They took a green vinyl chair each and settled in. The little lobby smelled of chlorine disinfectant, and it was silent. There was no sound at all except for a faint rush of water in pipes and a distant electronic pulse from a machine in another room. Nobody said anything but everyone seemed to know they were in for a long slow process. No point in starting out impatient. Reacher sat opposite Mary Mason and watched her. She was relatively young, for an expert. She seemed warm and open. She had chosen eyeglasses with large frames so that her eyes could be clearly seen. Her eyes looked kind and welcoming, and reassuring. How much of that was bedside manner and how much was for real, Reacher didn’t know.
“How do you do this?” he asked her.
“The assessment?” she said. “I start out assuming it’s more likely to be real than fake. A brain injury bad enough for a two-day coma almost always produces amnesia. Those data were settled long ago. Then I just watch the patient. True amnesiacs are very unsettled by their condition. They’re disoriented and frightened. You can see them really trying to remember. They want to remember. Fakers show up different. You can see them avoiding the days in question. They look away from them mentally. Sometimes even physically. There’s often some distinctive body language.”
“Kind of subjective,” Reacher said.
Mason nodded. “It is basically subjective. It’s very hard to prove a negative. You can use brain scans to show differing brain activity, but what the scans actually mean is still subjective. Hypnotism is sometimes useful, but courts are scared of hypnotism, generally. So yes, I’m in the opinion business, nothing more.”
“Who does the prosecution hire?”
“Someone exactly like me. I’ve worked both sides of the fence.”
“So it’s he said, she said?”
Mason nodded again. “It’s usually about which of us has more letters after her name. That’s what juries respond to.”
“You’ve got a lot of letters.”
“More than most people,” Mason said.
“How much will he have forgotten?”
“Several days, minimum. If the trauma happened Saturday, I’d be very surprised if he remembers anything after Wednesday. Before that there’ll be a shadowy period just about as long where he remembers some things and not others. But that’s the minimum. I’ve seen cases where months are missing, sometimes after concussions, not even comas.”
“Will anything come back?”
“From the initial shadowy period, possibly. He might be able to work backward from the last thing he remembers, through the preceding few days. He might be able to pick out a few previous incidents. Working forward, he’ll be much more limited. If he remembers his last lunch, he might eventually get as far as dinner. If he remembers being out at a movie, he might eventually recall driving home. But there’ll be a hard boundary somewhere. Typically it would be when he went to sleep on the last day he’s aware of.”
“Will he remember fourteen years ago?”
Mason nodded. “His long-term memory should be unimpaired. Different people seem to have different internal definitions of long- term, because there seems to be a literal chemical migration from one part of the brain to another, and no two brains are identical. The physical biology isn’t well understood. People like to use computer metaphors now, but that’s all wrong. It’s not about hard drives and random access memory. The brain is entirely organic. It’s like throwing a bag of apples down the stairs. Some bruise, some don’t. But I would say fourteen years counts as long-term for just about anybody.”
The waiting area went quiet. Reacher listened to the distant electronic pulse. It was a sinus rhythm, he guessed, from a machine that was either monitoring a heartbeat or causing one. It was running at about seventy beats a minute. It was a restful sound. He liked it. Then a door opened halfway down a corridor and Rosemary Barr stepped out of a room. She was showered and her hair was brushed but she looked thin and exhausted and sleepless and ten years older than the day before. She stood still for a moment and then looked right, looked left, and walked slowly toward the waiting area. Helen Rodin got up and went to meet her halfway. They stood together, talking low. Reacher couldn’t hear what they were saying. A two-way progress report, he guessed, first medical, then legal. Then Helen took Rosemary’s arm and led her onward to the group. Rosemary looked at the two psychiatrists, at Alan Danuta, at Reacher. She said nothing. Then she walked on alone toward the security desk. Didn’t look back.
“Avoidance,” Niebuhr said. “We’re all here to poke and prod at her brother, physically, mentally, legally, metaphorically. That’s invasive and unattractive. And to acknowledge us means to acknowledge her brother’s jeopardy.”
“Maybe she’s just tired,” Reacher said.
“I’m going in to see him now,” Helen said.
She walked back up the corridor and went into the room Rosemary had come out of. Reacher watched her until he heard the door close. Then he turned back to Niebuhr.
“Seen this kind of thing before?” he asked him.
“Coercion? Have you seen it before?”
Reacher smiled. Every psychiatrist he had ever met liked to answer questions with questions. Maybe they were taught to, day one at psychiatry school.
“I’ve seen it a lot,” he said.
“But?”
“Usually there was more evidence of a dire threat.”
“A threat against the sister isn’t dire? You came up with that hypothesis yourself, I believe.”
“His sister hasn’t been kidnapped. She’s not a prisoner somewhere. He could have arranged to have her safeguarded. Or told her to get out of town.”
