by Lee Child
“Go right through, sir,” she said. “The General will be along in a moment.”
Webster walked into the Chairman’s office and stood waiting. He looked out through the window. The view was magnificent, but it had a strange metallic tint. The window was made of one-way bulletproof Mylar. It was a great view, but the window was on the outside of the building, right next to the River Entrance, so it had to be protected. Webster could see his car, with his driver waiting beside it. Beyond the car was a view of the Capitol, across the Potomac. Webster could see sailboats in the Tidal Basin, with the last of the evening sun glinting low on the water. Not a bad office, Webster thought. Better than mine, he thought.
Meeting with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was a problem for the Director of the FBI. It was one of those Beltway oddities, a meeting where there was no cast-iron ranking. Who was superior? Both were presidential appointees. Both reported to the President through just one intermediary, the Defense Secretary or the Attorney General. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was the highest-ranking military post that the nation had to offer. The Director of the FBI was the highest-ranking law enforcement post. Both men were at the absolute top of their respective greasy poles. But which greasy pole was taller? It was a problem for Webster. In the end, it was a problem for him because the truth was his pole was shorter. He controlled a budget of two billion dollars and about twenty-five thousand people. The Chairman oversaw a budget of two hundred billion and about a million people. Two million, if you added in the National Guard and the Reserves. The Chairman was in the Oval Office about once a week. Webster got there twice a year, if he was lucky. No wonder this guy’s office was better.
The Chairman himself was impressive, too. He was a four-star general whose rise had been spectacular. He had come from nowhere and blitzed upward through the Army just about faster than his tailor could sew the ribbons on his uniform. The guy had ended up lopsided with medals. Then he had been hijacked by Washington and moved in and made the place his own, like it was some military objective. Webster heard his arrival in the anteroom and turned to greet him as he came into the office.
“Hello, General,” he said.
The Chairman sketched a busy wave and grinned.
“You want to buy some missiles?” he said.
Webster was surprised.
“You’re selling them?” he said. “What missiles?”
The Chairman shook his head and smiled.
“Just kidding,” he said. “Arms limitation. Russians have gotten rid of a bomber base in Siberia, so now we’ve got to get rid of the missiles we assigned against it. Treaty compliance, right? Got to play fair. The big stuff, we’re selling to Israel. But we’ve still got about a couple hundred little ones, you know, Stingers, shoulder-launch surface-to-air things. All surplus. Sometimes I think we should sell them to the dope dealers. God knows they’ve got everything else they want. Better weapons than we’ve got, most of them.”
The Chairman talked his way around to his chair and sat down. Webster nodded. He’d seen Presidents do a similar thing, tell a joke, tell a lighthearted story, man to man, get the ice broken, make the meeting work. The Chairman leaned back and smiled.
“So what can I do for you, Director?” he asked.
“We got a report in from Chicago,” Webster said. “Your daughter is missing.”
8
BY MIDNIGHT IN Chicago, the third-floor conference room was set up as a command center. FBI technicians had swarmed all evening, running phone lines into the room and installing computer terminals in a line down the center of the hardwood table. Now at midnight it was dark and cool and quiet. Shiny blackness outside the wall of glass. No scramble to decide which side of the table was better.
Nobody had gone home. There were seventeen agents sprawled in the leather chairs. Even the Bureau lawyer was still there. No real reason for that, but the guy was feeling the same triple-layered response they all were. The Bureau looks after its own. That was layer number one. The Chicago Field Office looks after Holly Johnson. That was layer number two. Not just because of her connections. That had nothing to do with it. Holly was Holly. And if layer number three was what McGrath wanted, McGrath got. If McGrath was worried about Holly, then they all were worried, and they all were going to stay worried until she was found, safe and sound. So they were all still there. Quiet, and worried. Until McGrath came loudly and cheerfully into the room, making a big entrance, smoking like his life depended on it.
