The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

“Shit, I was hoping you were going to tell me you know where the hell Yung is.”

FBI Special Agent David W. Yung, Jr., a fellow assistant legal attaché, was not held in high regard by his peers. He came to work late—or not at all—and left early. His research into Uruguayan bank records produced about half the useful information that came from the next least efficient of the others. And since he was still here—despite several informal complaints about his performance and back-channel suggestions that he be reassigned to the States—it was pretty clear he had friends in high places.

Another, less flattering rumor had it that Yung had been sort of banished to Uruguay because of his association with Howard Kennedy, the former Ethical Standards Division hotshot who had changed sides and was now working for some Russian mafioso. That rumor had some credence, as it was known that Yung had been assigned to the Ethical Standards Division.

It is a fact of life that people without friends in high places tend to dislike those who have them and that FBI agents do not like FBI agents whose personal integrity is open to question.

“Maybe still asleep?” Artigas asked. “It’s not quite noon.”

“I let his goddamned phone ring for five minutes. That sonofabitch!” Monahan paused. “Ordóñez say what he wanted?”

“Only that he hoped I could make my afternoon free.”

“Et tu, Artigas?”

“He’s got something on his mind, Jim,” Artigas said.

“Ride it out,” Monahan said. “But if you happen to run into Yung in a bar or a casino somewhere, would you please tell him that I would be grateful for a moment of his valuable time whenever it’s convenient?”

“I will do that.”

Artigas went out the front entrance of the embassy, found his car—a blue Chrysler PT Cruiser—got in, and drove to the gate.

The embassy, a four-story, oblong concrete edifice decorated with two huge satellite antennae on the roof, sits in the center of a well-protected compound overlooking the river Plate.

A heavy steel gate, painted light blue, is controlled by pistol-armed Uruguayan security guards wearing police-style uniforms. For reasons Artigas never understood, cars leaving the compound are subjected to just about as close scrutiny as those coming into the compound.

He waited patiently while security guards looked into the interior of the PT Cruiser, looked under it using a mirror mounted on the end of a long pole, and then checked his embassy identification before throwing the switch that caused the gate to slide open sideways.

He drove a hundred yards toward the water and then turned right on the Rambla, the road that runs along the coast from the port to the suburb of Carrasco where many embassy officers lived, including Artigas and the again-missing Yung.

Five minutes later, he pulled the nose of the PT Cruiser to the curb in front of what had been built sometime in the late nineteenth century to house cattle being shipped from the port. It now housed a dozen or more parrilla restaurants and at least that many bars.

He got a very dirty look from the woman charged with collecting parking fees on that section of the street. She had seen the diplomatic license plates on the car. Diplomats are permitted to park wherever they wish to park without paying.

In the interests of Uruguayan-American relations, Artigas handed her a fifty-peso note, worth a little less than two dollars U.S., and earned himself a warm smile.

He entered the building. With the exception of one or two women Julio could think of, there was in his judgment no better smell in the world than that of beef—and, for that matter, chicken and pork and a lot else—being grilled over the ashes of a wood fire.

As he walked to where he knew Ordóñez would meet him—one of the smaller, more expensive restaurants in the back of the old building—his mouth actually watered.

Chief Inspector Ordóñez was waiting for him and stood up when he saw Artigas coming.

They embraced and kissed in the manner of Latin males and then sat down at the small table. There was a bottle of wine on the table, a bottle of carbonated water, four stemmed glasses, a wicker basket holding a variety of bread and breadsticks, a small plate of butter curls, and a small dish of chicken liver pâté.

José poured wine for Julio and they touched glasses.

“There must be something on your mind,” Julio said. “This is the good Merlot.”

“How about seven males, six of them dressed in black, shot to death?”

Artigas thought: I don’t think he’s kidding.

He took a sip of the Merlot, then spread liver pâté on a chunk of hard-crusted bread and waited for Ordóñez to go on.

“You don’t seem surprised,” José said.

“I’m an FBI agent. We try to be inscrutable.”