thirty-seven thousand feet up. Nobody on the ground is even going to
be aware of them.”
“That’s seven miles up,” Brogan said. “How can they see anything from
that sort of height?”
“Good cameras,” the aide said. “Seven miles is nothing. They’ll show
you a cigarette pack lying on the sidewalk from seven miles. The whole
thing is automatic. The guys up there hit a button and the camera
tracks whatever it’s supposed to track. Just keeps pointing at the
spot on the ground you chose, transmitting high-quality video by
satellite, then you turn around and come back, and the camera swivels
around and does it all again.”
“Undetectable?” McGrath asked.
“They look like airliners,” the aide said. “You look up and you see a
tiny little vapor trail and you think it’s TWA on the way somewhere.
You don’t think it’s the air force checking whether you polished your
shoes this morning, right?”
“Seven miles, you’ll see the hairs on their heads,” Johnson said. “What
do you think we spent all those defense dollars on? Crop dusters?”
McGrath nodded. He felt naked. Time being, he had nothing to offer
except a couple of rental jeeps, two years old, waiting at the
sidewalk.
“We’re getting a profile on this Borken guy,” he said. “Shrinks at
Quantico are working it up now.”
“We found Jack Reacher’s old CO,” Johnson said. “He’s doing desk duty
in the Pentagon. He’ll join us, give us the spread.”
McGrath nodded.
“Forewarned is forearmed,” he said.
The telephone rang. Johnson’s aide picked it up. He was the
nearest.
“When are we leaving?” Brogan asked.
McGrath noticed he had asked Johnson direct.
“Right now, I guess,” Johnson said. The air force will fly us up
there. Saves six hours on the road, right?”
The aide hung up the phone. He looked like he’d been kicked in the
gut.
The missile unit,” he said. “We lost radio contact, north of Yorke.”
THIRTY-ONE
HOLLY PAUSED IN THE CORRIDOR. SMILED. THE WOMAN HAD LEFT her weapon
propped against the wall outside the door. That had been the delay.
She had used the key, put the tray on the floor, unslung her weapon,
propped it against the wall and picked up the tray again before nudging
open the door.
She swapped the iron tube for the gun. Not a weapon she had used
before. Not one she wanted to use now. It was a tiny submachine gun.
An Ingram MAC 10. Obsolete military issue. Obsolete for a reason.
Holly’s class at Quantico had laughed about it. They called it the
phone booth gun. It was so inaccurate you had to be in a phone booth
with your guy to be sure of hitting him. A grim joke. And it fired
way too quickly. A thousand rounds per minute. One touch on the
trigger and the magazine was empty.
But it was a better weapon than part of an old iron bed frame. She
checked the magazine. It was full, thirty shells. The chamber was
clean. She clicked the trigger and watched the mechanism move. The
gun worked as well as it was ever going to. She smacked the magazine
back into position. Straightened the canvas strap and slung it tight
over her shoulder. Clicked the cocking handle to the fire position and
closed her hand around the grip. Took a firm hold on her crutch and
eased to the top of the stairs.
She stood still and waited. Listened hard. No sound. She went down
the stairs, slowly, a step at a time, the Ingram out in front of her.
At the bottom, she waited and listened again. No sound. She crossed
the lobby and arrived at the doors. Eased them open and looked
outside.
The street was deserted. But it was wide. It looked like a huge city
boulevard to her. To reach safety on the other side was going to take
her minutes. Minutes out there in the open, exposed to the mountain
slopes above. She estimated the distance. Breathed hard and gripped
her crutch. Jabbed the Ingram forward. Breathed hard again and took
off at a lurching run, jamming the crutch down, leaping ahead with her
good leg, swinging the gun left and right to cover both approaches.