100 Malicious Little Mysteries

A Dip in the Poole by Bill Pronzini

I was sitting in a heavy baroque chair in the Hotel Poole’s genteel lobby, leafing through one of the plastic-encased magazines provided by the management, when the girl in the dark tweed suit picked Andrew J. Stuyvesant’s pockets.

She worked it very nicely. Stuyvesant — a silver-haired old gentleman who carried a malacca walking stick and had fifteen or twenty million dollars in Texas oil — had just stepped out of one of the chrome-and-walnut elevators directly in front of me. The girl appeared from the direction of the curving marble staircase, walking rapidly and with elaborate preoccupation, and collided with him. She excused herself. Bowing in a gallant way, Stuyvesant allowed as how it was perfectly all right, my dear. She got his wallet and the diamond stickpin from his tie, and he neither felt nor suspected a thing.

The girl apologized again and then hurried off across the padded indigo carpeting toward the main entrance at the lobby’s opposite end, slipping the items into a tan suede bag she carried over one arm. Almost immediately, I was out of my chair and moving after her. She managed to thread her way through the potted plants and the dark furnishings to within a few steps of the double-glass doors before I caught up with her.

I let my hand fall on her arm. “Excuse me just a moment,” I said, smiling.

She stiffened. Then she turned and regarded me as if I had crawled out from one of the potted plants. “I beg your pardon?” she said in a frosty voice.

“You and I had best have a little chat.”

“I am not in the habit of chatting with strange men.”

“I think you’ll make an exception in my case.”

Her brown eyes flashed angrily as she said, “I suggest you let go of my arm. If you don’t, I shall call the manager.”

I shrugged. “There’s no need for that.”

“I certainly hope not.”

“Simply because he would only call me.”

“What?”

“I’m chief of security at the Hotel Poole, you see,” I told her. “What was once referred to as the house detective.”

She grew pale, and the light dimmed in her eyes. “Oh,” she said.

I steered her toward the arched entrance to the hotel’s lounge, a short distance on our left. She offered no resistance. Once inside, I sat her down in one of the leather booths and then seated myself opposite. A blue-uniformed waiter approached, but I shook my head and he retreated.

I examined the girl across the polished surface of the table. The diffused orange glow from the small lantern in its center gave her classic features the impression of purity and innocence, and turned her seal-brown hair into a cascading black wave. I judged her age at about twenty-five. I said, “Without a doubt, you’re the most beautiful dip I’ve ever encountered.”

“I... don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t you?”

“Certainly not.”

“A dip is underworld slang for a pickpocket.”

She tried to affect indignation. “Are you insinuating that I...?”

“Oh come on,” I said. “I saw you lift Mr. Stuyvesant’s wallet and his diamond stickpin. I was sitting directly opposite the elevator, not fifteen feet away.”

She didn’t say anything. Her fingers toyed with the catch on the tan suede bag. After a moment, her eyes lifted to mine, briefly, and then dropped again to the bag. She sighed in a tortured way. “You’re right, of course. I stole those things.”

I reached out, took the bag from her and snapped it open. Stuyvesant’s wallet, with the needle-point of the stickpin now imbedded in the leather, lay on top of the various feminine articles inside. I removed them, glanced at her identification long enough to memorize her name and address, reclosed the bag and returned it to her.

She said softly, “I’m... not a thief, I want you to know that. Not really, I mean.” She took her lower lip between her teeth. “I have this... compulsion to steal. I’m powerless to stop myself.”

“Kleptomania?”

“Yes. I’ve been to three different psychiatrists during the past year, but they’ve been unable to cure me.”

I shook my head sympathetically. “It must be terrible for you.”

“Terrible,” she agreed. “When... when my father learns of this episode, he’ll have me put into a sanatorium.” Her voice quavered. “He threatened to do just that if I ever stole anything again, and he doesn’t make idle threats.”

I studied her. Presently, I said, “Your father doesn’t have to know what happened here today.”

“He... he doesn’t?”

“No,” I said slowly. “There was no real harm done, actually. Mr. Stuyvesant will get his wallet and stickpin back. And I see no reason for causing the hotel undue embarrassment through the attendant publicity if I report the incident.”

Her face brightened. “Then... you’re going to let me go?”

I drew a long breath. “I suppose I’m too soft-hearted for the type of position that I have. Yes, I’m going to let you go. But you have to promise me that you’ll never set foot inside the Hotel Poole again.”

“Oh, I promise!”

“If I see you here in the future, I’ll have to report you to the police.”

“You won’t!” she assured me eagerly. “I... have an appointment with another psychiatrist tomorrow morning. I feel sure he can help me.”

I nodded. “Very well, then.” I turned to stare through the arched lounge entrance at the guests and uniformed bellboys scurrying back and forth in the lobby. When I turned back again, the street door to the lounge was just closing and the girl was gone.

I sat there for a short time, thinking about her. If she was a kleptomaniac, I reflected, then I was Mary, Queen of Scots. What she was, of course, was an accomplished professional pickpocket — her technique was much too polished, her hands much too skilled — and an extremely adept liar.

I smiled to myself, and stood and went out into the lobby again. But instead of resuming my position in the baroque chair before the elevator bank, or approaching the horseshoe-shaped desk, I veered left to walk casually through the entrance doors and out to Powell Street.

As I made my way through the thickening late-afternoon crowds — my right hand resting on the fat leather wallet and the diamond stickpin in my coat pocket — I found myself feeling a little sorry for the girl. But only just a little.

After all, Andrew J. Stuyvesant had been my mark from the moment I first noticed him entering the Hotel Poole that morning — and after a three-hour vigil I had been within fifteen seconds of dipping him myself when she appeared virtually out of nowhere.

Wouldn’t you say I was entitled to the swag?