say, “How do you get home?”
“Oh, I just walk up to Seventy-sixth Street,” she said. “It’s nothing, I do it all the time.”
“Oh, okay,” he said, and everybody took off, in various directions.
Walking up Broadway, Darlene found herself brooding over the fact that not one of them had even tried to come home with her.
She hadn’t wanted any of them to, but still.
Awful thought. They weren’t all Kirbys, were they?
18
B ABE T UCK SAID , “You agreed to
what
” “Well, we didn’t exactly agree,” Doug said, seated across the pockmarked old wooden desk Babe had brought with him from
his foreign correspondent days. “Andy just suggested, if we could find a target from inside our own corporation, then, if
something went wrong, we could all claim it was never going to be a real robbery anyway.”
“But we
want
a real robbery,” Babe pointed out. “That’s the whole idea. Reality on the edge.”
“I think they’re a little insecure,” Doug said. “They’re not used to doing a burglary with cameras pointed at them.”
“You told them we’d cover their asses? Halo their heads? Alter their voices?”
“They know all that,” Doug agreed. “It’s just, I think, it’s just all a little too strange. They want some kind of reassurance.”
“An escape hatch,” Babe suggested.
“Exactly.”
“I can under stand that,” Babe said. “There’ve been times when I wouldn’t have minded an escape hatch myself.”
“So in theory,” Doug said, “it’s not an idea we’d reject out of hand.”
“A little strange to steal from yourself,” Babe said, and shrugged. “But I suppose the network could stand it. Might even
be something salutary in it.”
Politely, Doug said, “Salutary?”
“See our own vulnerabilities from the outside,” Babe explained. “Find out where we need to shore up our defenses. So they’ve
picked some underbelly of ours, have they?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What?”
Doug seemed reluctant to speak, and then he said, “Sir, before that, let me—”
“You’re calling me sir a lot,” Babe said, not as though he liked it.
“Am I?” Doug could be seen to replay his mental tape. “Oh, yeah, I guess I am. I guess I’m nervous.”
“About what, Doug?”
“First, si—Babe, let me say we agreed at the beginning, if anything ever made them uncomfortable, they didn’t have to do it.”
“Of course.”
“They now say it’s
this
target, or they’re not gonna be comfortable.”
“Then,” Babe said, “you’d really better tell me the target.”
“The storage facility on Varick Street.”
“The—
Varick
Street?”
“They say they wanted a place in that neighborhood to make the filming easier,” Doug explained. “There’s a Chase bank on the
corner—”
“Of course there is.”
“They say they considered doing that,” Doug said, “but they’d have to do it in the daytime, and there’s too much tunnel traffic
out front, and they’d never get away. So they decided to go with the storage facility in our building.”
“On Varick Street.”
“It’s called Knickerbocker Storage.”
“I know what it’s called,” Babe said.
“They say the losses will be covered by insurance, and that’s true, so that should make it even easier for us to say yes.”
“Doug, Doug, Doug.”
Doug said, “I know. Babe, I thought about this, and thought about it, and we’ve got a double problem here.”
“How so?”
“If we say yes,” Doug said, “we’re exposing ourselves in ways we can’t even be sure of. But if we say no, if we scrub the
whole operation, Babe, what do we tell them is our
reason
?”
“We don’t want to do it,” Babe said. “We don’t have to give reasons.”
“Babe,” Doug said, “these are professional burglars. They can smell profit around corners. If we say no, not that place, you
can hit anywhere else in our whole corporate structure, but you can’t do anything to Varick Street,
“Oh, I just walk up to Seventy-sixth Street,” she said. “It’s nothing, I do it all the time.”
“Oh, okay,” he said, and everybody took off, in various directions.
Walking up Broadway, Darlene found herself brooding over the fact that not one of them had even tried to come home with her.
She hadn’t wanted any of them to, but still.
Awful thought. They weren’t all Kirbys, were they?
18
B ABE T UCK SAID , “You agreed to
what
” “Well, we didn’t exactly agree,” Doug said, seated across the pockmarked old wooden desk Babe had brought with him from
his foreign correspondent days. “Andy just suggested, if we could find a target from inside our own corporation, then, if
something went wrong, we could all claim it was never going to be a real robbery anyway.”
“But we
want
a real robbery,” Babe pointed out. “That’s the whole idea. Reality on the edge.”
“I think they’re a little insecure,” Doug said. “They’re not used to doing a burglary with cameras pointed at them.”
“You told them we’d cover their asses? Halo their heads? Alter their voices?”
“They know all that,” Doug agreed. “It’s just, I think, it’s just all a little too strange. They want some kind of reassurance.”
“An escape hatch,” Babe suggested.
“Exactly.”
“I can under stand that,” Babe said. “There’ve been times when I wouldn’t have minded an escape hatch myself.”
“So in theory,” Doug said, “it’s not an idea we’d reject out of hand.”
“A little strange to steal from yourself,” Babe said, and shrugged. “But I suppose the network could stand it. Might even
be something salutary in it.”
Politely, Doug said, “Salutary?”
“See our own vulnerabilities from the outside,” Babe explained. “Find out where we need to shore up our defenses. So they’ve
picked some underbelly of ours, have they?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What?”
Doug seemed reluctant to speak, and then he said, “Sir, before that, let me—”
“You’re calling me sir a lot,” Babe said, not as though he liked it.
“Am I?” Doug could be seen to replay his mental tape. “Oh, yeah, I guess I am. I guess I’m nervous.”
“About what, Doug?”
“First, si—Babe, let me say we agreed at the beginning, if anything ever made them uncomfortable, they didn’t have to do it.”
“Of course.”
“They now say it’s
this
target, or they’re not gonna be comfortable.”
“Then,” Babe said, “you’d really better tell me the target.”
“The storage facility on Varick Street.”
“The—
Varick
Street?”
“They say they wanted a place in that neighborhood to make the filming easier,” Doug explained. “There’s a Chase bank on the
corner—”
“Of course there is.”
“They say they considered doing that,” Doug said, “but they’d have to do it in the daytime, and there’s too much tunnel traffic
out front, and they’d never get away. So they decided to go with the storage facility in our building.”
“On Varick Street.”
“It’s called Knickerbocker Storage.”
“I know what it’s called,” Babe said.
“They say the losses will be covered by insurance, and that’s true, so that should make it even easier for us to say yes.”
“Doug, Doug, Doug.”
Doug said, “I know. Babe, I thought about this, and thought about it, and we’ve got a double problem here.”
“How so?”
“If we say yes,” Doug said, “we’re exposing ourselves in ways we can’t even be sure of. But if we say no, if we scrub the
whole operation, Babe, what do we tell them is our
reason
?”
“We don’t want to do it,” Babe said. “We don’t have to give reasons.”
“Babe,” Doug said, “these are professional burglars. They can smell profit around corners. If we say no, not that place, you
can hit anywhere else in our whole corporate structure, but you can’t do anything to Varick Street,
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