Burglar on the Prowl

by Lawrence Block

  "Something like that," I said, "but on a grander scale. Like it's a really rich dessert, and I'm a diabetic, and I eat it anyway."

  "You're diabetic?"

  "No, that's just an illustration of the relative degree of craziness I'm capable of."

  "That's what I thought, but I wanted to make sure. Everybody has that sometimes, don't they? But this is different. I really think I might be losing it. First that blackout when I only had two drinks, which can't be a good sign. And then this. Can I tell you what happened?"

  "Sure."

  "Sit down. Can I get you anything to drink? There's different kinds of soda, or I could make you a cup of tea. Or coffee, but it'll have to be instant."

  "I'm fine."

  "I wish I could say the same. Bernie, when I woke up Saturday morning I thought about what we'd talked about, about how I brought someone home the night I had the blackout, and how he'd gone through my things but didn't take anything, except for my Lady Remington. And I thought about my missing class ring, and I went through my jewelry more carefully. All my good stuff was there, but I was definitely missing a pair of earrings, and a couple of silver bangle bracelets."

  "More souvenirs."

  "And nothing I couldn't live without, but it was still disturbing."

  "Of course."

  "And then I remembered the money."

  "In your wallet? You said it was all still there."

  She shook her head. "The other money," she said. "I never keep cash in the house, there's no need, not with an ATM two blocks away. But for a week or so I'd had a lot of cash on hand. Well, not a fortune, but I think you could call it a substantial amount. It was over twelve hundred dollars."

  "That's substantial. In cash, anyway."

  "That's what I mean. It was enough so that I found a place to hide it. I put it in the icebox, in the freezer compartment. I don't know, maybe that's the first place a burglar would look."

  Not the first place, I thought, but right up there.

  "Why I had the cash in the first place," she said, "is that Alison Harlowe's wedding was coming up, and she was one of the last of our crowd to get married. And she and Scott were torn between a big wedding and a honeymoon in Europe, they couldn't really afford both without going into debt. So word got around, and we all agreed that the gifts would be cash, but not individual gifts from individual friends, because that would feel like the opening scene inThe Godfather, with everybody coming around with envelopes.

  "So I volunteered to take the collection, and I got in touch with everybody, and people gave what they wanted, and the average gift was a hundred dollars, and by the time everybody was present and accounted for, the honeymoon fund came to almost nine thousand dollars."

  "That's impressive."

  "Most people gave me checks," she said, "but more people than I would have guessed gave me cash, and the cash amounted to over twelve hundred. I put the checks in the bank, and I don't know why I didn't do the same with the cash, but there's something about cash, do you know what I mean?"

  "Definitely."

  "It's like having a secret, or a concealed weapon, or something. It fit neatly into this brown envelope, and I tucked it away in the freezer, and I liked having it there."

  "It beats Pop Tarts."

  "And it's less of a temptation in the middle of the night than a pint of H„agen-Dazs. I suppose I would have put it in the bank eventually, but for the time being I figured it was fine where it was. And I sort of forgot about it. When I first started checking things to see what was missing, when I checked my wallet and counted the cash in it, I didn't even think of the money in the freezer. Maybe that's a sign all by itself that there was something wrong with me."

  "Doesn't sound alarming to me. It slipped your mind, that's all."

  "Or maybe it was my mind that was doing the slipping. Anyway, yesterday after I checked my jewelry drawer I thought about the wedding. The way we worked it, I was supposed to write one big check to cover everybody's contribution, and I'd done that, and mailed it in plenty of time so that they'd have it in the bank before the wedding and honeymoon. But getting packed for the wedding made me think about the check, and that made me think of the cash, and I got this sinking feeling in my stomach and went to the freezer."

  "I guess it wasn't there, or you wouldn't be telling me about it."

  "I took everything out of the freezer, including a beef brisket I never get around to cooking, and it's probably like frozen mastodon meat, it's been in there so long. I really searched, because I so much wanted the money to be there. I mean, I was probably ready for a new electric shaver anyway, and when am I ever going to wear a class ring from Bennett High? But twelve hundred dollars is a lot of money."

  "Sure it is."

  "And I felt really stupid for keeping it there in the first place. I'd put the checks in the bank right away, and it would have been the easiest thing in the world to do the same with the cash. But no, I had to hang on to it. Cold cash, frozen assets-God, I was so damn stupid."

  "Cut it out," I said. "You know what you're doing? You're blaming the victim. You didn't do anything wrong. Some unprincipled son of a bitch"-Bernie by name, I thought-"stole something from you, and you think it's your fault. It's not. It's his."

