“There we were, floating around on the ocean, catching our supper and giving this a lot of thought,” Delchamps said.
When Castillo didn’t immediately reply, Delchamps added, “Your call, Ace. But I think we’d all be more efficient if we didn’t have members of the Clandestine Service breathing down our necks. Or trying to put handcuffs on us. But if you—”
“Everybody’s willing to go along?”
Delchamps nodded.
“They would have joined this little chat,” he said, “but Uncle Remus said that you get really antsy when you feel outnumbered.”
“When do you plan to leave?” Castillo asked.
“First thing in the morning,” Delchamps said.
“I wonder what Pevsner’s going to think about this,” Castillo said.
“Well, he probably won’t like it when he learns he has just sold his new fly-the-high-rollers-around airplane to the LCBF Corporation, but the bottom line there, Ace, is you don’t ask your Russian pal anything. You tell him the way it is.”
[TWO]
The Oval Office
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
0915 8 February 2007
“Good morning, Mr. President and Madam Secretary,” John Powell, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, said as he walked into the Oval Office.
“This had better be important, Jack,” President Clendennen replied. “I am supposed to take off for Chicago in fifteen minutes, and Natalie has a lunch in New York with a gaggle of UN morons.”
“I believe it is important, Mr. President,” the DCI replied. “And all I have to do is slip this in the machine ...”
With a DVD disc in his hand, Powell walked toward a large flat-screen television monitor mounted on a wheeled table.
“Let him do that,” Clendennen said, indicating a Secret Service agent. “I know he won’t screw up the TV.”
“Yes, sir,” Powell said, and handed the disc to the Secret Service agent.
“Before it starts to play, Mr. President, I’d like to say, if I may, that we believe this disc to be authentic. That is, the surveillance tapes from which we made this are authentic. And that what you will see when it plays is authentic and has not been altered or changed in any way.”
“I’m delighted to hear that, Jack,” Clendennen said. “Play your movie.”
“What kind of an airplane is that?”
“That’s a Tupolev Tu-934A, Mr. President.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen one before,” Natalie Cohen said.
“Few people have. It’s a Russian Special Operations aircraft. Magnificent airplane. It’s practically invisible to radar, can fly nonstop—with aerial refueling, of course—anywhere in the world at Mach zero point nine and land on a football field. We are offering a hundred twenty-five million for one.”
“You better hope Senator Johns doesn’t hear about that,” the President said. “A hundred twenty-five million! Are the Russians that far ahead of us?”
“In this area, yes, sir. We have nothing like it; the Air Force really wants to take a close look at the Tu-934A. And, in a manner of speaking, sir, the Russians have been ahead of us before. They beat us into space of course, and before that, Igor Sikorsky—who fled the Communist revolution to come here—is generally recognized as the man who made rotary-wing flight practical.”
“And exactly where is this example of Russian aeronautical genius landing, Jack?”