Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the fat guard struggle out of his chair and stand vigil by the door, starting the process of my crime into motion. I walked in backward steps, never losing track of the guards. Once against the rear wall, with the whole room in view, I edged over toward the bathrooms. I slipped off the backpack and slid it silently through the sprung metal lid into the trash can. Unobserved, I snuck another peek inside to be certain I would fit.

The few remaining patrons ambled toward the entrance as I slipped undetected into the women's bathroom where my ears immediately caught the sound of music where there should have been none. I crouched down and peered under the brown fabric curtains to find a pair of legs spanned by elastic hose in the second stall. I bolted upright, tiptoed to the last stall and pulled the curtain closed. Her whistling was interrupted by short, coaxing groans. The toilet flushed minutes later and I leaned forward to catch a glimpse of her through the gap in the curtain. The heavyset blond woman touched up her lipstick and pulled at the pantyhose under her ample black skirt before disappearing back into the gallery. I stepped out seconds later and walked to the door.

The voices near the gallery entrance were barely audible when I put my ear next to the jamb. Their parting musings slowly declined to reveal the unmistakable sound of leather shoe soles landing on polished granite. It was the guard, it had to be, probably the fat one. Each of his footfalls was closer than the last and I knew that the entire plan now hung on the simplest of assumptions, that he would instinctively walk into the men's room. I clenched my fists tight as he approached and wished that I had kept the gun with me instead of putting it in the trash. The guard's strides wavered for a split second before he pushed open the men's room door.

I stepped out into the gallery just as the men's room door came to a rest in its frame. The dimmed lighting in the empty room seemed to subdue everything but my nerves. Instinct took over and within several seconds, I looked out on the room from the narrow slit in the lid of the garbage can. The door opened and the guard passed in front of me as an eclipsing shadow on his way to the women's room. That door opened seconds later. His dark figure shrank away as he walked back toward the lit foyer and out of sight around the corner. Faint tidbits of a television program echoed back to me. I parted my lips next to the crack and breathed from the fresher air outside, stopping to peer out every few seconds in nervous anticipation of his return.