If our Mr. Jones was a government employee, he was a hefty one, since Army general officers are very finicky about who they allow as neighbors. Why this is, I don’t know. Maybe they all like to get together at night and dance around naked. I waited around for three minutes and watched to see if I could tell which lights went on inside which room. I saw nothing. Jones’s room had to be on the back side of the building.
Among the many useful skills we were taught in the outfit was breaking and entering. They even brought in some ex-cons to put us through the paces. I ended up working with a guy named Harry G. No last name, just Harry G.
Harry was what my grandfather would call a grand piece of work. He was short and squat, much like a fireplug, bald as a billiard ball, and had this pair of sparkling little black eyes. When he laughed, he sounded just like a horse with a hernia. He’d only been caught once, he informed me, even though he had burgled thousands of places. The government knew he had managed to steal a fortune and threatened to do an IRS audit to add to his legal woes, then prosecute him for tax fraud on top of burglary, unless he agreed to cooperate. Since Harry always worked alone, he figured they couldn’t make him rat out anybody. Any kind of ratting, in Harry G’s book, was a capital offense. But since he had no partners to turn in, he therefore agreed.
The deal was this. In exchange for agreeing to train government agents in his skills, he was allowed to stay free. Oh, and he had to promise to stop stealing. Harry said, hey, what the hell, he was already worth millions, so why not? It would give him something to balance out the ledger when he met The Maker, as he put it. Maybe give a little back to the country that had given him so much. He had about ten more of these worthy justifications, and I thought they were hilarious at the time.
I spent a month with Harry. Two days on disabling burglar alarms, three days on picking locks, five days on safecracking, et cetera, et cetera. When Harry was done with me, I could break into and hot-wire a car in one minute flat. I could do a reasonable second-story job on a well-protected home, and get past most any safe manufactured before 1985. That was the year the government had forced Harry out of business, and he ruefully admitted that he hadn’t kept up with the new technologies.
I went back to my tent and lay down for a nap. I set my alarm for one o’clock, then fell asleep. When the alarm went off, I dressed in running shoes and a pair of Army sweats, which were as innocuous as green berets around here. I grabbed my black gloves, a knife, a poncho, and cut eyeholes in my Army-issued black ski cap, then tucked those in my waistband.
It was dark, and very few people were out and about. I jogged as though I were a late-night fitness addict. Since this was an Army base and lots of folks pulled night shifts, late-night runners were a common sight. Nobody paid me any attention. I got to the Visiting General Officers’ Quarters and did three swift laps around the building. I saw nobody, and nobody saw me.
I quietly went through the front entrance and into a hallway. There were four doors, two on the left and two on the right. I immediately ruled out the two nearest doors, because both had windows that faced the front of the building, and I hadn’t seen any lights go on when Jones entered his room. This left the last two. I had a 50 percent chance of hitting the right one.
I walked down and stood by the doorway on the left. I let two minutes go by to give my eyes a chance to adjust to the darkness. Then I bent down and studied the lock. It was a simple two-way tumbler. As Harry used to say, a piece of cake. I took out a straightened paper clip and went to work. Harry had taught me to insert the end of the clip and start feeling to the left. Once the end of the clip struck the first tumbler, spin it quickly counterclockwise, then withdraw it quickly. Harry would’ve been proud. I hit it on the first try.
Then I stayed where I was for a full minute. Picking a lock makes noise, so I waited to see if I could hear anyone stirring inside the room. If I did, I was prepared to sprint out of the building and call this one a dead end. Finally I twisted the knob and quietly entered, carefully pulling the door shut behind me.
The room smelled like perfume and I felt a sudden stab of fear. Maybe Jones had lined up some company for the night. It took me nearly a minute to work my way across the room to the bed. A lumpy figure was under the blanket and I could hear light snoring. Only one set of snores, though. A uniform jacket was slung across the desk chair, and I got out a small penlight and studied it. There was a single star on the collar, and the nametag read Jackson.
I put two and two together; the first two being the perfume, and the last two being her name. General Wanda Jackson was in charge of the military post exchange system. I guessed she was visiting here to check on the service being provided to our boys and girls in the field. It took me another full minute to work my way back to her door. I turned the interior locking mechanism, then slipped out, pulling the door closed behind me.
I waited two minutes, then went to work on the next lock. It took me four tries this time. I was glad Harry wasn’t there. He would’ve chewed my ass till it bled. I slipped in, closing the door behind me, and whiffed the air. This odor was much more satisfying. The room reeked of men’s cologne, which meant it was almost certainly Jones’s lair. Soldiers in the field, even general officers, don’t wear cologne. But civilians who think they are ladies’ men almost certainly do.
I stood for a moment and listened to Jones’s breathing pattern. He was a quiet sleeper, which was not a good omen since quiet sleepers are very often light sleepers. I worked my way over to his desk. It was a tiny room, but I moved very slowly and very delicately, so it took me a full two minutes. I knew what I wanted; it was only a matter of finding it. Quickly and without bashing into anything.
My hand pawed softly around on the floor until it hit Jones’s briefcase, which was located right between his desk and the headboard of his bed. I squeezed it and felt it. It was smooth, maybe suede, or maybe a very fine Italian or Spanish leather. I lifted it up and left the way I came in, making sure to leave the door unlocked.
I walked out the entrance and stretched as though I were preparing to jog, while I searched both sides of the street. Nothing. Not a soul anywhere in sight. I then ran across the street and dodged between two buildings. I had a poncho stuffed inside my waistband, and I pulled it out, whipped it open, then got inside it, using it like a little tent. I got on my knees and placed Jones’s briefcase on the ground. Then I pulled out my penlight and inspected my haul.
The briefcase was locked. It had one of those little combination locks, only, unfortunately, not the cheap type found on most briefcases. These were made of solid brass, three tumblers, with ten numbers each. Mr. Jones had spent a lot of money on this briefcase. Too bad for him, because I didn’t have the right equipment to get into it without damaging the mechanism. So be it.
I took out my knife, made a hole, withdrew it, and flipped it over, then used the serrated edge to cut a long slit along the bottom edge of the case. Then I kept sawing along the next edge. I took some joy in destroying Mr. Jones’s obscenely expensive briefcase. You have to take your victories where you find them. That done, I reached inside and felt around. There were a few papers and folders, but I figured that Jones knew better than to store any classified materials in his room. Besides, what I was looking for was smaller. I finally felt a tiny booklet and pulled it out.