‘Then I guess that study from when you were six was right on the money.’
‘Correct conclusion,’ Reacher said. ‘Wrong reasoning.’
‘How so?’
‘They thought my brain was wired backward. They got all excited about my DNA. Maybe they were planning to breed a new race of warriors. You know what the Pentagon was like back then. But I was too young to take much of an interest. And they were wrong, anyway. When it comes to fear, my DNA is the same as anyone else’s. I trained myself, that’s all. To turn fear into aggression, automatically.’
‘At the age of six?’
‘No, at four and five. I told you on the phone. I figured it was a choice. Either I cower back, or I get in their faces.’
‘I’ve never seen anyone fight with no hands.’
‘Neither had they. And that was the point.’
They stopped for gas and a meal in a place called Macomber, and then they rolled on, ever westward, through Grafton, and then they took the right fork, through a village called McGee, and eventually they came to the I-79 entrance ramp, which the Toyota told them was about an hour south of the Pittsburgh International Airport, which meant they would arrive there at about eight in the evening. The sky was already dark. Night had closed in, secure, and enveloping, and concealing.
Turner said, ‘Why do you like to live like this?’
Reacher said, ‘Because my brain is wired backward. That’s what they missed, all those years ago. They looked at the wrong part of me. I don’t like what normal people like. A little house with a chimney and a lawn and a picket fence? People love that stuff. They work all their lives, just to pay for it. They take thirty-year mortgages. And good for them. If they’re happy, I’m happy. But I’d rather hang myself.’
‘Why?’
‘I have a private theory. Involving DNA. Far too boring to talk about.’
‘No, tell me.’
‘Some other time.’
‘Reacher, we slept together. I didn’t even get a cocktail or a movie. The least you can do is tell me your private theories.’
‘Are you going to tell me one of yours?’
‘I might. But you go first.’
‘OK, think about America, a long time ago. The nineteenth century, really, beginning to end. The westward migration. The risks those people took. As if they were compelled.’
‘They were,’ Turner said. ‘By economics. They needed land and farms and jobs.’
‘But it was more than that,’ Reacher said. ‘For some of them, at least. Some of them never stopped. And a hundred years before that, think about the British. They went all over the world. They went on sea voyages that lasted five years.’
‘Economics again. They wanted markets and raw materials.’
‘But some of them couldn’t stop. And way back there were the Vikings. And the Polynesians, just the same. I think it’s in the DNA, literally. I think millions of years ago we were all living in small bands. Small groups of people. So there was a danger of inbreeding. So a gene evolved where every generation and every small band had at least one person who had to wander. That way the gene pools would get mixed up a little. Healthier all around.’
‘And you’re that person?’
‘I think ninety-nine of us grow up to love the campfire, and one grows up to hate it. Ninety-nine of us grow up to fear the howling wolf, and one grows up to envy it. And I’m that guy.’
‘Compelled to spread his DNA worldwide. Purely for the good of the species.’
‘That’s the fun part.’
‘That’s probably not an argument to make at your paternity hearing.’
They left West Virginia and entered Pennsylvania, and five miles after the line they saw a billboard for a shopping mall. The billboard was lit up bright, so they figured the mall was still open. They pulled off and found a faded place anchored by a local department store. Turner headed to the women’s section with a wad of cash. Reacher followed after her, but she told him to go check the men’s section instead.
He said, ‘I don’t need anything.’
She said, ‘I think you do.’
‘Like what?’
‘A shirt,’ she said. ‘And a V-neck sweater, maybe. At least.’
‘If you get something you can give me my old shirt back.’
‘I’m going to junk it. You need something better.’
‘Why?’
‘I want you to look nice.’
So he browsed on his own, and he found a shirt. Blue flannel, with white buttons. Fifteen dollars. And a V-
