“Do you know the Pickerals?”

“I know some of them.”

“Do you know Lenny?”

“No, but the name rings a bell. He might be Ralph’s boy. There’s a mess of Pickerals.”

I stopped for a light, pulled the Pickeral file out of my bag, and showed Grandma my file photo of Lenny Pickeral, the toilet paper bandit.

“He looks familiar,” Grandma said, “but then all them Pickerals sort of look alike. What’s he done?”

“Petty theft.”

“That’s not so interesting, but I’ll keep my eye open for him anyway,” Grandma said.

I pulled into the driveway at my parents’ house and made sure Grandma got through the front door.

A WHILE BACK, Morelli’s Aunt Rose died and left him her house. It’s a two-story row house with basically the same floor plan as my parents’ house. Living room, dining room, kitchen on the ground floor. Plus, Morelli added a half bath. Three small bedrooms and bath on the second floor. Morelli has slowly been working at making the house his own, but some of Rose remains, and I think that’s nice. Morelli lives there with his big, shaggy, orange dog, Bob, and truth is, Morelli has become surprisingly domesticated . . . although the domestication doesn’t seem to extend to the bedroom.

It’s a short drive from my parents’ house to my apartment if you go straight to Hamilton and turn right. I chose to weave around a couple blocks, cross Chambers, and drive past Morelli’s house. I prefer not to think too hard about why I was doing this. I suppose I miss Morelli. Or maybe I wanted to make sure he wasn’t having a party without me. No matter the reason, I found myself slowly driving by, looking at the house, feeling some desire to go inside. The green SUV was parked at the curb. Morelli was home. I continued to creep down the street, and the decision to stop or not was settled by momentum. Morelli’s house was behind me. Probably not a good time to visit anyway, since I’d have to explain why Ranger gave me a new Mercedes SUV as an indefinite loaner.

The parking lot to my apartment building was almost full when I pulled in. It was approaching dinnertime and the seniors and hardworking couples living here were watching sitcom reruns and cooking pasta. I parked in a far corner, where hopefully no one would ding my car, and I jogged into the building, up the stairs, and down the hall. Rex was on his wheel when I swept into the kitchen. He stopped running and looked at me with his whiskers whirring and his black eyes shiny bright. I gave him a piece of cheese, and he rushed into his soup can to eat it. So much for pet interaction.

I made myself a peanut butter and olive sandwich and washed it down with my last beer. I wasn’t sure if olives were fruit or vegetable, but they were green, and they were as close as I was going to get to a salad. I wanted to look normal, so I didn’t change into the all-black commando deal. I was wearing jeans and a red T-shirt and sneakers, and I thought that was okay. I had time to kill, so I spruced up my eyeliner and added more mascara. I arranged the lipsticks in my junk makeup drawer, and I brushed my teeth. I sprawled on my bed to think, and woke up with a start at twenty minutes to seven.