The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart (24 page)

“So these stamps are worth over two thousand dollars? That is good.”

“If you’re selling,” I said, “you generally figure on netting two-thirds to three-fourths the Dolbeck value.”

“Two thousand, then. A little less.”

“Per set.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “That is very nice.”

“It’s nicer than you realize,” I said. “The stamps are printed fifty to a sheet, so you’re holding fifty sets. That’s somewhere around a hundred thousand dollars.”

She stared. “But…”

“Take it before I change my mind,” I said. “There’s a man at Kildorran and Partners who specializes in this kind of material. He’ll either buy it from you or arrange to sell it for you. He’s in London, on Great Portland Street, and his name and the firm’s address are written down on the inside of that folder you’re holding. I don’t know if you’ll
get a hundred grand. It may be more, it may be less. But you’ll get a fair price.” I extended a forefinger, chucked her under the chin. “I don’t know how your flight’s routed tomorrow night, but if I were you I’d change things and take a day or two in London. You don’t want to wait too long with those things. You might make a mistake and use one to mail a letter.”

“Bear-naard, you could have kept these.”

“You think so?”

“But of course. No one knew you had them. No one even knew they were valuable.”

I shook my head. “It wouldn’t work, sweetheart. The hopes and dreams of a couple of little people like you and me don’t add up to a hill of beans next to the cause you and Michael are fighting for. Sure, I could use the money, but I don’t really need it. And if I ever do I’ll go out and steal it, because that’s the kind of man I am.”

“Oh, Bear-naard.”

“So pack them up and take them home with you,” I said. “And I think you’d better go now, Ilona.”

“But I thought…”

“I know what you thought, and I thought so too. But I went to bed with you once and lost you, and I don’t want to go through that again. One time is a good memory. Twice is heartbreak.”

“Bear-naard, I have tears in my eyes.”

“I’d kiss them away,” I said, “but I wouldn’t be able to stop. So long, sweetheart. I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll never forget you,” she said. “I’ll never forget Twenty-fifth Street.”

“Neither will I.” I took her arm, eased her out the door. “And why should you? We’ll always have Twenty-fifth Street.”

I
t was a full week before I got around to telling Carolyn about that final evening in Ilona’s company. I don’t think I ever made a conscious decision to keep it from her. But it turned out to be a busy time for both of us. I kept my usual hours in the bookstore, and put in some overtime as well, riding the Long Island Rail Road to Massapequa one evening to appraise a library (for a fee; they didn’t want to sell anything), and spending another evening at a book auction, bidding on behalf of a customer who was shy about attending those things himself.

Carolyn had a busy schedule herself, with a kennel club show coming up that meant a lot of dogs for her to pretty up. And there were a lot of phone calls and visits back and forth when Djinn and Tracey got back together again, and Djinn accused Tracey of having an affair with Carolyn, which
was what Djinn had done after a previous breakup. “Pure dyke-o-drama,” Carolyn called it, and eventually it blew over, but while it lasted there were lots of middle-of-the-night phone calls and phones slammed down and loud confrontations on street corners. When it finally cleared up, she plunged with relief into the new Sue Grafton novel she’d been saving.

So we had lunch five days a week and drinks after work, and then on Tuesday, a week and a day after Memorial Day, we were at the Bum Rap after work and Carolyn was telling a long and not terribly interesting story about a Bedlington terrier. “From the way he acted,” she said, “you’d have sworn he thought he was an Airedale.”

“No kidding,” I said.

She looked at me. “You don’t think that’s funny?”

“Yeah, it’s funny.”

“I can see you think it’s a scream. I thought it was funny.”

“Then why aren’t you laughing?” I said. “Never mind. Carolyn, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.” And then I signaled Maxine for another round of drinks, because this was going to be thirsty work.

I told her the whole story and she listened all the way through without interrupting me, and when I was done she sat and stared at me with her mouth open.

“That’s amazing,” she said. “And you didn’t say
a word about it for a week and a day. That’s even more amazing.”

“I just kept forgetting to bring it up,” I said. “You know what I think it was? I must have wanted a little time to digest it.”

