Sue Grafton - L is for Lawless

"Hope you can help us out here," Chester said, waving at the safe, which Jones had already spotted.

"No problem. I probably open thirty safes a month. I know this model. Shouldn't take me long."

The four of us stood and watched in fascination as Jones opened his toolbox. There was something in his manner of an old-fashioned doctor on a house call. He'd made his initial diagnosis, the condition wasn't fatal, and we all felt relief. Now it was just a matter of the proper treatment. He took out a cone-shaped device that he attached to the dial, screwing it down tightly. Within minutes he'd popped the dial off and set it aside, then removed the two screws holding the dial ring in place, slipped off the ring and set it with the dial. Next he took out an electric drill and began to bore a hole through the metal in the area that had been covered by the dial and ring.

"You just drill right through?" Babe said. She sounded disappointed, perhaps hoping for dynamite caps or nitroglycerin.

Jones smiled. "I wouldn't put it quite like that. This is a residential fire safe. If this were a burglary safe, we'd run into hardplate: barrier material just behind this steel plating. I got a pressure bar for that, but it'd still take me thirty minutes to drill a quarter-inch hole. Lot of them have auxiliary spring-loaded relocking devices. You hit the wrong spot and you can fire the relockers. If this happens, it gets a lot worse before it gets better again. This is easy."

We were quiet while he drilled, the low-pitched whine of metal making conversation awkward. The hair on the backs of his hands was a fine gold, his fingers long, wrists narrow. He was smiling to himself, as if he knew something the rest of us hadn't considered yet. Or maybe he was just a man who enjoyed his work. As soon as a hole had been drilled, he took out another device.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Ophthalmoscope," he said. "Gadget your doctor uses to peer in your eyes. This shines light on the combination wheels so I can see what we got going." He began to peer into the newly drilled hole, moving closer while flicking an outer dial on the scope to adjust the focal length. While squinting through his ophthalmoscope, he carefully rotated the protruding spindle stub to the left. "This turns the drive wheel, which in turn picks up the third combination wheel. The third wheel moves the second wheel, which then turns the first wheel," he said. "It takes four rotations to get the first wheel moving. That's the one closest to the front of the safe. Here it comes. Perfect. The gate's exactly under the fence. Now we'll just keep reversing the direction of our rotation and lessening the number of turns. Soon as I get all three wheels lined up, the fence will be in position to drop when the lever nose hits the gate in the drive wheel. We keep turning and the lever pulls back the lock bolt and it's all over."

With that, he gave the handle a pull and the safe door opened. Chester, Bucky, and I gave out a simultaneous "Ooo" like we were watching fireworks.

Babe said, "Heck, it's empty."

"They must have got it already. God damn ," Chester said.

"Got what?" Babe said, but he ignored the question, shooting her a cross look.

While Bergan Jones wrote down the combination and put his tools away, Bucky peered into the safe, then got down on his back like an auto mechanic and shone a light into the interior. "Something taped up here, Dad."

I leaned over and peered with him. An item had been secured to the top of the safe: a lumpy-looking ten-inch-by-ten-inch square of beige tape.

Chester stepped over Bucky's legs and crouched by the safe, squinting at the patch. "What is that? Peel it off and give it here. Let me take a look at that thing."

Gingerly Bucky loosened one corner, then pulled it away like a Band-Aid from a wound. A big iron key adhered to the tape. It appeared to be an old-fashioned iron skeleton key with simple cuts in the end. He held it up. "Anybody recognize this?"

"Beats me," I said, and then turned to Chester. "You know what it is?"

"Nope, but Pappy used to fool around with locks now I think of it. He got a kick out of it. He liked to take a lock out of a door and file a key to fit."

"I never saw him do that," Bucky said.

"This is when I was a kid. He worked for a locksmith during the Depression. I remember him telling me what a hoot it was. He had this collection of old locks – probably close to a hundred of them – but I haven't seen them for years."

I turned the key over in my hand. The design was ornate, the handle scalloped, with a hole in the other end like a skate key. Viewed straight on, the bit was shaped almost like a question mark. "The lock and keyhole would be odd looking, to say the least. You don't remember anything like it around here?"

Chester's mouth pulled down. "Not me. What about you guys? You know the place better than I do at this point."

Bucky shook his head, and Babe gave a little shrug.

I held the key out to Bergan Jones. "Any ideas?"

Jones smiled slightly, snapping down the locks on his toolbox. "Looks like a gate key. One of those big old iron jobs like they have on estates." He turned to Chester. "You want me to bill you on this?"

"I'll write you a check. Come on down to the kitchen and we'll take care of it. You probably gathered by now my pappy died a few months back. We're still trying to get his affairs sorted out. The safe came as a surprise. People ought to leave instructions. What the hell this is and who's supposed to get that. Anyways, we do appreciate your help."

"That's what I'm in business to do."

The two men departed, leaving Bucky, Babe, and me to contemplate the key. Bucky said, "Now what?"

"I have a friend who knows a lot about locks," I said. "He might have a suggestion about what kind of lock this might fit."

"Might as well. Won't do us any good otherwise."

Babe took the key and inspected it, frowning. "Maybe Pappy kept it because he liked the way it looked," she said. "It's neat. It's old-timey." She handed it to Bucky, who passed it back to me.

"Yeah, but why bother to keep it in a fireproof safe? He could have stuck it in a drawer. He could have wore it on a chain around his neck," he said.

"If you don't object, I'll see what my local expert has to say."

"Fine with me," Bucky said.

I slipped the key in my jeans pocket without mentioning the fact that my local expert was the burglar who'd also given me the set of key picks I carry in my handbag.

Walking back to my place, I found myself reviewing the entire sequence of events. I have to confess the past twenty-four hours had piqued my curiosity. It wasn't necessarily Chester's spy theory, which still seemed farfetched. What bothered me were the vague, unanswered questions surfacing in the old man's life. I like order and tidiness; no clutter and no dust bunnies hidden under the bed.

As soon as I got home, I sat down at my desk, pulled out a pack of index cards, and started making notes. It was amazing how many details I could actually recall once I began committing them to paper. When I'd exhausted the subject, I pinned the cards up on the corkboard that hangs above my desk. I put my feet up on the desk and leaned back in my swivel chair with my hands locked behind my head and studied the whole collection. Something wasn't right, but I couldn't figure out what it was. I shifted some cards around and pinned them up in a new configuration. It was something I'd read. Burma. Something about Chennault and the American Volunteer Group. For the moment the truth eluded me, but I knew it was there. I thought about nailing down the unit he'd served in. Was that really the issue here, or was there something else at stake? In scanning Johnny's books, I'd seen several AVG fighter pilots mentioned by name. One or more of those guys had to be alive today. Couldn't they provide a way to pinpoint Johnny's fighter group? It'd be a pain in the ass, and I sure wasn't going to do it, but I could at least steer Chester in the right direction. I'd have to check back through the books and see if I could find the reference, but what the hell, I wasn't doing anything else. Besides, once I start worrying a knot, I can't let go of it.