Lawrence Block - The Burglar In The Closet

“According to her, Crystal was just a girl who liked to have a good time. All she wanted out of life was a couple of drinks and a couple of laughs and the ever popular goal of true love.”

“Plus a million dollars worth of jewelry.”

“Frankie didn’t mention jewelry. Maybe Crystal didn’t wear much when she went bar-hopping. Anyway the impression I got from her was that Crystal didn’t make a policy of picking up strangers. She went to the bars primarily for the booze and the small talk. Now and then she got half in the bag and went home with somebody new at the end of the evening, but as a general rule she limited herself to three guys.”

“And one of them killed her?”

I shrugged. “It’s a reasonable assumption. At any rate, they were the three men in her life.” I picked up that morning’s Daily News, tapped the story we’d read. The Medical Examiner had told them what I’d already known. “Somebody was intimate with her the evening she was killed. Either the killer or someone else. And that would have been early in the evening so it’s not likely that she’d already gotten smashed and dragged a stranger home with her.”

“I don’t know, Bernie. According to Craig, she was more of a tramp than this Frankie seemed to think she was.”

“Well, Craig was prejudiced. He was paying alimony.”

“That’s true. Do you know who the three men are?”

I nodded. “This is where it gets tricky. I had trouble questioning Frankie because I couldn’t let her think I was too interested or she’d wonder what it was all about. Then as the night wore on I was too smashed to do a good job as Mr. District Attorney. And I’m not sure how much Frankie really knew about Crystal ’s boyfriends. I think two of them were married.”

“Almost everybody is.”

“Really? I thought everybody was divorced. But two of Crystal ’s three were married.” Including, I thought, the one who’d been rolling around with her while I’d languored in her closet, the one who had to hurry on home to What’s-Her-Name. “One of them’s a lawyer. Frankie referred to him as the Legal Beagle when she wasn’t calling him Snoopy. I think his first name may be John.”

“You think it may?”

“Uh-huh. Frankie did an Ed McMahon imitation a couple of times in reference to him. ‘And now, heeeeeeeere’s Johnny!’ So I assume that’s his name.”

“A married lawyer named Johnny.”

“Right.”

“That sure narrows it down.”

“Doesn’t it? Married Boyfriend Number Two is a little easier to get a line on. He’s a painter and his name is Grabow.”

“His last name?”

“I suppose so. I suppose he has a first name to go with it. Unless he’s very artsy and he just uses the one name. Frankie was pretty vague on the subject of Grabow.”

“It sounds to me as though she was pretty vague about everything.”

“Well, she was, but I don’t think she ever met Grabow. At least that’s the impression I got. She saw a lot of the Legal Beagle because Crystal used to drink with him in the bars. I gather Frankie found him amusing, but I don’t know whether she laughed with him or at him. But I have the feeling all she knew about Grabow was what Crystal told her, and that may not have amounted to very much.”

“What about the third man?”

“He’s easy. Maybe because he’s not married, or at least I don’t think he’s married, which would mean he’d have nothing to hide. Anyway, Frankie knows him. His name is Knobby and he tends bar at Spyder’s Parlor. That’s one of the places I hit last night.”

“So you met him?”

“No. We went there looking for him but he’d switched shifts with Lloyd.”

“Who’s Lloyd?”

“The guy who was tending bar at Spyder’s Parlor last night. I’ll tell you one thing, he pours a hell of a drink. I don’t know Knobby’s last name. I don’t know Frankie’s last name, come to think of it, or anybody’s last name. None of the people I met last night had last names. But I don’t suppose it’ll be hard to find Knobby, not if he hangs onto his job.”

“I wonder why he didn’t work last night.”

“Beats me. I gather the bartenders switch shifts with each other all the time. Maybe there was something on television Knobby didn’t want to miss. Or maybe he had to sit up washing Crystal ’s blood out of his official Spyder’s Parlor T-shirt. Not really, because there wasn’t any blood to speak of.”

“How do you know that, Bernie?”

Brilliant. “She was stabbed in the heart,” I said. “So there wouldn’t have been much bleeding.”

“Oh.”

“So here’s what we’ve got,” I said, changing the subject back where it belonged. “The Legal Beagle, Grabow the Artist, and Knobby the Bartender. I think we’ll have to concentrate on the three of them for the time being.”

“How?”

“Well, we can find out who they are. That would be a start.”

“And then what?”

And then I could see who had the jewels, but I couldn’t tell Jillian that. She didn’t know anything about my Ultrasuede attaché case filled with twice-stolen pretties, nor did she know B. G. Rhodenbarr had been on the premises when Crystal got hers.

“And then,” I said, “we can see if one of them had a reason for killing Crystal, and if there was any link between any of them and Craig, because the killer didn’t just happen to turn up with a dental scalpel because the local hardware store was fresh out of javelins. If it turns out that Grabow’s got a partial plate that Craig made for him, or-God, I’m stupid today. You’re really seeing me at my worst, Jillian. Drunk last night and hungover this morning. I’ve got a brain underneath it all, honest I do. A small one, but it’s stood me in good stead over the years.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Your files. Well, Craig’s files, actually. Knobby and Grabow and the Beagle. Craig has a record of everyone he’s seen professionally, doesn’t he? Grabow’ll be a cinch if he was ever a patient, unless Frankie got his name wrong. Knobby’ll be harder until I learn what his legal name is, but that shouldn’t take long and then you can see if there’s any connection between him and Craig. As far as Johnny the Lawyer is concerned, well, there we’ve got a problem. I don’t suppose you have your patients listed by occupation.”

She shook her head. “There’s blanks for business address and employer on the chart, but when they’re self-employed they don’t usually specify what they’re self-employed at. I know what I could do.”

“What?”

“I could go through and pull all the Johns who aren’t obviously something other than lawyers, and then I can check the ones who are left against the listings of attorneys in the Yellow Pages. Not all lawyers are listed, of course. I guess most of them aren’t. But does it sound as though it might be worthwhile?”

“It sounds like a long shot. And a lot of hard work.”

“I know.”

“But every once in a while somebody sifts through a haystack and actually comes up with a needle. If you don’t mind taking the time-”

“I don’t have anything else to do. And it’ll at least give me the feeling that I’m doing something to help.”

“You’re harboring a fugitive,” I said. “That’s something.”

“Do you really think you’re a fugitive? Just because you recognized a policeman in your lobby doesn’t mean he was there waiting for you. He might have been checking on some other tenant.”

“Mrs. Hesch, say. Maybe he came to arrest her for smoking in the elevator.”

“But he wasn’t even one of the cops we saw before, Bernie. Why would he be the one to go looking for you? I could understand if it was…I forget their names.”