W. E. B. Griffin - Presidential Agent 07 (43 page)

“You understand Carlito’s concern, Juan Carlos?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Who besides you would learn the field is capable of night flight if Charley were to take off right now?”

“Nobody,” Juan Carlos replied.

“And you can keep it that way?”

Pena nodded.

She moved the handset from her breast to her ear.

“If I have your word that you’ll do nothing until Carlito approves,” Svetlana said, “we can take off from here in about fifteen minutes.”

“You have my word that I will take no action until I tell him what I am going to do, and why,” Pevsner said. “And, Svetlana, remember who you are. How dare you talk to me that way.”

“I’ll tell you who I am, Aleksandr,” Svetlana said. “The woman who will tell my Carlito to fly over there. Or to stay here. And if we stay here, you will be free to do whatever you wish, and I can only hope that you will realize that you will be doing it alone.”

There was a long silence.

“What’s his name?” Juan Carlos asked.

“Aleksandr,” Castillo furnished.

“Can you hear me, Aleksandr?” Pena asked, raising his voice.

“I can hear you,” Pevsner said. “The policeman?”

“Actually, I’m a little more than a policeman,” Pena said. “But I used to be, and when I was, I learned that there are some women you just don’t fuck with, and your Cousin Sweaty is one of them. I wouldn’t cross her if I was you.”

“Pay attention, Aleksandr,” Castillo said, laughing.

There was a twenty-second pause.

“Then I will expect to see you in a little over three hours,” Pevsner said. “During which time you have my word that I will take no action that could possibly displease either my friend Charley or you, my dear Svetlana.”

The LEDs on the Brick went out; Pevsner had ended the call.

“Why do I think Aleksandr is annoyed with us?” Castillo asked rhetorically, then said, “You going to Acapulco tonight, Juan Carlos? Or do you want to spend the night here?”

“Neither. I’m going with you,” Juan Carlos said. “I’ve been hearing about that sonofabitch for years. Not only do I want to hear what he’s got planned, and for who, I want a look at him.”

“I can assure you, Juan Carlos,” Svetlana said, dead serious, “that Aleksandr’s parents were married. You are speaking of my mother’s sister, and she was not a bitch.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Sweaty,” Pena said. “No offense intended.”

“Watch your mouth in the future.”

“Sí, señorita,”
Juan Carlos said, contritely.

 

 

When they had landed at Cozumel International, Castillo had seen “the other” Cessna Mustang, the one used to fly high rollers to the Grand Cozumel casino, and drug money to be laundered out of Mexico. So he was not surprised to find former SVR Colonel Nicolai Tarasov sitting on the balcony of the twenty-third-floor penthouse suite beside former SVR Colonel Aleksandr Pevsner.

Max, delighted to see Pevsner, ran out onto the balcony, reared on his hind legs, draped his paws over Pevsner’s shoulders, and affectionately lapped his face.

“Can’t you control your goddamn animal?” Pevsner demanded.

“He likes you,” Castillo said. “Be grateful. His other mode is ‘rip your throat out.’”

“Very interesting,” Juan Carlos said. “Maybe you’re not the all-around son . . . bas . . .
evil
person everybody says you are.”

Castillo laughed when he saw that Juan Carlos was applying his
“when meeting someone cutthroat, attack to put them on the defense”
theory of how best to deal with dangerous people who expect to be treated differentially.

Sweaty said, “You’re learning, Juan Carlos.”

“You’re the policeman, obviously,” Pevsner said.

“Carlos has been telling me that Max is an infallible judge of character,” Juan Carlos said. “I tend to agree. We hadn’t known each other ninety seconds when he was begging me to scratch his ears.”

“And if I may be permitted to say so, Señor Pena,” Pevsner said, “I am not at all surprised that you and Karl are friends. You share not only a very odd sense of humor but a complete inability to take things seriously.”

“That’s it!” Svetlana snapped. “Stop.”

She walked to her Uncle Nicolai and allowed him to kiss her cheek.

“Introduce me to your friend, Svetlana.”

“Juan Carlos, this is my Uncle Nicolai,” Sweaty said. “Nicolai Tarasov, Juan Carlos Pena. I’d forgotten. You know Lester, don’t you?”

