“No, because he was covering his very considerable ass.”
“Such a guy would also pass on a dumb police report about two military personnel recorded in a homicide investigation. Walking past the scene and claiming to be tourists. Our names are right there in black and white. So he had to pass it on. Probably straight to HQ in Stuttgart. Where someone looked us up, and saw the 110th in our recent pasts, and hit some kind of a secret alarm button. Like in a bank. No one heard anything, but people started scrambling all over town. Who are we here for? This is a broad sweep. We’re going to upset all kinds of people.”
“Suppose these are the right people?”
“You take the one on the left, and you can have the Legion of Merit.”
“They would never give a Legion of Merit to a sergeant.”
“They’re not the right people. I’m a lucky man, but not that lucky.”
“So who are they?”
“Can’t tell by looking,” Reacher said.
They chased the last strudel crumbs around their plates, and drained their coffee cups down to the muddy paste at the bottom, and then they stood up fast and hustled out the door.
Chapter 14
Reacher and Neagley dodged pedestrians on the sidewalk and cars on the street, and they headed diagonally toward the second coffee shop on the other side. Through the window they saw the two guys startle and sit up straight. Too late. They were sitting together on the far side of a corner table for four, where their angle was good. Which left two empty chairs between them and the rest of the room. Neagley went in first and took one of the chairs. Reacher followed and took the other. Which meant the two guys were trapped. All quiet and genteel and civilized, but they had no way out. Not unless Reacher and Neagley stood up again to let them by. Which was not on the immediate agenda.
Reacher said, “Listen carefully, guys, because I’m going to say this once and once only. We have a one-time special offer. We’ll help you if we can. Minimum sentences in exchange for full disclosure. Unless it’s the one thing we’re interested in. But I don’t think it is. I think you’re the wrong kind of guys for that.”
The guy on the left said, “Get lost.”
He was closer to forty than thirty, with graying black hair buzzed short, and a doughy slab of a face, like an uncooked loaf. He had dark eyes and calluses on his hands. His accent was from Arkansas, or Tennessee, or maybe Mississippi.
Reacher said, “You know our names, because someone checked us out and raised the alarm. Therefore you know we’re MPs. You’re under arrest as of this moment.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I’m pretty sure we can. The Uniform Code says so. We could arrest the Chief of Staff if we wanted to. We would need a pretty good case, but in theory we could do it. You present much less of a problem.”
“You have no jurisdiction.”
“That’s a big word.”
“We’re not military personnel.”
“I think you are.”
“We’re not American either.”
“I think you are.”
“You’re wrong.”
“Prove it. Show me ID.”
“Get lost,” the guy said again.
“The law in Germany requires you to identify yourselves to the police on request.”
“German police. Not you.”
“You’re doing this wrong. Now you’re heading for maximum sentences.”
The guy said nothing. The other guy was watching the conversation, his eyes going back and forth, like tennis.
Reacher said, “Show me ID.”
The guy on the left said, “We’d like to leave now. Please step aside.”
“Not going to happen.”
“We could make it happen.”
“You could try,” Reacher said. “But you’d get hurt. You’re out of your league. You’re up against something you never saw before.”
“You have a mighty high opinion of yourself.”
Reacher nodded at Neagley. “I’m talking about her. I’m just here to clean up the mess.”
They looked at Neagley. Dark hair, dark eyes, a tan. A good-looking woman. She smiled at them. Her forearms were on the table. Reacher noticed her nails. They were shiny with clear polish, and neatly filed. Even on the right, which she must have done left-handed. She wouldn’t use a nail salon. She couldn’t bear her hands to be touched. She looked at one guy, and then the other.
The guy on the left shrugged and raised up an inch off his chair and dug in his back pants pocket. The other guy did the same. Reacher watched. Safe enough. No one kept a weapon in his back pants pocket. Uncomfortable. Not readily accessible.
The guys came out with two IDs each. Plastic, the size of credit cards. But not. They were national identity cards, and driver’s licenses. Both had Bundesrepublik Deutschland at the top. Germany. The Federal Republic. The photographs were right. The guy on the left was named Bernd Durnberger, and the guy on the right was named Klaus Augenthaler.
Reacher said, “You’re German citizens?”
The guy on the left took his cards back and nodded.
“Naturalized?”
The guy nodded again.