John Andersen holstered his pistol. A rifle raised into position. He checked something on the side of the weapon, then looked through the gunsight at the helicopter, taking aim. The helicopter jerked upward, John Andersen dropped out of shot, and the screen was a blur of faded greens and browns.

Fleeing.

I looked at Vee. There was something very adult about the set of her chin, about the determination in her eyes. She looked older than her sister ever had, and I wanted to tell her that I was sorry, that I could see sometimes how Licia’s disappearance had robbed her of her childhood.

“Dad,” said Vee, looking up, “you’re not watching.”

“Of course I’m watching.”

On-screen the water was an indistinct gray-black mass.

The camera steadied. The world fell into focus. There was the slipway on the mainland. At the waterline a red rubber boat, and on the boat four men. Figures around the boat busied themselves with levers and ropes. The boat seemed to be floating free. I had seen that boat before, in the video still that Bror had left for me on Elsa’s seat in the courtroom.

“You see that, Dad? No one’s even holding it.”

Two more men jumped aboard. The rubber of the boat seemed to swell around them.

“Fucking amateurs,” said Vee.

“Vee, please,” I said.

“Okay, but do they look to you like they know what they’re doing? It’s way too low in the water.”

Another two men approached and jumped in. The boat pulled slowly from the slipway. Water plumed out behind the motor.

“This is what they didn’t want us to see.”

“Maybe,” I said.

“No, Dad, it is. That’s the police tactical weapons unit.”

The helicopter was returning across the sound toward the island.

“You’re right,” I said. “That is a little odd.”

“That’s not the end of that story, Dad . . . But you have to keep watching . . .”

Now the helicopter was back above the island, hovering over a block of flat-roofed buildings at the side of the clearing.

The shower block.

At one end of the block a door opened. Two girls appeared on the steps. They waved frantically up at the helicopter. The shot began to close with the ground. Yellow-green grass filled the frame, then the screen turned dark gray. Pavel was landing, I realized, in the clearing by the shower block.

He had tried to help. He had been telling the truth about that.

“Vee,” I said, “was it Pavel who gave you this?”

“I know you told me to keep away from him. But if you’re going to shout at me, can you at least wait till you’ve seen it all?”

I took her hand. “I’m not going to shout at you. I promise.”

She appraised me for a moment, puzzled.