Past Tense

Chapter 19

Reacher and the guy with the ponytail climbed the fence and walked to the Subaru. The guy said, “You were pretty rough back there.”

“Not really,” Reacher said. “I hit him once. There is no smaller number. It was the irreducible minimum. It was almost kindhearted. I assume he has a dental plan.”

“His father meant what he said. He won’t forget. That family has a reputation to keep up. They’ll have to do something.”

Reacher stared at him.

Déjà vu all over again.

The guy said, “They think they’re top dogs around here. They’ll worry that word will get out. They won’t want people laughing at them behind their backs. So they’ll have to come looking for you.”

“Who?” Reacher said. “The granddad?”

“They offer a lot of seasonal work. They get a lot of loyalty in exchange.”

“How much more do you know about Ryantown?”

The guy paused a beat.

He said, “There’s an old man you should talk to. I was debating whether to mention him at all. Because honestly I think you should get going instead.”

“Pursued by a large and hostile crowd of fruit pickers?”

“These are not pleasant people.”

“How bad can they be?”

“You should get going.”

“Where is the old man I should talk to?”

“You couldn’t see him before tomorrow. It would have to be arranged.”

“How old is he?”

“I guess more than ninety now.”

“From Ryantown originally?”

“His cousins were. He spent time there.”

“Does he remember people?”

“He claims to. I interviewed him about the tin. I asked him about kids who got sick. He came up with a list of names. But they were just regular childhood ailments. Nothing conclusive.”

“That was eight years ago. Maybe his memory got worse.”

“Possible.”

“Why tomorrow?”

“He’s in a home. Deep in the countryside. Visiting hours are limited.”

“I would need a motel tonight.”

“You should go to Laconia. It would be safer. More people around. You would be harder to find.”

“Maybe I prefer the rural ambience.”

“There’s a place twenty miles north of here. It’s supposed to be good. But maybe not for you. It’s deep in the woods. No bus. Too far to walk. You would be much better off in Laconia.”

Reacher said nothing.

The guy said, “Better still if you moved on altogether. I could drive you somewhere, if you like. As a way of saying thank you for rescuing me back there.”

“That was my fault anyway,” Reacher said. “I persuaded you to come. I got you in trouble.”

“I would still drive you somewhere.”

“Drive me to Laconia,” Reacher said. “Then make the arrangements with the old guy.”

Reacher got out on a downtown corner, and the guy with the ponytail drove away. Reacher looked left and right and got his bearings. He smiled. He was halfway between where two separate twenty-year-olds had been discovered unconscious on the sidewalk, seventy-five years apart. He checked the passersby. There were a few folks who could have been up from Boston. But none of them looked wrong. Couples, mostly. Some gray hair. Shoppers, probably, looking for end-of-season bargains on whatever it was Laconia had to offer. Nothing suspicious. Not yet. Tomorrow, Shaw had said. The chief of detectives. He should know.

Reacher took a side street, where he had seen an inn, no better or worse than all the others. It was another narrow three-floor building, painted an artful faded color. He paid for a room, and went up to take a look at it. The window faced out back. Which he was happy about. It decreased the effective radius. He might get a quiet night. A raccoon or a coyote, maybe, looking for trash in the alley. Or a neighbor’s dog. But nothing worse.

Then he went out again, because it was still full daylight. He was hungry. He had skipped lunch. He should have been eating it about the time he was gazing at the fragment of old kitchen tile. All that remained. Not a large room. Probably not well equipped. Therefore a simple menu for lunch. Peanut butter, maybe, or grilled cheese. Or something out of a can. A tin can.

He found a coffee shop a block away which offered all-day breakfast, which in his experience usually implied all-day everything. He went inside. There were five booths. Four were occupied. The first three by what looked like out-of-town shoppers refreshing themselves after an exhausting spree, and the fourth by a familiar face.

Detective Brenda Amos.

She was deep in a salad. No doubt a long-awaited meal much delayed by ongoing chaos. Reacher had been a cop. He knew what it was like. Running here, running there, phones ringing, eat when you can, sleep when you can.

She looked up.

At first she looked surprised, just for a second, and then she looked dismayed. He shrugged and sat down on the bench across from her.

He said, “Shaw told me I’m legal until tomorrow.”

She said, “He told me you agreed to move on.”

“If I found Ryantown.”

“Didn’t you?”

“Apparently there’s a guy I should talk to. A very old man. Same age my father would be. An exact contemporary.”

“Are you going to talk to him today?”

“Tomorrow.”

“This is exactly what we were afraid of. You’re going to be here forever.”

“Look on the bright side. Maybe no one is coming. The kid was an asshole. Maybe they think he deserved it. Tough love, or whatever they call it now.”

“No chance whatsoever.”

“The very old man I should talk to had cousins in Ryantown. He used to visit on a regular basis. Maybe they all got up a game in the street. All the neighborhood kids. Stickball, or whatever. Maybe they played catch across the stream.”

“With all due respect, major, do you really care about that stuff?”

“I guess a little bit,” Reacher said. “Enough to stick around one more night, anyway.”

“We don’t want trouble here.”

“Always best avoided.”

“They have the rest of the day to plan. They’ll mobilize before midnight. They’ll be here by morning. The distances are not great. They’ll have your description with them. Therefore Shaw is going to dial it up to eleven before first light. He’s going to treat this place like a war zone. Where does this very old man live?”

“In a home somewhere out of town. A guy I met is going to pick me up.”

“What guy?”

“Eight years ago he thought the water was contaminated.”

“Was it?”

“Apparently not. It’s a sore point.”

“Where is he going to pick you up?”

“Where he let me out.”

“At an agreed-upon time?”

“Nine-thirty on the dot. Something about visiting hours.”

Amos paused a beat.

“OK,” she said. “You’re authorized to do that. But you’ll do it my way. You don’t leave your room at any point, no one ever sees you, and at nine-thirty in the morning exactly you run straight to the car with your head down. And you drive away. And you don’t come back. That’s the deal I’m offering. Or we run you out now.”

“I already paid for my room,” Reacher said. “Running me out now would be an injustice.”

“I’m serious,” she said. “This is not the O.K. Corral. This is collateral damage just waiting to happen. If they miss you, they’ll hit two other people instead. Watch my lips. We are not going to allow drive-by shootings in our town. No way. This is Laconia, not Los Angeles. And with respect, major, you should support our position. You should know better than to put innocent bystanders at risk.”

“Relax,” Reacher said. “I support your position. I support it big time. I’ll do everything your way. I promise. Starting tomorrow. Today I’m still legal.”

“Start when it gets dark tonight,” Amos said. “Play it safe. For my sake.”

She took out a business card and handed it to him.

She said, “Call me if you need me.”