In a high dark office over a quiet city, Marty Wilks watches.  In his dimly lit office, you could only make out his form hunched in a chair by the window, a limp cigarette hanging in his lips, occasionally glowing red before being lost in a sea of smoke.  A knock at the door. 

                “It’s open.”  He grumbles in the voice of someone who has smoked since he was twelve.

                The door opened slowly into the dark office, revealing a shabby wooden desk and a broken floor lamp.  Behind the desk, behind Marty’s chair stood a large, finished bookcase, every shelve bursting with books.   At the creak of the door, Marty turned to look; the silhouette of a woman, lit by the bright corridor behind her, stood framed in the door, trying to adjust to the light, or lack thereof.

                “Excuse me, but I was wondering if you could…”

                “Help you find your dog? No.”  Marty said gruffly.  He had not intended to be so abrupt or abrasive, but with the lack of real cases over the past few months, his temper had grown short, and his smoking habit had worsened severely.

                “That isn’t what I was going to say, thank you.  As I was trying to say a moment ago, I was wondering if you could help me find someone…a man.”

                “Now you’ve caught my interest, kid.  Now correct me if I’m wrong, but if it was your husband, you’da said so.”  He takes a hard drag on his cigarette before extinguishing it in the glass ashtray that sat overflowing on the surface of the desk.  “So who is this mystery man, and why does he need to be found?” 

                “Well,” she says cautiously “he’s my lover.”

                Marty chokes on the water he was drinking and looks up. “A sweet girl like you mixed up in stuff like that.  Huh, the world is really going to hell.”  He pulls out the remains of his last pack of Camels, reluctantly pulls out the last cigarette, and lights it. He leans back in his chair and closes his eyes, taking a long hard drag on the butt. With his eyes still shut, he quietly asks “what happened.”

                The strange woman steps further into the office, moving slowly towards the chair facing Marty.  She was young, no more than 20 years old.  She was pretty, but not in that china doll way that you’d read about in a trashy novel.  She had a unique beauty about her, but she didn’t flaunt it.  She seemed almost unaware that men found her attractive, but it may have been that she was preoccupied with her missing lover.

                “His name is Bobby,” she said softly, “Bobby Johnson. “  The woman told Marty.  “He was the bag boy at the grocer’s down the street from my, that is, my husband and I’s apartment.  When we met, he was 18, and I was 19. That was last summer, just after high school.  He was bagging my groceries, and he said hello to me and gave me this huge grin.  I thought nothing of it at the time; after all, I was to wed two weeks from then.  Well, every time we saw each other, he would smile, we’d make small talk, and I’d go on my way.  But one afternoon, about a month after the wedding, he asked me out to coffee after his shift ended.  I thought it would be harmless, so I agreed.

                At this point in the conversation, she began to weep softly.   Marty fumbled through his desk until he found a box of tissues, and handed it to her. 

                At the end of her story, Marty nods slowly, pensive.  He takes one last drag on his latest cigarette before stubbing it out in the crammed ashtray and looks up at the woman. “And what exactly do I call you?”

                “Mary,” she says cautiously, “Mary Collins.”

                “Well Mary, I’ll do what I can for you. Ten bucks an hour plus expenses.  Take it or leave it.”

                “that’s fine.”  Says Mary softer than ever and pulls out a large bankroll from her purse. “I can cover it.”