“The question is moot,” Castillo said. “Colonel Berezovsky and Lieutenant Colonel Alekseeva are not going to be involuntarily repatriated. And I ain’t goin’ nowhere I don’t want to go, neither.”
“So what are you going to do, Charley?” Allan Junior asked.
“It took me a lot longer than it should have for me to figure this out, Allan, but what I’m going to do is something they told me on that fabled plain overlooking the Hudson when I was eighteen. When, if I made it through Hudson High and became an officer, my first duty would be to take care of my people.
“I forgot that over the years. The truth of the matter was that falling off the face of the earth didn’t bother me much. There I was, with Sweaty, on the finest trout-fishing river in the world. The President of the United States had relieved me of my responsibilities.
“Then Dmitri and Sweaty’s cousin, Colonel V. N. Solomatin, who runs the Second Directorate of the SVR with Putin looking over his shoulder, wrote a letter to Dmitri and Sweaty, telling them to come home, all is forgiven.
“Since he didn’t know where they were, he had the rezident in Budapest give the letter to a friend of mine there who he thought knew how to get in touch with me. He was right. Several hours later, Sweaty and I were reading it in Patagonia.
“What was significant about the letter was not that Putin thought anybody would believe that all was forgiven, but that he wasn’t going to stop until Sweaty and Dmitri paid for their sins. That letter was intended to give Clendennen an out: He wasn’t forcing Sweaty and Dmitri to go back to Russia. ‘Knowing that all was forgiven—here’s the letter to prove that—they went back willingly.’
“Then the Congo-X appeared in Fort Detrick. Just about as soon as that happened, some people who knew the OOA—”
“The what?” Roscoe Danton interrupted.
“The Office of Organizational Analysis, the President’s—”
“Okay. Now I’m with you,” Danton said.
“Okay. Some people—”
“What people?” Danton interrupted again.
“I’m not going to tell you that now; I may never tell you. I haven’t figured out what to do about them yet.”
“Let me deal with the bastards, Charley,” Aloysius said.
“I’d love to, Aloysius, but I want to be invisible when this is all over, and that would be hard to do if all those people suddenly committed suicide by jumping off the roller coaster on top of that tower in Las Vegas. People would wonder why they did that.”
Casey chuckled.
“That’s not exactly what I had in mind, but close,” he said.
“You realize, Colonel,” Danton said, “that all you’re doing is whetting my appetite. Presuming that I come out of this alive, I’m going to find out who these people are. So, why don’t you tell me now?”
Castillo considered that.
“Tell him, Carlos,” Sweaty said.
“You think that’s smart?”
“I think you have to tell Mr. Danton everything,” she said. “Or eliminate him. He either trusts you—us—completely, or he’s too dangerous to us to stay alive . . .”
“Was that a threat?” Danton challenged, and thought: No, it was a statement of fact. And the frightening thing about that is I think he’s going to listen to her.
Sweaty ignored him. She went on: “. . . and now is when you have to make that decision.”
Danton thought: I realize this is overdramatic, but the cold truth is that if these people think I’m a danger to them, they’re entirely capable of taking me out in the desert, shooting me, and leaving me for the buzzards.
Why the fuck did I ever agree to come here?
“Dmitri?” Castillo asked.
“I think she’s right again,” Berezovsky said, after a moment’s consideration of the question.
“My consiglieri having spoken, Mr. Danton ...” Castillo said, and paused.
Roscoe Danton wondered: Consiglieri?
Where the hell did he get that? From The Godfather?
Castillo met Danton’s eyes, then went on: “There is a group of men in Las Vegas who have both enormous wealth and influence, the latter reaching all over, and, in at least two cases I’m sure of, into the Oval Office. Not to the President, but to several members of his cabinet. They’re all patriots, and they use their wealth and influence from time to time to fund intelligence activities for which funds are not available.
