"I'm afraid, Lieutenant, you must consider it as an order."
He turned slowly and re-checked the huge gleaming lock on the door, then walked to a littered, dusty desk in one corner of the room and sat down. It was obvious that the discussion was ended.
Ward shrugged and carried his grip into a small windowless storeroom that was directly off the main room of the small structure. There were bales of supplies, a cot and a stool. A vague musty odor permeated the air. He tossed his grip onto the cot, stripped off his tunic and walked back into the room where Halliday was seated at his desk.
Halliday looked up with a smile and removed his glasses with a characteristic nervous movement of his thin hands.
"Not exactly the choicest accommodations, eh?" he said, in an attempt at heartiness, which struck Ward as being almost pathetic.
"I'll get by," Ward said. He loosened the collar of his shirt and glanced at the massive steel door, closed and tightly locked. "Any objection to letting in a little air?" he asked. "It's pretty close in here."
Halliday smiled and his eyes flicked to the closed door. He put his glasses on again and spent quite a time adjusting them to his thin nose.
"I'm afraid we'll have to put up with the closeness," he said.
Ward sighed and sat down in a chair facing Halliday.