Lili Stein must be deaf to play the radio so loud, she thought. Maybe the old woman had a serious hearing loss.

She approached the radio, an old crystal set with knobby dials and yellowed channel band. She turned the volume lower. Used tissues littered the floor. "Madame Stein, I'm here with your packet!"

No response.

Her neck muscles tightened. Water trickled from somewhere out in the hallway. She didn't like this. Wasn't the old lady expecting her?

She paused beneath the living-room door frame. Across from her in the bathroom, a leaky faucet dripped onto a brown stain in the basin.

Her hand brushed the dark paneled wall searching for a switch. But her fingers only came back greasy.

Her anxiety mounted. She passed the dingy bathroom and edged down the narrow hallway. At the end, what looked to be a bedroom door stood partly open. She felt for her keys in her leather bag, positioning the pointed edges between her fingers as a weapon, her first lesson from the martial-arts dojo.

Carefully, she wedged the door open wider. In the dim light an old woman was sprawled on the bed, her stockings rolled down.

"Madame, Madame?"

She switched on the light. The woman's ashen face stared vacantly at the cobwebbed ceiling. Aimee walked towards the bed, then froze. Someone had carved a swastika into the woman's forehead. She gasped, gripping the bed frame as her legs buckled. Her heart pounded. She took a breath, then forced herself to touch the cheek. Smooth and cold like marble…

What if the killer was still there?

She reached for her Phillips screwdriver, part of the mini-tool set she carried in her bag, scanning the room for the attacker. But the only other inhabitant was a bloated angelfish, its silvery bubbles rising in the tank on the old rolltop desk. Wooden slats were nailed over the room's lone window, blocking all but a ribbon of light from the light well.