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he wanted to stretch before bed.
    â€œMel says thanks,” Jack told me, after we’d been clipping along for maybe twenty minutes. “I think he’ll call us again if he has any problems. You did a good job.” He sounded proud, and that lit an unexpected glow somewhere in my chest.
    â€œSo, what next?” I asked.
    â€œWe’ve got a workman’s comp job I’m sure you can handle,” Jack said. “I get a lot of that kind of case.”
    â€œThe person is claiming he can’t work any more?”
    â€œYeah. In this case, it’s a woman. She fell on a slippery floor at work, now she says she can’t bend her back or lift anything. She lives in a small house in Conway. It can be hard watching a house in some neighborhoods, so you may have to be creative.”
    That was not the adjective that sprang to my mind when I thought of my abilities, so I felt a little anxious.
    â€œI’ll need a camera, I’m assuming.”
    â€œYes, and lots of time fillers. A book or two, newspapers, snacks.”
    â€œOkay.”
    We paced along for a few more minutes. A familiar car went by, and I said, “Jack, there’s my counselor. And her husband, I think.”
    We watched the beige sedan turn the corner onto Compton. That was the way we’d planned to go, too, and when we rounded the same corner, we saw the car had stopped in front of an older home. It was built in a style popular in the thirties and forties, boxy and low with a broad roofed porch supported by squat pillars. Tamsin and the man with her had already left their car, and he was at the front door. She was standing slightly behind him. Under the glare of the porch light, I could see he was partially bald, and big. The clink of keys carried across the small yard.
    Tamsin screamed.
    Jack was there before I was. He moved to one side as I caught up, and I saw that there was a puddle of blood on the gray-painted concrete of the porch. I cast my gaze from side to side, saw nothing that could have produced it.
    â€œThere,” Jack said, still one step ahead of me.
    Following his pointing finger, I saw there was a squirrel hanging from a branch of the mimosa tree planted by the porch. The heavy scent of the mimosa twined with the hot-penny smell of blood.
    Since I didn’t have a bird feeder or fruit bushes, I happened to like squirrels. When I realized the squirrel’s throat had been cut and the little animal had been hung on the tree like an out-of-season Christmas ornament, I began a slow burn.
    I could hear Tamsin sobbing in the background and her husband saying, “Oh, not here, too. Honey, maybe it was just some kids, or someone playing a sick joke….”
    â€œYou know it was him. You know that,” Tamsin said, choking and gasping. “I told you about the phone calls. It’s him, again. He followed me.”
    Jack said, “Excuse me, I’m Jack Leeds. This is Lily. We were just out walking. Sorry to intrude, but can we help?”
    The man with his arm around Tamsin said, “I’m sorry, too. We can’t believe…excuse me, I’m Cliff Eggers, and this is my wife, Tamsin Lynd.”
    â€œTamsin and I know each other,” I murmured politely, trying not to look at Tamsin’s face while she was in such distress.
    â€œOh, Lily!” Tamsin took a long, shuddering breath, and she appeared to be trying to pull herself together in the presence of a client. “I’m sorry,” she said, though damned if I could think for what. “This is just very upsetting.”
    â€œSure it is,” Jack agreed. “Don’t you think we ought to call the police, Ms. Lynd?”
    â€œOh, we’ll call them. We always do. But they can’t do anything,” her husband said, with sudden violence. He ran a big hand across his face. He had one of those neatly trimmed beards that frames the mouth. “They couldn’t do anything before. They