Stuart Woods: Iron Orchid

“Thank you,” Holly said.

Colville walked her to the elevator. “While we have been speaking, your car and everything in it is being searched. Your car will be garaged until you have finished your training. You won’t need it, since you are not allowed to leave the Farm during training. Your luggage will be delivered to your room presently, and in the meantime, I suggest you walk over to the dining hall, there,” she pointed out a barn, “and have dinner. Someone will escort you to your room after you’ve eaten. While you are here your code name will be Harry One,” she spelled it, “and you are not to tell anyone, neither your fellow trainees nor even an instructor, your real name. Is that clear?”

“Yes,” Holly said.

Colville leaned over and patted Daisy. “You will remain Daisy” she said. “Good dog.” Daisy received this attention with gratitude.

“Thank you.”

“You may take her to the dining hall with you. When your luggage is returned, so will be her dog food, and you may feed her then.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Colville,” Holly said. She shook the woman’s hand and departed for the barn. During her short walk, she could not see anything that would reveal that the Farm was anything other than a farm. Even the parking lot didn’t look like a parking lot.

She walked to a door in a corner of the barn and went inside. She was in a large dining hall with a cafeteria line down one wall. She served herself and took a table alone. The food was good, and no one joined her. When she had finished dessert, a young man approached, as if on cue. “Harry One?”

“Yes.”

“Please follow me.” He led her to another long, low farm building, which turned out to be a dormitory. She was shown to a decent-sized room containing a queen-sized bed and a comfortable chair. A wall was fitted with built-in furniture: a desk, bookcase and television set. Her luggage was stacked, empty, in a corner, and when she looked she found that everything had been hung up or tucked into a drawer, except her gun, the gift from Ham. She didn’t ask about it.

“I hope you’ll be comfortable here,” the young man said. “Attached to your schedule is a map showing the places you’ll need to go tomorrow.”

“May I take my dog for a walk after she eats?” Holly asked.

“Yes, but stay on the map. If you wander beyond that, you’ll be challenged, and the trespass will go in your record. Good night.”

The young man left. Holly fed Daisy, took the map and went outside. There wasn’t much daylight left, so she exercised Daisy by throwing her ball, which got the job done in a hurry. When Daisy was finally tired, she returned to her room and began reading the document she had been given, then her schedule for the following day. That took much of the evening, and when she had finished, she watched the eleven o’clock news on TV, then went to bed.

HER PHONE RANG at six a.m. “Yes?”

The young man. “Breakfast now, your first class at seven. This is the last wakeup call you’ll get; from now on, you’re on your own as to schedule. Don’t be late for anything.” He hung up.

Holly showered and changed into sweat clothes, as her schedule had dictated. She would miss her morning run today, and she’d have to ask about that. She fed Daisy, had breakfast in the dining hall, threw the ball for Daisy for a few minutes, then followed the map to her first class, which was in an auditorium below the dining hail. Daisy remained at her side.

She took one of about two hundred seats, near the front. The room was less than a third full. At the stroke of seven o’clock, a lean, military-looking man of about sixty strode onto the stage and switched on a microphone at the podium.

“My name, for the purposes of your visit here, is Hanks,” he said. “During the coming weeks or months, depending on the course of your training, you will come to hate me.”

Somehow, Holly didn’t doubt him.

“Most of you have been here for less than twenty-four hours,” Hanks said, “and it may have occurred to you that this installation has been designed to look like a farm, which it has been for a couple of hundred years. Particularly, it has been arranged to reveal none of its secrets in satellite photographs. Most of your classes will therefore be conducted underground.

“For those who, after our physical training, still desire more exercise, there is a running path through the woods. You may not run in the company of more than one other person. There are also two tennis courts, one of them above ground. There is also an underground pool, which will be the site of special training for some of you as well as a recreational facility.

“We discourage your getting to know other trainees; that is why you have each been assigned a code name. You are not to tell any other trainee anything about your personal or professional or educational background, or anything about how you were recruited. If you confine your conversations to the weather and other such innocuous subjects, you’ll be fine. If you are questioned by someone not on the staff seeking personal information, then lie.

“In each of your rooms there are books and a television set with satellite service. You may entertain yourself, alone, in your room between dinner and bedtime. If you complete your training successfully, your assignments thereafter may involve long periods alone or with hostile companions. Learn to enjoy solitude.

“There will be no question-and-answer period. Good luck.” Hanks stalked off the stage.

Everyone sat still for a moment, waiting for further instructions. None came. Holly got up and started off for the first class on her schedule.

ROBERT KINNEY ARRIVED at his office at the Federal Bureau of Investigation promptly at nine a.m., still warm from the praise of the president at the news conference of the day before, announcing the resolution of the Theodore Fay affair, and from the extended sexual activity with his paramour, Nancy Kimble, following his proposal of marriage, which had been accepted.

His secretary, Helen Frankel, was just hanging up the phone as he walked past her desk. “Stop where you are,” she ordered.

Kinney stopped. “What?”

“That was the White House on the phone. The president wishes to see you immediately.”

“Right now?”

“Mr. Kinney,” Helen said, sighing.

“Okay, immediately is right now.”

“There’ll be a White House car waiting for you by the time you get to the garage.”

Kinney turned on his heel and headed for the garage. As he was entering the elevator, someone shouted his name. He turned to see one of his agents, Kerry Smith, walking rapidly toward him. “Later, Kerry,” he said, and the elevator door closed before Smith could reply.

There was, indeed, a White House car waiting for him in the garage. He folded his six-foot-five-inch frame into the rear seat, and twenty minutes later he was sitting in the office of Cora Parker, the president’s secretary.

“It won’t be long, Mr. Kinney,” Parker said. “Would you like some coffee?”

“Yes, thank you,” Kinney replied.

“As I recall, you take it black with a carcinogenic,” she said, walking to a coffee pot nearby.

“I wouldn’t put it quite that way, but yes,” he replied.

“That stuff will eat your insides out,” she said.

“If that were true, Ms. Parker, I would have no insides.”

She handed him the cup. “If you don’t have time to finish it here, just take it in with you,” she said.

Kinney took a sip of the coffee, then looked up as the door to the oval office opened. His boss, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, stalked out of the office, red-faced and blinking rapidly. He glanced at Kinney, and his expression changed to one of hatred, then he was gone.