“Or where they are holding this man?”
Castillo shook his head.
“Not even in which country?”
Castillo shook his head again.
“Then this man whom you have been ordered to rescue could be in Uruguay?”
“That’s possible, but unlikely.”
“Have you had the opportunity to meet Comandante Duffy of the Argentine Gendarmería Nacional, Colonel?” Ordóñez asked. “I know he was hoping to talk to you.”
“I met Comandante Duffy this morning.”
“Did he tell you that two of his men have been murdered, and two kidnapped, presumably by the same people who have taken your man?”
Castillo nodded.
“Did he tell you what he intends to do to the people who have done this? Or who he thinks may have done this?”
“He didn’t spell it out in so many words, but he made it pretty clear that he intends to take them out.”
“He intends not only to kill them, but to leave their bodies where they fall, as an example of what happens to people who murder gendarmes.”
Castillo nodded.
“Much as you did with the people at Shangri-La,” Ordóñez added.
Castillo met his eyes for a moment.
Castillo then softly but angrily said, “Sorry, Ordóñez, I can’t—won’t—let you get away with equating what happened at Shangri-La with the cold-blooded murder of Duffy’s gendarmes.”
“You’re not going to deny that there were six bodies—seven, counting Lorimer’s corpse—left lying in pools of blood at Estancia Shangri-La, are you, Colonel?”
“Actually, eight men died at the estancia,” Castillo said, his voice rising. “I lost one of my men, and we damn near lost Alfredo. But we acted in self-defense. They opened fire on us, without warning. We returned it. They died. What the hell were we supposed to do, call a priest, give them the last rites, and bury them?”
“José,” Munz said evenly. “Colonel Castillo went to Estancia Shangri-la with plans to take Lorimer back—alive—to the United States. Violence was neither planned nor expected.”
“And you went with him, Alfredo, fully aware that kidnapping is just as much a crime in Uruguay as it is in Argentina,” Ordóñez said.
Munz, his eyes narrowed, nodded.
“And was making off with Lorimer’s sixteen million dollars planned or expected?”
“We didn’t know about the money until we went into Lorimer’s safe,” Castillo said.
“So you’re admitting you stole the money?”
Neither Castillo nor Munz replied.
“What did you do with the money?”
“Alfredo and I spent most of it on whiskey and wild women,” Castillo said.
Ordóñez stared at him coldly.
“So tell me, Ordóñez, what happens now?” Castillo asked after a moment. “You escort us to the Buquebus?”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, obviously, our coming here has been a waste of time; you’re not going to help us. But on the other hand, we’ve given you no reason to arrest us; we’ve broken none of your laws.”
“Not today,” Ordóñez allowed. “Except, of course, the small matter of trying to get a senior police official to acquiesce in your violation of the laws of his country.”
“We came to ask your help, José,” Munz said with an edge in his voice. “Help in getting a fellow police officer—who happens to be an American—back from the hijos de puta who kidnapped him.”
“The hijos de puta who have him also have two of Duffy’s gendarmes,” Ordóñez replied evenly. “And have brutally murdered two of his gendarmes. And that’s what worries me, Alfredo. That’s who worries me.”
“The narcos or Duffy?” Munz asked.
“You and I both know, Alfredo, that these people are not ordinary narcos. If they were, I’d probably be hoping—may God forgive me—that Duffy would be leaving bodies not suitable for viewing in their caskets all over Corrientes and Entre Ríos Provinces and, for that matter, Paraguay. He’s right that the kidnapping—and the murder—of police officers cannot be tolerated, and that leaving bullet-riddled bodies on the side of the road, or at narcotics refining plants, would send that message far more effectively than running them through a justice system where, sadly, justice is often for sale.”
Ordóñez paused a moment.
“But,” he went on, “as I say, these are not ordinary narcos. Major Alejandro Vincenzo of the Cuban Dirección General de Inteligencia is proof of that.”
Castillo thought: How the hell does he know that—and how the hell much more does he know?
