Could he, Janek, live with himself if Aaron got in trouble for helping him out? No way! He'd turn himself in with the result that the doctrine of 'poisoned fruit' would prevail, the evidence against Archer would be tainted and quashed, Archer would get away with murder, and he, Janek, could end up doing a year in the penitentiary.
Would it be worth it? Not if it went down that way, it wouldn't be.
But there was another scenario, far more succulent. With one bold stroke he might solve a case that could otherwise require years of orthodox investigation.
That, he was ashamed to admit, was a possibility he could not resist.
At seven that evening, fifteen minutes after Archer's last patient left her house, Beverly Archer herself emerged, bundled in a shapeless gray goose down coat.
It was teeth-chattering weather. Janek and Aaron watched shivering from their parking spot as Beverly seemed almost to be swept by the wind down to the corner of Eighty-first and Second, then attempted to flag down a cab.
Several passed her by. Perhaps they didn't like the look of the short, dumpy lady thrashing at the air with her arms. But then a large Checker glided to a halt, Archer hopped in, the cab took off downtown, and, a few seconds later, after Janek stepped out of the car, Aaron waved to him and took off after the cab. For thirty minutes Janek waited on the corner, collar up, arms clutched to his chest, trying to avert his face from the wintry wind. 'Knives- in-the-cheeks' was what he called the relentless, driven icy air that ripped into the sides of his face. He was shaking when Aaron finally returned. He stumbled back into the car, then immediately began rubbing his hands while Aaron pulled into a fire hydrant zone directly across the street from Archer's house.
'Sorry I took so long. I thought I should follow her all the way just in case she forgot something and came back.'
'She could still come back.'' 'Harder now. Class started at seven-thirty. Which gives us a good hour and a half.' He glanced at his watch. 'Leo should be turning up. I talked to him this afternoon. Yesterday morning he did his utility man routine. No problems. The alarm system's disarmed.' Aaron grinned at Janek. 'Don't worry, Frank. No paper trail. I called him from a booth.'
But Janek was nervous. Still got time to cancel this madness, he thought. He was about to call the whole deal off when Aaron gestured toward the corner. Leo Titus was crossing Third Avenue.
'Good old Leo,' Aaron whispered.
Later Janek would wonder if the reason he didn't cancel then was that he didn't want to cause Aaron to lose face.
Leo didn't even glance at them as he approached the house. And then Janek had to admire the man's cool. Leo walked straight up to Archer's front door, paused briefly, and two seconds later he was in, the door was closed again, and even someone watching would have no reason to suspect that a burglar had just entered the house.
'Guy's got moves,' Aaron marveled.
Fifty minutes passed before Janek became uneasy. Then, when he asked Aaron if Leo wasn't due out pretty soon, Aaron responded with patronizing patience as if Janek were a rookie in need of a steadying hand.
'Keep the faith, Frank. This is our one crack at her. It's gotta be a thorough search. Leo's good. He knows how to look for stuff, and he knows how much time he's got left. Don't worry. If there's something in there, he'll find it.'
But that wasn't what Janek was worried about.
Twenty minutes later Aaron, too, started showing signs of nervousness.
'Class breaks at nine. Takes her a minimum of fifteen minutes to get home. Point of fact, she usually hangs around a while answering questions, stuff like that. So we're safe for another half hour at least.'
'Does Leo think he's got till nine-ten?'
Aaron exploded. 'I'm not stupid, Frank! I told him nine max.
He's got fifteen more minutes. He'll make it. Trust me-he'll be out of there in time.'
At eight fifty-five they turned to each other. 'Should have wired him up,' Aaron said.
But Aaron knew there was no way they could have wired Leo, though it would have been nice to listen to him as he worked. If they wired him and something went wrong, their role would be exposed.
At nine Aaron smashed his fist against the steering wheel. 'That son of a bitch better not try a double cross.'
'Could he?' Janek asked.
'If he found something really valuable-I don't know.' Aaron paused.
'I can't imagine it. Anyway, we would have seen him come out.' He paused. 'Unless there's some way he found to sneak out through the back.' He hit the wheel again. 'But he wouldn't. He wouldn't dare! He knows I'd come after him. I'd never rest!'
Ten minutes later Aaron announced he was going in no matter the risk to the case. Janek gently put his hand on Aaron's arm.
'Yeah, you're right, someone has to go in. But this is my case. If it's going to get screwed up, I'll do the screwing.'
'You can't go in there, Frank. You're a lieutenant, for Christ sakes!'
'I'll say I saw a thief enter and followed him in hot pursuit.'
'Jesus!
'They'll believe me.'
'Leo's my boy. I feel… awful.'
'Could be it's not his fault. Maybe he ran into whatever.' Janek picked up a radio. 'No talking unless you see Archer. Then just one squawk.'
It was only on the doorstep of Archer's house that he wondered how he was going to get inside. He wasn't one of those detectives who excelled at opening locks. But when he took hold of the doorknob, turned it, and pushed, he was not surprised to find the door opening easily. Somehow he expected it to open, as if he had dreamed of the very sound it would make, as if everything that had happened and would happen on this night was familiar to him in some mysterious way.
The door, of course, was taped. Perhaps Aaron had told him Leo always taped his doors while describing the burglar's technique. Janek closed the door softly behind him, then stood very still. The hallway was dark except for a residual glow from the street that filtered in through the narrow leaded windows on either side of the portal.
The coat closet door was open. lanek glanced inside.
A tiny bulb on the burglar alarm keyboard burned red to show that the system was armed up.
But Leo had neutralized it the day before. There was no danger; motion detectors would not set off the siren. Janek listened but heard nothing. Then he thought he felt vibrations, a faint thump on the floor above. He glanced at his watch. Nine-eleven. He had four minutes to find Leo and get out. He headed for the stairs. they were carpeted. He could barely hear his own footsteps as he crept up to the landing. He paused to listen again. This was the mysterious residential portion of the house he had been thinking about for a week. Janek waited until his eyes adjusted to the darkness, then continued to the second floor. Nine-twelve. Three more minutes. He noticed a reddish glow from an open doorway down the hall. He passed a closed door, probably a closet, then a door that was partially open. A glimpse of floor tiles suggested a bathroom. He paused.
'Leo,' he whispered. When he heard nothing, he whispered the burglar's name again and again heard no response.
He crept farther up the hall to the open doorway where he'd seen the glow. He stood there and peered into a cavernous high-ceilinged room strangely filled, like a photographer's darkroom, with dim red light.
It was a bedroom, but unlike any bedroom he had ever seen except perhaps in a movie. An enormous fourposter stood free, a foot or so from one of the walls. Opposite the bed there was a wide niche which once may have contained a fireplace. In this niche hung a fulllength life-size oil portrait of a woman. A light extending from the wall above the painting shed red light upon its surface. Janek stared at the picture, his eyes riveted to its dominating imagery. The woman depicted wore a lowcut silk scarlet dress and held a microphone in her hand. Posed before a dark velour curtain held open by a gilded rope, she appeared to be singing in a smoky ambience. But what was most striking about her was the halo of thick, glossy red curls that surrounded her head, her hard-edged alabaster white features, and the equally pale, lustrous exposed flesh of her upper bosoms, which swelled within the clinging silk of her dress. The woman made a striking figure, at once carnal and statuesque, sensual and
