“You got that right,” Tiny told him.

“Well, that’s my job,” Ombelen said. “But in this particular instance, it’s your job as well. We will photograph you from above, from below, from behind. We will photograph your ears, your hands, your elbows. But we need your help to do this right, so here’s the one rule you must remember. If you can see the camera lens, the camera can see your face. Tell us at once if the camera has moved into the forbidden zone, and we’ll reshoot.”

“That sounds good,” Kelp said.

“It’s the only way,” Ombelen assured him, “we can make this peculiar situation work. Now, your opening scene, you will all be at the bar, and Ray Harbach will join you with some news. Our production assistant, Marcy, will describe the scene to you.”

Marcy, showing evidence of stage fright, took a position in front of them and said, “First, I want to introduce you to your bartender.” Gesturing at the obvious bartender to come forward, she said, “This is Tom LaBrava, he’s a professional actor.”

“Hi, guys,” LaBrava said. He showed no stage fright at all.

Marcy said, “Tom isn’t going to be part of the actual robbery plot, in fact he isn’t going to hear anything about it at all, so his face will be seen.”

“Better for the résumé,” LaBrava said, and grinned around at them.

Kelp said, “So he’s Tom? ‘Hi, Tom,’ like that?”

Doug stepped forward again, saying, “No, we decided we had to make it clear his part was fictional, so he has a character name.” Chuckling a bit hollowly at them, he said, “We felt you wouldn’t like it if we called him Rollo—”

“That’s right,” several people said.

“—So we’ve decided to go with Rodney. If that’s okay with you guys.”

Kelp said, “Rodney?” He sounded uncertain. Turning to LaBrava, he smiled in an amiable way and said, “Hi, Rodney.” He then made a thoughtful face, like somebody tasting a new recipe, mulled, and finally said, “Sure. Why not?”

“Hi, Rodney,” Tiny growled.

“How you doin, Rodney?” Dortmunder asked.

“Just fine,” LaBrava said. “I kinda like Rodney. It’s a name I can work a character into.”

“It’s you, Rodney,” the kid said.

“Okay, that’s fine, then,” Doug said. “Marcy?”

Marcy came back into her place, looking slightly less self-conscious. “What’s going to happen,” she said, “you’re all going to be at the bar, and Ray will come in and say he’s got something really interesting to tell you all. You want to know what it is, and he says it isn’t really something for public consumption, and you—John, I think—say to Rodney, ‘Okay if we use the back room?’ and he says, ‘Fine.’ And then you all head off that way for the back room. Let’s try it once or twice without the cameras.”

Then Roy Ombelen took over, to place them here and there at the bar, angling them in ways that felt a little weird but were apparently going to look okay in the film. Once he had them where he wanted them, he said to Harbach, “Now, when you come in the bar you come over to about here, where you can see everybody, and you tell them you’ve got this interesting information.”

“Okay, great.”

“Places, please,” Ombelen said. “Rodney, a little farther away along the bar, if you would. That’s fine. Ray, a little farther back. I want you completely off the set, and then you come in. That’s it, that’s perfect. All right, everybody. Action.”

And, on that word, the loud elevator machinery jolted into its racket, and the elevator began to sink, as everybody turned to stare and watch it go.

Obviously, nobody was going to rehearse anything with that going on. Doug moved a little closer to the elevator, shaking his head in irritation, and as the sound receded he turned to tell them, “There isn’t supposed to be anybody else coming here now. We left strict instructions, everybody stay away from Varick Street, we’re putting together a new show here.”

The elevator snarl, having receded, now advanced again, and soon it appeared, with Babe Tuck standing on it, arms akimbo, expression deeply annoyed. As Doug and Ombelen both approached him, both trying to say something to him, he marched straight across from the elevator to the set, glowered at everybody, and said, “This show is canceled. Shut it down.”

28

DOUG WAS STUNNED. Shut it down? Cancel? But it was coming together so well. It was going to be wonderful, the most exciting innovative new reality show since Sitcom Reunion. So much more fun to work on than The Stand. Cancel it? Shut it down? What did Babe mean?

Doug voiced the question: “Babe? What do you mean?”

Babe, looking the angriest he’d been since he quit the news beat, said, “I talked with Quigg this morning.”

Doug nodded, not sure why. “About what?”

“About these phonies,” Babe said, jabbing a thumb in the general direction of the cast.

Now Doug was shocked. “Phonies? Babe, you mean these people aren’t crooks? They aren’t hardened criminals after all? They’re just people, like everybody else?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care what they are,” Babe said. “Every single piece of ID they gave Quigg on Friday is a phony.”

“Of course it is,” John said. “You gotta know we can’t give you our real names.”

“Names shmames,” Babe said. “What I need is legitimate rock-solid Social Security numbers. Not those soybean statistics you gave Quigg.”

“I don’t think we’re following this,” John said.

But Andy said, “John, maybe they got a legit problem.”

“And I,” John said, “got an il-legit problem.” Then he looked around and said, mostly to Babe, “We’re kind of a crowd here. Why don’t you and him and him and me”—pointing to Doug and Andy—“siddown at a booth there and talk this over. Everybody else takes a break somewhere.”

Roy Orbelem said, “There’s some nice sofas over there. Beyond the hallway set.”

“All right,” Babe said, though grumpily. To John he said, “If you think you got something to say.”

“Let’s find out.”

Everybody started to move, and Andy said, “Rodney?”

The actor/bartender looked alert. “Yes, sir?”

“You got any actual beer around here?”

It was Doug who answered. “We do, for the shoot. It’s in a cooler under the bar.”

“I’ll get it,” the new Rodney offered, and went away to do so.

So Doug and Babe and John and Andy, all of them looking grim in a variety of ways, settled into a booth to wait for their beer to be delivered. Doug took that hiatus to notice a change that had occurred in the dynamic of the gang. Before this, the impetus or spark plug had usually been Andy, sometimes the now-gone Stan, occasionally Tiny. But now, in the face of some unknown and unexpected apparent disaster befalling them, John had quietly taken over and everybody had tacitly agreed he had the right to do so. Interesting. See how that dynamic could be worked into the show. If there was a show.

Rodney soon brought four cans of Budweiser, solemnly said, “Call me, gentlemen, when you’re ready for more,” then grinned and winked to show he was merely getting into the part, and left.

Andy picked up his beer can, looked at it, and gave Doug a skeptical eye. “Product placement?”

“They will be providing the beer,” Doug agreed. “It’s a perfectly fine beer.”

“Uh-huh,” Andy said, popped open his can, and took a noncommittal slug.

Babe turned to John. “Just so you know what’s happened here,” he said, “the Social Security numbers are much more important than the names. You can call yourself Little Bo Peep for all I care. But a corporation like ours simply cannot employ anybody who cannot demonstrate, with a valid Social Security number, their right to work in this country. We absolutely cannot hire wetbacks.”

Andy said, “Wetbacks?” sounding incredulous.

Babe patted the air in his direction. “Listen, I know you guys are homegrown, I know you’re not illegal aliens.”