Echo Burning

pointer bounced up to a pound and then back down to zero. He took the magazine out of the Heckler & Koch and laid the empty gun in the bowl. It made a light metallic sound. The pointer spun up to two pounds and six ounces. Not an especially light weapon. About right, he figured. His memory told him the catalog weight was in the region of forty-three ounces, with an empty magazine.
    He put the gun back together and opened cupboards until he found a store of food. He lifted out an unopened bag of granulated sugar. It was in a gaudy yellow packet that said 5 lbs . on the side.
    “What are you doing?” Alice asked.
    “Weighing things,” he said.
    He stood the sugar upright in the chromium bowl. Thepointer spun up to five pounds exactly. He put the sugar back in the cupboard and tried a cellophane-wrapped packet of chopped nuts. The pointer read two pounds. He looked at the label on the packet and saw 2 lbs .
    “Good enough,” he said.
    He folded the maps and laid them across the top of the bowl. They weighed one pound and three ounces. He took them off and put the nuts back on. Still two pounds. He put the nuts back in the cupboard and tried the FedEx packet. It weighed one pound and one ounce. He added the maps and the pointer inched up to two pounds and four ounces. Added the loaded gun on top and the pointer jerked around to five pounds and three ounces. If he had wanted to, he could have calculated the weight of the bullets.
    “O.K., let’s go,” he said. “But we need gas. Long ride ahead. And maybe you should get out of that dress. You got something more active?”
    “I guess,” she said, and headed for the stairs.
    “You got a screwdriver?” he called after her.
    “Under the sink,” she called back.
    He bent down and found a brightly colored toolbox in the cupboard. It was made out of plastic and looked like a lunch pail. He clicked it open and selected a medium-sized screwdriver with a clear yellow handle. A minute later Alice came back down the stairs wearing baggy khaki cargo pants and a black T-shirt with the sleeves torn off at the shoulder seams.
    “O.K.?” she asked.
    “Me and Judith,” he said. “Got a lot in common.”
    She smiled and said nothing.
    “I’m assuming your car is insured,” he said. “It could get damaged tonight.”
    She said nothing. Just locked up her door and followed him out to the VW. She drove out of her complex, with Reacher craning his neck, watching the shadows. She got gas at a neon-bright all-night station out on the El Paso road. Reacher paid for it.
    “O.K., back to the courthouse,” he said. “Something I want from there.”
    She said nothing. Just turned the car and headed east.Parked in the lot behind the building. They walked around and tried the street door. It was locked up tight.
    “So what now?” she asked.
    It was hot on the sidewalk. Still up there around ninety degrees, and damp. The breeze had died again. There were clouds filling the sky.
    “I’m going to kick it in,” he said.
    “There’s probably an alarm.”
    “There’s definitely an alarm. I checked.”
    “So?”
    “So I’m going to set it off.”
    “Then the cops will come.”
    “I’m counting on it.”
    “You want to get us arrested?”
    “They won’t come right away. We’ve got three or four minutes, maybe.”
    He took two paces back and launched forward and smashed the flat of his sole above the handle. The wood splintered and sagged open a half inch, but held. He kicked again and the door crashed back and bounced off the corridor wall. A blue strobe high up outside started flashing and an urgent electric bell started ringing. It was about as loud as he had expected.
    “Go get the car,” he said. “Get it started and wait for me in the alley.”
    He ran up the stairs two at a time and kicked in the outer office door without breaking stride. Jinked through the secretarial pen like a running back and steadied himself and kicked in Walker’s door. It smashed back and the venetian blind jerked sideways and the glass pane behind it shattered and the shards rained down like ice in winter. He went straight for the bank of filing cabinets. The lights were off and the office was hot and dark and he had to peer close to read the labels. It was an odd filing system. It was arranged partly in date order and partly by the alphabet. That was going to be a minor problem. He found a cabinet marked B and jammed the tip of the screwdriver into the keyhole and hammered it in