A book in the Bernie Rhodenbarr series

At a quarter after ten on the last Wednesday in May, I put a beautiful woman in a taxi and watched her ride out of my life, or at least out of my neighborhood. Then I stepped off the curb and flagged a cab of my own.

Seventy-first and West End, I told the driver.

He was one of a vanishing breed, a crusty old bird with English for a native language. “That’s five blocks, four up and one over. A beautiful night, a young fella like yourself, what are you doing in a cab?”

Trying to be on time, I thought. The two films had run a little longer than I’d figured, and I had to stop at my own apartment before I rushed off to someone else’s.

“I’ve got a bum leg,” I said. Don’t ask me why.

“Yeah? What happened? Didn’t get hit by a car, did you? All I can say is I hope it wasn’t a cab, and if it was I hope it wasn’t me.”

“Arthritis.”

“Go on, arthritis?” He craned his neck and looked at me. “You’re too young for arthritis. That’s for old farts, you go down to Florida and sit in the sun. Live in a trailer, play shuffleboard, vote Republican. A fellow your age, you tell me you broke your leg skiing, pulled a muscle running the marathon, that I can understand. But arthritis! Where do you get off having arthritis?”

“Seventy-first and West End,” I said. “The northwest corner.”

“I know where you get off, as in get out of the cab, but why arthritis? You got it in your family?”

How had I gotten into this? “It’s posttraumatic,” I said. “I sustained injuries in a fall, and I’ve had arthritic complications ever since. It’s usually not too bad, but sometimes it acts up.”