Black Ops (Presidential Agent 5)

The Winchester was a family treasure, having been used on many dozen occasions to protect the Double-Bar-C and its cattle from marauding Apache Indians.

The M1A1 Abrams was named for one of the Army's most distinguished Armor generals, Creighton W. Abrams. Among his great achievements, Abrams, as a lieutenant colonel, had broken through the German ring surrounding Bastogne to rescue the 101st Airborne.

The AH-64, an instructor at Rucker had told Castillo before he'd even been allowed to get close to one of them, was named after the Apache Indians in tribute to their characteristics as warriors. Castillo had had trouble believing his ears--and even more keeping his mouth shut.

He had thought of that instructor every time he had climbed into an AH- 64 Apache thereafter, wondering again and again if the Pentagon chair-warmer--or chair-warmers, plural--who had given it that name because of the warrior characteristics of the Apache Indians had done enough research. For example, to learn, as Castillo well knew, that the Apaches had expressed their contempt for settlers against whom they waged war by capturing settlers and hanging them alive upside-down over a small fire and slowly roasting their brains. Or, for example, leaving their captors spread-eagle in the desert sun with eyelids hacked off and enough small bloodletting incisions made in the genital area to attract ants and other desert fauna.

And now Castillo thought of chair-warmer types again as he reached for the SPEAKERPHONE button on the AFC.

"Good morning, sir. Castillo here."

"So it says on this amazing device," Colonel Hamilton replied. "I am taking Mr. D'Allessando's word for it that we are now in Class One encryption."

"Yes, sir, we are."

"I have been hoping you would get in contact, Colonel Castillo, inasmuch as General McNab has informed me the press of his other duties forces him to leave this operation in your hands, so to speak."

"Yes, sir. That is my understanding."

"Are you alone, Colonel? Mr. D'Allessando suggested you might wish him to be privy to this, and he's with me."

"I have my people with me, sir, and we're on speakerphone."

"Specifically, our new Russian friends?"

"Yes, sir."

"Colonel Berezovsky, I regret I didn't have more time to talk with you and your charming sister when we were in Florida," Hamilton said. "But if you will continue to be available while we're doing this, no real harm done."

"Good morning, Colonel," Berezovsky said. "We will be here."

"There are some things that have to be done in the immediate future, Castillo, before Mr. DeWitt and I go into the Congo."

"Sir, I wanted to talk to you about that," Castillo said.

"About what?"

"Sir, what I'm thinking is that it would better if you didn't actually go into the Congo."

"That's absurd. Wherever did you come up with that?"

"What I was thinking would make more sense, sir, would be if you remained outside the Congo--say, in Tanzania or Chad. . . ."

"I repeat, that's absurd."

"Colonel, you're too valuable an asset to be put at risk."

"I will make that judgment, Colonel. I have made that judgment. Now, as I was saying--"

"Sir, with respect, I must insist."

"Colonel, you are in no position to insist on anything."

"Sir, as you told me, General McNab has been forced to place this operation in my hands."

"What General McNab said to me, Colonel, was that in the inevitable event we should find ourselves in disagreement, we could not look to him for resolution; we would have to do that ourselves."

"Yes, sir, I understand that. Sir, may I say that I regard myself as the operation commander and you, sir, as very likely our most important asset, and that it is therefore my responsibility to protect you to the best of my ability."