here was, of course, no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time.

—GEORGE ORWELL, 1984

Amelia Sachs arrived early.

But Lincoln Rhyme had been awake earlier, unable to sleep soundly because of the plans unfolding presently, both here and in England. He’d had dreams about his cousin Arthur and his uncle Henry.

Sachs joined him in the exercise room, where Thom was getting Rhyme back into the TDX wheelchair after he’d done five miles on the Electrologic stationary bicycle, part of his regular exercise scheme to improve his condition and to keep his muscles toned for the day when they might once again begin to replace the mechanical systems that now ran his life. Sachs took over, while the aide went downstairs to fix breakfast. It was a hallmark of their relationship that Rhyme had long ago lost any qualms about her helping him with his morning routine, which many people would find unpleasant.

Sachs had spent the night at her place in Brooklyn, so now he updated her on the 522 situation. But she was distracted, he could see. When he asked why, she exhaled slowly and told him, “It’s Pam.” And she explained that Pam’s boyfriend had turned out to be her former teacher. And a married one, at that.

“No…” Rhyme winced. “I’m sorry. The poor kid.” His initial reaction was to threaten this Stuart into getting the hell out of the picture. “You’ve got a shield, Sachs. Flash it. He’ll head for the hills. Or I’ll give him a call if you want.”

Sachs, however, didn’t think that was the right way to handle the matter. “I’m afraid if I’m too pushy or I report him, I’ll lose her. If I don’t do anything, she’s in for a lot of grief. God, what if she wants to have his baby?” She dug a nail into her thumb. Stopped herself. “It’d be different if I’d been her mother all along. I’d know how to handle it.”

“Would you?” Rhyme asked.

She considered this, then conceded with a smile, “Okay, maybe not… This parent stuff. Kids ought to come with an owner’s manual.”

In the bedroom, they had breakfast, which Sachs fed to Rhyme. Like the parlor and the lab downstairs, the bedroom was far homier than it had been when Sachs first saw it, years ago. Back then the place had been stark, the only decorations art posters, tacked up backward and used as impromptu whiteboards for the first case they’d worked on together. Now those posters had been turned around and others added: of paintings that Rhyme enjoyed—impressionistic landscapes and moody urban scenes by artists like George Inness and Edward Hopper. Then she sat back, next to his wheelchair, and took his right hand, the one in which he’d recently regained some control and touch. He could feel her fingertips, though the sensation was odd, a step or two removed from the pressure he’d sense on his neck or face where the nerves worked normally. It was as if her hand were water trickling onto his skin. He willed his fingers to close on hers. And felt the pressure of her response. Silence. But he sensed, through her posture, that she wanted to talk about Pam, and he said nothing, waiting for her to continue. He watched the peregrine falcons on the ledge, aware, taut, the female larger. The pair were muscular bundles of readiness. Falcons hunt by day, and there were fledglings to feed.

“Rhyme?”

“What?” he asked.

“You still haven’t called him, have you?”

“Who?”

“Your cousin.”

Ah, not Pam’s situation. That she’d been thinking of Arthur Rhyme had never occurred to him. “No. I haven’t.”

“You know something else? I didn’t even know you had a cousin.”

“Never mentioned him?”

“No. You talked about your uncle Henry and aunt Paula. But not Arthur. Why not?”

“We work too hard. No time for chitchat.” He smiled. She didn’t.

Should he tell her? Rhyme debated. His first reaction was not to. Because the explanation reeked of self-pity. And that was poison to Lincoln Rhyme. Still, she deserved to know something. That’s what happens in love. In the shaded portions where the two spheres of different lives meet, certain fundamentals—moods, loves, fears, angers—can’t be hidden. That’s the contract.

And so he told her now.

