The Watchmaker’s Hand

And eighty feet above this stack of suites and rooms sits the jib of a Swenson-Thorburg AB tower crane. Like all the others in the city it is no longer in service, temporarily halted because of the sabotage. Since the only weights on the front jib are cables, the trolly and hook, the counterweight blocks had been shuttled close to the cab and locked in position. Until a few minutes ago, moment — balance — had been achieved. Now, though, the jib is ever so slowly leaning forward toward the hospital. This is because of what is known in the industrial world as an “acid attack,” a term of art having nothing to do with tossing a caustic solution at a political rival or a cheating lover. It merely means there is a chemical reaction in progress. In this case, hydrofluoric acid was released from a plastic container and is presently engaged in, first, acting on the calcium hydroxide in the cement to turn it into a paste of calcium silicate hydrate, and, second, liquifying that resultant. A slurry of this mixture is sloughing off the blocks, along with bits of the rear trolley and brackets holding the blocks to it. This residue is sprinkling down to the jobsite — the place being deserted — though none of the skeleton crew at the entrance notices. Several of them thought they heard a moaning or groaning. This is the sound of the slewing plates binding as the tower mast leans forward. But since they’ve been guarding the entrance and are convinced no one could sabotage their crane, they put the sound down to the wind or an aircraft or a distant truck and return to their argument about a recent draft pick in the NFL.

37

So. It’s back to this.

Reviewing damn security videos. What security guards do, looking for kids who shoplift necklaces and candy bars at Walmart.

But, with a perp who has the inconsiderate habit of dissolving the most important physical evidence with acid, there was little else to do.

An irritated Lincoln Rhyme scrubbed the video into the far past and then back to the not-so-far.

He was not alone. Mel Cooper was doing the same at a nearby computer.

Two forensic analysts — the best in the city — with no evidence to analyze.

Though not happy with the task, he acknowledged the possibility of finding a nugget or two this way. While it was true that he didn’t trust witnesses, even the most cooperative, he did trust his own eyes — all the more because he believed that after he’d been robbed of so much by the accident, his other senses had been enhanced. Perhaps his imagination, but he’d come to believe that if he saw something himself it was the truth.

As he searched, he was thinking of the question that had dogged them from the beginning: How had the Watchmaker gotten the hydrofluoric acid onto the counterweights?

They knew he was somewhere near the crane yesterday morning when it came down — because Garry Helprin, the operator, had seen his beige SUV nearby.

And that meant he was probably present somewhere on video too, captured when he made his way to the tower, climbed it and planted the device. The operator started work at 9:00 and probably would have seen an intruder make the climb, so the device was planted prior to that. But how much prior? He knew from the discovery in the wheel well of the jet at JFK airport that the Watchmaker had been in the country for only a few days, which at least set a limit on the footage to search. This still meant, though, that Rhyme had to scrub through hundreds of hours of video, from multiple sources. He had footage from seven cameras.

Five of these were private security cameras with fair to poor resolution. Two of them were better, being newer additions to the Domain Awareness System.

“Nothing,” Cooper muttered.

Rhyme glanced at the clock on the wall nearby.

9:14.

Then a look at the map and a fleeting thought: Which one is your target, Charles?

He returned to the screen and scrubbed more quickly, focusing on the night before and the morning of the attack.

But the only person climbing the crane tower, at any time before the incident, was Helprin, just before 9 a.m.

The cameras were blocked occasionally by trucks stopping at lights or making deliveries at the jobsite or to nearby office buildings and apartments. Of particular irritation were advertising trucks, flatbeds toting large billboards. Most were cigarette ads — forbidden on TV — and for medicines to treat maladies whose nature was not clear from the content. Also, a number of campaign ads. Two, Rhyme noted, were pushing for voters to cast a ballot for Marie Leppert, the cartel buster running against the man who was Rhyme’s own representative in Washington, former activist (and criminal) Stephen Cody.

At one point, a large black bird nearly slammed into the camera, startling him.