Two uniformed customs officers got out of the Chevrolet sedan and walked across the tarmac toward the aircraft. Major H. Richard Miller, Jr., in civilian clothing, slid gingerly out of the front seat of the first Yukon in the line, turned and retrieved a crutch, stuck it under his arm, and moved with surprising agility after them.
As soon as the stair door opened into place, one of the customs officers, a gray-haired man in his fifties, bounded quickly up it, then stopped, exclaimed, "Jesus Christ!" and then backed up so quickly that he knocked the second customs officer, by then right behind him, off the stairs and then fell backward onto him.
Max appeared in the door, growling deeply and showing an impressive array of teeth. Madchen moved beside him and added her voice and teeth to the display.
Castillo appeared in the door.
"Gentlemen," he said, solemnly, "you have just personally witnessed the Office of Organizational Analysis Aircraft Anti-Intrusion Team in action."
The gray-haired customs officer gained his feet, glared for a moment at the stair door, and then, shaking his head, smiled.
"Very impressive, Colonel," he said, finally.
"They're okay, Max," Castillo said, in Hungarian. "You may now go piss."
Max looked at him, stopped growling, went down the stairs, and headed for the nose gear. Madchen went modestly to the other side of the fuselage.
"You all right?" Castillo said.
"What the hell kind of dogs are they?" the gray-haired customs officer asked.
"Bouvier des Flandres," Castillo said.
The customs officer shook his head. "What do they weigh?" he asked.
"Max has been known to hit one-thirty-five, Madchen maybe one-ten."
"You understand, Colonel, sir," Miller said, "that you may now expect these gentlemen to really search your person and luggage?"
"What I'm hoping you'll say, Colonel," the customs officer said, "is that you're going to show me evidence that you passed through customs someplace else."
"No," Castillo said. "We were going to do that at Hurlburt Field, but the hurricane got Hurlburt. We refueled at Fort Rucker, but we have to do the customs and immigration here."
"Everybody aboard American?"
"No," Castillo replied, and waved them onto the Gulfstream. "No more surprises, I promise."
"Welcome to the United States," the large customs officer said when he had stepped into the cabin. "Or welcome home, whichever the case may be. There would be a band, but I have been led to believe that everybody would prefer to enter the United States as quietly as possible. What we're going to do is collect the American passports and run them through the computers in the main terminal. Then-presuming the computer doesn't tell us there are outstanding warrants on anybody-they will be returned to you and you can be on your way."
He looked around the cabin and continued: "I just learned that some of you are not American citizens, which means that we'll have to check your visas. I think we can run them through the computers without any trouble, but I think we'd better have a look at them before we try to do that. Understood?"
When there were nods, he pulled a heavy plastic bag from his pocket and finished his speech: "And if any of you are carrying forbidden substances, not only mood-altering chemicals of one kind or another but raw fruits and vegetables, any meat product not in an unopened can-that sort of thing-now is the time to deposit them in this bag."
"As my patriotic duty," Castillo said, "I have to mention that the cigarettes that Irishman has been smoking don't smell like Marlboros."
He pointed. The customs officer looked.
"And I've seen his picture hanging in the post office, too," the customs officer said, and walked to the man with his hand extended. "How are you, Jack? And what the hell are you doing with this crew?"
"Hoping nobody sees me," Inspector Doherty said. "And what are you doing in a uniform?"
"The director of National Intelligence suggested it would be appropriate."
"Say hello to Edgar Delchamps," Doherty said. "I'll vouch for him. Use your judgment about the others. Ed, this is Chief Inspector Bob Mitchell."
The men shook hands.
"You're with the bureau?" Mitchell asked.
"Ed's the exception to the rule about people who get paid from Langley," Doherty said. "When he shakes your hand, Bob, you get all five fingers back."
"Actually, I'm with the Fish and Wildlife Service," Delchamps said.
Mitchell chuckled.
The other customs officer handed Mitchell several passports.
"Take a look at these, Inspector," he said. "When was the last time you saw a handwritten, non-expiring, multivisit visa signed by an ambassador?"
"It's been a while," Mitchell said. He looked at the passports and added, "An Argentine, a German, and two Hungarians. All issued the same day in Buenos Aires. Interesting. I'd love to know what's going on here."
"But you were told not to ask, right?" Doherty said. "Sorry, Bob."
"We also serve who look but do not see or ask questions," Mitchell said. "Well, I think I had better run these through the computer myself. I'm sure all kinds of warning bells and whistles are going to go off."
"Thank you, Mr. Mitchell," Castillo said.
"I always try to be nice to people I feel sorry for, Colonel," Mitchell said.
"Excuse me?"
"I bear a message from our boss, Colonel. The ambassador said, quote, Ask Colonel Castillo to please call me the minute he gets off the airplane, unquote."
"Oh. I see what you mean."
"That's the first time I can remember the ambassador saying 'please.'"
"That's probably because he's not my boss," Castillo replied. "He just thinks he is."
"That's probably even worse, isn't it?"
"Yes, it is," Castillo agreed.
Mitchell smiled and nodded.
"Okay, this'll take ten or fifteen minutes. You can start unloading whatever you have to unload."
"Thank you," Castillo said.
"Consider it your hearty meal for the condemned man," Mitchell said, shook his hand, and went to the stair door.
Castillo turned to Miller.
"So where do I find a secure phone?"
"There's one in your Yukon."
"I said a secure phone."
"And I said, Colonel, sir, 'In your Yukon,'" Miller said, and made a grand gesture toward the stair door.
Miller motioned for Castillo to precede him into the backseat of one of the dark blue Yukons. Then, not without difficulty, he stowed his crutch, got in beside him, and closed the door.
There was a telephone handset mounted on the rear of the driver's seat in the Yukon. Except for an extraordinarily thick cord, it looked like a perfectly normal handset.
"That's secure?" Castillo asked.
"Secure and brand-new," Miller replied. "A present from your pal Aloysius."
"Really?"
"He called up three or four days ago, asked of your general health and welfare, then asked if there was anything he could do for us. I told him I couldn't think of a thing. He said he had a new toy he thought you might like to play with, one in its developmental phase."
Miller pointed at the telephone.
"So yesterday, I was not surprised when the Secret Service guy said there were some people from AFC seeking access to your throne room in the complex. I was surprised when they came up to see that one of them was Aloysius in the flesh."
Aloysius Francis Casey (Ph.D., Electrical Engineering, MIT) was a small, pale-faced man who customarily dressed in baggy black suits. He also was the founder, chairman of the board, and principal stockholder of the AFC Corporation. AFC had a vast laboratory and three manufacturing facilities that provided a substantial portion of worldwide encrypted communications to industry in the form of leased technology.
During the Vietnam War, then-Sergeant Casey had served with distinction as the commo man on several Special Forces A-Teams. He had decided, immediately after the First Desert War, that it was payback time. Preceded by a telephone call from the senior U.S. senator from Nevada, he had arrived at Fort Bragg in one of AFC's smaller jets and explained to then-Major General Bruce J. McNab that, save for the confidence that being a Green Beanie had given him, he would almost certainly have become either a Boston cop-or maybe a postman-after his Vietnam service.