Past Tense (Jack Reacher #23)(89)

“What does the front part of your brain say about it?”

“It says follow the money. The guy is paying a Persian carpet cleaner to take care of his rugs. All the way from Boston. That’s hard cash. That’s solid evidence. What have I got? A feeling? A sneer I might have misheard? Maybe he needs the SUV for the snow. A jury would say the bulk of the evidence is all one way. He’s a good guy. He wants to save the planet. Or at least help a little bit.”

“I agree with the jury,” Burke said. “Better to trust the front of your brain than the back.”

Reacher said nothing.

He checked the phone.

Two bars.

He said, “I’m going to call Amos now.”

“Want me to stop?”

“Does it help the phone?”

“I think it does. I think it locks on better.”

Burke coasted a spell and pulled over where the gravel was wide.

Reacher dialed the number.

“Call me back in ten,” Amos said. “I’m real busy right now.”

“Have you found Carrington?”

“Negative on that. Call me back.”

—

The payment process turned into a ritual of understated magnificence. It started casual and became exquisitely formal. It felt ancient in its origins. Greek or Roman at least. Maybe tribal. Steven stayed in the parlor, watching the screens, and everyone else walked back to the motel, a bustling crowd of nine, six customers excited but restrained, plus Mark and Peter and Robert behind them. The customers went to their rooms. Mark and Peter and Robert went to the office. Where the process evolved, out of nothing. There and then. They had no plan. No thought had been given. There was a danger of jinxing. In the end it was a five-second commonsense decision. The obvious thing to do.

But epic in its drama. In its psychological freight. Mark sat behind the counter. Peter stood at the end. Side on. Halfway between. As if independent. Like a witness.

Robert was the escort. He went to get them. One at a time. The legend was born right there. He knocked on the door, and they came out and went with him. He was the Praetorian Guard, and they were the great gentlemen. They were the senators. They went with him, down the boardwalk. They had no choice. He stayed a respectful half step behind. In the office he stood at the door and saw nothing.

One by one they stepped forward and paid their tribute, to Mark, with Peter as a witness, to the transaction, to their bending of the knee. Some counted out bricks of money, prolonging the moment. Others set their bags on the counter, and stepped back, expecting instant and unquestioning acceptance. Which they got. The money would be there. All of it. They couldn’t afford to cheat. Then one by one Robert walked them back, and knocked on the next door along. Both casual and formal, like the deadly business of an ancient republic.

Karel got a healthy discount, for helping out the day before, but the other five paid sticker. At the end of the ritual Mark chose the two biggest of the abandoned bags, and Peter packed them. Not easy. To get five and a half bags’ worth of cash into two actual bags required ingenious layering. The others crowded around. Mark counted out loud as Peter stacked the bricks. But not in numbers. At first he said, overhead, overhead , as the first few bricks went in, and then profit, profit, profit , as the rest went in. They turned it into a kind of whispered chant. Quiet, so the sound wouldn’t carry. They hissed profit, profit, profit . Then they carried the bags back to the house, past all the windows, kind of hoping the great gentlemen were watching them do it. Watching their tribute, humbly and justly given, being carried away by the victor.

—

Peter had said they should think on it, and they had, not because he told them, but because it was their natures. It was the Saint Leonard way. Engage brain. Think before you speak. Begin at the beginning.

Patty whispered, “Obviously they’re tricking us somehow. It must be impossible to get to the break in the trees.”

“It can’t be impossible.”

“It must be.”

“Against how many people?”

“We’ve seen three. There are twelve rooms, less this one. Nine quad-bikes. Pick a number.”

“You think they’ll use the quad-bikes?”

“I’m sure they will. I think that’s why Peter emphasized we would be walking. To make us feel helpless and inferior. Like underdogs.”

“Call it nine people, then. They can’t cover it all. It’s a huge area.”

“I saw on the map,” Patty said. “It’s about five miles across, and about seven from top to bottom. Shaped like an oval. This place is about half a mile off-center, toward the east. It’s about equal north and south.”

“Then it might be possible. There would be one of them every forty degrees of the circle. They could be a hundred yards apart. If we got in the space behind them, we’d be home free.”

“It can’t be possible,” Patty said. “Because then what? We make it to a road, we get a ride, we call the cops and the FBI, because of the kidnapping and the false imprisonment, and they pay a visit, and they see the battery cable and the prison bars and the locks and the cameras and the microphones. I don’t think Peter and his buddies can afford for that to happen. They can’t afford for us to get out of here. Doesn’t matter how we try. Any method at all. They really cannot afford for us to make it. They must be totally confident we won’t.”