He swept his hand through the air, above eye level, left to right like a karate chop, to demonstrate the geography. Reacher nodded. He was familiar with the Canadian border. Ray used his other hand, up and down the left edge of his invisible map.
" Rapid River," he said. "That's our western border. It's a big river, completely wild. No way to cross it."
He moved the Canadian border hand across and rubbed a small circle in the air, like he was cleaning a pane of glass.
"National forest," he said. "You seen it? Fifty miles, east to west. Thick virgin forest, no way through. You want an eastern border, that forest is as good as you're going to get."
"What about the south?" Reacher asked.
Ray chopped his hand sideways at chest level.
"Ravine," he said. "Natural-born tank trap. Believe me, I know tanks. No way through, except one road and one track. Wooden bridge takes the track over the ravine."
Reacher nodded. He remembered the white truck pattering over a wooden structure.
"That bridge gets blown," Ray said. "No way through."
"What about the road?" Reacher asked.
"Same thing," Ray said. "We blow the bridge, and we're safe. Charges are set right now."
Reacher nodded slowly. He was thinking about air attack, artillery, missiles, smart bombs, infiltration of Special Forces, airborne troops, parachutes. He was thinking about Navy SEALs bridging the river or Marines bridging the ravine. He was thinking about NATO units rumbling straight down from Canada.
"What about Holly?" he asked. "What do you want with her?"
Ray smiled. His beard parted and his teeth shone out as bright as his eyes. "Beau's secret weapon," he said. "Think about it. The world government is going to use her old man to lead the attack. That's why they appointed him. You think the President appoints those guys? You got to be joking. Old man Johnson's a world government guy, just waiting for the secret command to move. But when he gets here, what's he going to find?"
"What?" Reacher asked.
"He comes up from the south, right?" Ray said. "First building he sees is that old courthouse, southeast corner of town. You were just there. She's up on the second floor, right? You notice the new construction? Special room, double walls, twenty-two inches apart. The space is packed with dynamite and blasting caps from the old mine stores. The first stray shell will blow old man Johnson's little girl to kingdom come."
Reacher nodded again, slowly. Ray looked at him.
"We're not asking much," he said. "Sixty miles by sixty miles, what is that? Thirty-six hundred square miles of territory."
"But why now?" Reacher asked. "What's the big hurry?"
"What's the date?" Ray asked back.
Reacher shrugged.
"July something?" he said.
"July second," Ray said. "Two days to go."
"To what?" Reacher said.
"Independence Day," Ray said. "July fourth."
"So?" Reacher asked.
"We're declaring independence," Ray said. "Day after tomorrow. The birth of a brand-new nation. That's when they'll come for us, right? Freedom for the little guys? That's not in their plan."
Chapter Twenty-Four
THE BUREAU LEAR refueled at Fargo and flew straight southwest to California. McGrath had argued again in favor of heading straight for Montana, but Webster had overruled him. One step at a time was Webster's patient way, so they were going to check out the Beau Borken story in California, and then they were going to Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado to meet with General Johnson, McGrath was about the only Bureau guy alive capable of shouting at Webster, and he had, but arguing is not the same thing as winning, so they were all in the air heading first for Mojave, McGrath and Webster and Brogan and Milosevic, all overtired, overanxious and morose in the hot noisy cabin.
"I need all the background I can get," Webster said. "They put me in personal charge and these are not the type of guys I can be vague with, right?"
McGrath glared at him and thought: don't play your stupid Beltway games with Holly's life, Webster. But he said nothing. Just sat tight until the tiny plane started arrowing down toward the airfield on the edge of the desert.
They were on the ground just after two o'clock in the morning, West Coast time. The Mojave Agent-in-Charge met them on the deserted tarmac in his own car. Drove them south through the sleeping town.
"The Borkens were a Kendall family," he said. "Small town, fifty miles from here. Farming place, mostly citrus. One-man police department. The sheriff is waiting for us down there."
"He know anything?" McGrath asked.
The guy at the wheel shrugged.
"Maybe," he said. "Small town, right?"
Fifty miles through the desert night at eighty-five took them just thirty-six minutes. Kendall was a small knot of buildings adrift in a sea of groves. There was a gas station, a general store, a growers' operation and a low cement building with whip antennas spearing upward from the roof. A smart black-and-white was parked up on the apron outside. It was marked: Kendall County Sheriff. There was a single light in the office window behind the car.
The five agents stretched and yawned in the dry night air and trooped single file into the cement building. The Kendall County sheriff was a guy about sixty, solid, gray. He looked reliable. Webster waved him back into his seat and McGrath laid the four glossy mug shots on his desk in front of him.
"You know these guys?" he asked.
The sheriff slid the photographs nearer and looked at each of them in turn. He picked them up and shuffled them into a new order. Laid them back down on the desk like he was dealing a hand of giant playing cards. Then he nodded and reached down to his desk pedestal. Rolled open a drawer. Lifted out three buff files. He placed the files underneath three of the photographs. Laid a stubby finger on the first face.
"Peter Wayne Bell," he said. "Mojave kid, but he was down here a lot. Not a very nice boy, as I believe you know."
He nodded across to his monitor screen on a computer cart at the end of the desk. A page from the National Crime Center Database was glowing green. It was the report from the North Dakota cops about the identity of the body they had found in a ditch. The identity, and the history.
The sheriff moved his wrist and laid a finger on the next photograph. It was the gunman who had pushed Holly Johnson into the back of the Lexus.
"Steven Stewart," he said. "Called Stevie, or Little Stevie. Farm boy, a couple of bushels short of a wagonload, know what I mean? Jumpy, jittery sort of a boy."
"What's in his file?" Webster asked.
The sheriff shrugged.
"Nothing too serious," he said. "The boy was just too plain dumb for his own good. Group of kids would go out and mess around, and guess who'd be the one still stood there when I roll up? Little Stevie, that's who. I locked him up a dozen times, I guess, but he never did much of what you would want to call serious shit."
McGrath nodded and pointed to the photograph of the gunman who had gotten into the front seat of the Lexus.
"This guy?" he asked.
The sheriff moved his finger and laid it on the guy's glossy throat.
"Tony Loder," he said. "This is a fairly bad guy. Smarter than Stevie, dumber than you or me. I'll give you the file. Maybe it won't keep you Bureau guys awake nights, but it sure won't help you sleep any better than you were going to anyhow."