“Sure,” Nell said. “I used to wear six-inch heels when I was in uniform.”

“Now there’s something to contemplate.” He smiled at her. He’d said his name was “Erbal,” like in the garden.

“Spelled with an aitch?” Nell had asked.

“Exactly, but pronounced the old-fashioned way.”

He was in his thirties, about six feet tall but terribly thin. Even features, sharply defined cheekbones, dark chin stubble trying to be a goatee. Maybe good looking, if he filled out.

Nell pointed to the NYPD-like uniforms displayed on wooden hangers. “The swastika, that on all the shirts and caps?”

“We deal in fantasy here, Detective.”

“I can see that.” Nell let her gaze roam over the leather goods, vibrators, and shrink-wrapped dildos arranged on a pegboard behind the counter.

“If it means anything,” Herbal said, “you don’t look like a fascist to me.”

“Nevertheless,” Nell said, “I’m going to need the names of people who bought or rented cop costumes in the past few months.”

“You can understand, a place like this, we don’t like giving out our clientele’s names.”

“You can understand, a place like this, we can close it down in a wink.”

“My, you can be dominating.”

“Even arresting.”

“We don’t rent here, only sell. And to tell you the truth, Bad Cop has kind of gone out of style. Though you could certainly bring it off, if you’re interested in buying a uniform. I’d alter it so it was skin tight.”

“Thanks, but I see enough rough stuff in my work.”

“It can be more a mental thing.”

“Ain’t that the truth.”

Herbal excused himself and went behind a curtain that led to a space behind the pegboard. Nell tried to stop looking at some kind of electrified dildo that featured attached but independently movable rubber protrusions. The thing was seventy-five dollars. It must do something.

Herbal was back with a slip of paper, and a yellow stub of pencil that he tucked behind his ear as if he were playing a newspaperman in an old movie.

“Two sales of Bad Cop in the last three months,” he said. “Two customers, a man and a woman. Here are their names and addresses. As you can see, they live in the neighborhood.”

“Do you know them?”

“Not personally. I’ve seen the woman around. And the man comes in here now and then and buys something.”

“What kind of something?”

“Magazines, usually. Sometimes a book.” Herbal pointed to a rack of magazines and paperbacks.

“What’s the subject, usually?”

“Bondage and discipline, S&M, that sort of thing.”

“Male on female?”

“Yeah.”

“And the woman?”

“I don’t know her orientation. She bought the uniform, and that’s the only time I’ve seen her in here. Other’n that, just passed her on the street.” Herbal bit his lower lip. “Detective…”

Nell waited.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell them where you got their names, or how you found out they bought the uniforms.”

“I can try to keep that confidential, Herbal, depending on where the investigation leads.”

He grinned, greatly relieved. “If there’s anything you might need…” He made an encompassing gesture with his right arm.

“Maybe that electric dildo,” Nell said. “The foot-long one that looks like it’s grown warts. Is it waterproof?”

“Detective!”

Nell laughed, thanked Herbal for his cooperation, and headed for the door.

“Remember,” said Herbal’s voice behind her, “confidential.”

“If I have to name my source,” Nell said, “I’ll tell them I tortured it out of you.”

“Detective!”

Nell thought it was fun sometimes, being a cop in New York.

64

Looper figured he’d make one more call before lunch. Proper Woman was listed as a company that specialized in theatrical props and other supplies, and it was located in Tribeca, near a Greek restaurant that served great baklava, which to Looper was almost as satisfying as a cigarette after a meal.

The entrance to Proper Woman wasn’t impressive. Nor was the building itself, an old brick and stone five-story structure a block off Broadway. The inside of the building was warmer than outside. In fact, the damned thing was a kiln. Looper wiped sweat from his face with a wadded handkerchief.

He had to trudge up a narrow flight of stairs to a converted freight elevator, which he rode to the top floor.

What he saw when he stepped out of the elevator was a vast, sunlit array of…everything. And it was cooler here. There was a system of shafts and vents suspended from the ceiling. Looper gazed out over sets of furniture, a suit of armor, long rows of ornate chandeliers, cases of paste jewelry, racks of firearms, medieval weapons, a rowboat, an antique car, staircases leading nowhere, a section of white picket fence, and racks of clothing. Including various uniforms.

Looper had phoned ahead, but saw no one. Then a slim, gray-haired woman appeared from behind some artificial shrubbery and smiled, holding out her hand. “Detective Looper?”

Looper shook her hand, careful not to squeeze. She was in her seventies and obviously had once been beautiful. “I’m Laverne Blisner.”

“Let me guess,” Looper said, “you used to be an actress.”

The smile brightened. “Close enough. I was a dancer. Now I do this.” She waved an arm gracefully—like a dance movement. “My husband and I went into the theatrical supply business twenty years ago. Now I and my daughters own and manage the company. We furnish play productions with just about anything, and if we don’t have it, we find it.”

“I can’t imagine you not having it,” Looper said.

“Have you seen Fiddler on the Roof?”

“Several times,” Looper lied.

“Our roof.”

“Amazing.”

“You mentioned uniforms when you called.”

“Yes. New York Police uniforms.”

“What period?”

“Present, or at least recent.”

“Got ’em.”

“No surprise, Laverne.” Such an innately lovely woman, he found himself wondering what her daughters looked like.

Laverne danced—or so Looper thought—over to a rack of clothes that weren’t uniforms, but Southern belle dresses with lace-laden hoop skirts. “Let me explain that most of our clothing is used. Those in charge of dressing a major play have their designs, their costumes, tailor-made. We get them after the plays close. Then, of course, smaller productions come to us to rent in order to economize.” Laverne obviously enjoyed explaining things, and might do so in detail for a long time.

“If you’d show me the NYPD costumes.”

She smiled and led the way through more racks of clothing, past a genuine stuffed grizzly bear that gave Looper the creeps, then to more clothing, including a rack of blue uniforms. Looper saw what looked like nineteenth-century police uniforms, then later, nineteen-twenties stuff, with less defined shoulders and the standard eight-point caps that were still worn. Other time periods were covered. The uniforms seemed to be arranged in chronological order. The last two on the rack looked modern enough to pass.

Looper held them out separately from the other uniforms. “Have you rented either of these lately?”

“Not for months. Those are from an Off-Broadway production, Rug Rats.”

“Never heard of it,” Looper said honestly.

“Well, it didn’t last very long. But there was a bit part in it for a policeman who patrols a lovers’ lane.”

“A policeman? There are two uniforms.”

“Everyone but the critics and the public expected the play to have a longer run,” Laverne said. “And costumes have to be rotated so they can be cleaned, or the first several rows of the theater would notice. That distinctive dress you see in a play is actually at least two dresses.”