Part 42 (1/2)

”We don't get those details.”

Reacher asked, ”What was this building originally?”

”A VD clinic,” the medic said.

”You got a phone I could use?”

The guy pointed to a console on his desk.

”Have at it,” he said.

Reacher dialed 411 upside down and got the number for David Robert Vaughan, Fifth Street, Hope, Colorado. He said the number once under his breath to memorize it and then dialed it.

No answer.

He put the phone back in the cradle and asked, ”Where's the mess?”

”Follow your nose,” the medic said. Which was good advice. Reacher walked back to the main cl.u.s.ter and circled until he smelled the aroma of fried food coming out of a powerful extraction vent. The vent came through the wall of a low lean-to addition to a larger square one-story building. The mess kitchen, and the mess. Reacher went in and got a few questioning looks but no direct challenges. He got in line and picked up a cheeseburger the size of a softball, plus fries, plus beans, plus a mug of coffee. The burger was excellent, which was normal for the army. Mess cooks were in savage compet.i.tion to produce the best patty. The coffee was excellent, too. A unique standardized blend, in Reacher's opinion the best in the world. He had been drinking it all his life. The fries were fair and the beans were adequate. All in all, probably better than the limp piece of grilled fish the officers were getting.

He took more coffee and sat in an armchair and read the army papers. He figured the two PFCs would come get him when Thurman was ready to leave. They would drive their guests out to the flight line and salute smartly and finish their little show in style, just after midnight. Taxiing, takeoff, the climb, then ninety minutes in the air. That would get them back to Despair by two, which seemed to be the normal schedule. Three hours' worth of free aviation fuel, plus a free four-hour dinner. Not bad, in exchange for a quarter-full jar of soot.A born-again-Christian American and a businessman was how Thurman had described himself. Whatever kind of a Christian he was, he was a useful businessman. That was for d.a.m.n sure. was how Thurman had described himself. Whatever kind of a Christian he was, he was a useful businessman. That was for d.a.m.n sure.

The mess kitchen closed. Reacher finished the papers and dozed. The PFCs never showed. At twelve-ten in the morning Reacher woke up and heard the Piper's engine in the distance and by the time the sound registered in his mind it was revving hard. By the time he made it outside the little white plane was on the runway. He stood and watched as it lifted off and disappeared into the darkness above.

60

The Humvee came back from the flight line and the two PFCs got out and nodded to Reacher like nothing was wrong. Reacher said, ”I was supposed to be on that plane.”

The driver said, ”No sir, Mr. Thurman told us you had a one-way ticket tonight. He told us you were heading south from here, on business of your own. He told us you were all done in Colorado.”

Reacher said, ”s.h.i.+t.” He thought back to Thurman, in front of the airplane barn. The deliberate pause.Debate in his face, some kind of a long-range calculus, like he was playing a long game, thinking eight moves ahead.

Fly with me tonight.

I won't ask you to join me for dinner.

Reacher shook his head. He was ninety minutes' flying time from where he needed to be, in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, with no airplane.

Outwitted by a seventy-year-old preacher.

Dumb.

And tense.

I think they were all stirred up because they're heading for the end of something.

What, he had no idea.

When, he had no clue.

He checked the map in his head. There were no highways in the Oklahoma panhandle. None at all. Just a thin red tracery of state four-lanes and county two-lanes. He glanced at the Humvee and at the PFCs and said, ”You guys want to drive me out to a road?”

”Which road?”

”Any road that gets traffic more than once an hour.”

”You could try 287. That goes south.”

”I need to go north. Back to Colorado. Thurman wasn't entirely frank with you.”

”287 goes north, too. All the way up to I-70.”

”How far is that?”

”Sir, I believe it's dead-on two hundred miles.”

Hitchhiking had gotten more and more difficult in the ten years since Reacher left the army. Drivers were less generous, more afraid. The West was sometimes better than the East, which helped. Day was always better than night, which didn't. The Humvee from Fort Shaw let him out at twelve-forty-five, and it was a quarter past one in the morning before he saw his first northbound vehicle, a Ford F150 that didn't even slow down to take a look. It just blew past. Ten minutes later an old Chevy Blazer did the same thing. Reacher blamed the movies. They made people scared of strangers. Although in reality most movies had the pa.s.sing strangers messed up by the locals, not the other way around. Weird inbred families that hunted people for sport. But mostly Reacher blamed himself. He knew he was no kind of an attractive roadside proposition.Look at yourself. What do you see? Maria from San Diego was the kind of person that got rides easily. Sweet, small, unthreatening, needy. Vaughan would do OK, too. Hulks six-five in height were a riskier bet. Maria from San Diego was the kind of person that got rides easily. Sweet, small, unthreatening, needy. Vaughan would do OK, too. Hulks six-five in height were a riskier bet.

At ten of two a dark Toyota pick-up at least slowed and took a look before pa.s.sing by, which was progress of a sort. Five after two, a twenty-year-old Cadillac swept past. It had an out-of-tune motor and a collapsed rear suspension and an old woman low down behind the wheel. White hair, thin neck. What Reacher privately called a Q-tip. Not a likely prospect. Then at a quarter past two an old Suburban heaved into view. In Reacher's experience new Suburbans were driven by uptight a.s.sholes, but old models were plain utilitarian vehicles often driven by plain utilitarian people. Their bulk often implied a kind of no-nonsense self-confidence on the part of their owners. The kind of self-confidence that said strangers weren't necessarily a problem.

The best hope so far.

Reacher stepped off the shoulder and put one foot in the traffic lane. c.o.c.ked his thumb in a way that suggested need, but not desperation.

The Suburban's brights came on.

It slowed.

It stopped altogether fifteen feet short of where Reacher was standing. A smart move. It gave the guy behind the wheel a chance to look over his potential pa.s.senger without the kind of social pressure that face-to-face proximity would imply. Reacher couldn't see the driver. Too much dazzle from the headlights.

A decision was made. The headlights died back to low beam and the truck rolled forward and stopped again. The window came down. The driver was a fat red-faced man. He was clinging to the wheel like he would fall out of his chair if he didn't. He said, ”Where are you headed?” His voice was slurred.

Reacher said, ”North into Colorado. I'm trying to get to a place called Hope.”

”Never heard of it.”

”Me neither, until a few days ago.”

”How far away?”

”Maybe four hours.”

”Is it on the way to Denver?”

”It would be a slight detour.”