Lee Child - Die Trying

“But which damn direction?” Webster yelled through the noise.

Holly glanced at Reacher. That was a question they had asked each other a number of times, in relation to that exact same truck. Reacher opened up the map in his head and trawled around it all over again, clockwise.

“Could have gone east,” he shouted. “He’d still be in Montana, past Great Falls. Could be down in Idaho. Could be in Oregon. Could be halfway to Seattle.”

“No,” Garber yelled. “Think about it the other way around. That’s the key to this thing. Where has he been ordered to go? What would the target be?”

Reacher nodded slowly. Garber was making sense. The target.

“What does Borken want to attack?” Johnson yelled.

Borken had said: you study the system and you learn to hate it. Reacher thought hard and nodded again and thumbed his mike and called through to the pilot.

“OK, let’s go,” he said. “Straight on south of here should do it.”

The noise increased louder and the Night Hawk lifted heavily off the ground. It swung in the air and rose clear of the cliffs. Slipped south and banked around. Dropped its nose and accelerated hard. The noise moved up out of the cabin and settled to a deep roar inside the engines. The ground tilted and flashed past below. Reacher saw the mountain hairpins unwinding and the parade ground sliding past. The knot of tiny people was breaking up. They were drifting away into the trees and being swallowed up under the green canopy. Then the narrow slash of the rifle range was under them, then the broad stony circle of the Bastion. Then the aircraft rose sharply as the ground fell away so that the big white courthouse slipped by underneath as small as a dollhouse. Then they were over the ravine, over the broken bridge, and away into the vast forested spaces to the south.

Reacher tapped the pilot on the shoulder and spoke through the intercom.

“What speed are we doing?” he asked.

“Hundred and sixty,” the pilot said.

“Course?” Reacher asked.

“Dead on south,” the pilot said.

Reacher nodded. Closed his eyes and started to calculate. It was like being back in grade school. He’s two hundred miles ahead, doing fifty miles an hour. You’re chasing him at a hundred and sixty. How long before you catch him? Grade school math had been OK for Reacher. So had fighting in the yard. The fighting part had stayed with him better than the math. He was sure there must be some kind of a formula for it. Something with x and y all over the damn page. Something equaling something else. But if there was a formula, he had long ago forgotten it. So he had to do it by trial and error. Another hour, Stevie would be two hundred and fifty miles from home. The Night Hawk would have done one hundred and sixty. Way behind. An hour after that, Stevie would be three hundred miles out, and the Night Hawk would be three hundred and twenty. Overshot. Therefore they were going to catch him somewhere near the top of the second hour. If they were headed in the right direction.

Flathead Lake came into view, far ahead and far below. Reacher could see the roads snaking across the rugged terrain. He thumbed the button on his mike.

“Still south?” he asked.

“Dead on,” the pilot said.

“Still one-sixty?” Reacher asked.

“Dead on,” the pilot said again.

“OK, stick with it,” Reacher said. “Hour and fifty minutes, maybe.”

“So where is he going?” Webster asked.

“San Francisco,” Reacher said.

“Why?” McGrath asked.

“Or Minneapolis,” Reacher said. “But I’m gambling on San Francisco.”

“Why?” McGrath asked again.

“San Francisco or Minneapolis,” Reacher said. “Think about it. Other possibilities would be Boston, New York, Philly, Cleveland, Richmond in Virginia, Atlanta, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City in Missouri, or Dallas in Texas.”

McGrath just shrugged blankly. Webster looked puzzled. Johnson glanced at his aide. Garber was motionless. But Holly was smiling. She smiled and winked at Reacher. He winked back and the Night Hawk thumped on south over Missoula at a hundred and sixty miles an hour.

“CHRIST, IT’S THE Fourth of July,” Webster said suddenly.

“Tell me about it,” Reacher said. “Lots of people gathered in public places. Families, kids and all.”

Webster nodded grimly.

“OK, where exactly in San Francisco?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” Reacher said.

“North end of Market,” Holly said. “Right near Embarcadero Plaza. That’s where, chief. I’ve been there on the Fourth. Big parade in the afternoon, fireworks over the water at night. Huge crowds all day long.”

“Huge crowds everywhere on the Fourth,” Webster said. “You better be guessing right, people.”

McGrath looked up. A slow smile was spreading over his bruised face.

“We are guessing right,” he said. “It’s San Francisco for sure. Not Minneapolis or anyplace else.”

Reacher smiled back and winked. McGrath had gotten it.

“You want to tell me why?” Webster asked him.

McGrath was still smiling.

“Go figure,” he said. “You’re the damn Director.”

“Because it’s the nearest?” Webster asked.

McGrath nodded.

“In both senses,” he said, and smiled again.

“What both senses?” Webster asked. “What are we talking about?”

Nobody answered him. The military men were quiet. Holly and McGrath were staring out through the windows at the ground, two thousand feet below. Reacher was craning up, looking ahead through the pilot’s Plexiglas canopy.

“Where are we?” he asked him.

The pilot pointed down at a concrete ribbon below.

“That’s U.S. 93,” he said. “Just about to leave Montana and enter Idaho. Still heading due south.”

Reacher nodded.

“Great,” he said. “Follow 93. It’s the only road goes south, right? We’ll catch him somewhere between here and Nevada.”

HE STARTED WORRYING near the top of the second hour. Started worrying badly. Started desperate revisions to his grade school calculations. Maybe Stevie was driving faster than fifty. He was a fast driver. Faster than Bell had been. Maybe he was doing nearer sixty. Where did that put him? Three hundred and sixty miles out. In which case they wouldn’t catch him until two hours fifteen minutes had elapsed. What if he was doing seventy? Could that Econoline sustain seventy, hour after hour, with a ton in back? Maybe. Probably. In which case he was four hundred and twenty miles out. A total of two hours forty minutes before they overhauled him. That was the envelope. Somewhere between one hour fifty minutes and two hours forty minutes, somewhere between Montana and Nevada. A whole fifty minutes of rising panic. More than a hundred miles of concrete ribbon to watch before he could know for sure he was wrong and they had to peel off hopelessly northeast toward Minnesota.

The helicopter was flying nose down, top speed, straight along U.S. 93. The seven passengers were craned forward, staring down at the road. They were over a town called Salmon. The pilot was calling out information like a tour guide. The giant peak of Mount McGuire, ten thousand feet, way off to the right. Twin Peaks, ten and a half thousand feet, up ahead to the right. Borah Peak, highest of all, twelve and a half thousand feet, way ahead to the left. The aircraft rose and fell a thousand feet above the terrain. Hurtled along lower than the surrounding peaks, nose down to the highway like a bloodhound.

Time ticked away. Twenty minutes. Thirty. The road was pretty much empty. It connected Missoula in the north to Twin Falls in Idaho, three hundred miles to the south. Neither was a booming metropolis and this was a holiday. Everybody had already gotten where they were going. There was an occasional automobile and an occasional trucker working overtime. No white Econoline. There had been two white vehicles, but they were both pickups. There had been one panel truck, but it was dark green. That was all. Nothing else. No white truck. Sometimes the road was empty all the way to the horizon in front of them. The time was ticking away. Like a bomb. Forty minutes. Fifty.