“Exactly,” Niebuhr said. “We can only conclude that he was instructed not to do any such thing. Evidently he was told to leave her open, and ignorant, and vulnerable. That demonstrates to us how powerful the coercion must have been. And it demonstrated to him how powerful it was. And it demonstrated to him how powerless he was in comparison. Every day. He must have been living with deep dread, and helplessness, and guilt for his obedience.”
“Ever seen a rational man afraid enough to do what he did?”
“Yes,” Niebuhr said.
“Me too,” Reacher said. “Once or twice.”
“The threatener must be a real monster. Although I’d expect to see other factors present, as enhancers, or multipliers. Very likely a recent relationship, some kind of dependency, an infatuation, a desire to please, to impress, to be valued, to be loved.”
“A woman?”
“No, you don’t kill people to impress women. That usually has the opposite effect. This will be a man. Seductive, but not in a sexual way. Compelling, somehow.”
“An alpha male and a beta male.”
“Exactly,” Niebuhr said again. “With any final reluctance resolved by the threat to the sister. Possibly Mr. Barr was never entirely sure whether the threat was a joke or for real. But he chose not to test it. Human motivation is very complex. Most people don’t really know why they do things.”
“That’s for sure.”
“Do you know why you do things?”
“Sometimes,” Reacher said. “Other times I don’t have the faintest idea. Maybe you could tell me.”
“I’m normally very expensive. That’s why I can afford to do things like this for nothing.”
“Maybe I could pay you five bucks a week, like rent.”
Niebuhr smiled uncertainly.
“Uh, no,” he said. “I don’t think so.”
Then the waiting area went quiet again and stayed quiet for ten long minutes. Danuta stretched his legs way out and worked on papers inside an open briefcase that he kept balanced on his knees. Mason had her eyes closed and might have been asleep. Niebuhr stared into space. The three of them were clearly accustomed to waiting. As was Reacher himself. He had been a military cop for thirteen years, and Hurry Up and Wait was the real MP motto. Not Assist, Protect, Defend. He focused on the distant electronic heartbeat, and passed the time.
Grigor Linsky turned his car around and watched the hospital doors in his mirror. Made a bet with himself that nothing would happen for at least sixty minutes. At least sixty, but not more than ninety. Then he rehearsed an order of priority in case they didn’t all come out together. Who should he ignore and who should he tail? In the end he decided to stick with whoever acted alone. He figured that was most likely to be the soldier. His guess was the lawyers and the doctors would head back to the office. They were predictable. The soldier wasn’t.
Helen Rodin came out of James Barr’s room fifteen minutes after she went in. She walked straight back to the waiting area. Everyone looked at her. She looked at Mary Mason.
“Your turn,” she said. Mason stood up and walked away down the corridor. She took nothing with her. No briefcase, no paper, no pen. Reacher watched her until Barr’s door closed behind her. Then he leaned back in his chair, in the silence.
“I liked him,” Helen said, to nobody in particular.
“How is he?” Niebuhr asked.
“Weak,” Helen said. “Smashed up. Like he got hit by a truck.”
“Is he making sense?”
“He’s coherent. But he doesn’t remember anything. And I don’t think he’s faking.”
“How far back is he blanking?”
“I can’t tell. He remembers listening to a baseball game on the radio. Could have been last week or last month.”
“Or last year,” Reacher said.
“Did he accept your representation?” Danuta asked.
“Verbally,” Helen said. “He can’t sign anything. He’s handcuffed to the bed.”
“Did you walk him through the charges and the evidence?”
“I had to,” Helen said. “He wanted to know why I thought he needed a lawyer.”
“And?”
“He assumes he’s guilty.”
There was silence for a moment. Then Alan Danuta closed his briefcase and took it off his knees and put it on the floor. Sat up straight, fast, all in one fluid movement.
“Welcome to the gray areas,” he said. “This is where good law comes from.”
“Nothing good about it,” Helen said. “Not so far.”
“We absolutely cannot let him go to trial. The government injured him through its own negligence and now it wants to put him on trial for his life? I don’t think so. Not if he can’t even remember the day in question. What kind of a defense could he conduct?”
“My father will have kittens.”
“Obviously. We’ll have to cut him out. We’ll have to go straight to federal court. It’s a Bill of Rights issue anyway. Federal, then Appeals, then the Supremes. That’s the process.”
“That’s a long process.”
Danuta nodded.
“Three years,” he said. “If we’re lucky. The most applicable precedent is Wilson, and that case took three and a half years. Almost four.”
“And we’ve got no guarantee of winning. We might lose.”
“In which case we’ll go to trial down the road and we’ll do the best we can.”
“I’m not qualified for this,” Helen said.
“Intellectually? That’s not what I heard.”
“Tactically and strategically. And financially.”
“There are veterans’ associations that can help with the money. Mr. Barr served his country, after all. With honor.”
Helen didn’t reply to that. Just glanced Reacher’s way. Reacher said nothing. He turned away and stared at the wall. He was thinking: This guy is going to get away with murder again? Twice?
Alan Danuta moved in his chair.