  "If the money hadn't been there-"

  "But it was, and it had every right to be, and he had no right to take it. If you'd left it in plain sight on the kitchen table you could blame yourself, maybe, but you didn't. You put it in the freezer where he had no business looking, and he poked around and found it and took it. Barbara, it's really not your fault, and it certainly doesn't mean you're losing your grip on reality."

  "I know," she said, and swallowed. "There's more."

  "Oh?"

  "When I got home this afternoon," she said, "I opened the freezer. Don't ask me why."

  "Okay."

  "No, I know why. I had the harebrained thought that maybe it would be there this time. So I opened the freezer."

  "And?"

  "And there it was."

  Right where I'd left it the previous afternoon, while she was out on Long Island. "You're kidding," I said. "So it had been there all along, huh?"

  "Bernie, I swear I took everything out of the freezer. Everything."

  "Even the mastodon meat."

  "Everything. I stood there looking into this completely empty compartment, and it even crossed my mind that it would be a good time to defrost it, but instead I put everything back. That money wasn't there, Bernie."

  "Okay."

  "Do you believe me?"

  "Sure."

  "And it's there now. Do you want to see it?"

  "No, why would I want to see it?"

  "So you'll know I'm not crazy. Except you'll know the opposite, that Iam crazy. Here, I want to show you. See? Do you want to count it?"

  I put a hand on her arm to steady her. "Put it away," I urged.

  "It comes to exactly twelve hundred and forty dollars. Are you sure you don't want to count it?"

  "I'm positive."

  "It must have been there all along. It couldn't go away and come back. But how could I have missed it?"

  There were, I told her, any number of logical explanations. She challenged me to name one.

  "The money could have dematerialized," I said. "Then it reappeared."

  "Something like that could happen?"

  "Who's to say it couldn't? Look at it this way, Barbara. If you hadn't checked yesterday, it could have dematerialized and reappeared without your knowing anything had happened."

  "But things don't dematerialize. Nothing ever dematerialized before."

  "I had a pint of H„agen-Dazs do just that once. It was gone, and I swear I didn't touch it."

  "I'm serious."

  "Well, don't be," I said. "I'll tell you what most likely happened. You were preoccupied and panicky when you looked for the money yesterday. It was there, and you took it out of the freezer along with the rest of the food, and it just didn't
register that that's what it was. And when you put everything back, it was still just another Stouffer's TV dinner for all the notice you gave it. It was right in front of your eyes, but you didn't see it, and that happens all the time."

  "And it's not a sign of Alzheimer's? Or a brain tumor?"

  "Afraid not."

  "I know you're right," she said. "That must be what happened. Although I sort of like your first theory, about dematerialization and all. Poof! It's gone. Poof! Poof! It's back."

  "Ricky Jay does stuff like that all the time. It's just magic."

  "Well, that explains it. You know what? I feel better now. Where should we eat?"

  We ate at a French place, where she put away a big dish of cassoulet while I had the steak frites. We each had a dry Rob Roy first-I ordered one, and she thought it sounded like a good idea. We decided our dishes called for a robust red, and agreed on a Nuits St.-Georges that turned out to be a splendid choice. It may not have been the meal I'd envisioned in the imaginary weekend in Paris I'd suggested to Carolyn, but there was nothing wrong with it.

  I grabbed the check, but she insisted we split it, and sounded as though she really meant it. She got out a credit card. I had plenty of cash, so I let her charge the whole thing and gave her my half in green.

  She brandished the bills before putting them away. "I'm a little nervous," she said. "Are you sure they're not going to dematerialize on me?"

  "Always a risk."

  Back on 36th Street, she led the way up the two flights of stairs and had a little trouble getting the key into the uppermost lock.Let me, I might have said, and taken the keys from her, and unlocked the locks for her. But of course I didn't do that, and the key slipped in and the lock turned.

  And she had no trouble at all getting the second key into the bottom lock. It went right in as if drawn by a magnet, or an irresistible impulse. But then it wouldn't turn.

  "Damn," she said, and forced it, and of course it snapped in the lock.

  "Oh, hell," she said. "Look what I did? Shit piss fuck. Pardon my Latvian, but what a stupid thing to do." She looked at the lock, looked at what was left of the key. "I don't believe this. We'll have to call a fucking locksmith. God fucking dammit."

  A curious calm settled over me, though I'll be damned if I know why. I took hold of her shoulders, said "Easy, easy" with the certitude of a horse whisperer, and moved her gently to one side. I drew my tools from my pocket, selected a small pair of needlenose pliers of the finest German steel, and extracted the broken-off bit of key from where it was lodged. I presented it for inspection like a dentist with a drawn molar, dropped it into my outside breast pocket, and bent to the all too familiar task of opening her lock.

  It didn't take long. When the door was open I straightened up and motioned her inside, but she stayed where she was, wide-eyed and openmouthed. "Come inside and sit down," I said. "There's something I have to tell you."

