“So something goes wrong,” Caldera continued when I stayed quiet. “There’s a fight, we get the call. Somewhere along the way, that focus gets lost. You pick it up, and sometime after that our Mr. Chamois figures out the thing’s missing. He gets the idea that if he hangs around, he might find out who took it. You show up, he spots you, and everything plays out from there.”

“Why was he trying to kill me then?”

“Probably wasn’t. Just wanted to cripple you badly enough that he could take you somewhere for a proper interrogation before he finished you off.”

“You’re a real ray of sunshine about this stuff, aren’t you?”

“Well, that’s enough guesswork for now,” Caldera said. “Check the folder. I’ve got every CCTV recording I can find from the Stratford area over that time period, plus all the recordings from Pudding Mill Lane from earlier. I’ve shared access with your computer, so go through them and see what you can turn up.”

I clicked on the folder and started scrolling down. When I saw just how much footage there was, my eyebrows went up.

| | | | | | | | |

It was a few hours later.

The sun had set, and the sky through the small office window was dark. Around us, Keeper headquarters was quieter, though still nowhere near empty. Every now and then footsteps would go past in the corridor outside, but Caldera and I were alone in the office.

I leant back from the computer with a groan. My eyes were aching and it was getting hard to focus on the screen. “I’m not getting anything.”

“Nothing from the stations?” Caldera said.

“He jumped on that train at Stratford, but he didn’t get off at Bow Church or any of the stations after that. No sign of him on the station cameras before or after. I don’t think he was even there.” I shook my head. “And once he stops casting spells and walks into the crowd, he looks just like all the other five thousand people on these tapes. This is like looking for a needle in a haystack, except you don’t know if the needle’s in the haystack. I don’t think he’s on any of these tapes at all.”

“Probably.”

I stared gloomily at the computer screen. “I wish we had Sonder for this.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not the only one who’s figured out that timesight’s useful,” Caldera said. “Sonder’s on the upward track now. He’s on the exchange program in Washington.”

“What are we doing here?” I asked Caldera. “I mean, we’re looking at footage from one to two days ago. Even if we see anything, is it going to help us catch this guy?”

“If he’s smart, he’s out of the country by now.”

“So . . . ?”

Caldera shook her head. “You’re like all the other mages. You think Keeper work’s all about mage duels and chasing people down. We only have those kinds of fights when stuff goes wrong.”