The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

“How hard is it to open an account?” Castillo asked.

“Actually, it’s quite simple. All they ask is a reference from your home banker and a cashier’s check or a wire deposit. They won’t take cash deposits,” Yung answered.

“Well, then, that’s what we’ll do. But I want to get that money out of Uruguay before they find out Lorimer is dead.”

“Bertrand,” Yung corrected him. “The funds are in Bertrand’s name.”

“Okay. Bertrand,” Castillo said. “Are any questions going to be asked when your secret little account suddenly grows by fifteen-point-seven million?”

“I’m not sure I want to do that,” Yung said.

“Answer the question,” Castillo said. “Is that going to make waves?”

“No questions are ever asked and they have stricter bank secrecy laws than even Switzerland. But, for the obvious reasons, I am uncomfortable transferring Bertrand’s funds into my account.”

“Then why did you tell us about your account?” Torine asked with a tone of impatience in his voice.

“I was going to suggest that you look into opening an account there. What Castillo’s asking me to do is commit a felony. I’m an FBI agent, dammit!”

“Jesus H. Christ!” Torine said. “FBI rule number one: Always cover your ass. Right?”

“What I’m ordering you to do is carry out an order of the President of the United States,” Castillo said.

“I don’t believe you have the legal authority to give me an order. I’m in the FBI. I don’t work for you.”

Torine started to say something, then changed his mind and looked at Castillo.

Castillo said, “I suppose that’s true, that you don’t work for me. Right now, I guess your status is volunteer.”

“Major, I thought—still think—you were doing the right thing when you staged that operation to kidnap Lorimer from Estancia Shangri-La. That’s why I went with you. But that’s not going to go over well at the J. Edgar Hoover Building when they hear about it. The FBI is supposed to investigate kidnappings, not participate in them.”

“And you don’t want to endanger your FBI career any more than you already have?” Torine asked, sarcastically.

Yung considered that and then nodded.

“Yung,” Torine said, evenly, “if you’re even thinking of running over to the J. Edgar Hoover Building and repeating even one word of this conversation or one detail of the operation we have just been on into some sympathetic FBI inspector’s ear, I suggest you think again. That would constitute the divulgence of material classified Top Secret Presidential to persons not authorized access to such material. And that is a felony.”

Castillo added, “And that includes telling anybody you bumped into Howard Kennedy in Buenos Aires.”

Yung looked at him coldly.

“Let me be brutal,” Castillo said. “Supposing you went to the FBI and confessed all and it was decided for a number of reasons not to try you for unauthorized disclosure, are you really naïve enough to think you’d be welcomed back like the prodigal son? Or is it more likely that you’d spend the rest of your FBI career investigating parking ticket corruption in Sioux Falls, South Dakota?”

The look on Yung’s face showed that Castillo had struck home.

“Right now, the question seems to be that you don’t think I have the authority to give you orders. Is that right?”

“I don’t believe you have that legal authority,” Yung said.

“What if I got it? Would that change things?”

“How could you do that?”

Castillo sat

down on the couch next to Corporal Lester Bradley and picked up the telephone. He punched in a number from memory.

“This is C. G. Castillo,” he announced a moment later. “Is Secretary Hall still with the President?