“Makes sense. Bern, I’m amazed. I don’t want to work the word to death, but I am. I’ll tell you this, kiddo. It’s the most romantic story I ever heard in my life.”

“I guess it’s romantic.”

“What else could it be?”

“Stupid,” I said. “Real stupid.”

“You gave away a hundred thousand dollars.”

“Something like that.”

“To a woman you’ll probably never see again.”

“I might see her on a stamp,” I said. “If Anatruria makes the cut. But no, I’ll probably never see her again.”

“She didn’t even know about the stamps, did she? That you had them, or that they were worth anything.”

“Tsarnoff or Rasmoulian would have known what they were worth, or at least known they were worth plenty. Candlemas might have known—he had a collector’s orientation. The others didn’t think in those terms. And no, nobody knew I had them, least of all Ilona.”

“And you gave them to her.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And you got to make the famous hill-of-beans speech.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“Why’d you do it, Bern?”

“They needed the money,” I said. “I can always use money, but I can’t pretend I had a genuine need for a hundred thousand dollars. They needed it.”

“Hell, Bern, the hip dysplasia people need it, too, and it was all I could do to get twenty bucks out of you.”

“The stamps came from Anatruria,” I said.

“I thought they came from Hungary.”

“You know what I mean. They were issued in the cause of Anatrurian freedom, and if they were worth all that money after all those years, then the money belonged to the cause. If there is such a cause, or if there even is such a country.” That was confusing, and I stopped and took a sip of my drink and started over. “If she hadn’t shown up at the Musette,” I said, “I don’t know what I would have done. I meant to call the king and give him the stamps, and maybe I would have done it, but maybe not. I just don’t know.

“But the point is she
did
show up. I bought that extra seat, and I swear I wasn’t all that surprised when she wound up sitting in it.”

“And once she did…”

“I held her hand, fed her popcorn, took her home, gave her a fortune in rare stamps, and sent her on her way.”

“With the hill-of-beans speech echoing in her cute little ears.”

“Forget the hill-of-beans speech, will you?”

“Schweetheart, the hopes and dreams of a couple of little shitkickers like you and me don’t amount to a hill of beans when you pile ’em up next to the Anatrurian Alps, and—”

“Dammit, Carolyn.”

“I’m sorry. You know what happened to you, don’t you?”

“I think so.”

“All those movies.”

“That’s what I was going to say.”

“You watched Bogart do the noble self-sacrificing thing one time too many, and when the opportunity came your way, you didn’t have a prayer. Poor Bernie. Everybody made something out of this business but you. Ray was the big winner. What did he wind up with, forty-eight grand?”

“He had to spread that around a little. The official story now is that Candlemas killed Hoberman, then went down to the Lower East Side to cop some dope.”

“Right, he was your typical junkie.”

“And got shot when the deal went sour. I would guess somewhere between twenty-five and thirty-five thousand dollars’ll wind up in Ray’s pocket.”

“And of course he insisted you take some of the money.”

“It must have slipped his mind.”

“Not fair, Bern. After all, you solved the whole case. He just stood there.”

“He doesn’t just stand. He looms.”

“Good for him. He gets the money, Ilona and
the king get the stamps, and the three mouseketeers get the bearer shares and go chasing after the lost treasure of Anatruria. And what about you? You didn’t even get laid.”

“Maybe that was dumb, too,” I said. “But all she’s going to be for me is a memory, and I didn’t have to repeat the experience to be sure I’d remember it. I’m in no danger of forgetting.”

“No.”

I picked up my drink, held it to the light. “Anyway,” I said, “it’s not as though I wind up empty-handed.”

“How do you figure that, Bern?”

“I got the bone woodchuck from Candlemas’s apartment, remember?”

“Wow, Bern.”

“And when I stopped by Charlie Weeks’s place, the stamps weren’t all I swiped. I got the mouse carving Hoberman gave him.”

“Gee, you can just about retire when you sell those two little beauties, can’t you?”

“No, I think I’ll hang on to them as souvenirs. My real profit comes tomorrow night.”

“What happens tomorrow night?”

“A man named Sung-Yun Lee goes to see
The Chink in the Armoire.
”

“Is that a show?”

“On Broadway, at the Helen Hayes. Very hot ticket. I got a pair from a scalper and it cost me perilously close to two hundred bucks.”