“Excuse me?” Castillo asked.
“Certainly someone of your background, Colonel, has considered that Vincenzo was here—possibly, even probably, in Paraguay—long before Lorimer went missing in Paris. And as ‘their’ man on the scene was available to supervise the very professional kidnapping of Mrs. Masterson and the subsequent murder of her husband, when they wanted to locate Lorimer. And their sixteen million dollars.”
“Can you define ‘they’ and ‘their’?” Castillo asked.
“Obviously, Vincenzo was a Cuban. But what is the connection between the Russian FSB and the Cuban Dirección General de Inteligencia? There are two possibilities: One, no connection here in this instance; Vincenzo was here to (a) make money from the drug trade and (b) cause what trouble he could in the interests of Cuba. Or, two, the Russians are involved, for the same purposes—making money and causing trouble. I place more credence in the latter in no small measure because of the murder of Lieutenant Colonel Viktor Zhdankov of the FSB in Punta del Este, and the presence of your friend Aleksandr Pevsner.”
“So far as I know, Pevsner is not under the FSB,” Castillo said. “And, as a matter of fact, he as much as admitted to me that he had Zhdankov and Kennedy eliminated in Punta del Este.”
“I suspected that, of course. And I appreciate your candor. Which leads us right now to what I was going to come to eventually. From this point on, we will tell each other the truth. Duffy has lied to me—”
“About what?” Munz asked.
“It doesn’t matter, Alfredo. But it is one more reason that I am worried about him and this situation. I want to have nothing whatever to do with him as he goes after these narcos.”
“Does that bring us back to my question about you escorting us to the Buquebus terminal?” Castillo asked.
“Listen to what I am saying, please, Colonel. I said I wanted to have nothing to do with Duffy in what he’s going to do. I am prepared, with the understanding that we will tell each other the truth, to help you with your helicopters. The truth about everything, and that includes el Señor Pevsner.”
Castillo met his eyes.
“So far as I know,” Castillo repeated, “Pevsner is not under the FSB. That’s the truth. He almost certainly has flown things around for them, but he has also flown things around for the CIA. But, again, so far as I know, he is no more an asset of the Federal’naya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti than he is an asset of the Central Intelligence Agency.”
Munz added: “And—other than what Carlos has just said—I found no connection between him and the FSB when I worked for him.”
Ordóñez looked at Munz a moment, nodded, then said, “I have to ask you something, Alfredo.”
Munz made a Go on gesture.
“When you worked for him,” Ordóñez said, “who were you working for?”
“Argentina,” Munz said. “But, since we’re telling the truth, I never turned the money Pevsner paid me over to SIDE.”
“One more indelicate question, old friend, I have to ask. Who are you working for now?”
“I am working for Carlos,” Munz said, met Castillo’s eyes, then looked back at Ordóñez. “But we have the unspoken agreement between us that I am not working—and will not work—against Argentina. In this case, it should go without saying that these hijos de puta—or whoever else, the Dirección General de Inteligencia and/or the FS
B—are working against the best interests of my country. My conscience is clear, José. Before God, I have not, will not, sell out my country.”
“Thank you,” Ordóñez said. “The problem we have here—I’m sure you will agree—is that Duffy also believes he’s working for his country. And can’t—or doesn’t want to—understand that his duty to Argentina is to turn over what he has to SIDE, and not embark on this mission to murder whoever killed and kidnapped his men.” He let that sink in for a moment, then added, “I don’t want you—by you, I mean you and Colonel Castillo—working with Duffy.”
“And you think I want to?” Castillo said. “What if I have to?”
“Then I can’t permit you to bring your helicopters into Uruguay.”
“All I want to do is refuel helicopters at Estancia Shangri-La. They would be on the ground less than an hour, and they would not be coming back.”
“An hour or two, plus whatever time it took them to reach the estancia, and then to leave Uruguayan air space,” Ordóñez corrected him.
“That’s right,” Castillo said.
