Because people bought anything on eBay. You could sell a stool sample on eBay.

So far, he’d attended four auctions, driving as far as Goleta-which turned out to be a total bust. But striking gold-silver, actually-right close to home.

Pasadena facility, seven-by-seven room piled high with neatly sealed boxes. Most of it turned out to be old moldy clothes that he ended up tossing in a Goodwill box, but there were also some jeans full of holes and a wad of rock-concert T-shirts from the eighties that eBayed pretty good.

Plus the bag. Little blue velvet Crown Royal drawstring full of coins, including buffalo-head nickels and a few silver dollars. Bob took all that to a coin dealer in Santa Monica, walked away with two hundred twenty bucks, which was a fantastic profit, considering his bid on the entire contents had been sixty-five.

He thought of paying his mom back, but decided to wait until everything was squared up.

A yawn overtook him and his eye blurred. Pete the auctioneer coughed, then said, “Okay, next unit: fourteen fifty-five,” and everyone dragged themselves up the murky tunnel-like hallway to one of the padlocked doors that lined the cement-block walls.

Flimsy doors, flimsy locks, Bob could’ve kicked any of them in. The storage facility got two hundred a month per, talk about a good scam.

“Fourteen fifty-five,” Pete repeated unnecessarily. Rubbing a rummy nose, he fiddled with a ring of keys.

The other bidders worked hard at looking disinterested. Two were chunky old women with braided hair, looked like sisters, maybe even twins. They’d gotten a sealed steamer trunk for forty-eight bucks. Behind them was a tall, skinny heavy-metal type wearing an AC/ DC tee, fake leather pants, and motorcycle boots, veiny arms more tattoo-blue than white skin. He’d just won the last two lots: a room full of dirty-looking, mostly creased paperback books for a hundred and fifty and what looked to be rusty junk for thirty.