“How could I forget Mr. Bradley?” Tarasov said, and patted Lester on the back.

Tarasov and Pena shamelessly examined each other as they shook hands.

“And tell me what brings the chief of the Policía Federal for Oaxaca State so far from home?” Tarasov said.

“Well, not much was happening at Hacienda Santa Maria,” Pena said, “so I thought I might as well come over here and arrest somebody.”

Castillo chuckled.

“I said stop that and I meant it!” Svetlana said. “All right, Aleksandr, what’s so important that you couldn’t tell us on the Brick?”

“Before we get into that, do you suppose I could have a glass of wine?” Castillo said.

“It would be better if you were sober when I tell you what I have to tell you.”

“I said a glass, Aleksandr, not a damn bottle. Humor me.”

A waiter—whose starched white jacket did not entirely conceal the mini Uzi on his hip—appeared.

“Bring wine, some of that Cabernet Sauvignon, for my guests,” Pevsner ordered. Then he turned to Castillo. “The reason I didn’t open this subject on the Brick is I didn’t think you’d believe me.”

“What makes you think I’ll believe you now?”

“Get to it, Aleksandr,” Svetlana ordered.

He looked at her and nodded.

“Vladimir Vladimirovich doesn’t want to exterminate us,” he said. “Unless of course that should prove to be convenient while he’s doing what he set out to do in the first place. It took me a long time to figure that out.”

“Of course he wants to exterminate us!” Svetlana said. “For all the reasons you know.”

“Listen to me carefully, Svetlana,” Pevsner said. “If he can eliminate us while he’s
doing what he set out to do in the first place
, he’d be pleased. But eliminating us is not his highest priority.”

Castillo looked at Pevsner.
Where the hell is he going with this?

“Then what is?” he said.

“We misjudged him. We thought of him as what we think he is, rather than what he believes he is.”

“Which is?” Castillo asked.

“Tsar of all the Russias. Vladimir the Terrible. Cast in the mold of Ivan the Terrible. Chosen by God to restore Russia to its former magnificence.”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?” Castillo asked.

There was not a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

“Perfectly. Absolutely,” Pevsner said.

“Where did this come from, Aleksandr?” Castillo asked. “Your notion that Putin thinks of himself as . . . Ivan the Terrible reincarnate?”

“The first time I thought of it—and dismissed it—was during the funeral.”

“The imperial family’s funeral?”

Pevsner nodded.

The waiter pulled the cork from a wine bottle with a
popping
sound, and poured a little for Castillo to taste.

“You know Saint Petersburg?” Pevsner asked.

Castillo nodded, and Pevsner went on: “Renamed Petrograd from Saint Petersburg in 1914, then renamed Leningrad in 1924, and then back to Saint Petersburg in 1991, after the Soviet Union became the Russian Federation.”

Castillo vaguely remembered seeing photographs of the funeral. He hadn’t paid much attention to it.

“On July 17, 1998, eighty years to the day after the Tsar and his family were executed by the Bolsheviks, they were interred—as ‘The Royal Martyrs Tsar Nicholas II and his beloved family’—in the Royal Vault of the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul.

“His Holiness Patriarch Alexis came from Moscow to preside, and President Boris Yeltsin represented the government of the Russian Federation.

“The arrangements—moving what was left of the bodies from where they had been tossed down a well in Yekaterinburg, some nine hundred miles east of Moscow, and DNA examination of the remains to prove it was indeed the Tsar and his family, were handled by one Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, then the KGB’s man in Saint Petersburg . . .”

“Now, that’s interesting,” Castillo interrupted.

“. . . who was very visible during the interment,” Pevsner finished.

“Yeah,” Svetlana said. “That caught my attention, too. I thought he was being blasphemous.”

“And that was my initial reaction, too,” Pevsner said. “But then, as I said, I dismissed it, deciding that either possibility was improbable.”

“Either possibility?”

“That he was being blasphemous, as Svetlana thought, or that he had gone back to the Lord.”

“But?”

