The Hostage pa-2

by W. E. B Griffin

  "Mrs. Masterson, I won't intrude on your grief anymore. If there's anything you need, all you'll have to do is tell Mr. Santini."

  "Thank you."

  Castillo nodded at the people in the room and walked out.

  He had taken half a dozen steps to the elevator when Ambassador Silvio caught up with him. Santini was on the ambassador's heels.

  "I'm forced to agree with you, Mr. Cas-Charley," Silvio said. "She's concealing something."

  "I got nowhere with her, either," Santini said.

  "Mr. Ambassador, she didn't even mention her brother," Castillo said. "Would you be willing to try to get him on the telephone?"

  "I thought that was odd, too," Silvio agreed. "I'll put a call in to him just as soon as I get back to the embassy. Where will you be?"

  "At the embassy, sir. I want to get the ETAs of the airplanes."

  "Then I'll see you there." [EIGHT] The United States Embassy Avenida Colombia 4300 Palermo, Buenos Aires, Argentina 1450 23 July 2005 It was a frustrating forty-five minutes on the telephone.

  Even getting the number of the United Nations European directorate of interagency coordination was frustrating. The Buenos Aires international operator had trouble first connecting to and then communicating with the Paris information operator.

  Silvio gave up on that and called the American embassy in Paris. The political attache had somewhat reluctantly-and only after Silvio had proven to him who he was-provided a listing for the directorate, but said he had neither an address nor a number for a Jean-Paul Lorimer.

  A somewhat nasal-voiced French woman at the directorate told Silvio-whose French was fluent-that M'sieu Lorimer was out of the office, that she had no number at which he could be reached, and that any further inquiries should be directed to the director of information. She was unmoved by Silvio's announcement that he was the United States ambassador to Argentina, and was trying to contact Lorimer because there had been a death in the family.

  The only address and telephone number the State Department in Washington and the United States Mission to the United Nations in New York City had for Lorimer was his office.

  "Let me see what the Secret Service can do, sir," Castillo said, finally, and started to punch in Isaacson's number in Washington on his cell phone.

  "You don't want to get a secure line?"

  "What's classified?" Castillo said, and immediately added, "I didn't mean to sound flip, sir. Sorry."

  "I didn't think you were being flip," Silvio said. "It was a dumb question."

  "Isaacson."

  "Charley, Joel."

  "I see we're being telepathic again," Isaacson replied. "I was just about to call you about the FBI plane-on which, I'm sure you'll be thrilled to hear, Casanova, is the beauteous Agent Schneider-and the C-17."

  "You didn't say something allegedly witty to her, did you, Joel?"

  "No, but I was sorely tempted. She really is a delight to the eyes, and I felt duty-bound to warn her about you."

  "Tell me about the airplanes."

  "She and Jack Britton are on a Gulfstream Five, which left here at eleven-oh-five local time. They make about four hundred sixty knots, and it's about fifty-two hundred miles from here to there, so you figure it out."

  Without asking permission, Castillo snatched a pencil from a mug on Silvio's desk. Silvio quickly handed him a yellow lined pad.

  "The call sign is Air Force Zero-Four-Seven-Seven. They're bound for an airport called Jorge Newbery, which I presume is somewhere near Buenos Aires. Also on the plane are six somewhat annoyed FBI agents, pissed not only because they were told to report to you-as Secret Service, not Presidential Hotshot-but because two of their number got bumped because Schneider and Britton got on."

  "Jorge Newbery is the downtown airport in Buenos Aires."

  "The C-17-tail number Air Force Zero-Three-Eight-One-left Charleston Air Force Base, South Carolina, an hour earlier, but it's going to-probably already has-made a stop at Hurlburt, where it picked up a dozen Air Commandos ready to go to war, and a ten-man spit-and-polish detail from the Old Guard under a lieutenant for the burial party, who were conveniently in Florida burying some retired general."

  "Jesus."

  "I think you can guess where that order originated," Isaacson added. "Anyway, the C-17 will be landing at an airfield called Ezeiza-"

  "That's the main international field."

