“Hang on!” I shouted. This was probably Trixie, but I was still in the habit of locking the door behind me every time I came in, so I couldn’t invite her to walk in on her own. I tried to set the fin in place, but I was going to need to hold it for several seconds, so I abandoned the project and ran to the door.

I was surprised to see that my visitor was not Trixie, but a rugged-looking man in his late twenties, early thirties, wearing a jean jacket and pants flecked with paint and drywall compound and other building materials. In one hand he held an oversized toolbox, and the other was shoved into the front pocket of his pants, only the thumb sticking out. His face was long, lean, and unshaven, at least for a day or so, and his short brown hair was slightly spiked with gel. He was chewing on a toothpick.

“Yes?” I said.

“This is 1481 Greenway?” he said.

“Yes,” I said hesitantly.

“I’m here about the shower. Mr. Greenway sent me over. I’m Rick.”

Thank you, Detective Flint, for not ratting me out!

“Oh!” I said. “Yes! Come in!”

His boots, I noticed, were dappled with dried mud. He made no effort to remove them as he stepped inside and advanced across the broadloom.

“Up there?” he said, standing at the foot of the stairs, looking up, his back to me.

“Yes,” I said. I followed him up and into the bathroom. It was a bit warm up there, and he slipped off his jean jacket and tossed it casually on the vanity, knocking down a little display of small round soaps carved to look like roses, which Sarah likes to put out for guests but which no one has ever dared use to wash their hands. I put them back in their dish and slid them into the corner, next to a single brass antique candlestick holding a single white candle. Rick set down his toolbox and opened it, revealing an assortment of tools and rolls of tape and tubes of caulking. He opened the glass door to the shower, looked down, sat on the bottom of the shower door opening, and ran his hand along the seams where the floor met the wall.

“You see where the grouting is cracked and coming apart?” I said, trying to be helpful. Rick said nothing.

“The water got in there,” I said, “and must have been dripping down to one place in the kitchen, and that’s where the drywall fell away.”