About Adrianna and Arthur, about the bitterly cold day of the science fair and the lies later, the embarrassing forensic examination of the Corvette and even the potential engagement present—a chunk of atomic-age concrete. Sachs nodded and Rhyme laughed to himself. Because he knew she’d be thinking: What was the big deal? A bit of teenage love, a little duplicity, a little heartbreak. Pretty small caliber in the arsenal of personal offenses. How did something so pedestrian ruin such a deep friendship?!!!You two were like brothers…

“But didn’t Judy say you and Blaine used to visit them years later? That sounds like everything got patched up.”

“Oh, yep. We did. I mean, it was only a high school crush. Adrianna was pretty… a tall redhead, as a matter of fact.”

Sachs laughed.

“But hardly worth destroying a friendship over.”

“So there’s more to the story, isn’t there?”

Rhyme said nothing at first. Then: “Not long before my accident, I went to Boston.” He sipped some coffee through a straw. “I was speaking at an international conference on forensic science. I’d finished the presentation and was in the bar afterward. A woman came up to me. She was a retired professor from M.I.T. She’d been struck by my last name, and said that she’d had a student from the Midwest in her class years ago. His name was Arthur Rhyme. Was he any relation?

“My cousin, I told her. She went on to tell me what an interesting thing Arthur had done. He’d submitted a scientific paper with his application in lieu of an essay. It was brilliant, she said. Original, well researched, rigorous—oh, if you want to compliment scientists, Sachs, say that their research is ‘rigorous.’” He fell silent briefly. “Anyway, she encouraged him to flesh it out and publish it in a journal. But Arthur never pursued it. She hadn’t stayed in touch with him and wondered if he’d done any research in the area since.

“I was curious. I asked her what the subject was. She actually remembered the title. ‘The Biologic Effects of Certain Nanoparticulate Materials’… Oh, and by the way, Sachs, I wrote it.”

“You?”

“It was a paper I’d written for a science fair project. Came in second in the state. It was some pretty original work, I will admit.”

“Arthur stole it?”

“Yep.” Even now, after all these years, the anger rippled within him. “But it gets worse.”

“Go on.”

“After the conference I couldn’t get what she’d told me out of my head. I contacted M.I.T.’s admissions. They kept all the applications on microfiche. They sent me a copy of mine. Something was wrong. My application was what I’d sent them, my signature. But everything sent by the school, from the counselor’s office, had been altered. Art got a hold of my high school transcript and changed it. He gave me B’s instead of the A’s I really had. He’d forged new letters of recommendation, which were lukewarm. He made them sound like form letters. They were probably the ones he’d gotten from his teachers. My uncle Henry’s recommendation wasn’t included in my packet.”

“He took it out?”

“And he’d replaced my essay with some generic Why-I-want-to-go-to-M.I.T. crap. He even added some very choice typos.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She squeezed his hand harder. “And Adrianna worked in the counselor’s office, right? So she helped him.”

“No. I thought so at first but I tracked her down and called her.” He gave a cool laugh. “We talked about life, our marriages, her kids, careers. Then the past. She always wondered why I’d cut things off the way I did. I said I thought she’d decided to go out with Arthur.”

That had surprised her and she’d explained that, no, she was only doing Art a favor—helping him with his college application. He’d come to her office a half dozen times simply to talk about schools, look at some samples of essays, letters of recommendation. He said his own college counselor was terrible and he was desperate to get into a good school. He asked her not to say anything to anyone, especially me; he was embarrassed that he needed the help, so they’d snuck off together a few times. She still felt guilty that Art had made her lie about it.

“And when she went to the bathroom or off to copy something he raided your file.”

“That’s right.”!!!Why, Arthur never hurt a single soul in his life. He isn’t capable of it…

Wrong, Judy.

“Are you absolutely sure?” Sachs asked.

“Yep. Because right after I hung up with her, I called Arthur.”

Rhyme could hear the conversation almost verbatim.

“Why, Arthur? Tell me why.” No greeting other than this.

A pause. Arthur’s breathing.

And even though years had passed since the transgression his cousin knew immediately what he was referring to. No interest in how Rhyme had found out. No interest in denying or feigning ignorance or innocence.