“Good news, people, listen up, listen up,” he called out.
He dodged his way through to the head of the table. Murmuring died into sudden silence. Eighteen pairs of eyes followed him.
“We found her,” he called out. “We found her, OK? She’s safe and well. Panic’s over, folks. We can all relax now.”
Eighteen voices started talking all at once. All asking the same urgent questions. McGrath held his hands up for quiet, like a nominee at a rally.
“She’s in the hospital,” he said. “What happened is her surgeon got a window for this afternoon he wasn’t expecting. He called her, she went right over, they took her straight to the OR. She’s fine, she’s convalescing, and she’s embarrassed as all hell for the fuss she’s caused.”
The eighteen voices started up again, and McGrath let them rumble on for a moment. Then he held his hands up again.
“So, panic over, right?” he called out again, smiling.
The rumbling got lighter in tone as relief fueled the voices.
“So, people, home to bed,” McGrath said. “Full working day tomorrow, right? But thanks for being here. From me, and from Holly. Means a lot to her. Brogan and Milosevic, you stay awhile, share out her workload for the rest of the week. The rest of you, goodnight, sleep well, and thanks again, gentlemen.”
Fifteen agents and the lawyer smiled and yawned and stood up. Jostled cheerfully and noisily out of the room. McGrath and Brogan and Milosevic were left scattered in random seats, far from each other. McGrath walked over in the sudden silence to the door. Closed it quietly. Turned back and faced the other two.
“That was all bullshit,” he said. “As I’m sure you both guessed.”
Brogan and Milosevic just stared at him.
“Webster called me,” McGrath said. “And I’m sure you can both guess why. Major, major D.C. involvement. They’re going apeshit down there. VIP kidnap, right? Webster’s been given personal responsibility. He wants total secrecy and minimum numbers. He wants everybody up here off this case right now except me plus a team of two. My choice. I picked the two of you, because you know her best. So it’s the three of us. We deal direct with Webster, and we don’t talk to anybody else at all, OK?”
Brogan stared at him and nodded. Milosevic nodded in turn. They knew they were the obvious choices for the job. But to be chosen by McGrath for any reason was an honor. They knew it, and they knew McGrath knew they knew it. So they nodded again, more firmly. Then there was silence for a long moment. McGrath’s cigarette smoke mingled with the silence up near the ceiling. The clock on the wall ticked around toward half past midnight.
“OK,” Brogan said finally. “So what now?”
“We work all night, is what,” McGrath said. “All day, all night, every day, every night, until we find her.”
He glanced at the two of them. Reviewed his choices. An adequate team, he thought. A good mixture. Brogan was older, drier, a pessimist. A compact man with a tidy, ordered approach, laced with enough imagination to make him useful. An untidy private life, with a girlfriend and a couple of ex-wives somewhere, all costing him big bucks and worry, but it never interfered with his work. Milosevic was younger, less intuitive, flashier, but solid. A permanent sidekick, which was not necessarily a fault. A weakness for big expensive four-wheel-drives, but everybody needs some kind of a hobby. Both of them were medium-term Bureau veterans, with mileage on their clocks and scalps on their belts. Both of them were focused, and neither of them ever bitched about the work or the hours. Or t
he salary, which made them just about unique. An adequate team. They were new to Chicago, but this investigation was not going to stay in Chicago. McGrath was just about sure of that.
“Milo, you figure out her movements,” he said. “Every step, every minute from twelve noon.”
Milosevic nodded vaguely, like he was already lost in doing that.
“Brogan, background checks,” McGrath said. “We need to find some reason here.”
Brogan nodded dourly, like he knew the reason was going to be the beginning and the end of the whole thing.
“I start with the old guy?” he asked.
“Obviously,” McGrath said. “That’s what I would do.”
“OK, which one?” Brogan asked.
“Whichever one,” McGrath replied. “Your choice.”