“When those people learned that OOA had been disbanded, they thought they could hire it as sort of a mercenary Special Operations organization.”
“Those people have names?” Danton asked.
“Giving them to you would be a breach of trust,” Castillo said. “We never agreed to this proposal when it was made, but neither, apparently, did we say ‘Hell, no’ with sufficient emphasis.
“It was from those people that we first learned of the Congo-X at Fort Detrick. They got in touch and wanted us to look into it. I was going to do that anyway, as it obviously was likely to have something to do with Dmitri and Sweaty as well as the threat it posed to the country.
“I made the mistake of taking two hundred thousand dollars in expense money, following my rule of whenever possible you should spend other people’s money rather than your own, and this, I am afraid, allowed them to think the mercenaries were on their payroll.”
“What was wrong with that?” Danton asked.
“Well, for one thing, we’re not for hire. But what happened, I have come to believe, is that when they learned that President Clendennen had decided to swap Dmitri, Sweaty, and me in exchange for the Congo-X that the Russians have, they decided that made sense, and that since I was a mercenary, I was expendable.”
“They told you this?” Danton asked.
“No. But I’m not taking any of their calls,” Castillo said. “Or letting them know where I am.”
“They think Charley’s on a riverboat between Budapest and Vienna,” Aloysius said. “And that I’m in Tokyo.”
“I don’t understand that,” Danton said.
“You’re not supposed to,” Sweaty said. “Go on, Carlitos.”
“What are you going to do?” Danton said.
“Well, there is some good news. We’ve learned how to kill Congo-X,” Castillo said. “Right now, nobody knows that but us—”
“You know something that important and you’re not going to tell the President ?” General Naylor blurted.
“If we told him, sir, there are several probabilities I’m not willing to accept. One would be that he would want to know how we came to know this before he did; that would place Colonel Hamilton in an awkward position.”
“Goddamn it, Charley!” Naylor exploded. “Hamilton is a serving officer. He is duty-bound.”
“Sir, with respect. You are violating your parole. I have told you that you are not permitted to question me. But I’ll answer that. Inasmuch as Colonel Hamilton marches beside us in the Long Gray Line, I’m sure he considered the Code of Honor before deciding that to keep this information to ourselves for the time being was necessary. He realized that if President Clendennen knew that we can now neutralize Congo-X, the Russians would learn that in short order. Right now, we don’t want to give them that.”
There was silence for a moment.
Then Danton asked, “So, what are you going to do, Colonel?”
“Depending on how much Congo-X the Russians have, that reduces the threat to the United States just about completely, or doesn’t reduce it much at all,” Castillo went on.
“The odds are that the Congo-X that General Sirinov flew out of Africa is all of it. Dmitri says that the Russians knew how awful this stuff is. Burned once, no pun intended, by Chernobyl, they didn’t want to run the risk of having any of this stuff inside Russia.
“If he’s wrong, and the Russians have warehouses full of Congo-X, or have the means inside Russia, or in Iran, or someplace else, to make more of it, then the United States is in deep trouble.
�
��So what we have to do is find out how much Congo-X they have. I don’t think Putin would answer that truthfully. So we have to ask the only other man who might, General Yakov Sirinov.”
“How the hell are you going to do that? And what makes you think he’ll tell you the truth?” Danton asked.
“We’re going to raid the Venezuelan airfield, La Orchila, grab the general, load him on his Tupolev Tu-934A, fly him here, and ask him.”
“You’re going to invade Venezuela?”
“We’re going to launch a raid on a Venezuelan airfield, not invade. When you invade, you try to stay. With a little luck, we should be in and out in no more than fifteen minutes, twenty tops.”
Danton repeated, “‘Load him on his Tupolev’?”
Castillo nodded. “The CIA has a standing offer of one hundred twenty-five million dollars for a Tu-934A. We’re going to get them one; we need the money.”
“To answer your other question, Mr. Danton,” Sweaty said, “once we get General Sirinov here, I’ll be asking the questions. He will tell us the truth.”
