61 Hours

communing with his stock in trade and shuffled the long way around. Five thousand gallons in a homemade tank. He wanted to be sure the connection was secure. He was going to be down there until Plato died, which was a minimum of a few more minutes and a maximum of ten more hours, and he preferred one thing to worry about at a time.
    He found Plato’s guy finishing up. The brass end of the hose was neatly socketed into a matching brass fitment brazed into the end wall of the tank. The guy was nudging it one way, nudging it the other, feeling for looseness or play. He seemed to find none, so he opened a tap on the tank side of the joint. Reacher heardthe fuel flow into the hose. Not much of it. Three gallons, maybe four. That was all. Gravity only, into the length of hose that lay on the floor at a lower level than the tank itself. For the rest, the pump would have to prime itself and then suck hard and haul it all up and out.
    Reacher watched the joint. A single fat drop of kerosene formed where two fibre washers were compressed. It beaded large and waited and then fell to the floor and made a tiny wet stain.
    That was all.
    No more.
    Safe enough.
    Plato’s guy crouched a little and duck-walked back to the stairs and headed upward. Reacher shuffled on around the perimeter of the circular chamber and disappeared into a corridor far from the jewellery and far from the meth.

FORTY-FIVE
    D O IT
. S HORT SIMPLE WORDS, A SHORT SIMPLE COMMAND . O R A short simple plea, or a short simple request. Or a short simple half of a bargain. A very attractive bargain. Do it, and get extremely rich, and live happily for ever with respect and veneration from your whole community. They would be the men who took down Plato. Saints. Heroes. Songs would be sung, tales would be told.
    The guy from seat 4A looked at the guy from seat 4B. They both swallowed hard. They were getting very close to doing it. Dangerously close. A hundred feet south a new sentry had just rotated into position. He was facing away, alert and on guard. Way far beyond him the flares still burned at the distant end of the runway. Fifty yards the other side of the Boeing’s tail the third flare still burned. Fifty yards beyond the de-icer truck in the other direction the fourth flare was still a bright crimson puffball. Blue moon, white snow, red flame.
    The other three guys were working in the plane. Opening the doors, setting the ladders, working out a system for haulingthe stuff hand-to-hand along a human chain and then getting it up into the plane and stacking it safely on the floor of the old economy section.
    The guy from seat 4A hoisted the end of the second hose on his shoulder. The guy from seat 4B hit the switch and the drum began to unwind.
    Sixteen minutes to four in the morning.
    Eleven minutes to go.
    Reacher heard Plato moving about. Heard him step out of the corridor into the round chamber. Reacher was sitting on the floor in the first of the curved connecting tunnels. In what he was calling the B-ring. Like a miniature Pentagon, but round and underground. The central chamber was the A-ring. Then came the B-ring, and then the C-ring, and around the outside was the D-ring. All partially interconnected by the eight straight spokes. More than seventeen hundred linear feet of tunnel. Twenty-four separate junctions. Twelve random left turns, twelve random right turns. Plus a total of ten hollowed-out bathrooms and kitchens and storage chambers.
    A warren.
    A maze.
    Reacher had been in it before, and Plato hadn’t.
    No cell signal, his guys all busy on the surface, no possibility of reinforcement.
    Reacher waited.
    Plato called, ‘Holland?’
    The sound of the word boomed and echoed and took unpredictable paths and seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.
    Reacher waited.
    Plato called, ‘Holland? Get your ass over here. Our deal isn’t finished yet. Remember, I’ll cripple her and mutilate her and let her live for a year before I finish her off.’
    Reacher said nothing.
    Plato called, ‘Holland?’
    No response from Reacher. Five seconds. Ten.
    ‘Holland?’
    Reacher said nothing. The big gamble came right then. Right at that exact moment in time. Fifty-fifty. Live or die. A smart guy with a dawning problem would hustle straight up the stairs and send foot soldiers down in his place. A dumb guy would stay to fight it out.
    But so might a smart guy overcome by ego, and arrogance, and a sense of superiority, and a need never to appear weak because