Van opened a rusty wrought-iron gate thick with bougainvillea. He tiptoed warily down a narrow, weedy brick path, clustered with wet pink blooms. Was there one loose doorknob around here, maybe? Just one window left open to the California breezes? Any open entrance around here? Any system vulnerability where a nearsighted computer scientist, six feet one and putting on weight, might illegally break-and-enter the home of some total strangers? Had he gone completely insane? What the hell was he thinking here? At any moment Van expected the white flick of a motion-sensor light. The frenzied barking of a Doberman. The cocking of a shotgun.