Reacher said, ‘It would feel exactly like a legal case, wouldn’t it? We’d assemble a file, and we’d all start preparing and strategizing, and we’d wait for a conference with the prosecutor, and we’d hope our strategy survived it.’
No answer.
Reacher said, ‘Have you had a conference with the prosecutor?’
Sullivan said, ‘No.’
‘Maybe there is no prosecutor. Maybe this is a one-sided illusion. Designed to work for one minute only. As in, I was supposed to see your file and run like hell.’
‘It can’t be an illusion. I’m getting pressure from the Secretary’s office.’
‘Says who? Maybe you’re getting messages, but you don’t really know where they’re coming from. Do you even know the Big Dog is dead? Have you seen a death certificate?’
‘This is crazy talk.’
‘Maybe. But humour me. Suppose it really was litigated sixteen years ago. Without my knowledge. Perhaps one of hundreds, with a specimen case involving some other guy, but I was in the supporting cast. Like class action. Maybe they started some aggressive new policy against ambulance chasers. Which might account for the guy getting his butt kicked so bad. What kind of paperwork would we have seen?’
‘If it really was litigated? A lot of paperwork. You don’t want to know.’
‘So if I searched
‘Eventually you’d find everything they tagged as defence material, I suppose. Hundreds of pages, probably, in a big case.’
‘Is it like shopping on a web site? Does it link from one thing to another?’
‘No, I told you. It’s a clunky old thing. It was designed by people over thirty. This is the army, don’t forget.’
‘OK, so if I was worried about a guy called Reacher, and I wanted to scare him away, and I was in a big hurry, I could search the archive for
‘Hypothetically.’
‘Which is your job, starting right now. You have to test that hypothesis. See if you can find any trace of a bigger file. Search under all the tags you can think of.’
They got in the car and drove east on the freeway, back to Vineland Avenue, and then south, past the girl’s neighbourhood, to the coach diner. She was gone, inevitably, and so was the blonde waitress, and so were all the other dinner-time customers. Rush hour was definitely over. Late evening had started. There were three men in separate booths, drinking coffee, and there was a woman eating pie. The brunette waitress was talking to the counter man. Reacher and Turner stood at the door, and the waitress broke away and greeted them, and Reacher said, ‘I’m sorry, but I had to run before. There was an emergency. I didn’t pay for my cup of coffee.’
The waitress said, ‘It was taken care of.’
‘Who by? Not the kid, I hope. That wouldn’t be right.’
‘It was taken care of,’ the woman said again.
‘It’s all good,’ the counter man said. Arthur. He was wiping his counter.
‘How much is a cup of coffee?’ Reacher asked him.
‘Two bucks and a penny,’ the guy said. ‘With tax.’
‘Good to know,’ Reacher said. He dug out two bills and a lone cent, and he put them on the counter, and he said, ‘To return the favour, to whoever it was. Very much appreciated. What goes around comes around.’
‘OK,’ the guy said. He left the money where it was.
‘She told me she came in often.’
‘Who did?’
‘Samantha. The kid.’
The guy nodded. ‘She’s pretty much a regular.’
‘Tell her I was sorry I had to run. I don’t want her to think I was rude.’
‘She’s a kid. What do you care?’
‘She thinks I work for the government. I don’t want to give her a negative impression. She’s a bright girl. Public service is something she could think about.’
‘Who do you work for really?’
‘The government,’ Reacher said. ‘But not the part she guessed.’
‘I’ll pass on the message.’
‘How long have you known her?’
‘Longer than I’ve known you. So if there’s a choice between her privacy and your questions, I guess I’m going to go with her privacy.’
‘I understand,’ Reacher said. ‘I would expect nothing less. But would you tell her one more thing for me?’
