Raoul opened the door, of course. There was really nothing else to be done.

"Hello, Raoul."

"Hullo."

She walked in, hands clasped behind her back and a faraway look clouding her face. "Look, I'm sorry to come over so suddenly, but there's just something I've been turning over in my head, and it's bothering me. I figured I might get your take on it."

"What's on your mind?"

"The broken ankle. Dietrichson broke her ankle."

"Right...so what?"

She turned to face him. "So why didn't she put in an accident claim? Why? Think about it."

"What are you driving at?" He tried to keep the wariness out of his voice.

"I don't know! It's strange, is all. And I just— I just have a feeling, a bad one, about this case. There's something off about it."

"Because she didn't put in a claim? Maybe she just didn't get around to it."

"Or maybe she didn't know she was insured."

"How could the woman not know that she was insured?"

She waved a hand. "No, you're right, that can't be it. Because you delivered the policy to her personally, right? And you saw her sign it?"

"That's right."

Christine shrugged. "Fine, then. I'm just playing with ideas anyway; I know there's a hole in here somewhere, but I still need to find it."

"Maybe it was suicide. Maybe Mr. Richard was right." Raoul suggested.

"No, not suicide. But not an accident either."

"What was it then?" Raoul asked very quietly.

Christine didn't answer, just huffed a sigh, and Raoul forced himself to stay quiet and wait. The clock ticked in the background.

Finally, she continued. "Look. She takes out an accident policy worth a hundred thousand dollars— but only if she's killed on a train. Then a month later, what happens? She gets killed on a train. You don't think that's some kind of luck?"

"Bad luck for Pacific All-Risk, anyway."

She laughed. "Alright, so maybe it's nothing. But if it's something…" she trailed off, pacing the room.

"Something like what?"

She continued to pace, silently.

"Something like…?"

He waited; she didn't answer.

"Something like murder?"

She sighed again. "I don't like to assume that. But in this situation, it doesn't seem unlikely, does it?"

"I don't know. Who do you suspect?"

"Maybe I like to make things easy for myself, but I always tend to suspect the beneficiary."

"You mean the husband?"

"Right. The husband. That wide-eyed, puffed up widower who didn't know anything about anything."

Raoul laughed, convincingly enough even if it was shaky. "You're kidding, Christine. He wasn't even on the train."

"I know he wasn't, Raoul. I'm not saying I know how he did it, but I'm sure that he did. Nothing else is likely." She crossed to the door. "This helped, thanks. But I've got to get home, now."

Thank God. "You can't stay awhile?"

"No, it's getting a little late for me. Bye, sweet boy."

"See you, Christine." Raoul answered absently.

She went to the door and pulled it open. "Goodnight."

Raoul followed her, and scanned the hallway for Erik. If these two run into each other on the way down— damn it.

Through the crack of the partially open door, he could see Erik's wide eyes. The man had clearly been standing in the hall to listen, and then flattened himself behind the door when it opened.

Quickly, Raoul pushed it wide to hide him. "Goodnight, Christine. I'll see you at the office."

She nodded, and started down the hallway. Don't look back, don't look back, don't look—

Christine had reached the elevator when she turned. "You know, I'd drop in on that man tonight, and get the real story out of him in less than an hour, if it weren't for Richard's striped-pants idea of company policy."

"Would you?" Raoul managed.

"For sure. I'd have the cops on him so fast his head would spin."

Raoul forced a laugh. "You would, except you've got nothing to go on."

"Sure, I've got nothing to go on. Just a decade of experience in this business, and a gut feeling so strong I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonight. Call it women's intuition maybe, I don't care, but that man is guilty of murder. It'll come out eventually."

With that, she got into the elevator. The two men waited, in shaken silence, as it chunk-ed its way down. Then, Erik slid out from behind the door. Without a word, Raoul chivvied him into the apartment.

They looked at each other for a long moment, heart rates slowing. Then Erik asked, "How much does she know?"

Raoul shook his head. "Not much. But it isn't what she knows; it's those hunches of hers. I've known her for years; she never gives up on her instincts, and they're never wrong."

"But she can't prove anything, can she?" Erik clutched at Raoul's arm.

"Not if we're careful. Not..." Raoul swallowed. "Not if we don't see each other for a while."

