The Hard Way

lot.
    “How do people stand this every day?” Pauling said.
    “Houston and LA are as bad,” Reacher said.
    “But it kind of explains why the Jacksons escaped.”
    “I guess it does.”
    And the traffic moved on slowly, circulating like water around a bathtub drain, before yielding to the inexorable pull of the city.

----

    They came in through St. John’s Wood, where the Abbey Road studios were, past Regent’s Park, through Marylebone, past Baker Street, where Sherlock Holmes had lived, through Marble Arch again, and onto Park Lane. The Hilton hotel was at the south end, near the truly world-class automotive insanity that was Hyde Park Corner. They parked in a commercial garage underground at a quarter to eleven in the morning. Maybe an hour before Lane and his guys were due to check in.
    “Want lunch?” Pauling said.
    “Can’t eat,” Reacher said. “I’m too knotted up.”
    “So you’re human after all.”
    “I feel like I’m delivering Taylor to an executioner.”
    “He deserves to die.”
    “I’d rather do it myself.”
    “So make the offer.”
    “Wouldn’t be good enough. Lane wants the partner’s name. I’m not up for torturing it out of the guy personally.”
    “So walk away.”
    “I can’t. I want retribution for Kate and Jade and I want the money for Hobart. No other way of getting either. And we have a deal with your Pentagon buddy. He delivered, so now I have to deliver. But all things considered I think I’ll skip lunch.”
    Pauling asked, “Where do you want me?”
    “In the lobby. Watching. Then go get yourself a room somewhere else. Leave me a note at the Hilton’s desk. Use the name Bayswater. I’ll take Lane to Norfolk, Lane will deal with Taylor, I’ll deal with Lane. Then I’ll come back and get you, whenever. Then we’ll go somewhere together. Bath, maybe. To the Roman spas. We’ll try to get clean again.”

----

    They walked past an automobile showroom that was displaying brand-new models of the Mini Cooper they had been driving. They walked past discreet set-back entrances to blocks of mansion flats. They went up a short flight of concrete steps to the Park Lane Hilton’s lobby. Pauling detoured to a distant group of armchairs and Reacher walked to the desk. He stood in line. Watched the clerks. They were busy with their phones and their computers. There were printers and Xerox machines behind them on credenzas. Above the Xerox machines was a brass plaque that said:
By statute some documents may not be photocopied. Like banknotes,
Reacher thought. They needed a law, because modern Xerox machines were just too good. Above the credenzas was a line of clocks set to world time, from Tokyo to Los Angeles. He checked New York’s against the time in his head. Spot on. Then the person in front of him finished up. He moved to the head of the line.
    “Edward Lane’s party,” he said. “Have they checked in yet?”
    The clerk tapped his keyboard. “Not yet, sir.”
    “I’m waiting for them. When they get here, tell them I’m across the lobby.”
    “Your name, sir?”
    “Taylor,” Reacher said. He walked away, clear of the busiest areas, and found a quiet spot. He was going to be counting eight hundred thousand dollars in cash and he didn’t want an audience. He dumped himself down in one of a group of four armchairs. He knew from long experience that nobody would try to join him. Nobody ever did. He radiated subliminal
stay away
signals and sane people obeyed them. Already a nearby family was watching him warily. Two kids and a mother, camped out in the next group of chairs, presumably off of an early flight and waiting for their room to be ready. The mother looked tired and the kids looked fractious. She had unpacked half their stuff, trying to keep them amused. Toys, coloring books, battered teddy bears, a doll missing an arm, battery-driven video games. He could hear the mother’s halfhearted suggestions of how to fill the time:
Why don’t you do this? Why don’t you do that? Why don’t you draw a picture of something you’re going to see?
Like therapy.
    He turned away and watched the door. People came in, a constant stream. Some weary and travel-stained, some busy and bustling. Some with mountains of luggage, some with briefcases only. All kinds of nationalities. In the next group of chairs one kid threw a bear at the other kid’s head. It missed and skidded across the tile and hit Reacher’s foot. He leaned down and picked it up. All the