SEVENTEEN HUNDRED AND two miles away, another executive decision had been taken. A decision about the third carpenter. The employer drove back to the white building in the crew chief’s pickup. The third carpenter had finished up stacking the tools and he took a step forward when he saw the vehicle approaching. Then he stopped in puzzlement when he saw the huge figure at the wheel. He stood, uncertain, while the employer pulled up at the curb and heaved himself out.
“OK?” the employer said to him.
“Where are the guys?” the carpenter asked.
“Something came up,” the employer said.
“Problem?” the guy asked.
He went quiet, because he was thinking about his share of the price. A minority share, for sure, because he was the junior guy, but a minority share of that price was still more cash than he’d seen in a long time.
“You got a saw there?” the employer asked.
The guy just looked at him.
“Dumb question, right?” the employer said. “You’re a carpenter and I’m asking you if you got a saw? Just show me your best saw.”
The guy stood still for a moment, then he ducked down and pulled a power saw from the stack of tools. A big thing in dull metal, wicked circular blade, fresh sawdust caked all around it.
“Crosscut?” the employer asked. “Good for ripping through real tough stuff?”
The guy nodded.
“It does the job,” he said, cautiously.
“OK, here’s the deal,” the employer said. “We need a demonstration.”
“Of the saw?” the guy asked.
“Of the room,” the employer said.
“The room?” the guy repeated.
“Supposed to be nobody can get out of it,” the employer said. “That’s the idea behind it, right?”
“You designed it,” the guy said.
“But did you build it right?” the employer said. “That’s what I’m asking here. We need a trial run. A demonstration to prove it serves its purpose.”
“OK, how?” the guy asked.
“You go in there,” the employer said. “See if you can get out by morning. You built it, right? So you know all the weak spots. If anybody can get out, you can, that’s for damn sure, right?”
The guy was quiet for a long moment. Trying to understand.
“And if I can?” he asked.
The employer shrugged.
“Then you don’t get paid,” he said. “Because you didn’t build it right.”
The guy went quiet again. Wondering if the employer was joking.
“You spot the flaw in my logic?” the employer asked. “The way you’re figuring it right now, it’s in your interest just to sit there on your ass all night, then tomorrow you say to me no sir, I couldn’t get out of there, no sir, not at all.”
The carpenter laughed a short nervous laugh.
“That’s how I was thinking,” he said.
“So what you need is an incentive,” the employer said. “Understand? To make sure you try real hard to get out.”
The carpenter glanced up at the blanked-off second-story corner. When he glanced back down, there was a dull black automatic in the employer’s hand.
“There’s a sack in the truck,” the employer said. “Go get it, OK?”
The carpenter just looked around, astonished. The employer pointed the gun at his head.
“Get the sack,” he said quietly.
There was nothing in the pickup bed. There was a burlap sack on the passenger seat. Wrapped into a package maybe a foot and a half long. It was heavy. Felt like reaching into a freezer at the market and pulling out a side of pig.
“Open it up,” the employer called. “Take a look.”
The carpenter peeled back the burlap. First thing he saw was a finger. Icy white, because the blood had drained. Yellow workman’s calluses standing out, big and obvious.
“I’m going to put you in the room now,” the employer called to him. “You don’t get out by morning, I’m going to do that to you, OK? With your own damn saw, because mine went dull doing those.”
9
REACHER LAY QUIETLY on the dirty straw in his stall in the cow barn. Not asleep, but his body was shut down to the point where he might as well have been. Every muscle was relaxed and his breathing was slow and even. His eyes were closed because the barn was dark and there was nothing to see. But his mind was wide awake. Not racing, but just powering steadily along with that special nighttime intensity you get in the absence of any other distractions.
