That evening one of the swells who’d attended the dinner party for the Weldon Institute and an acquaintance of Lacy DeHavilin’s was out on the town. One of his stops was the Cotton Club. This gentleman, scion of a Canadian timber fortune, liked it that the Club was strict in its Black Code policies—the way things should be, to his way of thinking. He could clap and enjoy the fevered antics of black dancers and musicians, but not have to rub elbows with the likes of them at the tables. The finest in black entertainment presented in a place designed along the lines of a grand southern plantation. Terrific. You could be in Harlem but not have to really be in Harlem. He could let loose and not have to worry about conversing with one of them. Oh, he probably could find something of interest to talk to a Langston Hughes or an Aaron Douglas—it wasn’t as if he didn’t enjoy their work. But it was so tiresome to invariably have to hear some variation of the Negro Problem as such conversing always seemed to wind around to. That had certainly been his experience in the couple of soirées he’d attended put on by that Van Vechten chap.
The man smiled, slipping his arm around the waist of an intriguing young woman named Myra something or another. Duke Ellington’s band was playing a rendition of “Love Me or Leave Me,” a rather tall woman with honey-colored skin on the vocals. He’d met this Myra before at some function and recalled she’d spent time in the Orient. Spoke Chinese if his memory served. Her hair smelled great.
Not too far away, his brownstone was in the process of being burglarized. The thief was in dark clothes and climbed the side of the building like a human spider. Closer examination revealed he was wearing specially-designed gloves where each finger and the thumb had a metal extension. These were made from hand-rolled steel and were flexibly hinged with custom made ball bearings and wiring. Drawing his hand back and then digging into the side of the red-bricked facade, he found grip in the grout between the bricks. He could accomplish this death-defying feat due to his being in tip-top physical condition aided by custom crampons strapped to his shoes. He had a lot of experience doing such at night with little or no light. Also, he’d cased the home previously during the day. The burglar quickly reached the third story. He was on the rear of the building, and from this area, had little chance of being seen given the back of another brownstone was opposite. Except for the ground floor, there were no windows on this side. He wasn’t worried about leaving evidence of how he’d climbed. He wasn’t going to leave finger or footprints.
He stopped at the third story—this was the riskiest part of his planned criminal entry. He had to go around to the front where there was a balcony. But as the street was a semi-private cul-de-sac, there wasn’t much foot traffic at this hour. Perched at the corner of the building, he scanned the street and then, moving with quick assuredness, clambered over the front and dropped down onto the balcony. From around his chest he removed the strap to his messenger bag and dropped the gloves and crampons inside. The latch on the French windows to the balcony was easy to overcome, and the thief stepped into Levering’s study. He closed the curtained windows and affixed the miner’s lamp to his head, switching on the battery-powered light. The version he wore wasn’t available commercially. It had been designed by his associate. In this way he was able to move about the room with both hands free. Downstairs the maid and butler had retired for the evening. He had no intention of causing them to come upstairs.
He moved silently to the standing safe, a sturdy cast-iron Marsh in the corner of the room. The safe was nearly five feet tall and looked like it could withstand a direct black from a stick of dynamite, there was no effort to disguise its presence. But the thief, a master cracksman having grown up around safes as a younger man, had an intricate knowledge of their makes and manufacturers. He wasn’t going to use brute force to gain its secrets. There was a sound in the hallway. He stopped mid-stride, listening, what looked like a rubber ball suddenly in his palm. If somebody did come in, there was sleeping powder in the ball and he would squirt the stuff in their face. He also had a sap and a gun, but he didn’t think it would come to that. There was no other sound and he resumed his thievery.
Taking a knee at the safe, he removed a one-of-a-kind drill from one of his hidden pockets in his coat. It was diamond-tipped and powered by batteries, made by the same inventor who’d produced his advanced headlamp. The thief, now wearing supple gloves, proceeded to drill a hole in the safe’s door to the right of the dial after using a ruler to mark exactly where he wanted to drill. There was little noise as the heavy bit wormed its way into the door. The shavings fell, glittering, to the thick carpet. A part of the tumbler mechanism was revealed. His headlamp illuminated the now-exposed inner works, he began working the dial, a stethoscope with a suction cup to hold the listening end in place.
He soon had the combination and got
