“It’s on the desk or bookcase,” Froehmer said. He wasn’t going to say anything else, but then thought better of it. “People are lazy,” he said, “but the rich are really lazy. Or careless. Or both.”

I guess it makes sense. If you had five dollars and one good watch, you guard them with your life, but if you had 5 million and 50 watches, maybe you don’t care about five dollars and one watch, maybe you can’t keep track of it all, anyway. I nodded at Froehmer and hoped he’d still give me a chance.

“If it’s not in the office, don’t look for it, just get out and let me know.”

“When do you want it?”

“Friday,” he said.

That gave me a couple of days to figure out what I was doing.

Stealing is instinctual. Everyone (and I mean everyone) does it; robbery is a skill; and thievery is a science. I knew I had to study, so I went to the address and looked around, then went back and watched, studied the house and the people who lived in it. I saw the office and the guy who had the thing Froehmer wanted. I watched myself and made sure no one noticed me. I knew what I was doing, I told myself. I knew I had the right instincts; I wasn’t sure that I had the right talent.

—

There was a window open in the back, and a screen that could be pushed out of its frame. I was standing in the office in seconds. The dark oak desk, looked like a monument, and seemed to take up most of the room. I stood behind the leather chair and looked at it. I had time. There were two books on the desk, Labor and Organization in Crisis, and The Study of Economic Cycles, nothing of interest. There were a series of framed photos I didn’t bother to notice, an antique lamp (or reproduction), a couple of stacks of papers, a paperweight with a gold piece in the center, and a small wooden box exactly like Froehmer had described. I opened it to make sure the silver coins were inside, then put it in my shoulder bag and went out the way I had come. I hadn’t touched anything I shouldn’t have, hadn’t disturbed anything, even put the screen back in the window when I left. There was nothing to worry about. I worried anyway. I worried all night and all the next day and the day after that, as long as I had possession of the thing, until finally Froehmer arranged a meeting and I handed it to the man Froehmer had sent. I didn’t like that part of it. I didn’t know the man. I only knew Froehmer. And now both of them knew what I’d done.