The Burglar Who Painted Like Mondrian by Lawrence Block Read Free Book Online Page A

“We ought to amend our policy,” he said. “No children, no dogs, and no artists.”
     
    I’d awakened before Carolyn and went directly to a liquor store on West Seventy-second, where I bought a replacement bottle of Canadian Club. I took it home and knocked on Mrs. Seidel’s door, and when my knock went unanswered I let myself in and cracked the seal on the bottle, poured an ounce or so down the sink drain, capped the bottle and put it back where I’d found its fellow the night before. I let myself out and met Mrs. Hesch in the hallway, the inevitable cigarette burning unattended in the corner of her mouth. I stopped at her apartment for a cup of coffee—she makes terrific coffee—and we talked, not for the first time, about the coin-operated laundry in the basement. She was exercised about the driers, which, their dials notwithstanding, had two temperatures—On and Off. I was vexed with the washers, which were as voracious as Pac-Man when it came to socks. Neither of us said anything about the fact that I’d just let myself out of Mrs. Seidel’s place.
    I went back to my apartment and listened to Carolyn being sick in the bathroom while I put a pot of coffee on. She came out looking a little green and sat in the corner of the couch holding her head. I showered and shaved and came back to find her staring unhappily at a cup of coffee. I asked her if she wanted aspirin. She said she wouldn’t mind some Extra-Strength Tylenol, but I didn’t have any. I ate and she didn’t and we both drank coffee and the phone rang.
    A woman’s voice, unaccented, said, “Mr. Rhodenbarr? Have you spoken to your friend?”
    I thought of pointing out that the question was implicitly insulting, presuming that I only had one friend, that I was the sort of person who couldn’t possibly have more than a single friend, that I was lucky to have one and could probably expect to be deserted by her when she wised up.
    I said, “Yes.”
    “Are you prepared to pay the ransom? A quarter of a million dollars?”
    “Doesn’t that strike you as a shade high? I know inflation’s murder these days, and I understand it’s a seller’s market for Burmese cats, but—”
    “Do you have the money?”
    “I try not to keep that much cash around the house.”
    “You can raise it?”
    Carolyn had come over to my side when the phone rang. I laid a reassuring hand on her arm. To my caller I said, “Let’s cut the comedy, huh? Bring the cat back and we’ll forget the whole thing. Otherwise—”
    Otherwise what? I’m damned if I know what kind of a threat I was prepared to make. But Carolyn didn’t give me the chance. She clutched my arm. She said, “ Bernie —”
    “Ve vill kill ze cat,” the woman said, her voice much louder and suddenly accented. The effect was somewhere between an ad for Viennese pastry mit schlag and that guy in the World War II movies who reminds you that you’ve got relatives in Chermany.
    “Now let’s be calm,” I said, to both of them. “No need to talk about violence.”
    “If you do not pay ze ransom—”
    “Neither of us has that kind of money. You must know that. Now why don’t you tell me what you want?”
    There was a pause. “Tell your vriend to go home.”
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “Zere is somesing in her mailbox.”
    “All right. I’ll go with her, and—”
    “No.”
    “No?”
    “Stay vere you are. You vill get a phone call.”
    “But—”
    There was a click. I sat looking at the receiver for a few seconds before I hung it up. I asked Carolyn if she’d heard any of it.
    “I caught a few words here and there,” she said. “It was the same person I talked to last night. At least I think it was. Same accent, anyway.”
    “She switched it on in midstream. I guess she forgot it at the beginning, and then she remembered she was supposed to sound threatening. Or else she slips into it when she gets excited. I don’t like the idea of splitting up. She wants you to go to your apartment