Worth Dying For

AND D OROTHY C OE WERE SITTING quiet in the dining room, but the football player with the shotgun had moved out of the doorway and gone into the living room, where he was sprawled out full-length on the sofa, watching recorded NFL highlights in high definition on the doctor’s big new television set. His partner had moved off the basement door and was leaning comfortably on the hallway wall, watching the screen at an angle, from a distance. They were both absorbed in the programme. The sound was low but distinct, grumbling richly and urgently through the big loudspeakers. The room lights were off, and bright colours from the screen were dancing and bouncing off the walls. Outside the window, the night was dark and still. The phone had rung three times, but no one had answered. Apart from that, all was peaceful. It could have been the day after Christmas, or late on a Thanksgiving afternoon.
    Then all the power in the house went out.
    The TV picture died abruptly and the sound faded away and the subliminal hum of the heating system disappeared. Silenceclamped down, elemental and absolute, and the temperature seemed to drop, and the walls seemed to dissolve, as if there was no longer a difference between inside and out, as if the house’s tiny footprint had suddenly blended with the vast emptiness on which it stood.
    The football player in the hallway pushed off the wall and stood still in the centre of the space. His partner in the living room swivelled his feet to the floor and sat up straight. He said, ‘What happened?’
    The other guy said, ‘I don’t know.’
    ‘Doctor?’
    The doctor got up from behind the dining table and fumbled his way to the door. He said, ‘The power went out.’
    ‘No shit, Sherlock. Did you pay your bill?’
    ‘It’s not that.’
    ‘Then what is it?’
    ‘Could be the whole area.’
    The guy in the living room found his way to the window and peered into the blackness outside. He said, ‘How the hell would anyone know?’
    The guy in the hallway asked, ‘Where are the circuit breakers?’
    The doctor said, ‘In the basement.’
    ‘Terrific. Reacher’s awake. And he’s playing games.’ The guy crept through the dark to the basement door, feeling his way with his fingertips on the hallway wall. He identified the door by touch and pounded on it. He called, ‘Turn it back on, asshole.’
    No response.
    Pitch black throughout the house. Not even a glimmer, anywhere.
    ‘Turn the power back on, Reacher.’
    No response.
    Cold, and silence.
    The guy from the living room found his way out to the hallway. ‘Maybe he isn’t awake. Maybe it’s a real outage.’
    His partner asked, ‘Got a flashlight, doctor?’
    The doctor said, ‘In the garage.’
    ‘Go get it.’
    ‘I can’t see.’
    ‘Do your best, OK?’
    The doctor shuffled down the hallway, hesitantly, fingers brushing the wall, colliding with the first guy, sensing the second guy’s hulking presence and avoiding it, making it to the kitchen, stumbling against a chair with a hollow rattle of wood, hitting the edge of the table with his thighs. The world of the blind. Not easy. He trailed his fingers along the countertops, passing the sink, passing the stove, making it to the mud room lobby in back. He turned ninety degrees with his hands out in front of him and found the door to the garage. He groped for the knob and opened the door and stepped down into the chill space beyond. He found the workbench and reached up and traced his fingers over the items clipped neatly above it. A hammer, good for hitting. Screwdrivers, good for stabbing. Wrenches, stone cold to the touch. He found the flashlight’s plastic barrel and pulled it out from its clip. He thumbed the switch and a weak yellow beam jumped out. He rapped the head against his palm and the beam sparked a little brighter. He turned and found a football player standing right next to him. The one from the living room.
    The football player smiled and took the flashlight out of his hand and held it under his chin and made a face, like a Halloween lantern. He said, ‘Good work, doc,’ and turned away and used the beam up and down and side to side to paint his way back into the house. The doctor followed, using the same lit memories a second later. The football player said, ‘Go back in the dining room now,’ and shone the beam ahead, showing the doctor the way. The doctor went back to the table and the football player said, ‘All of you stay right where you