23 Past Tense

by Lee Child

  Reacher stood for a second more, and then he turned again and blundered his way back to where Burke was waiting, on the other side of the fat rubber wire, next to the Subaru’s front fender. They got in the car and Burke backed up slowly, craning his neck, all the way to where the track met the road, where the wide gravel mouth gave him room to turn, either way.

  “East to the lakes?” he said.

  “No,” Reacher said. “South until your cell phone works. I want to call Amos.”

  “Something wrong?”

  “I want an update on Carrington.”

  “You asked a lot of questions at the motel.”

  “Did I?”

  “Like you were suspicious.”

  “I’m always suspicious.”

  “Were you happy with the answers?”

  “The front part of my brain thought the answers were fine. They all made perfect sense. They were all plausible. They all had the ring of truth.”

  “But?”

  “The back part of my brain didn’t like that place very much.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. Every question had an answer.”

  “So it’s just a feeling.”

  “It’s a sense. Like smell. Like waking up for a prairie fire.”

  “But you can’t pin it down.”

  “No.”

  They drove on, south. Reacher watched the phone. Still no service.

  —

  Afterward Peter nearly collapsed from tension. He let the two men out, and then he backed up and turned and hustled home as fast as he dared. He drove straight to the house. He ran through to the parlor, where he leaned on the wall, and then he slid down until he was sitting on the floor. The others crowded around him, crouching eye to eye, silent, as if in awe, and then they all burst out in a fist-pumping hiss of triumph, like a winning touchdown had been scored on TV.

  Peter said, “Did the customers see anything?”

  “Nothing at all,” Mark said. “We got lucky with the timing. The customers were all in here. Thirty minutes earlier would have been a problem. They were still milling around in the lot, shooting the shit.”

  “When are we going to explain the situation to Patty and Shorty?”

  “Do you have a preference?”

  “I think we should do it now. The timing would be right. It would give them enough hours to make some choices, and then start doubting them. Their emotional state will be important.”

  “I vote yes,” Steven said.

  “Me too,” Robert said.

  “Me three,” Mark said. “One for all and all for one. We’ll do it now. We should let Peter do it himself. As a way of thanking him for his performance. As a reward.”

  “I vote yes on that too,” Steven said.

  “And me,” Robert said.

  Peter said, “First let me get my breath back.”

  Chapter 33

  Patty and Shorty had migrated to the main room, and were sitting on the bed. The blind was still down. They had skipped lunch. They couldn’t face it. Now they were hungry. But eating would be an act of will. The last two meals from the carton. The last two bottles of water.

  They looked away.

  The TV turned on.

  All by itself.

  The same as before. The same tiny rustle as the circuit came to life. The same bright blue picture, with the same line of code, like the screen you weren’t supposed to see.

  It was replaced by a man’s face.

  Peter.

  The weasel who had screwed with their car.

  He said, “Guys, you’ve been asking what’s going to happen, and we think now is the time to bring you up to speed. We’re going to give you as much information as we can, and then we’re going to let you think on it, and then we’ll come back later for questions and answers, just in case something wasn’t clear. Are you with me so far? Are you paying attention?”

  Neither of them answered.

  Peter said, “Guys, I need your attention. This is important.”

  “Like fixing our car?” Shorty said.

  “You fell for it, pal. That’s why you’re here. Your own fault. Since then you’ve been bitching and moaning about what we want with you, and now I’m going to tell you, so you need to face front and listen up.”

  “I’m listening,” Patty said.

  “Come sit side by side on the end of the bed. Show me how you’re paying attention. Watch my face on the screen.”

  Patty was still for a second. Then she shuffled around. Shorty followed her. Didn’t want to, but he did all the same. They sat shoulder to shoulder, like the front row at the movies.

  “Good,” Peter said. “Smart move. Are you ready to hear what happens next?”

  “Yes,” Patty said.

  Shorty said, “I guess.”

  “Later this evening your door will unlock. At that point you will be free to walk away. But I mean that literally. No vehicles of any kind will be available. None at all. Every single key will be hidden where you won’t find it, except of course your own, which you still have, but your car doesn’t work anyway, as you mentioned. All the other vehicles here are too new to hot wire. So get used to it. You’ll be walking, literally, on your own two feet. Do not waste time trying to avoid it. Are you with me so far?”

  “Why are you doing this?” Patty said. “Why keep us here and then just let us go?”

  “I told you I would give you as much information as I could. I said you should think on it. I said you should save your questions for later. Are you with me so far?”

  “Yes,” Patty said.

  Shorty said, “I guess.”

  “All around this piece of forest is what looks like a firebreak. It’s a hoop about sixty feet across, with no trees growing. Did you see it on the way in?”

  There was a bar of bright pink open sky .

  “I saw it,” Patty said.

  “It’s not actually a firebreak. Mark’s grandfather cleared it for a different purpose. To keep the inner forest primeval. It’s a seed break, really, not a firebreak. It runs all the way around. Doesn’t matter which way the wind is blowing. Invasive species can’t make it across.”

