Abe swallows. He thinks of Mrs. Keilbacher, his favorite among all his mother’s friends. Suddenly he realizes she’ll have to be told. He imagines the phone call from a stranger, this is the Fullerton police, is this Mrs. Martin Keilbacher? At the thought his jaw clamps until he can feel all his teeth. No one should ever have to get a call like that. Better to hear it from—well, anybody. Any other way has to be better. He takes a deep breath. “Listen, X, drive me up onto Red Hill. I got to tell her folks, I guess.” As he says this he begins to tremble.

“Oh, man—”

“Someone’s got to tell them, and I think this would be better. Don’t you?”

“I don’t know. —We’re still on duty, you know.”

“I know. But they’re almost on the route back to the station.”

Xavier sighs. “Tell me the way.”

As they turn up the tree-lined, steep street that the Keilbachers live on, Abe begins shaking in earnest. “This one on the left.”

Xavier stops the truck. Abe looks past the white fence and the tiny yard, to their window of the duplex. A light is on. He gets out, closes the truck door quietly. Walks around the hood. Come on, he thinks, open the door and come out, ask me what’s wrong, don’t make me come knock on your door like this!

He knocks on the door, hard. Rings the bell. Stands there.

No answer.

No one’s home.

“Shit.” He’s upset; he knows he should feel relieved, but he doesn’t, not at all. He walks around the duplex, looks in the kitchen window. Dark. Light left on in the living room while they’re out, SOP. Xavier is leaning his head out the window. Abe returns to the truck. “No one’s home!”

“It’s all right, Abe. You did what you could. Get back in here.”

Abe stands, irresolute. Can’t leave a note in the door about this! And the two of them are still on duty. But still, still … he can’t rid himself of the idea that he should tell them. He climbs back in the truck, and as he sits he has an idea. “Jim’s folks live up here too, and his mom is a good friend of theirs. Drive me by there and I’ll tell her and she can take over here, we can get back to the station. They go to church together and everything.”

Xavier nods patiently, starts up the truck. He follows Abe’s directions and drives them past house after house. Then they are at Jim’s parents’ duplex, well remembered by Abe from years past, looking just the same to him. Drapes are closed, but lights are on inside.

Abe jumps out and walks to the kitchen door, which is the one the family always uses. Rings the bell.