The Black Echo (Harry Bosch, #1; Harry Bosch Universe, #1)

by Michael Connelly

Out of the blue and into the black is what they called going into a tunnel. Each one was a black echo. Nothing but death in there. But, still, they went.

“Meadows was something else.… Back then, we were all just a bunch of kids, afraid of the dark. And those tunnels were so damn dark. But Meadows, he wasn’t afraid. He’d volunteer and volunteer and volunteer. Out of the blue and into the black. That’s what he said going on a tunnel mission was. We called it the black echo. It was like going to hell. You’re down there and you could smell your own fear. It was like you were dead when you were down there.”

And in that moment it seemed to Bosch to be a million years ago that they had held each other in her bed.

Bosch looked at the date Binh had left Vietnam. April 30, 1975. The same day Meadows left Vietnam for the last time. The day Saigon fell to the NVA.

Afterward, Harry and Eleanor sat in a comfortable silence while nursing espressos. There was a warmness between them that Bosch felt but couldn’t explain to himself. He didn’t know this woman who sat across from him.

One look at those hard brown eyes told him that. He wanted to get behind them. They had made love, but

he wanted to be in love. He ...

“Did you ever hear what J. Edgar Hoover said about justice?” she asked. “He probably said a lot, but I don’t recall any of it offhand.” “He said that justice is incidental to law and order. I think he was right.”