“If I had your word, and Alfredo’s, I could arrange it so that you will not be working with Duffy.”
“I can’t give you my word,” Castillo said. “It’s going to be hard—impossible—for me not to work with Duffy. Duffy’s told me that unless I can get my superiors to order me to work under his orders and share my assets with him, I will have to leave Argentina within twenty-four hours. And I have to say this: If you hadn’t run at the mouth, I wouldn’t have that problem.”
Ordóñez considered that a moment, then almost visibly decided not to take offense.
“I ‘ran at the mouth’—an interesting phrase—before I understood what Duffy was planning to do. And before I discovered that he had lied to me.”
“But the cow’s out of the barn. It doesn’t matter who opened the barn door or when or why. The damage has been done.”
“And have your superiors ordered you to work with Duffy?”
Castillo hesitated before replying.
“Okay. Truth time. I have not asked my superior. But I’m going to call Duffy, very soon, and tell him that I have been ordered to do whatever he wants me to do.”
“You’re taking that responsibility on yourself?”
“I have been ordered to get an American Drug Enforcement Administration agent back from his kidnappers. The order carried with it the authority to do whatever I have to do to get him—his name is Timmons—back. There is no point in me calling my superior when I know his answer will be to do whatever I have to do.”
Ordóñez nodded.
“Colonel,” he said, “let me tell you about my superior, superiors. Nominally, I am under the authority of the minister of the interior. But when a situation has international implications, I get my directions from the foreign minister as well. Actually—for purposes of credible deniability—I get them from Deputy Foreign Minister Alvarez.
“It was Alvarez who decided with me that it was in the best interests of Uruguay to ascribe the murder of Lorimer at his estancia, the murders of Lieutenant Colonel Viktor Zhdankov of the FSB and Howard Kennedy in Punta del Este, and of course the deaths of Major Vincenzo and his five friends at Shangri-La to internecine warfare in the drug business.
“I don’t know—and don’t want to know—what, if anything, Alvarez told the foreign minister about what we had done, but there was no pressure from either the Foreign Ministry or the Interior Ministry on me to zealously pursue the people responsible for all those deaths.” He paused, then added, “Which, of course, would have included you and your men.
“It seemed to be the best solution to the problem. While murder is a terrible crime, no Uruguayans had been murdered. Kennedy and Zhdankov were buried beside Vincenzo and the others in graves marked ‘Unknown’ in the Sacred Heart of Jesus church cemetery in Tacuarembó.
“David Yung—through the American embassy—was repatriating the remains of Lorimer, and it seemed unlikely that the Russians or the Cubans would ask questions about Zhdankov or Vincenzo. And you and I had the little chat in which I suggested you should leave Uruguay and not come back soon. When you agreed to do so, I thought the matter was closed.
“I was wrong about that, of course. The day before Duffy called me—two days before he came here—Alvarez told me our ambassador in Washington had called him to report that Senator Homer Johns…”—he paused and looked at Castillo to see if he knew who he was talking about, and when Castillo nodded, went on—“…to ask him what he could tell him—officially or otherwise—about the death of Lorimer, or if he had heard anything about your Special Forces having conducted an operation in Uruguay.”
“And what did the ambassador tell him?” Castillo asked.
“That Lorimer was involved in the drug trade, and that he had heard nothing about Special Forces operating secretly in Uruguay. The senator then asked him to discreetly inquire again, and the ambassador agreed to do so.
“As it happens, the ambassador and I are old friends—Uruguay is a small country, and we have a saying, ‘Don’t worry if you don’t know someone, he’ll marry into your family by the end of the week.’ But the ambassador and I are friends from school, and you’ll remember it was he who I turned to for help in identifying the 7.62mm National Match cartridge case we found at Shangri-La.
“So, unofficially, I called him to see what else Senator Johns had had on his mind. He told me that the senator had told him he’d gone to see Ambassador Charles W. Montvale, who as your director of National Intelligence could be presumed to know about such things, and that Montvale had denied any prior knowledge of Lorimer’s involvement in the drug trade and denied any knowledge of a Special Forces operation in Uruguay.”