Erik's eyes narrowed, and he turned away. "For how long a while do you think that would be?"

"Till all off this dies down for good. Look, I hate the idea too, but wouldn't we both hate going to jail for murder more?" Raoul tried to reason with him.

"Actually, I think it's more likely we'll get the electric chair— alright, not funny, fine. But didn't we do all this so we could be together? Isn't that what you said?"

"And we will be. We just have to be careful first. Look, you don't know Christine like I do—"

"And how well do you know this Christine?" He broke in, words throwing off figurative sparks. "You make it sound like you two have spoken pretty intimately."

"What?" Then Raoul got it. "Erik, it's not like that. She and I work together, and we're friends. That's all. How could it be anything more than that, when I have you?"

"But you won't have me, not for a long time if you get your way."

"This isn't me getting my way! I'm not— alright, this is ridiculous. The point is, she won't let this go. I've seen it before. She'll have you investigated, have you shadowed, have you followed everywhere you go." He stopped at the look in Erik's eyes. "Are you afraid?"

"Yes, Raoul." His lover answered quietly. "But not of her. I'm afraid of us, Raoul. We're not the same anymore. We did this so that we could be together, but it's pulling us apart instead. Isn't it, sweetheart?"

"What are you talking about?"

"You don't really care whether we see each other or not, do you?" Outside, they could hear a car whoosh past, and the glaring headlights through the open window played over Erik's mask. His eyes glittered like a snake's.

"Stop talking, darling." Raoul said at last, and kissed him hard enough to leave marks.

The sound of telephone ringers ratcheting around him, Raoul hurried into work the next morning. He was running late. As he headed for his office, he was stopped by the secretary whose name he could never remember. "Mr. Chagny, there's a young girl who came in to see you. She says her name is Marguerite?"

Raoul frowned. "I don't think I know a Marguerite. Or any young girls, for that matter."

The secretary shrugged. "Well, she seemed pretty insistent on seeing you either way. I put her in your office."

"Alright, well, thank you." Puzzled, Raoul headed upstairs.

When he reached his office and opened the door, it took a moment to recognize the young woman leaning against his desk. She was small and drawn in on herself, worrying a handkerchief between her dark fingers and wearing a black mourning suit that looked a little too big for her. Then it clicked. Marguerite. Meg. Meg Dietrichson.

"Hello, Mr. Chagny." She offered him a weak smile.

"Hello, Miss Dietrichson."

"You should call me Meg. Look, I'm sorry to come in like this, but I knew I had to talk to you. Can we talk, please?"

"Alright, Meg." He answered warily. "Is this something to do with— with what happened?"

"With my mother's death, yes." Her lower lip trembled, but her voice was steady.

"I'm terribly sorry for your loss, Miss Dietrichson."

"Meg. Thank you, Mr. Chagny." She hesitated. "The thing is, maybe it isn't only about my mother. That's why I know I need to talk to you, but it isn't really what I want to talk about."

"What is, then?" He asked gently.

"My stepfather. I need to talk to you about my stepfather."

"I know you've never much liked him. But isn't it just because he is your stepfather?" He said without thinking.

"How would you know that?" She held up a hand to stop him from trying to find a response. "No, I know the answer. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. But I know he's been meeting with you for something." She shrugged. "Don't worry, it's just how he operates. It's not your fault."

"I haven't been...what are you talking about?"

"I saw you. Behind the house the other night, I saw a man sneaking up onto the back porch. It was too dark to see his face, but I'm...well, I'm almost sure that there was someone there! It had to have been you."

Relief swept over Raoul. He'd never been to the house at night. This was just a young girl in a lot of pain seeing shadows, and it was only bad luck that she had stumbled on a wild theory that happened to be a little bit true. "Meg. Meg, look at me."

She looked, brown eyes trembling with tears.

"Meg, listen very carefully. I have not been to your house since the evening I gave you a ride out to meet your friend. Do you remember that night?"

She nodded, then blinked. "You're telling the truth, aren't you, Mr. Chagny?"

"Yes." He said truthfully. "I am."

She closed her eyes, burying her face in her narrow hands. Slightly muffled, she said "You must think I'm crazy now, don't you?"

"I don't think you're crazy. I think you're grieving."

