What he found didn't fit the usual profile of a junkie. The standard binge items heavy in sugar or fat were missing, the lopsidedness of a larder composed solely of canned soup and frozen dinners was also absent. Instead, he was left with an economical and healthily varied assortment, neatly sorted and arranged. He closed the last cabinet softly, leaned up against the doorjamb, and gazed out into the living room again for a moment's careful reflection. A process born of instinct but without particular purpose now shifted gears with this finding. He began thinking like an investigator.

He crossed over to the bedroom, knowing the living room would hold the least, although perhaps the most subtle, information.

He started with the bed. It was disturbed, but only slightly, as if the person sleeping in it had just gotten up. Otherwise, its bottom corners and far side were tucked in, indicating the habitual tidiness he remembered of Mary in her prime, and he could tell from the single pillow and the way the night table and reading light were arranged that she was used to sleeping alone. Pushing his nose against the sheets to close off the odor from the room next door, Willy found they were also clean, and smelled faintly of detergent.

He checked beneath the bed. The floor was free of dust, and all he saw was a small, empty suitcase and a pair of well-worn slippers, neatly arranged.

Next came the closet. Again, he was struck by the same sense of order that had ruled the kitchen. There were no clothes on the floor, the few shoes were lined up, the odds and ends found in every closet were either stacked on the overhead shelf or hidden away in several small cardboard boxes. He checked their contents and found only belts, gloves, rolled-up pantyhose, hair clips, and an assortment of other mundane items. He went through the two purses he also unearthed and the pockets of every coat, jacket, and pair of pants. All he located were a few neighborhood grocery receipts, an old movie stub, and several more expired Metro cards, which he placed in a small stack along with the other Metro stubs he now extracted from the window jamb.