THIRTY-ONE

THE CLOCK IN REACHER’S HEAD HIT EIGHT EXACTLY. NOTHING happened. The world outside stayed icy and quiet. Nothing to hear except the sound of the wind, and the brush and rattle of frozen evergreens, and the creaking and stirring of tree limbs, and the primeval tectonic shudders as the earth itself got colder.

One minute past eight.

Nothing happened.

Two minutes past eight.

Nothing happened.

No sound.

No siren.

No one came.

Peterson glanced at Reacher. Reacher shrugged. Janet Salter looked out the window. No action on the street. The cop in the hallway moved. Reacher heard the boards creak under her feet.

Three minutes past eight.

Nothing happened.

Four minutes past.

Five.

Six.

Seven.

Nothing happened.

No sound, no siren.

Nothing at all.

At a quarter past eight they gave it up and stopped worrying. Peterson was certain the head count could not have been delayed. Prisons ran on strict routines. If the cells weren’t locked for the night at eight exactly, there would be entries to be made in operational logs, and reports to be filed in triplicate, and supervisors called upon to explain. Way too much trouble for any reason short of a riot in progress, and if a riot was in progress the siren would have sounded anyway. Therefore the bid had failed. Or the lawyer had been blowing smoke.

All clear.

‘You sure?’ Reacher asked.

‘Absolutely,’ Peterson said.

‘So prove it. Put your money where your mouth is.’

‘How?’

‘Go home.’

And Peterson did. He spun it out until twenty past, and then he put his coat on and crunched down the driveway and climbed in his car and drove away. Janet Salter stopped straightening books and started reading one instead. The cop in the hallway went back to her perch on the bottom stair. The cop in the library stepped back from the glass. Reacher sat in the kitchen and tried to decide whether to disturb Janet Salter by asking permission, or whether just to go ahead and make more coffee himself. He knew how to work a percolator. His mother had had one, even though she was French. In the end he went ahead and fired it up unbidden. He listened to it gulp and hiss and when it quieted down he poured himself a mug. He raised it in a mock salute to his reflection in the window and took a sip.

At eight thirty the phone rang in the hallway. The cop got up from the bottom stair and answered it. It was for Reacher. The voice from Virginia. The cop put two forked fingers under her eyes and then pointed them at the door. You watch the front, and I’ll give you some privacy. Reacher nodded and sat down and picked up the phone.

The voice said, ‘Forty tons of surplus aircrew requirements left over from World War Two.’

‘That’s vague.’

‘Tell me about it. My guy did his best for me, but that’s all he knows.’

‘What kind of surpluses did they have after World War Two?’

‘Are you kidding? All kinds of things. The atom bomb changed everything. They went from having lots of planes carrying small bombs to a few planes carrying big bombs. They could have had forty spare tons of pilots’ underwear alone. Plus they changed from prop planes to jets. They got helmets. It could be forty tons of those old-style leather hats.’

‘I wish I had one of those right now.’

‘Quit whining.’

‘What’s the temperature here?’

A pause. ‘Minus fourteen degrees.’

‘Feels worse.’

‘It’s going to get worse. The Weather Channel radar looks horrible.’

‘Thanks for sharing.’

‘Hey, you asked.’

‘Hats and underwear?’

‘Got to be something to do with a generational change of equipment or a reduced number of aircrew. Or both.’

‘Anything on the size or architecture of the place itself?’

‘That stuff disappeared a long time ago.’

‘OK,’ Reacher said. ‘Thanks.’

‘My guy talked. From Fort Hood. Like you said he would.’

‘I’m glad.’

‘I owe you.’

‘No, we’re even.’

‘No, I do. It’s my first major score.’

‘Really? How long have you been in the job?’

‘Two weeks.’

‘I had no idea. You sound like you’ve been there for ever.’

‘I’m not sure that’s a compliment.’

‘It was meant as one,’ Reacher said. ‘Then I thank you.’

‘You should be out celebrating.’

‘I sent my people out.’

‘Good move. Give them all the credit. They’ll appreciate it, but the brass will always know who really did the work. You’ll win both ways around.’

‘Is that how you did it?’

‘Always. I made out that I did nothing much. A lot of the time that was true, of course.’

‘Not what your file suggests.’

‘You still looking at that old thing?’

‘It’s a saga.’

‘Not fair. This is a very asymmetrical relationship in terms of information.’

‘Dude, life sucks.’

‘What did you just call me?’

‘I was trying to sound blond and Californian.’

‘I see.’

