If pressed, he’d say things were easier behind bars. It was pointless trying to break a jail cell lock with cameras watching one’s every move. Three square meals a day and no worries where his next dollar came from; prison had its advantages.

Edwards told this to Grant and Frankel as he walked them through the place. They found Chet in the community room watching The Talk . “One thing I’ll say about Chet—he’s quite forthcoming. Not good at keeping things to himself. He would have been a much more successful thief otherwise. I’d go with whatever he tells you.”

When looking at Chet Wilson, he reminded Grant of the men in Liverpool who trudged along with his father to the munitions factory. Chet wore an old denim work shirt and khakis; all that was missing was the black lunch pail and dour expression of a man who day-in, day-out, dutifully provided for his lower-middle class family. The former thief was content getting three hot meals every day at the halfway house and watching the roundtable discussions on the all-female talk show. Today’s topic was “My Favorite Christmas Party” with their very special guest, Sarah Michelle Gellar. Chet was glued to the set because he’d spent the past five holiday seasons locked up where Christmas was crap eggnog and the men’s chorus singing off-key carols.

The two cops apologized for dragging Chet away from his program to question him about Timothy Leeds.

“No problem—I’ll catch the rest later.” He muted the program and indicated the remote control. “The DVR’s an incredible thing.”

“Tell us about your discussion with the man on the phone,” said Frankel.

“Ain’t much to say. He asked if Timothy Leeds was around and I said I’d check. I hadn’t met the guy yet, but we all knew who he was because he arrived last night with all that fuss on the news.”

Grant stepped forward. “You said the caller had a British accent?”

“He talked like you, if that’s what you mean,” Chet replied.

“Do you think you’d recognize his voice again?”

“Probably not. Don’t take this wrong, but you all sound alike. It could’ve been you I was talking to.”

“Did you happen to overhear Leeds’s end of the conversation?” asked Frankel.

“I gave him his privacy. Most of us round here came from some place where we were on top of everyone else.”

“Then how’d you find out he was meeting a reporter?” wondered Frankel.

Chet indicated the door leading out to the main hallway. “He ducked his head in here and asked me how far Connolly’s was.”

“Connolly’s?”

“A dive bar down on Ninety-Fifth Street,” explained Edwards.

Chet nodded. “I said it was a ten-minute walk. That’s when he told me he was going to meet this reporter who wanted to pay him for his story.”