Johnson roused himself and glanced up. Five minutes later the Marines were sitting on the fractured edge of the roadway, feet dangling down into the abyss. Their LAV was parked up behind them. Webster was still in the lee of the rock face with McGrath and Johnson. The radio still pressed to his ear. He could hear muffled sounds. Like Borken had pressed his hand over the microphone and was using a walkie-talkie. He could hear his muffled voice alternating with crackly replies. Then he heard the hand come away and the voice come back again, loud and clear in the earpiece.
"OK, Webster, good work," Borken said to him. "Our scouts can see all eight of them. So can our riflemen. If they move, they die. Who else have you got there with you?"
Webster paused. McGrath shook his head urgently.
"Can't you see?" Webster asked. "I thought you were watching us."
"Not right now," Borken said. "I pulled my people back a little. Into our defensive positions."
"There's nobody else here," Webster said. "Just me and the General."
There was another pause.
"OK, you two can join the Marines," Borken said. "On the bridge. On the end of the line."
Webster waited for a long moment. A blank expression on his face. Then he got up and nodded to Johnson. Johnson got up unsteadily and the two of them walked forward together around the curve. Left McGrath on his own, crouched in the lee of the rock.
MCGRATH WAITED THERE two minutes and crawled back south to the Chevrolet. Garber and Johnson's aide were in front and Milosevic and Brogan were in back. They were all staring at him.
"What the hell happened?" Brogan asked.
"We're in deep, deep shit," McGrath said.
Two minutes of hurried explanation, and the others agreed with him.
"So what now?" Garber asked.
"We go get Holly," McGrath said. "Before he realizes we're bullshitting him."
"But how?" Brogan asked.
McGrath glanced at him. Glanced at Milosevic.
"The three of us," he said. "End of the day, this is a Bureau affair. Call it whatever you want, terrorism, sedition, kidnapping, it's all FBI territory."
"We're going to do it?" Milosevic said. "Just the three of us? Right now?"
"You got a better way?" McGrath said. "You want something done properly, you do it yourself, right?"
Garber was twisted around, scanning along the three faces on the rear seat.
"So go do it," he said.
McGrath nodded and held up his right hand, the thumb and the first two fingers sticking out.
"I'm the thumb," he said. "I go in east of the road. Brogan, you're the first finger. You walk a mile west of the road and go in from there. Milo, you're the second finger. You walk two miles west and go north from there. We infiltrate separately, spaced out a mile between each of us. We meet up back on the road a half-mile shy of the town. Clear?"
Brogan made a face. Then he nodded. Milosevic shrugged. Garber glanced at McGrath and the General's aide started the Chevy and rolled it gently south. He stopped it again after four hundred yards, where the road came back out of the rock cover and there was clear access left and right into the countryside. The three FBI men checked their weapons. They each had a government-issue.38 in a shiny brown leather shoulder holster. Full load of six, plus another six in a speed-loader in their pockets.
"Try to capture a couple of rifles," McGrath said. "Don't worry about taking prisoners. You see somebody, you shoot the bastard down, OK?"
Milosevic had the longest walk, so he was first to go. He ducked across the road and struck out due west across the mountain scrub. He made it to a small stand of trees and disappeared. McGrath lit a cigarette and sent Brogan after him. Garber waited until Brogan was in the trees, then he turned back to McGrath.
"Don't forget what I told you about Reacher," he said. "I'm not wrong about that guy. He's on your side, believe me."
McGrath shrugged and said nothing. Smoked in silence. Opened the Chevy's door and slid out. Ground out the cigarette under his shoe and walked away east, across the grassy shoulder and onto the scrub.
MCGRATH WAS NOT far off fifty, and a heavy smoker, but he was a fit man. He had that type of mongrel constitution that age and smoke could not hurt. He was short at five seven, but sturdy. About one-sixty, made up of that hard slabby muscle which needs no maintenance and never fades into