Reacher nodded.
"What did she say to you?" Neagley asked.
"She said nothing to me. She thought I was Joe."
He saw Stuyvesant picking his way back through the yard. Hauled himself upright with both hands against the wall.
"Armstrong will see us," Stuyvesant said. "You want to change first?"
Reacher looked down at his clothes. They were soaked with Froelich's blood in big irregular patches. It was cooling and drying and blackening.
"No," he said. "I don't want to change first."
They used the Suburban that Stuyvesant had arrived in. It was still Thanksgiving Day and D.C. was still quiet. They saw almost no civilian activity. Almost everything out and moving was law enforcement. There was a double ring of hasty police roadblocks on every thoroughfare around the White House. Stuyvesant kept his strobes going and was waved through all of them. He showed his ID at the White House vehicle gate and parked outside the West Wing. A Marine sentry passed them to a Secret Service escort who led them inside. They went down two flights of stairs to a vaulted basement built from brick. There were plant rooms down there. Other rooms with steel doors. The escort stopped in front of one of them and knocked hard.
The door was opened from the inside by one of Armstrong's personal detail. He was still wearing his Kevlar vest. Still wearing his sunglasses, although the room had no windows. Just bright fluorescent tubes on the ceiling. Armstrong and his wife were sitting together on chairs at a table in the center of the room. The other two agents were leaning against the walls. The room was silent. Armstrong's wife had been crying. That was clear. Armstrong himself had a smudge of Froelich's blood on the side of his face. He looked deflated. Like this whole White House thing was no longer fun.
"What's the situation?" he asked.
"Two casualties," Stuyvesant said quietly. "The sentry on the warehouse roof, and M.E. herself. They both died at the scene."
Armstrong's wife turned away like she had been slapped.
"Did you get the people who did it?" Armstrong asked.
"The FBI is leading the hunt," Stuyvesant said. "Just a matter of time."
"I want to help," Armstrong said.
"You're going to help," Reacher said.
Armstrong nodded. "What can I do?"
"You can issue a formal statement," Reacher said. "Immediately. In time for the networks to get it on the evening news."
"Saying what?"
"Saying you're canceling your holiday weekend in North Dakota out of respect for the two dead agents. Saying you're holing up in your Georgetown house and going absolutely nowhere at all before you attend a memorial service for your lead agent in her hometown in Wyoming on Sunday morning. Find out the name of the town and mention it loud and clear."
Armstrong nodded again.
"OK," he said. "I could do that, I guess. But why?"
"Because they won't try again here in D.C. Not against the security you're going to have at your house. So they'll go home and wait. Which gives me until Sunday to find out where they live."
"You? Won't the FBI find them today?"
"If they do, that's great. I can move on."
"And if they don't?"
"Then I'll find them myself."
"And if you fail?"
"I don't plan to fail. But if I do, then they'll show up in Wyoming to try again. At Froelich's service. Whereupon I'll be waiting for them."
"No," Stuyvesant said. "I can't allow it. Are you crazy? We can't secure a situation out West on seventy-two hours' notice. And I can't use a protectee as bait."
"He doesn't have to actually go," Reacher said. "There probably won't even be a service. He just has to say it."
Armstrong shook his head. "I can't say it if there isn't going to be a service. And if there is a service, I can't say it and not show up."
"If you want to help, that's what you've got to do."
Armstrong said nothing.
They left the Armstrongs in the West Wing basement and were escorted back to the Suburban. The sun was still shining and the sky was still blue. The buildings were still white and golden. It was still a glorious day.
"Take us back to the motel," Reacher said. "I want to get a shower. Then I want to meet with Bannon."
"Why?" Stuyvesant asked.
"Because I'm a witness," Reacher said. "I saw the shooter. On the roof. Just a glimpse of his back as he moved away from the edge."
"You got a description?"
"Not really," Reacher said. "It was only a glimpse. I couldn't describe him. But there was something about how he moved. I've seen him before."
