The Pot Thief Who Studied Ptolemy (The Pot Thier)

by J. Michael Orenduff

  Here is my conclusion as a professional anthropologist. Our society is currently stratified along an age line about 15 years younger than my age. The only people above that line who have tattoos are former sailors who got too drunk in Manila and woke up the next morning with something they have since come to regret. I speak here of tattoos. The other thing some of them woke up with can be cured with penicillin. The only people above the stratification line who have metal in their bodies are those who’ve had a hip or knee replacement.

  Below this dividing line of age, virtually everyone has tattoos and/or piercings. The older people think this will hamper the younger ones because they think that when the youngsters get older, they won’t be able to enter professions such as law because lawyers don’t have tattoos or pierced bodies.

  But the situation is temporary. The obvious fact being overlooked by my generation is that all the current lawyers will die, not an altogether bad thing. The only replacements will be from among the current crop of young people with their body adornments. So the stratification will disappear until some future generation decides it’s cool not to decorate themselves as their elders have done, and we will then have the same stratification, but in reverse.

  I was wondering whether my profound conclusion deserved to be added to my Schuze’s Anthropological Premisses (SAP’s) when Tristan arrived. He was wearing black cotton pants with a drawstring and a Sierra Club sweatshirt. If he has any tattoos or piercings, they are located in areas not visible in public. What he does have is a layer of baby fat he hasn’t yet outgrown and what all the girls seem to think of as bedroom eyes. Despite his Northern European name, he has Mediterranean skin the same tone as Sophia Loren. Come to think of it, his face is somewhat like hers – large intelligent eyes, good cheekbones, and pouty lips that you don’t think of that way because he’s always smiling. Thankfully, the comparison ends with the face. He has a normal chest and small hips.

  “I hope you didn’t leave your friend on my account.”

  “Actually, Uncle Hubert, I was glad to have an excuse to get away.”

  “It didn’t go well?”

  “You might say it went too well. She asked me if she could leave a few things at my apartment.”

  “Like clothes and a toothbrush?”

  “Something like that.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I said I’d have to check with you.”

  “Why me?”

  “Well, you are sort of a surrogate parent.”

  “I’m honored you think so, Tristan, but you don’t normally consult me on such things.”

  “Yeah, well I didn’t really want to consult you. I was just buying time.”

  “You haven’t made any promises to the young lady, have you?”

  “No! In fact, she invited herself over last night. We’ve had a few dates, and she’s fun to be with, but she’s sort of pushy.”

  I thought about Stella. “Pushy is not always bad.”

  “Really? I guess I hadn’t thought about that. It makes me uncomfortable though. Will you buy me a coffee?”

  “Sure.”

  He smiled. “How about breakfast?”

  “Sure.”

  He ordered a cappuccino and something called the Lobo Special, hash browns smothered with chili and cheese. That’s ‘chili’ as in ground beef, beans, tomato sauce, and chile powder, not ‘chile’ as in the only green vegetable that actually tastes good.

  “Maybe I will consult you,” he said between bites.

  “O.K., here’s my advice. Tell her I pay the rent for the apartment, and I don’t allow anyone to reside there except you.”

  “Yes sir,” he said cheerily between bites. And those were the last bites because the entire breakfast had disappeared.

  I told him about the pot smashing and my desire to protect my shops. He suggested a magnetic lock that would release only when I pushed a button under the counter. The doors to both shops have windows in them, so I could screen people before letting them in. I didn’t much like the idea, but I told him to install the locks.

  I asked him how he was doing and he said he was broke, so I slipped him a hundred dollars.

  “Thanks, Uncle Hubert. Now I can pay for my own breakfast.”

  I paid anyway.

  28

  After my visit with Tristan, I fabricated nine duplicates of the clay piece I had retrieved from the fourth floor stairwell bolthole.

  I thought about making an extra one for Stella as a gag gift, but then I came to my senses.

  After lunch I opened the store and settled behind the counter with the book on Ptolemy. It’s the sort of reading Susannah gives me a hard time about because nothing I learn from it will have any practical application.

  As I was thinking about Susannah, I looked up and there she was, coming down the street from the west and carrying a coffee in each hand. She walked methodically up to my door and kicked on it.

  I drew back the door and asked, “To what do I owe the honor of—”

  “Close the shop, Hubie, and let’s sit down in your kitchen.”

  I had just opened, but what difference did it make? The odds were I wouldn’t have any customers, so I did as I was told and followed her back.

  “You brought me—”

  “Do you have any Kahlua?”

  “Yes, but it’s—”

  “Get it. And two mugs.”

  She took the tops off the paper cups and poured the contents in to the two mugs. I handed her the Kahlua and she poured a generous shot in to one of my mugs.

  “You want some?”