  "I guess they couldn't get that big airplane into the little airport."

  "You can sit a Globemaster down in your backyard, Joel."

  "No kidding. Well, for some reason, that's where it's going. And it will take however long after it leaves Hurlburt to go forty-two hundred nautical miles at four hundred fifty knots."

  Castillo scribbled down those numbers.

  "Okay. Got it. Now I need something from you."

  "Shoot."

  "The widow's brother, Jean-Paul Lorimer, works for the UN in Paris. The ambassador has been trying for forty-five minutes to get him on the phone without any luck. Have we got anybody in Paris who can help?"

  "I'll get right on it."

  "Call the embassy here and leave the numbers and address with the ambassador's secretary."

  "Done. You got anything else you want me to tell the boss?"

  "I put Tony Santini in charge of the Mastersons' security. She came out of the drug they gave her all right, but they're keeping her in the hospital overnight. I don't know when she'll want to leave here, but when she does, she wants to go to Keesler Air Force Base in Mississippi, near where he lived."

  "She wants to bury him there?"

  "Apparently."

  "I know the President was thinking of Arlington…"

  "I think she wants the family plot in Mississippi, Joel."

  "That's going to pose a little problem. I also know the President wants Walter Reed to do the autopsy."

  "The Argentines are already doing the autopsy. And they're going to prosecute these bastards, presuming we can catch them, in Argentine courts."

  "Who decided that?"

  "I did," Charley said. He met Silvio's eyes, and added, "The ambassador concurs."

  "I think that may cause more than a little pique at the highest level, Charley."

  "There was considerable doubt that we could extradite the doers. And the crime occurred here. And it's a done deed. The ambassador has already told the Foreign Ministry."

  "I think the boss will more than likely want to talk to you about that, Charley. Or maybe his boss will."

  "I thought that might happen."

  "We'll be in touch, Charley. Watch your back."

  Castillo pushed the disconnect button, and then did the calculation of the arrival times.

  "Both planes will probably arrive here between eleven and midnight tonight," he announced to Ambassador Silvio, "the Gulfstream to Jorge Newbery, and the C-17 at Ezeiza. There's an honor guard from the Third Infantry Regiment-'the Old Guard'-on the Globemaster, plus a detail of Air Commandos."

  "As a suggestion, if you want to meet your agents and the FBI, I can have the defense attache meet the transport."

  "Thank you."

  "He'll have to arrange transportation for them, and a place to live. I think the best thing to do with the military personnel is move them in with the Marines. And you told that FBI agent Yung to arrange to take care of the FBI. What about your agents?"

  "I'll take care of them. But I am going to need wheels. Can I rent cars for them?"

  "You could, but the rentals here are generally small and not always reliable. And they don't have radios. I'll have Ken Lowery deal with it. How many are you going to need?"

  "If I can keep the one I have, one more. I really don't need a driver."

  "You never know," the ambassador said. "I'll tell Ken to get you another car and a driver. Tonight?"

  "First thing in the morning."

  "And what are you going to do now?"

  "Sir?"

  "What are your immediate plans? For the next forty-fiv
e minutes or an hour?"

  "I don't have any, sir. I thought I might go have a look at the Masterson house."

  "Have you had breakfast?"

  "No, sir."

  "Neither have I, and it's now after three. Fortunately, right around the corner from here is a restaurant-the Rio Alba-that serves what I believe are the finest steaks in the world. Why don't we go have one while we wait to hear from your friend in the Secret Service?"

  "I think that's a splendid idea, sir."

  VII

  [ONE] The Four Seasons Hotel Cerrito 1433 Buenos Aires, Argentina 2105 23 July 2005 The Marine guard-who Castillo had learned was Staff Sergeant Roger Markham, twenty years old, of Des Moines, Iowa, who had been a seventeen-year-old fresh from Parris Island when he had been on the Marine March to Baghdad before being assigned to the Marine Embassy Guard battalion-pulled the embassy BMW 545i to a smooth stop in front of the Four Seasons and started to open his door.

