Déjà Vu

Chapter Two

Hauptkommissar Beckmann had been gone for an hour. In that interval, Saskia had checked the security recordings of the cameras in the foyer. The recordings had been deliberately scrambled. While she worked implication after implication, two cleaning spiders entered her office. She watched them groom the carpet around her feet—touches to map her calf—and climb the desk, lift the blotter’s corner, shoo away the dust. The spell broke when a spider approached the kitchen.

‘Computer, get rid of them.’

The spiders slipped under the door and were gone.

‘How about some Vivaldi?’ she asked.

‘I don’t understand. Would you like to improve your accuracy by reading some training texts?’

‘No. Play me some music by the composer Vivaldi.’

‘Which symphony?’

‘The Four Seasons.’

‘Which piece?’

‘Winter.’

It played.

‘Louder.’

Louder.

She looked at the photograph of Simon. His eyes flashed green. Saskia turned to the blinking diode of a camera high on the wall. ‘Computer, you use those cameras to disambiguate voice commands, correct?’

‘Yes, a multiple constraint satisfaction framework is -’

‘Do you store the video? Show me.’

‘Yes, I use it to help process difficult utterances.’

‘I said show me.’

‘Raw video or my compressed representations?’

‘Raw.’

The blinds rotated and the daylight died. Four projected squares expanded. Each showed a live view of Saskia’s face. ‘Show me the video for last Friday afternoon.’

‘It has been deleted.’

Saskia saw herself scowl. ‘What?’

‘Please wait. I have located a back-up.’

The squares changed to show four profiles of her secretary, Mary. She was sitting at her desk.

‘Overlay a time stamp in the corner of the lower right frame.’

The time-stamp read 12:07 p.m.

Saskia nodded. ‘Now jump to 7:00 p.m.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Go forward to 7:00 p.m.’

The computer did so. An empty room.

‘Back to 6:30. Play it in real time.’

Saskia watched the secretary as she typed at her terminal, as she passed her moments, as she yawned, dug her nose, and tweaked an earring. There was a knock at the door, loud and abrupt. Both Mary and Saskia flinched. Mary walked to the door and opened it. Saskia tried to construct the scene from the traces of background and but the cameras cherished Mary’s portrait. She was expectant, then puzzled, then afraid. The visitor said nothing.

Pull back, Saskia willed.

Two cameras were retasked as the visitor entered. They moved from Mary to the murderer. Saskia leaned forward, then swore. His face was obscured by a broad-brimmed hat. The viewing angle made it impossible to see beyond his shaven chin. His coat was baggy but nondescript. Wordlessly, he moved to Mary. His head tilted to kiss her. Then a gloved hand flashed at her neck, fast as a tongue at an insect. Mary died sliding down his front. Unbalanced by her weight, he laid her out and wiped the blade on her collar. Then he hauled her towards the kitchen. Beyond the cameras.

‘Go back to the frame where the person walked in.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Back five seconds. Forward two seconds. Back three frames. Print that.’

Saskia opened the blotter and removed the single, blank sheet. As she watched, the murderer appeared mid-stride. His height was difficult to judge, though the computer could calculate it. He wore a long raincoat and dark gloves. His shoulders were narrow. Not enough detail. Nothing diagnostic.

Saskia took a lukewarm shower. She dried slowly and twisted her hair into a towel. She wiped a space in the bathroom mirror’s condensation and examined her eyes. She closed the wings of a white bathrobe around herself and returned to the office. The carpet tickled the gaps between her toes.

‘Computer, play the video once more. This time from 6:34 p.m.’

Again, Mary was disturbed by a knock at the door. Again, Mary was murdered. Saskia sighed; the unchangeable and dead past. But, on the brink of an idea, Saskia stepped closer to the window and tilted her head.

‘…Stop.’

The murderer froze with his knife on Mary’s collar.

‘Zoom in on the blade.’

Camera One filled the window. The knife was pixelated but Saskia hoped it had caught something essential of the murderer, as her darkening office had perhaps caught something of Mary’s expiration. Saskia’s thumbs itched.

‘Computer, can you analyze the image on the knife?’

‘Can you be more specific?’

‘I want a true representation of the object that caused the reflection on the knife. The object is a human face approximately thirty centimetres from the blade. However, do not share the analysis with any other computer. Is this clear?’

‘If I distribute the analysis, processing will take minutes. If I do it myself, hours will be required.’

‘How long?’

‘Twelve hours, plus or minus one.’

Saskia looked at her bare wrist. Her watch was still in the bathroom. ‘What time is it?’

‘It is 7:45 p.m.’

The analysis might not be complete by 8:00 am, when the engineer was to arrive. But, with a face, Saskia could pursue the investigation, could absolve herself. It represented the difference between being controlled and being the controller. It might save her from the life of a street sweeper, rehabilitated, the crinkles on her brain smoothed clean.

‘Begin your analysis.’

‘Yes, Kommissarin.’

The night was long. Saskia dressed again. She did not want to eat or read. She had nobody to call. Finally, she fell asleep in her chair, lulled by the swish-swish of the data carousels as, pixel by pixel, the computer formed its answer to her question. She dreamed she brushed the streets, swish-swish, until they were as blank as her.

Night terrors for the kommissarin, whose dreams carried her to a campfire on a dark plain. Around it sat three old women. Clotho, she spun the thread of life. Lachesis, she measured a length. Atropos, she cut it.

Spin, measure, snip.

Awake, she witnessed each tick of the dawn. The city restarted. The empty streets gathered their people. Saskia watched them. In the bathroom, she studied her reflection. She brought cold water to her face and massaged her eyebrows and her eyes. She pressed until her vision clouded. It was 7:50 am. If the engineer was punctual, he would arrive in ten minutes.

‘Saskia,’ called the computer, ‘I have completed the image processing job.’

She returned to her desk. ‘Give me a hard copy.’

As the reconstruction of the murderer’s face appeared on her blotting paper, there was a knock at the door. Saskia folded the paper in half.

‘Computer, who is that?’

‘The Hauptkommissar. He has not requested an appointment.’

‘Is he alone?’

‘Yes.’

‘Let him in.’

Beckmann, today, was as identical in dress and expression as yesterday, but a carnation had replaced the anonymous lemon-yellow flower in his buttonhole.

‘Kommissarin?’

‘Here.’

She unfolded the paper. It showed the reflection of Saskia frowning in disgust over the woman she had murdered.