  I shook my head and she took a large gulp of her liquor-laced coffee.

  She appeared shell-shocked. She looked up like she was going to say something and then she swallowed another gulp of the coffee. She stared down at her cup and took several deep breaths. “Well, Hubie, I know you’re not the type to say I told you so, but you can say it if you want to.”

  “Why would I want—”

  “I just had my first computer-dating experience.”

  “Oh.”

  “The guy’s message to me was witty and urbane. He poked fun at computer dating and even admitted he hadn’t told anyone he was doing it because he thought it was hokey. Then he wrote – here, let me read it to you,” she said and pulled a crumpled paper from her purse. “‘I tried the singles bars but all the gaiety seemed so forced, all the patrons so young. I sat at the bar and wondered what cruel twist of fate had placed me in this farce. So I figured computer dating couldn’t be any worse. After the first hundred messages I got, I decided I was wrong. It was worse. Then I read what you said, and I thought I sensed a kindred spirit’. Doesn’t that sound great, Hubie? Isn’t that exactly the sort of response I was hoping for when I placed that edgy paragraph you suggested?”

  “Actually,” I corrected, “I didn’t suggest—”

  “He writes well, doesn’t he?”

  I thought ‘cruel twist of fate’ was hackneyed but didn’t say so.

  “You think I should have suspected, Hubie? He writes well. He thinks the people in singles bars are too young, and his name is Frederick. That’s not all that common a name. Maybe I subconsciously didn’t want anything to go wrong, so I suppressed my caution.”

  “Susannah?”

  “Yes?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I arranged to meet the guy who wrote what I just read to you. In fact, I met him a few minutes ago at Alfredo’s Coffee House. That’s where we arranged to meet.” She took another slug of coffee.

  “And?” I prompted.

  “And I recognized him.”

  I paused briefly to think. “Well, of course you recognized him. That’s sort of the point, isn’t it? What did he do? Wear a monocle? Hold a rose between his teeth?”

  “I knew him, Hubie. I mean he was someone I already knew.”

  I was confused. “Why would you need a computer dating service to arrange a meeting with someon
e you already knew?”

  “Geez, Hubert, you are hopeless. Do you have any ice?”

  I took a tray from the fridge and dropped a couple of cubes in her empty mug. She poured some Kahlua over the ice.

  “You want some more coffee? I could brew some.”

  “No thanks, straight Kahlua is fine. You don’t give your last name in computer dating. That’s supposed to keep freaks from finding out where you live.”

  “So you do have to do something like wear a monocle,” I said triumphantly.

  She rolled her eyes to indicate my example was ridiculous, but she said I was right. “He said he had a thin moustache and would be wearing a black windbreaker. I said I would have on a green corduroy dress. So I walked in, glanced around and spotted a man with a thin moustache and a black windbreaker, and it was him.”

  “Of course it was him. How many people wear thin mustaches and black windbreakers? And on top of that, he was there at the right time and—”

  “No, Hubert. Not him as in the person I was supposed to look for. Him – the person I already know.”

  Now I was really confused.

  “See if you can guess who it was.”

  “Which one? The him you were supposed to look for or the him you already know?”

  “It’s one person.”

  “Oh.”

  “Let me give you the clues again. Well-educated, old enough to think people in singles bars are too young, has a thin moustache, and is named Frederick.”

  “Well, I’m relatively well-educated and I think people in singles bars are too young, but I’m not named Frederick, and I’ve always been clean-shaven, so it wasn’t me.”

  “Come on, Hubie, be serious. I really want to know if you can guess this.”

  “O.K., was it Frederick March?”

  “Who the hell is Frederick March?”

  “He’s a famous actor, well-educated, often sports a thin moustache, has the right name. I wouldn’t be surprised if he wears a black windbreaker. He’s quite dashing.”

  “Do I know any famous actors?”

  “I suppose not. Anyway, now that I think about it, Frederick March is probably dead.”

  “Geez. O.K., one more clue. He works at the University.”

  I mulled it over. “Frederick. Thin moustache. Since you keep mentioning education, I assume he’s a faculty member. I can’t think of …oh, no. It wasn’t—”

  “Frederick Blass? Yes it was.”

  “The head of the art department?”

  “The very one.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I turned away to leave, but he had already spotted me.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because he called my name. And then when I turned to face him, he said – God, this is so embarrassing – ‘Am I so unattractive that you would flee without saying hello?’”

  “Why didn’t you just keep walking when he called your name? He couldn’t be sure you were the one he was waiting for.”

  “Of course he was sure. How many people wear green corduroy dresses? God, I’m so stupid. I picked that dress because it’s so easy to spot. What I should have done is said I’d be the one in the white blouse. That way I could have made a clean getaway. Well, I’ve learned something for the next time.”

