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Eve hunted up a parking spot, then jaywalked diagonally across the street toward the Dukes’s residence. The first thing she noticed were the wilted flowers by the door.

“They’re gone.”

Peabody followed the direction of Eve’s cold stare. “Maybe she forgot to water them.”

“No, she wouldn’t forget. Probably has a daily duty list. Damn it. Damn it.” She rang the buzzer anyway, waited, rang again.

“Curtains are still at the windows.” Peabody craned her neck to see inside. “Furniture’s still in there.”

“They left it. Got out fast. They were probably packed and gone within twenty-four hours of our first visit.”

She started working the street, knocking on doors until one opened for her. She offered her badge to a snowy-haired woman in a pink tracksuit.

“Is something wrong? Has there been an accident? My husband—”

“No, ma’am. Nothing’s wrong. I’m sorry to alarm you. I’m looking for some of your neighbors. The Dukes. They don’t answer their door.”

“The Dukes.” She patted her hair as if to stir her thoughts. “I’m not sure I . . . oh, of course. Of course. I saw the story on the media report. Oh dear, you’re the policewoman they’re going to sue.”

“I don’t believe any legal action has been taken as yet. Do you know where they are?”

“Goodness. I don’t really know them. Pretty young woman. I’d see her walking to the market every Monday and Thursday. Nine-thirty. You could set your wrist unit by her. But now that you mention it, I don’t know the last time . . . They lost their older son, didn’t they? They only moved in two years ago. I never knew a thing about it. They didn’t really talk to any of the neighbors. Some people never do. It’s a terrible, terrible thing to lose a child.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’d see him come and go now and then. Didn’t look like a very kind sort of man. On Sundays they’d all go out together. Ten o’clock sharp. To church, I imagine from the way they were dressed. Back by twelve-thirty. You never saw the boy playing outside, with other children. I never saw another child go into that house.”

She sighed, staring across the street now. “I suppose they kept him close, afraid something would happen to him, too. Hold on, there’s Nita coming out. My jogging partner.”

She waved wildly at the woman who came out of a building directly across the street. She, too, wore a tracksuit. In powder blue.

“Nita doesn’t miss a trick,” the other woman said out of the corner of her mouth. “You ask her about them.”

“Getting yourself arrested?” Nita said cheerfully when she joined them. “Better lock her up tight, Officer. Sal’s a slippery one.”

“We’ll talk about slippery later,” Sal told her. “They’re asking about the Dukes. Two doors down from you.”

“They went on a trip a couple days ago. Loaded up the car with suitcases. Wife wasn’t too happy about it, if you ask me. She’d been crying. That would’ve been . . . let me think. Wednesday. Wednesday morning, bright and early. I was out front watering my pots when I saw them loading up.”

“Did you notice anyone visiting them prior to that?”

“Saw you,” Nita said with a grin. “The morning before. Got the commandant pretty stirred up from what I saw on-screen later.”

“Nita.”

“Oh, stop fussing, Sal. I didn’t like the man and I’m not afraid to say so out loud.”

She waved a hand and settled herself in as if for a nice, friendly chat. “I had an old cocker spaniel, old Frankie. Died last year. A few months before I was out walking him like I did every day, twice a day. Stopped in front of the Dukes place for a minute to talk to a neighbor who was out walking, too. And well, old Frankie did his business there on the edge of their property while I wasn’t watching.”

She sighed, one long expulsion of air. “Old Frankie. Now I’d’ve cleaned it up. I cleaned up behind that dog for sixteen years. But the commandant comes to the door and gives me what-for, says he’s going to report me. Carries on so you’d think he’d never seen a little poop before. Well, I gave him what-for right back. I don’t take that kind of thing from anybody.”

She huffed out a breath, obviously