Last name on the list was a 7-Eleven in north Trenton, a quarter mile from Eddie Kuntz and Mama Nowicki. The night manager had just come on when I called. She said a woman meeting Maxine's description had been in the night before. She remembered the woman because she was a regular. It had been late at night and store traffic had been slow. The woman had been chatty and had relieved the tedium.

I stuffed Maxine's photo into my shoulder bag and took off for the 7-Eleven to confirm the identification. I parked nose-in to the curb at the front of the store and stared beyond the plate glass windows to the register. There were four men in line. Three still in suits, looking rumpled from the heat and the workday. By the time I made my way through the door, there were two men left. I waited for them to complete their business before introducing myself to the woman behind the counter.

She extended her hand. "Helen Badijian. I'm the night manager. We spoke on the phone."

Her brown hair was plaited in a single braid that reached to her shoulder blades, and her face was devoid of makeup with the exception of eyes lined in smudgy black liner. "I didn't get it straight on the phone," Helen said. "Are you with the police?"

I usually try to avoid answering that question directly. "Bond enforcement," I said, leaving Helen to believe whatever. Not that I would lie about police affiliation. Imitating a police officer isn't smart. Still, if someone misunderstood because they weren't paying attention . . . that wasn't my problem.

Helen looked at Maxine's photo and nodded her head. "Yep, that's her. Only she's a lot more tan now."

So I knew two things. Maxine was alive, and she had time to sit in the sun.

"She bought a couple packs of cigarettes," Helen said. "Menthol. And a large Coke. Said she had a long drive ahead of her. I asked her if she was going to buy a lottery ticket because that's what she always did . . . bought a ticket every week. She said no. Said she didn't need to win the lottery anymore."

"Anything else?"

"That was it."

"You notice the car she was driving?"

"Sorry. I didn't notice."

I left my card and asked Helen to call if Maxine returned. I expected the card would go in the trash the moment I pulled out of the lot, but I left one anyway. For the most part, people would talk to me when confronted face-to-face but were unwilling to take a more aggressive step like initiating a phone call. Initiating a phone call felt like snitching, and snitching wasn't cool.