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“You will recall my telling you personally, as a result of Secretary Beiderman’s orders to me to do so, that you were not even to contemplate any military action with regard to freeing Colonel Ferris?”
“Yes, sir. I remember your personally telling me that,” McNab parroted.
“And do you also recall that I ordered you not to attend the interment of Warrant Officer Salazar?”
“Yes, sir, I remember that very well. May I say that I have not even been contemplating any action with regard to freeing Colonel Ferris,” McNab parroted, “and that I did not attend Mr. Salazar’s interment?”
“Instead, you send a delegation of Delta Force and Gray Fox personnel. Does that about sum it up?”
“I did not send a delegation of Delta Force and Gray Fox personnel anywhere, General,” McNab parroted again.
This time Naylor picked up on it.
“Goddamn you, McNab, don’t you mock me!”
“It’s hard to resist, Allan.”
“Goddamn you! How dare you use my first name?”
“That’s twice that you’ve cursed me, Allan,” McNab said. “Wouldn’t you agree that’s conduct unbefitting a general officer and a gentleman?”
The flashing red LED on the telephone died, indicating the connection had been broken.
McNab replaced the handset and looked at Colonel Caruthers.
“Ninety seconds,” he said. “Maybe a little less.”
Caruthers shook his head in disbelief. Or maybe admiration.
Sixty-two seconds later, the red telephone buzzed and the red LED started flashing.
McNab took a lot longer to pick it up than he had the first time, but finally put the handset to his ear.
“McNab.”
“Please accept my sincere apologies, General McNab,” Naylor said.
“I will, providing you start acting like one old soldier talking to another old soldier—and a classmate, which puts us on a first-name basis—and tell me exactly why Beiderman chewed your ass to the point where you lost your cool.”
There was a long pause, and Colonel Caruthers had just about decided the LED was about to stop blinking again when General Naylor said, “Bruce, Charley was at Arlington.”
“I’m not surprised. Danny Salazar was on the first A Team Charley ever commanded. But I didn’t send him up there, Allan. I haven’t talked to him since before these Mexican slime murdered Salazar. And I didn’t send the others, either. I didn’t even know they were going.”
“And then they all drove away, just when the President was about to deliver his remarks,” Naylor said. “And their departure was on Wolf News for the whole world to see, thanks to Andy McClarren.”
“What’s the President pissed off about? That they were there, or that they walked out on his speech?”
“Both. And it’s worse than that. Are you alone?”
“Max Caruthers is here.”
There was another long pause.
“I hope that silence doesn’t mean you don’t trust Max,” McNab said finally.
“No offense intended, Colonel Caruthers,” Naylor said. “Actually, what I was doing was rethinking whether I wanted to tell General McNab what I’m about to tell you both.”
“Which is?”
