The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

“Of course not. Have you any idea where Colonel Castillo might be?”

“The last I heard, he was on his way to Paris. And he’s liable to go anywhere from there. Germany. Hungary. The Southern Cone of South America.”

“He does get around, doesn’t he?”

“Yes, he does.”

“Well, as I said, I’ll keep my ear to the rumor mill and keep you posted.”

“Thank you. I know the ambassador will be grateful.”

“Happy to be of whatever assistance I can. Is that about it?”

“There’s one more thing, John. For some reason, the ambassador thinks your senior analyst in the South American Division’s Southern Cone Section may not be quite the right person for the job.”

“Oh really? Well, I’m sorry to hear that. And you can tell the ambassador I’ll have a personal look at the situation immediately.”

“Her name is Wilson. Mr. Patricia Davies Wilson,” Ellsworth said.

“You know, now that I hear that name, I seem to recall that it came up not so long ago in connection with Castillo’s.”

“Really?”

“I seem to recall something like that.”

“I think the ambassador would be pleased to have your assurance that you’re going to put someone quite top-notch in that job and do so in such `a manner that, when she is replaced, Mr. Wilson will have no reason to suspect the ambassador—or even the DCI—was in any way involved with her reassignment.”

“Of course.”

“And I think he would be even more pleased if I could tell him you said that that would be taken care of very soon.”

“How soon is ‘very soon,’ Truman?”

“Yesterday would be even better than today.”

The DCI nodded but didn’t say anything.

[FIVE]

Restaurante Villa Hipica

The Jockey Club of San Isidro

Buenos Aires Province, Argentina

1340 5 August 2005

Ambassador Michael A. McGrory was not at all pleased with where Ambassador Juan Manuel Silvio had taken him for lunch.

McGrory had suggested they go somewhere they could have a quiet, out-of-school conversation. If Silvio had made a similar suggestion to him in Montevideo, he would have taken Silvio either to his residence or to a restaurant where they could have a private room.

Instead, he had brought them all the way out here—a thirty-minute drive—to a wide-open restaurant crowded with horse fanciers.

Well, perhaps not wide open to every Tom, Dick, and José, McGrory thought, surveying the clientele. I suspect membership in the Jockey Club is tied in somehow with the restaurant.

Their table by a window provided a view of the grandstands and there was a steady parade of grooms leading horses—sometimes four or five at a time—right outside the window.

Certainly, a fine place to have lunch if you’re a tourist—if they let tourists in—but not the sort of place to have a serious conversation about the business of the United States government!