Roscoe took out his wallet and started to look for his White House press pa.s.s.

The third man s.n.a.t.c.hed the wallet from his fingers and handed it and the pa.s.sport to Liam Duffy.

"My press pa.s.ses are in there," Roscoe said. "Including my White House-"

Duffy silenced him with a raised hand, examined the pa.s.sport and the contents of the wallet, and then handed all of it to Darby.

Then he made another gesture, patting his chest with both hands.

The two men standing beside him instantly started to pat down Roscoe, finally signaling that he was clean except for a wad of currency, a sheaf of papers, several ballpoint pens, a box of wooden matches, and two cigars. They handed everything to Duffy.

"How did you happen to come to this address, Mr. Danton?" Darby asked, courteously.

Roscoe decided to tell the truth.

"I saw the for-sale ad, for the BMW, in the daily bulletin at the emba.s.sy," he said. He pointed to the sheaf of papers.

"What were you doing at the emba.s.sy?"

"I went there to see if they could point me at you."

"Why would you want to be pointed at me?"

"I told you, Eleanor Dillworth said you would be helpful."

"In what way?"

"That you could point me toward Colonel Carlos Castillo."

"I know no one by that name. An Argentine Army officer?"

"An American officer, Mr. Darby," Roscoe replied, stopping himself at the last second from saying, As you f.u.c.king well know As you f.u.c.king well know.

"I don't know what's going on here, Mr. Danton," Darby said. "But apparently someone has given you incorrect information. I'm sorry you've been inconvenienced. How did you get here?"

"In a taxi."

"Where are you staying?"

"The Plaza Hotel."

"Well, the least we can for you is give you a ride back there," Darby said. "We can do that, can't we, Liam?"

"Absolutely," Liam said.

"Nice to have met you, Mr. Danton," Darby said, and gestured toward the door.

"Likewise," Roscoe Danton snapped sarcastically. "And I'll pa.s.s on the free ride, thank you just the same."

Comandante General Liam Duffy locked eyes with Danton, and evenly said, "Let me explain something to you, Senor. There are some irregularities with your doc.u.ments-"

"What kind of irregularities?" Danton interrupted angrily.

Duffy ignored him. He went on: "I'm sure they can be quickly cleared up. Possibly even today and certainly by the morning. Our usual procedure is taking people with irregular doc.u.ments to our headquarters. Then we would notify the U.S. emba.s.sy and ask them to verify your doc.u.ments. Sometimes, they can do that immediately. In the case of someone like yourself, a distinguished journalist, I'm sure they would go out of their way to hasten this procedure-"

"Call the public affairs officer," Danton interrupted again. "Sylvia Grunblatt. She knows who I am."

Duffy ignored him again. "-and by late today, or certainly by tomorrow morning, a consular officer would come by our headquarters, verify the legitimacy of your doc.u.ments, which would then be returned to you and you could go about your business.

"But, in the meantime, you would be held. We can't, as I'm sure you understand, have people running around Buenos Aires with questionable doc.u.ments. Now, partly because I am anxious to do everything I can for a prominent North American journalist such as you purport to be, and partly because Senor Darby feels sorry for you, what I'm willing to do is take you to your hotel and let you wait there. With the understanding, of course, that you would not leave the Plaza until your doc.u.ments are checked and we return them to you. Believe me, Senor, the Plaza is far more comfortable a place to wait than the detention facilities at our headquarters."

Danton held up both hands at shoulder height.

"I surrender," he said. "The Plaza it is."

"Comandante, will you take this gentleman to the Plaza?"

"Si, mi comandante."

"What the h.e.l.l was that all about?" Julia Darby asked.

"If I were still an officer of the Clandestine Service," Alex Darby replied, "I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with this."

He held up a copy of the letter Colonel Vladlen Solomatin had given to Eric Kocian in Budapest.

"If I I were still an officer of the Clandestine Service," Edgar Delchamps said, "I would were still an officer of the Clandestine Service," Edgar Delchamps said, "I would know know not only what Roscoe Danton is up to, but also what Comrade Colonel Solomatin is up to." not only what Roscoe Danton is up to, but also what Comrade Colonel Solomatin is up to."

"You think I'm wrong?" Liam Duffy asked.

"No. Vladimir Putin may very well have dispatched one of the Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki hit squads-or several of them-to whack us all," Delchamps said. "But I don't think Roscoe Danton is a deep-cover SVR a.s.set who came out of his closet to do the deed. He's a pretty good journalist, actually."

"What was that about Eleanor pointing him at Alex? At Charley?" Julia asked. "Did he make that up?"

"I don't think so. Eleanor got fired when Charley stole her defectors. She's p.i.s.sed. Understandably," Alex Darby said. "I think she'd like to watch as Charley was castrated with a dull knife."

"I don't think she likes me much either," Delchamps said.

"And you know why," Alex said.

"I don't," Julia said.

