The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart - By Lawrence Block Page 0,13

of netsuke, so easy to wrap up and chuck in the attaché case? Or, most appealing of all, some sweet untraceable cash? I could probably hold off, but I was embittered and the job had gone sour and I was not going to pass Go or collect five thousand dollars, and I’d had a couple Ludomirs, and—

Oh.

I couldn’t go in, could I? I’d been drinking, and I don’t work when I drink or drink when I work.

So that settled that.

I rang his bell one more time, and don’t ask me which finger I used. I didn’t expect a response and I didn’t get one. Out on the street, I walked a block or so to clear my head, and when a cab came along I grabbed it.

It almost figured I’d get Max Fiddler for the third time, but nobody’s that lucky. This time my driver was a young fellow who ate pistachio nuts as he drove, spitting the shells all over the front of the cab. He got me home in one piece, but not for lack of trying.

Back in my own apartment, I stowed my tools and flashlight, got out of my clothes and under the shower. I stayed there for a long time, trying to wash the night away, but it was still there when I emerged. I put on a robe and poured myself a nightcap, wondering how Scotch would sit on top of Ludomir.

I drank half of it, then searched my wallet for the slip of paper with Hugo Candlemas’s phone number on it. Was it too late to call? Probably, but I picked up the phone and dialed the number anyway, and after two rings someone picked up and said, “Hello?”

It didn’t sound like Hugo.

I didn’t say anything. There was a silence, and the same voice said the same thing again, sounding a little peevish this time around.

Definitely not Hugo.

I put the receiver in the cradle.

I took another small sip of Scotch and made a mental list. Item: My visit to Apartment 8-B at the Boccaccio had turned out badly. Item: Hugo Candlemas, who was supposed to be home waiting for me to show up with the portfolio, had been absent when I went to see him. Item: An hour later, someone else was answering his phone. Someone who was definitely not Hugo Candlemas, but whose voice was curiously familiar.

Captain Hoberman? No, I decided, after a moment’s reflection. Definitely not Captain Hoberman. But definitely familiar, definitely a voice I’d heard before.

Oh.

I reached for the phone, hesitated, then went ahead and made the call. This time the fellow answered on the first ring, and at first he didn’t say anything, which was almost enough in itself to confirm my hunch. Then he said, “Hello,” and made assurance doubly sure. It was him, all right.

I broke the connection.

“Hell,” I said aloud, and picked up my drink and frowned at it. How had I gotten in this mess? Was this where I deserved to be after fifteen nights in a row of Humphrey Bogart movies?

I should have been watching Laurel and Hardy.

CHAPTER

Four

Of all the bookstores in all the towns in all the world, she walked into mine.

She did so exactly two weeks earlier, at three o’clock on a Wednesday afternoon. I was behind the counter with my nose in a book. The book was Our Oriental Heritage, the first of eleven volumes of Will and Ariel Durant’s Story of Civilization. Over the years the Book-of-the-Month Club has been distributing the books as if it were the Gideons and they were the Bible, and it’s a rare personal library that doesn’t include a complete set, usually in pristine condition, the dust jackets intact, the spines uncracked, and the pages untouched by human eyes.

There had been a set in inventory when I acquired Barnegat Books from old Mr. Litzauer, and over the years I had bought a set every now and then, and occasionally sold one. I hadn’t sold quite as many as I’d bought, and so I generally had a few sets on hand, one on the shelves and a couple in cartons in the back. On this particular Wednesday I had four sets in stock, because I’d bought one the previous afternoon, not out of a mad passion to corner the market but because it was part of a lot that included some eminently resalable Steinbeck and Faulkner firsts. By the time I closed the store Tuesday I’d recovered my costs by placing To a God Unknown and