Michael Connelly - Void Moon

Cassie nodded and climbed into the van.

"Close the door," Paltz said.

She slid the door closed but kept her eyes on Paltz as she did it.

"Let's do this quick," she said. "I don't like being here."

"Relax, I'm not going to bite you."

"I'm not worried about getting bit."

Now that she was closer, Cassie looked at the case again. Pieces of electronic surveillance equipment were placed in cutouts so they would not move during transport. Cassie recognized most of the pieces from prior use or from electronics magazines and catalogs. There were pinhole cameras, a microwave transmitter, a receiver and several pieces of related equipment. There was also a pair of night-vision goggles.

Like a door-to-door salesman, Paltz waved his arm in front of the display and started his spiel.

"You want me to go over everything or you think you've got a handle on it?"

"Better show me everything but the NVGs. It's been a while."

"All right, then, let's go from image capture to picture delivery. First, the cameras."

He pointed to the upper half of the case. Four small black squares with open circuitry and circular centerpieces were displayed in the foam rubber.

"You've got four chip cameras here – should be enough for any job. When we spoke before you didn't say if you needed color but – "

"I don't need color. I don't need audio. I need clarity. I need to read numbers."

"That's what I figured. These are all black and white. The first three you see here are your standard pinhole board cameras. When I say standard, I mean Hooten L amp;S standard. Nobody puts together a better board right now. With these you get four hundred lines resolution from a linear electronic iris. Very clear. Runs four to six hours on a dime battery. How's that work for you, timewise?"

"Should be fine."

Cassie felt herself getting excited. Keeping up through electronics magazines was one thing, but actually seeing the equipment was dipping the hot wire into her blood. She could feel the blood pounding in her temples.

Paltz went on with his show.

"Okay, then this fourth board is your green camera. It's called the ALI – like Muhammad Ali. That's why we call it the 'greatest little camera of all time' in the catalog."

"Ali?"

"A-L-I. Ambient Light Iris. With this one you have vision with lights on or off. With infrared you sometimes get exposure blooms on your LED screen when lights are on. So we developed this. It operates with what light is in the room and gives you enough picture to see what you have to see – shapes, shadows, movement. Green field of vision, as usual. Tell you what, t'night's supposed to be a full moon. If you – "

"A void moon, too."

"A what?"

"Never mind. Go on."

"I was just saying that if you can get some moonlight into the area you are filming, then that'll be all you need for this camera to work."

"Okay, sounds good."

Cassie only needed to be able to see enough to confirm the mark's location in the darkness of his room. The ALI seemed to be all she needed.

"Good, then moving on, you can take any of these boards and use them in any of the shells contained here."

He removed a false smoke detector and showed it to her. There was a small drill hole in the cowling. On the inside he showed her where the board camera would fit, aligning the lens with the drill hole.

"Now if you need a lower angle…"

He next removed a phony electric wall socket plate. The board camera could be installed behind the upper socket. He handed it to Cassie and she marveled at how small it was.

"This is great."

"But a little risky. Guy could try to plug something into it and – bingo – he finds a fucking camera in his room. So if you use this one, put it in a spot where it's not likely the guy will want to plug in his computer or shaver or whatever."

"Got it."

"Okay, good. So what you do is connect your cameras to the batteries like so."

Paltz plugged tiny round batteries into cradles attached by wires to the board cameras.

"Then install. You then have to hook the cameras to the transmitter. This is all going to be short run, right?"

Cassie nodded.

"Right. Eight, ten feet at the most, probably less."

He pulled out a roll of what looked like Scotch tape and held it up.

"Conduct-O tape. You used to use this, right?"

"Yeah, toward the end… on a few jobs."

Paltz went on with his explanation as though Cassie had said the opposite.

"It's your magic tape, man. It's got two conductors in it, one for video and one for ground. You connect to the camera and then run it to your transmitter. Just remember, keep it short. The longer the run, the more image distortion. You don't want that if you're readin' numbers."

"Right. I remember."

Sweat was running out of Paltz's hairline and down both of his cheeks. Cassie didn't think it was warm enough inside the van to create such a response. She watched him raise his arm and wipe his face.

"Something wrong?"

"Nothing," Paltz said as he reached into the suitcase. "It's getting toasty in here, that's all. This is a four-channel transmitter."

He pulled a flat square box about the size of a cell phone out of its place in the foam. It had a six-inch stub antenna.

"This is omnidirectional – it don't matter what angle you place it at. Just get it close to your cameras for the clearest signal. You notice this is not disguised in any way. Since it ain't a camera, you can hide it just about anywhere – under a bed or in a drawer or a closet or wherever. It, too, has a battery – lasts about as long as the cameras. Okay?"

"Got it."

"Now what this transmitter does is send your captured image to your remote. This little baby."

He pulled from the case the largest piece of equipment. It looked like a small laptop computer. Or maybe a space-age lunch box. Paltz flipped open a screen and folded up another stub antenna.

"This is your microwave receiver/recorder. You can set this up to two hundred yards from your transmitter, depending on the knockdown, and still pull in a decent picture."

"What's the knockdown?"

"Nothing you'll probably have to worry about. Water mostly. Tree sap is a killer too. You're not going to be working near a forest, right? Those trees just send a signal into the dirt."

"There a forest in Las Vegas, Jersey?"

"Not that I know of."

"Then no forest. No trees, no sap."

She was getting annoyed with his manner and his nervousness. It was getting contagious. She realized that without any windows in the back of the van she had no idea whether there would be someone waiting outside for them – or for her – when they opened the door. This rendezvous had been a mistake.

"What about the pool?" Paltz asked.

The question took Cassie out of her thoughts. She thought a moment and remembered the pool at the Cleopatra was at ground level.

"No pool."

"Good. Steel, concrete, all of that is no problem. Just stay inside with it and it should work perfect."

Paltz started working the buttons on the receiver/recorder. He turned it on and the screen came up full of static snow. He tapped a red button on the right side of the mini-keyboard.

"That's your record there. You can record everything or just watch it. You can quarter the screen and watch up to four cameras at once."

He hit a series of buttons and the screen split twice. It was still four views of snow.

"We won't get a picture because we don't have the cameras connected. But I've got your four camera freeks already loaded on here and it's good to go."

"Okay. It's a great kit, Jersey. You got anything else to show me? I gotta go."

"That's it. Now if you pay me what we agreed on, you can get out of here and I can go back to my chili – though it's gotta be cold by now."