Free Act of God by Jeremiah Healy

mean?”
    “Yes.”
    “No, I didn’t.”
    “But you did at night.”
    “Right.”
    “Why?”
    “It’s a small apartment, John, but you’re responsible for it, you like to make sure everything’s okay. Like nobody broke in through the window?”
    The sarcastic lift. “You know where Darbra stayed on her vacation?”
    “No, but I think there’s a way we can find out.”
    “How?”
    “There might be something in her mail about it.”
    “Her mail?”
    “Yeah. I picked it up all week and put it on her table.”
    “Which table?”
    “The one outside her kitchen, like mine there, only she doesn’t have a gateleg. Hers is a—”
    “You collected Darbra’s mail all week and left it on that table?”
    “That’s what I said, John.”
    “Was the mail still there Saturday morning?”
    “Huh?”
    “Was her mail still—”
    “Oh. Oh, I get it. To see if she got back Friday. Hey, that’s pretty good, you know?”
    “Was the mail still there?”
    Wickmire closed her eyes, really squeezed them shut. “I don’t remember.” She opened her eyes. “Sorry.”
    “That’s all right.”
    “But I know where the mail is now.”
    “Where?”
    “On the bed, with her clothes and stuff.”
    I folded my pad. “Maybe we’d better take a look.”
    “That’s what you came here for, right?”
    The sarcastic lift as she left her sectional piece and moved toward the kitchen.

6

    “Hey, you all right back there, John?”
    “Yes, fine.” My knee had buckled asI took the first step down the stairs behind Wickmire. |
    “Good. Last thing I need right now is medical bills.”
    At the second-floor landing, we stopped in front of the door marked 21. Wickmire made a production of putting the key in the two locks and turning it with gusto each time. Pushing the door a crack, she kept her foot, now wearing sneaker and sock, in the opening.
    “Keep back, Tigger. Stay inside, now.”
    Looking down, I could see an orange tabby’s head and forepaw struggling against Wickmire’s foot before giving up ‘ and disappearing.
    “Tigger always tries to get out, and it’s a pain to catch him on the stairs.”
    Wickmire let me go inside first, the cat starting down the short corridor, then returning to blink curiously at me. Closing the door behind us, Wickmire said, “Believe me, seeing a strange man come into this apartment is not the trauma for Tigger that it might be.”
    I walked down the oriental runner that covered most of the short corridor. At the end of it, the floor plan of Darbra Proft’s apartment seemed identical to Wickmire’s. I turned left first, into the living/dining area.
    There was another oriental rug, a big one with a marble coffee table in the center of it and a hunter’s-print couch and love seat grouped around it. The drapes over the windows picked up a minor color of the rug and the print. On the walls were etchings, artist’s proofs. The small table outside the kitchen was antique cherry with one ladderback chair, a mate to the chair next to a Governor Windsor desk in the corner, the drop leaf closed. A television, in a big wooden cabinet like you don’t see anymore, but no stereo or...
    “Darbra doesn’t have a VCR?”
    “Uh-unh. Can’t work it.”
    “Just the clock, or the whole thing?”
    “Whole thing. She’s hopeless with remote control stuff, and she’s barely computer literate. I don’t know how she gets along at work.”
    I tried to take in the living area as a whole. Lamps, end tables, miniature shelving with lots of figurines, like Hummels, jade elephants, and bronze tigers. Even the knick-knacks looked pricey.
    “Nice furnishings.”
    Wickmire looked around casually. “Darb got some big bucks when her mom died. My guess is this is all that’s left from it.”
    I indicated the cherry table. “That where you piled the mail?”
    “Yeah, but there wasn’t so much that you’d exactly call it a pile.”
    The sarcastic lift. I walked from the living area past the table into the