  “So what?” Shorty said.

  “You walk all the way there, through the woods, in any direction, and you step out in that gap, in any location, and you’ve won the game.”

  “What game?”

  “Was that a question?”

  “I call bullshit, man. You can’t tell us we’re in a game, and then not tell us what kind.”

  “Think of it like a game of tag. You have to make it all the way to the seed break without getting tagged. Simple as that. Walking, running, creeping along, whatever works for you.”

  “Tagged how?” Patty said. “By who?”

  The TV turned off.

  All by itself. The same dying rustle of circuits, the same blank gray screen, the same standby light glowing red.

  —

  Burke’s old phone showed a bar, but Reacher wanted to wait for two. He figured the signal might fluctuate, plus or minus. Starting with just one bar would be a problem, when it came to the minus part. His experience was with army comms, which always failed first and fastest. Presumably civilians had better stuff, as always, but presumably not radically better.

  Burke ignored him and drove on south, and after five minutes of silence he asked, “How’s the back part of your brain doing now?”

  Reacher checked the phone.

  Still one bar.

  He said, “The back part of my brain is worried about the organic jute carpets.”

  “Why?”

  “He said he was trying to be sustainable. He sounded partly proud, and partly apologetic, and partly defiant. A very typical tone, for people into things other people think are weird. But he was clearly sincere, because he was putting his money where his mouth was, by paying Boston prices for specialist cleaning. As if he really wanted to make the experiment work. At that point he presented a coherent p
icture.”

  “But?”

  “Later he said maybe the Canadian guy had dumped his car to avoid recycling fees at home. Or whatever. He said, I’m sure there are environmental regulations. He said it with a kind of smug sneer. Just very slightly. He sounded like a regular person. Not like a guy who would use organic jute. Or even know what it was. Then he showed up in an SUV with a V8 motor. And he drove it pretty fast. In a boyish way. He seemed to like thumping up and down over things. Not like a guy who would use organic jute. That guy would drive a hybrid car. Or electric. I felt the picture was no longer coherent. I felt now it was out of focus.”

  “What does the front part of your brain say about it?”

  “It says follow the money. The guy is paying a Persian carpet cleaner to take care of his rugs. All the way from Boston. That’s hard cash. That’s solid evidence. What have I got? A feeling? A sneer I might have misheard? Maybe he needs the SUV for the snow. A jury would say the bulk of the evidence is all one way. He’s a good guy. He wants to save the planet. Or at least help a little bit.”

  “I agree with the jury,” Burke said. “Better to trust the front of your brain than the back.”

  Reacher said nothing.

  He checked the phone.

  Two bars.

  He said, “I’m going to call Amos now.”

  “Want me to stop?”

  “Does it help the phone?”

  “I think it does. I think it locks on better.”

  Burke coasted a spell and pulled over where the gravel was wide.

  Reacher dialed the number.

  “Call me back in ten,” Amos said. “I’m real busy right now.”

  “Have you found Carrington?”

  “Negative on that. Call me back.”

  —

  The payment process turned into a ritual of understated magnificence. It started casual and became exquisitely formal. It felt ancient in its origins. Greek or Roman at least. Maybe tribal. Steven stayed in the parlor, watching the screens, and everyone else walked back to the motel, a bustling crowd of nine, six customers excited but restrained, plus Mark and Peter and Robert behind them. The customers went to their rooms. Mark and Peter and Robert went to the office. Where the process evolved, out of nothing. There and then. They had no plan. No thought had been given. There was a danger of jinxing. In the end it was a five-second commonsense decision. The obvious thing to do.

  But epic in its drama. In its psychological freight. Mark sat behind the counter. Peter stood at the end. Side on. Halfway between. As if independent. Like a witness.

  Robert was the escort. He went to get them. One at a time. The legend was born right there. He knocked on the door, and they came out and went with him. He was the Praetorian Guard, and they were the great gentlemen. They were the senators. They went with him, down the boardwalk. They had no choice. He stayed a respectful half step behind. In the office he stood at the door and saw nothing.

  One by one they stepped forward and paid their tribute, to Mark, with Peter as a witness, to the transaction, to their bending of the knee. Some counted out bricks of money, prolonging the moment. Others set their bags on the counter, and stepped back, expecting instant and unquestioning acceptance. Which they got. The money would be there. All of it. They couldn’t afford to cheat. Then one by one Robert walked them back, and knocked on the next door along. Both casual and formal, like the deadly business of an ancient republic.

  Karel got a healthy discount, for helping out the day before, but the other five paid sticker. At the end of the ritual Mark chose the two biggest of the abandoned bags, and Peter packed them. Not easy. To get five and a half bags’ worth of cash into two actual bags required ingenious layering. The others crowded around. Mark counted out loud as Peter stacked the bricks. But not in numbers. At first he said, overhead, overhead , as the first few bricks went in, and then profit, profit, profit , as the rest went in. They turned it into a kind of whispered chant. Quiet, so the sound wouldn’t carry. They hissed profit, profit, profit . Then they carried the bags back to the house, past all the windows, kind of hoping the great gentlemen were watching them do it. Watching their tribute, humbly and justly given, being carried away by the victor.

