“Obviously someone was able to get enough of her information to impersonate her. Must have stolen some of her blank checks, got her PIN number for the ATM because there are some cash withdrawals, nothing abnormal but enough so you think she’s alive and well. He got the code to her alarm, who knows what all? Any signs of torture?” he asks, as the elevator doors finally slide open.

“She has some strange brownish areas that I’m not sure about.” I describe them. “No obvious injuries or marks I’d immediately associate with torture. But not everything leaves a mark.”

“Probably just scared the shit out of her and she told him whatever he wanted, believing he wouldn’t hurt her.”

“Did you talk to Howard Roth’s wife?” We ride up in what Marino calls “the slowest boat in China.”

“Yesterday. She came down here and ID’d a photograph, and I talked to her for a while and then called her back as I was driving here. Apparently, he’s a regular in Cambridge. In fact, I think I’ve seen him walking around, and a couple of guys I work with know about him. Doing the odd job, a pretty decent handyman, and honest, harmless, according to the ex. But she couldn’t stay with a drunk,” Machado says. “No car. Driver’s license is expired. A real sad case.”

I return the envelope to him, and he verifies that personal checks and checkbooks he found inside Peggy Stanton’s house are like this one, exactly like it, he says.

“That’s the other thing I find really interesting,” he adds. “She had all her bank statements in a file drawer, you know, with all her canceled checks? Years’ worth of them, but only through this past April.”

“Because someone began intercepting her mail.” We get out on the seventh floor, where Toby seems to be having difficulty pushing a cart loaded with boxes. “Are you considering that Howard Roth killed her?”

“It’s always smart to consider everything. But it wouldn’t make sense to think he had anything to do with it.”

“He had something to do with it even if he wasn’t aware of it,” I reply, as we follow the corridor toward the computer lab. “Are you the one holding the elevator door open forever?” I say to Toby, when we get to him.

“Sorry about that. I’m having trouble with a stuck wheel, then it turned over when I was pushing it out.”

“I thought you were off today.”

“Well, with Marino not here, I thought it was good to come in.” He’s not looking me in the eye and I notice the boxes are computer supplies.

Machado and I walk off, and I comment, “It says a lot that she continued using her husband’s name when he’s been dead thirteen years.”