False Allegations

error until a long time later. Perhaps when she has other medical problems as a result. The statute of limitations doesn't begin to run until she actually knows malpractice was committed.'

'But Jennifer did know…'

'She knew it when it was happening, yes. But the perpetrator's own conduct—the shock of the sudden knowledge that she was a victim—literally drove it out of her mind. She was in a psychiatric coma. She didn't discover it until later. And that's another doctrine we plan to utilize: equitable estoppel. It simply means a wrongdoer cannot profit from his own bad acts. Do you understand?'

'I hit someone in the head with a tire iron. He goes into a coma. Years pass, he's still in a coma. The statute of limitations runs out. He wakes up. Remembers it was me who did it. It was me who took his memory, so I don't get a free pass for doing it.'

'Yes! Not the most graceful explanation, but certainly a cogent one.'

'But that was physical,' I said. 'This was…'

'Emotional. Of course. The hardest thing to prove in law is the so–called soft–tissue injury. Any lawyer representing a car accident victim would rather have a broken finger than the worst whiplash. And the human heart is the softest tissue of all,' Kite intoned in that jury–summation voice.

'So how are you going to…?'

'Laws change,' he said. 'Some cases actually make law. I have never heard of a better case to prove the viability of the 'delayed discovery' doctrine than this one. And times are changing. Many states recognize that a child may not have the internal resources to come forward in a case of sexual abuse, especially when the perpetrator is a powerful figure in the child's life. Connecticut has already extended the statute. So has Vermont. And California. I don't fear the odds. In fact, I look forward to the opportunity.'

'Okay. You said there was other proof. Could I—?'

'Take this with you,' he said, handing me a pile of paper. And a bunch of letters, neatly tied in a black ribbon. I put them into the aluminum case.

At the grille, Heather said goodbye in a soft voice. When I turned toward her, she put her forehead against my chest, whispered, 'Could I have another chance?'

'Who knows?' I lied.

I didn't want to use my Arnold Haines ID for a plane ticket, in case something went wrong out of town. And I knew better than to pay cash. Michelle booked me a round–trip on USAir through a travel agent she knows. Now that the federales finally figured out that any crew of drooling dimwits with a rental van and enough money to buy a few tons of fertilizer can level an entire office building, they want photo ID at airports. What they haven't figured out is that anyone with the coin and the contacts can score a complete set of papers in a couple of days. When I showed the uniformed woman at the ticket counter a driver's license that matched the Stanley Weber name on my first–class ticket, she didn't give it a second glance.

I couldn't contract the job out, not in Buffalo. In a few cities, you still have old–time thieves working. Guys who'll do a house as fine as pouring it through a strainer and turn over whatever they find—never even look at what they lift, much less make copies. The old–timers have a professional's pride: 'If I take a fall, I take it all,' the Prof used to say—no rats allowed in that exclusive club.

But those kind of burglars are a dying breed. Hell, burglary itself is a dying art. Today, it's mostly smash– and–snatch punks, junkies and fools, amateurs who think a fence is what you climb over to get to the windows… which you break with a brick. They don't know how to bypass an alarm, don't even know enough to start at the bottom with a chest of drawers. They leave their trail like it was blazed in neon, counting on the cops' being too busy to do anything but give you a complaint number for your insurance report. And if they ever run into a dog, all they're going to get is bit.

There're no standards now, the way there used to be. I remember a guy who wanted to join our crew years ago, when we were stealing all the time. Hercules, we'd called him in prison, a big, handsome kid, strong as the stench from a two–day–old corpse. He had a deep weakness for the ladies, but he was stand–up—if he got popped, he'd go down by himself, the way you were supposed to. Still, the Prof had nixed him off. 'He's a stone amateur, bro—gets his nose open like a subway tunnel. Never keeps his mind on business. Old Herc, he's a hopeless pussy– hound. The boy can't run with us—he's a rooster, not a booster.'

So I was never tempted, always stayed with a true–pro crew even if I had to pass up something that looked luscious. And I can still get it done in a few cities. Chicago has one of the best thieves I've ever known, almost in the Prof's class. There's a real slick guy who works San Francisco, one of those small, compact boys who can move like smoke. And in New Orleans, there's a double–jointed woman who could find a diamond in a vat of zircons with her nose. But they're few and far between, an aging class. And every prison jolt thins the ranks.

In Buffalo, I didn't know a soul. I wasn't going to trust some secondhand recommendation—and without a local bondsman and a good lawyer already lined up, it's not righteous to ask your own people to take a risk.

Besides, whatever Brother Jacob had lying around that might help me was probably in his head, not in some desk drawer. I decided this was a one–thief job.

The flight took under ninety minutes, nonstop. I fly first class because it's more anonymous. The seats are separated—the whole setup doesn't encourage the guy next to you to get into a conversation. And you can board the plane after everyone else but still be first off when you land. If you don't check luggage, you can slip on and off the plane like it was a taxicab.

I ate a little bit of the blah food they served, watching the letters Brother Jacob had written to Jennifer Dalton come up on the screen in my head. They were all fun–house mirrors, tricky reflections, bending your vision. The handwriting was strong, with a confident right–hand slant. On heavy, cream–colored, watermarked paper, each letter only one sheet, one side. No return address, no monogram. Expensively anonymous.

Dear One,

I know it's hard for you, Jennifer. It's hard for me as well. But there is a right way to do everything, even the most difficult tasks. Patience doesn't come easily to someone your age, but the greatest joys in life are always worth the investment.

And another…

Most things in life are all a matter of perspective. How you look at something is more important than what you're looking at. You've seen this for yourself, haven't you, dear?

All the same…

Remember, Jennifer, your feelings are your own. They are private, special things, unique to you and you alone. And you are always entitled to them. They are always yours. The best things in life are always investments. You have to wait for them to pay off. And this takes patience. I know things are hard for you now, but they'll get better, I promise.

I thought about promises. In the hands of an expert, they're like razor cuts—so sharp the target never feels them until he sees the blood.

And when the target trusts you enough, sometimes he doesn't even see the blood. Until it's almost all gone.

I rented a bronze Taurus sedan at the airport and used the City Planning Commission maps to find him. It wasn't hard—the house was in Brother Jacob's name, and I had a pretty good photo that came with the file Kite had given me.

A pearlescent orange Jeep chugged up next to me at a light. The sun blazed on the Jeep's wheels— masterpieces of sculpture with hand–set centerpieces, gold–plated. A set like that can set you back a few thousand dollars. Useless—you're paying for the flash. Like two–hundred–dollar sneakers. And like the ultra–sneakers, there were more people stealing them than working for them. And not even real stealing—the robot mutant psychopaths don't have the brains to boost a car or shoplift some shoes, so they rough it off face–to–face. Your stuff or your life—either one gratifies the urban punk killing machines.

It was late afternoon by the time I found the place. A freestanding house of weathered white wood on a short block in what looked like a middle–class neighborhood with aspirations. A matching one–car garage stood at the end of a driveway, no fence around the small front yard. The house looked well tended, but whoever owned it wasn't obsessive about it—the lawn could have used a trim and one of the trees had branches that wouldn't last through the fast–coming winter.

I parked across the street and settled in to watch. A trio of kids flew past on fat–tired trail bikes, shouting