Bad Luck and Trouble

of thirst,” Reacher said.
    Nobody spoke.
    “The water bowl in the kitchen is dry,” Reacher said. “Then it drank what it could from the toilet. Probably lasted about a week.”
    “Awful,” Neagley said.
    “You bet. I like dogs. If I lived anywhere I’d have three or four. We’re going to rent a helicopter and we’re going to throw these guys out one by one in little pieces.”
    “When?”
    “Soon.”
    O’Donnell said, “We’re going to need more than we’ve got now.”
    Reacher said, “So let’s start looking.”

    They took scraps of paper towel from the kitchen and balled them up and shoved them up their noses to combat the smell. Settled down to a long and serious search. O’Donnell took the kitchen. Neagley took the living room. Reacher took Swan’s bedroom.
    They found nothing of any significance in any of those three places. Quite apart from the dog’s predicament, it was clear that Swan had gone out expecting to return. The dishwasher was half-loaded and had not been run. There was food in the refrigerator and trash in the kitchen pail. Pajamas were folded under the pillow. A half-finished book was resting on the night table. It had one of Swan’s own business cards jammed in it as a placeholder: Anthony Swan, U.S. Army (Retired), Assistant Director of Corporate Security, New Age Defense Systems, Los Angeles, California. On the bottom of the card was an e-mail address and the same direct-line phone number that Reacher and Neagley had tried so many times.
    “What exactly does New Age make?” O’Donnell asked.
    “Money,” Reacher said. “Although less than it used to, I guess.”
    “Does it have a product or is it all research?”
    “The woman we saw claimed they’re manufacturing something somewhere.”
    “What exactly?”
    “We have no idea.”
    The three of them tackled the second bedroom together. The one at the back of the house, with the draped slider and the step down to the empty patio. The room had a bed in it but was clearly used as a den most of the time. There was a desk and a phone and a file cabinet and a wall of shelves piled high with the kind of junk that a sentimental person accumulates.
    They started with the desk. Three pairs of eyes, three separate assessments. They found nothing. They moved on to the file cabinet. It was full of the kind of routine paperwork any homeowner has. Property taxes, insurance, canceled checks, paid bills, receipts. There was a personal section. Social Security, state and federal income taxes, a contract of employment from New Age Defense Systems, paycheck stubs. It looked like Swan had made a decent living. In a month he had pulled down what Reacher could make last a year and a half.
    There was stuff from a veterinarian. The dog had been female. Her name had been Maisi and her shots had all been up-to-date. She had been old but in good health. There was stuff from an organization called People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Swan had been a contributor. Big money. Therefore a worthwhile cause, Reacher guessed. Swan was nobody’s fool.
    They checked the shelves. Found a shoe box full of photographs. They were random snaps from Swan’s life and career. Maisi the dog was in some of them. Reacher and Neagley and O’Donnell were in others, and Franz, and Karla Dixon, and Sanchez and Orozco, and Stan Lowrey. All of them long ago in the past, younger, different in crucial ways, blazing with youth and vigor and preoccupation. There were random pairings and trios from offices and squad rooms all over the world. One was a formal group portrait, all nine of them in Class A uniforms after a ceremony for a unit citation. Reacher didn’t remember who had taken the picture. An official photographer, probably. He didn’t remember what the citation had been for, either.
    “We need to get going,” Neagley said. “Neighbors might have seen us.”
    “We’ve got probable cause,” O’Donnell said. “A friend who lives alone, no answer when we knocked on the door, a bad smell from inside.”
    Reacher stepped to the desk and picked up the phone. Hit redial. There was a rapid sequence of electronic blips as the circuit remembered the last number called. Then a purring ring tone. Then Angela Franz answered. Reacher could hear Charlie in the background. He put the phone down.
    “The last call he made was to Franz,” he said. “At home in Santa Monica.”
    “Reporting for duty,” O’Donnell said. “We knew that already. Doesn’t