I now had three possible targets I wanted Dick to inspect. We started with a store on the east side of Fifth Avenue, between 54th and 55th Streets. A relatively small shop, one entrance, three clerks, plus a manager and armed guard. Two display windows, with only a few items tastefully exhibited. The vault was in a back room, protected with a steel gate and solid door, both open during selling hours.
We took a look from across the street, then walked by once, then returned to look in the windows, then went in to stroll about. All the employees were busy with customers, so we had an opportunity to wander around and inspect the merchandise in showcases. We chatted, laughed, pointed out items to each other.
After we exited, I took Dick’s arm and led him downtown.
‘Well?’ I asked him. ‘What do you think?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said doubtfully. ‘An awful lot of gold-plated costume jewelry and cultured pearls. I don’t think it would be a big take. Maybe they keep the best stuff in the vault, but that four-thousand-dollar necklace of small diamonds was the most expensive thing I saw. I just don’t think the place is worth the effort.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘The second one’s over on Park, just one more block south.’
This was a larger, more elegant shop with a uniformed doorman, apparently no armed guard, and six clerks on duty, plus a cashier, floor manager, and an aged lady who apparently did nothing but gift-wrap. There were two small television cameras high up in opposite corners, so perhaps that missing armed guard was in a bulletproof cubbyhole, watching TV monitors.
This time we asked to see a diamond solitaire — ‘something in the moderate range’ — and we were shown a gorgeous rock like a miniature ice cube held in platinum claws. Only $18,000. We asked if something better was available. Indeed it was, we were assured, but the manager would prefer to take care of us personally. Unfortunately he was busy. If we would wait a few minutes …?
We told the clerk that we had another appointment.
Outside, to prove our innocence, we paused casually on the sidewalk to light cigarettes before sauntering away.
‘What about that one?’ I asked Dick Fleming.
‘The money is there,’ he acknowledged. ‘Did you see what the manager was showing the woman in the white mink? The emerald bracelet?’
‘Fifty-thousand minimum, I’d guess,’ I said. ‘Wonder where the vault is? In the back?’
‘Or on another floor,’ Dick said. ‘Up one level or down one: But that’s not what’s bothering me. It’s those TV cameras.’
‘Take a look at the last place,’ I said. ‘Then we’ll discuss it.’
My final possible was on East 55th Street, just west of Madison. But I was so impressed by it that I disregarded the business about traffic jams on crosstown streets. The outside was not prepossessing. There were small signs in the windows: ‘Watch and Jewelry Repair. We Buy and Sell Antique Jewelry. Silver, Gold, Precious Gems. Diamonds for Investment.’
Dick turned to me. ‘What’s this — a supermarket?’
‘Take a look,’ I urged.
The place was called Brandenberg amp; Sons. It wasn’t the newest or the most elegant of the shops I had cased, but it was furnished in a kind of quiet, subdued opulence: deep Oriental rugs, upholstered Louis XIV armchairs for customers, small polished walnut showcases with brass corners and hardware. There were three clerks, all handsome young men, wearing navy blazers and grey flannel slacks.
An opened door at the rear afforded a glimpse of an old-fashioned safe. No television cameras here, but there were several silent alarm buttons in plain view. No armed guard to be seen. Steel shutters that could be drawn down at night to protect the outside window displays. The whole place had a genteel, hushed, cathedral atmosphere.
The three clerks were busy. The manager himself approached us. ‘Good afternoon,’ he said, bowing deeply. ‘May I be of service?’
‘I noticed your sign,’ I said. ‘I have a gold pocket watch-’
He spread his hands and raised one shoulder. ‘But of course,’ he said. ‘How old is it?’
‘I have no idea,’ I confessed.
‘Bring it in,’ he told me.
‘Thank you,’ I said.
‘Could we look around a moment?’ Dick asked.
‘Please do,’ the manager said, beaming.
We didn’t stay long, just long enough to take a quick look at a dazzling display of gold, diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds. Incredible Victorian jewelry in worked gold, and avant-garde designs in crystal, silver, platinum. We heard one of the clerks say to a sable-clad dowager, ‘With the matching bracelet and earrings, madam, the necklace would be two hundred and eighty thousand.’
When we got outside, I took Dick Fleming’s arm and walked him across the street to a luncheonette.
‘That’s it,’ Dick said. ‘The place is loaded.’
I reached across the table to squeeze his hand.
‘I’m glad to hear you say it, Dick. It’s my first choice, too. It’s not as flashy as some of the places I saw, but I think the loot is there.’
‘No doubt. And it has only one entrance. A total of six employees, counting the two repairmen in the back. Of course there may be messengers or others.’
‘Plus customers,’ I reminded him.
We were silent while our tea was served.
He shook his head.
‘It seems too good to be true,’ he said. ‘No TV cameras. No armed guard. The door of the safe open.’
‘Alarm buttons,’ I reminded him.
‘I know, but still — in a place handling two-hundred-thousand dollar necklaces, the security seems awfully casual to me.’
‘Not to worry. All we’ve done is tentatively decide on a target. I’ll check out the place completely before we go ahead. I like this luncheonette. I can sit here and see when it opens, when it closes, how many employees report for work, when it’s crowded with customers, when it’s empty, and so forth. Also, I’m going to pay them at least one more visit. I really do own that old pocket watch I told the manager about.
‘And you’re willing to sell it to them?’
‘Why not? Help finance our campaign.’
We both laughed. We were so light-hearted, so happy. All I can say in our defense is that we honestly had no intention of going through with it.