  I couldn’t believe she was contemplating a next time, but this didn’t seem like a good time to argue the point. “Meanwhile, what are you going to do about this time?”

  “Well, he invited me to a party.”

  “You didn’t accept, did you?”

  “I did.”

  “Susannah! You can’t go out with your department head.”

  “He’s not my department head. You’re making the mistake everyone makes. Art history and studio art are not the same department. In fact, they aren’t even in the same college. Studio art is in the college of fine arts, and art history is in the college of humanities.”

  “That sounds like a Clintonesque quibble to me. You’re a student and he’s a faculty member, and…and...” And I didn’t know what. I found the whole idea disturbing, but I didn’t know why.

  “I’m not one of his students. He has no say in my academic progress. And on top of that, he is rather handsome.”

  “He’s old enough to be your father,” I said and then immediately wished I hadn’t.

  “I’d guess he’s around forty, and I’m almost thirty. That’s not such a big deal.”

  “I guess not.”

  Susannah seemed to relax for the first time since she crossed my threshold. “There’s another reason I agreed to go to the party.”

  I really didn’t want to talk about it anymore.

  “Don’t you want to know what that reason is, Hubert?”

  “Not really.”

  “Come on, don’t be a fuddy-duddy. I promise you’ll like this reason.”

  “Just tell me it’s not because he has a thin moustache.”

  “No. It’s because the party is at his apartment.”

  “Why would I like that?”

  “Because he lives in Rio Grande Lofts.”

  29

  The real coincidence was not that Ognan Gerstner and Frederick Blass both lived in Rio Grande Lofts. Many of the residents are university people who came here from back East where high-rise living is common. We Westerners like our space. I doubt there’s a single native New Mexican living in Rio Grande Lofts.

  The real coincidence was that I wanted in and was invited. Why would Blass let his date bring a date? Well, it turns out Susannah and Blass didn’t have a date exactly. She and he had chatted after the rocky start, and she told him the reason she tried to dodge the meeting was not his looks – she actually told him he was attractive! But she felt uncomfortable when she saw who he was.

  He was very understanding, of course, and told her the thing he liked least about computer dating was the sense of being pushed into a relationship, the idea that the very fact of signing up almost committed you to pursuing a relationship, and wouldn’t it be better if they just let things flow now that they knew each other. And by the way, he added, he was glad they did now know each other. Very slick. Probably said something hackneyed about ‘respecting her space’. I mean, anyone who would write “cruel twist of fate”!

  So Susannah wasn’t really bringing a date to the party. She had asked him if she could bring a friend, and he graciously agreed. Of course if he found out I planned to break in to his neighbor’s apartment, the invitation would likely be withdrawn.

  I didn’t plan for him or anyone else to find out. And to that end, I had to have the run of the place once I got in. I needed to go back before the party to finish my clay plug project and see if my plan for opening Gerstner’s door would work.

  I drove to Rio Grande Lofts after Susannah left, punched in #07114, and watched in satisfaction as the gate slid open. Where did I get that code? I read it off the dashboard of the Mercury Grand Marquis, which I had visited after my romp with Stella.

  I parked the Bronco and walked to the glassed-in area where I punched in the other code I had picked up from Wes. I rode the elevator to two, transited the hallway from elevator door to stairway door, and stuck a clay plug in the bolthole. Then I repeated the process on each floor, ending up on eleven.

  Where I knocked loudly on Gerstner’s door. What was I planning to do if he opened it? Nothing, because I had run back to the stairwell and was standing inside it with my ear against the door. No sound came from the hall.

  I returned to Gerstner’s door and put my ear to it. Silence. I extracted from my pocket a handful of plastic chips the size of playing cards, samples from an artists supply store. They came in various colors, which I understood, and various thicknesses which I didn’t because they were measured in mils, and I have no idea what a mil is. It’s very thin, though.

  The first time I had grasped Gerstner’s door after spending the night in the parking garage, I noticed it had a certain amount of give like all normal doors, and t
he gap between the door and the jamb was also normal, perhaps a quarter of an inch. I don’t know how many mils that is.

  It was a perfectly normal door and it fit well enough for any purpose short of maintaining a watertight seal. Or preventing someone from loiding it. That’s a word I learned from the book Susannah gave me about the burglar who studied Spinoza. It means to slide a spring-loaded lock bolt out of its jamb by prying it with a piece of celluloid. The ‘loid’ has to be flexible enough to slip between the door and the jamb and then bend around the bolt, and it has to be firm enough to force the bolt out as it bends. That’s why I had a variety.

  I figured plastic would work as well as celluloid. The burglar book says you can also do it with a credit card, but despite the best efforts of the banking industry who are constantly pre-qualifying me, I keep only one credit card, and I didn’t want to risk its destruction.