The Affair: A Reacher Novel

wheel, low in the seat, in what looked like a clean version of the same uniform she had worn the day before. Her riot of hair was still wet from the shower. She was talking on the radio. Probably telling Pellegrino that job one for the day was to haul my ass halfway back to Memphis.
    I went down the stairs and stepped out to the sidewalk. The morning air was fresh and cold. I looked up the street and saw that Deveraux’s car was parked again, right outside the diner. So far, so good. I walked in that direction and pushed in through the door, past the pay phone, past the hostess station. There were six customers inside, including Deveraux. The other five were men, four of them in work clothes and the fifth in a pale-colored suit. A professional gentleman. Maybe a country lawyer or a country doctor, or the guy that ran the loan office next to Brannan’s bar. The waitress was the same woman as the night before. She was busy toting plates of food, so I didn’t wait for her. I just walked up to Deveraux’s table and said, “Would you mind if I joined you?”
    She was sipping coffee. She didn’t have her food yet. She smiled and said, “Good morning.”
    Her tone was warm. She seemed happy to see me.
    I said, “Yes, good morning.”
    She said, “Have you come to say goodbye? That’s very polite and very formal.”
    I said nothing in reply to that. She did her thing with her foot again, under the table, and kicked the facing chair out. I sat down. She asked, “Did you sleep well?”
    I said, “Fine.”
    “The train didn’t wake you at midnight? It takes some getting used to.”
    “I was still up,” I said.
    “Doing what?”
    “This and that,” I said.
    “Inside or out?”
    “Out,” I said.
    “You found the crime scene?”
    I nodded.
    She nodded in turn.
    “And you found two things of note,” she said. “So you thought you’d stop by and make sure I appreciated their significance before you got on your way. That’s very public-spirited of you.”
    The waitress came by and put a heaping plate of French toast on the table. Then she turned to me and I ordered the same thing, with coffee. Deveraux waited until she was gone, and asked, “Or was it entirely private-spirited? Is this your one last attempt to protect the army before you go?”
    “I’m not going,” I said.
    She smiled again. “Are you going to give me your civil rights speech now? Free country, and all that bullshit?”
    “Something like that.”
    She paused a beat.
    “I’m all for civil rights,” she said. “And certainly there’s room at the inn, as they say. So sure, by all means, please stay. Enjoy yourself. There are trails to hike, and there are things to hunt, and there are sights to see. Knock yourself out. Do whatever you want to. Just don’t get between me and my investigation.”
    I asked her, “How do you explain the two things?”
    “Do I need to? To you?”
    “Two heads are better than one.”
    “I can’t trust you,” she said. “You’re here to steer me wrong, if you have to.”
    “No, I’m here to warn the army if things start to look bad. Which I will, if I have to. But we’re a long way from any kind of a conclusion here. We’ve barely even started. It’s too early to steer anybody anywhere, even if I was going to. Which I’m not.”
    “We?” she said. “
We’re
a long way from a conclusion? What is this, a democracy?”
    “OK, you,” I said.
    “Yes,” she said. “Me.”
    At that point the waitress came back with my meal. And my coffee. I sniffed the steam and took a long first sip. A little ritual. Nothing better than just-made coffee, early in the morning. Across the table from me Deveraux continued eating. She was cleaning her plate. A metabolism like a nuclear plant.
    She said, “OK, time out. Convince me. Put your cards on the table. Tell me about the first thing, and spin it so it looks bad for the army. Which it does, by the way, spin or no spin.”
    I looked straight at her. “Have you been on the base?”
    “All over it.”
    “I haven’t. Therefore apparently you know what I’m only guessing.”
    She nodded. “So bear that in mind. Tread carefully. Don’t blow smoke.”
    I said, “Janice May Chapman was not raped in that alley.”
    “Because?”
    “Because Pellegrino reported gravel abrasions on the corpse. And there’s no gravel in that alley. Nor anywhere else that I could see. It’s all dirt or blacktop or smooth paving stones for miles around.”
    “The