Wiley took the padlock off the hasp, in the center of the door, and then off the top bolt, and the bottom, and he dragged the door open, and he ducked inside. He was calm. He had simple mechanical tasks ahead of him. First up were the plates. He took off the rental’s fresh new issue, and he put on the old BMW’s number in their place. Then he took out his cans of spray paint, bought at the hardware store, lurid greens and yellows and orange and red and silver. He sprayed fat initials on the side of the van, his own, just for the hell of it, but reversed, WH, all swelled up like balloons, like you saw on the subway cars. He shaded the letters with silver, and sprayed random swirls in the background, and added a fat S and a fat L, like a tag for a second artist, except it wasn’t. It was Sugar Land, right there on the truck, because why the hell not? It was where he was from, and it was where he was going.
Then he sprayed a mist of gray over everything else, to calm it down, to give it age. He stood back. He was light-headed from the aerosol fumes. But he was satisfied. It was no longer a new white truck. It was a piece of urban junk. It was no longer worthy of a passing glance. Not that anyone would be passing. Everyone was at the hotel. There would be crowds of law enforcement and all kinds of perimeters. Firefighters and SWAT teams in the center, because of the handgun rounds and the gasoline fires. Then all kinds of security and rubberneckers and glory hunters. I was there, man. The bullets were zipping right over my head.
He opened the double doors all the way, and then he climbed in and started up the rental. He reversed it out, and maneuvered it around, sawing it back and forth until it was lined up perfectly. He watched his mirrors and backed it up slowly, slowly, until its rear bumper kissed the old truck’s rear bumper. He put on the parking brake and shut down the motor. He climbed through from the cab to the load space. He rolled up the rear door from the inside. The old truck’s rear door was right there, an inch away. He unlocked it and rolled it up from the outside.
A wooden crate.
It was six feet high and six feet wide and twelve feet long. It was solidly made from tight-grained softwood, straight and true, once pale, now aged to a tobacco amber. It was a prototype of a standardized container system the Pentagon experimented with in the 1950s. A survivor. A piece of history. It was stenciled here and there with faded whitewash numbers.
It weighed more than six hundred pounds. No way to move it without a forklift truck. One of which he no longer had. He took out a regular slot screwdriver from his bag. Old fashioned. Like the crate. It had screws the size of buttons. They were set on six-inch centers all around the perimeter of the end panel. Forty-four in total. Probably the result of a study by a research and development corporation. Some guy in a suit got a fat check for saying more was better. Which made everyone happy. The Pentagon’s ass was covered. The screw supplier was making out like a bandit. Probably charged a dollar each. Military spec.
Wiley got to work.
—
The phone rang in the consulate room. Griezman. Who said, “Something is happening in the hotel parking garage. Where the hooker vanished. There were gunshots and then a car blew up. Then two more. The fire is contained because there are sprinklers and foam on the ceiling. But we can’t get close. Not until we’re sure about the gun.”
Reacher said, “You think the guy is still in there?”
“Don’t you?”
“We didn’t like the sound. It could have been ammo cooking off. Some kind of a delayed mechanism. You need to consider someone set it up on a timer. In which case he’s long gone. He’s where you’re not.”
“Who?”
“Horace Wiley, maybe. He’s keeping to a busy schedule right now. He might be in need of a decoy. You should put half your men back on the street.”
“You think he’s back in town?”
“I’m beginning to think he never left. He could be moving his truck right now. You should put guys on the street.”
“Impossible. This is a government protocol. There were gunshots and explosions in the center of town. It’s not my decision. They planned for a year. The mayor’s office is in charge and we’re doing it by the book.”
“How long do they plan to wait before they go in?”
“A unit with body armor is on its way. Thirty minutes, possibly.”
“OK,” Reacher said. “Good luck.”
He clicked off the call. No one spoke.
Reacher said, “I’m going out for a walk.”
—
Forty-four screws cost him just shy of twenty minutes, plus a lot of burn in his forearms. But then the panel came free and he laid it down to bridge the gap between the load floors. A flat surface, from one truck to the other. As planned ahead of time. He had thought of everything.
The air in the crate smelled still and stale. Old wood, old canvas, old dust. The old world. The contents were exactly what Uncle Arnold had told him about, all those years before. Ten identical items. All the same. Each one weighed fifty pounds. Each one was ready-packed in a transport container. What Uncle Arnold had called an H-912. Wiley still remembered all the details. The containers had straps all over them. Easy to grab. Easy enough to haul and slide and drag and push. One at a time. From the old truck to the new truck. All the way in. Butted up tight, starting in the far back corner.
Then a pause, and a breath, and back for the next one.