Alleys are very much alike, whether they're out in Redmond or downtown behind the Mayflower Park Hotel, which was where we were. Same blue-painted dumpsters, same scavengers, both four- and two-legged, waiting for you to do something dumb. We legged it down this one as though the devil were at our heels. We were a couple of dozen meters from the street when I put on the brakes. The alley was narrowed down to maybe six meters by two dumpsters facing each other across empty space. I pointed to the dumpster on our left, and tried to gasp out instructions to Jocasta.