Of Images and Angels 3

Her name was Anja.
Preston reflected a moment. “That’s rather like Angie in America.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “You can call me Angie; I like that.” Angie it was.
By the time they arrived back in Gouda, he realized she had to be around thirty years old. Her story was pretty simple, in that she grew up in a Catholic orphanage somewhere close to Delft and never knew her parents. She managed to graduate just about the time the orphanage closed and found various jobs with an inter-denominational Christian missionary society. She played whatever volunteer sports were available.
“I was sexually abused along with all the other girls, but far less often because I was never as cute as the others. I was considered too boyish.” She was also exposed to numerous different languages and spoke a few with enough fluency to pretend it was her native tongue. He noticed her English had a hint of proper British enunciation, but not too strong. As she continued chatting with him, it faded noticeably into a standard American sound.
The night air was still warm as they entered Gouda and made their way to the old market plaza. Preston pulled a small gadget from his pocket and was delighted to see several unsecured wifi signals were still available. The only lighting was the minimal security lamps here and there. He sat down in the shadows; Angie huddled next to him as he opened his laptop. He transferred the memory chip from the camera to the laptop and copied the video first.
After running through it couple of times, Preston zoomed in the middle frames of it to see the action with as much clarity as possible. He used editing software to bring the ambient light level up just a bit more. This he saved as a second video file. Then he copied out several frames showing the man’s face as he walked back toward the wheelhouse after dumping the bag.
He explained to Angie, “First, we take advantage of the face recognition software on a couple of major social websites.” Sure enough, the site searching algorithms found a few matches, but only as a secondary person unnamed in the pictures.
“So it means he has a social life of sorts, but avoids being identified the way most people do.” Angie seemed rather surprised how easy it all was.
He turned to her and warned, “This next part is rather risky. I have access to a commercial vendor site that happens to have a development contract with several national and international law enforcement agencies. One of my friends works there and lets me use his login. It checks images on file with the likes of Interpol and the FBI to see if there’s a match. The problem is, if I get a hit, someone in those agencies is going to know about it. They might not have any idea who, simply because I’m using a public wifi connection, but they are going to know where it was and when. I would go through Tor, but the site doesn’t allow connections from there.”
As he logged in, he added, “Depending on what I find, I’ll probably try to send a copy of the video to whichever agency seems most interested in him.”
It took quite a while, but as long as the site seemed to be working and didn’t come up empty, he waited. He was about to give up, though, when suddenly a black and white mugshot popped up on the screen. It was the same guy a good bit younger. All the data boxes below it were blank, except for the Interpol case number.
“Why is there no data?” Angie asked.
Preston’s face went pale as the meaning dawned on him. He pressed the button combination for a screen grab, saved it to the camera chip and closed his laptop. He paused a moment and extracted the camera memory chip, stuffing it securely in his pants pocked. Then he thrust his laptop back into the knapsack. Jumping to his feet, he began walking immediately off toward the north. It took only a few moments for Angie to catch up on her bicycle. He cautioned her to silence with his finger and very nearly jogged along the narrow side streets. In the shadow of some trees a couple hundred meters from the train station, he stopped long enough to explain in a loud whisper.
“Our boy was arrested at least once in the past; that was a mugshot. However, something on the level of a government agency covered for him. That would mean CIA, MI6 or perhaps Mossad. What we witnessed was not likely a common criminal act, but some kind of espionage. While I don’t specifically know what they can do, nor how quickly, it is guaranteed to be very unpleasant if they ever find out about us and what we know.”
He paused a moment while she absorbed that. Then he went on, “As quickly as I can I am going to disappear. I’m going to get as far from here as I can, and I suggest you do the same. Pretend you were never here, that you never met me. And for God’s sake, make sure there aren’t any more tags following us around. Pull the battery from your cellphone. Go somewhere safe and wait at least 24 hours before turning it back on.”
She remembered the little tag and tossed it into bushes.
He turned to go in the direction of the open train platform. There were night trains at odd intervals in this part of the country. She caught up with him again. Keeping her voice in the same loud whisper he used, she pleaded with him. “Take me with you! I know this area better than you; I know places to hide.”
He barely turned his head as he walked a blistering pace along a narrow street. “Are you ready to give up your whole life and marry me? Can you team up with me as if the only thing that matters is whatever crazy shit I think sounds like fun tonight or tomorrow? Are you ready to watch me die under torture and not say anything? Because I assure you right now, I’m not all that interested in living a long and healthy life of peace and security. I’m a complete madman. I have an important mission in life and this business just threw me a curve ball. I’m going to face it but I have no illusion about saving the world. I’ll stumble along trying to estimate what makes the most sense according to what I believe.”
He paused and caught his breath. “Not much in this world really matters to me. Are you ready to sign onto that mission, sight unseen?”
He barely closed his lips before she said, “Yes! Of course I am. Do you think it’s been a nice life for me up to now? Until an hour ago I had no idea, but this is exactly what I’ve been training for my whole life. If I get killed chasing you around the world, that would be a lot more meaningful than what I’ve been doing so far.”
He grinned and turned to face her. “You’re my kind of gal. You may regret this just a few hours from now, but I’m willing to let you come along if you can keep up.”
With that, he pushed off in a renewed attack on the distance to the train platform.