"Quickly changing the subject," Delchamps said, "I suggest we get the h.e.l.l out of Dodge as quickly as possible. Just as soon as the movers come."

"I can leave somebody here to deal with the movers," Liam said.

"And Sylvia has the car keys-and the power of attorney-to sell the car," Darby said. "Moving Julia and the boys to the safe house in Pilar until it's time to go to Ezeiza seems to be the thing to do. Honey, will you go get the boys?"

"No," Julia said. "I'm a mommy. Mommies don't like it much when their sons look at them with loathing, disgust, and ice-cold hate. You go get them."

"It's not that bad, honey," Alex argued. "People who-h.e.l.l, people who sell air conditioners get transferred, with little or no notice, all the time. Their children get jerked out of school. It's not the end of the world."

"You tell them that," she said.

"They'll like Saint Albans, once they get used to it," Alex said somewhat lamely.

"Why? Because you went there?" Julia challenged.

"No. Because Al Gore and Jesse Jackson, Jr., did," Alex said, and after a moment added, "I'll be right back. With my pitiful abused namesake and his pathetic little brother."

When the door to the elevator foyer had closed behind her husband, Julia asked, "What are you going to do, Edgar? Eventually, I mean."

Delchamps considered the question a long moment before replying.

"I don't know, Julia," he said. "Like Alex, this business of ... of selling air conditioners ... selling air conditioners ... is all I know. What I won't be doing is hanging around the gate at Langley with the other dinosaurs telling spy stories." is all I know. What I won't be doing is hanging around the gate at Langley with the other dinosaurs telling spy stories."

"I didn't know what Alex did for a living until the night he proposed," Julia said. "And then he told me he was in research for the agency."

"They call that obfuscation," Delchamps said.

"You never got married, did you?"

He shook his head.

The telephone rang.

This time it was the emba.s.sy movers.

[FIVE].

The President's Study The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C.

0935 5 February 2007

"What am I looking at, Charles?" President Joshua Ezekiel Clendennen inquired of Amba.s.sador Charles M. Montvale, the director of National Intelligence.

Before Montvale could reply, the President thought he knew the answer to his question, and went on: "This is the-what should I call it?-the package package that caused all the uproar at Fort Detrick yesterday, right? And why am I looking at this now, instead of yesterday?" that caused all the uproar at Fort Detrick yesterday, right? And why am I looking at this now, instead of yesterday?"

"These photographs were taken less than an hour ago, Mr. President," Montvale said. "On a dirt road one hundred fifty yards inside our border near McAllen, Texas."

The President looked at him, waiting for him to continue.

"A routine patrol by the Border Patrol found that sitting on the road at about half past seven, Texas time. The intel took some time to work its way up the chain of command. The Border Patrol agents who found it reported it to their superiors, who reported it-"

"I know how a chain of command works, Charles," the President interrupted.

"Homeland Security finally got it to me just minutes ago," Montvale said.

"Cut to the chase, for Christ's sake," the President snapped. "Is that another load of Congo-X or not?"

"We are proceeding on the a.s.sumption that it is, Mr. President, and working to confirm that, one way or the other-"

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?" the President interrupted again.

"As soon as this was brought to my attention, Mr. President, I contacted Colonel Hamilton at Fort Detrick. I was prepared to fly him out there."

"And is that what's happening?"

"No, sir. Colonel Hamilton felt that opening the beer cooler on-site would be ill-advised."

"'Beer cooler'?"

"Yes, sir. The outer container is an insulated box commonly used to keep beer or, for that matter, anything else cold. They're commonly available all over. The FBI has determined the one sent to Colonel Hamilton was purchased at a Sam's Club in Miami."

"I don't know why I'm allowing myself to go off on a tangent like this, but why don't you just call it an 'insulated box'?"

"Perhaps we should, sir. But the Congo-X at Fort Detrick was in a blue rubber barrel, resembling a beer barrel, in the insulated-"

"Okay, okay. I get it. So what's with Colonel Hamilton?"

"Colonel Hamilton said further that in addition to the risk posed by opening the insulated box on-site, to determine whether whatever it holds was Congo-X or not, he would have to take all sorts of various laboratory equipment-"

"So you're moving it to Detrick, right? Is that safe?"

"We believe it is the safest step we can take, sir."

"And that's under way?"

"Yes, sir. The insulated box will be-by now has been-taken to the Corpus Christi Naval Air Station in a Border Patrol helicopter. From there it will be-by now, is being-transported to Andrews Air Force Base here in a Navy C-20H. That's a Gulfstream Four, Mr. President."

"Thank you for the clarification, Charles," the President said sarcastically. "One can never know too many details like that. And when the beer cooler-slash-insulated box gets to Andrews? Is everything set up there to cause another public relations disaster, like the one we had yesterday?"

"An Army helicopter will be standing by at Andrews, sir, to fly the insulated container to Fort Detrick. It should not attract undue attention, sir."