His response: to go on the offensive. He’d blustered angrily, “All right, you want to know the answer, Lincoln? I’ll tell you. The prize at Christmas.”

Mystified, Rhyme had asked, “The prize?”

“That my father gave you in the contest at the Christmas Eve party when we were seniors.”

“The concrete? From the Stagg Field stadium?” Rhyme had frowned in confusion. “What do you mean?” There had to be more to it than winning a souvenir of significance to only a handful of people in the world.

“I deserved it!” His cousin had raged, acting as if he were the victim. “Father named me after the man in charge of the atomic project. I knew he’d kept the memento. I knew he was going to give it to me when I graduated from high school or college. It was going to be my graduation present! I’d wanted it for years!”

Rhyme had been at a loss for words. There they were, grown men, talking like children about a stolen comic book or piece of candy.

“He gave away the one thing that was important to me. And he gave it to you.” His voice was breaking. Was he crying?

“Arthur, I just answered some questions. It was a game.”

“A game?… What kind of fucking game was that? It was Christmas Eve! We should’ve been singing carols or watching It’s a Wonderful Life. But, no, no, Father had to turn everything into a fucking classroom. It was embarrassing! It was boring. But nobody had the balls to say anything to the great professor.”

“Jesus, Art, it wasn’t my fault! It was just a prize I won. I didn’t steal anything from you.”

A cruel laugh. “No? Well, Lincoln, it ever occur to you that maybe you did?”

“What?”

“Think about it! Maybe… my father.” He’d paused, breathing deeply.

“What the hell’re you talking about?”

“You stole him! Did you ever wonder why I never tried out for varsity track? Because you had the lock on that! And academically? You were his other son, not me. You sat in on his classes at U of C. You helped him with his research.”

“This’s crazy… He asked you to come to class too. I know he did.”

“Once was enough for me. He picked me apart until I wanted to cry.”

“He cross-examined everybody, Art. That’s why he was so brilliant. He made you think, he pushed you until you got the right answer.”

“But some of us could never get the right answer. I was good. But I wasn’t great. And the son of Henry Rhyme was supposed to be great. It didn’t matter, though, because he had you. Robert went to Europe, Marie moved to California. And even then he didn’t want me. He wanted you!”!!!The other son…

“I didn’t ask for the role. I didn’t sabotage you.”

“Didn’t you? Ah, Mr. Innocent. You didn’t play the game? You just accidentally drove up to our house on weekends, even when I wasn’t there? You didn’t invite him to come to your track meets? Sure, you did. Answer me: Which of them would you really want for a father, mine or yours? Did your father ever fawn over you? Ever whistle for you from the stands? Give you that raised eyebrow of approval?”

“That’s all bullshit,” Rhyme had snapped. “You’ve got some issue with your father and what do you do? You sabotage me. I could’ve gotten into M.I.T. But you ruined that! And my whole life changed. If it weren’t for you, everything would’ve been different.”

“Well, I can say the same about you, Lincoln. I can say the same…” A harsh laugh. “Did you even try with your father? What do you think he felt, having a son like you, who was a hundred times smarter than he was? Going off all the time because he’d rather hang out with his uncle. Did you even give Teddy a chance?”

At that, Rhyme had slammed the phone into the cradle. It was the last time they talked. Several months later he was paralyzed at the crime scene.!!!Everything would’ve been different…

After he’d explained this to Sachs she said, “That’s why he never came to see you after you were hurt.”

He nodded. “Back then, after the accident, all I could do was lie in bed and think that if Art hadn’t changed the application I would have gotten into M.I.T. and maybe done graduate work at Boston University or joined the BPD or come to New York earlier or later. In any case I probably wouldn’t’ve been at the subway crime scene and…” His voice dissolved to silence.

“The butterfly effect,” she said. “A small thing in the past makes a big difference in the future.”

Rhyme nodded. And he knew that Sachs could take in this information with sympathy and understanding and make no judgments about the broader implications—which he would choose: walking and leading a normal life, or being a crip and perhaps a far better criminalist because of it… and, of course, being her partner.

