from the extreme right edge of the picture. Just an arm, in a
heavy soft sleeve. A tweed overcoat, maybe. The hand on the
end of it was gloved in leather. There was an envelope in the
hand. It was pushed through the half-closed sliding window and
dropped onto the ledge. Then the arm disappeared.
‘He knew about the camera,’ Froelich said.
‘Clearly,’ Neagley said. ‘He was a yard shy of the booth,
stretching out.’
‘But did he know about the other camera?’ Reacher asked.
Froelich ejected the first tape and inserted the second.
Wound backward thirty-five minutes. Pressed play. The view
was straight up the alley. The quality was poor. There were
pools of light from outdoor spotlights and the contrast with
areas of darkness was vivid. The shadows lacked detail. The
angle was high and tight. The top of the picture cut off well
before the street end of the alley. The bottom of the shot
stopped maybe six feet in front of the booth. But the width was
good. Very good. Both walls of the alley were clearly in view.
There was no way of approaching the garage entrance without
passing through the camera’s field of vision.
The tape ran. Nothing happened. They watched the fimecode
counter until it reached a point twenty seconds before the arm
had appeared. Then they watched the screen. A figure appeared
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at the top. Definitely male. No doubt about it. There was no
mistaking the shoulders or the walk. He was wearing a heavy
tweed overcoat, maybe grey or dark brown. Dark pants, heavy
shoes, a muffler round his neck. And a hat on his head. A
wide-brimmed hat, dark in colour, tilted way down in front.
He walked with his chin tucked down. The video picked up
a perfect view of the crown of his hat, all the way down the
alley.
‘He knew about the second camera,’ Reacher said.
The tape ran on. The guy walked fast, but purposefully, not
hurrying, not running, not out of control. He had the envelope
in his right hand, holding it flat against his body. He disappeared
out of the bottom of the shot and reappeared three
seconds later. Without the envelope. He walked at the same
purposeful pace all the way back up the alley and out of shot at
the top of the screen.
Froelich froze the tape. ‘Description?’
‘Impossible,’ Neagley said. ‘Male, a little short and squat.
Right-handed, probably. No visible limp. Apart from that we
don’t know diddly. We saw nothing.’
‘Maybe not too squat,’ Reacher said. q’he angle foreshortens
things a little.’
‘He had inside knowledge,’ Froelich said. ‘He knew about the cameras and the bathroom breaks. So he’s one of us.’
‘Not necessarily,’ Reacher said. ‘He could be an outsider who
staked you out. The exterior camera must be visible if you’re
looking for it. And he could assume the interior camera. Most
places have them. And a couple of nights’ surveillance would
teach him the bathroom break procedure. But you know what?
Insider or outsider, we drove right past him. We must have.
When we went out to see the cleaners. Because even if he’s an
insider, he needed to time the bathroom break exactly right. So
he needed to be watching. He must have been across the street for a couple of hours looking down the alley. Maybe with
binoculars.’
The office went quiet.
‘I didn’t see anybody,’ Froelich said.
The neither,’ Neagley said.
‘I had my eyes closed,’ Reacher said.
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‘We wouldn’t have seen him,’ Froelich said. ‘He hears a
vehicle coming up the ramp, he ducks out of sight, surely.’
‘I guess so,’ Reacher said. ‘But we were real close to him,
temporarily.’
‘Shit,’ Froelich said.
‘Yeah, shit,’ Neagley echoed.
‘So what do we do?’ Froelich asked.
‘Nothing,’ Reacher said. ‘Nothing we can do. This was more
than forty minutes ago. If he’s an insider, he’s back home by
now. Maybe tucked up in bed. If he’s an outsider, he’s already
on 1-95 or something, west or north or south, maybe thirty
miles away. We can’t call the troopers in four states and ask
them to look for a right-handed man in a car who doesn’t limp,