He was lying naked on the sofa bed and staring up at the ceiling, wearing mirrored sunglasses.
“Coffee?”
His head turned slowly while the rest of his body stayed absolutely motionless. “Yes it is.”
I handed it over and he sat up to drink it and then he dressed. As he did so I found myself staring. His skin looked like mine and I never really had a chance to look at mine from the outside. A fairly apt talker, a con artist and smuggler I’d known in Halifax, had called his body his blooded passport. And looking at Smiley I could appreciate the term; he had made his body into his own.
Tiny seed pearls inserted under his foreskin, a Turkish crook thing saying, this is how tough I am. Tattoos of flames on his knees and a razor-clawed eagle on his chest, a Russian crook thing stating I do not kneel and I will avenge myself. Tattoo of a tiger on his back in three colors, a Chinese crook thing so nothing could attack him from behind. But nothing tattooed on his hands, arms, or face; nothing that could be used to identify him when he was working.
Scars from knives on his face and forearms, defensive wounds sewn up with fishing line or dental floss or whatever was handy and allowed to heal badly. Scars from fists on his face. Scars from fire on his ankles and lower back, from stories I’d never heard. Two puckered scars on his front, little dimples from twenty-two hollow points in the shaky hands of a South Korean jade dealer who decided to play instead of pay. Three big scars on his back from police buckshot and glass chunks, because glass becomes shrapnel when force is applied. When he was dressed he looked at me and all I could see was my reflection in his sunglasses. He said hoarsely, “I’m going out for awhile, okay?”
“Sure.”
“Any more job ideas for me?”
“Claire left a list. There’s a copy for you so you can think about them.”
“Sure, I’ll take it with me.”
He took it and left and I went back to the kids.
When they were napping I went and used the extra alarm components I’d borrowed from Marie. I wired Smiley’s door, tucking the machinery into the panelling of the door itself. When it was all in place I checked the receiver. If the door was closed, the receiver was green; when it opened, it turned red and stayed that way. I marked that one and its receiver as number one with a black marker and then marked the rest of the alarms.
The kids were still asleep, so I wired the other doors in the front and back of the house and then the ones to the main bedroom and Fred’s room as well. I had three units left, so I pulled the carpeting from the stairs and put them under the risers there. Then I put all the receivers in the pocket of Claire’s winter coat in the upstairs closet.
With them in place I would have a rough idea of everything that went on in the house, even when I wasn’t there. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start.
When Claire arrived home for lunch I kissed her, fed her, and then showed her how to read the sensors.
“If Smiley’s door indicator turns red it means someone has opened it. If the ones on the stairs go red it means someone has used the stairs.”
When I’d shown her everything she looked at me sadly. “So that’s how it’s going to be?”
“Yes.” Then I kissed her and fled into the early afternoon. The first thing I did was visit Marie. She told me no one had been around either the camp or the house. I nodded, “Okay. By the way, find an extra vehicle and don’t keep using the same one. The cops might start noticing.”
“Sure.”
“You can rent one or borrow it. If you rent it, pay cash. Keep your trail cold. Tell them you’re using it meet your lover and use a smaller rental place, not a national one—they’re more likely to go for that.”
I rechecked the house and went to work with some of the tools and equipment I’d left in the garage making adjustments to the front door. By the time I was done, I’d reinforced the whole inside door frame with bar steel scavenged from an abandoned pawnshop and I’d attached extra sets of quarter-inch steel chain to hold it open at fifteen centimetres. You could break in by chopping the centre panels into kindling or by taking the whole front of the house off. You could not, however, knock the door off the hinges. Not without an arc welder, Jaws of Life, or maybe a shaped explosive charge (God bless you Major Munroe, inventor of the shaped charge; the world is a better place for your contributions.)
When I was done, Marie gave me a bottle of designer water. “Where are you off to now?”
“Wreaking more havoc.”
“Ah. Should I ask?”
“No. Keep your head down.”