“I began to think of it again a few days ago in San Carlos de Bariloche,” Pevsner said. “When I was trying very hard, and failing, to see how Vladimir Vladimirovich’s intention to eliminate us tied in with the kidnapping of Colonel Ferris. When I finally realized it had nothing to do with that—the kidnapping had nothing to do, except possibly as a diversion, with eliminating us—everything suddenly began to be clear.”

“Tell me how,” Castillo said.

“Who is Vladimir’s greatest enemy? I don’t think anyone would argue it’s not the United States. Can he engage in a war against the United States? No. If he could, he would. Can he, at virtually no cost to himself, cause the United States trouble? Weaken it? Yes, he can. And is.”

“And that’s what he’s up to?” Castillo asked.

Pevsner nodded. “Mexico is the battlefield. For one thing, the Mexicans hate the United States. The United States took most of the Southwest away from Mexico in the war of 1848, and the Mexicans have never forgiven them for that. Mexicans by the millions illegally enter the United States while the Mexican government not only looks the other way but actively encourages them. If those people aren’t in Mexico, not only don’t they have to be fed and hospitalized and educated but they send money—billions and billions of dollars—to their families in Mexico.”

“That seems a little far-fetched, Aleksandr,” Castillo argued.

“It won’t if you give it some thought,” Pevsner said. “But illegal immigration isn’t the point here, and neither is the drug traffic—both of which weaken the U.S., which is fine with Vladimir Vladimirovich, but what he’s really after is the destruction of the United States government.”

“And how does he plan to do that?”

“Off the top of your head, friend Charley, tell me what were the greatest threats to the stability of the United States government in your lifetime?”

“I don’t know,” Castillo admitted. And then after a moment, asked, “You’re talking about Nixon?”

“Before Nixon resigned, there was rioting in the streets. You needed armed troops to protect the Pentagon.”

“And later the impeachment of Clinton,” Castillo added thoughtfully.

“And now you have a President who should be in a room with rubber walls,” Pevsner said.

“Who told you about that?” Castillo asked. “And what makes you think Putin even knows about it?”

“Oh, he knows,” Pevsner said, and issued an order in Russian: “Put two chairs there,” he said, pointing. “And bring them out.”

Two folding chairs were set up and then two men—stark naked, showing signs of having been severely beaten—shuffled onto the patio, their hands and their ankles bound together with plastic ties. Janos, Pevsner’s Hungarian bodyguard, brought up the rear of the procession.

The waiter offered Castillo more of the Cabernet Sauvignon.

“No, thank you,” Castillo said, politely. “I’ve had quite enough for the time being.”

“You’ve met Sergei, I understand,” Pevsner said. “But I don’t think you’ve met José Rafael Monteverde.”

Both men looked at Castillo. Monteverde looked terrified. Murov, Castillo decided after a moment, seemed resigned to his fate, whatever that might turn out to be.

“Untie their hands, Janos,” Castillo ordered in Hungarian. “Lester, get them water and a cigarette if they want one.”

Janos looked at Pevsner for guidance. Pevsner nodded.

Lester went to the wet bar for water.

“Where is Colonel Ferris?” Castillo asked.

Neither man replied.

“I don’t know about you, Mr. Monteverde,” Castillo said in Hungarian, “but you’re a professional, Mr. Murov. You know what options you have. You either answer my questions or Janos will slowly beat you to death.”

Castillo looked at Janos. “What have you been using on him?”

Janos flicked his wrist and a telescoping wand appeared in his hand. He flicked it back and forth. It whistled.

“That’s the one with the little ball of shot at the end?” Castillo asked.

Janos extended the wand to show Castillo the small leather shot-filled ball at the end of his wand.

“Very nice,” Castillo said. “It’s been some time since I’ve seen one.”

“As one professional to another, Colonel Castillo, can we get this over with quickly?” Murov asked, in Russian.

“Do you speak Hungarian, Mr. Monteverde?” Castillo asked, in Hungarian.

Monteverde’s face showed he did not.

“Pity,” Castillo said, in Russian. “Hungarian seems to have become the
lingua franca
of interrogations like this. Now you won’t know what Mr. Murov and I are talking about, will you?”