else still speaking in shorthand. Because it's not a him. It's them. It's a team. It always is. It's two people."
"That's a guess," Stuyvesant said.
"You wish," Reacher said back. "It's provable."
"How?"
"It bothered me way back that there was the thumbprint on the letter along with clear evidence of latex gloves. Why would he swing both ways? Either his prints are on file or they aren't. But it's two people. The thumbprint guy has never been printed. The gloves guy has been. It's two people, working together."
Stuyvesant looked very tired. It was nearly two o'clock in the morning.
"You don't really need us anymore," Neagley said. "This isn't an internal investigation now. This is out there in the world."
"No," Stuyvesant said. "It's still internal as long as there's something to get from the cleaners. They must have met with these people. They must know who they are."
Neagley shrugged. "You gave them lawyers. You made it very difficult."
"They had to have counsel, for God's sake," Stuyvesant said. "They were arrested. That's the law. It's their Sixth Amendment right."
"I guess it is," Neagley said. "So tell me, is there a law for when the Vice President gets killed before his inauguration?"
"Yes, there is," Froelich said quietly. "The Twentieth Amendment. Congress chooses another one."
Neagley nodded. "Well, I sure hope they've got their short list ready."
Silence in the room.
"You should bring in the FBI," Reacher said.
"I will," Stuyvesant replied. "When we've got names. Not before."
"They've already seen the letters."
"Only in the labs. Their left hand doesn't know what their right hand is doing."
"You need their help."
"And I'll ask for it. Soon as we've gotten names, I'm going to give them to the Bureau on a silver platter. But I'm not going to tell them where they came from. I'm not going to tell them we were internally compromised. And I'm sure as hell not bringing them in while we still are internally compromised."
"Is it that big of a deal?"
"Are you kidding? CIA had a problem with that Ames guy, remember? The Bureau got hold of it and they laughed up their sleeves for years. Then they had their own problems with that Hanssen guy, and they didn't look so smart after all. This is the big leagues, Reacher. Right now the Secret Service is number one, by a very healthy margin. We've only recorded one defeat in our entire history, and that was almost forty years ago. So we're not about to take a dive down the league table just for the fun of it."
Reacher said nothing.
"And don't get all superior with me," Stuyvesant said. "Don't tell me the Army reacted any different. I don't recall you guys running to the Bureau for assistance. I don't recall your embarrassing little secrets all over the Washington Post."
Reacher nodded. Most of the Army's embarrassments were cremated. Or six feet under. Or sitting in a stockade somewhere, too scared even to open their mouths. Or back home, too scared to tell their own mothers why. He had arranged some of those circumstances himself.
"So we'll take it a step at a time," Stuyvesant said. "Prove these guys are outsiders. Get their names from the cleaners. Lawyers or no lawyers."
Froelich shook her head. "First priority is getting Armstrong to midnight alive."
"It's only going to be a demonstration," Reacher said.
"I heard you before," she said. "But it's my call. And you're just guessing. All we've got is nine words on a piece of paper. And your interpretation might be plain wrong. I mean, what better demonstration would there be than actually doing it? Really getting to him would demonstrate his vulnerability, wouldn't it? I mean, what better way is there of demonstrating it?"
Neagley nodded. "And it would be a way of hedging their bets, also. An attempt that fails could be passed off as a demonstration, maybe. You know, to save face."
"If you're right to begin with," Stuyvesant said.
Reacher said nothing. The meeting came to an end a couple of minutes later. Stuyvesant made Froelich run through Armstrong's schedule for the day. It was an amalgam of familiar parts. First, intelligence briefings from the CIA at home, like on Friday morning. Then afternoon transition meetings on the Hill, the same as most days. Then the evening reception at the same hotel as Thursday. Stuyvesant noted it all down and went home just before two-thirty in the morning. Left Froelich on her own at the long table in the bright light and the silence, opposite Reacher and Neagley.