observe the ice cream parlor. The place had an outdoors sitting area with wooden chairs and tables. Few customers walked in and out of the main door, and none were sitting outside. I went inside and got some vanilla ice cream and then sat down at one of the outdoors tables. I waited a long while. After an hour I began to wonder whether I would in fact meet a cat burglar there that day. Could it be that Doc told me a story about a cat burglar to get rid of me for the day? I was becoming paranoid. Never mind, so was he. But no, it was not a fair assessment of the man. Doc Minus Two took pains to prepare for every possible scenario, yes, but he did not always act with caution. He let me witness his use of a fake badge. How did he know I would not go and squeal to the authorities? He revealed too much about his methodology, and some of it was illegal, like hiring wanted criminals to kidnap people, or obtaining police records. I could have reported this, too, to someone. A paranoid would not have entrusted me with the means for his own destruction. What was he then? Could I define someone like Doc in one word?
When she finally arrived I thought it was a mistake. I imagined a limber young girl, athletic and confident, maybe dressed in black from head to toe. But the cat burglar turned out to be a middle-aged woman in jeans, somewhat on the heavy side, with a loud red handbag dangling from her shoulder. Her eyes were tired, though not as much as those of Doc Minus Two. "Al?" she inquired.
I nodded and got up to greet her. "Lili," she said. She shook my hand as if we were two corporate executives about to hammer out a deal. She did not smile but had a pleasant expression on her face.
"Wow," I said. "I never met a..." I looked around and saw no one within earshot but decided not to finish the sentence anyway. I had to practice being cautious. "Did Doc explain everything to you?"
"He did. He said you'll tell me how to get to the place, the ins and outs, and also give me practical information like are there any nosy neighbors, cop on the beat, where the pen drive is and where the valuables are."
I told her what I could. She seemed satisfied with the information. She reached inside her handbag and took out a tablet PC. She turned it on and gave it to me. A microphone set was connected to it. "Open the web browser. I have the link pre-set for you. That'll show you my camera feed." She took out a black bandana with a small camera in its center and wore it around her head so that the device was positioned over her forehead. The link came to life and I could see myself in the browser. "When I'm there tonight, you'll be able to see what I see and talk to me so we're on the same page."
"Aren't you afraid someone else might be able to see this?"
"It's encrypted. It'll only work on my own tablet. And I expect it back when I'm done, together with my four hundred bucks."
"So what happens now?"
"I'll give you a call just before I start out, around 2 AM. Be somewhere where you can talk freely and where it's quiet, because I'll be whispering."
Now I had to kill more than twelve hours, and did not know how. I went to three different restaurants and ordered only an appetizer in each. I walked up and down Longfellow Bridge and Cambridge Street, and spent some time at Granary Burying Ground where John Hancock and Samuel Adams have their final resting place. As it turned dark I knew I had to find a place to spend the night and communicate with Lili, but could not go to a hotel without showing my ID. This seemed hopeless. I could not stand on a street corner and give instructions to a cat burglar. I was tired, too. Days of riding for hours on end in an open Jeep were taking their toll on me. I needed to find a solution and quick. Then I remembered I had Lili's tablet with me, and immediately I knew what I needed to do.
I opened the web browser and looked up escort services in the area. I called one up, also using the tablet. I was nervous as I had never done this before. The voice that greeted me was cheery, as if it were a flower shop I was calling — one of those madams who know how to make the nervous feel comfortable. After some negotiations in a trembling voice, she agreed to send Vicky, someone whose picture I saw online, for two hours, which was the minimum. It was to be two hundred dollars an hour. But I was not done. I said, "There's one other thing I hope you could help me with."
"We usually can," she replied in the same cheery voice.
"I need her to book the hotel room for me. I'll come up later."
Silence on the other side. She was expecting something else, more in line with the nature of her business. Her tone was a little firmer now, but only just. "The client books the hotel room, sir."
"I'll pay her upfront. I'll meet her outside the lobby and give her the money in advance. You won't have to trust me with a dime."
