"Where are you?"
Not that it's any of your business, but-
"I'm in the Four Seasons."
"According to them, they don't have anybody named Castillo registered. You want to tell me what that's all about?"
"How'd you get my cellular number?"
"Ambassador Silvio gave it to me."
"How can I help you, Ms. Grunblatt?"
"The shoe's on the other foot. The press is onto you. Somebody around here has a big mouth."
"You want to explain that?"
"The New York Times guy wants to know about the President's agent, starting with his name, and so do CNN and AP and La Nacion, ad infinitum. What do I tell them?"
"You have no idea what they're talking about."
"They're not going to believe that, and they're not going to like it."
"Ambassador Silvio told me you're a first-class press officer. You'll think of something."
"I can hear them now," she said. " 'Are you trying to tell me, Sylvia, that my source was lying to me?' "
"To which you respond, 'I cannot vouch for your unnamed sources. I can only tell you what I have been told.'"
"To which they will respond, 'Oh, bovine excreta, Sylvia,' or words to that effect."
"Sylvia, I'm sorry, but your splendid relations with the press are going to have to be sacrificed for operational requirements."
"I was afraid of that," she s
aid. "The ambassador said I was to handle this any way you wanted."
"The one thing I don't need is my name, picture, or the words 'Presidential Agent' in the newspapers or on the tube."
"Okay, you got it. But be warned, they'll be looking for you. Since there are-with one exception-no other developments in the story, you-the President's agent- are the story."
"What's the one exception?"
"Presuming the ambassador can get Mrs. Masterson to go along-he hasn't asked her yet-the Argentines want to pin the Grand Cross of the Great Liberator on Jack's casket, which at the time will be lying in state in the Catedral Metropolitana. If she goes along-and she might not; if I were her I think I'd tell the Argentines to go piss up a rope-that will be a spectacle. The press- especially TV-likes spectacles, and that may get some of the heat off you."
"I was about to go to the German Hospital," Castillo said.
"You got somebody from SIDE with you who can get you in the back door? Otherwise be prepared for celebrity."
"How will they know what I look like?"
"The leak about the President's agent was intentional. I think it follows they would have also leaked a description."
"You have any idea who the leaker is?"
"If I had to bet, I'd bet it was one of the law enforcement types…"
Yeah, Castillo thought, and I'll bet the bastard's name is Yung.