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been swept away to some romantic B&B overlooking the ocean on Cape Cod. Or cracked under the strain of being a post-doctoral fellow in the competitive medical hub of America. His genius might have morphed into madness. It happens. He could have looked at someone the wrong way, or walked down the wrong street at the wrong time. That happens too. But very few people simply vanish for two weeks without a word to their loved ones, unless they turn up in a refrigerated drawer.
    Hence the mood as I entered the Porter Airlines terminal. They give you good coffee and plenty of space to spread out, use a computer, read complimentary newspapers and otherwise chill. My edge softened a bit as I sipped an espresso and picked up the arts section of the
Globe and Mail
. It had a fiendishly hard cryptic crossword I could try on the flight.
    I heard the rumble of suitcase wheels on the floor, and a woman asked, “Is zis seat taken?” A husky voice with a faint accent, something middle European.
    There were so many empty seats around that she didn’t really need to pick the one next to me, but she had, so I said, “No,” and shifted my knapsack to the floor.
    She parked her suitcase next to her, remained standing and said, “Sank you, sir.”
    I looked up at her. It was Jenn, holding a boarding pass and sporting one of her evil grins. Wearing jeans and a black sweater over a white T-shirt that showed off a figure burlap sacks couldn’t fail to flatter.
    She said, “You can close your jaw now.”
    “What are you doing here? The deposition. The phone call.”
    “The deposition was postponed till next month.”
    “When?”
    “Yesterday.”
    “And you played me?”
    “Yes. You who considers himself the office player.”
    “And Colin went along.”
    “Don’t blame him.”
    “He can’t lie to me. I’m his boss.”
    “Shows you who he’s more afraid of. Which you can delve into further on your own time. Now are you going to stand up and hug me or what?”
    I jumped out of my chair and we had a long, warm hug. My friend, my partner, my backup was with me. We stood there melded to each other and I whispered, “You don’t know how glad I am to see you.”
    She rubbed my head and said, “I didn’t want you going alone. Get your head knocked around.”
    “Did my mother put you up to this? She doesn’t want me going to the store by myself.”
    “Can I not care about you on my own?”
    “Knock yourself out.”
    They called our flight and we got our knapsacks on, lined our suitcases up behind us and settled into stride together, our team of two.
    Jenn knew Boston better than I did. When she was in her early twenties, a woman she was dating was accepted at the Berklee College of Music and she spent a semester in Boston studying drama and improv, which was then her thing. We spent most of the flight browsing city maps on Jenn’s laptop, noting where our hotel was in relation to David’s home and workplace. We read background material on the hospital where David worked, its transplant program and its department head, Dr. E. Charles Stayner. We looked at research papers David had co-authored. I understood a few words, like
and
or
but
. The rest was incomprehensible.
    When we landed at Logan, we argued briefly over whether to pay an extra ten bucks a day for a GPS. Jenn didn’t think we needed one. I did. Or at least I would if we split up, which we often did during cases to cover more ground, and I had to drive myself around. Plus the guy at the car-rental counter sold me when he switched the demo’s flat American accent to that of a posh British gal. I wanted to use it right away but Jenn said, “I’m telling you I know the way to the hotel from here.”
    “Not in that accent.”
    “You can use it when I’m not in the car. For now, get out the map that’s in the rental package. If I need it, I’ll let you know.”
    I stored the GPS in a backpack, as advised by our rental guy, to minimize the likelihood of getting our