The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

State Route 212

Near Durham, Bucks County, Pennsylvania

1155 10 August 2005

The Secret Service radio went off in the black Yukon XL as they were going down a winding road through the countryside.

“Cheesecake?”

“Go.”

“Big Eye asks for Don Juan’s present location, destination, and ETA as soon as possible. He will send a taxi.”

Swanson looked at Castillo.

“Don’t tell him where we are,” Castillo said. “Jake, we’re going into Baltimore, right?”

“Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport,” Torine correcte

d.

“And ETA will be furnished when available,” Castillo said.

“Don Juan going to BWI. ETA will be furnished when available,” Swanson said into his lapel microphone. “Cheesecake off.”

Castillo saw the questions in Swanson’s eyes.

“I don’t care if he knows where I am,” Castillo said. “But I don’t want to talk to him right now.”

Swanson nodded.

“The entrance to the farm is about half a mile on the right,” Swanson said five minutes later. “You can’t see much—nothing but an unpaved road—from the highway. I’ve got some people, really good at what they do, in a house directly across the highway taking pictures of everyone going into and out of the farm road. We told the guy who owns the house that we’re investigating a drug operation.”

“So far, I’ve recognized all of them,” Britton said. “They’re all from the Aari-Teg mosque.”

“And we’ve got a Cessna 172 that flies over the farm every couple of hours taking pictures,” Swanson said. “All that’s produced is that they’ve got three house trailers parked near the farmhouse…”

“New ones,” Britton interrupted, “which makes me wonder where they got the money for them.”

“…and a Ford pickup, one of those with two rows of seats, also new, registered to the mosque in Philadelphia.”

“Same question about how did they pay for that,” Britton said.

“Okay,” Swanson said, pointing out his deeply tinted passenger’s window. “Here we are. The road winds around that hill to the farm. The iron mines are in that hill. On the back side.”

Castillo saw the steep, tree-covered hill, but almost missed the road as the Yukon rolled past it.

“Not much to see, is there?” Britton said.

Castillo didn’t reply directly.

“Maybe you better get me a set of those pictures,” he said.

“I’m way ahead of you, Colonel,” Britton said. “The ones taken from the house are on their way—ain’t e-mail and digital photography wonderful?—to Dutch Kramer and Tom McGuire five minutes after they’re taken. The aerials go the same way ten minutes after the Cessna lands at Allentown. So far nobody we don’t know.”

“Is that about all there is to see here?” Castillo said.

“Yep,” Swanson said, then asked, “Where do you want to go now? To the hotel?”