someone who had been there. Bruce Wayne sometimes heard the stories:
Bunny Wigglesworth regaling the others at the Country Club about a robbery
he foiled at her dinner party or Richard Flay telling his golfing foursome
about Batman’s recovery of a stolen Rembrandt. Bruce always reacted in
character, producing a glib smile or a foppish laugh while he privately
noted what he could about the way the non-criminal public perceived him.

Such stories were seldom told in front of the masked
man himself, however. On the rare occasions when police or bystanders
discussed his actions in front of him, he assumed a fixed expression of
focused and righteous determination. On the equally rare occasions when he
and Robin overheard criminals discuss a “Bat encounter,” his expression was
similar—but with a dark satisfaction simmering just under the surface, a
malicious contentmentin the fear he could instill.

That was the expression Batman had assumed soon after
Catwoman began her phone call. She had hit the redial on the smuggler’s
cell and introduced herself with purring politeness when his boss answered.
She could have told him anything to explain why the notorious Catwoman was
calling on his flunky’s phone, but she opted for something very close to the
truth. When Batman realized she was giving a rogue’s eye view of his
assault on the warehouse as if she’d been watching from the shadows, his jaw
automatically stiffened into that grim scowl of focused determination...
The Silent Takedown. Grapnel to the rafters. Batarang Takedown. Triple
Takedown with a concussion grenade… But then he heard that old charge in her
voice as she added these little details: the way he stretched his
neck and