by Lee Child
“Who?”
“The how tells us who, I’m afraid. Keever is a prisoner. That’s the only way this thing can work. They found notes in his jacket pocket, maybe torn out from a legal pad, and in one pants pocket they found his wallet, with his driver’s license, which told them his address, which they assumed was where the rest of the legal pad was, maybe with more notes on it, and in the other pants pocket they found his house keys, which meant they could walk right in, even to the extent of these new alarms maybe having a thing you wave near the panel, to turn it off. A remote fob, on the keychain. A transponder. Which would be a mercy, I guess. It would mean they didn’t have to beat the code out of him.”
Chang said, “That’s very blunt.”
“I can’t explain it any other way.”
“It doesn’t tell me who.”
“Mother’s Rest,” Reacher said. “That’s his last known location.”
They went through Keever’s house room by room, in case something had been missed. The mud room held nothing of interest. The kitchen was a plain space, not much used. There was mismatched silverware, and odds and ends of canned food, presumably bought with temporary enthusiasm, but never eaten. There was nothing hidden, unless it had been walled up and artfully painted over with a finish exactly resembling twenty-year-old latex base coat, complete with grease and grime.
The living room and the dining nook were the same. Searching was easy. The guy wasn’t exactly camping out, but it was clear he had started over without much stuff, and hadn’t added a great deal along the way. The guest room with beds looked like it had been set up for his children. Visitation rights. Every other weekend, maybe. Whatever the lawyers had agreed. But Reacher felt the room had never been used.
The master suite smelled slightly sour. There was a bed with a single night table. There was a chest of drawers and a wooden apparatus that had a hanger for a jacket, and trays for watches and coins and wallets. Like in a fancy hotel. The bathroom smelled humid, and the towels were a mess.
The night table had a short stack of magazines, weighted down by a hardcover book. As he passed by, Reacher glanced down to see what it was. Purely out of interest.
He saw three things.
First, the magazine on the top of the pile was the Sunday supplement from the LA Times.
Second, it was only part consumed. There was a quarter-inch of bookmark visible.
Third, the hardcover book was also only part consumed. It had a bookmark, too.
The bookmarks were old slips of memo paper, folded once, lengthwise. They were the first paper Reacher had seen, anywhere in the house.
Chapter 17
The slip of paper in the hardcover book was blank, except for a single scribbled number 4. Which was a number of moderate technical interest, and most famous for being the only number in the entire universe that matched the number of letters in its own word in English: four. But other than that, it didn’t seem to mean much. Not in context.
Chang said, “I’m with the defense attorneys on that one.”
Reacher nodded. But the next one was better. Much better. Purely in terms of function, at first. The LA Times Sunday magazine came open at the start of a long article by science editor Ashley Westwood. It was about how modern advances in treating traumatic brain injuries were giving us a better understanding of the brain itself.
The magazine was less than two weeks old.
Chang said, “The defense attorneys would start by quoting the LA Times’s Sunday circulation.”
Reacher said, “Which is what?”
“Nearly a million, I think.”
“As in, it’s a million-to-one chance this is not a coincidence?”
“That’s what the defense attorneys would say.”
“What would an FBI agent say?”
“We were taught to think ahead. To what the defense attorneys would say.”
Reacher unfolded the bookmark. It was blank on one side.
It wasn’t blank on the other side.
The other side had two lines of handwriting.
At the top was the same 323 telephone number. Science editor Westwood himself, in Los Angeles, California.
At the bottom was written: Mother’s Rest—Maloney.
Reacher asked, “Now what would an FBI agent say?”
Chang said, “Now she would tell the defense attorneys to bite her. Keever is due to call Westwood for corroboration of or information about something to do with the town we were just in. I think that’s clear. Plus now we have a name. There could be people up there named Maloney. After all, we just met the Moynahans.”
“But why was the bookmark at the front of the article?”
“He hasn’t read it yet.”
“Which is why he hasn’t called Westwood yet. Let’s keep an open mind about the client. Let’s just call him passionate. A guy like that, he’s on the phone all the time. He’s telling the same story, to whoever will listen. Mother’s Rest, two hundred deaths, if you don’t believe me call this reporter in LA, and he gives out the hard-won phone number, and every single time Keever jots it all down, over and over again, because that’s the kind of guy he is, which is why we’ve already found that number twice without really trying. So maybe at first this is a nuisance client. Which I’m sure you get.”
“From time to time.”
“But there’s some little thing in what the guy is saying that sets Keever thinking. But he’s still skeptical, so he tries a little test. And this is Oklahoma City, right? He’s likely got to go all the way to the train station to get newspapers from other cities. But he does. He gets the LA Times one Sunday. He wants to see if this expert witness has any kind of credibility. Is he a serious writer, or is he something from a supermarket paper? Keever wants to decide for himself. How long ago was wheat first grown?”
“Depends where,” Chang said. “Thousands of years, anyway.”
“So it turns out Westwood is probably pretty good. He’s done the brain, and now he’s going back thousands of years. This is a smart guy. But Keever doesn’t know that yet. Because he hasn’t read the piece. Which suggests that whatever the client said was intriguing, but somehow not very urgent. Keever didn’t hop right to it.”
