MIRROR IMAGE

CHAPTER TWELVE

In stocking feet, Irish McCabe went to his refrigerator for another beer. He pulled off the tab and, as he sipped the malty foam from the top of the can, inspected his freezer for dinner possibilities. Finding nothing there that was a better option than hunger, he decided to do without food and fill up on beer.

On his way back into the living room, he picked up the stack of mail he'd dropped on the table when he had come in earlier. While idly watching a TV game show, he sorted through the correspondence, culling junk mail and setting aside bills.

"Humph." A puzzled frown pulled together salt and­ pepper eyebrows when he came across the manila envelope. There was no return address, but it bore a local postmark. He unfastened the brad and wedged his index finger beneath the flap. He upended the envelope and dumped the contents into his lap.

He sucked in a quick breath and recoiled, as though something foul had landed on him. He stared at the damaged jewelry while his lungs struggled for air and his heart labored in his chest.

It was several moments before he calmed down enough to reach out and touch the shattered wristwatch. He had immediately recognized it as Avery's. Gingerly he picked it up and tentatively investigated the gold earring he'd last seen decorating Avery's ear.

Quickly coming to his feet, he rushed across the room to a desk that he rarely used, except as a catchall. He pulled open the lap drawer and took out the envelope he'd been given at the morgue the day he had identified Avery's body. "Her things," the forensic assistant had told him apologetically. He remembered dropping her locket into the envelope without even looking inside. Up till now he hadn't had the heart to open it and touch her personal effects. He was superstitious. To paw through Avery's belongings would be as distasteful to him as grave robbing.

He'd had to empty her apartment because her landlady had insisted on it. He hadn't kept a single thing, except a few photographs. Her clothes and all other usable items had been donated to various charities.

The only thing that Irish had deemed worth keeping was the locket that had identified her body. Her daddy had given it to her when she was just a kid, and Irish had never seen Avery without it.

He opened the envelope that had been in his desk all this time and dumped the contents onto the desk's littered surface.  Along with Avery's locket, there was a pair of diamond earrings, a gold bracelet watch, two bangle brace­ lets, and three rings, two of which comprised a wedding set. The third ring was a cluster of sapphires and diamonds. Together it added up to a hell of a lot more than Avery's jewelry, but it wasn't worth a plug nickel to Irish McCabe.

Obviously, the pieces belonged to one of the other crash victims, possibly to one of the survivors. Was somebody grieving its misplacement? Or had it even been missed?

He would have to check on that and try to get it back to the rightful owner. Now, all he could think about was Avery's jewelry—the watch and earring that had been delivered today to his post office box. Who had sent them? Why now? Where had they been all this time?

He studied the envelope, searching for possible clues as to its sender. There were none. It didn't look like it had come from a municipal office. The printed lettering was rickety and uneven, almost childish.

"Who the hell?" he asked his empty apartment.

The pain of his grief over Avery should have been blunted by now, but it wasn't.  He dropped heavily into his easy chair and stared at the locket with misty eyes. He rubbed it between his finger and thumb like a talisman that might make her miraculously materialize.

Later, he would try to solve the mystery of how her jewelry had become switched with that of another crash victim. For the present, however, he only wanted to wallow in the morass of his bereavement.