Hazardous Duty (Presidential Agent 8)

“I think I am, Your Grace,” Torine replied. “My wife is not so sure. Which brings us, of course, to the First Epistle to the Corinthians… .”

“‘Let Your Women Keep Silent,’” the Archbishop quoted, chuckling. “On the basis of your knowledge of Holy Scripture, Colonel, I will regard you as a Christian. I’ll get to the other gentlemen in a moment, but right now, why don’t we all have a glass of the very excellent Saint Felicien Cabernet Sauvignon that Aleksandr has so graciously provided.”

He raised his hand and a man in a starched white jacket appeared with a tray holding bottles of wine and glasses.

When the wine had been poured, Archimandrite Boris raised his glass.

“I would like to thank you all for coming here to help His Eminence and myself, even understanding that wasn’t your primary purpose in coming.”

When there was no response to that, the archimandrite went on: “Will someone tell us what that primary purpose is?”

When there was no response to that, the archimandrite nodded toward Naylor.

“Perhaps you would be willing, my son, to do so.”

Naylor opened his mouth. But before a word came out, the archimandrite asked, “Are you a Christian, my son?”

“When I was a kid, I was confirmed—Colonel Castillo and I were—in the Evangelische Church in Germany. Saint Johan’s, in Hersfeld. And then I became an Episcopalian when I was at West Point. My parents are Episcopalian.”

“That’s very interesting, but my question was ‘Are you a Christian?’”

“Yes, sir.”

“And what is it that brings you here, that so infuriates Mrs. Alekseeva?”

Naylor looked at Castil

lo, obviously asking for his permission to answer. Castillo nodded.

“I am to relay to Colonel Castillo the request of the President of the United States that he enter upon extended hazardous active duty in connection with the Mexican drug and Somali pirates problems.”

“And why would you say this so infuriates Mrs. Alekseeva?”

Naylor again wordlessly asked for—and got—Castillo’s permission to reply.

“Probably because the last time Colonel Castillo worked for the President, the President tried very hard to kidnap Colonel Castillo—and Mrs. Alekseeva and her brother—with the intention to load them on a plane and ship them off to the SVR in Russia.”

“So they’ve told me. So why are you in effect doing so?”

“Obeying orders, Your Grace.”

“Obeying orders from whom?”

“My father.”

“Heeding the scriptural admonition to ‘Honor thy father and mother…’ et cetera?”

“It’s more that my father is a general and I’m a lieutenant colonel, Your Grace.”

“And do you think the President will again try to turn Colonel Castillo over to the kind ministrations of the SVR?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me, Your Grace.”

Castillo snorted.

The archimandrite asked, “Yet you’re here to tell him what President Clendennen wants him to do?”

“And to tell him I think he’d be a damned fool to do it.”