“It feels plenty urgent now.”
“Exactly. We need to know what changed.”
It wasn’t a Neighborhood Watch kind of a place, but even so they saw no sense in lingering. They went out through the mud room and pulled the door behind them. They walked around to the driveway and got in the car.
Reacher said, “We should talk to Westwood again.”
“Keever didn’t call him yet,” Chang said. “He has nothing to tell us.”
“Maybe someone else called him. He can tell us about that.”
“Who else?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Chang didn’t answer. She took out her phone, and dialed it, and hit an extra button, and laid it on the armrest between the front seats.
“It’s on speaker,” she said.
Reacher heard the ring tone.
He heard the call answered.
“Hello?” Westwood said.
Reacher said, “Sir, my name is Jack Reacher, and right now I’m working with my colleague Michelle Chang, who spoke to you not long ago.”
“I remember. We agreed her other colleague never called me. Keever, was it? I thought we established that.”
“Yes, we accept that. But now we have a pretty clear indication he was intending to call you at some point in the future. Maybe next on the list, or maybe somewhere down the line.”
Westwood paused a faint distant beat, and said, “Where is this guy now?”
Reacher said, “He’s missing.”
“How? Where is he?”
Reacher said nothing.
Westwood said, “Dumb questions, I suppose.”
“The how part could be crucial. The where part was fairly dumb. If we knew where he was, he wouldn’t be missing.”
“
You should look at the calls he already made, surely. Not the calls he was possibly going to make. At some point in the future.”
“Our information is limited.”
“To what?
“We have to work this thing backward, Mr. Westwood. We think he was about to rely on you for some kind of expert insight or opinion. We need to know what kind of a thing you could have helped him with.”
“I’m a journalist. I’m not an expert on anything.”
“But you’re informed.”
“Anyone who reads my stuff is as informed as I am.”
“I think most readers imagine outtakes get left on the cutting room floor. They assume you know more than was printed. Maybe there was stuff you couldn’t print for legal reasons. And so on. And they assume you like this stuff anyway. And they respect your senior title.”
“Possibly,” Westwood said. “But we’re talking about a conversation that never took place.”
“No, we’re thinking about Keever’s client now. So far we’re picturing a passionate person with time on his hands. We have evidence that he called Keever repeatedly. We get the feeling he’s that type of guy. And clearly there’s an issue he feels strongly about. I said I bet he’s called everyone from the White House downward. And I bet he has. Hundreds of people. Including you. Why wouldn’t he? You’re the science editor of a big newspaper. Maybe you wrote something that had a bearing on his issue. I think maybe he found your number on the internet not to pass on to Keever, not originally, but to talk to you direct. I think he has some weird-ass scientific beef, and he thinks you would understand it. So I think maybe he called you. I think maybe you’ve spoken to him.”
There was a short pause, thousands of miles away, and then Westwood’s voice came back, a little strangled, as if he was fighting a smile. He said, “I work for the LA Times. In Los Angeles. Which is in California. And my number can be found on the internet. All of which on balance is a good thing, but it means I get strange calls all the time. All day and all night. I’ve heard every weird-ass scientific beef there is. People call to talk about aliens and flying saucers and birth and suicide and radiation and mind control, and that’s only the last month alone.”
“Do these calls go in the database?”
“They’re most of the database. Ask any reporter.”
“Can you search by subject?”
“We get lazy about details. These guys ramble on. We use categories, mostly. This type of crank, that type of crank. Sooner or later I block their calls. When they outstay their welcome. I have to sleep sometimes.”
“Try Mother’s Rest.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s the name of a town. Two words. Like your mom sitting down in a chair. Capital letters.”
“Why is it called that?”
“I don’t know,” Reacher said.
They heard keyboard keys clicking, loud on the speakerphone. The database search, presumably. By subject.
Westwood said, “Nothing there.”
“You sure?”
“It’s a fairly distinctive name.”
Reacher said nothing.
Westwood said, “Hey, I’m not saying your guy’s client didn’t call me. He probably did. We all know people like that. I’m saying, how would I know which one he was?”
They drove out of Keever’s dead-end street, and out of his development, and past an outlet mall, to the highway entrance. Five hours to the right was Mother’s Rest, and ten minutes to the left was downtown Oklahoma City, with steakhouses and barbecue, and decent hotels.
But Chang said, “No, we have to go back.”
Chapter 18
Instead of a steakhouse or a barbecue pit they ate in chilly fluorescent silence in a rest-stop facility run by a third-best national chain. Reacher got a cheeseburger in a paper wrapper and coffee in a foam cup. Chang got a salad, in a plastic container as big as a basketball, with a clear lid at the top, and a white bowl underneath. She was stressed and maybe a little tired from driving, but even so she was good company. She put her hair behind her shoulders and turned attacking her salad into a shared misadventure, with widened eyes and about six different kinds of half-smiles, ranging from rueful and self-effacing to amused anticipation, as Reacher picked up his burger and tried to take a bite.
