We crossed the patchy lawn, and Lula tested the bottom porch step, pausing when it groaned under her weight. She moved to the next step and picked her way around floorboards that were obviously rotted.

Sally tiptoed behind her. Clonk, clonk, clonk with his clogs. Not exactly the stealth transvestite.

They each took an end of the bench and flipped it over.

No note stuck to the bottom.

"Maybe it blew away," Lula said.

There wasn't a stray breath of air in all of Jersey, but we checked the surroundings anyway, the three of us fanning out, covering the yard.

No note.

"Hunh," Lula said. "We been given the runaround."

There was a crawl space under the porch, enclosed with wooden lattice. I dropped to hands and knees and squinted through the lattice. "The note said 'under the bench.' It could have meant under the porch, under the bench." I jogged to the car and retrieved a flashlight from the glove compartment. I returned to the porch, scrunched low and flashed the beam around the dirt floor. Sure enough, there was a glass jar directly under the part of the porch that supported the bench.

Two yellow eyes caught in the light, held for a second, and skittered away.

"Do you see it?" Lula wanted to know.

"Yep."

"Well?"

"There are eyes under there. Little beady yellow ones. And spiders. Lots of spiders."

Lula gave an involuntary shiver.

Sally made another adjustment on his thong.

"I'd go get it, but a big woman like me wouldn't fit," Lula said. "Sure is a shame it isn't just a little roomier."

"I think you'd fit."

"Nope, unh ah, I know I wouldn't fit."

I considered the spiders. "I might not fit, either."

"I'd fit," Sally said, "but I'm not doing it. I paid twenty bucks for this manicure, and I'm not fucking it up crawling under some rat-infested porch."

I hunkered down for another look. "Maybe we can stick a rake in there and pull the jar out."

"Nuh ah," Lula said. "A rake isn't gonna be big enough. You gotta go in from the end here, and it's too far away. Where you gonna get a rake anyway?"

"We can ask Mrs. Nowicki."

"Oh yeah," Lula said. "From the looks of this lawn she does lots of gardening." Lula stood on tiptoes and looked in a window on the side of the house. "Probably not even home. Seems like she'd be out by now what with us up on her porch and all." Lula moved to another window and pressed her nose to the glass. "Uh oh."

"What uh oh?" I hated uh oh.

"You'd better look at this."

Sally and I trotted over and pressed our noses to the glass.