It isn’t true, as some have said, that we knew nothing about it at the time and were later taken by surprise. How could that have been possible? It was right there, next to the mall, a big operation only partly concealed by a high fence, with trucks going in and out every day, to say nothing of the ads in the local paper, telling us to get ready for the big event. I even seem to recall a sign somewhere in the area of the dig, with diagrams and pictures, though I can’t swear to it now. So it just isn’t true, as some say, that it took us by surprise, as if we were innocent, that it sprang out of nowhere, like a miracle. What they mean, in my opinion, is that we didn’t really care all that much about it, at the time. The fact is, we knew places like that, we’d been going to them for years. Why should we care about another? And then there was the name itself: The Next Thing. That was a name that irritated a lot of us, made us skeptical and even resentful. It was the sort of name that seemed to smile at you and say, “I know you can’t resist me,”