“And now you’ll have to excuse me for a few minutes,” Castillo said. “I have to go buy another Black Hawk. While I’m gone, we’ll show you the surveillance tapes.”
“‘Buy another Black Hawk?’” Danton parroted.
“That’s right,” Castillo said. “You don’t know how that works, do you?”
“Uh-uh.”
“Well, the U.S. Army buys them from Sikorsky. They run right around six million dollars. Then the State Department sells them to the Mexican government—to be used in their unrelenting war against the drug cartels—for about one-tenth of that, say, six hundred thousand.
“The next thing that happens is that—in the aforementioned unrelenting war run by the Policía Federal Preventiva against the drug cartels—the helicopter is reported to have been shot down, or that it crashed in flames.
“Next, a Policía Federal Preventiva palm is crossed with a little money—say, a million or so—and the Black Hawk rises phoenix-like from the ashes. The drug cartels find them very useful to move drugs around. That tends to raise the price. The one downstairs cost us one point two million, and I have been warned that the bidding today will start at a million three.”
“Incredible!” Danton said.
“Enjoy the movies, Mr. Danton,” Castillo said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
[EIGHT]
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence
Eisenhower Executive Office Building
17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
1210 11 February 2007
“Mr. McGuire is here to see you, Mr. Ambassador,” Montvale’s secretary announced.
“Ask him to come in, please,” Montvale said, and, as Truman Ellsworth watched from a leather armchair, then rose from behind his desk and walked toward the door, meeting McGuire as he entered the office.
“Hello, Tom,” Montvale said. “What can I do for you?”
McGuire hesitated, and then said, “I suppose you’ve heard I don’t work here no more.”
Montvale nodded. “Mason Andrews lost very little time in telling me; he was here two minutes after Truman and I got here this morning.”
“How are you, Tom?” Ellsworth said.
He got out of his armchair, went to McGuire, and gave him his hand.
McGuire hesitated again.
“I decided I couldn’t just fold my tent, Mr. Ambassador, without facing you and telling you I was sorry . . .”
“You’re not going to be prosecuted, Tom, if that’s what’s worrying you. To do that, Andrews would need me to testify and I made sure he understands that’s just not going to happen.”
McGuire finished, “. . . but when I walked in here just now, I realized I couldn’t do that. When Mrs. Darby told me Alex Darby was down there in . . .”
“Ushuaia,” Ellsworth furnished.
“. . . with some floozy, I knew that wasn’t so. And when I told you, I told myself that you were too smart to swallow that whole. But what I came to tell you, Mr. Ambassador, is that I hoped you would.”
“I appreciate your honesty, Tom. Are you going to tell me why?”
“I just had enough of the whole scenario, Mr. Ambassador. I think what the President’s trying to do to Charley Castillo is rotten. I didn’t want to be part of it. I hope they never find him.”
“Prefacing this by saying that I’m about to join you in the army of the unemployed . . .”
“Excuse me?”
“You’ve been around the White House for a long time, Tom. What inferences would you draw if I told you that that red telephone no longer directly connects the director of National Intelligence to the President?”
He gave McGuire time to consider that, then went on: “And when the director of National Intelligence—to whom the President is now referring to as the ‘director of National Stupidity’—attempts to telephone the President using the White House switchboard, the President’s secretary answers and tells me the President is busy and will get back to me. Or words to that effect.”
“He’s going to throw you under the bus, too?” McGuire asked.
“That is the inference I have drawn. Does that sound reasonable to you?”
“Then I am sorry, Mr. Ambassador. I didn’t think what I did would cost you your job.”
