I could put it back and walk away and avoid stealing it, and keep out of trouble. I could just sit there and let the world spin down the drain, too, taking everybody with it.Or I could borrow it. All right, steal it, but I’d put it back when I was done. There were so many in that box, and hundreds more in storage. What difference did it make if one went somewhere else for a while?I wrapped it in the napkin I’d brought and shoved it in my pocket. Then I got out of there.I’d never done anything like that in my life. I could feel it in there, as if it was literally hot. Any minute I expected alarms to go off and buzzers to buzz and Aunt Jessie to leap out of a cupboard chanting Thief! Thief! Thief!The silence was almost worse. Somehow, before it broke and I got busted, I had to figure out how to get to the marketplace, bazaar, whatever they called it.People would expect me to want to play tourist, at least I hoped so. I also hoped they wouldn’t ask too many questions about what I wanted to buy.Some of it maybe wasn’t legal.
