Tracking Shot by Colin Campbell (i can read book club .txt) 📗

“That one.”

Larry clicked on the link, sweat beading on his forehead. “He recorded his own death?”

McNulty focused on the video window that opened on the laptop. “I recorded the other night at the courthouse set. Maybe he was doing the same. For protection.”

Neither stated the obvious, that it hadn’t worked. A solid black rectangle appeared but there were no play or pause buttons. The circle did its thing. It kept on twirling. The rectangle stayed blank until the circle disappeared.

Upload Failed

McNulty slammed the desk but it didn’t work this time. The video screen remained blank. Larry went back to the menu screen and they both knew what to look at next. He clicked on “Pictures” and the familiar drop-down list appeared. This one said “Downloaded” beside each date that had been viewed. Larry had been right: everything had been downloaded up to the day before the shooting. There was only one date left unseen.

Larry’s feet stopped tapping. McNulty held his breath and nodded. Larry clicked on “Download” and the circle began twirling again. McNulty crossed his fingers and breathed slowly. The circle stopped twirling and a dozen thumbnail images appeared.

THIRTY-FOUR

There is a terrible feeling in the pit of your stomach when you can see the car crash coming but can do nothing to stop it. No matter how bad you know it’s going to be you can’t take your eyes off the tragedy. McNulty felt like that when Larry double-clicked on the first image and the courtroom filled the screen.

Image 1

The courtroom viewed from just in front of the judge’s bench. Background extras are milling about near the open double doors at the back of the room. Lighting technicians help the gaffer and the best boy adjust the lights and reflectors. F.K. Parenteau is standing next to the main camera, resting one hand on the tripod. All is calm. Nothing untoward.

Image 2

Same angle but slightly to the right, catching the court clerk’s desk and the edge of the judge’s bench. Amy Moore is applying makeup to the actor playing the judge. The court clerk is blowing his nose, eyes squeezed shut.

Image 3

A selfie of Randy Severino with the Arriflex on one shoulder. The judge’s bench is in the background with a set dresser adjusting the Stars and Stripes. Still calm. Still nothing untoward.

Image 4

A blurred image that would have been a whip pan if it had been a video instead of a still photograph. The vague color scheme and lines of the courtroom are visible, but smeared across the image like passing scenery through a train window. Moving from right to left. Toward the double doors at the back, which can be seen as a distorted rectangle of light.

Images 5 thru 12

Burst mode of continuous images. Everybody is in motion. The background extras are scattering, mouths open in silent screams. F.K. is diving to one side. A man is standing in the doorway, one hand blurred as it begins to come up. With each image the hand moves six inches, the extras move to the right away from the gunman, and the arm slows and sharpens. The gun is clear and focussed. It spits fire in the last two images. Then there is nothing.

“Oh my God.”

Larry looked pale and sickly. McNulty knew how he felt. As a cop he’d often attended violent crime scenes but had rarely witnessed violent death. He came along afterward or gave chase to the offender. Seeing the car crash was different. A cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck, and he felt sick. He rested a gentle hand on Larry’s shoulder. The producer got up and left the room. McNulty took his place at the keyboard. It was time to get up close and personal.

McNulty ignored images 1 to 4 and went straight to the first picture of the gunman in the doorway. Severino had managed to get the double doors in the center of the frame, but the phone’s wide-angle lens meant they were just a white square taking up a quarter of the screen. He looked at the photo editing tools and clicked enlarge several times until the double doors filled the frame.

The gunman was a silhouette against the daylight coming from the lobby outside the courtroom. The background was burned out because the camera had automatically set the exposure for the interior. At least the image was sharp and focused, apart from the blurred movement of the gun hand. The man appeared to be wearing black, although the silhouette made it hard to be certain. Dark clothing, anyway. He was taller than the witness descriptions, and slim and toned. There was no slouch in his stance. He had a strong upright posture with his feet planted shoulder-width apart. A good firing position. His head was turned slightly to look along his arm, once it was raised. The face was strong and square-jawed in outline, but dark because of the backlighting.

McNulty lowered the contrast and turned up the brightness. The background outside the room vanished but some facial features appeared. A straight nose, arched eyebrows and thin lips. The eyes were just pools of blackness above the high cheekbones. The hair in silhouette was neat and cut short.

He concentrated on the clothes. With the adjustment in contrast and brightness, more detail came out of the shadows. The man was wearing some kind of all-in-one coverall similar to those worn by police SWAT teams or military assault teams. A black zippered jacket flapped open as he raised his arm. There appeared to be some kind of utility belt, but there wasn’t enough detail to be certain. The shooter’s feet weren’t in the shot.

McNulty resized and centered the image so he could see the entire doorframe. The adjustments he’d made to be able to see the figure had burned out the exterior, but there was some kind of smudge that looked nearer than the deep background. He altered the brightness and definition to