Chapter 37
Sam Pickett did what most detectives he knew did when they worked a case. He leaned against a streetlamp, rolled a cigarette, and observed the scene across the way through the blue haze of cigarette smoke. It was getting late in the day—the lamplighter would be coming by soon to turn on the gas lights—but oddly enough, the street was quiet.
Neighborhoods like this…a stranger came into them, and the people who lived there would have no qualms about questioning his presence. That was how it had been after he’d stood leaning against the lamp for a few days. A plump, rosy-cheeked little woman who reminded him of a robin redbreast stormed across the road and demanded to know what he was doing there, thumping a forefinger against his chest.
Sam couldn’t help smiling. He hadn’t been
