I said, “Sit down. You’re fine. Take a deep breath. You’re doing great.”

She sank into a chair and I covered her hands with mine.

“Look,” I said, “we’ll have the locksmith come in, and once he’s done, you can spend the night at my place. If you stay here, you won’t sleep a wink.”

“I won’t sleep anyway. I feel like I’m hopped up on something . . .”

“Adrenaline.”

“Worse. Feels like my veins are full of Freon.” She put her hands between her knees and then leaned forward and put her arms around her waist, hugging herself.

“Are you feeling faint?”

She pressed two fingers to her lips and shook her head. “Might throw up. I shouldn’t guzzle wine on an empty stomach.”

“You have any cheese and crackers? You should eat.”

“Great idea.”

She got up and opened the refrigerator, rummaged in the meat drawer, and then seemed to lose track of what she was looking for. I moved over to the kitchen counter and opened one cabinet after another until I unearthed a box of Ritz crackers that I placed on the table.

I took her place at the refrigerator and found a block of cheddar while she took a cue from my action and pulled a slicer out of the utensil drawer. I took the slicer and began carving off chunks, which I mounted on crackers and passed to her in rapid succession. I couldn’t help but make one for myself while I was at it. I was still chewing, holding a hand in front of my mouth lest I spray her with crumbs, as I said, “At Rosie’s the other night, you mentioned the house giving you the creeps.”

“I know. I remember.”

She took over the cheese-and-cracker duties and fed herself two more, which seemed to calm her to some extent. “Something else. I had another friend complain about my not returning calls, and it bothered me. When you said you left that first message, I shrugged it off, thinking you dialed wrong or there’d been a power outage, something like that. But then I couldn’t figure out how your message and hers could just evaporate. So then I held down the Play button and brought up old messages. I had sixteen, which I played and deleted as fast as I could because most I’d heard but neglected to erase. Then yours popped up, and two from her were on there as well. I had to ask myself what the hell was going on, and the only answer I could think of was someone was in here and listened to them first. Once you play a message, the message light no longer blinks.”

“Which means you’d have no idea the message was ever there.”

“That’s what I concluded.”

“You think someone was in here before the incident today?”

“I do. On more than one occasion.” She dropped her gaze and shook her head. “Once it occurred to me, I realized I’ve had the same feeling for the past couple of weeks. Like something was off.”