Bad Luck and Trouble

6

The past, which meant the army. Calvin Franz had been an MP and Reacher’s exact contemporary and pretty much his equal all the way through his thirteen years of service. They had met here and there in the way that brother officers often tended to, rubbing shoulders in different parts of the world for a day or two at a time, consulting on the phone, crossing paths when two or more investigations had tangled or collided. Then they had done a serious spell together in Panama. Quality time. It had been very short but very intense, and they had seen things in each other that left them feeling more like real brothers than brother officers. After Reacher had been rehabilitated from his temporary demotion disgrace and given the special investigations operation to build, Franz’s name had been near the top of his personnel wish list. They had spent the next two years together in a real unit-within-a-unit hothouse. They had become fast friends. Then as often happened in the army, new orders had come in and the special operation had been disbanded and Reacher had never seen Franz again.

Until that moment, in an autopsy photograph punched into a three-ring binder laid flat on a sticky laminate table in a cheap diner.

In life Franz had been smaller than Reacher but bigger than most other people. Maybe six-three and two-ten. Powerful upper body, low waist, short legs. Primitive, in a way. Like a caveman. But overall he had been reasonably handsome. He had been calm, resolute, capable, relaxing to be around. His manner had tended to reassure people.

He looked awful in the autopsy photograph. He was laid out flat and naked on a stainless tray and the camera’s flash had bleached his skin pale green.

Awful.

But then, dead people often looked pretty bad.

Reacher asked, “How did you get this?”

Neagley said, “I can usually get things.”

Reacher said nothing in reply to that and turned the page. Started in on the dense mass of technical information. The corpse had been measured at six feet three inches in length and weighed a hundred and ninety pounds. Cause of death was given as multiple organ failure due to massive impact trauma. Both legs were broken. Ribs were cracked. The bloodstream was flooded with free histamines. The body was severely dehydrated and the stomach held nothing but mucus. There was evidence of rapid recent weight loss and no evidence of recent food consumption. Trace evidence from the recovered clothing was unexceptional, apart from unexplained ferrous oxide powder ground into both pant legs, low down, on the shins, below the knee and above the ankle.

Reacher asked, “Where was he found?”

Neagley said, “In the desert about fifty miles north and east of here. Hard sand, small rocks, a hundred yards off the shoulder of a road. No footprints coming or going.”

The waitress brought the food. Reacher paused as she unloaded her tray and then started his sandwich, left-handed, to keep his right grease-free for turning the autopsy pages.

Neagley said, “Two deputies in a car saw buzzards circling. Went to check. Hiked out there. They said it was like he had fallen out of the sky. The pathologist agrees.”

Reacher nodded. He was reading the doctor’s conclusion, which was that a free fall from maybe three thousand feet onto hard sand could have produced the right amount of impact and caused the internal injuries observed, if Franz had happened to land flat on his back, which was aerodynamically possible if he had been alive and flailing his arms during the fall. A dead weight would have fallen on its head.

Neagley said, “They made the ID through his fingerprints.”

Reacher asked, “How did you find out?”

“His wife called me. Three days ago. Seems he kept all our names in his book. A special page. His buddies, from back in the day. I was the only one she could find.”

“I didn’t know he was married.”

“It was recent. They have a kid, four years old.”

“Was he working?”

Neagley nodded. “He set up as a private eye. A one-man band. Originally, some strategic advice for corporations. But now mostly background checks. Database stuff. You know how thorough he was.”

“Where?”

“Here in LA.”

“Did all of you set up as private eyes?”

“Most of us, I think.”

“Except me.”

“It was the only marketable skill we had.”

“What did Franz’s wife want you to do?”

“Nothing. She was just telling me.”

“She doesn’t want answers?”

“The cops are on it. LA County sheriff, actually. Where he was found is technically part of LA County. Outside of the LAPD’s jurisdiction, so it’s down to a couple of local deputies. They’re working on the airplane thing. They figure it was maybe flying west out of Vegas. That kind of thing has happened to them before.”

Reacher said, “It wasn’t an airplane.”

Neagley said nothing.

Reacher said, “An airplane has a stall speed of, what? A hundred miles an hour? Eighty? He’d have come out the door horizontal into the slipstream. He’d have smashed against the wing or the tail. We’d see perimortem injuries.”

“He had two broken legs.”

“How long does it take to freefall three thousand feet?”

“Twenty seconds?”

“His blood was full of free histamines. That’s a massive pain reaction. Twenty seconds between injury and death wouldn’t have even gotten it started.”

“So?”

“The broken legs were old. Two, three days minimum. Maybe more. You know what ferrous oxide is?”

“Rust,” Neagley said. “On iron.”

Reacher nodded. “Someone broke his legs with an iron bar. Probably one at a time. Probably tied him to a post. Aimed for his shins. Hard enough to break the bone and grind rust particles into the weave of his pants. Must have hurt like hell.”

Neagley said nothing.

“And they starved him,” Reacher said. “Didn’t let him drink. He was twenty pounds underweight. He was a prisoner, two or three days. Maybe more. They were torturing him.”

Neagley said nothing.

Reacher said, “It was a helicopter. Probably at night. Stationary hover, three thousand feet up. Out the door and straight down.” Then he closed his eyes and pictured his old friend, tumbling, twenty seconds in the dark, cartwheeling, flailing, not knowing where the ground was. Not knowing exactly when he would hit. Two shattered legs trailing painfully behind him.

“Therefore it probably wasn’t coming from Vegas,” he said. He opened his eyes. “The round-trip would be out of range for most helicopters. It was probably coming north and east out of LA. The deputies are barking up the wrong tree.”

Neagley sat quiet.

“Coyote food,” Reacher said. “The perfect disposal method. No tracks. The airflow during the fall strips away hairs and fibers. No forensics at all. Which is why they threw him out alive. They could have shot him first, but they didn’t even want to risk ballistics evidence.”

Reacher was quiet for a long moment. Then he closed the black binder and reversed it and pushed it back across the table.

“But you know all this anyway,” he said. “Don’t you? You can read. You’re testing me again. Seeing if my brain still works.”

Neagley said nothing.

Reacher said, “You’re playing me like a violin.”

Neagley said nothing.

Reacher asked, “Why did you bring me here?”

“Like you said, the deputies are barking up the wrong tree.”

“So?”

“You have to do something.”

“I will do something. Believe it. There are dead men walking, as of right now. You don’t throw my friends out of helicopters and live to tell the tale.”

Neagley said, “No, I want you to do something else.”

“Like what?”

“I want you to put the old unit back together.”