Lawrence Block - Burglars Can’t Be Choosers

“Sounds fair to me.”

He looked at me for a moment, then let out air in a soundless whistle. He patted the bulky package on the sofa beside him. “Size thirty-eight long,” he said. “That’s what you ordered, right?”

“That’s what I take.”

“Loren’s smaller’n you so I picked this up new. Maybe you better try it on.”

I unwrapped the parcel, got out of my own clothes, donned a pair of regulation police blues over a blue shirt. There was no cap; I would wear Loren’s. When I was dressed Ray inspected me, tugged here and there on the uniform, frowned, stepped back, shrugged, shook his head doubtfully and turned aside.

“I don’t know,” he said. “You don’t look like New York ’s Finest to me.”

“Just so I’m not a disgrace to the uniform.”

“I guess it ain’t too bad of a fit. It don’t look tailor-made, you got to admit that, but then you also got to admit that neither does Loren’s.”

I took a moment to picture Loren. “No,” I agreed, “he doesn’t look as though the uniform was stitched together around him.” I patted my trousers, pressed out imaginary wrinkles. “So I guess I’ll do,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said. “I guess you’ll do.”

I was still in uniform when he left. After the door closed behind him Darla Sandoval emerged from the kitchen. She looked me up and down and raised her eyebrows.

“Well?”

“I think you look like a policeman. There’s a mirror on the bedroom door if you want to see yourself.”

I wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been a mirror on the bedroom ceiling. (Well, maybe I would have.) But I went and checked my reflection on the mirrored door and decided I cut a reasonably dashing figure. I returned to the living room and agreed with Darla that I looked like a cop.

“He took all our money,” she said. “Do you think that was wise?”

“I think it was inevitable. You can’t pay cops half in advance and the balance upon delivery. You ought to be able to but they don’t like to work that way.”

“He’s picking you up here tonight.”

I nodded. “At twenty-one hundred hours. That’s nine o’clock in English but he said it in cop talk because I was wearing the uniform.”

“So you’ll just wait for him here?”

I shook my head. “I’ll go back to where I’m staying downtown. I didn’t want to complicate things by having him meet me there. I’d just as soon he didn’t know where I’m staying.”

“Suppose he doesn’t show up, Bernard? Then what?”

“He’ll show. He’ll even make sure he’s on time because he doesn’t want anything to go wrong. He’ll bring Loren and I’ll equip myself with all of Loren’s paraphernalia, the badge and the cap and the gun and the nightstick and the cuffs, all that crap, and Loren’ll curl up here with an astrology magazine while Ray and I go and do the dirty deed. Then Ray’ll drop me back here and pick up Loren and that’s the end of it.”

“But suppose he keeps the ten thousand dollars and forgets all about you?”

“Oh,” I said, “he won’t do that.”

“How can you be sure?”

“He’s honest,” I said, and when she stared at me I explained. “There’s all kinds of honest. If a cop like Ray makes a deal he’ll stick with it. He’s that kind of honest. And you heard him carry on when I showed some doubt about his giving Loren an even split. He was genuinely offended at the implication. What’s so funny?”

“I was thinking of Carter. He wouldn’t understand a syllable of this.”

“Well, he’s a different kind of honest.”

“He certainly is. Bernard, I think I can have one more drink without harming myself any. Can I get you one?”

“No thanks.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive.”

“More coffee, then?”

I shook my head. She went back to the kitchen and returned with drink in hand. She sat down on the sofa, sipped her drink, set it down on the coffee table and noticed the pair of hundred-dollar bills I’d convinced Ray to leave behind. “I guess these are yours,” she said.

“Well, one of us counted wrong, Mrs. Sandoval.”

“Darla.”

“Darla. Why don’t we each take one of them?”

That struck her as fair. She kept a bill and passed its brother to me. Then she said, “You said he was honest. That policeman. But he would have kept the extra two hundred dollars.”

“Oh, sure. He was steamed when I called him on it.”

“There really are all kinds of honesty, aren’t there?”

“There really are.”

It was time to change back into mufti, time to pack up the uniform and cart it downtown. But for the moment I didn’t feel much like moving. I sat in a chair across from Darla and watched her nibble at her drink.

“Bernard? I was thinking that it’s a waste of time for you to chase downtown and back. And it’s an added risk, isn’t it? Being out on the street that much?”

“I’ll take cabs both ways.”

“Even so.”

“A small risk, I suppose.”

“You could stay here, you know.”

“I’d like to drop my suitcase at the place where I’m staying.”

“Oh?”

“And there’s someone I’ll want to see before I meet Ray this evening. And a stop or two I’ll want to make.”

“I see.”

Our eyes met. She had a lot of presence, this lady did. And something more than that.

“You really look effective in that uniform,” she said.

“Effective?”

“Very effective. I’m just sorry I won’t be able to be here tonight when you have all the accessories. The nightstick and the handcuffs and the badge and the gun.”

“Well, you can imagine how I’ll look with the props.”

“Yes, I certainly can.” She ran the tip of her tongue very purposefully over her lips. “Costumes can be very useful, you know. I sometimes think that’s what I like most about theater. Not that the actors wear costumes physically, although they often do, but that the whole character which an actor puts on is a sort of costume.”

“Do you do any acting yourself, Darla?”

“Oh, no, I’m just a dabbler. I told you that, didn’t I? Why should you think I might have acted?”

“The way you were using your voice just then.”

She licked her lips again. “Costumes,” she said, and ran her eyes over my uniform. “I think I told you that I used to consider myself a very conventional person.”

“I think you did.”

“Yes, I’m quite sure I said that.”

“Yes.”

“Conventional in sexual matters.”

“Yes.”

“But in recent years I’ve found out otherwise. I may have told you that.”

“Uh, yes, I think you did.”

“In fact I’m positive I did.”

“Yes.”

She got to her feet and stood in such a way as to make me very much aware of the shape of her body. “If you were to wear that uniform,” she said, “or one rather like it, and if you were to have handcuffs and a nightstick, I think I would find you quite irresistible.”

“Uh.”

“And we might do the most extraordinary things. Imaginative persons could probably find interesting things to do with handcuffs and a nightstick.”

“Probably.”

“And with each other.”

“Very probably.”

“Of course you might be too conventional for that sort of thing.”

“I’m not all that conventional.”

“No, I didn’t really think you were. Do you find me attractive?”

“Yes.”

“I hope you’re not saying that out of politeness.”

“I’m not.”

“That’s good. I’m older than you, of course. That wouldn’t bother you?”

“Why should it?”

“I’ve no idea. It wouldn’t?”

“No.”