Lee Child - Never Go Back

‘Possible,’ Turner said.

‘Which makes a difference.’

‘But only as a background detail.’

‘No, more than that,’ Reacher said. ‘They had already stopped Weeks and Edwards, between one and nine hours previously, so why did they still go ahead and come after you?’

‘You know why. They thought I knew something I actually didn’t.’

‘But they didn’t need to think anything. Or guess, or plan for the worst. Not if they were reading stuff in and out of Bagram. No speculation was required. They knew what Weeks and Edwards told you. They knew for sure. They had it in black and white. They knew what you knew, Susan.’

‘But I knew nothing. Because Weeks and Edwards told me nothing.’

‘If that’s true, then why did they go ahead and come after you? Why would they do that? Why would they go ahead with a very complex and very expensive scam for no reason at all? Why would they risk that hundred grand?’

‘So what are you saying?’

‘I’m saying Weeks and Edwards did tell you something. I’m saying you do know something. Maybe it didn’t seem like a big deal at the time, and maybe you don’t remember it now, but Weeks and Edwards gave you some little nugget, and as a result someone got his panties in a real big wad.’

THIRTY-FIVE

TURNER PUT HER bare feet up on the bed and leaned back on the pillow. She said, ‘I’m not senile, Reacher. I remember what they told me. We’re paying a Pashtun insider, and they met with the guy, and he told them an American officer had been seen heading north to meet with a tribal elder. But at that point the identity of the American officer was definitely not known, and the purpose of the meeting was definitely not known.’

Reacher asked, ‘Was there a description?’

‘No, other than American.’

‘Man or woman?’

‘Has to be a man. Pashtun elders don’t meet with women.’

‘Black or white?’

‘Didn’t say.’

‘Army? Marines? Air Force?’

‘We all look the same to them.’

‘Rank? Age?’

‘No details at all. An American officer. That’s all we knew.’

‘There has to be something else.’

‘I know what I know, Reacher. And I know what I don’t.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘What does that even mean? This is like you and that woman in Korea. No one is aware of forgetting. Except I’m not forgetting. I remember what they said.’

‘How much back and forth was there?’

‘There was what I just told you, about the rumour, and then there were my orders, which were to go chase it. And that was all. One signal out, and one signal back.’

‘What about their last radio check? Did you see it?’

‘It was the last thing I saw, before they came for me. It was pure routine. No progress. Nothing to see here, folks, so move right along. That kind of thing.’

‘So it was in the original message. About the rumour. You’re going to have to try to remember it, word for word.’

‘An unknown American officer was seen heading north to meet with a tribal elder. For an unspecified reason. That’s it, word for word. I already remember it.’

‘What part of that is worth a hundred thousand dollars? And your future, and mine, and Moorcroft’s? And a bruise on a schoolgirl’s arm, in Berryville, Virginia?’

‘I don’t know,’ Turner said.

They went quiet after that. No more talking. No more discussion. Turner lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling. Reacher leaned on the window sill, running her summary through his head, fourteen words, a perfect sentence, with a subject and an object and a verb, and a satisfying rhythm, and a pleasing cadence: An unknown American officer was seen heading north to meet with a tribal elder . He went over and over it, and then he broke it into thirds, and stared it down, clause by clause.

An unknown American officer.

Was seen heading north.

To meet with a tribal elder .

Twenty-three syllables. Not a haiku. Or, a little less than a haiku and a half.

Meaning?

Uncertain, but he sensed a tiny inconsistency between the start of the sentence and its finish, like a grain of sand in an otherwise perfect mechanism.

An unknown American .

A tribal elder .

Meaning?

He didn’t know.

He said, ‘I’ll get going now. We’ll come back to it tomorrow. It might creep up on you in the night. That can happen. Something to do with the way the brain reacts to sleep. Memory processing, or a portal to the subconscious, or something like that. I read an article about it once, in a magazine I found on a bus.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘Don’t.’

‘Don’t what?’

‘Don’t get going,’ she said. ‘Stay here.’

Reacher paused a beat.

He said, ‘Really?’

‘Do you want to?’

‘Does the Pope sleep in the woods?’

‘Then take your shirt off.’

‘Really?’

‘Take it off, Reacher.’

So he did. He hauled the thin stretchy cotton up over his shoulders, and then up over his head, and then he dropped it on the floor.

‘Thank you,’ she said.

And then he waited, like he always did, for her to count his scars.

‘I was wrong,’ she said. ‘You’re not just feral. You’re an actual animal.’

‘We’re all animals,’ he said. ‘That’s what makes things interesting.’

‘How much do you work out?’

‘I don’t,’ he said. ‘It’s genetic.’ Which it was. Puberty had brought him many things unbidden, including height and weight and an extreme mesomorph physique, with a six-pack like a cobbled city street, and a chest like a suit of NFL armour, and biceps like basketballs, and subcutaneous fat like a Kleenex tissue. He had never messed with any of it. No diets. No weights. No gym time. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, was his attitude.

‘Pants now,’ she said.

‘I’m not wearing anything underneath.’

She smiled.

‘Me neither,’ she said.

He undid his button. He dropped his zip. He pushed the canvas over his hips. He stepped out. One step closer to the bed.

He said, ‘Your turn now.’

She sat up.

She smiled.

She took her shirt off.

She was everything he thought she would be, and she was everything he had ever wanted.

They woke very late the next morning, warm, drowsy, deeply satiated, roused from sleep only by the sound of automobile engines in the lot below their window. They yawned, and stretched, and kissed, long and slow and gentle.

Turner said, ‘We wasted Billy Bob’s money. With the two-room thing. My fault entirely. I’m sorry.’

Reacher asked, ‘What changed your mind?’

‘Lust, I suppose. Prison makes you think.’

‘Seriously.’

‘It was your T-shirt. I’ve never seen anything so thin. It was either very expensive or very cheap.’

‘Seriously.’

‘It was on my bucket list since we talked on the phone. I liked your voice. And I saw your photograph.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘You mentioned the girl in Berryville. That’s what changed my mind. With the arm. That offended you. And you’ve done nothing but chip away at my problem. You’re ignoring your own, with the Big Dog. Which is just as serious. Therefore you still care for others. Which means you can’t really be feral. I imagine caring for others is the first thing to go. And you still know right from wrong. Which all means you’re OK. Which all means my future self is OK, too. It’s not going to be so bad.’

‘You’re going to be a two-star general, if you want to be.’

‘Only two stars?’

‘More than that is like running for office. No fun at all.’