“That’s my security, Mr. Stone,” he said. “But like you just told me, I’m sure there won’t be a problem.”

Chester Stone said nothing. Just stood up and threaded his way by all the furniture and over to the door. Through the reception area and into the corridor and into the elevator. Down eighty-eight floors and back outside, where the bright morning sun hit him in the face like a blow.

3

THAT SAME SUN was on the back of Reacher’s neck as he made his way into Manhattan in the rear seat of a gypsy cab. He preferred to use unlicensed operators, given the choice. It suited his habit. No reason at all why anyone should ever want to trace his movements by checking with cabdrivers, but a cabdriver who couldn’t admit to being one was the safest kind there was. And it gave the opportunity for a little negotiation about the fare. Not much negotiating to be done with the meter in a yellow taxi.

They came in over the Triborough Bridge and entered Manhattan on 125th Street. Drove west through traffic as far as Roosevelt Square. Reacher had the guy pull over there while he scanned around and thought for a moment. He was thinking about a cheap hotel, but he wanted one with working phones. And intact phone books. His judgment was he couldn’t meet all three requirements in that neighborhood. But he got out anyway, and paid the guy off. Wherever he was going, he’d walk the last part. A cut-out period, on his own. It suited his habit.

THE TWO YOUNG men in the crumpled thousand-dollar suits waited until Chester Stone was well clear. Then they went into the inner office and threaded by the furniture and stood quietly in front of the desk. Hobie looked up at them and rolled open a drawer. Put the signed agreements away with the photographs and took out a new pad of yellow paper. Then he laid his hook on the desktop and turned in his chair so the dim light from the window caught the good side of his face.

“Well?”

“We just got back,” the first guy said.

“You get the information I asked for?”

The second guy nodded. Sat down on the sofa.

“He was looking for a guy called Jack Reacher.”

Hobie made a note of the name on the yellow pad. “Who’s he?”

There was a short silence.

“We don’t know,” the first guy said.

Hobie nodded, slowly. “Who was Costello’s client?”

Another short silence.

“We don’t know that either,” the guy said.

“Those are fairly basic questions,” Hobie said.

The guy just looked at him through the silence, uneasy.

“You didn’t think to ask those fairly basic questions?”

The second guy nodded. “We asked them. We were asking them like crazy.”

“But Costello wouldn’t answer?”

“He was going to,” the first guy said.

“But?”

“He died on us,” the second guy said. “He just upped and died. He was old, overweight. It was maybe a heart attack, I think. I’m very sorry, sir. We both are.”

Hobie nodded again, slowly. “Exposure?”

“Nil,” the first guy said. “He’s unidentifiable.”

Hobie glanced down at the fingertips of his left hand. “Where’s the knife?”

“In the sea,” the second guy said.

Hobie moved his arm and tapped a little rhythm on the desktop with the point of his hook. Thought hard, and nodded again, decisively.

“OK, not your fault, I guess. Weak heart, what can you do?”

The first guy relaxed and joined his partner on the sofa. They were off the hook, and that had a special meaning in this office.

“We need to find the client,” Hobie said into the silence.

The two guys nodded and waited.

“Costello must have had a secretary, right?” Hobie said. “She’ll know who the client was. Bring her to me.”

The two guys stayed on the sofa.

“What?”

“This Jack Reacher,” the first guy said. “Supposed to be a big guy, three months in the Keys. Costello told us people were talking about a big guy, been there three months, worked nights in a bar. We went to see him. Big tough guy, but he said he wasn’t Jack Reacher.”

“So?”

“ Miami airport,” the second guy said. “We took United because it was direct. But there was an earlier flight just leaving, Delta to Atlanta and New York.”

“And?”

“The big guy from the bar? We saw him, heading down to the gate.”

“You sure?”

The first guy nodded. “Ninety-nine percent certain. He was a long way ahead, but he’s a real big guy. Difficult to miss.”

Hobie started tapping his hook on the desk again. Lost in thought.

“OK, he’s Reacher,” he said. “Has to be, right? Costello asking around, then you guys asking on the same day, it spooks him and he runs. But where? Here?”

The second guy nodded. “If he stayed on the plane in Atlanta, he’s here.”

“But why?” Hobie asked. “Who the hell is he?”

He thought for a moment and answered his own question.

“The secretary will tell me who the client is, right?”

Then he smiled.

“And the client will tell me who this Reacher guy is.”

The two guys in the smart suits nodded quietly and stood up. Threaded their way around the furniture and walked out of the office.

REACHER WAS WALKING south through Central Park. Trying to get a grip on the size of the task he had set himself. He was confident he was in the right city. The three accents had been definitive. But there was a huge population to wade through. Seven and a half million people spread out over the five boroughs, maybe altogether 18 million in the metropolitan area. Eighteen million people close enough to focus inward when they want a specialized urban service like a fast and efficient private detective. His gut assumption was Costello may have been located in Manhattan, but it was entirely possible that Mrs. Jacob was suburban. If you’re a woman living somewhere in the suburbs and you want a private detective, where do you look for one? Not next to the supermarket or the video rental. Not in the mall next to the dress shops. You pick up the Yellow Pages for the nearest major city and you start calling. You have an initial conversation and maybe the guy drives out to you, or you get on the train and come in to him. From anywhere in a big dense area that stretches hundreds of square miles.

He had given up on hotels. He didn’t necessarily need to invest a lot of time. Could be he’d be in and out within an hour. And he could use more information than hotels had to offer. He needed phone books for all five boroughs and the suburbs. Hotels wouldn’t have all of those. And he didn’t need to pay the kind of rates hotels like to charge for phone calls. Digging swimming pools had not made him rich.

So he was heading for the public library. Forty-second Street and Fifth. The biggest in the world? He couldn’t remember. Maybe, maybe not. But certainly big enough to have all the phone books he needed, and big, wide tables and comfortable chairs. Four miles from Roosevelt Square, an hour’s brisk walk, interrupted only by traffic on the cross streets and a quick diversion into an office-supply store to buy a notebook and a pencil.

THE NEXT GUY into Hobie’s inner office was the receptionist. He stepped inside and locked the door behind him. Walked over and sat down on the end of the sofa nearest the desk. Looked at Hobie, long and hard, and silently.

“What?” Hobie asked him, although he knew what.

“You should get out,” the receptionist said. “It’s risky now.”

Hobie made no reply. Just held his hook in his left hand and traced its wicked metal curve with his remaining fingers.

“You planned,” the receptionist said. “You promised. No point planning and promising if you don’t do what you’re supposed to do.”

Hobie shrugged. Said nothing.

“We heard from Hawaii, right?” the receptionist said. “You planned to run as soon as we heard from Hawaii.”