Without Fail

15

A staffer from the Office of Protection Research was waiting when Reacher and Neagley and Stuyvesant got back to the Treasury Building. He was standing in the reception area wearing a knitted sweater and blue pants, like he had run straight in from the family di

“I heard what the FBI is saying,” Swain said.

“You believe it?” Reacher asked.

Swain just shrugged.

“Yes or no?” Reacher asked.

“I guess it’s not impossible,” Swain said. “But there’s no reason to believe it’s likely. Just as likely that it’s ex-FBI agents. Or current FBI agents. As an agency we’re better than they are. Maybe they’re trying to bring us down.”

“Think we should look in that direction?”

“You’re Joe Reacher’s brother, aren’t you?”

Reacher nodded.

“I worked with him,” Swain said. “Way back.”

“And?”

“He used to encourage random observations.”

“So do I,” Reacher said. “You got any?”

“My job is strictly academic,” Swain said. “You understand? I’m purely a researcher. A scholar, really. I’m here to analyze.”

“And?”

“This situation feels different from anything else I’ve seen. The hatred is very visible. Assassinations fall into two groups, ideological or functional. A functional assassination is where you need to get rid of a guy for some specific political or economic reason. An ideological assassination is where you murder a guy because you hate him, basically. There have been plenty of attempts along those lines, over the years. I can’t tell you about any of them except to say that most don’t get very far. And that there’s certainly always plenty of hatred involved. But usually it’s well hidden, down at the conspirator level. They whisper among themselves. All we ever see is the result. But this time the hatred is right there in our face. They’ve gone to a lot of trouble and taken a lot of risks to make sure we know all about it.”

“So what’s your conclusion?”

“I just think the early phase was extraordinary. The messages? Think about the risks. Think about the energy required to minimize those risks. They put unbelievable resources into the early phase. So I have to assume they felt it was worthwhile.”

“But it wasn’t,” Neagley said. “Armstrong has never even seen any of the messages. They were wasting their time.”

“Simple ignorance,” Swain said. “Were you aware we absolutely won’t discuss threats with a protectee?”

“No,” Neagley said. “I was surprised.”

“Nobody’s aware,” Swain said. “Everybody’s surprised. These guys thought they were getting right to him. So I’m convinced it’s personal. Aimed at him, not us.”

“So are we,” Reacher said. “You got a specific reason?”

“You’ll think I’m naive,” Swain said. “But I don’t believe anybody who works or has worked for us would have killed the other two Armstrongs. Not just like that.”

Reacher shrugged. “Maybe you’re naive. Maybe you aren’t. But it doesn’t matter. We’re convinced anyway.”

“What’s your reason?”

“The hyphen in the second message.”

“The hyphen?” Swain said. Then he paused. “Yes, I see. Plausible, but a little circumstantial, wouldn’t you say?”

“Whatever, we’re working with the assumption it was personal.”

“OK, but why? Only possible answer is they absolutely hate him. They wanted to taunt him, scare him, make him suffer first. Just shooting him isn’t enough for them.”

“So who are they? Who hates him that bad?”

Swain made a gesture with his hand, like he was pushing that question aside.

“Something else,” he said. “This is a little off the wall, but I think we’re miscounting. How many messages have there been?”

“Six,” Reacher said.

“No,” Swain said. “I think there have been seven.”

“Where’s the seventh?”

“Nendick,” Swain said. “I think Nendick delivered the second message, and was the third message. You see, you got here and forty-eight hours later you got to Nendick, which was pretty quick. But with respect, we’d have gotten there anyway, sooner or later. It was inevitable. If it wasn’t the cleaners, it had to be the tapes. So we’d have gotten there. And what was waiting for us? Nendick wasn’t just a delivery system. He was a message in himself. He showed what these people are capable of. Assuming Armstrong was in the loop, he’d have been getting pretty shaky by that point.”

“Then there are nine messages,” Neagley said. “On that basis, we should add in the Mi

“Absolutely,” Swain said. “You see what I mean? Everything has fear as its purpose. Every single thing. Suppose Armstrong was in the loop all along. He gets the first message, he’s worried. We get the second message, he’s more worried. We trace its source, and he starts to feel better, but no, it gets even worse, because we find Nendick paralyzed with fear. Then we get the demonstration threat, he’s worried some more. Then the demonstration happens, and he’s devastated by how ruthless it was.”

Reacher said nothing. Just stared at the floor.

“You think I’m overanalytical,” Swain said.

Reacher shook his head, still looking at the floor. “No, I think I’m underanalytical. Maybe. Possibly. Because what are the thumbprints about?”

“They’re a taunt of a different sort,” Swain said. “They’re a boast. A puzzle. A tease. Can’t catch me sort of thing.”

“How long did you work with my brother?”

“Five years. I worked for him, really. I say with him as a vain attempt at status.”

“Was he a good boss?”

“He was a great boss,” Swain said. “Great guy all around.”

“And he ran random-observation sessions?”

Swain nodded. “They were fun. Anybody could say anything.”

“Did he join in?”

“He was very lateral.”

Reacher looked up. “You just said everything has fear as its purpose, every single thing. Then you said the thumbprints are a taunt of a different sort. So not everything is the same, right? Something’s different.”

Swain shrugged. “I could stretch it. The thumbprints induce the fear that these guys are too clever to be caught. Different sort of fear, but it’s still fear.”

Reacher looked away. Went quiet. Thirty seconds, a whole minute.

“I’m going to cave in,” he said. “Finally. I’m going to be like Joe. I’m wearing his suit. I was sleeping with his girlfriend. I keep meeting his old colleagues. So now I’m going to make a lateral random off-the-wall observation, just like he did, apparently.”

“What is it?” Neagley said.

“I think we missed something,” Reacher said. “Just skated right on by it.”

“What?”

“I’ve got all these weird images going around in my head. Like for instance, Stuyvesant’s secretary doing things at her desk.”

“What things?”

“I think we’ve got the thumbprint exactly ass-backward. All along we’ve assumed they knew it was untraceable. But I think we’re completely wrong. I think it’s just the opposite. I think they expected it would be traceable.”

“Why?”

“Because I think the thumbprint thing is exactly the same as the Nendick thing. I met a watchmaker today. He told me where squalene comes from.”

“Sharks’ livers,” Neagley said.

“And people’s noses,” Reacher said. “Same stuff. That gunk you wake up with in the morning is squalene. Same chemical exactly.”