The Hero always gave me a dope slap upside the head whenever he caught me looking in the mirror. “Men built those things so women would have something to do,” he’d say. Hero. Philosopher. My father, the Renaissance man.

When I was sixteen, I had deep blue eyes and a nice smile, and little else to take confidence in, hanging around the Hero. And if I was still sixteen, staring into the mirror, working up some nerve, telling myself tonight I’d finally do something about the Hero, I’d definitely be at a loss.

But now, damnit, I had a genuine case to solve, a Jenna Angeline to locate, an impatient partner on the other side of the door, a gun in my holster, detective’s license in my wallet, and...a face that looked like it belonged to a Flannery O’Connor character. Ah, vanity.

***

When I opened the door, Angie was rifling through her purse, probably looking for a misplaced microwave or an old car. She looked up. “You ready?”

“I’m ready.”

She pulled a stun gun from the purse. “What’s this guy look like again?”

I said, “Last night he was wearing a blue cap and wraparounds. But I don’t know if it’s like his regular uniform or anything.” I opened the door. “Ange, you won’t need the stun gun. If you spot him, lay back. We just want to verify that he’s still around.”

Angie looked at the stun gun. “It’s not for him, it’s for me. Case I need something to keep me awake in cow country.”

Wickham is sixty miles from Boston, so Angie thinks they don’t have telephones yet.

I said, “You can take the girl out of the city... “

“But you’ll have to shoot her first,” she said and headed down the stairs.

She stayed in the church, giving me a minute head start and watching the street through the lower opening of a stained-glass window.

I crossed the street to what I call my “company car.” It’s a dark green 1979 Volaré. The Vobeast. It looks like shit, sounds like shit, drives like shit, and generally fits in well in most of the places where I have to work. I opened the door, half expecting to hear a rush of feet on the street behind me, followed by the snap of a weapon hitting the back of my skull. That’s the thing about being a victim; you start to think it’ll happen to you on a regular basis. Suddenly everything looks suspect and any brightness you may have noticed the day before has dissipated into the shadows. And the shadows are everywhere. It’s living with the reality of your own vulnerability, and it sucks.

But nothing happened this time. I didn’t see Blue Cap in my rearview as I pulled a U-turn and headed for the expressway. But then, unless he’d really enjoyed last night’s encounter, I didn’t think I would see him again; I’d just have to assume he was there. I pushed the Vobeast down the avenue, then turned onto the northern on-ramp for I-93 and drove downtown.