He was doing two things at once. First, he was keeping track of time. It was nearly two hours since he had last looked at his watch, but he knew what time it was to within about twenty seconds. It was an old skill, born of many long wakeful nights on active service. When you’re waiting for something to happen, you close your body down like a beach house in winter and you let your mind lock onto the steady pace of the passing seconds. It’s like suspended animation. It saves energy and it lifts the responsibility for your heartbeat away from your unconscious brain and passes it on to some kind of a hidden clock. Makes a huge black space for thinking in. But it keeps you just awake enough to be ready for whatever you need to be ready for. And it means you always know what time it is.
The second simultaneous thing Reacher was doing was playing around with a little mental arithmetic. He was multiplying big numbers in his head. He was thirty-seven years and eight months old, just about to the day. Thirty-seven multiplied by three hundred and sixty-five was thirteen thousand five hundred and five. Plus twelve days for twelve leap years was thirteen thousand five hundred and seventeen. Eight months counting from his birthday in October forward to this date in June was two hundred and forty-three days. Total of thirteen thousand seven hundred and sixty days since he was born. Thirteen thousand seven hundred and sixty days, thirteen thousand seven hundred and sixty nights. He was trying to place this particular night somewhere on that endless scale. In terms of how bad it was.
Truth was, it wasn’t the best night he had ever passed, but it was a long way from being the worst. A very long way. The first four or so years of his life, he couldn’t remember anything at all, which left about twelve thousand three hundred nights to account for. Probability was, this particular night was up there in the top third. Without even trying hard, he could have reeled off thousands of nights worse than this one. Tonight, he was warm, comfortable, uninjured, not under any immediate threat, and he’d been fed. Not well, but he felt that came from a lack of skill rather than from active malice. So physically he had no complaints.
Mentally, it was a different story. He was suspended in a vacuum just as impenetrable as the darkness inside the cow barn. The problem was the total lack of information. He was not a guy who necessarily felt uncomfortable with some lack of information. He was the son of a Marine officer and he had lived the military life literally all the way since birth. Therefore confusion and unpredictability were what he was accustomed to. But tonight, there was just too much missing.
He didn’t know where he was. Whether by accident or by design, the three kidnappers had given him absolutely no clue at all where they were headed. It made him feel adrift. His particular
problem was, living the military life from birth, out of those thirteen thousand seven hundred and sixty days of his life, he’d spent probably much less than a fifth of them actually inside the United States. He was as American as the President, but he’d lived and served all over the world most of his life. Outside the United States. It had left him knowing his own country about as well as the average seven-year-old knows it. So he couldn’t decode the subtle rhythms and feel and smells of America as well as he wanted to. It was possible that somebody else could interpret the unseen contours of the invisible landscape or the feel of the air or the temperature of the night and say yes, I’m in this state now or that state now. It was possible people could do that. But Reacher couldn’t. It gave him a problem.
Added to that he had no idea who the kidnappers were. Or what their business was. Or what their intentions were. He’d studied them closely, every opportunity he’d had. Conclusions were difficult. The evidence was all contradictory. Three of them, youngish, maybe somewhere between thirty and thirty-five, fit, trained to act together with a measure of efficiency. They were almost military, but not quite. They were organized, but not official. Their appearance shrieked: amateurs.
Because they were so neat. They all had new clothes, plain chain store cottons and poplins, fresh haircuts. Their weapons were fresh out of the box. The Glocks were brand-new. The shotgun was brand-new, packing grease still visible. Those factors meant they weren’t any kind of professionals. Because professionals do this stuff every day. Whoever they are, Special Forces, CIA, FBI, detectives, it’s their job. They wear working clothes. They use weapons they signed out last year, the year before, tried and trusted weapons, chipped weapons, scratched weapons, working tools. Put three professionals together on any one day, and you’ll see last night’s pizza on one guy’s shirt, another guy won’t have shaved, the third guy will be wearing the awful old pants his buddies make jokes about behind his back. It’s possible you’ll see a new jacket once in a while, or a fresh gun, or new shoes, but the chances of seeing everything new all at once on three working professionals on the same day are so slim as to be absurd.