Lawrence Block - The Burglar on the Prowl

"She was just passing by, and thought you'd be the perfect person for a serious talk about Amway products."

"It was GurlyGurl, Bern."

"And did she live up to her screen name?"

"She's pretty great looking. Taller than I am, but who do you know that isn't? Dark hair, real nice figure, peaches and cream complexion, big gray eyes-"

"Gray?"

"She said they used to be blue, but the color faded out of them. Have you ever heard of that happening?"

"With hair."

"I guess it can happen with eyes, too, and Miss Clairol's no help if it does. She'd just come from work, and she said she hoped I hadn't been waiting long, and I said I just got there myself, I hadn't even ordered yet, and she said…"

Di dah di dah di dah. She fed me the conversation word for word, and a court reporter couldn't have done a better job of it. I stopped listening, because I was caught up in the physical description.

Hair, figure, complexion, eyes-granted, it could fit any number of women, but I'd had the feeling for a while now that there was a great big coincidence hovering just out of sight, waiting patiently for the chance to coincide.

I tuned in again, and she was telling how they'd ordered drinks after all. "She asked what I wanted, and I said I'd probably have a cup of tea, and she said she thought I liked scotch, and I said I did, but tea's nice sometimes, and she said she's a big tea drinker herself, but after the week she'd just had scotch would sure hit the spot, and I said in that case I didn't figure one drink would hurt me. Because I know you don't drink before a job, Bern, and I shouldn't either, but it would be different if I was going into the house. I'm not, am I?"

"No, I'm on my own for that part."

"That's what I thought, so I figured one drink would be fine."

"So you had a drink."

"Well, two."

"I thought you just said-"

" Bern, who has one drink? It's like one pant or one scissor. They come in pairs. Nobody has just one drink."

"Somebody must," I said, "or where would the expression come from? 'I think I'll have a drink.' A drink. Not two drinks, not six drinks, not ten drinks. 'I think I'll have a drink.' People say it all the time."

"Uh-huh, and then they say 'I think I'll have another.' A drink is just the stepping-off point. Anyway, we had two each, and I ate a whole dish of mixed nuts to soak up the alcohol, and I'm fine."

"You seem okay."

"That's because I am okay. And I'm not driving, so I don't have to worry about a Breathalyzer test, and I'm not going into the house, so what's the problem?"

"I don't think there is any. I gather the two of you hit it off."

"I like her, Bern. And I think she likes me."

"You made a good impression."

"And a good thing, because that's something you only get one crack at."

"Where does she live?"

" Manhattan. Hey, I knew that going in. I didn't want to meet her and be crazy about her and then discover she's GU."

"Geographically undesirable. It's a curse, all right. I met a girl once and we hit it off, and she wouldn't tell me where she lived. She'd always meet me places, or come over to my place."

" Brooklyn?"

"Way the hell out in Queens," I said. "You had to take the subway for days, and then you took a bus, and then you walked ten blocks. That was the end of that."

"But if she was willing to come into the city all the time-"

"When they're that GU," I said, "you wind up under all this pressure to live together, because otherwise one person's spending half their life in transit. I figured it would save a whole lot of aggravation to break up."

"Wow."

"Besides," I said, "she had this whiny voice, and I thought I could get used to it, and then one day I realized I didn't want to get used to it. In fact what I didn't want was to hear it long enough to get used to it." I took the cell phone from my pocket, put through a call to the number I'd programmed in earlier. "So that was that," I said, while the phone rang in the house on Devonshire Close. It rang four times before a machine picked up, and I listened to what I supposed was the recorded voice of Crandall Rountree Mapes, inviting me to leave a message. I hung up in mid-invitation.

"Well, GG's not GU," Carolyn said.

"As in GurlyGurl. In fact she's pretty desirable all across the board."

"No whiny voice, huh?"

"A nice voice. Kind of throaty."

"She could live in Manhattan and still be a long ways away. Washington Heights, say."

" Washington Heights isn't that far. I had a girlfriend in Washington Heights."

"That's what I was referring to."

"Well, it was a disaster, but you couldn't blame it on the neighborhood. It was just a disaster. Anyway, she lives closer than that, because she walks to work, and it only takes her fifteen minutes."

"Where does she work?"

"Forty-fifth and Madison. That's why she picked the Algonquin. Why?"

"I just wondered. So if she lives fifteen minutes from there, she could live in the East Sixties."

"I suppose."

"Or the West Fifties."

"So?"

"Or the East Thirties."

"What are you getting at, Bern?"

"I just want to make sure," I said.

"You want to make sure of what?"

"That she's not who I'm afraid she is."

"Huh?"

"Because it would be a coincidence," I said, "but coincidences happen all the time, and I've had the feeling one's on its way right about now. And if it turns out that she's who I think she is-"

"Who do you think she is?"

"This would be a lot easier," I said, "if the two of you had told each other your names, but as it stands-"

"We did."

"You did?"

"Of course we did, Bern. You only keep it anonymous until you actually meet. We told each other our names right away. Before the old guy brought the drinks, even."

"What did you say your name was?"

"I said it was Carolyn, Bern. Carolyn Kaiser. Not very imaginative, I know, but I just went and pulled a name out of the air, and-"

"What did she say?"

"She said, 'Hi, Carolyn.' Taking me at my word, not suspecting for a moment that I'd lie about a thing like that, and-"

"What did she say her name was?"

"Lacey Kavinoky," she said, "which rhymes with okie-dokey."

"You're sure?"

"That it rhymes? Positive, Bern. No question in my mind."

"I mean-"

"I know what you mean. Am I sure it's her name? I'm sure it's what she said. Was I supposed to ask to see her driver's license? Are you gonna tell me who you were afraid she was?"

"Barbara Creeley."

"Barbara Creeley. The one who got-"

"Burgled and date-raped. Yeah, you don't have to tell me. I know it's ridiculous."

"I think it would have to make a lot more sense," she said, "in order to be no worse than ridiculous. There are eight million people in New York, Bern. What are the odds?"

"Eight million in the five boroughs," I said. "Only two million in Manhattan, if that many."

"One in two million?"

"Half of the two million are male," I said. "Of the one million left, by the time you cross out the ones who are under twenty and over fifty, and the married ones, and-"

"I see where you're going with this," she said, "and you're still nuts."

"You're right."

"Anyway, forget it. Lacey's not Barbara."

"I know."

"It would not only be a coincidence, it'd be a dumb one."

"I know."

"I sound like I'm pissed off, don't I? I'm not. I'm just sort of incredulous, that's all."

"Whatever you say."

"Her name's Lacey Kavinoky," she said, "and she's cute and bright and genuinely nice. And she's gay, Bern, and she knows it. She's not one of those oh-I-always-thought-it-might-be-interesting-to-try-being-with-a-woman women. She's not one of those variety's-the-spice-of-life women, either. She's like me, she's got nothing against men, and high on the list of things she doesn't hold against them is her beautiful body. You remember that song?"