  Castillo caught his arm.

  "If you try to rush around and open my door, Roger, I swear to God you'll regret it."

  Markham looked at him sheepishly.

  "It's now a little after nine," Castillo said. "The plane's due at eleven-thirty, give or take, which means we should leave here around eleven. What are your plans for those two hours?"

  "Wait."

  "Here?"

  "Right here."

  "Can you leave the car here?"

  "Dip plates. I can leave it anywhere."

  "What you are going to do, Roger, is park it. The driveway is right there." Castillo pointed to the entrance of the hotel's basement garage. "And then you're going to come to my room, where we will try to get a little shut-eye."

  "Whatever you say, s-"

  "There you go again," Castillo said. "What do they do to you at Parris Island, give you fifty push-ups every time you to forget to say 'sir'?"

  "Fifty, sometimes a hundred. Sorry."

  "Not really a problem, but try, huh?"

  Markham nodded.

  "Go park the car," Castillo said, and got out.

  As he walked through the lobby Castillo remembered that he had not gotten rooms for Betty Schneider and Jack Britton.

  That proved to be more of a problem than he anticipated.

  The house was nearly full, the assistant manager on duty told him. After ten minutes of consulting the computer, it was decided that Herr Gossinger would move from his suite-1550-into 1500. Fifteen hundred was far grander than Castillo needed, and consequently far more expensive.

  He toyed with the idea of putting Betty into 1500, but decided against it.

  She would almost certainly decide that I was plying her with luxurious accommodation as part of my wicked and devious plan to get into her pants.

  If I thought that would work, I'd rent the whole goddamn floor.

  Vacating 1550 made it available to someone else, and somehow that freed up 1510 and 1518, both very nice single rooms with views of Avenida 9 Julio and the port. Both were equipped with two queen-sized beds. Castillo asked the assistant manager which was farthest from 1500 and was told 1518.

  "Put Senorita Schneider in fifteen-eighteen, please."

  "Would you like to have a bottle of champagne and some flowers-roses, perhaps?-waiting for the young lady, Senor Gossinger?"

  "I don't think that would be a very good idea, thank you."

  As far as the young lady is concerned, our relationship is-and will remain-professional and platonic. There wasn't much that had to be moved from 1550 to 1500, and there were two bellmen and Sergeant Markham to help him, but it was after nine-thirty before the process was completed.

  "I am now going to drink one of these," Castillo said, holding up two bottles of Quilmes beer from the in-room bar, "and then make a valiant attempt to catch a few winks." He extended a bottle to Markham, and added, "I suggest you do the same."

  "I'm not sure I should be drinking," Markham said.

  "Trust me, Roger, you should drink that beer." With Sergeant Markham stretched out on the couch in the sitting room of suite 1500, Castillo lay down on the super-king-sized bed in the bedroom. The first thing that came to mind were mental images, not all of which could honestly be deemed lewd and obscene, of Special Agent Schneider.

  He finally chased them away with images of Jack the Stack Masterson in the taxicab.

  Jesus, was that only this morning? When his cellular telephone buzzed, he was dreaming. In his dream, Sergeant Schneider was being much, much more affectionate than she had ever been in his waking hours.

  He looked at his watch. He had been asleep for fifteen minutes.

  "Castillo."

  "I really hope I either woke you up or interrupted something really indecent," Major H. Richard Miller's very familiar voice announced.

  You have no idea, you sonofabitch!

  How did he get this number?

  "How's the knee?"

  "How do you think it is? After every sonofabitch and his brother has been digging around in it for a month with the very latest in shiny sharp instruments of torture?"

  "What's up, Dick?"

  "We can't find this Lorimer guy in Paris, and God knows I've tried. You are going to have one hell of a phone bill, old pal."

  "You sound as if you're not calling from your Walter Reed bed of pain."

  "Actually, having accepted your kind invitation to share your pad," Miller said, "I'm lying on your couch in the Mayflower as we speak. In the morning they will roll me into your office at the Nebraska complex, where I will lie on your couch there."

  "What about Lorimer?"

