The stamp sat in the bottom corner, faded from purple to a soft violet, the way ink goes after eighteen years in a box.

I laid my finger on the date.

The clock on Arthur Vance’s wall ticked, steady and patient, and I kept my finger there.

When I unlocked the shop on Monday morning, a deputy’s cruiser was idling behind my service van.

He climbed out with a clipboard and a manila envelope and didn’t glance at the sign on my door.

“You Thomas Whitfield?”

“That’s the van,” I said.