I’d been gone about twenty minutes, enough time for someone to leave the house, enough time for someone to go in and out again; it was an uncertainty that would bother Frank, bedevil him (and me) to the point where, if Frank was adamant enough, or persuasive enough, we’d have to try to determine what had happened in the gap.

“You can’t proceed if you don’t know,” Frank would argue.

He was right, but I was confident nothing had happened. I ate the food and wondered if I would regret it, regret taking my eyes off of the place for even twenty minutes. I had a hunch I had to play. If I was right, twenty minutes wouldn’t matter. Twenty hours wouldn’t matter. There was a bed waiting with no one in it (a couple of them, in fact), and a pool I’d paid for, stinking the place up with chlorine. But I didn’t need it. I stayed put and watched.

I had a hunch, but I had Frank’s logic in my head too. I had to keep an eye out. I had to be sure. I finished off the food too early. I put the empty cartons back in the bag and put it in the back seat. I didn’t even crack the fortune cookies.

I watched the house until the sun came up; I watched it until everyone left, first the father, then the mother and son. I watched after they left, sitting there in our car, watching it the way we had a few days ago. But it was only me, and I wasn’t exactly sure what I was going to find when I went inside. I knew what I wanted to find. If my hunch was wrong, I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.

So I waited. I waited, longer than I needed. Finally, I returned to the window by the back stoop and went inside. I was up the stairs and into the office in less than thirty seconds. I knew when I entered the room; I knew I was right. The goat trophy was sitting on the shelf, just where I’d found it before. Frank hadn’t run off with the thing; he’d brought it back. I heard the voice echoing from the pool, “give it back.” Frank gave it back. And I was going to take it again, finish the job. I would give it to Froehmer. The job would be done. At least that would be settled. It didn’t explain where Frank went, or why.