W. Griffin - By Order of the President

"Yes, sir."

"Some of that, obviously, has to do with funding. Funding is finite. One agency feels that if another agency has come up with something, there's no sense in duplicating the effort, which means spending money. That's just human nature."

"Yes, sir, I understand."

"And then Secretary Hall came up with the idea that one way to have a look at what's really going on in the field would be to have a quiet look at an active case where more than one agency-the more, the better-is involved. This gone-missing airplane is a case where not just two or three agencies but most of them are involved. I don't have to get into that with you, do I, Major? The jealously guarded turf of the various agencies?"

"No, sir. I'm familiar with the Statements of Mission."

"Okay," the president said. "In the case of this missing 727 airplane, the agency has primary responsibility. But the State Department has been told to find out what they can. And the Defense Intelligence Agency. And DHS, because one scenario is that the plane was stolen for use as a flying bomb against a target in this country. There is not much credence being placed in that story, but the fact is we just don't know. What we do know is that we cannot afford to allow it-or any other act of terrorism-to happen again. And certainly not as a result of interagency squabbling: or one agency deciding it doesn't want to spend money because it (a) would be duplication and (b) could be more profitably spent on something else.

"So that gives Secretary Hall reason to send someone to find out what he can. Because the agency and the others are involved, and he will have access-at least in theory-to what intelligence they develop, he will not be expected to send a team, just go through the motions with someone junior who can be spared. You with me, Major?"

"Yes, sir. I think I am."

"The question then became who could Secretary Hall send on this mission, and he answered that by saying he had just the man, and he thought I would like him because he was just like Vernon Walters. You know who General Walters was, of course?"

"Yes, sir, I do."

"Well, are you like Vernon Walters, Major? You do speak a number of languages fluently?"

"Yes, sir."

"Russian?"

"Yes, sir."

"Hungarian?"

"Yes, sir."

"How many in all?"

"Seven or eight, sir," Castillo said, "depending on whether Spanish and Tex-Mex are counted as one language or two."

The president chuckled. "How did you come to speak Russian?" he asked.

"When I was growing up, sir, my mother thought it would be useful if the Russians won. We lived right on the East/West German border, sir."

"And Hungarian?" the president asked.

"An elderly grandaunt who was Hungarian lived with us, sir. I got it from her."

"General Walters:" the president began, then paused. "I suppose protocol would dictate that I refer to him as Ambassador Walters, but I think he liked being a general far more than he ever liked being an ambassador. Anyway, he told me that languages just came to him naturally, that they hadn't been acquired by serious study. Is that the way it is with you, Major?"

"Yes, sir. Pretty much."

The president studied Castillo carefully for a moment and then asked, "You think you're up to what's being asked of you, Major?"

"Yes, sir," Major Carlos Guillermo Castillo said, confidently.

"Okay. It's settled," the president said. "I was about to say, 'Good luck, thank you for coming, and one of the Hueys will take you back to Fort Stewart to wait for Matt: for the secretary.'"

"There's no reason for him to stay at Fort Stewart, Mr. President," Hall said. "Actually, I promised him the long weekend off if we finished here quickly."

The president nodded, then asked Castillo: "Well, we are done. Any plans?"

"Yes, sir. I promised my grandmother a visit."

"She's where?"

"Outside San Antonio, sir."

"Would a chopper ride to Atlanta cut some travel time for you, Major?"

"Yes, sir. It would. But a ride back to Fort Stewart is all I'll need, sir."

"How's that?"

"Sir, I'm going to meet a cousin at Savannah. We're going to Texas together."

The president raised his voice. "Nathan!"

A very large, very black man appeared almost immediately from inside the house. He had an earphone in his ear and a bulge under his arm suggested the presence of either a large pistol or perhaps an Uzi. Right on his heels was one of the secretary's Secret Service bodyguards.

"Yes, Mr. President?"

"See that Major Castillo gets to a Huey and that it takes him back to Stewart," the president ordered.

"Yes, Mr. President."

The president offered Castillo his hand and put a hand on his shoulder.

"We'll see each other again," the president said. "Thank you."

"I'll do my best, Mr. President."

"I'm sure you will," the president said.

Secretary Hall shook Castillo's hand. Hall said: "See you in my office at noon on Tuesday."

A Secret Service Yukon rolled up a moment later. The president and Secretary Hall watched as Castillo got in the front seat and they waved as the SUV started off.

"A very interesting guy, Matt," the president said.

"The Secret Service dubbed him 'Don Juan,' " the secretary said. "I never asked them why."

The president chuckled.

"Where did you get him, Matt?"

"From General Naylor," the secretary said. "I got on my knees and told him I really needed him more than he did."

"That's right," the president said. "You and Naylor go back a long way, don't you?"

"To Vietnam," the secretary said. "He was a brand-new captain and I was a brand-new shake-and-bake buck sergeant."

"A what?" the president asked.

"They were so short of noncoms, Mr. President, that they had sort of an OCS to make them. I went there right out of basic training, got through it, and became what was somewhat contemptuously known as a 'shake-and-bake sergeant.' "

"Where did Naylor get him?" the president asked.

"Actually, he and Charley go a long way back, too," the secretary said.

" Charley?" the president parroted.

"He doesn't look much like a Carlos, does he?" the secretary said. "Yeah, I call him Charley."

"So where did Naylor get him? Where does he come from?"

"It's a long story, Mr. President," the secretary said. The president looked at his watch.

"If you're not in a rush to get back," the president said, motioning toward the wicker rockers and the tub of iced bottles of beer, "I have a little time."

[ONE]

Near Bad Hersfeld

Kreis Hersfeld-Rotenburg

Hesse, West Germany

1145 7 March 1981

"That has to be it, Netty," Mrs. Elaine Naylor, a trim, pale-faced redhead of thirty-four, said to Mrs. Natalie "Netty" Lustrous, a trim, black-haired lady of forty-four, pointing. "It's exactly three-point-three klicks from the little chapel."

"Yeah," Netty Lustrous said, slowing the nearly new black Mercedes-Benz 380SEL and then turning off the winding, narrow country road through an open gate in a ten-foot-high steel-mesh fence onto an even more narrow road.

Fifty yards down the road, a heavyset man stepped into the middle of it. He was wearing a heavy loden cloth jacket and cap and sturdy boots. A hunting rifle was slung muzzle downward from his shoulder.

Netty stopped the Mercedes and the man walked up to it.

" Guten tag, "the man said.

"Is this the road to the House in the Woods?" Netty asked, in German.

" Frau Lustrous?" the man asked.

"Jet."

" Willkomen, "the man said, stepped back, and somewhat grandly waved her down the road.

Netty smiled at him. " Danke schoen, "she replied and drove on.

"I didn't know anything was in season," Elaine said in obvious reference to the hunting rifle the man had been carrying.