Stuart Woods - Iron Orchid

AFTER A GOOD LUNCH from a Chinese restaurant across the street, Teddy dressed in khaki trousers, a white, short-sleeved button-down shirt and a bow tie, then he dug up a black baseball cap. The outfit looked nearly enough like a uniform. On the computer, he made and printed out a delivery log, then signed half a dozen of the blank spaces with fictitious names. He took the subway to 42nd Street, walked crosstown to the address of the townhouse and rang the bell.

Shortly, a tough-looking man in a black suit answered the door. “Yes?”

“Delivery for Mr…” Teddy consulted his log.“… Alley Hackim.”

“Do you mean Mr. Ali Hakim?” the man asked.

“Yeah, that must be it.” Teddy showed him the address on the crate, also displaying the royal seal on the lid.

The man’s eyes widened at the sight of the seal. “We don’t usually accept deliveries on a weekend,” he said.

“Okay, I’ll send it back,” Teddy said, turning to go.

“Wait!” the man yelled. “Does it have to be signed for by Mr. Hakim himself?”

“No, you can sign,” Teddy said.

The man stepped out onto the stoop, and Teddy gave him the clipboard. “Space number seven,” he said.

“What is the name of your delivery service?” the man asked.

“I’m from Eastern Freight Forwarders at Kennedy Airport,” Teddy replied. “This came in last night and cleared customs this morning. Have a nice day.”

“Wait, where is your delivery truck?”

“I took a cab,” Teddy said. “This was a high-priority delivery.” He gave a little wave and headed off toward the corner. Once there, he looked back. The stoop was empty.

ALI HAKIM WAS DOZING in front of a soccer match on television, when his phone rang. “Hello, Hakim here,” he said.

“Mr. Hakim, this is Osama, the security guard on duty at your office.”

“Yes? What’s happened?”

“Nothing, sir, but we’ve received a delivery addressed to you that bears the seal of the House of Saud.”

“Have you X-rayed it?”

“Yes, sir. It is a small statue of a horse.”

Hakim smiled. It must be from a friend of his in Saudi intelligence. “I’ll be right over,” he said.

Teddy waited patiently for forty-five minutes. He was about to leave when a black sedan pulled up in front of the townhouse and a man got out. Teddy checked the face against the photograph he had downloaded. Hakim himself. Teddy removed the remote control from his pocket, tapped in five minutes and activated it.

It took several minutes to get a cab, and he was about to cancel the code when a taxi finally appeared. “Fifth Avenue and Fifty-seventh Street,” he said to the driver. He could walk from there.

The cab pulled away and had driven for a couple of blocks when the detonator did its job.

“What the hell was that?” the cab driver asked.

Teddy looked back at the rising column of smoke and dust. “I don’t know,” he said, “but let’s get the hell out of here.”

The driver stomped on the accelerator.

HOLLY AND LEE ARRIVED at the Holiday Inn at seven, had a drink at the half-empty bar, then went into the dining room for dinner.

Lee looked over the menu. “No Chinese noodles,” she said.

“Looks like the steak is a safe bet,” Holly replied.

“I’m game.”

They ordered dinner and another drink. “So, Lee,” Holly said, “what brings you to Virginia?”

“Oh, I drove down to see Monticello,” Lee said smoothly, “and it was too late to drive back to New York.”

“Where do you live in New York?”

“Mott Street, in Chinatown. My parents have a laundry and a restaurant there.”

“What do you do?”

“I keep books for my father and do the ordering for the restaurant. What about you? What do you do?”

“I teach second grade in D.C. I came down here to see my parents and thought I’d stay the night before driving back.”

“Where’d you go to school?”

“At Georgetown.”

The two women continued quizzing each other, running through their legends, until dinner arrived.

“Well, that’s enough of that,” Lee said. “Who are you, really?”

“I’m Harry One,” Holly said, “and you’re Harry Three.”

Lee grinned. “I thought I might trip you up.”

Holly grinned back. “Not as easily as that.”

They finished dinner and went back into the bar for a nightcap. Holly looked carefully at every face; she didn’t want to run into Whitey Thompson, off his usual beat. She felt for the gun at her waist, too.

“You carrying?” Lee whispered.

“It was suggested that I should,” Holly whispered back.

“You worried about running into the instructor guy?”

“Yes.”

“Is that why you didn’t want to go to Buster’s?”

“Yes, it’s his regular hangout, I’m told.” Holly looked up at the TV over the bar, which was tuned to CNN. Somebody was reporting from a helicopter over New York. The camera panned from a shot of the U.N. to a nearby street, then zoomed in closer to reveal a large gap between two townhouses with a big pile of rubble at the bottom. “Excuse me,” she said to the bartender, “can you turn that up for a minute, please?”

“The explosion occurred late this afternoon,” the reporter was saying, “and no one has any idea if anyone was inside the house. Firemen can’t even start going through the rubble until the houses on either side of the site can be shored up. Although the police are refusing comment, we’ve heard from sources inside the department that the explosion is thought to be connected with the upcoming meeting of heads of state at the U.N. We’ll keep you posted as details come in. Now back to the studio.”

“Thanks,” Holly said to the bartender. “You can turn it back down.”

“What do you suppose that was about?” Lee asked.

“I don’t know any more than you do,” Holly said. At that moment, her cell phone vibrated, and she pulled it from her belt. “Hello?”

“Harry One?”

“Yes.”

“Is Harry Three with you?”

“Yes.”

“Both of you return to base at once. Go to the main house for a meeting in the conference room. Got that?”

“Got it.” She hung up.

“What is it?” Lee asked.

Holly put some money on the bar and indicated for Lee to follow her outside. When they were halfway to the car, she said, “They want us back at the Farm right now for a meeting at the conference room in the main house.”

“You think this is some sort of drill?”

“Who knows?” Holly asked, but she was willing to bet it had something to do with the explosion in New York.

As she was getting into her car a shiny new pickup pulled into the parking lot, and a man got out. She didn’t recognize him immediately, but then she saw the bandage covering his nose. She breathed a sigh of relief as she left the lot and turned onto the highway.

ALL FIVE OF THE HARRY SUBGROUP were gathered around the conference table when Lance Cabot walked in. “Good evening,” he said. “I’m sorry to break into your first night of liberty, but something has come up.” He flicked a remote control, and a TV in the room replayed the report that Holly had seen on CNN, then he turned off the TV and turned on a slide projector. A picture came up of the same block before the explosion.

“This is what the house looked like this afternoon,” he said, flicking to another photo. “We’ve had it under surveillance for a couple of weeks, because we learned that the house is owned by an Iranian millionaire with ties to Iranian and Saudi intelligence. We think that the house may have sheltered a terrorist team that was planning an attack during the heads-of-state conference at the U.N., which starts tomorrow.