Covert Warriors (Presidential Agent 7)

“Good afternoon, Madam Secretary,” the DCI said. “And how were things in sunny Meh-hee-co?”

“Why does your ebullience worry me, Frank?”

Natalie Cohen replied.

“The problem of swapping Colonel Ferris for Félix Abrego may be solved. I just got off the phone with Stanley Crenshaw. He is probably at this moment telling the President what he told me.”

“Which was?”

“Roscoe J. Danton gave him until five minutes to nine tonight to explain why ol’ Félix has been transferred to the La Tuna Country Club, otherwise he goes on The Straight Scoop with Andy McClarren and tells the world.”

Cohen didn’t reply.

“I take back all the unkind things I ever said about devious diplomats,” Lammelle said. “That was pure genius.”

“What are you talking about?” she said.

“Well, Clendennen can’t send Abrego to Mexico now, can he?”

“How did Danton find out?” she asked.

“What is that, ‘credible deniability’? Your secret is safe with me, Natalie.”

“I didn’t tell Danton, if that’s what you’ve been thinking.”

“Then who the hell did? That’s a very interesting question, Natalie. Who knew besides Stanley and me? And possibly Mark Schmidt?”

“I was not taken into the President’s confidence in this matter. I heard it from Schmidt. Do you think Schmidt told Roscoe?”

“No. That would be committing career suicide,” he said. “And he likes being director. That leaves Stanley, and that doesn’t make sense. Did Montvale know? Or Truman Ellsworth?”

“I’ve learned from painful experience that Charles Montvale often knows more than one presumes he does,” the secretary of State said. “And that’s equally true of Mr. Ellsworth. Who would actually move Abrego? The FBI? The Bureau of Prisons?”

“The U.S. Marshals,” Lammelle said. “And when Montvale was director of National Intelligence, he was over the Marshal Service.”

“But why would Montvale tell Roscoe Danton? To embarrass the President?”

She was silent a moment, then offered: “Montvale would tell Danton—but after. If something went wrong, then, to embarrass the President, he’d leak it to him after.”

“So, we’re back to: Then who?”

“I don’t know, Frank. But I think it behooves us to make a serious effort to find out. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a connection with the coup d’état business.”

“I’ll see what I can find out.”

[EIGHT]

1655 18 April 2007

“Mental telepathy, Frank,” Charley Castillo said. “I was just this moment thinking of calling you.”

“To tell me, a little late, that you told Roscoe that Clendennen’s moving Abrego to the La Tuna facility outside El Paso?”

“No shit? I didn’t know that. Who the hell told Roscoe?”

When Lammelle didn’t answer, Castillo said: “Well, what I was going to ask is what I should tell the cops if I’m arrested stealing my Black Hawk back?”

“What?”