The Shooters (Presidential Agent 4)

"You know what happened there, Dad!" she interrupted.

"-and your mother and I both speak, as a result of our service in Madrid, quite passable Spanish."

Betsy Masterson looked at Castillo. "Charley, you didn't encourage him to go down there, did you?

"No, ma'am. More the opposite."

"Can't you stop him?"

"I don't see how," Castillo said.

"I'll call the secretary of State myself!"

"Secretary Cohen has already taken her best shot, sweetheart. She sent Colonel Castillo to dissuade me. He failed."

"You're in no condition to fly all the way down there, Dad," Betsy argued. "You're in no condition to go through the security hassle at an airport, much less get on an airplane and fly that far."

"I have survived going through the security hassles at a number of Third World airports," he said. "The one in Addis Ababa comes to mind as the worst."

Despite herself, she smiled.

General Wilson stood up.

"I think I'll take a little walk," he said.

"Please keep your seat, General," Winslow Masterson said. "This is not a family argument. Philippe doesn't have family arguments. He politely listens to whatever anyone wishes to say, then does what he had planned to do in the first place."

"My wife does much the same thing," General Wilson said.

"Thanks for the support, Father Masterson," Betsy said, then turned to her father.

"I'm not talking about down there, Dad, and you know it. I'm talking about here. New Orleans is closed. You'd have to go to Miami. And how are you going to get to Miami?"

"We'll manage. May I suggest we change the subject?"

"Mrs. Masterson…" Castillo began.

"I've asked you to call me Betsy, Charley," she snapped.

"Sorry. Betsy, since the ambassador is determined to go down there, what I can do is arrange to fly your parents down there in a Gulfstream. I could arrange to have them picked up in New Orleans, and if customs and immigration's not functioning there, stop at Tampa or Miami on the way down."

"I don't know whether to say 'that would be fine, thank you very much' or 'for God's sake, don't enable him!'"

"You could do that, Charley?" Winslow Masterson said.

Castillo nodded.

"And I'll arrange to have some friends keep an eye on your parents."

"The same kind of friends who've been keeping an eye on Betsy and the kids here?" Winslow Masterson asked.

Castillo nodded.

"Darling Betsy," Masterson said. "I agree with you. If I had my way, Philippe and your mother would stay here with us until they can have their house repaired-"

"Winslow, it's under water," Lorimer said. "Everything in it has been destroyed. And you know what they say when someone goes to the hereafter-'I want to remember him as he was, not lying in the coffin.' I want to remember the house as it was. I'm not foolish enough to try to resurrect it."

"-as I was saying, darling Betsy, until they can have their house repaired and a new one can be built for them. Here or in New Orleans-"