W. Griffin - The shooters

"Last night, Mr. President."

"'If Lorimer goes down there' what?" the President asked.

Natalie Cohen said, "Ambassador Lorimer's home in New Orleans is under the water, Mr.-"

"His and several hundred thousand other people's," the President interrupted. "My God, what a disaster!"

"-and he called me and asked for directions to his son's ranch in Uruguay in which, or at which, he intends to live until he can get back in his home."

"And that poses problems?"

"It may, sir," Montvale said.

"How bad problems?" the President asked.

"Not catastrophic, Mr. President," Montvale said, "but potentially dangerous."

"I can't imagine why the hell…yeah, now that I think about it, I can imagine why he'd want to go down there. Far from the mess in New Orleans, and it's cheap-right, Charley?-to live down there."

"Yes, sir, it is."

"If it's not going to cause catastrophic problems for us, I don't think it's any of our business what he does," the President said. "We have other problems to deal with. Aside from Katrina, I mean."

"Sir?" Natalie Cohen asked.

The President sipped his coffee, then said, "Two days ago, the mayor of Chicago called me. Now, I know you two are above sordid politics, but I'll bet Charley can guess how important Cook County is to me. Right, Charley?"

"I think I have an idea, Mr. President," Castillo said.

"And knowing that, you'll all understand why I responded in the affirmative when the mayor asked me to do him a personal favor."

"Yes, sir," the three said, chuckling almost in unison.

"And when I heard what favor he was asking, I was glad that I had replied in the affirmative, because it pissed me off, too. If I'd known about this, I would have taken action myself."

"Known about what, Mr. President?" Montvale said.

"You're the director of National Intelligence, Charles," the President said, "so I am presuming you (a) know what's going on in Paraguay and (b) have a good reason for not telling me about it."

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about, Mr. President," Montvale said.

"You have any idea what I'm talking about, Natalie?"

"I'm afraid not, Mr. President."

"Well, then, let me tell you," the President said. "What the drug cartel down there has been doing is kidnapping our agents and then either turning them into junkies or giving them fatal overdoses of what we euphemistically call 'controlled substances.' Are you learning this for the first time, Charles?"

"No, sir. Of course, I'm aware of the situation-"

"Natalie?"

"I've heard of the abductions, Mr. President, but not about the…uh…business of making the agents drug addicts."

"Charley, are you learning this for the first time now?"

"No, sir."

"Why doesn't that surprise me?" the President said. "Sometime when we have time, Charles, we can have a long philosophical discussion of what the DNI should, or should not, pass on to the commander-in-chief, but right now all we have time for is dealing with the problem.

"I have come by my intelligence regarding this situation from His Honor the Mayor. It seems that his father, who was, you recall, His Honor the Mayor for a very long time, had a lifelong pal, one Francis "Big Frank" Timmons, who the current mayor told me his father said was one of the only two really honest cops in Chicago.

"The mayor told me that Big Frank Timmons called him and asked him for a favor. The mayor, who was bounced on Big Frank's knees as an infant and calls him 'Uncle Frank,' said 'Name it,' or something like that.

"Big Frank told the mayor that his son Byron-who is a captain on the Chicago Police Force-just had a visit from an official of the Drug Enforcement Administration, who told him that his son, Special Agent Byron J. Timmons, Jr., of the DEA, was missing from his assignment at the U.S. embassy in…whatever the hell the capital city is…in Paraguay…"

"Asuncion," Castillo furnished without thinking.

The President's face showed that he was not very grateful for the information.

"…and that the possibility he had been kidnapped had to be faced, although they had no proof of that."

Castillo exhaled audibly.

"What's with the deep breathing, Charley?" the President asked.

"Pardon me, Mr. President."

"What does it mean, Colonel?" the President demanded coldly.

"Sir, I don't know if the DEA man in Chicago knew this, but the embassy in Asuncion knew the day after Timmons disappeared that he had been kidnapped. They sent a photograph of him, surrounded by men in balaclava masks, and with a garrote around his neck."

"How long have you known about this?" the President asked.

"That Timmons had been kidnapped, about"-he paused and did the arithmetic-"thirty-six hours, Mr. President. I learned about the photograph being sent to the embassy about midnight last night, sir."

"And you, Charles?" the President asked.

"I learned of this incident for the first time last night, Mr. President, when Colonel Castillo did."

"And you, Natalie?"

"I'm hearing about this man…Special Agent Timmons…for the first time now, Mr. President. I'm sure the embassy made a report. I can simply presume it never made it to my desk."

"I guess not," the President said. "Well, it seems that Special Agent Timmons wrote his grandfather-who bounced the mayor on his knee, you will recall-about what was happening down there. He said there have been four such kidnappings. His makes five. So neither he nor Captain Timmons was very much impressed with what the DEA representative had told them. The word they used to describe it, forgive me, Madam Secretary, was 'bullshit.' At that point, Big Frank Timmons called the mayor."

"Mr. President," Montvale said, "just as soon as you're finished with us, I'll get on the telephone to our ambassador in Paraguay."

"No, you won't, Charles," the President said.

"Sir?"

"What I told the mayor was that I have an in-house expert for dealing with matters like this, and just as soon as I could lay my hands on him, I was going to tell him that his first priority was to get Special Agent Timmons back from these bastards."

"Sir, you don't mean Charley?" the secretary of State asked.

"Natalie, who else could I possibly mean?" the President said. But it clearly was more a statement than a question.

"Mr. President," she said, "I don't think that's a very good idea."

"Your objection noted," the President said.

"Mr. President, with all possible respect," Castillo said, "I don't know anything about dealing with something like this."

"How much did you know about finding a stolen airliner, Colonel? Or a missing UN official?"

"Sir, with respect, I know nothing about the drug trade…"

"I thought the way this works is the superior officer gives an order and the subordinate officer says, 'yes, sir,' and then does his goddamnedest to carry it out. Am I wrong?"

"Yes, sir," Castillo said.

"I'm wrong?"

"No, sir. I meant to say-"

"I know what you meant to say, Charley," the President said, and smiled. "And to assist you in carrying out your orders, the DNI and Secretary Cohen will provide you with whatever you think may be useful. As will the secretary of Defense and the attorney general. I will inform them of this just as soon as I can get to Andrews, where both are waiting for me. We're going to have a look at what Katrina has done." He paused. "Any questions?"

There was a chorus of "No, sir."

The President had another thought: "I'm going to call the mayor from Air Force One and tell him that I am sending you up there to talk to him and Big Frank and Captain Timmons and anyone else who needs reassurance that I'm doing everything in my power to right this wrong."

"Yes, sir," Castillo said.