"Sharon Green - Mists of the Ages" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Sharon)

where the safe spot had been put.
Even the heavy shadows couldnтАЩt hide the position of the wall vault from me, and
I had to turn my back on the corner before it would stop jumping up and down in
my face, waving its arms trying to get my attention. Sometimes the talent of
finding things like that makes itself more of a handicap than a help, getting in
your way when itтАЩs the really obscure location youтАЩre trying to pinpoint. The
wall vault would have illegal documents and negotiable securities and a good
chunk of cash and possibly even jewelry and drugs that were exchangeable for
cash, but I had no use for frivolities and no time to waste picking them up. I
was after something a lot more delicate in nature and valuable in potential, a
special prize that would not be kept with everything else.
Turning away from the wall vault faced me toward one of the rows of windows, the
one that had been on my left when IтАЩd entered the office. The second row had
faced me when IтАЩd come in and now decorated most of the wall to the right.
Corner offices had been high status just about forever, but wouldnтАЩt have been
quite as popular if the occupants had to wash all those windows they were so
proud of. The thought made me grin into the near dark I stood in, a little
female humor injected into an otherwise dull time, and then I began laughing
softly instead of grinning. What I had thought of as a joke was my subconscious
noticing something the rest of me hadnтАЩt, and I was forced to admire the skill
that had almost gotten it past me. The safe spot in that office was very well
situated, but тАЬalmostтАЭ doesnтАЩt make the mark.
I moved carefully around the desk and approached the second window-section from
the left, every sense I had extended and alert. It seemed possible that some
part of the floor would be pressure sensitive, and I found out rather quickly
that it certainly was. Once I discovered that, it was back to the desk to check
for the controls that would not be part of the general systems, but once found
the switches werenтАЩt difficult to neutralize. They couldnтАЩt be turned off
without activating a different set of alarms, of course, something a large
number of my contemporaries had learned the hard way, but setting them to
neutral didnтАЩt produce the same results.
Neutral was off enough to suit my purposes, and let me turn away from the desk
to examine what IтАЩd found. The window-section that had caught my attention was
no window-section, and with the system deactivated I was able to get a good look
at the four-foot by four-foot safe spot. The repeater screen that covered it
most of the time was excellently made, but that very excellence had been its
greatest flaw. The other windows in the office were filthy with the usual city
grime that settles on everything no matter how often washing is done, but that
section of window was measurably cleaner. The system designer hadnтАЩt been stupid
enough to leave it spotless, but had erred on the short side when it came to
тАЬdirty enough.тАЭ Most people would never have noticed something like that, but
thatтАЩs what makes me more valuable than most people.
There was a fairly complex maze lock on the safe spot entry, but maze locks, as

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they say, are only good for keeping out the honest. Opening it took no more than
a few minutes, and then I was able to slide the entry down out of my way so that