Mrs. Altman proved to be the kind of witness the police must pray for. There were no fanciful elaborations. She was telling it like it was and, despite Vivienne’s doubts about the possibility of knowing whether or not someone was telling the truth, Orson was convinced the description of the accident the woman across the lunch table was giving him was exactly as she had seen it.
“There’s a hill coming up to where the car went off the road. I was just coming up to the crest when I saw him weave. He’d been heading toward the double yellow when he seemed to overcorrect and went right through the guardrail. I can’t be sure of his speed, of course, but the limit is forty-five along that stretch, and I don’t think he was going faster than that. As the car turned, I saw he had a cell phone in his hand.
“There was another car behind him. It was probably fifty yards or so back. Believe me, I didn’t get more than a glimpse at it. My attention was caught up with what was happening to his car. All I saw was someone in it, also using a cellphone. Really, I can’t tell you any more than that.
“Was it a man or woman driving?”
A head shake. “I have the vague feeling it was a woman, but I would never swear to it, especially these days with men having their hair done in beauty salons.”
“Any idea about the make of the car?”
Again, a shake of the head. “I’m afraid I’m not very good at telling one kind of car from another. It seemed to be compact size, but I wouldn’t even want to testify to that.
“Color?” Orson was thinking of the white Daren van with the lightning stroke logo on the side.
“Dark. Beyond that I can’t say.”
***
Vivienne’s comment as he finished telling her about the results of the interview was, “That means more work. Maybe Riordan’s done it already. If not, you can alert him to it.”
“What’s it?”
“Check all the auto rentals for a lone woman coming in on the day before the accident. Car out for just one day. Simple.”
“Simple! Do you have any idea of how many rental outlets there are within twenty miles of here? And, if she rented one, she’d never have used her own name or her own ID.”
“That’s Riordan’s problem. We’ve got our own fish to fry. I talked to a police clerk back in Rochester. She’s going to fax us the accident report—if she can find it.
***
The morning sped by quickly for both of them—Orson catching up on other cases, Vivienne tinkering in her office with the pacemaker that had finally arrived, and also with what she had insisted to Orson was a magneto brought up to date.
It was just minutes before usual closing time when the fax machine coughed out the accident report, with Orson looking over Vivienne’s shoulder as the document emerged.
Orson was the first to comment. “It looks like mechanical failure. Tie rod got loose and broke an oil line.”
“Geez!” Vivienne exclaimed. “It’s no wonder his car went off the highway. Even back then a ’39 Chevy was an antique.” She paused, repeated the word “antique” and reached for the phone. It took several calls to finally locate the auto dealership formerly owned by Floyd and Kristina Hansen. At that point, Vivienne pushed the speaker button.
The disembodied voice said, “Sure. That’s what we are. An antique-car dealership. Business has been here for over forty years. And we have two beautiful Model-T’s right here on the floor. Lots of spare parts for them in case that’s a concern.”
When they were finally able to break away, Orson said, “I guess it’s time to level with Riordan. We don’t have any proof, but the evidence is piling up.”
Vivienne was stuffing various pieces of equipment into a briefcase. “I’ll get proof. Call Kristina at her office and tell her you want to discuss the case with her. Have her come out, and stall her. As soon as she pulls up in front of the building, give me a ring and let me know.”
“You’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do, are you?”
“I’m shocked! Do you think for one moment I’d do anything illegal?”
Before he could stop her, Vivienne gave him a four-finger wave as she was closing the door.
***
“This is a bad, bad idea, Vivienne.” Orson’s face reflected his concern as he spoke into the office phone. “With all that electronic equipment she sells, she’s bound to have a burglar system at home.”
“Piece of cake. I’ve already checked it out. It took only minutes to tape in a by-pass. If I missed anything, the security company should be by long before I go in. At the moment I’m sitting a block away with the house in view. No action yet, and I really don’t expect any. Is she on her way from her office?”
Orson could see the answer to the question pulling into the office parking lot. “She’s here. For God’s sake, be careful!”
“What’s to be careful? She’s there, twenty minutes away, and I’m here. I’ll leave my phone on. Just call me when she leaves. In the meantime, I’ve got a lot to do. Ciao.”
Orson knew he should have mapped out more carefully what he planned to tell Kristina, but Vivienne’s scheme had unnerved him, perhaps even more than he had originally envisioned.
“I take it you have something significant to report,” Kristina said as soon as she sat down.
“Yes and no. Vivienne sat in with the experts. That particular make of cellphone couldn’t possibly have interfered with the pacemaker.”
Kristina seemed to be digesting that information before she asked, “What about the pacemaker, itself?”
The phone rang at that moment. Orson excused himself, actually grateful for the interruption.
“Hi, Riordan here. Got some news about your client. Something she’s not going to like to hear.”
Orson said nothing. Riordan paused, as though expecting a question. “We lucked out on that tip you gave us. Of course we’d been planning on checking, anyway. A woman matching her description rented a car the day of the accident. Phony name. Phony license. Paid cash, then abandoned the car a few blocks from Daren Electronics. She wore dark glasses, but there’s a nice set of fingerprints on the receipt and a signature that could be used for a writing match. Kristina Daren has a lot of questions to answer about that car and the accident. Of course, I still haven’t the foggiest idea as to how she did it, but I’m sure she did do it, and she’s scheduled for a long interrogation.”