Chapter 14
He peeled off his clothes. They were stiff and cold and clammy with blood. He dropped them on the closet floor and stepped into the bathroom. Set the shower going. The tray under his feet ran red and then pink and then clear. He washed his hair twice and shaved carefully. Dressed in another of Joe's shirts and another of his suits and chose the regimental tie that Froelich had bought, as a tribute. Then he went back out to the lobby.
Neagley was waiting for him there. She had changed, too. She was wearing a black suit. It was the old Army way. If in doubt, go formal. She had a cup of coffee ready for him. She was talking to the U.S. marshals. They were a new crew. The day shift, he guessed.
"Stuyvesant's coming back," she told him. "Then we go meet with Bannon."
He nodded. The marshals were quiet around him. Almost respectful. Toward him or because of Froelich, he didn't know.
"Tough break," one of them said.
Reacher looked away.
"I guess it was," he replied.
Then he looked back.
"But hey, shit happens," he said.
Neagley smiled, briefly. It was the old Army way. If in doubt, be flippant.
Stuyvesant showed up an hour later and drove them to the Hoover Building. The balance of power had changed. Killing federal agents was a federal crime, so now the FBI was firmly in charge. Now it was a straightforward manhunt. Bannon met them in the main lobby and took them up in an elevator to their conference room. It was better than Treasury's. It was paneled in wood and had windows. There was a long table with clusters of glasses and bottles of mineral water. Bannon was conspicuously democratic and avoided the head of the table. He just dumped himself down in one of the side chairs. Neagley put herself on the same side, two places away. Reacher sat down opposite her. Stuyvesant chose a place three away from Reacher and poured himself a glass of water.
"Quite a day," Bannon said in the silence. "My agency extends its deepest sympathies to your agency."
"You haven't found them," Stuyvesant said.
"We got a heads up from the medical examiner," Bannon said. "Crosetti was shot through the head with a NATO 7.62 round. Died instantly. Froelich was shot through the throat from behind, same gun, probably. The bullet clipped her carotid artery. But I guess you already know that."
"You haven't found them," Stuyvesant said again.
Bannon shook his head.
"Thanksgiving Day," he said. "Pluses and minuses. Main minus was that we were short of personnel because of the holiday, and so were you, and so were the Metro cops, and so was everybody else. Main plus was that the city itself was very quiet. On balance it was quieter than we were shorthanded. The way it turned out we were the majority population all over town five minutes after it happened."
"But you didn't find them."
Bannon shook his head again.
"No," he said. "We didn't find them. We're still looking, of course, but being realistic we would have to say they're out of the District by now."
"Outstanding," Stuyvesant said.
Bannon made a face. "We're not turning cartwheels. But there's nothing to be gained by yelling at us. Because we could yell right back. Somebody got through the screen you deployed. Somebody decoyed your guy off the roof."
He looked directly at Stuyvesant as he said it.
"We paid for it," Stuyvesant said. "Big time."
"How did it happen?" Neagley asked. "How did they get up there at all?"
"Not through the front," Bannon said. "There was a shit-load of cops watching the front. They saw nothing, and they can't all have fallen asleep at the critical time. Not down the back alley either. There was a cop on foot and a cop in a car watching, both ends. Those four all say they saw nobody either, and we believe all four of them. So we think the bad guys got into a building a block over. Walked through the building and out a rear door into the alley halfway down. Then they skipped ten feet across the alley and got in the back of the warehouse and walked up the stairs. No doubt they exited the same way. But they were probably running, on the way out."
"How did they decoy Crosetti?" Stuyvesant said. "He was a good agent."
"Yes, he was," Reacher said. "I liked him."
Bannon shrugged again. "There's always a way, isn't there?"
Then he looked around the room, the way he did when he wanted people to understand more than he was saying. Nobody responded.
"Did you check the trains?" Reacher asked.
Bannon nodded. "Very carefully. It was fairly busy. People heading out for family dinners. But we were thorough."