'What good will that do?'
'If I see something, I'll say I'm strongly convinced there's evidence in her house. Then we'll figure out a way to get at it legally. That way at least we'll know.'
Janek was familiar with the technique and its rationale: the illegal break-in or wiretap to assure yourself that you weren't wasting your time, that there was a real case to be made. He had never employed it and was contemptuous of detectives who did. It wasn't just the illegality, though that was bad enough. It was the chain of deceit that followed, that led inevitably to perjury in court. It would be one thing to acquiesce if Aaron wanted to go in for a look, another to state later under oath that he hadn't known anything about it.
Aaron understood. 'That's what I thought you'd say. But if there was a way, Frank-a way that was, say, a little less direct, what would you think about that?'
Sounds like shading. But he felt he ought to hear Aaron out. Then, as he listened and began to feel seduced, he understood why Kit Kopta didn't like to assign detectives to cases in which they were emotionally involved. they were in Aaron's car driving up Third Avenue. It was past midnight. they had long since passed Ninetysixth Street, the infamous DMZ, and were now deep into the huge Hispanic neighborhood of upper Manhattan, where the store signs were in Spanish, the streets were crowded, bodegas sold live chickens, and pharmacists' wives told fortunes.
'In all my years with Safes and Lofts,' Aaron was saying, 'Leo Titus was the slickest burglar I ever met. Charming guy. I know you'll like him.'
'I thought I wasn't going to meet him.'
'Yeah. Sorry. I forgot. Anyway, if you did meet him, you'd like him. How's that?' 'Irrelevant,' Janek said. they passed a battered-looking storefront gym. It wasn't like a yuppie health club in midtown. Up here a gym was a real, sweaty, sour-smelling place where slick-haired Latino boys with names like Pedro and Paco slugged hard at leather bags and skipped rope with exquisite poise deep into the night.
Aaron was still talking about his favorite burglar: 'Leo's got this comy MO, but it always seems to work. First he makes a point of going into the house legally in daylight. Comes on as a telephone or Con Ed repain-nan: 'Hey, lady, gas leak around the corner, gotta get into your basement,' or 'Line trouble, lady-gotta inspect.' He's got nice company credentials, and he's got his girlfriend working as backup. If anyone asks questions, he gives them her number. She's waiting on the other end to verify.'
'Yeah, slick,' Janek agreed.
'On the first go-around he sees if there's anything worth taking, figures out how he's going to get in, and neutralizes the alarms.'
'What's he looking for?' 'Not the crap the addicts take. No computers or VCRs. Leo goes for the good stuff: money; gold; jewels; bearer bonds. He likes stamp and coin collections but won't bother much with art. Too cumbersome, he says, hard to sell. He likes stuff he can stick into his pockets.'
'I doubt Archer's got anything he'd be interested in.'
'You may be surprised, Frank. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Leo'll find something, and we'll take it from there. '
It was a complicated scheme, devious and tempting, which was why Janek had agreed to go uptown and take a look at Leo Titus. But he didn't think he'd end up going for it. I'm much too true blue a cop for this, he thought.
Aaron pulled into a space on the east side of Third, center of the block between I 12th and I 13th streets. He cut the engine and pointed toward a bar. A narrow red neon sign flashed BAD BOY. 'We're meeting in there,' he said.
'Gay bar, isn't it?' Aaron nodded. 'One of the esoteric ones.
Whites cruising Latinos and blacks.'
'I thought you said this guy had a girlfriend.'
'Yeah, he does. But he's kind of a swish sometimes, too. Goes home occasionally with guys. He's gotten into some nice Park Avenue apartrfients that way.'
'Shit!' 'Hey, Frank! This isn't about sexual preference.' 'You know I don't care about that. But you make him sound, I don't know-undependable.'
Aaron clamped his jaws. 'Leo's highly dependable.' He glanced at his watch. 'Time I went in. I'll talk with him a few minutes, then bring him out and parade him up and down the block. He'll know someone's looking him over but won't know who. All I want is for you to get a feel for the guy. Watch his moves, see what you think.'
Janek nodded. 'Yeah.'
As he waited, he asked himself what the hell he thought he was doing sitting low in a car in this none-too- elegant neighborhood, implicating himself in this thoroughly illegal maneuver. And the answer, he knew, was that he was at a point where he didn't care about legalities one way or the other. All he cared about was finding Jess's killer.
When Aaron walked out the door of Bad Boy Bar with Leo Titus in tow, Janek strained forward to peer. Aaron slouched in his usual manner, but Leo, a small, suave, coffee-colored man with neatly cropped hair and a debonair mustache, stepped forward with a stylish gait. And then, as they made their promenade down to the corner and back, Janek had to smile. It was impossible to dislike Leo. The lithe cat burglar moved with the bold grace of Fred Astaire. He almost seemed to prance.
'What do you have on the guy?' Janek asked as Aaron drove them back downtown. It was past 2:00 A.M.
The street life of Spanish Harlem gave way to the cold, silent, empty residential cross streets of Manhattan's Upper East Side.
Aaron glanced at him quizzically. 'Hub?'
'He's not going to do this for charity, is he?'
'Charity?' Aaron shook his head. 'Not Leo.'
'So?'
'He owes me a favor, Frank. Let's just leave it at that. '
Janek nodded. He knew better than to pry into the intricacies of a detective's relationship with an informant. Such alliances could be built upon almost anything from real affection and respect to manipulation and fear. This time, Janek suspected, it wasn't Leo who owed Aaron a favor; rather, it was Aaron who was about to incur an enormous debt.
'Here's the plan,' Aaron said. 'Tuesday night, soon as Archer leaves for her class at Eisenberg, we pull up to her place and wait.
We're running a surveillance. After a while we happen to notice a black man with a briefcase enter the house. We sit tight. For all we know Archer gave him the key.'
Janek nodded. 'Go on.'
'After a while the dude comes out. And now we notice instead of a briefcase he's carrying this overstuffed satchel. We look at each other. 'Hey,' we say,,maybe a robbery was committed in there.' So, having probable cause, we step out of our car and grab the guy. Leo's scared. He's done two tours in Attica, and he doesn't want to go up for a third. He starts to bargain. Is there any way he can get himself out of this mess? We don't take bribes, we're not that kind, but we're very interested in what he may have seen that could tie Doc Archer to the Happy Families crimes. Well, seems with all his snooping around Leo came across some pretty interesting evidence. So he trades what he saw for a walkaway deal on the robbery. And on the basis of that, valid information from an informant, we get a warrant, go in legally, and impound whatever he saw.' 'Suppose Leo doesn't see anything?'
'Then he exits with an empty satchel. The satchel's the signal: If it's bulging with stuff, he's seen something, we move in on him and make the deal. Otherwise no harm done. He just walks away.' Aaron looked at Janek. 'What do you think?'
Janek stared ahead. 'We never had this conversation.'
Aaron shook his head. 'That's right, Frank. We never talked about any of this.'
Tuesday, December 1. All day Janek asked himself if he wasn't making an enormous mistake. Twenty-five years in law enforcement and he'd never done a deal like this. Suppose Leo doesfind something, he asked himself, and they go in after it, and then Archer gets a smart lawyer who finds Leo's entry just a wee bit coincidental The lawyer goes to the D.A., who opens Leo up with the threat of a perjury charge. Leo quickly gives up Aaron, but Aaron hangs tough.
