"Yeah," Miller said, disbelievingly, then added, "I have a cell phone with the number of your boss, to be used only if necessary."

"What does that mean?"

Miller shrugged. "General Naylor gave it to me. I guess if somebody shows up here with a cross to nail me to, your boss wants to know."

"Well, let me see what's going on," Charley said and took out his cellular telephone.

"Where the hell have you been?" Miller asked.

Castillo put up his hand to tell him to wait.

"Sir, this is your personal FedEx international courier," he began. "I have your Sacher torte for you "Yes, sir. I just walked into my apartment "Yes, sir. He's here. If I can have twenty minutes for a shower and a shave, I'll be right over "Sir, I can come over there "Yes, sir. I'll be waiting for you."

He hung up and turned to Miller.

"Get your ass off the chair and try to look respectable, my boss is on his way over here. And before he gets here, I need a shower."

"You want me here?" Miller asked.

"I think he wants to see you, too," Charley said after a just barely perceptible hesitation.

Castillo, freshly shaved and wearing crisp trousers and a dress shirt, opened the door to Secretary Hall.

"Good afternoon, sir."

"I tried to call you in Vienna," Hall said. "I had all kinds of second thoughts about you and Pevsner. And all the Bristol would tell me was that you had checked out early this morning. I was really getting worried, Charley."

Hall saw Miller.

"I'm Matt Hall, Major Miller," he said, putting out his hand.

"How do you do, sir?"

"Now that our friend is back, in one piece, I'm feeling a lot better than I was a half hour ago. Did he tell you where's he's been, what he was trying to do?"

"No, sir," Miller said. "I picked up on 'Vienna.' "

Charley walked into the bedroom and came back with the Sacher torte from Demel's.

"Here you go, sir," he said. "One cake of fourteen raspberry layers."

"I was kidding, Charley!"

"You sounded serious to me, sir. And it's fresh. I picked it up on the way to the airport this morning."

Hall took the box and shook his head.

"How'd you get it into the country?"

"A customs service captain at BW is one of your admirers. He said to tell you, one Vietnam sergeant to another, that he hopes you enjoy it."

"You told him you worked for me?"

"It was either that or go to jail. I was in custody. Two armed females and a beagle. The beagle sniffed the cake."

Hall shook his head but chuckled.

"My God, Charley!" he said. "But thank you. What do I owe you?"

"My pleasure, sir. I was happy to do it."

"We'll argue about that later," Hall said. "Right now all I want to say is that I'm glad you had second thoughts about trying to meet with Pevsner, too."

"Sir?"

"He's really a dangerous character, Charley. I asked Joel Isaacson if he knew anything about him and got a five-minute lecture. All frightening."

"He's a frightening man," Charley agreed.

"The FBI is sending me his dossier," Hall went on, and then he thought aloud: "Which I should have had by now. Anyway, I'm glad you missed him."

"I met with Pevsner, sir."

"You met with him?"

"Yes, sir. I've got a long story you're going to have a hard time believing. I'm not sure I believe it myself."

"Well, let's hear it, Charley."

"Sir," Miller asked, "would you like me to make myself scarce?"

Hall looked at him.

"No," he said after a moment. "It was your filing, after all, that started this whole thing." He paused. "And I have the feeling that what one of you knows, so does the other. So, no, Major Miller, don't make yourself scarce."

He looked at Charley.

"The bottom line," Castillo began, "is that he said he didn't steal the 727:"

"Which is precisely what one would expect him to say," Hall said.

": and that he's going to help us find it," Charley said. "In exchange for which he wants you to use your influence to get the government to: reduce the attention it's paying to him."

The telephone rang. Castillo looked at Hall for guidance.

"Answer it," Hall said.

Charley walked to the telephone and picked it up and said, "Hello."

He was silent a moment, then replied, "Yes, it is "The Drei Hussaren "No. Wait."

He patted his chest, and finding no pen, gestured to Miller to give him something to write with. Hall beat Miller to it.

"Okay," Charley said. "Now I need some paper."

Miller picked up The Washington Post from the couch and handed it to Castillo.

"Okay," Castillo said into the receiver. "Shoot."

He made notes on the newsprint, then said, "Let me make sure I have that right. I spell Able-Baker-Echo-Charley-Hotel-Echo. Right? Hello? Hello? Shit."

He put the phone back in the cradle.

"He hung up."

"Come on, Charley," Hall said, gesturing for details.

"It was a man. American accent. He asked if I was Major Castillo. I said I was. He said he had a message from Alex, if I would tell him where I had dinner last night. I told him. He said that as of 1700 last night, the 727 was on the ground in Abeche, Chad."

"Alex being Pevsner?" Hall asked.

Yes, sir.

"Why would he refer to you as Major Castillo?"

"He knew who I was before he called Otto Gorner," Charley said. "That's why he agreed to the interview. Before he knew I'm me, he was going to take out Gossinger."

"He told you that?" Hall asked.

"The way he put it was that Gossinger was going to get an Indian beauty mark," Charley said. "That's a small red circle in the middle of the forehead."

" Jesus!" Hall said. "And he was serious, right?"

"I believed him," Charley said.

"I never should have let you go over there. At least not alone."

"If I hadn't been alone, I don't think he would have met with me."

"Permission to speak, sir?" Miller asked.

Hall gave him a strange look but said, "Permission granted."

"Two things," Miller said. "I don't think it was a coincidence that phone call came fifteen minutes after Charley walked in here. That's the first time it's rung since I've been here. Which means they have somebody here, are paying a bellman or someone."

"Yeah," Castillo grunted his agreement.

"Two," Miller went on, "Pevsner would know where the 727 is because he put it there."

"I don't think he stole it," Charley said. "He told me he has airplanes. That he just bought a nearly new 767 from an Argentine airline that went belly-up."

"Charley, I think you should take it from the top," Hall said.

"Yes, sir."

"And you, Miller, if you have any questions while he's telling us ask them."

"Yes, sir," Miller said.

"Sir, I sent an e-mail saying he didn't show at the Sacher the first night," Charley began. "So I went back the next night-that's last night-and:"

"So how did you handle the woman who went to your room?" Hall asked with a smile. "You left it that she showed up at your door with a bottle of cognac and then drove you to the airport in the morning."

"I was hoping you wouldn't ask, sir," Charley said.

"You dumb sonofabitch, Charley!" Miller said.

"Agreed," Charley said. "And that brings up the equally embarrassing fact that I was at least half drunk, which should be factored into this."

"You think Pevsner purposefully got you drunk?" Hall asked.

"We all had a lot to drink," Charley said. "But do I think there was a conscious effort to get me drunk? No. He was drinking cognac when I met him on the Cobenzl, offered me some, which I didn't think I should refuse, and I kept up with him. He had as much to drink-for that matter, so did Kennedy-as I did."