The Hostage (Presidential Agent 2)

"Come on, Charley, what's on your mind?" the President pursued.

General Naylor's face was frozen.

"There's two things, Mr. President," Castillo said. "We would never have located that airplane without Mr. Pevsner."

"That's the Russian gangster?"

"Yes, sir."

"What do you want me to do, Charley?" the President asked, more than a little sarcastically. "Pardon him? I don't think I can do that. I think we're the only country in the Western world who doesn't have a warrant out for him."

"Sir, he has intelligence sources we, self-evidently, don't have. I'd really like to… to suggest that the government should maintain a relationship with him."

"For God's sake, Castillo," FBI Director Mark Schmidt exploded, "that Russian bastard's got a record that makes John Gotti look like a Boy Scout."

"And he has intelligence sources we just don't have," Castillo repeated evenly. "And which he has proved willing to make available to us."

"He's got a point, Mark," the President said. "How would we do what you suggest, Charley? What does this guy want?"

"He wants the CIA off his back, sir. Right or wrong, he suspects that since they have stopped using him, they-"

"Hold it right there," the President interrupted. "'Stopped using him'? The CIA's been using him?" He looked at the DCI. "Tell me about that, John."

The DCI looked uncomfortable.

"On several occasions, Mr. President," he said, "Operations has covertly dealt with Pevsner, chartered his aircraft to deliver certain things where they were needed-"

"How about 'frequently dealt' with him?" Castillo interrupted, earning an immediate glower from the DCI.

"To deliver the weapons and other goodies they bought from him?" Castillo went on.

The President looked at Castillo, and then at the DCI and waited for him to go on.

"There were some transactions of that nature, Mr. President," the DCI admitted. "But that's in the past. I've ordered that all connections with this character be severed."

"And now he believes, rightly or wrongly," Castillo said, "that since the agency has stopped using him, they've been trying to arrange his arrest-or worse-by the governments the agency hired him to work against."

"You don't know that, Castillo!" the DCI snapped.

"I said that's what he believes," Castillo said.

"Why?" the President asked, softly.

"Because if he's in some jail in a remote area of the Congo-or dead-there's no trail back to the agency, sir."

The President sat back in his chair and looked out across the Atlantic. He took a long and thoughtful pull at the neck of his beer bottle.

After a moment, he turned to Charley and said carefully, "I want you to tell Mr. Pevsner that while I find it difficult to believe that anything like that could be happening-it sounds more than a little paranoiac-I have, as a token of my gratitude for his valuable assistance vis-a-vis locating that 727, directed the DCI to look into the matter, and if anything like that is going on, to stop it immediately."

"Thank you, sir," Castillo said.

"You have any questions about that, John?" the President asked.

"No, sir," the DCI said.

"And that I have told the director of the FBI that I want to be informed of the details of any investigation of Mr. Pevsner now under way in the United States, or which may be begun in the States. Make sure he understands that if he violates any of our laws, he will be prosecuted."

"Yes, sir."