"Grieving and crazy. But I'm not!" She clutched his arm with one damp gloved hand. "You have to understand, if you did know Erik, you'd see why I thought that." She took a deep, shuddering breath, and exhaled slowly. Then she met his eyes again. "Look at me, Mr. Chagny. I'm not hysterical. I've barely even cried. But I have this awful feeling that something is really wrong, and the last time I had this feeling, it was when my father died."

"When your father died?"

"Yes." She sat down on the edge of the desk, and closed her eyes as she began her story. "You see, my father and I were up at Lake Arrowhead, at our family's cabin, and he got very sick very suddenly. Pneumonia. He had a doctor brought in— but not a real doctor, one of those male nurses, you know? Anyway, it was just the three of us there. One night, I went to my father's room to check on him. He was delirious with fever— and all the windows were wide open, and the bedclothes all on the floor! This was the middle of winter, and so cold. I ran to close the windows and cover him up, and then I turned round." She paused dramatically, having gotten caught up in telling the story even as tear tracks dried on her cheeks. "The nurse was standing in the doorway, with a look in his eyes that I'll never forget. My father died two days later. Do you know who that nurse was?"

Raoul knew. "Who was the nurse?"

"Erik. It was Erik. I tried to tell my mother, but I was just a kid then, and she wouldn't listen. And then she told me that he was staying to help with the funeral arrangements, and I knew there wasn't any hope. Whenever my mother was in the room, Erik would get all sweet and nervous and fluttering, almost like a girl. He'd hang on her every word. Six months later, she married him. I tried to put the whole thing out of my head, and I almost made myself believe that I dreamed it. But now it's all back again, because for the last year, my mother and Erik have been fighting almost every day. And now, she's dead too, and I just know that Erik killed her!"

"Meg, you're not making sense. Your mother fell off a train."

She shrugged off the hand he tried to put on her shoulder. "Yes and what was Erik doing three days before she fell? Trying on a black hat in his bedroom mirror, like he couldn't wait to see how he would look in mourning!"

"You've had a pretty bad shock." Was all he could think to say. "Are you sure you aren't imagining all of this?"

She turned her head away from him. "Everyone always believes him. The police, my mother—" Her voice caught on that word, but she continued. "You. Everyone thinks he's perfect. He even wears a mask, and still no one thinks he's hiding anything! Do you want to know why he wears a mask?"

"I'm sure it's for legitimate medical reasons. And what does it matter, anyway?"

"Have you ever seen his face?"

"Of course I have...?"

"No." She whispered, leaning towards him across the desk. "His whole face."

"Guess I haven't. Why does that matter?" But he couldn't help adding, "Have you seen it, then?"

She nodded. "It's disgusting." But the girl didn't sound like she was being cruel. She sounded like a child telling a ghost story, a personal experience she still didn't quite believe was real. It occurred to Raoul that maybe she didn't. Maybe all of this was just a fragile little girl looking for attention from a stranger by telling tall tales. But he kept listening anyway. "I caught him with it off once. Only once, he's so careful...but I remember. You couldn't forget it. The whole left side of his head is like a skull, with rotten flesh hanging off of it, and those yellow eyes glaring out at you." She shuttered. "It's like a Halloween mask, but real. And I'm telling you, that's what he looks like on the inside too! He's a monster, and no one believes it but me!"

"That's enough, Meg." He said, but he had waited until she was already done speaking, and they both knew it.

She slid off the desk, and walked over to the window, staring down at the street. "I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to act like this. Sometimes I just start talking and can't stop, you know? But everything I've said is the truth, and you have to believe me."

"Everything you've been telling me— who else have you told?"

"No one."

"You haven't talked to your step father about any of this?"

She shook her head without looking at Raoul, and something occurred to him. "Are you still living at home?"

"No. I moved out." She sighed. "And Lisa and I stopped talking too. We had a fight."

"Who are you living with, then?"

"No one. I got myself a little apartment down in Hollywood."

"Four walls, and you just sit and stare at them, don't you?" He asked gently.

She turned away from the window with a pathetic little nod. "Yes, Mr. Chagny."

"Well, how about if I take you out to dinner tonight?" After all, Raoul thought, it was far less than the least that he should do for her.