“All in the interests of getting him out of the
house,” she guessed. “But who the hell is he, and what house do you want to get him out of? Oh,
wait
a minute. The people downstairs from Candlemas, but I forget their names.”

“The Lehrmans.”

“And he’s in their place on an exchange program. Right?”

I nodded. “And they’ll be gone for another month, and their place is absolutely overflowing with good stuff, and you couldn’t ask for a better setup. The security is nothing, the locks are child’s play, and the guy who’s living there won’t have a clue that anything’s missing, because it’s not his stuff. He’ll go on being careful not to look in their closets or poke around in their drawers, and everything I take will be converted into cash long before they’re even back in the country.”

I went on, telling her about some of the items I’d noticed on my brief passage through the Lehrman apartment. When I stopped she said, “I’ll tell you something, Bern. I’m relieved.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re your old self again. Bogart’s great on the screen, but all that Noble Loser stuff is no way to go through life. I’m glad you’re getting ready to steal something. It’s tough on the Lehrmans—”

“Oh, I’m sure they’re insured.”

“Even if they’re not, I’m happy for you.” She frowned. “That’s tomorrow, right? Not tonight?”

“No, why? Oh.” I brandished my glass. “No,
it’s tomorrow. You know I don’t drink when I’m working.”

“That’s what I was wondering.”

“Anyway,” I said, “I’ve got something else planned for tonight. In fact, you might want to come along, but we’ll have to go straight from here.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’m about halfway into the new Sue Grafton and I’m kind of anxious to get back to it. It’s really something.”

“Well, you always like her work.”

“One of the things I like is she never repeats herself, and this one’s kind of shocking.”

“Really?”

She nodded. “Sadism and perversion,” she said. “Roman orgies, incest. Toga parties. I’ve got to tell you, it’s a whole lot kinkier than what Kinsey usually gets herself mixed up in.”

“Gee, maybe you were right about Kinsey.”

“I know I’m right, but she doesn’t do anything wild herself. Everybody else does, though.”

“What’s it called, anyway?”

“‘I’ Is for Claudius.”

“Catchy,” I said. “But you can stay home and read anytime. Come on and keep me company.”

“Where, Bern?”

“A movie.”

“The Bogart festival’s over, Bernie. Isn’t it?”

“Over and done with. But down at the Sardonique in Tribeca they’re starting an Ida Lupino film festival.”

“Bern, I got a question. Who cares?”

“What have you got against Ida Lupino?”

“Nothing, but I never knew you were such a big fan. What’s the big deal about Ida Lupino?”

“I always liked her,” I said. “But tonight’s movies are kind of special.
They Drive by Night
and
High Sierra.
”

“I’m sure they’re both terrific, but…wait a minute, Bern. I know
High Sierra.
It’s not an Ida Lupino movie.”

“It most certainly is.”

“She may be in it, but that doesn’t make it her movie. It’s a Humphrey Bogart movie. He’s trapped on a mountain peak with a rifle, and they kill him.”

“Why’d you have to ruin the ending for me?”

“Come on, Bern, you know the ending. You’ve seen the movie.”

“Not recently.”

“What’s the other one?
They Drive by Night?
Who’s in that, if you don’t mind my asking? Besides Ida Lupino.”

“George Raft,” I said. “And I think Ann Sheridan.”

“And?”

“And Bogart. He plays a one-armed truck driver. They showed
High Sierra
at the Musette, but on a night I couldn’t go. I was stuck at that auction. And
They Drive by Night
never played the Musette.”

“Maybe for a good reason.”

“Don’t be silly,” I said. “I’m sure it’s great.
What do you say? Do you want to go? I’ll buy the popcorn.”

“Oh, what the hell,” she said. “But one thing, Bern. Can we get one thing straight?”

“What’s that?”

“This is entertainment,” she said. “These are not training films. Is that understood?”

“Of course.”

“Good,” she said. “Don’t forget, sweetheart.”

The author is pleased to acknowledge the contributions of the Ragdale Foundation, in Lake Forest, Illinois, where some of the preliminary work on this book was done, and of the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, in Sweet Briar, Virginia, where it was written.