She said, “Thank you for your help so far.”
He said, “You’re welcome.”
“We need to think about a more durable arrangement.”
“Do we?”
“We shouldn’t start out working as a team if I’m going to finish up working alone.”
He said, “You should call 911.”
“It would be a missing persons report. That’s all, at this point. An independent adult, gone for two days, in a business where there’s a lot of short-notice travel. They wouldn’t do anything. We have no evidence to give them.”
“His door.”
“Undamaged. An unlocked door is evidence of homeowner negligence, not foul play.”
“So you want to hire me? How does that work, with the low overhead thing?”
“I just want you to tell me your intentions.”
He said nothing.
She said, “You could get a ride back to OC from here. There would be no hard feelings.”
“I was heading over to Chicago. Before the weather gets cold.”
“Same answer. Hitch back to OC and get the train. Same train you got before. Won’t get delayed again, I’m sure.”
He said nothing. He had come to like her lace-up shoes. They were practical, but they looked good, too. Her jeans were soft and old, and they rode low on her hips. Her T-shirt was black, neither tight nor loose. Her eyes were on his.
He said, “I’ll ride with you. But only if you want me to. This is your business, not mine.”
“I feel bad asking.”
“You’re not asking. I’m offering.”
“I can’t pay you.”
“I already have everything I need.”
“Which is what exactly?”
“A few bucks in my pocket, and four points on the compass.”
“Because I would need to understand your reasons.”
“For what?”
“For helping me.”
“I think people should always help each other.”
“This could go above and beyond.”
“I’m sure we’ve both seen worse.”
She paused a beat.
“Last chance,” she said.
He said, “I’ll ride with you.”
It was dark when they came off the highway. The county road ran onward through the vastness, visible only a headlight’s length ahead, and unrevealed beyond. The little Ford hummed along, bouncing now and then on eroded blacktop, pale wheat stalks strobing by on both sides. Overhead were thin clouds, and a new moon, and a dusting of distant stars.
It was impossible to say when they passed the point where they had left the Moynahans. Every mile looked exactly the same as every other mile. But the dull red pick-up had gone. They saw it nowhere, not on the county road itself, or on the right-left-right-left local turns that led back through the fields to Mother’s Rest. Which they saw a mile away, faint and ghostly in the night, the elevators by far the tallest things in the landscape. They came in on the old trail, through the widest part of town, six low-rise blocks, and they turned on the plaza and drove down to the motel. The light was burning in the office window.
Chang said, “Let the fun begin.”
She parked in the slot under her room and shut down the engine. They paused a moment in the sudden silence, and then they climbed out. They put their hands on their captured guns in their pockets, and stood near the car, in the yellow nighttime half-light, from the glow of the electric bulbs in their bulkhead fixtures, one above every door, and all of them working.
No movement. No sound.
No Moynahans, no posse.
Nothing.
Then a hundred feet away the one-eyed guy came out of
the office.
He hustled over, the same way he had before, waving and gesturing, and when he arrived he fixed his imperfect gaze on the ground, and he took a breath.
“I apologize,” he said. “A mistake was made. It led to a misunderstanding. Room 215 is yours to use, until the other gentleman gets back.”
Chang said nothing.
Reacher said, “Understood.”
The one-eyed guy nodded, as if to seal the deal, and then he turned tail and hustled back. Chang watched him go, and said, “Could be a trap or an ambush.”
“Could be,” Reacher said. “But I don’t think it is. He wouldn’t want fighting inside the actual room itself. The furniture would get busted up, and he would be patching bullet holes in the drywall all winter long.”
“You saying they’ve surrendered?”
“It’s a move in the game.”
“What’s the next move?”
“I don’t know.”
“And when will it come?”
“Tomorrow, probably,” Reacher said. He looked all around, all three sides of the horseshoe, downstairs and upstairs. There was a rim of light around the drapes in room 203. Where the man in the suit had stayed. It had a new occupant.
“Not before dawn,” he said. “That would be my guess.”
“Will you sleep OK?”
“I expect so. Will you?”
“If I don’t, I’ll bang on the wall.”
They went up the metal stairs together, and pulled their keys, and turned their locks, side by side but twenty feet apart, like neighbors getting home from work.
A hundred feet away the one-eyed guy took the lawn chair from outside 102, which was empty, and hauled it over to the spot he had used before, on the sidewalk under his office window. He lined it up and dumped himself down, in the nighttime air, ready to obey the second of the evening’s commands, which had been Watch their rooms all night.
The first command had been Even if they come back, do not under any circumstances rock the boat tonight. Which matter he thought he had handled in a satisfactory manner.
Chapter 19
As before, Reacher sat in his room in the dark, back from the window, invisible from the outside, just watching, this time from a second-floor perspective. Fifteen minutes, then twenty, then thirty. As long as it took, to be sure. The one-eyed guy in his plastic chair was the same pale smudge in the distance, a hundred feet away. The rim of light around 203’s drapes burned steadily. Nothing moved. No cars, no people. No glowing cigarettes in the shadows.