“There is an alternative,” he said. “Not very exciting legally, but it’s out there.”
“What is it?” Helen asked.
“Give your father the puppet master. Under these circumstances, half a loaf is better than none. And the puppet master is the better half anyway.”
“Would he go for it?”
“You know him better than I do, presumably. But he’d be a fool not to go for it. He’s looking at a minimum three-year appeals process before he even gets Mr. Barr inside a courtroom. And any prosecutor worth his salt wants the bigger fish.”
Helen glanced at Reacher again.
“The puppet master is only a theory,” she said. “We don’t have anything that even remotely resembles evidence.”
“Your choice,” Danuta said. “But one way or the other, you can’t let Barr go to trial.”
“One step at a time,” Helen said. “Let’s see what Dr. Mason thinks.”
Dr. Mason came back twenty minutes later. Reacher watched her walk. The length of her stride and the look in her eyes and the set of her jaw told him she had arrived at a firm conclusion. There was no uncertainty there. No diffidence, no doubt. None at all. She sat back down and smoothed her skirt across her knees.
“Permanent retrograde amnesia,” she said. “Completely genuine. As clear a case as I ever saw.”
“Duration?” Niebuhr asked.
“Major League Baseball will tell us that,” she said. “The last thing he remembers is a particular Cardinals game. But my bet would be a week or more, counting backward from today.”
“Which includes Friday,” Helen said.
“I’m afraid so.”
“OK,” Danuta said. “There it is.”
“Great,” Helen said. She stood up and the others joined her and they all moved around and ended up facing the exit, either consciously or unconsciously; Reacher wasn’t sure. But it was clear that Barr was behind them, literally and figuratively. He had changed from being a man to being a medical specimen and a legal argument.
“You guys go on ahead,” he said.
“You’re staying here?” Helen asked.
Reacher nodded.
“I’m going to look in on my old buddy,” he said.
“Why?”
“I haven’t seen him for fourteen years.”
Helen stepped away from the others and came close.
“No, why?” she asked quietly.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not going to switch his machines off.”
“I hope you’re not.”
“I can’t,” he said. “I don’t have much of an alibi, do I?”
She stood still for a moment. Said nothing. Then she stepped back and joined the others. They all left together. Reacher watched them process out at the security desk, and as soon as they were through the steel door and in the elevator lobby he turned around and walked down the corridor to James Barr’s door. He didn’t knock. Just paused a beat and turned the handle and went inside.
CHAPTER 7
The room was overheated. You could have roasted chickens in it. There was a wide window with white venetian blinds closed against the sun. They glowed and filled the room with soft white light. There was medical equipment piled everywhere. A silent respirator, disconnected. IV stands and heart monitors. Tubes and bags and wires.
Barr was flat on his back in a bed in the middle of the room. No pillow. His head was clamped in a brace. His hair was shaved and he had bandages over the holes they had drilled in his skull. His left shoulder was wrapped in bandages that reached to his elbow. His right shoulder was bare and unmarked. The skin there was pale and thin and marbled. His chest and his sides were bandaged. The bedsheet was folded down at his waist. His arms were straight at his sides and his wrists were handcuffed to the cot rails. He had IV needles taped to the back of his left hand. There was a peg on his right middle finger that was connected by a gray wire to a box. There were red wires leading out from under the bandages on his chest. They led to a machine with a screen. The screen was showing a rolling pattern that reminded Reacher of the cellular company’s recording of the gunshots. Sharp peaks, and long troughs. The machine made a muted beep every time a peak hit the screen.
“Who’s there?” Barr asked.
His voice was weak and rusty, and slow. And scared.
“Who’s there?” he asked again
. The way his head was clamped limited his field of vision. His eyes were moving, left and right, up and down.
Reacher stepped closer. Leaned over the bed. Said nothing.
“You,” Barr said.
“Me,” Reacher said.
“Why?”
“You know why.”
Barr’s right hand trembled. The motion put a ripple in the wire from the peg. The handcuff moved against the bed rail and made a quiet metallic sound.
“I guess I let you down,” he said.
“I guess you did.”
Reacher watched Barr’s eyes, because they were the only part of him that could move. He was incapable of body language. His head was immobile and most of the rest of him was trussed up like a mummy.
“I don’t remember anything,” Barr said.
“You sure?”
“It’s all blank.”
“You clear on what I’ll do to you if you’re bullshitting me?”
“I can guess.”
“Triple it,” Reacher said.
“I’m not bullshitting,” Barr said. “I just can’t remember anything.” His voice was quiet, helpless, confused. Not a defense, not a complaint. Not an excuse. Just a statement of fact, like a lament, or a plea, or a cry.
“Tell me about the ballgame,” Reacher said.
“It was on the radio.”
“Not the TV?”
“I prefer the radio,” Barr said. “For old times’ sake. That’s how it always was. When I was a kid. The radio, all the way from St. Louis. All those miles. Summer evenings, warm weather, the sound of baseball on the radio.”
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