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McNab was right—she is built like a brick . . . outdoor sanitary facility.
“Hey, Dick,” Lieutenant Colonel (Designate) Naylor called to the Mustang pilot, Major H. Richard Miller, Jr. (U.S. Army, Retired), whom he had known since his plebe year at the U.S. Military Academy. “Is that Charley’s Russian spy holding his hand?”
“That’s her. We call her ‘Sweaty.’ She calls him ‘my Carlos.’”
“Nice,” Lieutenant Colonel (Designate) Naylor said. “Very nice. Maybe thirteen on a scale of one to ten.”
“She’s okay, Allan,” Miller said. “But don’t let her looks dazzle you. Sweaty’s’s one tough little cookie.”
“Here comes General McNab,” Colonel Brewer said.
General McNab, when he climbed aboard the Mustang, was also wearing a yellow polo shirt and khaki trousers.
“General Naylor, welcome to Drug Cartel International Airfield,” McNab said, and then, raising his voice, asked, “Everything under control, Vic?”
“I had to—hold that. With great pleasure, I darted Lammelle. He’s about to come out of it. Got a place to put him on ice?”
“Just the place. I’ll put him in with Roscoe J. Danton. Then when Frank wakes up, he’ll have someone to talk to.”
Naylor thought: Roscoe J. Danton? Is he talking about the reporter from the Times-Post?
I will be damned if I’ll give him the satisfaction of asking.
McNab backed down the stair doors and said something in Russian. A moment later two burly blond men came onto the airplane.
“Over there,” D’Allessando said in Russian. “Be careful, he’s dangerous.”
Forty-five seconds later, the deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency was off the airplane and, slung in a fireman’s carry over the shoulder of one of the burly men, was being carried toward a stainless-steel elevator door set in the rock wall.
McNab appeared again at the stair door opening.
“General,” D’Allessando said, “General Naylor has given me his parole, which also covers Colonel Brewer and Lieutenant Colonel (Designate) Naylor.”
“Wonderful! If we had to chain him, it would have been hard to get him down the stairs. Anytime it’s convenient, General, you may disembark.”
Castillo and the Russians were at the foot of the stair door when Naylor came down it. He noticed that Charley and the woman were still—or again—holding hands.
Castillo waited until Colonel Brewer, Allan Junior, and Vic D’Allessando had come down the stairs.
“At the risk of being rude, and with great respect, General Naylor, if you h
ave something to say to me, let’s get it out of the way,” Castillo said.
“Colonel, I have been ordered by the President of the United States to place you under arrest. Mr. Lammelle was ordered by the President to take possession of the two Russian defectors you are believed to hold. You will, therefore, consider yourself under arrest, and when Mr. Lammelle is capable of receiving them, you will turn them over to him.”
“Sir, again with great respect, that’s just not going to happen. Will you explain to me, please, what your understanding of the parole you have given Mr. D’Allessando is?”
“Colonel, as I understand the Code of Honor, I have waived my right to attempt to escape or take any hostile action against my captors until after I inform you that I am withdrawing my parole. My parole covers both Colonel Brewer, whom I don’t believe you know, and Lieutenant Colonel (Designate) Naylor.”
“Thank you, sir. Gentlemen, may I present Dmitri Berezovsky, formerly colonel of the SVR, and Lieutenant Colonel Svetlana Alekseeva, also formerly of the SVR. They are here of their own volition, not as my prisoners. Having said that, I am responsible for their being here, and consider them to be under my protection.”
“I see the way you’re hanging onto her, Charley,” Allan Junior said. “I wondered what that was all about.”
General McNab laughed. General Naylor glared at him.
“This is very difficult for my Carlos,” Sweaty flared. “You will not mock him!”
“Colonel Sweaty, I wouldn’t think of it!” Allan Junior said.
