Iron Orchid

THIRTY-FIVE

TEDDY WALKED INTO HIS APARTMENT, took off his coat and leaned against the wall. He was sweating. He went into the kitchen and got himself a glass of ice water and sat down. He was seeing way too much of this Holly woman, and the string of coincidences was driving him crazy.

First, the opera, then the record shop, now coming out of an apartment building a block and a half away. He habitually maintained a high level of paranoia, as a means of survival, and alarm bells were ringing all over the place.

He waited until evening and called Irene Foster.

“Hello?”

“Are you inside?”

“I’m in New York, at the Waldorf again. We must meet.”

“Central Park, in an hour?”

“Where in the park?”.

“Outside the boathouse restaurant, find a bench; I’ll find you.”

“All right.” She hung up.

____________________

TEDDY ENTERED THE PARK only after walking around the block twice, checking for tails. He was going to have to relocate to another city immediately, that was clear. He walked up to the boathouse, past it, then back by another route, before he sat down on the bench where Irene was reading the Post.

“I don’t know how you read that trash,” he said, not looking at her.

“I never miss Page Six,” she said. “Can I pass you something?”

“Put it inside the paper and hand it to me,” he said. She did so, and he found two CDs.

“They’ve changed the codes again,” she said. “They suspect someone inside the Agency is helping you. In fact, I suggested that myself, in order to avoid suspicion, and Hugh English has put me in charge of the internal investigation.”

“How very convenient.”

“Yes, but it’s a pain in the ass. What I suggest you do is create a file for a fictional employee, give him all the proper clearances, then use his name when you log on. Can you do that?”

“Sounds like a good idea; I wish I’d thought of it earlier.”

“How’s it going, in general?”

“I’ve been living in New York, but I’m going to have to leave immediately,” he said.

“Why?”

“That agent I told you about, Holly something; I’ve run into her again. It can’t be an accident.”

“Holly Barker,” Irene said. “She did a teleconference yesterday, with Lance Cabot. Why are you worried about her?”

“I saw her at the opera, at a record store and coming out of an apartment building a block and a half from my apartment. That’s too many coincidences.”

“Take it easy,” Irene said. “I’ve read her report: the first time, at the opera, she was looking for you, but she didn’t figure out that she met you until you ran for a cab with your ‘new knee.” The second time, she went to the record shop looking for you, because they were covering everything they could think of to do with the opera. That’s it. If you saw her coming out of a building, then that was a coincidence. She doesn’t know where you are or what you look like.“

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely. I read everything that comes through from Lance’s group.”

“I met Lance once, a long time ago, in Tech Services.”

“He doesn’t remember it, so you’re okay. You’ve got to change your log-in codes today, though. I’ve already gone into Hugh’s computer to make it possible, ostensibly as a test.”

“That’s good; thank you.”

“Listen, Teddy, this is going to have to become a two-way street, if I’m going to continue to help you. I have to know how to get in touch with you. If you’re using a phone like mine, it can’t be dangerous.”

“It makes me nervous, though.”

“Well, you’ve got to make a choice,” she said. “If I were going to give you up, you’d be surrounded right now.”

Teddy sighed and gave her the phone number. “I want you to know that it was not because I don’t trust you implicitly; I was just being as careful as I could.”

“I understand, but you’re going to have to trust somebody if you’re going to continue to do this successfully.”

“What do they know about me?”

“They think you’re in New York, and that’s it. And they know you’ve made Holly. That was very funny, the thing with the opera seats; it drove them crazy, but you’ve got to drop everything to do with the opera, except watching it on TV. That’s their big, new piece of information, that you love the opera.”

“Oh, all right,” Teddy said, “though it was my chief pleasure in New York.”

“Find another pleasure,” she said, “and make it something you’ve never done before.”

“My new pleasure is going to be Holly Barker,” Teddy said. “I’m going to read her file, but what can you tell me about her?”

“She’s an ex-Army MP commander, and for four years she was chief of police in a little town in Florida called Orchid Beach, where she broke a couple of big federal cases, much to the embarrassment of the FBI. Lance met her in New York earlier this year and recruited her as part of his new group. She was in training at the Farm when they suddenly moved most of her class to New York to start looking for you.”

“So she’s green?”

“Yes, but she’s smart, or Lance wouldn’t have recruited her. He’s the best judge of talent I’ve ever seen, and she’s his fair-haired girl. Oh, and I’ve got to tell you, she broke Whitey Thompson’s nose in her self-defense class; it was the talk of the training command, and Whitey got fired as a result of it.”

“That’s the funniest thing I ever heard,” Teddy said, laughing. “I always hated that guy.”

“Everybody did. Well, he’s gone, now.”

“How are you coming with your internal investigation?”

“Oh, I’ll wring out the whole place, everybody but myself.”

“They’ll polygraph you before it’s over. Can you handle it?”

She nodded. “I have some pills that will do the trick.”

“Good. Let me give you a code: if you ever learn that I’m about to be busted and I should run, call the number I gave you and say, ”Is this Bloomingdale’s?“ then hang up. If I hear that, I’ll drop everything and go.”

“Got it.”

“Shall I find a hotel room?”

“Can’t this trip; we’re too busy. Hugh thinks I’m running an errand for him, so I’ve got to get back.”

“Thanks for the new codes, Babe. I’ll talk to you soon.”

“Bye-bye.” She got up and left.

Teddy sat on the bench, feeling greatly relieved. He was glad he wasn’t going to have to leave New York, after all the trouble he’d gone to to set himself up here. He was sorry about the opera, though.