He spent another hour preparing before he was satisfied that all was in order. Finally, he stepped out into the yard and stood looking down the orchard lane that Tom Jorgenson always took when he went to watch the moon. At the far end, Bo could see the tractor.
He walked slowly between the rows of trees. The apples were a nice size but still green. The branches sagged, in need of propping. Bo had to walk a crooked line and bend occasionally to make his way. When he reached the idle machine, he circled it, then stood looking back for the branch that had thrown Tom Jorgenson into harm’s way. The most likely candidate was a thick limb a few feet back of the flatbed. It hung low, but not so low, Bo thought, that it couldn’t easily have been avoided. Bo climbed onto the tractor seat, looked back, and confirmed his assessment that if Jorgenson had made the slightest effort, he’d have missed the limb. Bo had known Tom Jorgenson long enough to believe that he was a man with great presence of mind. What could have distracted him? The moon? As he dismounted, he spotted a silver Thermos wedged under the seat. He unscrewed the cap and sniffed. Coffee and-maybe this explained a lot-whiskey.
Bo walked to the edge of the bluff thirty yards in front of the tractor. A sheer sandstone cliff fell fifty feet to a rocky, tree-covered slope that ran down to the St. Croix River. The river was a silver sparkle of sunlight a half-mile wide, edged on both sides by tall, wooded bluffs. Sailboats and power launches skimmed over the water. Bo turned back, stared at the tractor, and wondered about something. He returned to the Kubota and checked the ignition. The key was still there, but the ignition was in the off position. He was pretty sure Tom Jorgenson didn’t have time to kill the engine before he fell to the ground. So probably the ignition had been switched off by someone in the aftermath of the accident. Still, the elements of the situation felt odd to him.
He puzzled only a brief moment before he heard his name called over the walkie-talkie he carried, and the cryptic message, “Dreamcatcher is en route to Mount Olympus.”
Communicating over the airwaves, even when using a scrambled signal, Secret Service always employed code names to designate protectees. Dreamcatcher was the First Lady. Mount Olympus was Wildwood.
chapter
six
The First Lady arrived in a dark blue Lincoln Town Car escorted by two state patrol cars and by two Regals from the field office, each carrying several of the agents on permanent FLOTUS duty. Bo stood just behind Annie Jorgenson as the limousine stopped in front of the house.
Special Agent Christopher Manning emerged first. He wasn’t tall, just under six feet, nor remarkably broad in chest and shoulders, yet in his compactness there was something powerful. He’d always reminded Bo of a jack-in-the-box, tense and ready to spring. He wore his red-blond hair in a neat crew cut. To Bo, the most remarkable feature of Manning’s face was that it usually displayed all the emotion of a bowling ball.
The woman who stepped out after Manning, Bo had met only once in person, when she was seventeen. During all the operations Bo had overseen at Wildwood, Kathleen Jorgenson Dixon had been absent, either in Colorado as the state’s First Lady or in Washington, D.C., bearing the same title for the nation. He’d seen the family pictures, of course, framed inside the Jorgenson house, and along with most other Americans, he’d been treated to more than enough television, magazine, and newspaper coverage to know the basics of her life story. It was of a vivacious young woman, always smiling, eyes bright, raised in an international arena. There were pictures of the Jorgensons in Paris, Rome, London, Amsterdam, many posed with leaders of great renown. In them, Kate Jorgenson, the oldest of the children, usually stood holding hands with her sister, Ruth, and her brother, Earl.
Kate had grown into a Nordic beauty, tall, large-boned, blonde, with striking gray eyes. Although Bo had always been impressed with her composure and with the strength of her character, when he saw her emerge from the limousine, it was, much to his own chagrin, her long and slender legs that he noted. He considered wryly whether this might somehow be a breach of his patriotic duty.
“Aunt Annie.” The First Lady sounded near tears.
“It’s all right, Katie,” Annie Jorgenson said as they hugged. “We’re all together now. It will be okay.”
“He looks so broken.”
“Come on in, sweetheart, and we’ll get you settled. Then, if you’d like, we’ll go back and see him together.”
Two more agents stepped from the Town Car, along with a woman whom Bo knew from report and reputation, Nicole Greene, who functioned as the First Lady’s communications director.
“Agent Aguilera,” Manning instructed one of his team, a tall woman, “you’re with the First Lady. Gooden, give a hand with the luggage.” He turned, finally, to Bo. “I’ve been in communication with Diana Ishimaru in the Minneapolis office. She indicated you have the Operations Center ready.”
“The guesthouse,” Bo replied, pointing toward the maples. “We’ve checked the security cameras and radio equipment. We still need a frequency cleared for emergency communication, but we should have that momentarily.”
“Good,” Manning replied with a nod.
Stu Coyote, who’d driven one of the Regals, joined them. “County deputies are stationed at the entrance to Wildwood. State patrol’s assigned us these two units for the duration of the First Lady’s visit.” He indicated the burgundy-and-tan patrol cars. “Anywhere she goes, they clear the way.”
Manning said, “We’re going to try to limit her traveling to between Wildwood and the hospital. According to the contingency report I have, there’s only one main road to Stillwater.”
“The St. Croix Trail. The road we just traveled,” Coyote said. “That’s it.”
“I don’t like the idea of keeping to a single route.” Although his words betrayed concern, Manning’s face didn’t show it. “Show me the Op Center. Carter, Searson, Jones,” he called to the other agents. “Get your things.”
Bo led him to the guesthouse. On the lawn in front, secured to a concrete slab as if it were being held captive, stood a huge, twisted sculpture of stainless steel. As they passed the polished metal, a blast of reflected sunlight blinded Manning, and he lifted his hands to block the glare.
“Jesus, what the hell is that?”
“Don’t you recognize great art when you see it, Chris?” Bo said. “That’s a bona fide masterpiece, or so I’ve been told. The guesthouse used to be the studio for Tom Jorgenson’s infamous brother, Roland. A true eccentric, from what I understand. Died twenty years ago in a car accident. Drove his Porsche into a tree. Created his final sculpture, a heap of metal with him at the heart. Goddesshere is the only piece left at Wildwood. Everything else is in museums.”
“Goddess?”Manning said. “My ass.”
Bo shared the lack of enthusiasm. The sculpture was a wild thing that gave the feel of monstrous forces barely contained. The polished steel itself was beautiful, but to Bo it had always seemed like a dream that had been warped by a dark subconscious into a nightmare.
“You learn to ignore it,” Bo said and led Manning inside.
Bo briefed him on the layout and the bedrooms. Manning made assignments for his team. Then they went down to the Op Center, where Bo’s people were already at work. Manning checked the sweep of the cameras. “Nothing that looks beyond the buildings,” he said. “At night, you could hide an army in those orchards.”
“We have motion detectors and motion-activated cameras on the wall around the orchard,” Bo told him. “During periods of heightened security, I have agents patrolling the perimeter around the clock.”
“What about the river bluff?” Manning said. “No wall there.”
“Tom Jorgenson won’t let anything ruin the view of the river. We’ve had to settle for mobile tripods that we set up each time we come out.”