Mr Lamb had always found it preferable to be bold in his actions, and never more so than when it came to illegal activities. Breaking was to be avoided when the entering needed to be kept confidential. Ordinarily he would choose a time when 99.9% of the population was guaranteed to be asleep. However, he had little choice in the matter on this occasion. He needed more information and he needed it now.
He walked straight up to the door like he belonged there, picks in hand. The lock was adequate but not much of a barrier to someone who knew what he was doing. Within moments he was in the entrance hall and closing the door gently behind him. He stood in total silence for a full minute, listening intently. He already knew the homeowner did not have a pet and there were no guests staying, but he had stayed alive and at large for so long precisely because he was ultra-cautious.
A motor hummed quietly nearby. It sounded like a fridge or a freezer. Then came a cry and heavy footsteps, but they were from the flat above — probably a parent responding to a child’s bad dream. He crept soundlessly in well-worn soft shoes. For a flat the floor space was probably considered quite large but nevertheless it didn’t take him much more time to track down the PC than it had to get through the front door. He booted it up, amazed that no password was needed, then waited a minute for the out-of-date operating system to activate before inserting a flash drive. The internal workings of the PC hummed as the worm self-extracted and began slithering its way through the operating system.
Once the worm had infected every part of the computer it shut down. he secreted the flash drive in an inside pocket, crept along the corridor, closed and locked the front door. Within a minute he was in his car and had withdrawn from his latest satisfactory crime on society.