Silence again. "I don't know. If something happens in that hotel room afterwards, they'll go to her."
"Nothing will happen. She can take a picture of me and the room before she leaves if she wants to have proof."
I never thought that someone could sound both cheery and suspicious at the same time, but she managed it. "Why can't you book the room yourself?"
"My wife has a top-notch divorce layer, and they go through every hotel registry in town. I can't have my name in there."
A sigh of understanding, maybe even relief that there was nothing more sinister behind it. "All right, if you pay her upfront for everything, and you tack on a hundred dollars for the service, we can accommodate you."
As I was waiting for Vicky outside the hotel lobby, I thought about my dwindling stash. Just a few days ago I considered ten thousand dollars to be a lot of money. Now this sum did not seem to get me through a week. Doc Minus Two was an expensive person to hang around with. Sooner or later I would have to go into a bank again and make another withdrawal, this time from my 401K, and so leave a trace. I would have to ask Doc Minus Two if it wouldn't be too risky.
Vicky showed up on time. She was very nice, and betrayed neither surprise nor hesitation at my unique request. The madam must have explained it to her and removed any doubts she might have had. I gave her the money and she went inside and after ten minutes I saw her through the glass door walking energetically towards the elevators. She made a hand gesture. I walked in quickly and found her still waiting there as several guests were going past her and through an elevator door that had just slid open. She handed me the key card and followed me into the next elevator. I had a hotel room now without having to show my ID and did not need Vicky anymore. I wanted to be the gentleman from the books and movies and let her go without using her services, like Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye. But I was no Holden Caulfield and she was no cheap prostitute, and I had already made it so far. I felt that I had earned it, and that furthermore, I needed it. No one had a right to take it away from me now, certainly not some twisted morality that existed only in my head as the reflection of the copious amounts of popular culture I was fed since a little boy.
She was very nice, even to novices like me who kept apologizing every five minutes for what they perceived they had done wrong or not done enough or not wanted done to them. She even kissed me on the cheek before she left. I let her go early. It was now ten. I had four hours of sleep ahead of me. It felt like years since I last had a nice shower in a clean bathroom, and so I took my time about it. Then I lay in a comfortable bed, which, after spending days in caves or tents, felt like heaven. Forget the wheel or the internal combustion engine or the computer; humanity's most important invention thus far was the soft mattress, period. You may not think it true when you wake up refreshed in the morning, but you would sure as hell agree with me at night when you're dead tired and looking for something soft to support you as you lay unconscious. I fell asleep immediately. The alarm clock buzzed at two as I had set it to, and I opened the web browser in the tablet. I was groggy with sleep but not unfocused.
I could already hear Lili. "Alright, do you get the camera feed?" She asked. She was speaking very quietly.
"Yes." I could see my apartment house in green and white. It was very bright. "Are you using infra red?" I asked.
"Of course." Then she approached the hous
e carefully and went to the back of the parking lot, underneath my bedroom window. She stood right by the outside wall and put her arms on it. She was wearing suction cups on her hands. I assumed she had these on her feet, too. She climbed up slowly, quietly. It was not a long way. My apartment was on the second floor. She took out a glass cutter and cut a square in my window pane and then removed it with one of the suction cups. She reached inside and released the latch, and slid the window open. Now she was inside my bedroom. This seemed too easy. I thought it must have been insulting for her, who was used to diffusing sophisticated alarm systems in much larger homes. My apartment had no protection because no one in his right mind would break into it. It is a sad situation, I thought, when you not only need to pay someone to break into your own place, but feel guilty about putting them through this.
I guided her towards the pen drive. It was in a desk drawer, but I could not remember which one, and made Lili open all six. I was embarrassed by the things she saw coming out of them; the moldy piece of cheese I forgot there six months ago and the gigantic green pencil I still kept from my sixth birthday, and the award for coming in third in a bowling competition at my old workplace. Lili said nothing. Once she