Lawrence Block - The Burglar on the Prowl

I considered going over and having a word with the doorman, who was on the sidewalk smoking a cigarette. But what could I ask him, and what would he be likely to tell me? Nothing, I was sure, that Ray didn't already know.

Not that I expected anything to come of the partnership he'd proposed. Still, somebody had killed the Rogovins (whom I was going to have to learn to think of as Lyle and Schnittke). And the same people-the perps, if you will-had traumatized Edgar the Doorman, sacked my apartment, stolen my emergency fund, and shot holes in a good customer of mine. (I'd never seen the fat man before, but anybody who's in my store for less than five minutes and manages to spend $1300 is a hell of a good customer. Besides, Raffles thought he was a prince.)

If I could help Ray nail the bastards, or if we could take some money away from them, or both-well, that was fine with me.

I walked around some more, wondering just how many security cameras were recording my movements. All of these infringements on our privacy are making it particularly difficult on people who are doing something they shouldn't be doing, so I suppose it's not surprising the crime rate is dropping. Pretty soon every criminal in a position to make a choice will choose to go straight, or at least to go into the world of big business, where criminal conduct rarely leads to anything so extreme as a jail sentence, and where security cameras aren't a factor.

This is the sort of musing best done in a place where alcoholic beverages are sold, and before I knew it I was in just such a place myself, an upscale saloon called Parsifal's on Lexington a few doors south of 37th Street. It was that transitional hour when the less hardy members of the local workforce were ready to head home, while the crowd of drinkers who lived in the neighborhood had not yet arrived in full force. Thus there were seats at the bar, and I took one and ordered a Perrier. The bartender, a tall blonde with cheekbones you could cut yourself on, brought Pellegrino, squeezed a wedge of lime in it, collected a couple of bucks for it, and left me to drink myself into a stupor.

It would have been in a place just like this, I thought, that Barbara Anne Creeley would have met the deep-voiced chap who'd slipped her her first Rohypnol and then a token of his esteem, or lack thereof. I wondered if he might be fishing the same waters again, and I looked around, wondering what I thought I was looking for. Since I hadn't seen him and had nothing to go by but his voice, I couldn't very well expect to recognize him.

But I could recognize Barbara Creeley, and did, standing at the bar with one foot on the rail, not five stools away from mine.

Except it wasn't her, as a second glance quickly established. This woman was a little older and a little heavier than the woman into whose apartment I'd recently broken, and her face was harder and her hair shorter. The more I looked, the less resemblance I could see.

I scanned the rest of the room, but largely as a matter of form. I knew she wasn't there, and I was right. But I also felt absolutely certain that this was a regular stop of hers. It might not be where she met the Rohypnol guy- the roofer is how I found myself thinking of him-but I thought it very likely was. If I hung around long enough, and poured down enough of the Italian fizzy water, one or both of them was almost certain to turn up.

Why, I wondered, would I want to run into either of them?

But I didn't have to know the answer to that one, did I? I had things to do, and it was time to go do them. I drank down most of my Pellegrino, scooped up most of my change, and went home.

By 8:45 I was sitting behind the wheel of a bronze-colored Mercury Sable sedan. It was parked with its front bumper about eight feet from the only curbside fire hydrant on Arbor Court. That's closer than the law allows, but that was the least of my worries, because the car was stolen.

I somehow doubt that too many traffic cops and meter maids work Arbor Court-how many of them even know where it is?-but if one turned up I was ready, parked so that I could see anyone, on wheels or on foot, who happened to turn into the little street. I didn't have the key in the ignition, because I hadn't had a key in the first place, but it wouldn't take me more than a second or two to start the car up, and I'd do that the minute a cop came into view.

For ten minutes no one turned up, cop or civilian, and when someone finally did I started up the Sable and honked the horn, because it was Carolyn. She looked around, saw nothing familiar, and kept walking. I honked again and she spun around, frowning, and I lowered the window and said her name.

"Oh," she said. "Neat car, Bern. Where'd you get it?"

" Seventy-fourth Street. I borrowed it."

"Oh yeah? Who from?"

"Beats me."

"That means you stole it."

"Only technically," I said. "I intend to give it back."

"That's what embezzlers always say, Bern. They were planning to give the money back. Somehow they never get around to it."

"Well, I fully intend to give this one back," I said. "Cars are a pain in the neck in the city. Where would I park it? It costs a fortune to garage them, and if you park them on the street-"

"People 'borrow' them," she said, "and take them to chop shops."

"You know," I said, "you're sounding less and less like a henchperson, and more and more like Ray Kirschmann."

"That may be the nastiest thing you ever said to me," she said, "but I think maybe you're right. I'm sorry, Bern. I got a little confused. I wasn't sure you were coming."

"I said I was."

"I know, but what with everything that happened today I thought you might change your mind. That fat guy getting shot right in front of you."

"Riverdale's miles away."

"I know, but-"

"And I need the money."

I also needed the psychological lift of winning one for a change. I'd started off hiding under the bed, and things had gone downhill from there. Since then I'd been hassled by the cops, burgled by brutes, and given a supporting role in a drive-by homicide. It was time for me to make something happen instead of waiting to see what happened next. Maybe I couldn't bomb Iraq, but I could damn well burgle Mapes, and I wouldn't even have to wait to find out what the premier of France thought of it.

"Wait here," Carolyn said. "I'll just be a minute. Don't you dare go without me."

I got on the West Side Drive. The Sable rode well and handled nicely, and the traffic was almost light enough for Cruise Control, but not quite. I caught a light at 57th Street and glanced over at Carolyn. "I gather she didn't stand you up," I said.

"Not at all, Bern. What I did do is sit up."

"Sit up?"

"And take notice. I got there first, but only by a minute or two. I walked right into the lobby of the Algonquin, just like Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley before me."

"And Alexander Woollcott, and George S. Kaufman…"

"And all those guys, right. So I took a table in the lobby, and this waiter straight out of a London men's club came over and asked me what I wanted to drink, and I didn't know."

"That's a first."

"Well, there's a bar off the lobby, where you'd go for a drink, and there's the lobby, where people meet for tea. Now most of the people having tea were actually having it in martini glasses. Tea's more or less an expression there. But what if she really intended to have tea, and there I am, looking like a drunk?"

"Didn't your Date-a-Dyke ad say you love scotch?"

"I know, but I wasn't sure I should love it on the first date. You know what they say, Bern. You never get a second chance to make a good first impression."

"Is that what they say?"

"I think so. While I was weighing the pros and consequences, this woman walked in the door and made a beeline for my table. She didn't even take a minute to scan the room. She zoomed right in on me and came over."