There was a jump in the sequence. The photographer must have been sitting in the cabin. The truck was driving along a forested road. In front was a group of civilians with their belongings in bundles on their heads and backs, their children hurrying with them. They ran into the forest at the sight of the truck. A skeleton lay in thick vines on the side of the road, still fully dressed, its death’s head looking out at the watcher.
The trucks came to a stop in a deserted village. The photographer got out and went to meet the driver, who was also getting out of the truck. Harrigan recognised Jerome Beck. He grinned and spoke but there was no sound. The other driver appeared from the second truck: du Plessis, also talking and grinning soundlessly.
The next image showed the village turned into an encampment with two tents set up in the centre. Two of the soldiers were dragging a terrified young girl towards one of the tents. Again the video jumped. The eye was now inside one of the tents. It watched one figure hold the young girl in a chair while another injected her with something. Both wore protective clothing. Then the eye followed her running out of the tent and through the encampment, while the soldiers watched her from a distance, laughing. She made her escape along a dirt road through a partially forested landscape. The camera turned back to the entrance to the tent. The people in protective clothing were seen walking outside. They washed their gloved hands in some solution, then poured it over their heads. Then they took off their headgear. Harrigan again found himself looking at Beck and du Plessis.
Next, Beck, without protective clothing, was walking through a village where a number of people lay either dead or dying on the ground outside their houses. He stopped to look down at them, his hands on his hips. Then he went inside a house. The young girl from the earlier video, recognisable by the dress she had been wearing, lay curled up on a mat, her face to the wall. Beck was joined by du Plessis. The angle was from behind them, looking between them. They stood looking at the girl, talking, then walked away.
The watcher and the two men moved from house to house. Other people were shown inside, most of them dead. Some were still alive but sick, lying in their beds, turning their faces away from the intruders.
Then the eye went back outside. It showed the armed men standing on the periphery of the small village, apparently refusing to come any closer. Du Plessis went up to them; some backed away. He talked angrily to them, gesturing to them to come closer. Reluctantly, they began to move forward. Then, with du Plessis, they moved through the village, shooting whoever had been left alive. Meanwhile, Beck was talking to one of the men. The man was gesturing down the road; the inference was that some of the villagers had fled.
The eye swung around quickly. It was heading towards one of the trucks on the edge of the village. The truck door was pulled open, the photographer was climbing inside the cabin. Then his hands were on the wheel and he was driving away at speed. A distance down the road, he stopped to collect a small group of villagers, one of whom was carrying a child. A man climbed in the front and spoke to the driver. He was directing him. Presumably the others had climbed into the back.
The truck moved on down the dirt road. Eventually it came to another, larger village that seemed equally deserted. They were passing a large white building when the truck stopped suddenly. It had broken down.
Next, the driver and the villagers were inside what must have once been a schoolhouse. The eye looked out of the window. The other truck carrying the soldiers had stopped outside. In the open space in front of the school, Beck and du Plessis got out of the cabin; the armed men spilled out of the back. They surrounded the building. Through a window, Beck could be seen standing and shouting at whoever was inside the school.
Then Beck gestured to three of the men. The eye watched them return from the truck carrying jerry cans. Then it followed them from window to window as they threw what could only be petrol against the walls of the building. One of them tossed a lighted rag onto the petrol, which burst into flames. The woman with the child ran out of one of the doors. What happened to her the camera did not show and there was no sound. In its eye view, the walls and roof had begun to burn fiercely. Flames rained down around the camera. It saw people burning. Then it was pushed through a door into another room, a storage area with a window on one side. At floor level there was a long metal grille. The ceiling came down in curtains of flame. The eye was propelled towards the dirt floor against the grille. Then there was nothing.
When the video was over, Harrigan and Grace sat in silence for some moments. Then she got to her feet and went to the kitchen where she began to make coffee.
‘Now we know how Brinsmead got his burns,’ Harrigan said. ‘He was an agent in an undercover operation that went wrong.’
‘Yes,’ Grace said shortly, her back to him.
He went to her. She was crying. He put his arms around her and comforted her, pleased that he had this to do. Anything to occupy his thoughts while he tried to find some meaningful way to deal with what he had just seen.
‘That’s why I do the job I do,’ she said. ‘Knowing that people can do that kind of thing to other people. I hate it, and if I can stop them or get them, I will.’
The coffee was ready. She poured them a mug each and lit a cigarette.
‘Go after them,’ she said. ‘Go after the people behind that massacre with everything you’ve got. Get du Plessis. Take him to trial.’
‘I’m doing my best. But someone with the authority to do it shut down that original operation.’
‘Had they seen that video? They could have prosecuted Beck and du Plessis on the strength of that.’
‘But they didn’t. We don’t know why and I don’t think anyone’s going to tell us.’
‘Daniel Brinsmead will know,’ she said. ‘Somehow he got out of there and was still alive enough to be flown back to London. He must have had that video on him then.’
‘You want my opinion? He’s involved in the shooting up at Pittwater. Him and Jonas together. For all I know, they’re our murderers. I can’t feel for him.’
‘We don’t know that for sure.’
‘Calvo didn’t have the motive to kill those people and then advertise it. That video gives Brinsmead all the motive he needs to kill Beck.’
‘He and Sam didn’t talk that way when I was listening to them the other day. They talked like professional agents. If they are, they can’t be your murderers. Did you find out if they were legitimate?’
‘I’ve asked the question. I don’t know when I’ll get an answer or even if I’ll be told.’
‘That video is as much motive for Calvo as it is for Daniel Brinsmead,’ Grace said. ‘It’s what she has to cover up. She is a murderer. A murderer just like the people behind the killings we saw on that video just now. Someone who gets other people to do it for them. They don’t even have the guts to do it for themselves. They’re worse than the people who actually pull the triggers.’
‘She’s definitely one of them. Grace, you need to calm down. We can only deal with this calmly. That’s the only thing we can do for those people now.’
Grace moved away, restlessly. ‘I want to know the whys and the wherefores,’ she said. ‘Who’s behind what. Calvo would know.’
Harrigan’s phone rang.
‘Paul,’ the commissioner said. ‘Can you come to a meeting in my office immediately? We have a significant development in the Pittwater investigation.’
‘Are you referring to the video that’s on the net, Commissioner?’