‘Do you?’

‘You’re not blond or Californian.’

‘Is that OK?’

‘Brunette could work for me. Brown eyes?’

‘You got it.’

‘Long hair, right?’

‘Longer than it should be.’

‘Excellent.’

‘You want to revisit the A-cup thing too?’

‘Got to be honest. I’m just not hearing it.’

She laughed. ‘OK, I confess. You’re right.’

‘Height?’

‘Five feet seven.’

‘Pale or dark?’

‘Neither, really. But I tan well.’

‘You want to see South Dakota in the winter?’

She laughed again. ‘I prefer the beach.’

‘Me too. Where are you from?’

‘Montana. A small town you never heard of.’

‘Try me. I’ve been to Montana.’

‘Hungry Horse?’

‘Never heard of it.’

‘Told you,’ she said. ‘It’s near Whitefish.’

‘You like the army?’

‘Did you?’

‘You’ve got my file,’ Reacher said.

‘And half the time I’m thinking, man, if you hated it that bad, you should have just gotten out while the getting was good.’

‘I never hated it. Not for a minute. I just wanted to fix what was wrong with it.’

‘Above your pay grade.’

‘I learned that, eventually.’ Reacher looked around the hallway. The closed door, the dark panelling, the oil paintings, the Persian carpet. The rare woods, the wax, the polish, the patina. He had all the information he was ever going to get from or through the 110th. No real reason to keep on talking.

The voice asked, ‘What are you doing in South Dakota anyway?’

He said, ‘I was on a bus that crashed. I got hung up here.’

‘Life is a gamble.’

‘But the deck is stacked. No bus that I was on ever crashed in a warm place.’

‘You behaving yourself up there?’

‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

‘These files get tagged if an outside agency asks to take a look. You know, the FBI or a local police department or something. And yours is tagged to hell and back. Folks have been all over you for the last twelve years.’

‘Anything from here in the last two days?’

‘A transcript went out to someone called Thomas Holland at the Bolton PD.’

‘The Chief of Police. Probably routine. He wanted to know I was qualified, because he wanted my help. Back when he thought the stone building was an army place. Any follow-up?’

‘No.’

‘That’s because I’m behaving myself.’

A long pause.

Time to go.

He asked, ‘What’s your name?’

‘Does it matter?’

‘I could find out. The way the army is now, you’re probably on a web site somewhere.’

‘Are you kidding? The 110th? No way. We don’t exist.’

‘So what’s your name?’

‘Susan.’

‘Nice name.’

‘I think so too.’

Another long pause.

Time to go.

He asked, ‘Is your air force guy at Lackland?’

‘Yes. Talking to their records guys in Colorado.’

‘Ask him to try one more time. Obviously that stuff was flown in. There has to be a cargo manifest somewhere.’

‘I’ll try.’

‘Call me back?’ he asked.

‘You bet,’ she said.

Reacher went back to the kitchen and took another cup of coffee. The house was quiet. No significant sound from the outside. No significant sound from the inside either, except for the subliminal vibe of calm alert people concentrating hard on the business at hand. It was the kind of silence Reacher had heard a hundred times before. He carried his mug to the parlour and found Janet Salter reading there. She looked up from her book and said, ‘You’re drinking coffee.’

Reacher said, ‘I hope you don’t mind.’

‘Not at all. But doesn’t it keep you awake?’

He nodded. ‘Until I want to go to sleep.’

‘How was she?’

‘Who?’

‘The woman in Virginia.’

‘She was fine.’ Reacher stepped to the window and took a look at the street. Snow, ice, the parked cruiser, frozen foliage moving stiffly in the wind. A little moonlight, a little high cloud, a distant orange glow from vapour lamps on the streets to the north and the east. He said, ‘All quiet.’

Janet Salter asked, ‘Do you think the state penitentiary and the federal prison have the same lock-down time as the county jail?’

‘I imagine so.’

‘Then we’re safe for a spell, aren’t we? Heads have been counted and there’s no opportunity for mass disturbance until the morning.’

‘In principle.’

‘But?’

‘Hope for the best, plan for the worst.’

‘Is that your motto?’

‘One of many.’

‘What are the others?’

‘Never forgive, never forget. Do it once and do it right. You reap what you sow. Plans go to hell as soon as the first shot is fired. Protect and serve. Never off duty.’

‘You’re as hard on yourself as you are on others.’

‘Cruel but fair.’

‘I can’t stand this kind of tension much longer.’

‘I hope you won’t have to.’

