Worth Dying For_ A Reacher Novel - Lee Child [71]
He said, “It’s a fairly simple job. Sixty miles north of here there’s a corner of the county with forty farms. There’s a guy running around causing trouble. Truth is, it’s not really very important, but our mutual supplier is taking it personally. Business is on hold until the guy goes down.”
Mahmeini’s man said, “We know all that. Next?”
“OK,” Cassano said. “Next is we all move up there and work together and take care of the problem.”
“Starting when?”
“Let’s say tomorrow morning, first light.”
“Have you seen the guy?”
“Not yet.”
“Got a name?”
“Reacher.”
“What kind of name is that?”
“It’s an American name. What’s yours?”
“My name doesn’t matter. Got a description?”
“Big guy, blue eyes, white, six-five, two-fifty, brown coat.”
Mahmeini’s man said, “That’s worthless. This is America. This is farm country. It’s full of settlers and peasants. They all look like that. I mean, we just saw a guy exactly like that.”
Safir’s guy said, “He’s right. We saw one too. We’re going to need a much better description.”
Cassano said, “We don’t have one. But it will be easier when we get up there. Reacher stands out, apparently. And the local population is prepared to help us. They’ve been told to phone in with sightings. And there’s no cover up there.”
Mahmeini’s man said, “So where is he hiding out?”
“We don’t know. There’s a motel, but he’s not in it. Maybe he’s sleeping rough.”
“In this weather? Is that likely?”
“There are sheds and barns. I’m sure we’ll find him.”
“And then what?”
“We put him down.”
“Risky.”
“I know. He’s tough. So far he’s taken out four of the local people.”
Mahmeini’s man said, “I don’t care how tough he thinks he is. And I don’t care how many local people he’s taken out either. Because I’m sure they’re all idiots up there. I mean it’s risky because this isn’t the Wild West anymore. Do we have a safe exit strategy?”
Cassano said, “They tell me he’s a kind of hobo. So nobody is going to miss him. There’s not going to be an investigation. There aren’t even any cops up there.”
“That helps.”
“And it’s farm country. Like you said. There must be backhoes all over the place. We’ll bury him. Alive, preferably, the way our supplier is talking.”
Chapter 31
The physical search of the area was described four separate ways, in four separate files, the first from the county PD, the second from the State Police, the third from the National Guard’s helicopter unit, and the fourth from the FBI. The helicopter report was thin and useless. Margaret Coe had been wearing a green dress, which didn’t help in corn country in early summer. And the pilot had stayed above a thousand feet, to stop his downdraft damaging the young plants. Priorities had to be observed in a farm state, even when a kid was missing. Nothing significant had been seen from the air. No freshly turned earth, no flash of pink or chrome from the bike, no flattened stalks in any of the fields. Nothing at all, in fact, except an ocean of corn.
A waste of time and aviation fuel.
Both the county PD and the State Police had covered the forty farms at ground level. First had come the loud-hailer appeals in the dark, and the next day every house had been visited and every occupant had been asked to verify that they hadn’t seen the kid and that they had searched their outbuildings thoroughly. There was near-universal cooperation. Only one old couple confessed they hadn’t checked properly, so the cops searched their place for themselves. Nothing was found. The motel had been visited, every cabin checked, the Dumpster emptied, the lot searched for evidence. Nothing was found.
The Duncan compound showed up in three files. Everyone except the helicopter unit had been there. First the county PD had gone in, then the county PD and the State Police together, then the State Police on its own, and then finally the FBI, which had been a lot of visits and a lot of people for such a small place. The searches had been intense,