The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart - By Lawrence Block Page 0,41

just past midnight when I left it. I walked over to Third Avenue to catch a cab headed uptown, and sprinted the last twenty yards to snag one cruising across the intersection.

“Running yet,” Max Fiddler said. “Can’t be the herbs. How could they work so fast? He makes miracles, this Chinaman, but even miracles take a little time to work. When did I see you, three, four nights ago?”

“Something like that.”

“No, it was two nights ago. I know it for a fact, because right after I dropped you off the second time I picked up the woman with the monkey. Where to?”

“Seventy-first and West End.”

“Right where I dropped you and then picked you up again. And then we took the Transverse and I dropped you at—gimme a minute—”

“Take all the time you want,” I said.

“—Seventy-sixth and Lexington,” he said triumphantly. “Am I right or am I right?”

“You’re right.”

“Some memory, eh?”

“I’m impressed.”

“Ginkgo.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Ginkgo biloba,” he said. “An herb! Comes from the ginkgo trees, you see ’em around town, got a funny little leaf shaped like a fan. I take these pills, my Chinaman told me about them, you get ’em in any health food store. I used to have a memory like Swiss cheese, now I got a memory like a hawk.”

“That’s wonderful.”

“You want to test me on state capitals, names of the presidents, be my guest.”

“No, that’s all right.”

“Or New York streets, anywhere in the five boroughs. Or something else. Go ahead, try and stump me.”

“Well, here’s an easy one. Did I happen to leave my attaché case in your cab the other night?”

“No,” he said without hesitation. “You want to know how I remember? I got this picture in my mind, you’re limping away from the cab, the case is knocking against your leg with each step you take.”

“That’s amazing,” I said. And even more amazing, I thought, was that I had managed to forget for a moment there that I already knew where the attaché case was. Ray Kirschmann had shown it to me yesterday, with an incomprehensible six-letter word printed on its side in blood.

“Ginkgo,” he said. “I recommend it.”

“Maybe I’ll get some. Except it’s not my memory that bothers me so much as the feeling I get sometimes that I’m not thinking too clearly.”

“It’s good for that, too. Mental clarity!”

“That’s what I could use.”

“Also a ringing in the ears.”

“It gives it to you or gets rid of it?”

“Gets rid of it!”

“Well, that’s good to know,” I said, “although that’s not something I’ve had to worry about.”

“Yet.”

“Yet,” I agreed. “Tell me about the woman and the monkey.”

He told me about the woman and the monkey in considerable detail, but I don’t know that it constituted much of a testament to his memory, or to the efficacy of ginkgo biloba. I’ve never touched the stuff myself, and I expect to remember the whole episode long into my dotage. All I’ll say is this—the woman had a well-developed figure (“Cantaloupes!” Max Fiddler said), while the monkey was a scrawny specimen with a mean little sour apple of a face. And they both should have been ashamed of themselves.

The story of their courtship carried us all the way to my corner. He was reaching to throw the flag when I told him to wait a minute.

“You said New York streets,” I said. “Anywhere in the five boroughs, you said.”

“So?”

“How about Arbor Court?”

“Arbor Court,” he said. “There’s only one Arbor Court and it’s in Manhattan. Is that the one you mean?”

“That’s the one.”

“In the Village, right?”

“Right.”

“Child’s play,” he said. “I thought you’d give me something hard, like Broadway Alley or Pomander Walk, but the best you can do is Arbor Court. Do I know Arbor Court? Of course I know Arbor Court, and you could take away my ginkgo and I’d still know it.”

“You know how to get there from here?”

“Why wouldn’t I know? Over to Broadway, then down Columbus and Ninth Avenue and Hudson Street, and then you pick up Bleecker and take it until you swing right on Charles, and—”

“Fine,” I said. “Let’s go.”

He put a hand on the back of his seat, turned around, and looked at me. “You want to go there?”

“Why not?”

“You want me to wait, and you’ll go inside and get whatever you came here to get?”

“No,” I said, sinking back into my seat. “Let’s just go straight downtown.”

“To the Village. To Arbor Court.”

“Right.”

“You’re the boss,” he said, and pulled away from the curb. “Arbor Court, coming up. You know what I think?