61 Hours

Nothing to see. Just a vague sense of flat land receding into the frigid distance. The snow was easing. The falling flakes themselves seemed stunned by the cold.
    Reacher turned back from the window and found Janet Salter stepping in through the door. She said, ‘May we talk?’
    Reacher said, ‘Sure.’
    She said, ‘I know the real reason why you’re here, of course. I know why you’re inspecting the house. You have volunteered to defend me, if the siren should happen to sound, and you’re making yourself familiar with the terrain. And I’m very grateful for your kindness. Even though your psychological imperatives may mean you won’t be here for quite long enough. The trial might not happen for a month. How many new shirts would that be?’
    ‘Eight,’ Reacher said.
    She didn’t reply.
    Reacher said, ‘There would be no shame in bowing out, you know. No one could blame you. And those guys will get nailed for something else, sooner or later.’
    ‘There would be considerable shame in it,’ she said. ‘And I won’t do it.’
    ‘Then don’t talk to me about psychological imperatives,’ Reacher said.
    She smiled. Asked, ‘Are you armed?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Do retired plumbers carry wrenches the rest of their lives?’ She pointed to a low shelf. ‘There’s a book that might interest you. A work of history. The large volume, with the leather binding.’
    It was a big old thing about a foot and a half high and about four inches thick. It had a leather spine with raised horizontal ribs and a quaint title embossed in gold:
An Accurate Illustrated History of Mr Smith’s & Mr Wesson’s Hand Guns
. Which sounded Victorian, which did not compute. Smith & Wesson had made plenty of handguns in the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth, but not nearly enough to fill a book four inches thick.
    Janet Salter said, ‘Take a look at it.’
    Reacher pulled the book off the shelf. It was heavy.
    She said, ‘I think you should read it in bed tonight.’
    It was heavy because it wasn’t a book. Reacher opened the leather-bound cover and expected to see faded pages with half-tone engravings or hand-tinted line drawings, maybe alternated with tissue paper leaves to protect the art. Instead the cover was a lid and inside was a box with two moulded velvet cavities. The velvet was brown. Nested neatly in the two cavities was a matched pair of Smith & Wesson revolvers, one reversed with respect to the other, cradled butt to muzzle, like quotation marks either end of a sentence. The revolvers were Smith & Wesson’s Military and Police models. Four-inch barrels. They could have been a hundred years old, or fifty. Plain simple steel machines, chequered walnut grips, chambered for the .38 Special, lanyard eyelets on the bottom of the butts, put there for officers either military or civil.
    Janet Salter said, ‘They were my grandfather’s.’
    Reacher asked, ‘Did he serve?’
    ‘He was an honorary commissioner, back when Bolton first got a police department. He was presented with the guns. Do you think they still work?’
    Reacher nodded. Revolvers were usually reliable for ever. They had to be seriously banged up or rusted solid to fail. He asked, ‘Have they ever been used?’
    ‘I don’t think so.’
    ‘Do you have any oil?’
    ‘I have sewing-machine oil.’
    ‘That will do.’
    ‘Do we need anything else?’
    ‘Ammunition would help.’
    ‘I have some.’
    ‘How old?’
    ‘About a week.’
    ‘You’re well prepared.’
    ‘It seemed the right time to be.’
    ‘How many rounds?’
    ‘A box of a hundred.’
    ‘Good work.’
    ‘Put the book back now,’ she said. ‘The policewomen need not know. In my experience professionals are offended by amateur plans.’
    After dinner the phone rang. It was Peterson, at the police station. He told Janet Salter that the phone on the back corner desk had rung. The 110th MP. The woman wouldn’t talk to him. She wanted Reacher to call her back.
    Janet Salter’s phone was in the hallway. It was newer than the house, but not recently installed. It had a push-button dial, but it also had a cord and was about the size of a portable typewriter. It was on a small table with a chair next to it. Like phones used to be, back when one instrument was enough for a household and using it was a kind of ceremony.
    Reacher dialled the number he remembered. He waited for the recording and dialled 110.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘Amanda, please.’
    There was a click.