Never Go Back

boring to talk about.’
    ‘No, tell me.’
    ‘Some other time.’
    ‘Reacher, we slept together. I didn’t even get a cocktail or a movie. The least you can do is tell me your private theories.’
    ‘Are you going to tell me one of yours?’
    ‘I might. But you go first.’
    ‘OK, think about America, a long time ago. The nineteenth century, really, beginning to end. The westward migration. The risks those people took. As if they were compelled.’
    ‘They were,’ Turner said. ‘By economics. They needed land and farms and jobs.’
    ‘But it was more than that,’ Reacher said. ‘For some of them, at least. Some of them never stopped. And a hundred years before that, think about the British. They went all over the world. They went on sea voyages that lasted five years.’
    ‘Economics again. They wanted markets and raw materials.’
    ‘But some of them couldn’t stop. And way back there were the Vikings. And the Polynesians, just the same. I think it’s in the DNA, literally. I think millions of years ago we were all living in small bands. Small groups of people. So there was a danger of inbreeding. So a gene evolved where every generation and every small band had at least one person who had to wander. That way the gene pools would get mixed up a little. Healthier all around.’
    ‘And you’re that person?’
    ‘I think ninety-nine of us grow up to love the campfire, and one grows up to hate it. Ninety-nine of us grow up to fear the howling wolf, and one grows up to envy it. And I’m that guy.’
    ‘Compelled to spread his DNA worldwide. Purely for the good of the species.’
    ‘That’s the fun part.’
    ‘That’s probably not an argument to make at your paternity hearing.’
    They left West Virginia and entered Pennsylvania, and five miles after the line they saw a billboard for a shopping mall. The billboard was lit up bright, so they figured the mall was still open. They pulled off and found a faded place anchored by a local department store. Turner headed to the women’s section with a wad of cash. Reacher followed after her, but she told him to go check the men’s section instead.
    He said, ‘I don’t need anything.’
    She said, ‘I think you do.’
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘A shirt,’ she said. ‘And a V-neck sweater, maybe. At least.’
    ‘If you get something you can give me my old shirt back.’
    ‘I’m going to junk it. You need something better.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘I want you to look nice.’
    So he browsed on his own, and he found a shirt. Blue flannel, with white buttons. Fifteen dollars. And a V-neck sweater, cotton, a darker blue. Also fifteen dollars. He changed in the cubicle and trashed his twin T-shirts and checked the mirror. His pants looked OK. As did his coat. The new shirt and sweater looked neat under it. Nice? He wasn’t sure. Nicer than before, maybe, but that was as far as he was prepared to go.
    Then twenty minutes later Turner came back, head-to-toe different. New black zip boots, new blue jeans, a tight crew-neck sweater, and a cotton warm-up jacket. Nothing in her hands. No shopping bags. She had trashed the old stuff, and she had bought no spares. She saw him noticing, and said, ‘Surprised?’
    ‘A little,’ he said.
    ‘I figured we should stay nimble right now.’
    ‘And always.’
    They moved on to the smaller stores in the mall’s outlying regions and found an off-brand pharmacy. They bought folding toothbrushes and a small tube of toothpaste. Then they headed back to the truck.
    The Pittsburgh International Airport was way far out from the city, and the Interstate led them straight to it. It was a big, spacious place, with a choice of hotels. Turner picked one and parked in its lot. They split Billy Bob’s remaining money nine different ways, and filled every pocket they had. Then they locked up and headed for the lobby. No luggage was no problem. Not at an airport hotel. Airport hotels were full of people with no luggage. Part of the joy of modern-day travel. Breakfast in New York, dinner in Paris, luggage in Istanbul. And so on.
    ‘Your name, ma’am?’ the clerk asked.
    Turner said, ‘Helen Sullivan.’
    ‘And sir?’
    Reacher said, ‘John Temple.’
    ‘May I see photo ID?’
    Turner slid the two borrowed army IDs across the desk. The clerk glanced at them long enough to establish that, yes, they were photo IDs, and yes, they had the names Sullivan and Temple on them. He made no attempt to match the photographs with the customers.