Iron Orchid Read Free Page B

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