crime and a workforce whose only skill is pilferage. All small business has been driven out of
Among these surviving small companies is Affiliated Fur Storage — and who knows how many failed furriers are entombed in that cemetery of a word,
The interior of this building, except for the administrative offices, is a maze of windowless rooms, air- conditioned to a fur-loving forty degrees. Here is where many of the more fortunate women of New York store their minks in summer, to protect them from deadly heat and humidity. Here, if you've a mind to steal fur coats, is the place to go.
And here is where Freddie came, this afternoon at four-thirty, slipping in with a delivery truck, filled with another load of arriving mink. Once inside, he'd tucked out of the way, taking it easy, expecting the place to close at five. But it did not.
Problem. By June, the fur coat owners really should already have called Affiliated to make their arrangements for the pickup of their coats, but you know how people procrastinate, how they forget to do something unless it's staring them right in the face, how they don't even
He'd come in here in the first place figuring half an hour was all he'd need to watch the security systems, see how they were armed and how they could be disarmed, and he'd been right; once everybody finally did get the hell out of here, he'd open the building like a banana, no sweat. But when would they call it a day, goddam it, and go
And now it was six-twenty, and a person came around the corner of the hall. Not the speed demon, this was a middle-aged woman shrugging into a light cloth spring coat. Freddie pressed himself against the wall as she went by, and here came three more, chatting together, taking up the entire width of the hall. And more behind them.
Whoops. Freddie fled in front of the staff, and found that the receptionist had been among the first to leave, which meant her desk was empty, which meant Freddie could skip around behind it, and even sit in the receptionist's chair, still warm from her bottom, and from that vantage point watch everybody leave.
This place had rent-a-cops, three of them in brown uniforms and shoulder patches, with holsters containing walkie-talkies, and the seriously humorless faces of drunks who aren't drinking yet today. These were the last to leave, having checked every room to be sure there were no stragglers, having set every alarm, and having called their security office from the receptionist's desk — Freddie leaped nimbly out of
Ain't no security against the invisible man; no,
The first thing Freddie did, when he knew he was alone in the building, was skip down the hall, waving his invisible arms and kicking his invisible feet, knowing
June, shmoon; Freddie was
13
By five-thirty, Peg had to go to the bathroom
Before they'd come out here, she'd talked this situation over with Freddie, or at least with the volume of air she'd assumed contained Freddie, and she'd asked him how come they had to deal with Jersey Josh Kuskiosko all the time? Aside from Jersey Josh's personality, which was the pits, why not just steal cash, and cut out the middleman? Take 100 percent instead of 10 percent? And Freddie had said, 'What cash? There aren't any big piles of cash around. Payrolls are by check. Big stores take credit cards.'
'Banks have cash,' she'd pointed out. 'You could sneak in, wait till they close—
'Bank security is not simple, Peg,' the air had told her. 'Bankers are serious about money, that's one thing I'm sure of. You never know what you're gonna find in a bank. Heat sensors, motion sensors; they don't have to
'I can put up with him, if I have to,' Peg had said, being brave. 'As long as you're there with me.'
'I'm sorry, Peg, but that's just the way it is. All I can take is merchandise, and convert it to cash. I could start, maybe, a new relationship with a new fence . . .'
'Would he be any better?'
'Probably worse. You know, guys who go into that business, being a fence, they're not your Albert Schweitzer mostly.'
So here they were, in pursuit of more merchandise. Over there,
Leaving the area, Peg drove past the fur building and noticed that across the street from it was a parking lot with a sign that read AFFILIATED FUR STORAGE PARKING ONLY. The lot was better than half full. Employee cars, they must be. If they're gone when I get back, Peg told herself, then Freddie will be ready for me. So there is a signal after all, whether I'm here or not.
At the diner, Peg relieved herself and ordered a coffee and a doughnut to go, because she didn't feel right about just using the ladies' and then walking out. When she drove back to take up her vigil, the cars were all still in that lot, so nothing had changed. Peg settled down again, a bit more comfortably, to wait.
An
What it came down to was, an invisible boyfriend was no fun. You just didn't get used to being around such a person, having their voice suddenly come at you from over
What made it even worse, you could never be sure when