Lawrence Block - The Burglar on the Prowl

"Of course, we may not be able to taste anything again for the next few days."

"It's worth it," she said. "Believe me." She mopped her forehead with her napkin and sighed with satisfaction. "So after you finished drinking tap water in the guise of tea, you went straight to the bookstore?"

"I went home first."

"To see how they left your apartment. And?"

"You could tell they'd been there," I said, "but I have to admit they didn't make that much of a mess. Maybe the new commissioner's sending them to charm school. What's the matter?"

"I was trying to picture Ray in charm school. He'd sit in the front row, and when the teacher walked in and introduced herself, he'd fart."

"Funny, he always speaks highly of you."

"The hell he does. He can't stand me, and thank God for that, because this way I can hate him without feeling guilty. I gather they didn't find your hiding place."

"No, I was pretty sure they wouldn't."

"So everything's okay, right? And you're off the hook for the Rogovin murders. Not that you were ever on it, but now you're off."

"I wouldn't be surprised if Ray dropped in to yank my chain from time to time," I said, "but he's apt to do that anyway. I hope they wrap up the case in a hurry, though. If only to get those creeps out of circulation."

"That poor doorman," she said.

"What about the Rogovins?"

"Well, them too, of course, but didn't Ray say those might not be their real names?"

"Just because a person's name isn't Rogovin, that doesn't mean it's okay to kill them."

She rolled her eyes. "If they were using false names," she said, "maybe they were crooks. And no, that doesn't make it all right to kill them either, but it might mean they were involved with the guys who broke into their apartment, co-conspirators in a dope deal or something, and they betrayed their partners and that's what got them killed. Hey, you read the papers, Bern. That kind of thing happens all the time."

"I guess."

"But the doorman was just minding his business," she said, "which consisted of minding the door, and he wound up dead. So I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for the Rogovins, too, but not as intensely."

"I guess I follow you."

"Not that it matters who I feel sorry for or how sorry I feel, because it doesn't do any of them a bit of good. Right?"

"Don't ask me," I said. "Ask Wally Hemphill. He's studying martial arts, and it's making him spiritual, so a question like that should be right up his alley."

I hung around and we watched some TV, and then I picked up a book and read for half an hour while she booted up the computer and dealt with her e-mail and worked her way through the message boards and newsgroups she subscribed to. Then I guess she found her way over to Google, the search engine, because she was able to report that one Saul Rogovin had pitched for several minor-league baseball teams in the 1950s, while a woman with the memorable name of Syrell Rogovin Leahy had published a couple of novels, before turning to mystery fiction and adopting a pen name.

I said, "A pen name? She was born with a pen name."

"Anyway," she said, "I can't find any Lyle Rogovin, and I don't know what his wife's name was so I can't look for her. You want to hear the good news?"

"Sure."

She grinned. "My date's on for tomorrow night with GurlyGurl. She says she's really looking forward to it."

"I'd call that good news."

"Me too. Bern? What about after?"

"After?"

"In Riverdale. Are we still on?"

I took a moment to think about it, because, curiously enough, I hadn't thought about it at all. Tomorrow was Friday, and Carolyn had an early date with GurlyGurl, and Crandall Mapes and his wife had a date with Wolfgang Amadeus, and then Carolyn and I had a late date with the wall safe in their bedroom.

Since we'd set the date, I'd committed one burglary and been arrested for another, but that was all water over the dam or under the bridge, as you prefer. The Mapeses were still opera-bound, and I was still a burglar, and Mapes was still a shitheel, and I could only assume the money was still in the safe, so why change a good plan at this late date?

"Sure," I said. "We're on. Why not?"

It must have been around ten when I left Carolyn's apartment. I caught the subway at Sheridan Square. That's a local stop, and I could have changed to the express at 14th Street, but I was comfortable and stayed put. I got off at 72nd Street and walked home, trying to remember if I needed anything from the deli. It seemed to me that I did, but I couldn't think what it was.

I turned at West End, and when I got to my building I found that the doorman had deserted his post. Some of the building staff still smoke, and they can't do that indoors, so they generally step outside for a cigarette. But we've got a couple of antitobacco activists in the building, and they'd complained about having to run a gauntlet of cigarette smoke on their way in or out, and some of the guys had taken to slipping around the corner when they felt themselves going postal with nicotine withdrawal. I figured it would all sort itself out, as soon as the mayor quit pussyfooting around and made smoking illegal anywhere in the five boroughs.

Meanwhile, though, the lobby was wide open. If it was someone else's building, I'd have sailed in and set about looking for someone to burgle. But I lived here, so all I did was get on the elevator and go up to my apartment.

I had the key out, and I don't know what made me try the knob first, but I did, and it turned and the door opened. Stupid cops, I thought. The least the inconsiderate bastards could have done was lock up, but no, that was too much for them.

And I pushed the door open and followed it into my apartment.

I hadn't taken two steps before the penny dropped. The cops hadn't left the door unlocked. I'd already been home, for God's sake, and determined that they'd locked up after themselves, and then I'd gone out, heading first to the bookstore and then to Carolyn's place, and I'd damn well locked up after myself, because I always do. And even if I didn't, the snap lock would have engaged automatically and kept the door from opening.

Which meant someone else had come here after I left, and if I'd had any sense at all I'd have realized as much the minute I tried the knob and found the door unlocked. And, armed with that realization (and nothing else) I could have spun on my heel and gotten the hell out of there.

But it was too late for that now.

If anybody had been waiting to ambush me, there wouldn't have been much I could do about it, short of hopping into a time machine and taking a cram course in the martial arts. But there was no one looming behind my door, no one pressed up against my wall. Whoever had broken in had left, and that was all to the good, although it would have been worlds better if they hadn't come around in the first place.

Unlike the cops who'd dropped in earlier, these sons of bitches (or this son of a bitch, though I tended to think in the plural) had not been to charm school. They'd been through my apartment as if they were a tornado and it was a trailer park. They'd stopped short of outright vandalism, and thus hadn't smashed or slashed anything, which is to say they'd done their dirty work without malice-but you could say the same thing for the tornado, couldn't you?

They'd taken my Mondrian off the wall and set it on the floor, but they hadn't damaged it, nor had they thought to take it away with them. Either they hadn't recognized it or they'd assumed, as everyone does, that it was a worthless copy.

I didn't know what they'd come looking for, but I'd bet it was worth a good deal less than the Mondrian, which would probably bring a couple million dollars at auction, assuming the seller had clear title and a provenance for it. On the underground market, well, who knows what it might bring? I've never been tempted to find out, because what could I buy with the money that I'd enjoy as much as the painting?