“I’d be careful with that,” said McHenry. “It isn’t developed.”

Sanders quickly returned it to its container, and then to its envelope, wrote out a receipt and handed it to the lawyer. “Thank you very much. This looks interesting. You wouldn’t have any idea where the twenty thousand came from, would you? That’s even more interesting.” McHenry shook his head rather sadly.

“Ah well. Back to headquarters, Dubinsky, and get the lab on to this.”

Not far from the legal office of Van Loon and McHenry, Eleanor was back at her desk at Webb and MacLeod, staring glassily at a pile of papers. Real estate seemed to be suffering from a mid-week slump, and she was having difficulty staying awake. It was warm and sunny out her window, and just as she was sleepily deciding to abandon all efforts at earning a living in favour of a walk, the harsh buzz of her phone sent her crashing back into the real world. It was a business call. A Mr. Jones, who had heard about her, and what a wonderful agent she was, from a friend of his, wanted to look at a house for sale in his neighbourhood.

“Certainly,” said Eleanor. Then, curious, “Who recommended me to you?”

“Al,” said the voice of Mr. Jones laconically.

“Oh,” said Eleanor, trying to remember an Al among her recent clients. Not that it mattered. “When would you like to look at this house? I could probably arrange something quite soon, if you wish.” Strike while the iron is hot, she thought. “And which of our houses is it?”

He gave her an address on the Kingsway, far in the west end of the city. Good fellowship and ethics struggled for a brief moment in her breast against the thought of commissions—prices were generally very high on the Kingsway—and she muttered weakly, “Our west-end office usually handles houses on that side of the Humber. They know the area better. But if you wish to deal with me, I’d be glad to show it to you.” That dealt with her conscience.

“Good,” said Mr. Jones. “Maybe I’ll look at houses downtown later. So you meet us there in an hour, me and my wife, right?”

“I could pick you up if you like. Then you and your wife wouldn’t have to worry about driving there.” Eleanor preferred to keep her clients under her nose between houses.

“No. It’s better if we meet there. In an hour. Okay?”

Well, well, thought Eleanor. You never know when business is just going to fall into your lap, like manna from heaven. She put down the receiver and went for her book to look up the house she was supposed to be showing.

The west-end office had been a trifle sulky about the property. She had apologized for poaching; her client had seen the house and insisted on her showing it to him. “You know how they are,” she’d said guiltily.

“Yeah,” said the girl on the desk. “I know. Anyway, the house is empty now. They moved out last weekend, and it doesn’t show very well now. But they might be a bit soft on the price.” Eleanor’s heart sank. That meant everywhere there had been furniture, there would be great stains or dirt marks. It might even be one of those houses where the paint job didn’t extend to behind the big pieces, and a green room would have big pink patches where there had been chests and sideboards. She hoped they weren’t a fussy couple, after she had driven out all this way to show them the damn place. She was beginning to wish she had insisted that they deal with the west-end office. O greed.

The house was very large and rambling, with half-timbers, diamond-paned windows—the Tudor look. The grounds, she noted happily, seemed to be in good shape—neat grass, nice shrubs, a pretty tree. Good. A large tan Lincoln was parked out in front, and so she pulled into the empty driveway. Mr. Jones’ voice might be a bit rough, but his credit was apparently sound. Two men, expensively dressed in dark suits, got out of the car and walked over to her. “Mr. Jones?” she asked, holding out her hand. One of them responded with his. “Mrs. Jones didn’t come with you after all?” Damn. That meant they had changed their mind.

“She don’t really like looking at a lot of houses,” he said. “So her brother came instead. He knows what she likes.”

“Fine,” she said. Clients came in all shades of peculiarity. And even the strangest often bought houses. She pulled out the key with its big red tag on it—with the white slash across it to show that it came from the west end—and opened the door. Her heart sank even further. Huge curls of dust mingled with indescribable winter grime in the foyer and front hall.

“Nice house,” grunted Mr. Jones. “Nice and roomy.” Eleanor wondered if he had trouble with his eyes. If so, he might like this place. She conjured up the floor plan in her mind and headed confidently for the living room, trying to ignore the newspapers, torn and dirty, scattered on the floor, as she pointed out the working fireplace and the charming bay windows. Mr. Jones didn’t seem to be paying much attention to her. He opened a door at the back of the living room and said, “What’s this here?”

“That’s a study, Mr. Jones, although it could be used as a breakfast room or even a spare bedroom, since it’s close to the ground-floor washroom.” Eleanor had done her homework in that hour. She walked in past the two men toward the rear windows. “And you can see from here what a nice garden there is. Isn’t it a lovely—” Her sentence was cut off abruptly as Mr. Jones’ brother-in-law flipped her arm tightly up behind her back and clapped his other hand over her mouth.

Mr. Jones walked around in front of her and smiled. “Don’t worry, Miss Scott. Nobody’s gonna hurt you. Not now, anyways.” He looked at her appraisingly. “Nice hair.” She glared back. “I bet your boyfriend likes your hair, don’t he? No, don’t answer, I can tell he does.” He slowly pulled a smallish knife out of his pocket, held up a huge chunk of hair from the side of Eleanor’s head, and then, in one smooth gesture, hacked it off. Tears of pain started up in her eyes. “And because we’re nice guys, we’re gonna send your boyfriend some hair—like a memento, you know.” He smiled and shoved his face close to hers. “I got a piece of advice for you. You shouldn’t ought to go out with cops. Not with cops that tread on people’s toes. You tell your boyfriend. ’Bye now. Vito here will make you nice and comfortable for the time being.” He started to walk out of the room. “Stick her in the corner over there, Vito.”

Sanders looked up as Dubinsky came in from lunch. In front of him was a file folder stuffed with sheets of paper. “This just came up,” he said. “It’s the first crop of sightings from the sketch. It would have helped if bloody MacVey hadn’t been off for the weekend, though. By now this guy and his van are probably in Vancouver.” He picked up half the pile and dropped it on Dubinsky’s desk. “Might as well go through them and see if there’s anything worthwhile. Then grab Collins and get him to start sifting.”

“Anything come in this morning on the license number?”

“Are you kidding? There are hundreds of light brown vans out there, most of them have a number in them that looks like a nine, and none of them so far is owned by someone who says he likes to go out to attack women in one.” He picked up another set of reports. “When you finish those, you can look at these. Every van not more than five years old owned by a male, or a family in which there is a male between the ages of sixteen and forty-five. Have fun.” He yawned. “Did you drop the film off at the lab?”

“Yeah,” said Dubinsky. “They said it was exposed all right, and they’d develop it and get some prints over in an hour or two if it was that urgent.”

“I didn’t need them to tell me it was exposed. She’d hardly be keeping extra rolls of film in her lawyer’s safe, would she? But why didn’t she take it off and get it developed like anyone else?” He looked up again. “Yeah. They might have been that kind of picture. Funny thing for a girl to have around.”