Silvio held out his hand and took the handset from Montvale.
“What we’re going to have to do is get a secure line to the State Department switchboard. They can connect you with the CIA,” Silvio said, then switched on the secure telephone.
“This is Ambassador Silvio. Get a secure line to State, then get a secure line to the director of Central Intelligence. Ambassador Montvale is calling.”
Toward the end of saying “Ambassador Montvale is calling” Silvio had raised his voice questioningly while looking at Montvale, in effect asking,
Montvale had nodded, signaling that DCI was fine.
“Put it on the speakerphone,” Castillo said. “That way Ambassador Silvio and I can both testify that you asked the DCI personally.”
Montvale gave him a dirty look, then looked at the phone base and pushed the speakerphone button in time for everyone to hear, “Office of the DCI.”
“This is Ambassador Montvale. Get me the DCI, please.”
Moments later, the voice of John Powell, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, inquired cheerfully: “How are you, Mr. Ambassador?”
“I’m well, thank you, Jack.”
“What can I do for you?”
“I’m sitting in Ambassador Silvio’s office in Buenos Aires.”
“Little warm down there, isn’t it?”
“Brutal. Jack, Lieutenant Colonel Castillo is with us.”
“Oh, really?”
“The question has come up—actually, Castillo raised it—about activity in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; specifically, on that experimental farm the West Germans used to operate down there. You know what I mean?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Do you know of anything going on down there?”
“Is that what Castillo suggested?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Where did he get that?”
Castillo clapped his hands, then drew his right hand in a cutting motion across his throat.
“He’d rather not say,” Montvale said.
“I see. Well, as I said, I haven’t heard anything. But if you’ll give me a minute, I’ll check to see if anything has happened that I missed. Hang on a minute, please.”
There came the murmur of unintelligible voices in the background, and then Powell came back on: “It’ll take a couple of minutes. Are you on a speakerphone?”
“Yes, Jack, we are.”
“How are you, Colonel?”
Castillo said: “I’m very well, Mr. Powell. Thank you. And yourself?”
“I understand you’ve been in Vienna.”
“There is a rumor circulating to that effect, sir.”
“Apropos of nothing whatever, Colonel, to kill the time while we’re waiting to hear about Africa, so to speak, a couple of interesting Interpol warrants crossed my desk this morning.”
“Yes, sir?”
“The Russians say that several of their diplomats—Dmitri Berezovsky and Svetlana Alekseeva, known to be SVR officers, one in Copenhagen and the other in Berlin—have absconded with large amounts of money. More than a million dollars from Copenhagen, and twice that from Berlin.”
“Well, I suppose that goes to show we’re not the only ones with crooked diplomats,” Castillo said, and winked at Ambassador Silvio, who smiled and shook his head.
“The Russians seem really upset about these two,” Powell went on. “They’ve offered a large reward for information leading to their arrest. And no one seems to know where they are or how they got there.”
“Well, I’ll keep my eyes peeled for dishonest-looking Russians, Mr. Powell. And you’ll be the first to know if I find any.”
“I don’t like to think what will happen to these people—Lieutenant Colonel Alekseeva is Colonel Berezovsky’s sister, and his wife and little girl are apparently with them—if the SVR catches up with them. As they will eventually.”
“Well, just off the top of my head, Mr. Powell, I’d say if anyone knew how to dodge the SVR it would be a couple of senior SVR officers. Especially if they had a lot of cash. What did you say they’re supposed to have stolen? Three million dollars?”
“And off the top of my head, Colonel Castillo,” Powell said with more than a little impatience in his voice, “if the situation presented itself, I’d think it obviously would be in their self-interest to place themselves under the protection of the CIA.”
“And you’d really like to talk to them, right?”
“Yes, we would really like to talk to them.”
“Well, I’d say that might be possible somewhere down the pike, but not anytime soon.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Well, if I have heard that the Vienna station chief has a big mouth—I understand she’s been telling wild stories to her old pal, Mrs. Patricia Davies Wilson, who in turn has been running her mouth to C. Harry Whelan, Jr.”—Castillo glanced at Montvale to gauge his reaction to the mention of the journalist who’d tried to crucify Castillo but was outsmarted by Montvale—“I think we have to presume these people have heard it, too. Under those circumstances, I don’t think if I were them I would place a hell of a lot of faith in the agency to protect them. Would you?”
There was a long silence, then Powell asked, “Did you ever hear of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, Colonel Castillo?”
“Isn’t he one of those talking heads we see on Fox News?”
“Before that, he was a serving Marine officer who was given more authority than he could handle.”
“The story I get, Mr. Powell, is that Colonel North saw what he was doing as his duty as an officer sworn to protect the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic, and to do what he was doing despite a lot of opposition from what he called the ‘LAs.’ ”
“The what?”
“I think it stands for ‘Langley Assholes,’ but I’m not sure.”
Silvio suddenly had the urge to clear his throat. Castillo looked at him, but the ambassador apparently was finding the tips of his shoes fascinating.
Powell shot back: “Can I infer from that that you share North’s opinion of the agency?”
“I don’t know what Ollie thinks of the CIA. But if you’re asking for my opinion?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Some really wonderful people struggling to stay afloat in a sea of politically correct left-wing bureaucrats.”
“Interesting,” Powell said icily.
“This is getting us nowhere,” Montvale said. “How long is it going to take to get the information on the alleged chemical factory in the Congo?”
“I think Mr. Montvale means the
“It was just handed to me,” Powell said. “The latest analysis is dated five days ago. It states that there is no discernible activity there of interest to the United States. They are apparently experimenting with fish farms.”
“ ‘Fish farms’?” Castillo parroted.
“Yes, Colonel. I spell: Foxtrot-India-Sierra-Hotel farms.”
Castillo shook his head. “Are you open to a suggestion, Mr. Powell?”
“I’ll listen to one, Colonel Castillo.”
“You might consider the possibility that whoever filed that, and whoever analyzed and approved the raw
