The blue garbage can was always on the right and the brown on the left, and the thief had reversed them. I’d unlocked my back door and entered without turning on a light, then opened the correct kitchen drawer, extracted two twisties, and lifted out and sealed the garbage bags already lining the cans. I’d relined the cans with the garbage bags that had been used to cover the body, then put the bagged garbage in them, sealing the second set of bags over the first set. I’d figured I couldn’t examine the cart in the middle of the night, and wheeling it inside would have created too much noise. It would have to wait until morning.

I’d done all I could do to erase my own involuntary complicity.

I should have been ready for bed, but I found myself biting my lower lip. My bedrock middle-class upbringing was raising its strong and stern head, as it did at unexpected and inconvenient times. The mortal remains of someone I knew were lying out there in dark solitude. That was wrong.

I couldn’t call the police department; possibly incoming calls were taped or traced in some way, even in little Shakespeare. Maybe I could just forget about it? Someone would find him in the morning. But it might be the little kids who lived on Latham… And then it came to me-whom I could call. I hesitated, my fingers twisting and untwisting. The back of my neck told me this was not a smart move. Get it over with, I told myself.

I pulled out my little flashlight and was able to read my tiny Shakespeare phone book by its dimming glow. I punched in the right numbers, listened to three rings; then a groggy male voice said, “Claude Friedrich here.”

“Listen,” I said, surprised at how harsh and ragged my voice came out. I waited a beat.

“Okay.” He was alert now.

“There’s a dead man in the park across the street from you,” I said, and hung up the phone. I crept across the hall to the room with the punching bag, my workout room. Through its window, I could see the light come on in Claude Friedrich’s apartment, which was on the second floor, by Deedra Dean’s.