"Todos vuelven," Ruben Blades sang seductively from the stereo system. Kitty had translated the song for her once. Everyone returns. But first you had to go somewhere.

The contest over, most of the couples were now drinking sangria and snatching up books. Kitty held court in one of those slit-skirt Mandarin dresses requiring a perfect body. She didn't let the dress down. Officer Friendly was at her side, wearing a poncho and looking vaguely lost without his gun and bicycle but absolutely devoted.

"These theme nights seem to be working out," Kitty said to Tess. "What should I do next? A ‘George' night, with Eliot and Sand? Rita Mae Brown? Or suppressed Catholic girls night, with McCarthy's memoirs? We could put little girl mannequins in the windows, in Catholic girl uniforms and those shiny shoes."

"Do people still read McCarthy?"

"Good point," Kitty turned to her Zapata-ed beau. "Thaddeus, do you know who McCarthy is?"

Officer Friendly looked panicky, and Tess found herself rooting for him. This obviously had not been on the civil service exam.

"Normally I would say the witch hunt guy from the fifties," he said. "But I guess you're talking about some woman writer I never heard of."

Good answer. Thaddeus was a tad brighter than he seemed, smart enough not to bullshit, a rare quality in a man. Kitty almost cooed with pleasure at her protégé.

"There's nothing wrong in saying you don't know something, Tad. We'll read some McCarthy together later tonight."

She gave him a large, wet kiss on his left ear. Tess looked at them and all the happy couples around her-boy-girl, boy-boy, and girl-girl alike-and had an overwhelming need to be alone. No one was stopping her. She went to Kitty's kitchen, hijacked a bottle of Riesling, and climbed the stairs to her apartment.

The piles she had made of Abramowitz's life just two nights earlier still sat on the floor. She had a sudden desire to kick them into the air, or shred them into confetti and toss them from the roof. Instead she sat down and reviewed what she had written so far. Lists and lists of names. Rock's chronology of the night of Abramowitz's murder, side by side with Joey Dumbarton's account, and Mr. Miles's. Something was missing. Someone was missing.

Ava. Rock had never mentioned if Ava was at his apartment when he returned. Where had she been when the police arrived and arrested him? If she had still been sleeping there, they would have taken her in, too, for questioning. But the police didn't find Ava until later, which is why Jonathan had known so little about her when he came by two nights after the murder.

"I guess I do have a job to do," Tess said aloud. Really two jobs-her official chores for Tyner and these unofficial chores she kept assigning herself. If she had not earned Rock's money before, as Tyner had suggested, perhaps she could now.

Ava may have sinned, but she had not been forced out of Eden. Late Saturday afternoon, Tess stood across President Street from the luxurious apartment building, trying to think of how she could slip past the uniformed doorman who guarded the entrance to Eden 's Landing. At least she assumed it was a uniform and not his clothing of choice: Bermuda shorts, hiking shoes, a pith helmet. She walked around the corner to the underground garage entrance on Pratt Street. No sentry here. She slipped inside and checked to see if Ava's silver Miata was there. It was, a guarantee Ava was home. Except for work, Tess hadn't seen Ava walk anywhere. And Ava didn't strike her as the kind of person who went to work on weekends unless she was trying to impress the boss. If the boss was dead, what was the point?

The parking garage had an elevator leading to the apartments, but one needed a key to summon it. Tess patted her pockets frantically, as if looking for a key ring, until she saw an older woman, loaded down with shopping bags and a bakery box, heading to the elevators. Tess ran toward her, pretending a fit of gracious concern.

"Let me help you," she practically sang to the woman, taking the box by its red and white string. The woman looked a little nervous, as if Tess might be a mugger who prowled Baltimore parking garages for baked goods, but she didn't protest. When they reached the elevator Tess again made a show of trying to find her keys, but her hands were full of cake.

"Let me," the woman said quickly. She keyed the elevator, got on, and pushed four. Tess pressed the top button, but insisted on walking the woman to her door. In their three minutes of acquaintance, she told the woman she was new in the building, living in a studio apartment, and studying at the Peabody Conservatory.

"What instrument do you play?" the woman asked politely in the bored tone of someone who couldn't care less.

"I'm a vocalist," Tess said. "Soprano, but I have an enormous range. I'll be appearing with the Baltimore Opera this fall."

Unfortunately this piqued the woman's interest. "Really? What role? My husband and I are subscribers."

Tess thought for a moment. She had never been to the opera and, although she knew a few titles, she couldn't describe any plots or name any characters. But there was one opera the local company seemed to produce year after year. She tried to recall the ads she had heard on the radio.

" La Bohème?"

The woman did not notice she had answered in the form of a question. "Are you singing Mimi? Musetta? Or are you in the chorus?"

They had reached the woman's door. As long as she was committed to lying, Tess decided, she might as well lie big. "Mimi. I'm playing Mimi. If I don't go to New York first. The Met has a standing offer for me to sing Mimi there."

The woman, now thrilled, put her packages on a small table inside the door, but she made no move to take the cake box from Tess. Instead she handed her a pen.

"I know it's silly, but could I have your autograph?"

Tess signed the box with a flourish. Teresita L. Mentiroso. If she remembered her high school Spanish correctly, that translated to little Theresa, the liar.

Her opera career behind her, she ran up the stairs to Ava's apartment on the sixth floor. Feeling smug and devious, she rang the doorbell. But when Ava opened the door, her face quickly deflated Tess. She registered no surprise, no interest. For a moment it wasn't clear if she even recognized Tess. What did Rock see in this incurious, self-absorbed woman?

"Well, come in then," Ava said at last, gesturing with a half-empty glass of white wine.

She led Tess through the apartment toward the terrace without even a perfunctory show of hospitality. Unlike Joey Dumbarton or Frank Miles, Ava did not mistake this visit for a social call.

Her apartment faced the harbor and downtown, which added at least $30,000 to the price, Tess estimated. Whatever the extra cost had been, it appeared to be a stretch Ava could ill afford, even on a lawyer's salary. The one-bedroom apartment had a sparse, undernourished look, and it wasn't because Ava liked minimalism. The apartment simply didn't have enough furniture. And what was there looked shabby and worn. Ava was living paycheck to paycheck.

Once on the terrace, there was only one place to sit, a cheap director's chair with a torn orange seat. Ava took the chair and let Tess have the concrete floor. There was a crystal wine cooler by the chair, a nice one, possibly from Tiffany. But when Ava pulled the bottle out to top off her glass, Tess recognized the label, a Romanian Chardonnay available for less than six dollars, even at package stores, which gouged you. Tess had tried it. Once.

"What do you want now?" Ava said. She sat with her back to the harbor, indifferent to the view. Or perhaps she considered the sunset, a brilliant red orange heightened by the smog, something of a rival. Its warm hues did little for her pale, cool beauty.