Bad Luck and Trouble

17

O’Donnell looked up, somber. “I was going to inquire as to the meaning of all those rude and abusive messages on my answering machine.” Then he raised the autopsy report, an explanatory gesture. “But now I understand.”

Neagley asked, “How did you get in here?”

O’Donnell just said, “Oh, please.”

“Where the hell were you?” Reacher asked.

“I was in New Jersey,” O’Donnell said. “My sister was sick.”

“How sick?”

“Very sick.”

“Did she die?”

“No, she recovered.”

“Then you should have been here days ago.”

“Thanks for your concern.”

“We were worried,” Neagley said. “We thought they got you, too.”

O’Donnell nodded. “You should be worried. You should stay worried. It’s a worrying situation. I had to wait four hours for a flight. I used the time making calls. No answer from Franz, obviously. Now I know why, of course. No answer from Swan or Dixon or Orozco or Sanchez, either. My conclusion was that one of them had gotten all the others together and they had run into a problem. Not you or Reacher, because you’re too busy in Chicago and who the hell could ever find Reacher? And not me, because I was temporarily off the grid in New Jersey.”

“I wasn’t too busy,” Neagley said. “How could anyone think that? I’d have dropped everything and come running.”

O’Donnell nodded again. “At first that was the only thing that gave me hope. I figured they would have called you.”

“So why didn’t they? Don’t they like me?”

“If they hated you they’d still have called you. Without you it would have been like fighting with one hand behind their backs. Who would do that voluntarily? But in the end it’s perception that counts, not reality. You’re very high grade now compared to the rest of us. I think they might have hesitated with you. Maybe until it was too late.”

“So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying that one of them, and now I see that it would have been Franz, was in trouble, and he called all of us that he perceived as readily available. Which excluded you and Reacher by definition, and me also, by bad luck, because I wasn’t where I normally am.”

“That’s how we saw it, too. Except you’re a bonus. Your sister being sick was a stroke of luck for us. And for you, maybe.”

“But not for her.”

“Stop whining,” Reacher said. “She’s alive, isn’t she?”

“Nice to see you, too,” O’Donnell said. “After all these years.”

“How did you get in here?” Neagley asked.

O’Donnell shifted in his seat and took a switchblade from one coat pocket and a set of brass knuckles from the other. “A guy who can get these through airport security can get into a hotel room, believe me.”

“How did you get those through an airport?”

“My secret,” O’Donnell said.

“Ceramic,” Reacher said. “They don’t make them anymore. Because they don’t set the metal detector off.”

“Correct,” O’Donnell said. “No metal at all, apart from the switchblade spring, which is still steel. But that’s very small.”

“It’s good to see you again, David,” Reacher said.

“Likewise. But I wish it were under happier circumstances.”

“The circumstances just got fifty percent happier. We thought it was just the two of us. Now it’s the three of us.”

“What have we got?”

“Very little. You’ve seen what’s in his autopsy report. Apart from that we’ve got two generic white men who tossed his office. Didn’t find anything, because he was mailing stuff to himself in a permanent loop. We found his mail box and picked up four flash memories and we’re down to the last try at a password.”

“So start thinking about computer security,” Neagley said.

O’Donnell took a deep breath and held it longer than seemed humanly possible. Then he exhaled, gently. It was an old habit.

“Tell me what words you’ve tried so far,” he said.

Neagley opened her notebook to the relevant page and handed it over. O’Donnell put a finger to his lips and read. Reacher watched him. He hadn’t seen him in eleven years, but he hadn’t changed much. He had the kind of corn-colored hair that would never show gray. He had the kind of greyhound’s body that would never show fat. His suit was beautifully cut. In the same way as Neagley, he looked settled and prosperous and successful. Like he was making it.

“Koufax didn’t work?” he asked.

Neagley shook her head. “That was our third try.”

“Should have been your first, out of this list. Franz related to icons, gods, people he admired, performances he idolized. Koufax is the only one of these that really fits the bill. The others are merely sentimental. Miles Davis perhaps, because he loved music, but ultimately he thought music was inessential.”

“Music is inessential and baseball isn’t?”

“Baseball is a metaphor,” O’Donnell said. “An ace pitcher like Sandy Koufax, a man of great integrity, all alone on the mound, the World Series, stakes high, that’s how Franz wanted to see himself. He probably wouldn’t have articulated it exactly that way, but I can tell you his password would have to be a worthy repository for his devotion. And it would be expressed in a brusque, masculine fashion, which would mean a surname only.”

“So what would you vote for?”

“It’s tough, with only one try left. I’d look like a real fool if I were wrong. What are we going to find on there anyway?”

“Something he felt was worth hiding.”

Reacher said, “Something he got his legs broken for. He didn’t give up anything. He drove them into a fury. His office looks like a tornado hit it.”

“What’s our ultimate aim here?”

“Seek and destroy. Is that good enough for you?”

O’Donnell shook his head.

“No,” he said. “I want to kill their families and piss on their ancestors’ graves.”

“You haven’t changed.”

“I’ve gotten worse. Have you changed?”

“If I have I’m ready to change back.”

O’Donnell smiled, briefly. “Neagley, what don’t you do?”

Neagley said, “You don’t mess with the special investigators.”

“Correct,” O’Donnell said. “You do not. Can we get some room service coffee?”

They drank thick strong coffee out of the kind of battered electro-plated jugs found only in old hotels. They kept pretty quiet, but each of them knew the others were tracing the same mental circles, shying away from the last attempt at the password, examining the vector, trying to find another avenue forward, failing to, and starting all over again. Finally O’Donnell put his cup down and said, “Time to shit or get off the pot. Or fish or cut bait. Or however else you want to express it. Let’s hear your ideas.”

Neagley said, “I don’t have any.”

Reacher said, “You do it, Dave. You’ve got something in mind. I can tell.”

“Do you trust me?”

“As far as I could throw you. Which would be pretty damn far, as skinny as you are. Exactly how far, you’ll find out if you screw up.”

O’Donnell got out of his chair and flexed his fingers and stepped over to the laptop on the desk. Put the cursor in the box on the screen and typed seven letters.

Took a breath and held it.

Paused.

Waited.

Hit enter.

The laptop screen redrew.

A file directory appeared. A table of contents. Big, bold, clear and obvious.

O’Donnell breathed out.

He had typed: Reacher.