Another pause. “You still there?”
“Yes.”
“Well here’s a bonus piece of information. Kristina Daren also has a boyfriend. He’s the owner and manager of Meckler’s Gun Shop.”
Yet another pause from Riordan’s end before a, “Hey. What’s going on?”
Orson looked across his desk at the woman who was waiting patiently for the end of the conversation. “Smiley Face.”
“What? You mean… Oh, oh! Got it. Keep her busy, I’ll get the local patrol there in minutes. I’m on my way.”
The usual smile greeted the end of the call, and Orson did his best to explain how there might have been something faulty about the pacemaker, that Vivienne would describe the problem in greater detail on her return from a trial run with it up in the vicinity of the accident, that just generally they were on to something.
It wasn’t until a defiant Daren had been herded into a patrol car and Orson was attempting to explain her modus operandi to Riordan, that a call came through from Vivienne. Her amusement was obvious. “Get in touch with Riordan. Tell him to get a warrant and to look for electronic equipment in the garage. Kristina was nice enough to have it all set up on a workbench, pacemaker, clone phone, and a magneto brought up to date. And there’ll be another surprise waiting there for him. I’ll see you at the station because I’m sure the police will need statements from us.”
***
It wasn’t until Vivienne and Orson were leaving the station that he got the whole story. Vivienne was still amused. Orson was appalled.
“You have to give Kristina credit. It was all
very well planned. She had the magneto rigged up to a battery to do the cranking for her. I’ll bet your Dad would have approved of that innovation. So she followed her husband in that rental car. Waited until he was at the most dangerous spot on the road, called him on the cell phone and as soon as he answered punched the button on the magneto. His pacemaker must have jolted the hell out of him.”
“But why the cellphone call?”
“Greed! Turns out Art didn’t believe in insurance the way her first husband did, and Kristina wanted more than to just get rid of him. She was hoping to pin the liability for the accident on the cellphone company or the pacemaker company, or both. That’s why she hired us, hoping we could at least muddy the waters enough for our investigation to make a case for her in court.”
“Ugh!”
“Fantastic. By the way, did you see the look on Riordan’s face when he was describing how they found Meckler bound and gagged in the garage along with all that equipment.”
“I clean forgot about Meckler,” Orson said. “And I never imagined he’d be visiting Kristina while you were there.”
“I didn’t exactly expect a visitor, either. But it was after business hours, he had a key to her house and was stopping by. I heard him come in and was ready for him. Good thing I was. He was packing.” She lifted a hand shoulder high. “I’m a bit out of practice with my chop. I’ll have to go back to breaking two-by-fours. But it did work. He never knew what or who hit him.”
“I suppose she was planning on marrying him,” Orson mused.
Vivienne guffawed. “Do you think she had any plans laid out for her third husband? Just think how much easier it will be with this one if she somehow beats the rap. From an auto dealership, to an electronics shop to a gun store, no less.”
THE PERFECT CIRCLE
Steve Totten slipped on a pair of powdered latex gloves, then waited for the rumble of traffic to increase before giving the window a sharp rap. The wait wasn’t really necessary, but he prided himself on never taking chances. The suction cup held the perfect circle of glass etched out by the cutter—the sound it made when breaking clear was more a soft musical note than a noise. The window was an old fashioned one with sash weights. Reaching in carefully with his gloved hand to avoid the sharp edges, he released the latch, slowly pushed open the window, pulled himself up on the sill and dropped into the darkened room.
Burglary had been Steve’s specialty since his senior year in high school. But back then, accompanied by friends, it had been a lark, and as much like what he was doing now as wielding a machete was to using a surgeon’s scalpel. And that was why he’d gotten caught, spent eighteen months behind the Walls, learned his now much polished professional technique from an old con, was back in circulation, was operating alone, and was well on the way to becoming rich.
As he looked back at it, the dumbest part of those early days was in not setting limits, in not deciding beforehand to pull the act just so many times and then quit. Actually, the operation itself had a lot to recommend it. The four of them would cruise down the empty streets in the business district around two in the morning. The one with the best pitching arm would hurl a coke bottle through the plate glass window of a likely store, then they’d speed off, drifting back later to see if the noise had aroused anyone. Nine times out of ten, it had, and they would hunt out another section of the district to repeat the performance. On that tenth time, they’d score.
And then, one night, the cops didn’t rush to the scene, blue lights flashing, but instead waited quietly in a nearby alley. The coast seemed clear. It wasn’t. Steve could still remember Sergeant Casey shaking his head over the four young men who had left thousands of dollars of damage in their wake, an amount far exceeding the value of the stolen goods.
But the months behind the Walls, followed by a year’s probation, hadn’t been wasted. Steve went to work for a charitable organization, soliciting door to door—an ideal job for casing potential targets. He was at least as honest as the other collectors, skimming off only small amounts of cash, and faithfully—though enviously—turning in all the checks he knew seldom benefited the announced goals of his solicitation.
