beneath. "Huh?"

"You reach up, grab a blade, and rotate the prop a couple of times," Wy said.

"Oh, you mean like-"

Gruber choked on his wad of gum, and Wy said, "Don't do that!"

She grabbed his half-raised hand. Her touch seared right through the surface of his skin. She let go, a brief flush of color in her cheeks. "Sorry," she said gruffly. "I haven't checked her out since I got back and found Bob. Whatever was wrong with her still is."

"Oh." Liam, feeling suddenly warm, unzipped his jacket and turned his face up to catch a little of the cooling drizzle on his overheated skin. "Why would he do that? What did you call it, "pull the prop through by hand"? I take it that isn't standard procedure." He looked at Gruber because he wasn't sure what his face would show if he looked at Wy.

"No." Gruber looked at the pilot standing silently next to the trooper. Liam waited. "He was an old-timer," she said finally.