Reacher and Neagley left Sinclair in her room. They leapfrogged Reacher’s billet and went to Neagley’s, so they couldn’t be heard through the wall. Reacher said, “I don’t know why she came. She won’t watch the safe house.”
“She’s here because slim is better than none.”
“Except she’s deliberately opting for none.”
“Is she?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Never mind,” Neagley said. “Take a break. The East Coast won’t be up and running for another hour. We’ll get together then. I’m sure a conference call will cheer us up.”
—
Reacher went out for a walk. He found himself in a street full of menswear shops. And belts and gloves and watches and wallets. Clothing and accessories. Like an unofficial outdoor mall. He stopped in at a basic place and bought fresh underwear and a new T-shirt. The T-shirt was black, and spun from a fine grade of cotton. It cost about four times what he was accustomed to paying. But it fit. Germans were tall, on average. Not as tall as the Dutch, who were world champions, but taller than Americans, as a whole.
He changed in the store’s cubicle and dumped his old stuff in the trash. Like Neagley had said. A million small things missing. An olive drab undershirt, right there, once issued, never returned or reported missing or destroyed, and therefore now suddenly subtracted from an inventory that as a consequence would be out of balance forever.
He walked on. Halfway down the street there was a barbershop, like the centerpiece of the unofficial mall. It was tricked out to look like an old-time American place. Two vinyl chairs, with more chrome than a Cadillac. A big old radio on a shelf. Not a marketing plan, but a tribute. There was no large number of U.S. military nearby. And the PX barber was always cheaper. To Reacher’s practiced eye the place looked more like a diner than a barbershop, but it was a brave attempt. Some of the accessories were good. There was a visual chart taped to a mirror. An American publication. Reacher had seen hundreds of them in the States. Black-and-white line drawings, twenty-four heads, all with different styles, so the customer could point, instead of explaining. Top left was a standard crew cut, then came the whitewall, and the flat top, and the fade, and so on, the styles getting a little longer and a little weirder as they approached the bottom right. The Mohawk was in there, plus a couple of others that made the Mohawk look a model of probity.
A guy inside beckoned Reacher in.
Reacher mouthed, “How much?”
The guy held up his hand, fingers and thumb all extended.
Reacher mouthed, “Five what?”
The guy came to the door and opened it and said, “American dollars.”
“My regular barber is cheaper.”
“But I’m better. You get your uniforms tailored, right?”
“Do I look like I wear a uniform?”
“Oh, please.”
Reacher said, “Five bucks? I remember when five bucks got you two hamburgers and the back row of the movies. Plus car fare for her, if you fell out along the way. A shave and a haircut was two bits.”
“Was that an homage?”
“What?”
“Did you say that deliberately?”
“Sometimes I let things out by accident, but generally only one syllable at a time.”
“Therefore you said it deliberately. It was an homage. You were building the energy.”
“What was I doing?”
“You like this place.”
“I suppose.”
“Then support it by paying the full five bucks.”
“I don’t need a haircut.”
The guy said, “You know the difference between you and me?”
Reacher said, “What?”
“I can see your hair from the outside.”
“And?”
“You need a haircut.”
“For five bucks?”
“I’ll add a shave for free.”
Which turned out to be a luxurious experience. The water was warm, and the lather was creamy. The steel was perfect. It hissed through, on a molecular level. The mirror was tinted, so the finished job looked tan where it was probably pink. But even so, it looked pretty good. Call it a buck, Reacher thought. Which leaves the haircut costing four. Which is still outrageous.
The guy swapped the razor for scissors and started in on Reacher’s hair. Reacher ignored him and looked at the visual chart instead. The twenty-four styles. He went through them in order, only his eyes moving, carefully, as if studying them, from the plain number-one at the beginning, all the way to a fantastically elaborate DA at the other end of the scale.
He looked back at the Mohawk.
The guy said, “What do you think?”
Reacher said, “About what?”
“Your new haircut.”
Reacher looked in the mirror. He said, “Have you done it yet?”
“Are you in doubt?”
“It doesn’t look like it’s just been cut.”
“Exactly,” the guy said. “The best haircut looks like it was done a week ago.”
“So I pay five bucks for a haircut that already looks grown out?”
“This is a salon. I am an artist.”
Reacher said nothing.
He looked back at the Mohawk.