‘For the first time in my life I’m afraid. It’s a very elemental thing, isn’t it?’

‘It’s a choice,’ Reacher said. ‘That’s all.’

‘Surely everyone’s afraid of death.’

‘That was another motto. I’m not afraid of death. Death’s afraid of me.’

‘You sound like you were trying to convince yourself.’

‘We were. All the time. Believe me.’

‘So you are afraid of death.’

‘We all have to go sometime. Depends what form it takes, I guess.’

Janet Salter went quiet for a moment. Then she said, ‘I met my successor at Yale two years ago. At a library conference. It was an interesting experience. I imagine you feel the same way, talking to the woman in Virginia.’

‘She isn’t my successor. Not directly. There could have been six or seven other people in between me and her. Maybe more. It’s a distant connection. Almost archaeological.’

‘Is she better than you?’

‘Probably.’

‘That’s how I felt, too. At first I was depressed about it. Then I realized actually I should feel encouraged about it. Progress is being maintained. The world is still moving forward.’

‘How long have you been retired?’

‘A little more than ten years.’

‘So you got back here before the prison was built.’

‘Years before. It was a different town then. But not too different, I suppose. The real change is still to come. We’re still in a transitional phase. The real change will come when we get used to it. At the moment we’re a town with a prison in it. Soon we’ll be a prison town.’

‘So what was it like?’

‘Gentle,’ Janet Salter said. ‘Quiet. Half the size. No fast food, only one motel. Chief Holland was a young man with a family. Like Andrew Peterson is now. I don’t know why, but that symbolizes the change for me. Everything felt cheerful and young and lighthearted. Not old and tired and bitter, like it is now.’

‘What happened to Holland’s wife?’

‘Cancer. But mercifully quick. Their daughter Liz was fifteen at the time. Which could have been awkward, but she seemed to handle it quite well. She was named for her mother. Her mother went by Betty, and she went by Liz. They were very similar in every way. Which could have been awkward for the chief, too, but he got past it. He was already involved in the early stages of planning the prison by then, which took his mind off it.’

‘And what was the Lowell divorce all about?’

‘I told you, I don’t know. But the fact that no one speaks of it invites speculation, doesn’t it?’

‘His fault or hers?

‘Oh, his, I think.’

‘Peterson said he has a sister who looks just like him.’

‘In a way. Much younger than him. More like a niece.’

‘Are you going to stay here, even when it’s a prison town?’

‘Me? I’m far too old to start over somewhere else. What about you?’

‘I couldn’t stay here. It’s too cold.’

‘Eventually you’ll want to stay somewhere.’

‘Hasn’t happened so far.’

‘See how you feel thirty years from now.’

‘That’s a far horizon.’

‘It will come faster than you expect.’

Reacher put his empty mug on a low table. He wasn’t sure whether to stay in the room or to leave her alone to read. He wasn’t sure which she would prefer.

‘Sit,’ she said. ‘I’ll have plenty of time to read after all this fuss is over.’

He sat.

She asked, ‘Are you warm enough?’

He said, ‘I’m fine.’ Which he was. The ancient radiator under the window was putting out plenty of heat. The hot water in the pipes was coursing around the house relentlessly. He could hear it. He could hear the occluded right-angle joint at the top of the stairs, hissing a little louder than the others. He pictured the burner in the basement, roaring, and the pump, running hard. Unlimited heat, available around the clock. Much better than the arrangement in Andrew Peterson’s farmhouse. The old iron wood stove, banked and cooling all night, barely warm by morning.

He stared into space for a second.

He said, ‘Stupid.’

Janet Salter asked him, ‘Who or what?’

‘Me.’

‘Why?’

‘I need to make a phone call.’ He got up and stepped out to the hallway. Spoke to the cop sitting on the bottom stair. Said, ‘I need Andrew Peterson’s home number.’

The cop said, ‘I’m not sure I’m at liberty to give it to you.’

‘Then dial it for me. I won’t look.’

She dialled it for him. Checked that she was getting ring tone, and then handed the receiver to him. Kim Peterson answered. Reacher introduced himself and said, ‘I’m very sorry to disturb you, but I need to speak with Andrew.’

‘He just got home.’

‘I know. I’m sorry. But it’s important.’

There was a long delay. Maybe Kim had to go drag Peterson out of his den. But he came on the line eventually.

‘Problem?’ he asked. ‘The opposite,’ Reacher said. ‘I know where the key is. For the stone building.’

Five to nine in the evening.

Seven hours to go.