  —

  Peter had said they should think on it, and they had, not because he told them, but because it was their natures. It was the Saint Leonard way. Engage brain. Think before you speak. Begin at the beginning.

  Patty whispered, “Obviously they’re tricking us somehow. It must be impossible to get to the break in the trees.”

  “It can’t be impossible.”

  “It must be.”

  “Against how many people?”

  “We’ve seen three. There are twelve rooms, less this one. Nine quad-bikes. Pick a number.”

  “You think they’ll use the quad-bikes?”

  “I’m sure they will. I think that’s why Peter emphasized we would be walking. To make us feel helpless and inferior. Like underdogs.”

  “Call it nine people, then. They can’t cover it all. It’s a huge area.”

  “I saw on the map,” Patty said. “It’s about five miles across, and about seven from top to bottom. Shaped like an oval. This place is about half a mile off-center, toward the east. It’s about equal north and south.”

  “Then it might be possible. There would be one of them every forty degrees of the circle. They could be a hundred yards apart. If we got in the space behind them, we’d be home free.”

  “It can’t be possible,” Patty said. “Because then what? We make it to a road, we get a ride, we call the cops and the FBI, because of the kidnapping and the false imprisonment, and they pay a visit, and they see the battery cable and the prison bars and the locks and the cameras and the microphones. I don’t think Peter and his buddies can afford for that to happen. They can’t afford for us to get out of here. Doesn’t matter how we try. Any method at all. They really cannot afford for us to make it. They must be totally confident we won’t.”

  Shorty didn’t answer. They sat side by side in the gloom. Patty had her hands palm-down on the bed, under her legs. She was rocking back and forth, just a little, and staring ahead at nothing. Shorty had his elbows on his knees, and his chin propped in his hands. He was sitting still. Trying to think.

  Then all at once the room lit up bright, every fixture, every table lamp, like a movie set, and the motor whirred and the blind rolled up in the window. Outside they saw a line of six men. On the boardwalk. Shoulder to shoulder. An inch from the glass. Staring in. Karel was one of them. The weasel with the tow truck. Three of them they had seen before. Two were new.

  The six of them stared on and on. Openly, frankly, no inhibition at all. From her to him, and him to her. They were judging, and evaluating, and assessing. They were reaching conclusions. Tight grimaces of quiet satisfaction appeared on faces. There were slow nods of appreciation and approval. There were gleams in eyes, of enthusiasm.

  Then on some unspoken cue they raised their hands and clapped, long and loud, a standing ovation, as if they were a respectful audience saluting star performers.

  But somehow in advance.

  Chapter 34

  Ten minutes later Reacher dialed Amos again. She answered. She sounded out of breath.

  He said, “What’s up?”

  “False alarm,” she said. “We got a maybe on Carrington. But it was two hours old and nothing came of it. We still can’t find him.”

  “Did you find Elizabeth Castle?”

  “Her neither.”

  “I should come back to town,” Reacher said.

  Amos paused a beat.

  “No,” she said. “We’re still in the game. The computer is watching the red light cameras. Nothing that came in from the south in the second wave this morning has gone back out again yet. We think Carrington is still in the area.”

  “Which is why you need me there. No point coming back after they take him away.”

  “No,” she said again.


  “What was the maybe?”

  “Allegedly he was seen entering the county offices. But no one else remembers him, and he isn’t there now.”

  “Was he alone, or with Elizabeth Castle?”

  “It was hard to say. It was a busy time of day. Lots of people. Hard to say who was with who.”

  “Was it the census archive?”

  “No, something else. The county has offices all over town.”

  “Did you get a minute for ancient history?”

  She paused again.

  “It was longer than a minute,” she said.

  “What did you find?”

  “I need advice before I tell you. From Carter Carrington, ironically.”

  “Why?”

  “You asked for unsolved cases. I found one. It has no statute of limitations.”

  “You found an unsolved homicide?”

  “Therefore technically it’s still an open case.”

  “When was it?”

  “Within the dates you specified.”

  “I wasn’t born yet. I can’t be a witness. Certainly I can’t be a perpetrator. Talking to me is no legal hazard.”

  “It has implications for you.”

  “Who was the victim?”

  “You know who the victim was.”

  “Do I?”

  “Who else could it be?”

  “The kid,” Reacher said.

  “Correct,” Amos said. “Last seen face down on the sidewalk, late one September evening in 1943. Then later he shows up again, now twenty-two years old, just as much of an asshole as he was before, and he gets killed. The two files were never connected. I guess there was a lot going on back then. It was wartime. Detectives came and went. They didn’t have computers. But today’s rules say the first file makes a material difference to the second file. Which it does, no question. We can’t pretend we haven’t seen it. Therefore we’re obliged to re-open the homicide as a cold case. Just to see where it goes. Before we close it again.”