“What you did, Tom, probably contributed to that, but I don’t think it was the only thing that made President Clendennen decide he could do without my services. He really isn’t quite as stupid as he appears. I think it is entirely likely that he has known for some time what I think of him. He would like nothing better than to have Roscoe J. Danton write a column detailing how his director of National Stupidity went on a wild-goose chase to Ushuaia, but he can’t do that because Roscoe would be sure to ask him why he sent Truman and me to Argentina in the first place, and he can’t be sure how far he can push my reluctance to embarrass the Office of the President—for that matter, Clendennen himself—before it is overwhelmed by my contempt.
“Inasmuch as he knows that I won’t oblige him by resigning, what he’s doing is looking for a way to fire me in conditions that won’t reflect adversely on him.”
“Is Danton going to write about ... you going to Ushuaia?”
“I don’t know. I’m having trouble getting in touch with him. Just before you came in, Truman and I decided that we will take our lunch at the Old Ebbitt Grill. Not only are we fairly sure that the Executive Dining Room will no longer welcome us, but we suspect we can find Mr. Danton at one of his favorite watering holes, the Old Ebbitt.
“We’ll have to walk. Truman and I no longer have access to the White House fleet of Yukons.”
“My God!”
“If you don’t mind the walk, Truman and I would be delighted if you were to join us.”
“You don’t have to do that, Mr. Ambassador.”
“I want to do it,” Montvale said. “Please join us.”
[ONE]
Laguna el Guaje
Coahuila, Mexico
1335 11 February 2007
“Sorry to have taken so long,” Castillo said when he walked into the dining room trailed by Max. “Unexpected problems at the used helicopter lot.”
“But you got another Black Hawk?” Sweaty asked.
“I got another one. But the price went up to one point four million, and I suspect it’s not going to be as nice as the one downstairs.”
“Colonel, can I ask where you’re getting all that money?” Roscoe Danton said.
“The LCBF Corporation actually purchased the Black Hawks, and is loaning them to us,” Castillo answered.
“That’s ‘those people’ in Las Vegas?” Danton asked.
“Oh, no,” Castillo said. “The LCBF Corporation has absolutely nothing to do with those people in Las Vegas.”
“Then what the hell is it?”
“I’d really like to tell you, Roscoe,” Castill
o said solemnly. “I really would. But if I did, I’d have to kill you.”
That earned a chuckle from not only the Special Operations people around the table—there was one more of them now, CWO5 Colin Leverette (Retired) having come in while they were watching the surveillance camera tapes—but also from Lieutenant Colonel (Designate) Allan Naylor, Jr.
General Naylor, however, who had heard the comment often, was not amused.
He thought: These Special Operations types, from Charley’s teenaged ex-Marine “bodyguard” Lester Bradley up to Lieutenant General Bruce McNab, have an almost perverse sense of humor. They’re different. They have no respect for anything or anyone but each other.
And then he thought: Why do I suspect that things did not go well when Charley was off buying another Black Hawk?
And I think he was telling the truth about that, too. We give the Mexicans multimillion-dollar helicopters, which then promptly wind up in the hands of the drug cartels.
Castillo said, “Well, now that you’ve seen the movie starring General Yakov Sirinov and his Dancing SVR Ninjas ...”
There he goes again! Why does he feel compelled to make a joke even of that?
“. . . I think we should move to the war room, where I will attempt to explain our plan.”
“Am I permitted to make a comment?” the elder Naylor asked.
“Yes, sir. Of course.”
“That tape should be in the hands of the President. He could have the secretary of State demand an emergency session of the UN Security Council. . . .”
“Not until we know how much Congo-X the Russians have,” Castillo said very seriously, and then his voice became mocking: “And now, lady, Max, and gentlemen, if you’ll be good enough to follow me to the war room?”
He bowed deeply, holding one arm across his middle and pointing the other toward the door.
Naylor thought: I’d like to throw something at him.
He glanced at McNab, who was smiling.
What’s he smiling at? Charley playing the clown?
Or me?
The war room had been a recreation/exercise room. There was a Ping-Pong table, a pocket billiards table, and half a dozen exercise machines of assorted functioning.
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