  Thirty

  Aburglar," she said. "I never met a burglar before. But how can I say for certain? I wouldn't have known you were one if you hadn't told me."

  "You must have had your suspicions when I opened your lock."

  "I don't know what I thought. That this wasn't happening, that I really had lost my mind and I'd never be able to find it. Or that maybe you were just this incredible storybook hero, a man for all seasons able to cope with anything."

  "What kind of hero hides under the bed?"

  "A smart one. Is there really room under there? I've heard of women who always check the bed to see if there's a man under it. I thought it was a joke, but now just watch, I'll be doing it myself. What's the name of the drug he gave me?"

  "Rohypnol. Roofies for short."

  "The date-rape drug. What a bastard he must be. Pardon my Latvian, but what a motherfucking cocksucking shiteating cuntrag asswipe." She took a breath. "Whew! I got carried away there. Pardon my Latvian, or did I say that already?"

  "You can say it all you want."

  "I brought one stranger home with me, and there was another one already here. Suppose I'd come home alone. What would you have done?"

  "Pretty much the same thing, when I missed my chance to get out the window. Incidentally, you're taking a big chance keeping it nailed shut like that. Suppose there's a fire?"

  "There are two windows side by side."

  "Right, and they're nailed shut."

  "I bet I can tell you which one you tried."

  "Only one's nailed shut? I'll be a ringtailed son of a bitch."

  "It's a good thing you picked the one on the right, or you'd have gone out the window with all my good jewelry. How come you put it back, anyway?"

  "Because I felt sorry for you. Because by the time he left and I got out from under the bed I felt as though I knew you, and I don't take things from people I know."

  "You kept the money."

  "Well, I didn't know you that well. And it was only money, it wasn't something personal like jewelry."

  "My dad gave me the charm bracelet. He was a coin collector, and he'd add a coin for birthdays and other occasions, or just because he'd picked up something at a show. I never wear it because it looks dorky, but I'd hate to part with it. I probably ought to keep it in a safe-deposit box. It must be worth a few dollars."

  "The diamond earrings, too."

  "I know. They were my grandmother's, and I'd hate to lose them. But I wear them sometimes, and that would mean having to go to the bank first."

  I told her about hidey-holes, and that I'd make one for her.

  "My hero," she said. And her eyes got this look in them, and it seemed like a good time to kiss her. And, well, one thing led to another.

  "That's how you knew it was pink," she said.

  In light of the particular activity that immediately preceded this remark, it took me a second to realize she was talking about her Lady Remington.

  "You took it," she said, "so of course you knew what color it was. Why do you suppose he smashed it? He likes his women hairy?"

  "Quite the contrary. He threatened to shave you."

  "Toshave me? Where would he-oh."

  "Right."

  "In that case I'm glad he broke the shaver. I've already replaced it, and God knows how long the other would have taken. I guess he broke the thing because he's all those things I already called him, but why did you take it?"

  "To keep you from wondering why it was broken."

  "So I wouldn't know just how bad a night it had been. That's the same reason you straightened up. And you put the jewelry back because you're a sweet man. You may be a criminal, but you're too much of a softie to be a hardened criminal."

  "Sometimes I tell myself I'm not really a criminal, I'm just a man who performs criminal acts."

  "Oh, I like that."

  "And then I tell myself that's a load of crap."

  "I like that, too. You put the jewelry back because you felt like you knew me, but you kept the money because it was only money, and then you put it back. Because we'd slept together?"

  "I suppose so. And you hadn't noticed it was gone, and this way it would be back before you missed it."

  "Except it wasn't, but how could you know I would look between the time we talked on the phone and the time you got here to replace it?"

  "I should have expected it."

  "Why, Bernie?"

  "Because it's a coincidence, and I've had a run of them lately. If I'd known you'd missed the money, I don't know how I would have handled it. I'd have found some way to give it back to you, but not in a way that would leave you doubting your sanity."

  "You were Gaslighting me, and you didn't know it. I like the explanations you came up with, incidentally."

  "They were the best I could do on the spur of the moment."

  "Dematerialization's cute, but the other was actually plausible enough to make me feel better. The idea that I could have taken the money out and put it back without it registering. I suppose that would be a form of hysterical blindness, wouldn't it? But
I didn't really get hysterical until I came home and the money was there again, so would it still be hysterical blindness?"

  "Maybe it's more along the lines of an emotionally detached retina."

  "That sounds right. Wow, you've had a busy few days, haven't you? Wednesday night you broke into my apartment, except that's the wrong word for it, because you didn't actually break anything. The only thing that got broken was the Lady Remington, and you're not the one who broke it. Whatever we call it, you were here Wednesday night. Then Friday you picked me up at Parsifal's, or I picked you up-"