Die Trying by Lee Child

of there, no sir, not at all.”

The carpenter laughed a short nervous laugh.

“That’s how I was thinking,” he said.

“So what you need is an incentive,” the employer said. “Understand? To

make sure you try real hard to get out.”

The carpenter glanced up at the blanked-off second-story corner. When

he glanced back down, there was a dull black automatic in the

employer’s hand.

“There’s a sack in the truck,” the employer said, ‘go get it, OK?”

The carpenter just looked around, astonished. The employer pointed the

gun at his head.

“Get the sack,” he said quietly.

There was nothing in the pickup bed. There was a burlap sack on the

passenger seat. Wrapped into a package maybe a foot and a half long.

It was heavy. Felt like reaching into a freezer at the market and

pulling out a side of pig.

“Open it up,” the employer called. “Take a look.”

The carpenter peeled back the burlap. First thing he saw was a finger.

Icy white, because the blood had drained. Yellow workman’s calluses

standing out, big and obvious.

“I’m going to put you in the room now,” the employer called to him.

“You don’t get out by morning, I’m going to do that to you, OK? With

your own damn saw, because mine went dull doing those.”

NINE

REACHER LAY QUIETLY ON THE DIRTY STRAW IN HIS STALL IN THE cow barn.

Not asleep, but his body was shut down to the point where he might as

well have been. Every muscle was relaxed and his breathing was slow

and even. His eyes were closed because the barn was dark and there was

nothing to see. But his mind was wide awake. Not racing, but just

powering steadily along with that special nighttime intensity you get

in the absence of any other distractions.

He was doing two things at once. First he was keeping track of time.

It was nearly two hours since he had last looked at his watch, but he

knew what time it was to within about twenty seconds. It was an old

skill, born of many long wakeful nights on active service. When you’re

waiting for something to happen, you close your body down like a beach

house in winter and you let your mind lock on to the steady pace of the

passing seconds. It’s like suspended animation. It saves energy and

it lifts the responsibility for your heartbeat away from your

unconcious brain and passes it on to some kind of a hidden clock. Makes

a huge black space for thinking in. But it keeps you just awake enough

to be ready for whatever you need to be ready for. And it means you

always know what time it is.

The second simultaneous thing Readier was doing was playing around with

a little mental arithmetic. He was multiplying big numbers in his

head. He was thirty-seven years and eight months old, just about to

the day. Thirty-seven multiplied by three hundred and sixty-five was

thirteen thousand five hundred and five. Plus twelve days for twelve

leap years was thirteen thousand five hundred and seventeen. Eight

months counting from his birthday in October forward to this date in

June was two hundred and forty-three days. Total of thirteen thousand

seven hundred and sixty days since he was born. Thirteen thousand

seven hundred and sixty days, thirteen thousand seven hundred and sixty

nights. He was trying to place this particular night somewhere on that

endless scale. In terms of how bad it was.

Truth was, it wasn’t the best night he had ever passed, but it was a

long way from being the worst. A very long way. The first four or so

years of his life, he couldn’t remember anything at all, which left

about twelve thousand three hundred nights to account for. Probability

was, this particular night was up there in the top third. Without even

trying hard, he could have reeled off thousands of nights worse than

this one. Tonight, he was warm, comfortable, uninjured, not under any

immediate threat, and he’d been fed. Not well, but he felt that came

from a lack of skill rather than from active malice. So physically he