This was the type of woman Amelia Sachs was.

He gave a faint smile. “The funny thing is, Sachs…”

“There was something to what he said?”

“My own father never seemed to notice me at all. He certainly never challenged me the way my uncle did. I did feel like Uncle Henry’s other son. And I liked it.” He’d come to realize that maybe, subconsciously, he had been pursuing boisterous, full-of-life Henry Rhyme. He was pelted with a dozen fast memories of the times he’d been embarrassed by his father’s shyness.

“But it’s no excuse for what he did,” she said.

“No, it’s not.”

“Still,” she began.

“You’re going to say that it happened a long time ago, let bygones be bygones, water over dams and under bridges?”

“Something like that,” she offered with a smile. “Judy said he asked about you. He’s reaching out. Forgive him.”

You two were like brothers…

Rhyme glanced over the still topography of his immobile body. Then back to Sachs. He said softly, “I’m going to prove he’s innocent. I’ll get him out of jail. I’ll give him his life back.”

“That’s not the same, Rhyme.”

“Maybe not. But it’s the best I can do.”

Sachs began to speak, perhaps to make her case again, but the subject of Arthur Rhyme and his betrayal vanished as the phone buzzed and on the computer screen came Lon Sellitto’s number.

“Command, answer phone… Lon. Where are we?”

“Hey, Linc. Just wanted to let you know our computer expert’s on his way.”

The guy was familiar, the doorman thought—the man who nodded pleasantly as he left the Water Street Hotel.

He nodded back.

The guy was on his cell phone and he paused near the door, as people eased around him. He was talking, the doorman deduced, to his wife. Then the tone changed. “Patty, sweetheart…” A daughter. After a brief conversation about a soccer game he was back on with the wife, sounding more adult, but still adoring.

He fell into a certain category, the doorman knew. Been married fifteen years. Faithful, looked forward to getting home—with a bag of tacky, heartfelt presents. He wasn’t like some guests: the businessman who’d arrive wearing his wedding ring and leave for dinner with finger naked. Or the tipsy businesswoman being escorted into the elevator by a hunky coworker (they never shed their rings; they didn’t need to).

The things a doorman knows. I could write a book.

But the question nagged: Why was this guy so familiar?

And then he was saying to the wife, with a laugh, “You saw me? It made the news there? Mom did too?”

Saw him. A TV celebrity?

Wait, wait. Almost there…

Ah, got it. Last night, watching the news on TV. Sure—this guy was a professor or doctor of some kind. Sloane… or Soames. A computer expert from some fancy school. The one that Ron Scott, the assistant mayor or whatever, was talking about. The prof was helping the police with that rape and murder on Sunday and some other crime.

Then the professor’s face went still and he said, “Sure, honey, don’t worry. I’ll be fine.” He disconnected and looked around.

“Hey, sir,” the doorman said. “Saw you on TV.”

The professor smiled shyly. “Did you?” He seemed embarrassed by the attention. “Say, can you tell me how to get to One Police Plaza?”

“Right up there. About five blocks. By City Hall. You can’t miss it.”

“Thanks.”

“Good luck.” The doorman was watching a limo approach, pleased that he’d had a brush with a semi-celebrity. Something to tell his own wife about.

Then he felt a thunk on his back, almost painful, as another man hurried out the door of the hotel and pushed past him. The guy didn’t look back and said nothing by way of apology.

Prick, thought the doorman, watching the man, who was moving fast, head down, in the same direction as the professor. The doorman didn’t say anything, though. However rude they were, you just put up with it. They could be guests or friends of guests or they could be guests next week. Or even executives from the home office, testing you.

Just put up and shut up. That was the rule.

The TV professor and the rude asshole faded from the doorman’s thoughts as a limo stopped and he stepped forward to open the door. He got a nice view of soft cleavage as the guest climbed out; it was better than a tip, which he knew, absolutely knew, she wasn’t going to give him anyway.

I could write a book.