Castillo filled his wineglass, then said, “Comments solicited.”
“A dangerous man,” former SVR Major Stefan Koussevitzky said.
“But I think he really likes Carlos,” former SVR Lieutenant Colonel Svetlana Alekseeva said.
“That makes him less dangerous?” Koussevitzky challenged.
“I didn’t say that,” she said.
“Are you interested in what I think?” Don Armando Medina asked.
“Of course,” Castillo said.
“Some of the things he said were absolutely true. If you don’t get in the way of the drug cartel people, they leave you alone. We have had no trouble with them.”
“They aren’t stealing our grapefruit?” Castillo quipped.
“One of their bricks of cocaine is worth more than an eighteen-wheeler trailer load of grapefruit. That’s another thing Juan Carlos said that’s true: The amount of money involved is nearly unbelievable.”
“I was hoping I could get him talking more about the people involved. He suggested everybody involved is Mexican.”
“He came here to tell you as little as possible beyond ‘butt out or die,’ ” Fernando said, “and that’s just what he did.”
“You think our ol’ buddy is in with the drug people?”
“He’s alive, isn’t he?”
“Then why did he come here at all?”
“Like Sweaty said, he likes you. And he was probably curious-professionally-why you showed up here.”
“And do you think I convinced him I’m just an old soldier trying to help out an old classmate?”
“Yeah,” Fernando said after a moment. “Don’t let this go to your head, Gringo, but that was quite a performance. You, Stefan, and Sweaty were pretty convincing.”
“Looking stupid is easy for me,” Castillo said. “But Sweaty? Sweetheart, I could have kissed you when he asked for an address in Uruguay and you came up with Golf and Polo.”
“ ‘ I’ve got a good memory for addresses and numbers, things like that,’ ” Sweaty quoted. “You can kiss me later. So now what?”
“Now we get in the Mustang and go to Cozumel, and catch tomorrow’s PeruaireCargo flight to Chile.”
“Why are we going to do that?”
“I want Aleksandr to understand that whacking Sergei Murov or any of his people without asking me first is not one of his options.”
“You’re going to have trouble with that,” Koussevitzky said. “He’s convinced the best way to protect himself is to eliminate anybody Vladimir Vladimirovich sends over here.”
“If he takes out anybody, Ferris will die,” Castillo said.
“Stefan’s right,” Sweaty said. “Aleksandr will be genuinely sorry about that, but he’ll think of your friend’s passing as unavoidable collateral damage.”
“Well, I’ll just have to talk him out of thinking that way,” Castillo said. “Sweetheart, your call. We either leave right now, or very early in the morning.”
“Why can’t we have dinner first, and then leave?” she asked.
“Because I suspect Juan Carlos is going to have the radar operators at Bahias de Huatulco International Airport report to him when any airplanes take off from here. If we take off after dark, he’ll know the runway is lighted. And I don’t want him to know that.”
“Then dinner here, looking down at the ocean,” Sweaty said without hesitation. “Afterward, we can walk on the beach, holding hands.”
“Are you going to take Stefan and his ‘citrus experts’ with you?” Don Armando asked.
Castillo nodded. “Stefan, yes. But if you don’t think the ‘citrus experts’ pose a danger to Hacienda Santa Maria, I’d like to leave them here. I may need them later on.”
THREE
The President’s Study The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 0830 17 April 2007
FBI Director Mark Schmidt, presidential press secretary Clemens McCarthy, and Supervisory Secret Service Agent Robert J. Mulligan were already in the room when Secretary of Defense Frederick K. Beiderman walked in.
Beiderman nodded at them, and said, “Good morning, Mr. President.”
“We’ve been waiting for you,” President Joshua Ezekiel Clendennen said as he rose from his small “working desk.” He walked to a library table on one side of the room. “Take a look at what we have to show you.”
Clendennen gestured to Mulligan, who handed McCarthy a large manila envelope. McCarthy walked to the table, opened the envelope, and took from it a sheaf of eight-by-ten-inch color photographs. As if laying out a hand of solitaire, he laid them one at a time, side by side, in four rows on the table. When he was finished, the table was nearly covered.
Clendennen gestured for Beiderman to examine the pictures. He did so, then raised his head and asked, “Exactly what am I looking at, Mr. President?”
“These photographs were taken yesterday afternoon outside suite 1002 in the Mayflower Hotel,” McCarthy said.
“They were taken by FBI photographers, so they will stand up as evidence in court, if it ever comes to that,” Clendennen amplified.
“Yes, sir. Who are these people, Mr. President?”
“Don’t tell me you couldn’t pick anyone you know from them?”
“Well, sir, I of course recognize Roscoe Danton and Colonel Castillo-”
“
“Yes, sir.”
“And what about my former press secretary, Porky Parker. Did you recognize him?”
“Yes, sir, of course. But I don’t recognize any of the others.”
“You didn’t see any of them at Arlington the day before yesterday? Maybe as they got into their limousines and drove off just as I was beginning my remarks?”
“I didn’t make that connection, sir. Who are they, sir? And what were they doing at the Mayflower?”
“They’re soldiers. Five of them are commissioned officers, seven of them are warrant officers, and the remaining ten are senior noncommissioned officers. They are all assigned to General McNab’s Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg-to the Delta Force and Gray Fox components thereof.”
“Yes, sir?”
“As to what they were doing at the Mayflower, they were having a party. The host was
“I don’t think I understand, Mr. President,” Beiderman said.
“What I want you to do, Mr. Secretary,” President Clendennen said, “is take these photographs to General Naylor. Tell him to show them to General McNab as proof that we know what he’s up to-”
“Sir?”
“Please don’t interrupt me, Beiderman,” the President said unpleasantly. “Tell Naylor to show these photographs to General McNab, and to tell McNab that if he immediately applies for retirement, that will be the end of it.”
“The end of what, Mr. President?”
“McCarthy thinks the less we put into words at this time, the better,” the President said. “For reasons that should be obvious to you.”
“I’m afraid they’re not, Mr. President,” Beiderman said. “Frankly, I don’t understand any of this.”
“I think you do,” the President said icily.