  "Well, we finally got an address for him, seven Rue Monsieur, and a phone number. No answer on the phone. Isaacson called some Secret Service guy he knows in Paris. The guy went there. The concierge said she had no idea where Lorimer was, but that he was often gone for a week or two. His car is in the garage. Isaacson said that he's going to ask Secretary Hall to ask Secretary Cohen to lean on the UN to find out where he is. And Isaacson said for me to call you and bring you up to speed."

  "Thanks, Dick. Are you sure you're all right to work?"

  "I'm fine. I presume the love of your life has not yet arrived?"

  "Screw you. And if you're referring to Betty Schneider, the ETA is twenty-three-thirty local."

  "An hour difference between here and there, huh?"

  "It's almost ten here."

  "As a friendly word of advice I'm almost positive you will ignore, try to think with your upper brain for a change, before you do something stupid with that woman."

  "Jesus Christ!" Castillo heard himself flare. "She's no longer a cop that I can make a pass at. She's now in the Secret Service and she works for me. I still like to think of myself as an officer and a gentleman. So fuck you, Dick!"

  There was a moment's silence, and then Miller said, "Charley, ol' buddy, you have no idea how happy that outburst made me. I'll be in touch."

  The line went dead.

  Castillo sat up in the bed and turned the light on.

  I don't know where that outburst came from, either, but it was right on the money. I can't make a pass at Special Agent Schneider. I shouldn't even be fantasizing about her.

  Moot point. She has made it as clear as humanly possible that she has no interest in me at all.

  But I'm glad Dick brought it up.

  I am entirely capable of doing the wrong thing, and probably would have.

  What the hell is the matter with me?

  In one movement, he laid the cellular on the bedside table and fell back on the bed.

  Then, a moment later, he sat up again, picked up the phone, and punched the autodial button for Howard Kennedy.

  Kennedy answered on the third ring.

  "Hello?"

  "Did I wake you up, Howard?"

  "As a matter of fact, no."

  "Are you in the hotel?"

  "Why?"

  "I thought we might have a drink. There's a jazz quartet in the bar."

  "Very kind of you
, but what I'm doing is standing in the rain at Ezeiza watching ground handlers in whom I have no confidence whatsoever loading very expensive- and very nervous-horses onto an airplane. I'll take a rain check, though."

  "Are you going with the horses wherever they're going?"

  "As a matter of fact, yes."

  "But you'll be coming back soon?"

  Kennedy's silence indicated he wasn't going to answer the question.

  "Pity," Castillo went on, "some old friends of yours are coming to town."

  There was another silence long enough to make Castillo think Kennedy was not going to respond when he did:

  "The major crime investigation team from Quantico?"

  "I don't know where they're from, but they're coming from Washington."

  "Have you got their names?"

  This time Castillo hesitated before replying.

  Why the hell not get him the names? What harm can it do?

  "I can get them as soon as they get off the Gulfstream."

  "When will that be?"

  "Eleven-thirty, give or take. I told another of your former associates to meet the plane and find them someplace to sleep."

  "What's his name?"

  "Yung. He's stationed in Montevideo-"

  "Chinese? Feisty little bastard? Round face, five-eight, one-fifty?"

  "Yeah. You know him?"

  "Very well. What did he tell you he's doing in Montevideo?"

  "He didn't tell me he's doing anything. I have the impression he's just one more of your former associates looking into money laundering. The ambassador asked the ambassador in Montevideo if any of them had kidnapping experience, and he sent Yung and another guy here."

  "His name?"

  "I don't have it handy. But I can get it."

  "Where are they landing? Here?"

  "Jorge Newbery. There's a transport on the way that should land at Ezeiza at about the same time."

  "I just saw an Air Force colonel in full uniform surrounded by Argentine Air Force brass; I wondered what he was up to."

  "I'm going to get the family-and the body-out of here just as soon as I can."

  "What were you planning to chat about, Charley, while we were listening to the jazz quartet?"

  "I thought I might idly inquire if you had ever heard of a fellow named Jean-Paul Lorimer."