“Yes, sir.” A few mouse clicks later the monitor over the sheriff’s head came to life, displaying a street map of White River and the adjacent section of Willard Park. Two colored lines, a blue one and a red one, beginning at the same point on Poulter Street, diverged into separate routes through the city streets. Torres explained that the blue line represented the route taken by the Corolla from the sniper house after the shooting and the red line the route taken by the motorcycle.
The blue line proceeded directly along one of White River’s main avenues to a point where the city’s business section abutted the fire-damaged Grinton neighborhood. The red line, however, zigzagged here and there through the side streets of Bluestone and Grinton to the edge of Willard Park, where it ended.
Shucker removed a powdery doughnut from the bag in front of him and took a thoughtful bite, which turned his lips white. “Looks to me like the Corolla driver knew where he was going, and the motorcycle rider didn’t have a clue.”
“There’s a termination point shown for each route,” said Kline. “Were the vehicles found at those locations?”
“Correct, sir, in the case of the Corolla. It was discovered at the corner of Sliwak Avenue and North Street by WRPD patrol officers at approximately six ten this morning. Garrett Felder and Shelby Towns are going over it now for latents and trace evidence.”
“You said ‘in the case of the Corolla’—meaning the motorcycle wasn’t found?”
“Correct, sir. I should explain that the two lines we’re showing on the map were constructed differently. Once it left Poulter Street, the Corolla followed a thoroughfare that’s covered by traffic department cameras—which gave us a video record of the car’s route. But the motorcycle’s route had to be reconstructed with the help of witnesses along the way. Starting with Hollis Vitter, we found a sequence of individuals who heard or saw a motocross bike at the time in question. Lucky for us, it was a nice afternoon and a lot of people were outside.”
“You got a description of the bike?”
“Red motocross with a loud engine.”
“Plate number?”
“Nobody noticed.”
“Any description of the rider?”
“Full leather riding suit, full-coverage helmet and visor, no identifying elements.”
“And you say the bike wasn’t found at the end of the route?”
“The end point shown on the map is just the last place where we have witness observation. It may have cut into the park at that point and taken one of the wilderness trails to just about anywhere.”
“Okay,” said Kline, with prosecutor-like intensity. “If I’ve got this right, we have a load of video on the Corolla and no video at all on the motorcycle, even though its roundabout route covered a lot more ground?”
“That’s correct, sir.”
Shucker took another huge bite out of his doughnut. As he spoke, specks of sugar flew onto the table. “Any of them Corolla videos give us a picture of the driver?”
“I was coming to that, sir. We have partials that were captured under different angle, shadow, and glare conditions. No single video frame provides a usable likeness, but the Albany lab has a composite process that may give us what we need. They can combine the best parts of multiple shots and resolve them into one high-definition image. At least that’s the theory.”
“When?” asked Kline.
“We emailed them the digital files last night, and I spoke to them this morning. If we’re lucky, we may get something back by the end of this meeting.”
Kline looked skeptical. “That’s amazingly fast for Albany.”
The sheriff uttered an unpleasant little laugh. “Upside of an impending race war is we get attention.”
Beckert glanced at his watch. “Let’s keep this moving along, Mark. Where do we stand on tracking down the rental information?”
“Interesting news there, sir. This morning we finally got hold of the records for the locations used as the sniper sites. Both leases are in the name of Marcel Jordan.”
Beckert exhibited a rare fleeting smile. “That eliminates all doubt about BDA involvement.”
Something in Gurney’s expression caught his eye. “You don’t agree?”
“I agree that it provides support for a certain view of the case. As for eliminating all doubt, that’s a leap I wouldn’t make.”
Beckert held his gaze for a moment, then turned mildly to Torres. “Do you have anything else for us?”
“That’s it for now, sir, until we get the enhanced photo from Albany and the report on the Corolla from Garrett.”
“Speaking of Albany,” said Beckert, looking at Kline, “have the computer people gotten back to you regarding Steele’s phone?”
