The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

“What happened to the guy with the hypo?” Castillo asked.

“He was begging—in German—for me to get Max off him.”

“What happened to the needle?” Castillo asked.

“The cops have it.”

“By any wild coincidence was it loaded with bupivacaine? Or something similar?”

“This one was loaded with phenothiazine,” Kocian said. “I have been told they use it on lunatics. What’s the wild coincidence you were hoping to find?”

“When Masterson’s wife—”

“Masterson being your murdered diplomat in Buenos Aires?” Kocian interrupted.

Castillo nodded. He went on: “When she was kidnapped in a restaurant parking lot, they jabbed her in the buttocks with a hypo full of bupivacaine.”

“Very interesting,” Kocian said. “But, sorry. No match.”

“What about the guy this adorable puppy almost ate?”

“He’s in jail. His story, which I think he may get away with, is that he’s a vacationing housepainter from Dresden who was walking on the bridge when I made an indecent proposal to him, attempted to fondle his private parts, and when he resisted and pushed me away my dog attacked him.”

“How did he explain the hypo?”

“He never saw it before; therefore, it probably belongs to the old pervert.” He paused and looked at Otto. “That’s why I told you I fell over Max, Otto. I knew you’d be delighted to acce

pt the old pervert story.”

“My God, Eric!”

“What’s going to happen to this guy?”

“I told the cops—in particular, the police commissioner, who is an old pal of mine—to see if he can connect him with Stasi…”

“They’re out of business, aren’t they?”

“You can ask a question like that and still get promoted as an intelligence officer?”

“You have all the answers, you tell me,” Castillo said.

“Did you ever think about it, Karlchen?” the old man asked and Castillo had a sudden insight: From now on, when he calls me Karlchen it will be because he has decided I am either impossibly ignorant or have done something monumentally stupid.

“Think about what?”

“What happened to the better agents of the Ministry for State Security of the German Democratic Republic, commonly known as Stasi, when the Berlin Wall came tumbling down and peace and loving-kindness descended on our beloved Germany?”

“Frankly, I never gave it much thought.”

“Maybe you should have, Karlchen,” Kocian said. “Well, I’ll tell you this, very few of them became bakers, cobblers, or took Holy Orders.”

“Okay, so what are they doing? For whom? Who’s paying them?”

“If you have to ask that, you must believe that once democracy came to the former Soviet Union, Russia really became the ‘friendly bear’ your President Roosevelt always thought it was. While you’re here in Budapest you should go over to Andrassy Ut 60. Broaden your professional horizons.”

“I’ll bite. What’s at Andrassy Ut 60?”

“Now it’s a museum. It used to be the headquarters of the AVO, and then the AVH. The Allamvedelmi Osztaly and the Allamvedelmi Hatosag. I don’t suppose you have any idea what that means.”