Lee Child - Night School

Hooper and Reacher had never met before, so Reacher was sure Hooper wouldn’t say it. Or Orozco. Too much old-world courtesy. It would be Neagley who said it. She would assemble a dozen alternative theories, starting with ships sailing back to Brazil, or with trucks rolling on to Berlin. And then ending, either with successful resolutions, or with blast zones and fireballs and a million dead. All depending on one critical question.

Which she would ask.

She said, “Are you sure you counted right?”

He smiled.

“Let’s use the two-personnel rule,” he said. “Basic nuclear safeguard. Hooper should go. He hardly knows me. He’s still an unbiased observer.”

So Hooper went. He checked from the corner, one eye, very carefully, and then he stepped into the hidden bay. Reacher replaced him at the corner, one eye, and saw him at the tailgate. He was too short. The height of the load floor plus a couple of feet to the top of the backpacks meant he was looking up at the front rank only.

Then Reacher saw a man in the corner of the office room. On the right. In the far back. On an exact diagonal from where Reacher was. Which meant the guy couldn’t see Hooper. Not yet. The angle was wrong. The corner of the truck was in the way.

The guy in the room moved. He was looking for something. He was going from desk to desk, opening drawers, stirring a thick finger through, moving on. He was a big guy. He looked competent.

Hooper stepped back and went up on tiptoe.

The guy moved on, the length of a desk.

Now the angle was right.

The noise was loud. Howling, squealing, rattling. Chugging and beeping.

Reacher called, “Hooper, get in the van.”

Loud enough to be heard, he hoped, by one and not the other. Hooper froze for a split second, and then he vaulted up on open palms and scrambled over the backpacks into the shadows.

The guy in the office looked out the window.

He took a step closer.

He checked the van. He checked the space behind the van.

He watched for a moment.

Then he turned and walked away, to the far back corner again, and through a door, to the hidden part of the suite.

Reacher waited.

The guy didn’t come back. Not in one minute. Not in two. Which he would, if he had heard. Human nature. He would have grabbed his guns and his buddies and come back right away.

He hadn’t heard.

Reacher called, “All clear, Hooper.”

No response.

Howling, squealing, rattling.

Reacher called again, louder this time, “Hooper, all clear.”

Hooper stuck his head out the back of the truck. Then he jumped down, and bounced up, and walked back to safety.

“Nine bombs,” he said. “The code book is missing, too.”

In the other direction the crowd had grown to about twenty strong, and they were forty yards away. Still tiny, in the industrial vastness. Not threatening. Reacher felt the opposite was true. They were standing up in puzzled solidarity against what they saw as a threat against their bosses in the office. They were ready to close ranks against the intruders. They were loyal employees. Or more. Maybe some of them were low-level members of the cause. Maybe that’s how a guy got a foreman’s position, at Schuhe Dremmler.

Reacher said to Hooper, “How good is your German?”

“Pretty good,” Hooper said. “That’s why I work here.”

“Go tell them to calm down and get back to work.”

“Any particular form of words you want me to use?”

“Tell them we’re American military police here on behalf of the Brazilian military police, conducting a routine audit connected to shoes, and if we’re forced to report a hostile reception they’ll get extra scrutiny.”

“Will they believe me?”

“Depends how convincing you are.”

They watched him, forty yards away, face to face with the guy at the tip of the arrowhead. He was talking in long composed sentences. The crowd wasn’t buying what he was selling.

Orozco said, “Stand by to rescue him.”

Reacher said, “Don’t kick them in the knees.”

“Why not?”

“They’re wearing knee pads.”

Hooper kept on talking. And talking. Forward motion ebbed away. The crowd went still. But not convinced. Hooper took the long walk back. He said, “I did my best.”

“Are they going to call the cops?” Reacher said.

“Not their place. They’re confused, is all. And concerned. It’s a family business.”

“Then we better be quick.”

“Where do we start?”

“With data. Which means the office. And the guy in it.”

“Rules of engagement?”

“We’ll figure them out afterward.”

–

They did no more one-eye checking. Too much scrutiny. Didn’t look right. Instead they walked around the pile of boxes, brisk and routine, into the hidden bay, as if all they needed was a signature on their paperwork, or an answer to a supplementary question, or a copy of a document. They pulled their guns as soon as they were out of sight. The entrance to the office suite was a door in the far back corner of the space, beyond the van, near the manual panel for the roll-up exit. The door led to the first room, which had a matching door in the far back corner, which led onward, to wherever the guy had gone. To the rear part of the suite, presumably. Unknown territory.

Opening the door let in a pulse of factory noise, so they got through fast, and fanned out, ready. Hooper walked backward. He was tasked to be eyes-on-rearward at all times. Essential for confidence. Nothing worse than not knowing what was behind. The crowd could get restless again. Reinforcements could show up. The night shift, reporting early. Or expert opinion. German army veterans, maybe, called in especially, and asked a simple question: What the hell are these?

They didn’t know what they got.

They moved on, toward the next door. It was narrow. A bottleneck. What stun grenades were invented for. But they had none. The door was open a crack. Reacher peered through. Saw nothing. A slice of empty room. He put his ear to the opening. He heard talking in German. Male voices. Questions and answers. Frustrated, but not angry. Puzzled, but patient. They were trying to figure something out. Three guys talking, Reacher thought. Were there others saying nothing? The sound was off to the left, and it had a boxed-in, glassy tone. As if they were in a walled-off executive office in the left-hand corner. Which he couldn’t see.

He backed off a step. Glanced out the window. No one was coming after them. Not yet. He made hand signals, minimum three people, located far left, in the corner. They paced it out, back to back on their side of the dividing wall. It was an awkward distance. Two steps too long for total surprise. Hooper would guard the door, facing out, and first Neagley and then Reacher and Orozco would go deep, fanning out, splitting the target, giving three different lines of sight. Any monkey business, waste all but one.

They took up station in operational order, first Neagley, then Reacher, then Orozco, then Hooper facing backward. Neagley burst through the door and headed for third. Reacher took second. Orozco stopped at first. Where home plate should have been was a glassed-in cubicle. Set up like an office within an office. Flanking the desk were two guys. One was the man Reacher had seen before. A big guy, and competent. The other was similar.

Propped in a chair in front of the desk was the tenth Davy Crockett. Like a human visitor. Like a suspect in a police station. Its canvas pack was unlaced and pulled down. The cylinder was dull green. It had white stencil writing. It had a screwed-on panel up top, with six small chicken-head knobs, and three small toggle switches.