No first aid. No bloodstained gauze. You couldn’t sell a kidney without a blood type. It was the kind of thing people needed to know.
She relaxed, for a moment. But not for long. She didn’t understand. Who was she, and who was Shorty? What were they good for?
* * *
—
Reacher woke up at one minute past three in the morning. Same deal. He snapped awake, instantly, like flicking a switch.
Same reason.
A sound.
Which he didn’t hear again.
Nothing.
He padded naked out of bed and checked the alley through the window. Nothing. No glint of raccoon, no ghostlike coyote, no eager dog. A quiet night. Except apparently not, and once again at exactly one minute past three in the morning. He doubted the cocktail waitress would have gone to work that night. Probably fired, or afraid of reprisals. And a new gig in a new place wouldn’t have gotten her home at precisely the same time. Plus the kid wasn’t waiting at her door anymore. He was in the hospital. Plus now the alley where she lived was more than four blocks away. On a diagonal, with plenty of stuff in between. Outside the radius. He wasn’t close enough for a cry to carry.
Therefore the timing was a coincidence. He heard Amos’s voice in his head: They’ll mobilize before midnight. They’ll be here by morning. The distances are not great.
Was it morning? Technically, he supposed. He pictured midnight in Boston, and a car gassing up, and slipping away in the dark. Could it be in Laconia three hours and one minute later? Easily. Probably two times over. He pictured the guy taking his time, prowling, getting the lay of the land, maybe rousing a clerk or an innkeeper here or there, asking his question about a big guy with a cut hand, apologizing when the answer was no, shoving a fifty in a shirt pocket, moving on, back to the car, looking for the next place. Until sooner or later he found the innkeeper who would say, sure, top floor, the room in the back.
Reacher pulled his pants out from under the mattress and put them on. He buttoned his shirt and laced his shoes. He collected his toothbrush from the bathroom glass, and he put it in his pocket. He was good to go.
He walked downstairs to the lobby. Still three hours before the buffet. He waited inside the street door and listened. He heard nothing. He stepped out. He heard the swish of a distant car. He saw no one. He walked to the corner. Nothing there. He heard the car again. Same sound, different position. Far away. Then nearer. As if it had turned in, one block closer. Going nowhere in particular. Just around and around, on a new tighter radius.
For the sake of it Reacher walked the four diagonal blocks and found the alley between the bag store and the shoe store. Where the waitress lived. It was all quiet. No one was there. No disturbance. Just dark blank windows, and mist, and silence.
He heard the car again. Behind him, in the distance. The faint hiss of its tires, the breathing of its engine, a pock as it hit a join in the blacktop. Three blocks away, he thought. No direct line of sight. There was a dogleg in the cross street.
He turned back toward the inn. He walked through cones of yellow light. Once he stopped in the shadows and listened. He could still hear the car. Rolling slow. Still three blocks away. Turning right every now and then, going around and around.
He walked on. The car stepped another block closer. It turned right one street early. Now it was only two blocks away. Going around and around. A giant map-sized spiral. A search pattern. But a lazy one. It proved nothing. There could be a whole football team of big guys with cut hands running around, and a slow spiral could miss every one of them, every time. Not missing one of them would be a random chance.
Therefore maybe not a search pattern. Not yet. Maybe still a lay-of-the-land reconnaissance. It was still very early. Thorough preparations were always to be recommended. A degree of professionalism could be anticipated. Exit routes could be planned. Difficult turns could be noted. Alleys could be inspected, for width and destination.
The car turned right, two blocks behind him.
He walked on. Two blocks to go. Which presented a problem with four dimensions. Where would he be, when the car next