The Burglar in the Library - By Lawrence Block Page 0,79

way I earned my living, and it had served me well on the handful of occasions when I’d found myself up to my ears in a homicide investigation.

Carolyn had called me an amateur sleuth, and if I’m any kind of a sleuth at all I’m certainly an amateur. I’m a pro in two other areas, burglary and bookselling, and I know the difference between amateurs and professionals, and when it comes to sleuthery I’m not about to hang out a shingle. I know what detectives do—I ought to, I’ve read enough books about them. They knock on doors and ask impertinent questions and check alibis and gather evidence and do all sorts of things I’d be no good at.

I don’t do that. I sort of slip around and sneak around and stir things up, and sometimes things work out.

But at Cuttleford House everybody was right there. There was never a question of rounding up the usual suspects, because they never strayed very far. They couldn’t. The bridge was out and the phone lines were down and the whole place was piled deep with snow.

So what had I done? Well, I’d tried approaching the situation like a real detective, interrogating everybody one at a time, and that hadn’t been a great success. Even so, by the end of the day I had a couple of ideas buzzing in my brain. I even had a strong hunch as to the identity of the killer, but it seemed impossible. I needed more information than I had, and I couldn’t get it because there were all these people all over the place, watching my every move even as I was watching theirs. (And who could blame them? For all they knew, I was the murderer and they were next on my list.)

And so I worked out a different approach. While the rest of the household slept, I’d skulk around with my flashlight, like Diogenes looking for a dishonest man. While I was at it, I’d take a shot at faking my own death, leaving an apparent corpse in a spot inaccessible enough to discourage close investigation. That would give me a chance to continue skulking in the daytime.

I explained what I had in mind to Carolyn before we turned out our respective bedside lamps. At first she thought I was going to lie down at the bottom of the gully and play dead, and she was concerned that I might catch a bad cold and wind up with pneumonia.

“I might even freeze to death,” I told her.

“Then don’t do it,” she said. “Why take the chance, Bern? It’s not worth it.”

The news that it wouldn’t actually be me down there reassured her, and when I’d run through it a couple of times she said she had it down pat. “The tricky part,” I said, “is getting somebody to think of looking in the gully.”

“Why don’t I just say, ‘Hey, guys, maybe he fell in the gully’?”

“That would work,” I allowed, “but it would be better if someone else thought of it.”

“So they don’t think it’s a setup.”

“Right.”

“I’ll work on it,” she said. “And you’ll be out of the way somewhere while we’re all running around searching the house?”

“Snug,” I said, “as a bug in a rug.”

“But that’s hours from now. What’ll you be doing between now and then?”

“Setting the stage,” I said. “Going places. Doing things.”

“Going where? Doing what?”

“Here and there,” I said. “This and that.”

“And you’re not gonna tell me who the killer is.”

“Not until I know for sure.”

She yawned. “I’d argue the point,” she said, “if I weren’t so tired. Aren’t you tired, Bern?”

“Exhausted.”

“Can I ask a dumb question? How are you gonna stay up all night sneaking around in the dark? You’ll be dead on your feet tomorrow.”

“Never mind tomorrow,” I said. “I’ll be dead on my feet tonight.”

“So why not forget it, Bern? Get a good night’s sleep. Sleep late, in fact, and take a nap tomorrow during the day, and if the police don’t turn up by then you can stay up tomorrow night.”

“You’re tempting me.”

“So? Do what I always do when I’m tempted.”

“Surrender to it?”

“Hey,” she said. “Works for me, Bern.”

I said I’d let my body decide. I read for a few minutes and turned off the light, and there was a moment when I almost drifted off, but it passed and I knew it wasn’t going to happen. But I waited until Carolyn was sleeping, snug in the arms of Morpheus or Molly Cobbett, before I got