She glanced up every few moments, to make sure no one was coming back for a forgotten jacket, or to use the Bloodstone Circle at the office so they didn’t have to wait until home to use one. But the office was silent. She felt the silence more than heard it. In her tension it had become tactile.

There was no record of people who called in to the office, only outgoing calls, so that was no good. She then searched the payroll folders for all staff lists. Any sign of someone named . . .

Diane could not remember who she was looking for.

Evan. She was looking for Evan. Diane grabbed blank paper from Tina’s printer and wrote “EVAN” in pencil, all caps, and slid it into a new manila folder.

A search of Tina’s computer came back with no Evans. It found some usage of “griEVANces” in a folder titled “HR” and several usages of “relEVANt” in Tina’s e-mail program. No “Evan.”

Diane walked around the empty office again, to reassure herself that it was empty. She imagined being watched.

At Dawn’s computer (password “A11isL0ss”), Diane opened the web browser and typed in the address of every phone provider she could think of. Two letters into her third guess, the browser autofilled the address of a log-in screen. When she hit enter, the browser had already filled in a user name and password.

Diane logged into Dawn’s phone account as Dawn.

She looked up recent call history and found the four dates Dawn was gone but no record of her calling the office.

Of course, this did not mean Dawn did not have another phone at home. Diane tried looking up more phone and cable providers. There were no other autofills.

Outside Catharine’s office, Diane gripped the doorknob, but it did not turn. She stared at the brushed-nickel knob.

She was not at all the type of person to break into her boss’s office. Or rather, as it turned out, she was that type of person, but she had never considered herself that type of person. The type to do anything that anyone might consider wrong or that anyone might report to a local government agency or amateur surveillance club. She was responsible and quiet, she thought, as she quietly started on the responsibility of getting through the door.

She first imagined the old trick from television where a detective pops a lock with a credit card. Then she imagined having the power to walk through walls and, by extension, doors.

Then she imagined being a professional locksmith, with a small backpack full of short wires that she would shove carefully into a standard lock, grease smudges on her knuckles and face, a cold, concentrated look in her eye and a plastic-handled screwdriver hanging by its flat-headed tip from her teeth.

Then Diane imagined that a custodian probably keeps keys.