Outside I thought about what to do next. While I thought I walked, finally stopping at the end of my block where an Anglican church sat on a lot surrounded by tall, well-tended trees. The wind picked up and I sat on a bench in a dark corner beside a thick elm. While I rested two boys, maybe eleven, walked past. There was no way they could see me, so I eavesdropped.
“She let me put it in her mouth.”
“Bullshit!” A pause. “She did?”
“Yeah. I gave her ten dollars but she did. She said I could do it again, too.”
The second boy whistled. “So where’s she at?”
“Her and her cousin got kicked out by their stepdad. They’re living in that old house.”
“Yeah?”
They were both standing on the sidewalk with their hands in their pockets and the second boy said, “Betcha I can get ten bucks from home.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’ll tell Auntie it’s for school books.”
They took off and I followed them at a distance. I watched them run into a bungalow and then out again. With idle curiosity I followed them the rest of the way until they entered the drug house I’d destroyed.
I made a list: I was helping Marie, that was what I was being paid for. I was helping Smiley and keeping an eye on him, and that was going fine. And I had warned Samantha in a serious way to back off, and she seemed to be doing just that. Lastly, I had dealt with the drug house, permanently, I hoped.
However, the house itself was still there, albeit falling apart.
There were consequences to my actions there, something I’d never considered.
The house was a wreck and no one seemed to be cleaning it up, which meant that the lost and forgotten would continue to use the building. I could do something about that which would keep me busy and that was a good thing. As my uncle Sal used to say, “Idle hands are the devil’s tools.” Or something like that.
And I couldn’t fix any other problem, so I might as well focus on the one I could fix.
I had two names, the Abernathys, who had rented the house, and Jarrod and Tho Jarelski, who owned the house. Abernathy was probably an alias or they were in jail. In any case, the address they had was fake, so finding them would be difficult. I took the path of least resistance via a quick bus ride and a nice walk through River Heights, the Jarelskis’ neighbourhood, just to check things out.
Big, well-kept houses in a clean neighbourhood. Lots of carefully trimmed trees, well-maintained sidewalks, good walls between the properties, grass all shorn at roughly the same height. People walking dogs and barbecuing things.
Frankly, too many people.
The absolute best time to burglarize a place is in the midmorning when most honest, law-abiding folk are at work. Best time to perform a home invasion is in the early evening when you can be sure most people are going to be at the home you want to invade. Unfortunately, my rule didn’t work here because there were too many people around, so I’d have to do it the hard way, at night.
I went home, plotting all the way.
#25
The next evening I was back in the Jarelskis’ neighbourhood, only this time wearing a suit of second-hand clothes I’d bought at a Salvation Army thrift store. The jeans, parka (to make me look truly homeless and decrepit) and T-shirt fit fine but the boots were a bit too wide and I’d pulled on three pairs of socks to make sure of a fit. A few blocks down from the thrift store I stopped in
a Wal-Mart. In the hardware section I grabbed a short-handled pry bar and two rolls of duct tape. In the men’s wear section I found a dark red jogging suit, pants and jacket just slightly too big for me. In the sporting goods I picked up a black wool ski hat and a Bionic Ear, an audio amplification device favoured by bird watchers, amateur spies, and bad guys like myself.
The device was powered by two triple A batteries and looked like a set of fairly fancy ear phones for a CD player, a radio or an MP3 player. It would amplify sounds out to a range of thirty metres using a three-band equalizer that included safety shut offs, so really loud noises wouldn’t deafen the user.
With my shopping basket almost full I stopped at the pharmacy and bought a small pack of rubber gloves and a set of triangular-bladed Exacto knives. At the cash register an older female clerk slowed me down by asking me, “Did you find everything you needed?”
“I did.”
“And was everyone kind to you?”
“They were.”
“And is there anything else we can do for you today?”
I was getting annoyed. “You could unionize.”
“What?”
“Unionize. Join a union. Earn a living wage. Fight the power. Take a stand.”
Her hands were flashing as she bagged my purchases. Nodding at me and smiling brightly, “Uh-huh. Yes. Of course.”
