Die Trying

trial and error. Another hour, Stevie would be two hundred and fifty miles from home. The Night Hawk would have done one hundred and sixty. Way behind. An hour after that, Stevie would be three hundred miles out, and the Night Hawk would be three hundred and twenty. Overshot. Therefore they were going to catch him somewhere near the top of the second hour. If they were headed in the right direction.
    Flathead Lake came into view, far ahead and far below. Reacher could see the roads snaking across the rugged terrain. He thumbed the button on his mike.
    “Still south?” he asked.
    “Dead on,” the pilot said.
    “Still one-sixty?” Reacher asked.
    “Dead on,” the pilot said again.
    “OK, stick with it,” Reacher said. “Hour and fifty minutes, maybe.”
    “So where is he going?” Webster asked.
    “San Francisco,” Reacher said.
    “Why?” McGrath asked.
    “Or Minneapolis,” Reacher said. “But I’m gambling on San Francisco.”
    “Why?” McGrath asked again.
    “San Francisco or Minneapolis,” Reacher said. “Think about it. Other possibilities would be Boston, New York, Philly, Cleveland, Richmond in Virginia, Atlanta, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City in Missouri, or Dallas in Texas.”
    McGrath just shrugged blankly. Webster looked puzzled. Johnson glanced at his aide. Garber was motionless. But Holly was smiling. She smiled and winked at Reacher. He winked back and the Night Hawk thumped on south over Missoula at a hundred and sixty miles an hour.

    “CHRIST, IT’S THE Fourth of July,” Webster said suddenly.
    “Tell me about it,” Reacher said. “Lots of people gathered in public places. Families, kids and all.”
    Webster nodded grimly.
    “OK, where exactly in San Francisco?” he asked.
    “I’m not sure,” Reacher said.
    “North end of Market,” Holly said. “Right near Embarcadero Plaza. That’s where, chief. I’ve been there on the Fourth. Big parade in the afternoon, fireworks over the water at night. Huge crowds all day long.”
    “Huge crowds everywhere on the Fourth,” Webster said. “You better be guessing right, people.”
    McGrath looked up. A slow smile was spreading over his bruised face.
    “We are guessing right,” he said. “It’s San Francisco for sure. Not Minneapolis or anyplace else.”
    Reacher smiled back and winked. McGrath had gotten it.
    “You want to tell me why?” Webster asked him.
    McGrath was still smiling.
    “Go figure,” he said. “You’re the damn Director.”
    “Because it’s the nearest?” Webster asked.
    McGrath nodded.
    “In both senses,” he said, and smiled again.
    “What both senses?” Webster asked. “What are we talking about?”
    Nobody answered him. The military men were quiet. Holly and McGrath were staring out through the windows at the ground, two thousand feet below. Reacher was craning up, looking ahead through the pilot’s Plexiglas canopy.
    “Where are we?” he asked him.
    The pilot pointed down at a concrete ribbon below.
    “That’s U.S. 93,” he said. “Just about to leave Montana and enter Idaho. Still heading due south.”
    Reacher nodded.
    “Great,” he said. “Follow 93. It’s the only road goes south, right? We’ll catch him somewhere between here and Nevada.”

    HE STARTED WORRYING near the top of the second hour. Started worrying badly. Started desperate revisions to his grade school calculations. Maybe Stevie was driving faster than fifty. He was a fast driver. Faster than Bell had been. Maybe he was doing nearer sixty. Where did that put him? Three hundred and sixty miles out. In which case they wouldn’t catch him until two hours fifteen minutes had elapsed. What if he was doing seventy? Could that Econoline sustain seventy, hour after hour, with a ton in back? Maybe. Probably. In which case he was four hundred and twenty miles out. A total of two hours forty minutes before they overhauled him. That was the envelope. Somewhere between one hour fifty minutes and two hours forty minutes, somewhere between Montana and Nevada. A whole fifty minutes of rising panic. More than a hundred miles of concrete ribbon to watch before he could know for sure he was wrong and they had to peel off hopelessly northeast toward Minnesota.
    The helicopter was flying nose down, top speed, straight along U.S. 93. The seven passengers were craned forward, staring down at the road. They were over a town called Salmon. The pilot was calling out information like a tour guide. The giant peak of Mount