Lee Child - Night School

Which went to the U.S. Consulate.

Which meant there were brownie points to be earned.

The guy said, in English, very politely, “How may I help you?”

Like a concierge in a hotel.

White said, “We need a name and address for the witness. The same for the bar. Background information on both. Possibly surveillance on both.”

“I don’t know.”

“I could have your chancellor call you. Your head of state. Then you would know.”

“No, I mean I don’t know. I don’t know the details. I’m the chief of detectives. Those reports pass through my office, that’s all. And anyway it says here the witness is a lunatic.”

“Can he tell the time?”

“OK, I’ll get the details for you. Certainly. End of the day tomorrow.”

“Are you kidding me? You’ve got an hour. And tell no one what you’re doing or why. Consider this matter top secret. And keep this line open for when I call you back.”

–

In Hamburg Griezman took a breath, and looked out at the evening gloom. Then he set to work. It was not taxing. It was merely a sequence of telephone calls. One number led to another. Like a neural pathway. An organization in action. Something to be proud of. The validation of a theory. As granular as he wanted. He could take it all the way back to the hapless trooper who took the original call. If he wished. Which he did. With fortunately simple questions. Names and addresses, of a person and a place.

–

In Virginia Waterman’s guy Landry said, “Bigger than they dared to dream doesn’t sound good to me. Neither does it sound like stopping someone’s clock. It sounds much worse than that.”

Reacher said, “We’re hearing it third-hand. We can’t judge the tone.”

“But?”

“I heard the words whole new ball game. As if it was a big step up. As if it was unexpected to the extent of feeling accidental. Like they dropped a nickel and found a quarter. Such that guys in their twenties who wear Italian shoes and go out to nightclubs are getting all excited. It sounds erotic to me. Are computers that big of a deal?”

Landry said, “We think they are. And they’re certainly going to be in the future. Even now the damage would be catastrophic. Lots of people would die. But I agree, it’s not erotic.”

Vanderbilt said, “It’s not a grand gesture either. Which they tend to value. It’s not like blowing up a building. It has no single moment of climax. It’s a little too technical.”

Reacher said, “So we all agree we’re wasting our time with computers.”

“Where else would we start?”

“What is the guy selling?”

“We’ve been over that.”

“An hour is up,” Waterman said.

White dialed the Hamburg number again. The guy named Griezman answered. He had names and addresses, for the witness and the bar. The witness was a municipal worker. He started his duties early in the morning and finished them after lunch. Hence the bar in the afternoon. He was a man of strong convictions. Some of them were offensive and all of them were erroneous. The bar was five streets from the safe house. It was said to be a hardcore place. But not visibly. It looked civilized. Stern, but discreet. Men in suits, mostly, with normal haircuts. And not yet anti-American, as long as the American was white.

After the call ended Neagley found the bar on the street plan she had. She said, “Not the place we liked so much. Better part of the neighborhood. And a very easy walk from the apartment. Less than twenty minutes. The timing works. Do you think it was the rendezvous?”

Reacher said, “It was the right place at the right time. And the right feel.”

“We need a description from the witness. Maybe a police sketch.”

“Can we trust the Hamburg cops? Or should we go do it ourselves?”

“We don’t have a sketch artist. And maybe the witness doesn’t speak English. We’re going to have to trust them. The State Department would insist, anyway. Otherwise it would turn into a diplomatic incident.”

Reacher nodded. He had dealt with German cops before. Both military and civilian. Not always easy. Mostly due to different perceptions. Germans thought they had been given a country, and Americans thought they had bought a large military base with servants.

There was the noise of a vehicle on the driveway. Swooping in, past the knee-high sign. Then another. Two vehicles. Two vans, no doubt. Black in color. A minute later two men in suits came in through the door, followed by Ratcliffe and Sinclair, with two more men in suits bringing up the rear. Ratcliffe was out of breath. Sinclair was a little flushed. Her throat, and high on her cheeks. She was in another black dress, looking as good as ever. Maybe better. Maybe the flush helped.

Ratcliffe said, “I hear we have an eyewitness.”

Reacher said, “That’s our current operational assumption.”

“We’re going to roll the dice. You and Sergeant Neagley will go back to Germany tonight. The State Department will give you passport photographs for all two hundred programmers. Including the expats. First thing in the morning you will interview the eyewitness. The Hamburg police department is being leaned on as we speak. Then immediately after the eyewitness picks out a photograph, you will call here with the name, and we’ll have the guy picked up at home. Which will be a neat and timely conclusion.”

Reacher said nothing.

–

They got the same Lufthansa flight. Early evening departure, six time zones, scheduled arrival at the start of the business day. Neagley brought her bag. This time Reacher had one, too. It was a red canvas tote from the Air and Space Museum. Presumably some State Department staffer’s lunch bucket, requisitioned in an emergency and repacked with two hundred passport photographs. Which was a large quantity. Each photograph was glued to an index card, with a name and a passport number. Reacher and Neagley looked at some of them. They dealt them back and forth like playing cards. They found the expat Hamburg resident. The counterculture guy, with the shock of hair. His government picture was better quality than the underground journal. Glossier, and much crisper. Regulation size, white background. The guy was showing a head-on stare, and a challenge in his eyes. A large head, and a thin neck.

“It’s not him,” Reacher said.

“Why not?” Neagley said.

“Because of his hair. He has to do something to make it look like that. Even if it’s doing nothing at all. It’s a choice. It’s a statement. He’s saying, look at me, I have interesting hair. Like guys who wear hats. They’re saying, look at me, I have an interesting hat. All a little desperate, don’t you think? Insecurity, I suppose. As if what’s inside ain’t quite enough. And such people don’t write software patches that could blow up the known universe. If you’re smart enough to write a thing like that, and you’re smart enough to sell it for a hundred million bucks, all in secret, then you’re not insecure. Not even a little bit. You’re the best there ever was. You’re the king of the world.”

They put the pictures back in the bag, and ate the meal. Neagley had the window, and she went to sleep leaning away, her head against the fuselage wall. Less danger of accidental contact that way. Reacher stayed awake. He was thinking about the eyewitness. The municipal worker with the offensive views. Possibly a waste of time. Possibly the man who saves the known universe. Reacher wanted to get a look at him. He felt like the plane, racing east to meet the dawn.

–

The American was brushing his hair, in the bathroom mirror in his Amsterdam hotel. He was up early. No reason. He had slept. He was calm. But it was time to get back. He would shower and pack and hit the road before the morning rush got going. After that it was plain sailing.