FIFTY-THREE

This time there was no banter.

As Sung Kim reached the head of a line of cars that stretched at least a quarter mile from Battle Valley Farm’s main entrance gate back toward State Highway 15, she could see from the look on Steve Batcholder’s face that there would be no kidding around today.

Today Steve’s guard shack at the big iron gate was crowded with stern-faced men and women, walkie-talkies in their hands and earpieces in their ears. Watching them closely, Sung Kim pushed the gear lever up into Park, zipped her window down, and smiled as they approached. Steve was in the lead, and he was shaking his head.

“I told you the other day this would happen, Mary Anne,” he said. “Not that I don’t like seeing you again so soon, but I’m sorry it has to be …”

He stopped talking and stared at the bruises on her face.

“My God, what happened to you?” he said. “What happened to your face?”

She smiled. “I fell getting into the van, back at the flower shop. It’s nothing. Looks a lot worse than it is.”

He shook his head slowly, then turned to the woman at his side, a thirty-something Secret Service agent in a dark blue suit with light gray pinstripes, and a sour look on her square face.

“I know this woman,” Steve told the bodyguard. “Her name is Mary Anne White. She delivers flowers to the farm. I see her all the time. Just a couple days ago, as a matter of fact.”

The woman took a step closer to Sung Kim’s van. “Good afternoon,” she said. “Would you mind stepping out of the van please?”

Sung Kim smiled. “Of course not.”

She swung the door open and got out. The Secret Service agent moved closer. She was holding a wand in her right hand, a metal-detecting wand that looked a little like a whisk used in the kitchen for beating eggs or sweet cream.

“Extend your arms, please,” the agent said.

Sung Kim did so. The agent ran the detector up and down her body, up the inside of each leg, then along the length of both arms, which were just as bruised as her face, although the injuries were hidden by the long sleeves of her blue and white shirt.

“Thank you, ma’am,” the agent said when there were no beeps from the detector. “What’s in the van?”

“Flowers, lots of flowers … and a few plants.” Sung Kim smiled. “Mr. Franklin sure loves roses. I brought a load a few days ago, but I got the call today to bring even more.”

The agent stepped up close to the van, inspected the driver’s compartment, then turned back to Sung Kim. “I need to look in the back.”

“It’s not locked.”

“Please, ma’am, I need you to open the door for me.”

“Of course.”

Sung Kim led the way to the rear of the van. When she got there, she turned around and saw three more Secret Service agents walk up. One of them—a tall skinny man in a dark blue suit—was leading a gorgeous dog, an immense German shepherd. The bomb dog, of course.

“Open the door, please,” the man said.

Sung Kim did so. The man looked at the dog, then uttered a sharp command. The shepherd leaped effortlessly into the back of the van. Sung Kim watched as the dog zigzagged among the plants and flowers, his big nose darting and sniffing, before he came back and jumped to the ground.

Next, the woman agent stepped up into the van and moved around on the same path as had the dog, her eyes playing over the same plants and flowers. Suddenly she stopped, bent over, and picked up a small unmarked cardboard carton from the floor of the van and brought it back to Sung Kim.

“What’s this?”

“Timers,” Sung Kim told her. “Watering timers. They run on batteries. I use them to regulate the water lines to the various indoor plants in the house, and around the farm.” She reached for the carton. “I can show you what they look like.”

But the agent opened the carton herself, picked out one of the timers, a green plastic device about the size of a pack of cigarettes, with a yellow dial on the front, and stubby armlike extensions for the plastic tubing that carried the water.

“It’s just a valve,” Sung Kim said. “An electrically operated valve, connected to a tiny computer chip that opens and shuts it according to the settings on the dial.”

The agent brought the carton up closer to her eyes, inspecting the rest of the timers, then put the one she was holding back into the carton, closed it up, and set it back in the van, next to a pink azalea that Sung Kim could see was already starting to wilt in the heat.

“Can I close up?” she asked the agent. “Are you finished back here? I’ve really got to get these plants out of the sun.”

The agent nodded. “I just have to call the house and make sure you’re on their list, then you can go on in.”

Sung Kim smiled. She was on the list, all right. One thing she knew for sure was that she was on that list.