As always he had decent shoes, and for once he had a decent coat, so the weather didn’t bother him. He had known colder. Korea in the winter, and the advanced units on the German plain. And some American bases. Baltimore in February was balmy by comparison. But even so, he couldn’t afford an all-nighter. In the summertime he could sleep under a bridge. But not in February, however balmy. Happily the traffic was heavy. Rush hour, all across the civilized world. Lots of potential benefactors. But Reacher was a large man, and not especially attractive. Lots of rejection, too, for all kinds of gut-level reasons.
But the sheer weight of numbers and the overall odds were with him, and, sure enough, inside an hour and twenty minutes a guy in a rental Impala pulled over and agreed to take him as far as Savannah, Georgia, right then, a straight shot, as late as it took. Maybe conversation would keep the guy awake. That seemed to be the motive behind the offer. So Reacher climbed in, and they took off. The driver was a dark fleshy man who could have been forty. He had a black five o’clock shadow against what in better days would have been pale and papery skin, but was now dark red and swollen with capillaries. Which was a problem all its own. Reacher could stop the guy falling asleep, but he couldn’t keep him alive from a heart attack. He wasn’t a doctor.
There was no conversation at first. The guy had the radio playing, on a mostly sports talk station, where all kinds of mostly wonderful things were happening. Then at eight o’clock a different voice in a different acoustic read out the local news from Baltimore, just as they were leaving it, and then the voice called upon expert opinion to expand on and explain the news, in the form of respectful conversation, as if between the best of friends. Reacher tuned it out, until he heard a name he knew, and then one he didn’t.
The anchor asked a question, and the expert answered, “You’re absolutely right; to understand this case, you have to understand the Calder Massee case, and some say the dispute about that case’s original findings has now gone on so long we should take the issue seriously at last. The official line has always been suicide, and indeed the government’s last communication on the subject dates from four years ago, when it said it welcomed what it called Dr. Temperance Brennan’s meticulous and independent analysis, which as expected confirmed conclusions made at the time, and therefore the case was now closed.”
Reacher had never heard the word Temperance used as a name before.
The anchor said, “But Jonathan Yeow claimed it was more than a dispute. He claimed to have definitive proof that Massee was executed.”
The expert said, “You’re absolutely right, even to the point where there was a strong rumor Yeow had an actual copy of the illegal 1987 order to deploy the assassin. And don’t forget, Yeow was a very well respected reporter. He was from the Washington Post. He was the heir to a grand tradition. What he was going to say would have carried some weight. If he was right, Dr. Brennan was either ordered or coerced or bribed to falsify her second autopsy, and if that was true, her career would be over. All her previous testimony would be worthless. She would be a laughingstock. I mean, just this morning she gave the keynote at their convention at the Marriott Wardman down there in D.C., telling hundreds of other forensic scientists to keep it reliable, and relevant, and real.”
“Is that enough reason for homicide?”
“Professional ruin is a powerful motivator. Stranger things have happened. And sources inside the FBI suggest there is physical evidence, perhaps in the form of fingerprints.”
“But Dr. Brennan hasn’t been formally arrested.”
“Before she even left the convention ballroom, she hired Veronica Luong. Brennan’s supporters say that’s appropriate, in terms of their respective professional achievements, but others say you don’t hire the hottest hotshot in town unless you’re in trouble. Either way it seems Luong negotiated a special arm’s-length own-recognizance relationship with the FBI, at least for these initial stages of the investigation. Some are calling that a professional courtesy, and others are calling it the start of another cover-up.”
Then the anchor moved on, to the price of gas.
Reacher looked at the driver and said, “I’m sorry, I have to get out now. I changed my mind. I’m not going to Savannah anymore. I’m going to D.C. instead.”
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2100 EST
REACHER GOT A BUS ON Georgia avenue and got out where he thought the convention hotels might be. He asked a girl passing by if she knew the Marriott Wardman, and she did what they all did, thumbs flashing over a thin flat telephone the size of a paperback book, and then she showed him the screen, which represented their current location as a blue pulse, and the Wardman as a red blob, like the plastic head of a pushpin shoved in a map. South and west, two blocks down and three blocks over.
It was a big brassy place, with a lobby the size of a football field, still busy in the middle of the evening. Reacher figured however courteous and arm’s-length Brennan’s current relationship with the FBI might be, it would inevitably include a don’t-leave-town provision, which meant extra nights in her convention room, plus no doubt a deal breaker on the FBI’s part, in the form of an agent right outside her door, just in case she decided to run for it. No hotshot lawyer could negotiate that one away. So Reacher rode the elevator as high as it went and then walked back down the fire stairs, stopping at every floor to take a covert glance up and down the corridor. He saw two turndown carts, and three maids walking, and plenty of crusted trays of room-service leftovers. But no federal agents.
Until the fifth floor. Like in a movie. An old guy in a fold-up chair, right next to a door. Reacher pulled back and walked down to four, and came back up again to five in the elevator, like a normal person would. He stepped out and pretended to study the sign, these numbers this way, those numbers that way, and then he walked toward the seated agent, and said, “I’m Dr. Brennan’s paralegal. From Veronica Luong’s office.”
The old guy didn’t get up.
He said, “Got ID?”
Reacher gave him his passport.
The old guy said, “According to the number, this passport was issued direct by a certain office inside the State Department.”
“It came in the mail,” Reacher said.
“And now you’re a lawyer?”
“Not quite. Paralegal, from the ancient Greek para. Like parachute. Not quite a fall.”
“What do you need to see Dr. Brennan about?”
“Her Sixth Amendment right to assistance of counsel.”
“Now you’re the pro bono intern too?”
“You haven’t arrested her. You can’t stop her having visitors. You can put my name in the log. Which could help you in the end. We might want to switch to the Fifth Amendment later, and think about due process instead. Or as well.”
The old guy handed back Reacher’s passport.
He said, “Knock yourself out, kid.”
The room door had a panel on the wall, close to the handle, with a red light for Do Not Disturb, and a green light for Make Up My Room, and a pushbutton for the doorbell.
The red light was on.
Do not disturb.
Reacher pressed the doorbell button. He heard a chime inside the room, muted and polite. A woman’s voice said, “Who is it?”
Reacher said, “Your paralegal. Ms. Luong sent me.”