Ordóñez looked more intensely at Castillo.
“I’ve always suspected Montvale is the man you answer to, Colonel. Do you?”
Castillo shook his head.
“I thought we were agreed to tell one another the truth,” Ordóñez said.
“I don’t work for Ambassador Montvale.”
“For whom, then? The secretary of Defense?”
Castillo shook his head again.
“Ah, then, the secretary of State,” Ordóñez said, clearly pleased with himself. “Of course. I should have thought of that. It explains a great deal. The authority you wielded in your embassy in Buenos Aires; the decision to keep Ambassador McGrory in the dark about your operation.”
“I don’t work for Secretary Cohen, either,” Castillo said.
Ordóñez’s face showed that not only did he not believe that, but that the denial offended him.
Munz caught that, and said, “He doesn’t, José.”
“Well, who does he work for? Do you know?”
Munz was quiet a moment, then laughed.
“Yes, I do,” he said. “But if I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
“What did you say?” Ordóñez asked incredulously.
“It’s a useful phrase I’ve learned working for Carlos,” Munz said.
“It’s not said seriously?”
“You never know, José,” Munz said. “You’re not going to put it to the test, are you?”
“I may not be Sherlock Holmes,” Ordóñez said to Castillo, “but after we eliminate Montvale and your secretaries of State and Defense, there’s not many people left, are there, from whom you could be taking orders?”
“What else did you learn from your old pal the ambassador?” Castillo asked, ignoring the question.
Ordóñez looked at him for a long moment, as if deciding whether or not to pursue the question of who gave Castillo his authority and orders. Finally, he said: “He said that he had the distinct feeling that Senator Johns would like nothing more than proof that there had been a secret Special Forces operation in Uruguay and that Montvale had lied to him about it.”
“Perhaps he doesn’t like Ambassador Montvale. A lot of people don’t,” Castillo said. “I don’t like him much myself. But
I would hate to see him embarrassed by Senator Johns.”
“And so would I,” Ordóñez said. “Because that would mean the decision Alvarez and I made about everything would come to light. The Cubans—and probably the Russians, too—would go to the United Nations to righteously denounce Uruguay—”
“I get the picture,” Castillo interrupted. “And you’re right, of course.”
“—for not only permitting the imperialist Yankees to send their infamous Special Forces to murder innocent Cuban tourists and Czechoslovakian businessmen on Uruguayan soil, but then to shamelessly deny it.”
Castillo was silent for a moment, then he said: “Just for the record…oh, hell.”
“Go on,” Ordóñez said.
“I was going to split a hair,” Castillo said. “My people at Shangri-La were not all Special Forces. It was not an SF unit that was sent here.”
“I don’t think, whatever the legalities, that anyone will believe that.”
“That’s what I decided. And the people who came here now to rescue Timmons are bona fide Special Forces.”
“They’re already here?”
“Just about all of them,” Castillo said. “And the helicopter pilots are from the 160th—the Special Operations Aviation Regiment.”
“And the helicopters, too, presumably?”
“No. I got the helicopters from a graveyard. By the time they get here, they’ll be cleaned and black—”
“‘Cleaned and black’?” Ordóñez parroted.
“Anything that could indicate they belong to the U.S. Army will be removed. And they’ll be painted in the color scheme used by the Argentine Army. They’ll be more or less identical to the Hueys the Argentines are flying.”
“And if nothing goes wrong and you manage to rescue your man without murdering everyone whoever so much as talked to the narcos, how do you plan to get your men and the helicopters out of Argentina or Paraguay?”
If he’s not going to let me use Shangri-La to bring the choppers in, Castillo thought, what the hell does he care about the details of what’s-not-to-happen?
What the hell is he hinting at?
“The men will leave the same way they came in, as tourists. I haven’t given much thought to the helicopters.”
The Shooters Page 39
