“So here’s what I come up with,” Stan said. “This is more complicated than it looks, because we’re tryin to come up with two heists at the same time.”

John thought about that, then nodded and said, “Yeah, that’s right. The one they see and the one they don’t see.”

“While they,” Stan said, demonstrating with arm movements, “think we’re doing something to put in front of their camera, we’re actually doing something we don’t want them to know about, because it’s stuff we’re not supposed to know about.”

“The cash in Combined Tool,” John said. “If there is cash in Combined Tool.”

“There’s something in there,” Stan said. “Something with a value on it. That high-tech door tells you that much.”

“I think,” John said, “what we gotta do is their heist first, collect our pay, and then pick up the tools.”

“Well, that’s what I was thinking about,” Stan said. “Once we do their heist, we got no more access to that building.”

“Well,” John said, “we’ve always got access.”

“Yeah, but not so easy,” Stan insisted. “If there’s an excuse for us to be around that building anyway, it gives us more elbow room, like.”

John shook his head. “We can’t do Combined Tool first,” he said. “They’ve got to know it’s us that did it. They’ll call off the other thing and they’ll call the cops.”

“So what we do,” Stan said, “we do them both at the same time.”

John frowned at that. “What, a couple of us one place, a couple another place?”

“No, that’s not the idea.” Stan spread his hands. “I know you think it’s a mistake for drivers to come up with ideas.”

“Not exactly a mistake,” John said, being diplomatic. “Just unnecessary.”

“Well, I did my thinking anyway,” Stan said, “and I’m gonna tell you what I come up with.”

“I’m listening,” John said, but couldn’t entirely hide a hint of skepticism in face and voice.

“We haven’t given Doug our target yet,” Stan pointed out, “because we didn’t pick it yet.”

“Right.”

“And Andy, sometime back, suggested to Doug we make the target one of the outfits in that corporate spaghetti they got over there. People thought maybe that was a good idea.”

“Maybe,” John said. “I don’t seem to remember Doug being really excited about it. So what do you want to do?”

“The storage place,” Stan said. “One floor up from the tool place. People put things in storage if they got no use for them right now but they’re too valuable to throw away.”

John said, “Wait a minute. What? You want to knock over Knickerbocker Storage? In the same building?”

“At the same time,” Stan said. “We’re right there already, we can get alarms shut down, we can get the electricity off if it comes to that. We can probably go right down through the floor from one of the storage units.”

“That you’re not gonna do,” John told him. “That isn’t just some little thin wood floor like a house in the suburbs. That’s a building you can drive trucks around in, every floor. Those floors are gonna be concrete, thick slabs of concrete.”

“All right, some other way,” Stan said. “Maybe there’s a fire escape in the back.”

“I don’t think so,” John said. “There’s that inside metal staircase, with the trapdoor to the roof. That’s the second exit, all you need for the fire code.”

“Then some other way,” Stan said, shrugging that off. “The point is, we’re there.”

“Yeah, we would be,” John said. “You’re right about that. The question is, would Doug go along with this?”

“We ask,” Stan said. “If you think it’s a good idea, we ask.”

“I think,” John said, “it could possibly be a good idea.”

Heady praise indeed. Grinning in relief, Stan said, “I’ll take that beer now. And what the hell, I’m not driving. Hold the salt.”

WHAT WITH THE MASSIVE last-minute changes in the story line of The Stand, Doug didn’t get home on Monday evening till well after seven. There were so many subsidiary decisions to be made, or remade, so much new research to be done. For instance, they had to be certain the actual officiator at the Grace-and-Harry wedding twenty-some years ago wouldn’t come out of the woodwork to sue everybody in sight for calling him a con man. So much to do, so little time.

Fortunately, to make up for all this sudden scrambling, Doug was bringing Darlene Looper home for an evening of confabs. A little later, they’d go out for dinner in the neighborhood, during which he would describe to her the concept of Heist! (provisional), but for now, there was time to relax and get to know one another a little better. “It’s a humble hovel,” he announced grandly, unlocking the door, “but it’s my own,” and he pushed it open to everything wrong.

In the first place, he would never leave the lights on in the empty apartment all day long, and in the second place, this was not an empty apartment. There were several people in the room, the most prominent being someone who could retire the phrase “most prominent” if he wanted to. A giant in black trousers and a vast black turtleneck sweater who suggested somehow a black hole that had come to Doug’s living room from deepest space, he was turning in his huge mitts the life-size brass banana with Doug’s name etched into it that had been given him by his employers in celebration of the completed first season of The Stand. That the banana was not a crop that could be grown on the Finch’s upstate New York farm had been completely irrelevant; the operative consideration, Doug believed, as with most things, had been phallic.

Now, in the corners of the room not occupied by the giant, Doug saw faces he recognized, that at least suggested some explanation for this invasion: Stan, Andy, and John, all pawing through Doug’s artifacts. Plus, in another corner, a young guy with the eager look of a born pickpocket.

“The householder,” said the giant, in deep organ tones, and Andy looked around, dropping several of Doug’s books onto the coffee table as he said, happily, “There you are! We thought you’d never get home.” Then, noticing the dumbfounded Darlene peeking over Doug’s shoulder, his happy smile switched to a look of concern, and he said, “Doug? Is this a bad time?”

In the reality business, Doug had learned to recover fast when hit with surprises; adapt, play the scene you’ve got, fix it later in the editing room. “As a matter of fact, Andy, this is a very good time. I was going to tell Darlene all about you guys at dinner, so now we can all get on the same page at the same time.”

Stan, never far from paranoia, said, “Tell her all about us? Which all is that, Doug?”

“Come in, Darlene,” Doug said, and when she sidled past him into the room he shut the apartment door and said, “Darlene, these guys are going to be in another reality show we’re just putting together, that I want you for. That’s Andy, that’s Stan, and that’s John, and I don’t know these other two.”

Andy, a natural master of ceremonies, said, “The kid is Judson, and the guy with the banana is Tiny.”

Doug said, “Tiny?”

“It’s a nickname,” the big man growled, and put the banana down.

Darlene, who also adapted fast, grinned a little loosely at Tiny and said, “It doesn’t do you justice. I’m sure it doesn’t.”

Andy said, “Doug? You want her for the show? Walk me through this.”

“Let’s all sit down,” Doug said. “As long as we’re all here.”

There were chairs and sofas to accommodate them all, but not much over. Once they were all seated, Darlene said, “Doug? What kind of reality show are they going to be in? Not a farmstand.”

“How do I phrase this?” Doug wondered, “The fact is, these guys are, uh…”

“Crooks,” John said.

“Criminals,” Tiny grumbled.

“Thieves,” Stan said.

“Professional thieves,” Andy expanded, and grinned. “Licensed and bonded.”