Lawrence Block: The Burglar Who Studied Spinoza

Let there not be a burglar alarm, I urged the good Dismas. Let the dog really be in Pennsylvania. Let what lies within be a burglar's fondest dream, and in return I'll-I'll what?

I took out my ring of picks and probes and went to work.

The locks were pretty good. There were three of them on that door, two Segals and a Rabson. I left the Rabson for last because I knew it would be the toughest, then surprised myself by knocking it off in no more than a minute. I heard Carolyn's intake of breath when the bolt turned. She knows a little about locks now, and has been known to open her own without a key, and she's driven herself half mad practicing with a Rabson I gave her, and she sounded impressed.

I turned the knob, opened the door a crack, stood aside for Carolyn. She shook her head and motioned for me to go first. Age before beauty? Pearls before swine? Death before dishonor? I opened the door and committed illegal entry.

Lord, what a feeling!

I'm grateful there isn't something even more despicable than burglary that gives me that feeling, because if there were I probably wouldn't be able to resist it. Oh, I'm a pro, all right, and I do it for the money, but let's not kid ourselves. I draw such an intense charge out of it it's a wonder lamps don't dim all over the city every time I let myself into somebody else's abode.

God knows I'm not proud of it. I'd think far more highly of myself if I eked out a living at Barnegat Books. I never quite cover expenses at the store, but maybe I could if I took the trouble to learn to be a better businessman. The shop supported old Mr. Litzauer for years before he sold it to me and retired to St. Petersburg. It ought to be able to support me. I don't live all that high. I don't shoot crap or snort coke or zoom around with the Beautiful People. Nor do I consort with known criminals, as the parole board so charmingly phrases it. I don't like criminals. I don't like being one myself.

But I love to steal. Go figure.

The radio program was one of those talk-show things with listeners calling in to share their views on fluoridation and child labor and other burning issues. I stood there and resented its blaring away at me. The lights were a nice touch-we wouldn't have to turn on lights ourselves, which might draw attention, nor would we have to curse the darkness. But I stood there in the entrance foyer and resolved to turn off the damned radio. It was a distraction. You have to think straight to burgle efficiently, and who could do so with all that noise?

"Jesus, Bern."

"What?"

"She always dresses so nice. Who figured she'd be such a slob around the house?"

I followed her into the living room to see what she was talking about. It looked as though an out-of-season tropical storm had wandered far off course, only to sneak down through the chimney and kick the crap out of everything. The pillows were off the couch. Desk drawers had been pulled out and upended, their contents strewn all over the Aubusson carpet. Pictures had been taken down from the walls, books tossed from their shelves.

"Burglars," I said.

Carolyn stared.

"They beat us to the punch."

"Are they still around, Bern? We better get out of here."

I went back to the front door and checked it. I'd relocked the locks when we were inside, fastening an additional chain lock for good measure. The three locks had been locked when I found them, the chain bolt unengaged.

Strange.

If burglars had come through that door, and if they'd locked themselves in as I had done, wouldn't they put the chain bolt on as well? And if they'd already left, would they bother locking up from outside? I generally do that sort of thing as a matter of course, but then I'm not apt to leave a room looking as though it had been visited by the Gadarene swine, either. Whoever tossed that room was the type who kicked doors in, not the type who took extra time to lock up afterward.

Unless-

Lots of possibilities. I eased past Carolyn and began tracking the radio to its source. I passed through the dining room, where a mahogany breakfront and buffet had been rifled in fashion similar to the living-room desk, and entered a kitchen that had received a dose of the same treatment. A Panasonic stood on the butcher-block counter beside the refrigerator, blaring its transistorized heart out. I turned to Carolyn, raised a finger to my lips for silence, and switched off the radio in the middle of a rant about the latest increase in the price of oil.

I closed my eyes and listened very carefully to the ensuing silence. You could have heard a pin drop, and I was certain no one had dropped one.

"They're gone," I said.

"How can you be sure?"

"If they were here we'd hear them. They're not the silent type, whoever they are."

"We better get out."

"Not yet."

"Are you crazy, Bern? If they're gone, that just means the cops are on their way, and even if they're not, what are we gonna find to steal? Whoever did this already took everything."

"Not necessarily."

"Well, they took the sterling. What are we gonna do, swipe the stainless?" She followed me out of the kitchen and up a flight of stairs. "What do you expect to find, Bern?"

"A coin collection. Maybe some jewelry."

"Where?"

"Good question. What room is the wall safe in?"

"I don't know."

"Then we'll have to look for it, won't we?"

We didn't have to look very hard because our predecessors in crime had taken all the pictures off the walls. We checked the library and guest bedroom on the second floor, then climbed another flight of stairs and found the wall safe in the master bedroom. The dreamy pastoral landscape which had screened it from view was on the floor now, along with the contents of both dressers and some broken glass from the overhead skylight. That, no doubt, was how they'd entered. And how they'd exited as well, I felt certain, lugging their loot across the rooftops and into the night. These clowns hadn't locked up downstairs because they'd never opened the locks in the first place. They couldn't have dealt with that Rabson in a year and a day.

Nor had they been able to deal with the wall safe. I'm not sure how hard they tried. There were marks around the combination dial to show that someone had worked on it with a punch, hoping to knock the lock out and get into the safe that way. I didn't see any evidence that they'd had an acetylene torch along, nor would one very likely have worked anyway. The safe was a sound one and the lock was a beauty.

I commenced fiddling with the dial. Carolyn stood beside me, watching with more than idle curiosity, but before long we started to fidget and we were getting on each other's nerves. Before I could suggest it she said something about having a look around. I promised to call her when I got the thing open.

It took a little doing. I stripped off my rubber gloves-that Jimmy Valentine number of sanding one's fingertips for increased sensitivity is nonsense, but there's no point in making things more difficult than they have to be. I did a little of this and a little of that, using the combination of knowledge and intuition that you have to have if you're going to be good with locks, and I got the last number first, as one always does with combination locks, and one at a time I got the other three numbers, and then I put my gloves on again and wiped the surfaces I'd touched and took a deep breath and whistled for Carolyn.

She came in carrying a framed print. "It's a Chagall lithograph," she said. "Pencil-signed and numbered. I guess it's worth a few hundred, anyway. Is it worth stealing?"

"If you want to take it out of the frame."

She held it up. "I think it'll fit in the attaché case. Are you getting anywhere with that mother?"

"I'm just going to try a couple numbers at random," I said. I dialed the four numbers in their proper sequence, felt a little click in my own head if not in the locking mechanism as the tumblers lined up, then swung the handle around to the left and opened the safe.