Aunt Louise loved this building.
She had described it as one small part of the fabric that made San Francisco what it is and a reflection of the history of Diamond Heights. The many design influences since the beginning of development in the late 1950s then stopped, started again, and stumbled along until it became the hodge-podge it was today. The more than 11,000 houses built by Joseph Eichler, scattered throughout Diamond Heights and across the rest of the Bay area, now back in vogue.
Aunt Louise had found and restored both the ornate iron entrance gate and the wooden door behind it - both items favored beauty over function. She'd had a two-foot-by-three-foot hole cut in the door to accommodate an abstract modernist piece of stained glass, casting a pink glow inside the entrance, of varying shades, as the sun moved across it. Adding high-tech security to these period treasures was not a conversation they had ever considered having with Aunt Louise. Jack was sure Conti had cracked or shattered the stained-glass window in his efforts.
While wondering how Conti had broken in, Jack looked at the red mark on Debbie's face. He went to the fridge and the kitchen sink, returning with a packet of frozen peas and a tea towel. As he wrapped the peas in the tea towel, he noticed the two black nylon pouches he had earlier flipped onto the bed. He placed the cold compress against the red mark.
"Hold that there," said Jack.
Debbie held it with one and her other reached up to place her palm on Jack's face. Jack pulled her hand off his face, turned it over, kissed her palm, put it in her lap and gave his attention to the pouches.
He opened them and emptied the contents onto the bed. Debbie shuffled her sitting position around to get a better view of the black metal items and then at Jack.
"Are they lock picks?" she asked.
"Yes, it's quite a collection."
He opened the other pouch and emptied it next to the lock picks. A group of door keys clattered onto each other, followed by a one-inch steel cylinder with a rubber front piece.
"What's with all the keys?" said Debbie.
"This is a Bump Lockset," said Jack.
Conti's mouth formed a sort of horizontal crack below his nose. Jack assumed this was a smile of pride.
"He used this to get into the building? How?"
"Short explanation. You file down the teeth on the key, leaving one protruding more than the others. You stick it in the lock and hit it with the hammer. The key goes in, the tumblers fall into place and you can open the door."
"That easy?"
"As I said, that's the short explanation."
"Why so many keys?"
"They are all filed down differently. Five different keys will take care of a lot of locks. Twenty-four takes care of about 99 percent of all locks."
"How do you know this?"
"Through my cousin."
The countless hours of lectures at the San Francisco Police Department Academy, courtesy of Freddie.
"My guess he used the lock picks on the iron gate and the Bump Lock on the wooden door."
The crack across Conti's face didn't move, but he shrugged one shoulder.
"Did you make these?" Jack said to him.
"If you know so much, you know you can buy all of this on the Internet. It's not illegal to have them."
Jack knew what Conti said was correct. He wouldn't have even needed a tutor. Video instruction was available on the Internet, free of charge. All a person would need after that was practice.
The doorbell made its 'attention-attention' tones. Jack looked at Debbie, whose head had snapped towards the door. "Are there anymore ex-anythings you haven't told me about?"
"No. But it could be one or more of Rizzo's cousins," said Debbie as she picked up her steel pin, "I mean they sent Conti here. They could have sent more."
Possibly Conti was to make a phone call once he had secured Debbie. No phone call so they send a backup team. With Conti, Jack knew he had the element of surprise in his favor when he first smashed Conti's face into the wall. Without that and more than one, it would not end well.
Jack looked at Conti who shrugged his shoulders in answer to Jack's unspoken question.
YOU ARE READING
Forensics 101
Mystery / ThrillerJack Rhodes should have been ordinary. But twenty-five years ago something happened which left him with anger which he struggles to contain whenever he comes across injustice. Intellectually, this is channeled into his consultancy work as a forensic...
