Lawrence Block: The Burglar on the Prowl

"No, don't do that. This'll be your third connection through Date-a-Dyke, and everybody knows the third time is the charm. Besides, I always feel a little guilty involving you in my crimes."

"As long as we don't get caught," she said, "you've got nothing to feel guilty about."

"That's not the way they teach it in Sunday school."

"Too bad." She frowned. "What time?"

"I really don't want you breaking your date."

"I got that part. What time are you gonna be doing it?"

"I don't know. I haven't worked that out yet. The Mapeses have tickets for the Met. There's an eight o'clock curtain, so they'll most likely leave the house around seven."

"And that's when you'll go?"

"No, that's a little early for me. I figure I'll set out around nine. They're seeingDon Giovanni, and that lasts close to four hours, and by the time they get home-"

"I can come," she said.

"But your date with GurlyGurl-"

"Didn't I tell you I'd be skipping the Bum Rap Friday? I'm meeting her in the lobby of the Algonquin at 6:15. That gives me plenty of time to run home and put on jeans and sneakers and meet you wherever you say."

"Suppose the two of you hit it off?"

"Then I'll probably be a lot better company on the way to Riverdale than if we hate each other. So?"

"I mean really hit it off," I said, "and decide to have dinner together, and then decide to, uh-"

"To do all the things the fifteen-year-olds dream up in the chat rooms. Relax, Bern. It's not gonna happen."

"But if you both really like each other-"

"If that happens," she said, "and I really hope it does, although God knows the odds are against it. But if it does, we'll have a second round of drinks, and then we'll tell each other how much we enjoyed the meeting, and we'll shake hands, with maybe a significant little squeeze at the end of the handshake. And then we'll meet again online and arrange a dinner date."

"That sounds complicated."

"It's a lot simpler to go over to the Cubby Hole and drag some drunk home with you," she allowed, "but most of the time it doesn't work and you wind up going home alone, and when you do get lucky, who do you wind up with? The kind of woman who lets herself get picked up in dyke bars, that's who."

"Oh."

"What I figured I would do, Bern, is have my drinks with GurlyGurl, and then pick up a barbecued chicken on the way home, and after I shared that with the cats I'd go over to the Cubby Hole and make a night of it. But I'd a whole lot rather go with you to Riverdale. Can you really use the company?"

"Well, I'll want to drive. The subway's fine for tonight, but when you're carrying things that don't belong to you, public transportation's not the safest way to go."

"You need me," she said firmly. "Suppose you can't find a parking place?"

"That's what I was thinking."

"We're in business," she said. "I'm your henchperson, just like old times. And of course I won't breathe a word of it, Bern, but GurlyGurl's going to notice that I have an air of mystery about me." She grinned. "So? What could it hurt?"

I didn't really have to go home first. I was dressed all right in what I'd worn to work that morning. They haven't got a dress code in the subway, and I don't suppose they've got one on the streets of Riverdale, but one wants to avoid calling attention to oneself, and the only thing my khakis and polo shirt might call to anyone's attention was the relative poverty of my sartorial imagination.

It was spring-I may not have mentioned that-and, if the thermometer dropped a few degrees with nightfall, I might feel the chill in a short-sleeved shirt. Even if it didn't, I'd had a pair of stiff scotches at the Bum Rap, and it wouldn't hurt me to give them a little extra time to wear off. There was nothing on the agenda that required a sober head or quick reflexes, but my mission, while lawful enough all by itself, was part of a larger campaign that was as felonious as a monk. I'd had a slice of pizza on my way from the Bum Rap to the subway, and I suppose that had a sobering effect, but why not make assurance doubly sure? Why not stop home, and even make myself a cup of coffee while I was at it?

As it turned out, it didn't cool off that much, but I couldn't know that ahead of time, when I stopped at my apartment for my windbreaker. It was tan, a shade or two deeper than my slacks, and completed the costume of an ordinary guy, Mr. Middle of the Road, leading a blameless and certainly law-abiding existence.

My apartment's in a prewar building on West End and 70th. Much of my life centers in the Village-the bookstore's there, of course, on East 11th, and Carolyn's apartment on Arbor Court is less than a mile south and west of our two stores, in the West Village. She walks to work every day, and it's often occurred to me that it would be nice to be able to do the same. I suppose I could as things stand, but I'd have to allocate two hours to the process, and so far it's never seemed like a good idea.

Moving to the Village hasn't seemed like a good idea, either, because it's just not feasible. My apartment's rent-stabilized, which means that it costs me around a third of what it would otherwise. If I gave it up I'd have to pay at least three or four times as much for an equivalent apartment downtown. Or, if my nighttime activities brought me a really big score, I could buy a co-op or condo downtown-and then shell out in monthly maintenance about as much as I pay now for rent.

Besides, I'm used to the place. It's not much, a skimpy one-bedroom with a view of another apartment on the other side of the airshaft, and I've never taken the trouble to improve its furnishings or décor.

Well, wait a minute. That's not entirely true. First thing I did when I moved in was build in bookshelves on either side of the fireplace. (On the rare occasions when I actually have someone over, she invariably asks if the fireplace works. No, I explain, it's retired.) And the second change I made, a few years later, was to construct a hidden compartment at the rear of the bedroom closet. That's where stolen goods go, until I manage to figure out how to unload them. It's also where I keep my Get Out of Dodge kit, which consists of five to ten thousand dollars in cash and a pair of passports, one of them genuine, the other a very decent facsimile.

Plus, of course, the little collection of picks and probes and thingamajigs and whatchamacallits that come under the general heading of burglar's tools. Unless you're a licensed locksmith, the mere possession of such implements is enough to earn you a stretch upstate as the guest of the governor. It's occasionally occurred to me to pick up a locksmith's license, just to keep from getting nailed for possession of burglar's tools, but they'd laugh themselves silly if they saw my name on an application. Or at least I think they would; maybe the people who give out the licenses don't check the names against a master list of convicted burglars. If not then I'd have to say the system's flawed, and wouldn't that be a shock?

I made a cup of coffee and drank it, and I went to the closet for my windbreaker, and somewhere around eight o'clock I went downstairs and walked over to 72nd and Broadway to catch the West Side IRT. I had my hands in the pockets of my windbreaker, and in a trouser pocket I had my burglar's tools.

And for the life of me I couldn't tell you why.

I suppose it must have been automatic. I was going to work, even though I knew my work would be strictly limited to reconnaissance. But a man on his way to work takes the tools of his trade along with him, and that was precisely what I did.

Halfway to the subway station, I realized what I'd done. I thought about going home and putting the tools back where they belonged, and I decided it was a fool's errand. No one was going to put his hand in my pocket, with the possible exception of myself. I wouldn't be doing anything illegal, so no cop would have a reason to frisk me. And it wasn't as if I were walking along with a loaded gun on my hip. They were burglar's tools, that's all. They weren't apt to go off on their own.