Corridor Man by Mick James

absolutely nothing. The SUV was nowhere to be seen.
    The following morning the activity from the middle of the night had ceased. There were still two squad cars out there, but they appeared to be empty and were parked along the curb with their lights off.
    Bobby was reading his stolen copy of the newspaper and sipping from his second cup of coffee when there was a knock on the door. It wasn’t quite seven-thirty.
    “Who is it?”
    “Police officers, we’ve just a couple of questions.”
    Perhaps he should have asked for some sort of identification, a badge number or even exactly what they wanted. Instead, he just opened the door. There were two of them, in uniform, a man and woman.
    “Good morning, sir, sorry to bother you so early,” the male officer said.
    “We’re wondering if you were aware of any sort of disturbance around your building last night?” the woman asked.
    “Disturbance? No, did something happen?” He tried not to sound insincere.
    “You weren’t aware of anything happening last night, say around two-thirty, maybe three o’clock?” she asked.
    “No, nothing. I’m a pretty sound sleeper to tell you the truth. I’ve got some coffee on, would you like to come in for a cup?” That seemed to smooth over any potential problem.
    “No, thank you, we have a number of doors to knock on. If something does jog your memory or if you hear or maybe notice something, anything, please give us a call. No matter how insignificant it might seem,” she said and handed him a card.
    “Thank you, I’ll be sure to do that,” he said looking briefly at the card. “What happened anyway?”
    “That’s what we’re trying to determine. Sorry to interrupt your morning, sir,” the male officer said. They gave him a curt nod in unison and walked down to knock on the next door. He watched them for a moment until the ‘We’re on business here, please move along’ sort of look drove Bobby back into his apartment.
    They had worked their way down to the first floor by the time he dropped the newspaper back at the front entry and went out the door. He put ten bucks worth of gas in the Geo at Super America and called Marci from the pay phone mounted on the side of the store to see if she wanted him to attempt to redeliver her subpoenas.
    “We contacted both parties, they insisted they were home yesterday, all day,” she said, raising her voice at the end and then letting the silence just hang out there, suggesting he had maybe been trying to pull a fast one, and clever Marci had caught him.
    “Then why didn’t they answer? I rang the doorbell and knocked at the one place, called on the lobby phone at the other. Are they elderly?”
    Marci ignored the question. “They’ll both be home this morning. The sooner you come in and deliver these, the better.”
    “I’ll be there shortly,” he said, then listened as Marci hung up.

Chapter Thirty-Three
     
     
    “Once you have these properly signed I won’t have need of your services for the rest of the day. Maybe just phone in tomorrow and I’ll see if there’s anything we need.” Marci flashed another one of those teeth-baring grins and squinted her eyes for a second or two then returned to her blank face.
    Bobby saw no point in trying to explain he’d done his utmost to deliver the things yesterday. Instead he half-whispered a meek, “Thank you,” and departed.
    Twenty minutes later he stood on the front stoop and rang the doorbell three times before the door finally opened an inch.
    “What is it?” a woman’s voice creaked out from behind the door.
    “Hi, just making a delivery, I’m afraid I need a signature.”
    There was a pause before the door swung open and a woman stood there, not elderly, but maybe mid-sixties. She had a metal crutch tucked against her right arm with a metal brace around her forearm.
    “You were here yesterday. They phoned me earlier this morning.” She spoke in an unpleasant tone like she was accusing him of spray painting