Usually, he beelines for the kitchen. This time he stood in the door, eyes dancing, lips curled in a scary scimitar I knew to be a smile.

“His Excellency woke someone up and presto, we got records from the N.Y. Housing Department rolls. Mr. Dale Bright was never a property owner but his name does show up on a petition eight years ago. Converting an industrial building to condos.”

“Pro or con?”

“Pro.”

I said, “One year after he inherits, he’s in his favorite American city, trying to break into the real estate market?”

He loped to my office, logged on to my computer, typed in 518 w. 35th st NY 10001.

Six hits flashed, all culled from newspaper accounts, all variants on the same theme.

He called up the New York Post.

Vanished Couple Condo-Complexity?

The mysterious disappearance of a Manhattan couple involved in a long-term landlord-tenant dispute continues to baffle New York’s finest. Three weeks ago, rent-controlniks Paul and Dorothy Safran left their apartment on 518 W. 35th Street to attend an off-off-Broadway production in lower Manhattan and haven’t been seen or heard from since.

Paul, 47, a lithographer, and Dorothy, 44, a substitute teacher, had been embroiled in a yearlong struggle with their landlord over failure to provide heat and plans to convert the former warehouse that served as their domicile to condominiums.

The three-story structure in the still-industrial ’hood had been subdivided 22 years ago into Soho-style rental lofts and the Safrans had lived there protected by rent-control provisions. Soon after the building changed hands, the new owner, an Englewood, N.J.–based developer named Roland Korvutz, announced plans for condo-conversion. Under an agreement brokered between Korvutz and a newly elected tenant board, residents were offered compensated relocation or first dibs on the newly constructed units.

Most tenants opted for the payoff but the Safrans, claiming the board was corrupt, refused to budge and brought suit against Korvutz in Housing Court. For the past six months, the Safrans withheld rent and tried to rally other tenants to their cause.

In a breaking story three days ago, The Post reported the claims of Paul Safran’s sister, Marjorie Bell, of Elmhurst, that shortly before the dueling duo vanished they’d expressed fears for their safety because of the conflict with Korvutz. Bell also criticized the police for not investigating Korvutz more thoroughly and alleged that Korvutz, an immigrant from Belarus, has a history of tenant intimidation.

When contacted yesterday by The Post for follow-up, Bell refused comment.

Court records reveal eleven suits brought against Korvutz’s company, RK Development, all settled before trial. Korvutz’s attorney, Bernard Ring, said, “Anyone attempting to beautify the city encounters that kind of thing. Call it the price of doing business in a litigious society.”

Repeated calls to Korvutz’s home in Englewood and to RK Development offices in Teterboro were not returned. Police sources describe the investigation into the Safrans’ whereabouts as “in progress.”

A five-year follow-up article reported no solve.