I recalled what the fattish woman’s T-shirt had read, LA LUCHA CONTINUA! Strike while the iron is hot! Struggle to overcome imperialism!
The woman was starting to sweat. I took pity on her as she accepted my money and gave me back my change. She’d remember me if the cops asked but she’d remember me as nuts, which I’m not.
Sometimes, if you can’t be invisible, it’s best to be an asshole.
Six blocks away I changed clothes in the restroom of a coffee shop attached to a non-chain hotel (less chance of security cameras) and then crossed the St. James Bridge into River Heights. I found a small park near a high school where I sat in the pale autumn sunshine and folded my original clothes small and packed them in several layers of plastic bags for later disposal. With that out of the way, I fiddled with the Bionic Ear and entertained myself by listening in to the angry and abusive and pitying conversations of high school students when the classes let out. It was one way to wait for the right time to work.
Twenty metres away, dressed as I was, I was invisible. Neither the kids nor the teachers so much as looked at me as I watched them all and I raised a silent toast of welcome to the real world in commiseration.
I waited two more hours and then started walking slowly, shuffling actually, towards the Jarelskis’ house, fiddling with the ear pieces as I went, mumbling to myself. Everyone I met gave me a wide berth; pretty young housewives walking their dogs, grumpy-looking middle-aged men coming home from their work, and clean white children dressed in the latest gangster fashion.
I kept walking, turning my head slowly from side to side and listening to what people were saying in their cars and on their yards and even in their homes. At the Jarelskis’ house, I heard nothing in the front, so I circled around in the beginnings of the twilight and listened from the back lane. From there I could hear the clattering of metal and glass along with a single female voice speaking in a language I didn’t recognize.
At a guess I’d say it was Ms. Tho Jarelski talking on a phone while cooking. Maybe waiting for Mr. Jarelski to come home from wherever. I’d also guess they didn’t have a dog; there was no shit in the backyard and there was no hint of barking or scrabbling inside.
With that in mind I headed two blocks over to where a big Catholic church occupied a whole block. In the back was a dumpster pulled away from the wall. I curled up to wait until eleven. It was a long time but the early approach had allowed me to scope out the whole area for cops and crooks. No one had paid any attention to me. It was always like that when I disguised myself as a derelict—no one notices or really pays attention to the lost ones who wander the streets. Indeed, most of the time no one even looks them in the eyes, because to do that would be to acknowledge their humanity.
I have a theory about that fear. I suspect that most people don’t want to acknowledge the humanity of the street people because then they’d have to acknowledge that maybe there wasn’t that much difference between them.
And that would maybe make them start wondering about what exactly the difference was.
And that might make them start believing in luck and divine fate.
And that might make them start wondering about why other people had more than they did.
And that might make them realize that the whole world was billionaires laughing at millionaires.
#26
At slightly past eleven I woke up and pulled on the jogging suit, not the easiest thing to do while lying in the dirt and grime, but doable. I then pulled on a pair of rubber surgical gloves (hard to recognize at a distance) and padded the straight edge of the pry bar with about ten layers of duct tape, to muffle the sound in case I had to use it to break glass. It would also make it a lot harder to lift a fingerprint. The padded pry bar went down the front of my pants, the Exacto knives (still in their plastic) went into my right-hand jacket pocket, and I put a roll of duct tape over each fist. With luck anyone who saw me would assume that I was carrying hand weights of some new and unusual design.
I cut the top off the ski hat and pulled it over my head to cover my neck and mouth like a muffler and then put the Bionic Ear back on with the gain turned to full. All my regular clothes along with my wallet (always bring your wallet; if you ever get stopped by the cops, for whatever reason, not having ID is like waving a red flag at a bull, so bring your wallet until you are actually doing something bad, then leave it behind) were already carefully wrapped up in three plastic bags and those went under the dumpster. The parka and the clothes I’d bought from the Salvation Army went into the dumpster. Once I was sure no one was watching I walked out onto the sidewalk, stretched, and started to jog slowly down back lanes, spiralling slowly towards the Jarelski house with the pry bar tapping my dick every few feet.
