‘How much time?’

‘At least an hour.’

‘What kind of problems?’

‘They didn’t say.’

‘You’re going to have to start the engine.’

‘They’ve got coats.’

‘Not good enough.’

‘I’m worried about a fire.’

‘Diesel fuel is a lot less volatile than gasoline.’

‘What are you, an expert?’

‘I was in the army. Trucks and Humvees were all diesel. For a reason.’ Reacher glanced back down the aisle. ‘Got a flashlight? Got an extinguisher?’

‘Why?’

‘I’ll check the underbody. If it looks all clear I’ll knock twice on the floor. You start up, if anything goes on fire I’ll put it out and knock again and you can shut it down.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Best we can do. And we have to do something.’

Knox was quiet for a spell and then he shrugged and opened up a couple more compartments and came out with a silver Maglite and an extinguisher bottle. Reacher took them and waited for the door to open and climbed out into the spectral crimson world of the flares. Down into the ditch again. This time he trudged counterclockwise around the front of the bus because the oblique angle put more of the left side above the blacktop than the right. Crawling around in the freezing ditch was not an attractive prospect. Crawling around on the shoulder was marginally better.

He found the fuel filler door and sat down in the snow and then swivelled around and lay on his back and wriggled into position with his head under the side of the bus. He switched the flashlight on. Found the fat tube running from the filler mouth to the tank. It looked intact. The tank itself was a huge squared-off cylinder. It was a little dented and scraped from the impact. But nothing was leaking out of it. The fuel line running back towards the engine compartment looked OK. Snow soaked through Reacher’s jacket and his shirt and freezing damp hit his skin.