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“Randy’s got a Polaroid?”
“That’s what I just said. Didn’t I show you pictures of the cats last week?”
“Probably.”
“Well, she took them. But I can’t ask her to borrow it, because she’s convinced we’re having an affair and she’d probably think I wanted us to take obscene pictures of each other or something. And she’s probably not home, anyway.”
“Call her and see.”
“Are you kidding? I don’t want to talk to her.”
“Hang up if she answers.”
“Then why call in the first place?”
“Because if she’s not home,” I said, “we can go pick up the camera.”
“Beautiful.” She reached for the phone, then sighed and let her hand drop. “You’re forgetting something. Remember last night? I gave her keys back.”
“So?”
“Huh?”
“Who needs keys?”
She looked at me, laughed, shook her head, “Far out,” she said, and reached for the phone.
Randy lived in a tiny studio on the fifth floor of a squat brick apartment house on Morton Street between Seventh Avenue and Hudson. There’s an article in the New York building code requiring an elevator in every structure of seven or more stories. This one was six stories tall, and up the stairs we went.
The locks were candy. They wouldn’t have been much trouble if I’d been limited to my drugstore tools. Now that I had my pro gear, I went through them like the Wehrmacht through Luxembourg. When the pe
“God,” she said. “It takes me longer than that when I’ve got the keys.”
“Well, they’re cheap locks. And I was showing off a little. Trying to impress you.”
“It worked. I’m impressed.”
We were in and out quicker than Speedy Gonzales. The camera was where Carolyn thought it would be, in the bottom drawer of Randy’s dresser. It nestled in a carrying case with a shoulder strap, and an ample supply of film reposed in the case’s zippered film compartment. Carolyn hung the thing over her shoulder, I locked the locks, and we were on our way home.
I’d told Ray I would call him in half an hour and I didn’t miss by more than a few minutes. He answered the phone himself this time. “Your friend moves around,” he said.
“Huh?”
“The guy with the three phone numbers. He covers a lot of ground. The Rhinelander number’s a sidewalk pay phone on the corner of Seventy-fifth and Madison. The Chelsea number’s also a pay phone. It’s located in the lobby of the Gresham Hotel. That’s on Twenty-third between Fifth and Sixth.”
“Hold on,” I said, scribbling furiously. “All right. How about the Worth number?”
“Downtown. I mean way downtown, in the Wall Street area. Twelve Pine Street.”
“Another lobby phone?”
“Nope. An office on the fourteenth floor. A firm called Tontine Trading Corp. Bern, let’s get back to the coat, huh? You said ranch mink, didn’t you?”
“That’s right.”
“What did you say the color was?”
“Silver-blue.”
“And it’s full-fashioned? You’re sure of that?”
“Positive. You can’t go wrong with this one, Ray. It’s carrying an Arvin Ta
“When can I have it?”
“In plenty of time for Christmas, Ray. No problem.”
“You son of a bitch. What are you givin’ me? You haven’t got the coat.”
“Of course not. I retired, Ray. I gave up burglary. What would I be doing with a hot coat?”
“Then where’d the coat come from?”
“I’m going to get it for you, Ray. After I get myself out of the jam I’m in.”
“Suppose you don’t get out of it, Bern? Then what?”
“Well, you better hope I do,” I said, “or else the coat’s down the same chute as your twenty-buck bet on Wake Forest.”
CHAPTER Sixteen
I cabbed uptown for the Pontiac. By the time I brought it downtown again Carolyn had familiarized herself with the intricacies of the Polaroid camera. She proved this by clicking the shutter at me as I came through the door. The picture popped out and commenced developing before my eyes. I looked startled, and guilty of something or other. I told Carolyn I wasn’t going to order any enlargements.
“You’re a better model than the cats,” she said. “Ubi wouldn’t sit still and Archie kept crossing his eyes.”
“Archie always keeps crossing his eyes.”
“It’s part of being Burmese. Wa
“Sure.”
She was wearing a charcoal-gray turtleneck and slate-blue corduroy jeans. For the photo she slipped on a brass-buttoned blazer and topped things off with a rakish beret. So attired, she sat on the edge of a table, crossed her legs, and gri
Randy’s Polaroid captured all of this remarkably well. We studied the result together. “What’s missing,” Carolyn said, “is a cigar.”
“You don’t smoke cigars.”
“To pose with. It’d make me look very Bo
“Which of them do you figure you’d look like?”
“Oh, very fu
“I think so. You’ve got the Bli
“In my pocket.”
“And you’re comfortable with the camera?”
“It’s about as tricky to operate as a self-service elevator.”
“Then let’s go.”
And on the sidewalk I said, “Uh, Carolyn, you may not remind anybody of Faye Dunaway, but you look terrific today.”
“What’s all this about?”
“And you’re not bad to have around, either.”
“What is this? A speech to the troops before going into battle?”
“Something like that, I guess.”
“Well, watch it, will you? I could get misty-eyed and run my mascara. It’s a good thing I don’t wear any. Can’t you drive this crate, Bern?”
On weekends, New York ’s financial district looks as though someone zapped it with one of those considerate bombs that kills people without damaging property. Narrow streets, tall buildings, and no discernible human activity whatsoever. All the shops were closed, all the people home watching football games.
I left the Pontiac in an unattended parking lot on Nassau and we walked down to Pine. Number 12 was an office building that towered above those on either side of it. A guard sat at a desk in the lobby, logging the handful of workers who refused to let the weekend qualify their devotion to the pursuit of profit.
We stood on the far side of Pine for eight or ten minutes, during which time the attendant had nothing whatever to do. No one signed in or out. I looked up and counted nine lighted windows on the front of the building. I tried to determine if one of these might be on the fourteenth floor, a process made somewhat more difficult by the angle at which I had to gaze and the impossibility of determining which was the fourteenth floor, since I had no way of knowing if the building had a thirteenth floor.
I couldn’t find a pay phone in line of sight of the building. I went around the corner and walked a block up William Street. At two minutes past four I dialed the number Prescott Demarest had given me. He picked it up after it had rung twice but didn’t say anything until I’d said hello myself. If I’d shown similar restraint the night before we could have had Randy’s Polaroid without breaking and entering to get it.
“I have the book,” I told him. “And I need cash. I have to leave town. If you’re ready to deal, I can offer you a bargain.”
“I’ll pay a fair price. If I’m convinced the item is genuine.”
“Suppose I show it to you tonight? If you decide you want it, then we can work out a price.”
“Tonight?”
“At Barnegat Books. That’s a store on East Eleventh Street.”
“I know where it is. There was a story in this morning’s paper-”
“I know.”
“You feel it’s entirely safe? Meeting at this store?”