I reached the Jarelskis’ near midnight. I could hear vague strains of television coming through from the back of the house but no one seemed to be in the kitchen. Without pausing I opened the gate and ran softly up the rear walk. Just before I reached the cedar stairs I wrenched my boots off and put them neatly on the top step.
While I was doing all that my ears were growing points listening for any dangerous sounds, but there was nothing: no neighbours saying, who’s that, Martha? No bystanders calling the cops, no sirens in the distance, no dogs barking. Nothing but sounds of televisions playing shows with titles like Who Wants to Marry a Million Bears, 24/7: The Torture Show and American Idiot.
At the top of the steps I slowly twisted the door handle. It turned easily. Almost no one locks their doors until they’re going to sleep. Two seconds later, silent on stocking feet, I was inside.
As far as kitchens went, it was pretty nice. Dark but nice: black granite counters, a high end gas stove, coffee pod system, microwave, bagel guillotine; all in blacks and fine lines of chrome. Also a black fridge and built-in dishwasher with a black-and-white-checkered floor and black-and-grey-tiled walls.
Expensive.
The Bionic Ear worked perfectly. I could hear a television in the front room and two people talking quietly during the commercials. I pulled my hood up, put the duct tape on top of the fridge, drew out the pry bar, and waited.
After twenty minutes I heard someone padding towards the kitchen from the front room. I stood to the left of the entrance in front of a door and held my breath.
It was the wife; small boned with fine hair, about five foot nothing and wearing a lavender pantsuit and leather moccasins. She turned towards the microwave and yawned and didn’t expect a thing as I surged forward and scooped her up.
She went rigid and her back arced, but she was already off the ground with my left arm around her throat and my right arm
holding her arms to her sides.
Her scream was more a whisper and she kicked my shins, which didn’t hurt much, and her hands scrabbled for my nuts.
I ignored it all and did something a Los Angeles cop showed me once, a Los Angeles Police bar choke hold, outlawed back in the nineties. It was called a blood choke. I felt with my hand until I found the right spot and applied steady, relentless pressure.
She spasmed and stopped moving. In general the person choked out will stay unconscious for two or three times the length of time the hold is applied. That gave me time to very slowly strip lengths of tape off the spool and bind her hands and feet together. Duct tape is never quiet but I did my best. Then I flipped her over and hogtied her feet to her hands before putting a couple of loops around her mouth but leaving her nose free so she could breathe.
She was still breathing and that was good, because the downside of the blood hold is death by asphyxiation, which is why the Lost Angels Police Department had been forced to abandon it. A large number of black men had been killed or turned into vegetables by a large number of white men. Eventually the public had become aware that the hold had some inherent problems and it had been outlawed.
When I was sure her breathing was okay I picked up a glass jar of spaghetti noodles and stepped back into my corner. I took a deep breath and tossed the jar to shatter in the sink.
Smash.
“Honey?”
It was a man’s voice. I stood still and waited for him to do something.
“Honey, are you okay?”
Sound of him getting to his feet and rushing toward the kitchen. I’d put her on the floor in the far corner so he had to turn his head when he came in to see her. His back was to me and he was quite big; over ninety kilos, short and squat; so I cheated a bit and used the pry bar to apply the same blood hold. Ten seconds later he was out too.
Once Mr. Jarelski was hogtied I locked the front, back, and garage doors, checked the house from top to bottom, and found no one. When that was done I dragged them both down to a carpenter’s workshop they had in the basement. Each of them struggled a little but I choked them out again and propped them in two lawn chairs I found in a storage closet. I ducttaped the chairs together, side by side, and then I ducttaped the Jarelskis into immobility, securing their forearms to the arms of the chairs and their calves to the legs of the chairs. Their mouths were still taped shut, and I put an extra roll across their eyes as well.
Your Friendly Neighborhood Criminal Page 13