No longer having to be concerned about a probation officer who could drop in unexpectedly (once even with Sergeant Casey, who was still on burglary detail) Steve now devoted himself seriously to his actual vocation. The first step had been to obtain a storage locker, well away from the studio apartment he was living in. The next step was to equip himself with the simple and readily disposable tools of his trade—a glasscutter, a suction cup, a pen lighter—dropped into a dumpster after every trick. No jimmies, no skeleton keys, no elaborate burglar’s tools. In the unfortunate, though unlikely, event that the police suspected him and obtained a search warrant, neither the apartment nor van would reveal a trace of the loot or the implements designed to burglarize.
The one additional and essential item was becoming a nuisance, however. After hearing a radio attorney announcing the dangers of latex gloves, he was now convinced that he’d found the reason for his reddened and itchy hands. The further announcement that, “If you feel that you have developed an allergy to latex as a result of the use of that product in your profession, consult an attorney. An action against the manufacturer may well be called for.”
Steve quickly decided that he wouldn’t sue. He also decided that this would be the last time he’d ever use the damn things.
Steve’s watchword was always caution—extreme caution. The two crates in the storage warehouse were almost full, and once they were, he would move on. No local fence ever saw the fruits of Steve’s labor. Those were being saved for Cousin Frank in Chicago, who would guarantee at least fifty percent of face without any of the dangers attendant upon patronizing a local fence.
And he never entered a house cold. After a careful casing and waiting for weekends when homes were most likely to be empty for an evening, Steve would go to a nearby pay phone. Answering machines were never proof of an empty house, but he had found an infallible way to get a response if it wasn’t. At the tone, he would come up with an emergency suitable to the occasion and, in a suitably disguised voice, leave the number of the pay phone—and wait. The scheme worked.
Burglar alarms, or their possibility, called for different tactics. Several advance late-night visits, followed by cautious retreats, would reveal motion detectors. Seeming attempts at forcible entry would usually trigger any alarms which could bring the police or guards. Conspicuous signs announcing “Alert Security Systems” almost invariably signaled the absence of such devices. But the principle was always the same. Check and recheck the ground carefully.
It all worked and worked well. Tonight was the eleventh burglary, and he knew it was destined to fill the last empty spaces in the storage crates. Tomorrow he’d pack them off to Chicago by airfreight and would follow them before the next weekend. Considering his relatively frugal lifestyle, with careful investments he could go into semi-retirement. Maybe he’d work part time as a security guard. There was something especially appealing about that thought.
This evening had begun with a promise followed by a disappointment. An answering phone replied to Steve’s dialing. After the tone, he announced, “We have an emergency call for a Mr. Seymour Berkowitz. Please call the following number so that we may be sure we have the correct party: 989 8843.” The message, unfortunately, produced an almost immediate response. Steve scowled at the ringing phone. Allowing some time for a second attempt by the Berkowitzs to track down the emergency, Steve then tried the Lehrings, and after a fifteen minute wait set off for their home.
So far, all was going well, in spite of his now itching hands. He looked back briefly at the hole in the windowpane and admired his workmanship. Over time, and after much practice, the circle had become perfect. He remembered Michelangelo—the prison had an excellent library—who left cards with a hand drawn perfect circle on it so that the recipient knew, without being told, who his visitor had been. By now the polic
e undoubtedly recognized this calling card, but this caller was and would remain anonymous.
Swiftly but carefully Steve searched for the answering phone. On finding it, he erased the messages and then settled down to serious exploration.
The results this time, as he finished filling the pillowcases, were falling short of expectations. Jewels must have been kept in a safe which Steve wasn’t about to go looking for. Since the residents were old timers, with at least a couple of generations of family in the house behind them, he had expected rooms full of recognizable and portable antiques. But the pickings were slim. Fortunately, the weight of the silverware indicated something more than plate, and these added a comforting heft to his burden. A Rolex watch, left behind in one of the bedrooms, seemed very promising.
One last look around produced a few additional items, then Steve slipped out the window into the shadows, peeled off his gloves, rubbed his itching hands, walked a half-block to his van, and headed for the storage locker, stopping only very briefly besides a dumpster.
He slept late, called in sick, had a hearty and unhealthful breakfast at the nearby Pancake House, then was off on his last trip to the lockers with a rented dolly to load the unwieldy boxes.
The end of his career didn’t banish his usual caution. A light green pickup seemed to be following him. Stopping at the next light, he made a sudden right turn. The pickup sailed on. Steve checked his rearview mirror frequently, and although traffic was heavy, he was certain that the vehicle never came back into sight.
It took almost a half hour to load the boxes, and Steve became so engrossed in his work that he never noticed the cars that drove up, parked at each end of the narrow alleyway, and disgorged several blue-uniformed figures. Sergeant Casey officiated at the interrogation, which was really a simple matter. Before asking for an attorney, Steve traded off the bare essentials, in order to find out where his system had broken down. The sergeant was very cooperative, describing in loving detail how five sneaker cars, including the green pickup, had traded off the duty of following him to the lockers.
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