"Sam would have to call me!" ???

I've seen this wonderful film too many times to count. I saw it one Saturday afternoon when I was about 12 or so (1986-ish) and then 'found' it again when I was about 18. I stumbled across the book and read it and then finally watched it again. It quickly became a fave. It remains one of my top favorite films of all time.

There are many details that casual and even repeat viewers miss or otherwise don't get.
I just have to say...there is one for me. It's confused me for years.

In Cathy's apartment just after the news report.

Condor's mind is racing and he's talking out loud (attempting to figure out how things might follow up rationally considering the actual outcome he experienced in the pick-up/set-up in the alley).
He goes on about his section chief and that he'd be there and that "...he'd have to call Sam! Sam would have to call me!"

Um. What?

For decades now I've chalked it up to too loose writing or Redford improvising and his dialog not quite matching up to what has/does/will happen in the story and the context of the events,etc.
(After all, these were the days of seeing something perhaps a handful of times in a theater and then seeing it once or twice on TV three or four years after... so missteps like that would have been less noticible, etc.,etc.,blah,blah,blah...)

But maybe I'm missing something somehow after all these years of knowing the film backwards and forwards. A 'forest for the trees' sorta thing.

I'm just wondering if anyone has any insight.

"The last man on Earth doesn't miss anyone at all!" -Faith In Chaos, Haujobb