He’d been punched in the face four times, tripped twice and pinned to the floor by psycho Aquilla Sanchez, who dripped sweat into his face as he screamed in Spanglish until some bored hacks (that is, guards) pulled him off.

Arthur had peed his pants twice and puked a dozen times. He was a worm, scum, not worth fucking.

Until later.

And the way his heart kept thudding, he expected it to pop apart at any moment. As had happened to Henry Rhyme, his father, though the famed professor had died not in an ignoble place like the Tombs, of course, but on an appropriately stately collegiate sidewalk in Hyde Park, Illinois.

How had this happened? A witness and evidence…It made no sense.

“Take the plea, Mr. Rhyme,” the assistant district attorney had said. “I’d recommend it.”

His attorney had too. “I know the ins and outs, Art. It’s like I’m reading a fucking GPS map. I can tell you exactly where this is going-and it’s not the needle. Albany can’t write a death penalty law to save its life. Sorry, bad joke. But you’re still looking at twenty-five years. I can get you fifteen. Go for it.”

“But I didn’t do it.”

“Uh-huh. That doesn’t really mean a whole lot to anybody, Arthur.”

“But I didn’t!”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, I’m not taking a plea. The jury’ll understand. They’ll see me. They’ll know I’m not a killer.”

Silence. Then: “Fine.” Though it wasn’t fine. Clearly he was pissed off, despite the six hundred plus an hour he was racking up-and where the hell was that kind of money going to come from? He-

Then suddenly Arthur looked up to see two cons studying him, Latinos. They were regarding him now with no expression whatsoever on their faces. Not friendly, not challenging, not tough. They seemed curious.

As they approached him, he debated whether to get up or to stay put.

Stay.

But look down.

He looked down. One of the men stood in front of him, putting his scuffed running shoes right in Arthur’s line of vision.

The other went around to the back.

He was going to die. Arthur Rhyme knew it. Just do it fast and get it fucking over with.

“Yo,” the man behind him said in a high voice.

Arthur looked up at the second, in front. He had bloodshot eyes and a large earring, bad teeth. Arthur couldn’t speak.

“Yo,” came the voice again.

Arthur swallowed. Didn’t want to but couldn’t help himself.

“We talking to you, me an’ my friend. You no be civil. Why you a prick?”

“Sorry. I just…Hello.”

“Yo. Whatchu do for work, man?” High Voice asked his back.

“I’m…” His mind froze. What should I say? “I’m a scientist.”

Earring Man: “Fuck. Scientist? Whatchu do, like, make rockets?”

They both laughed.

“No, medical equipment.”

“Like that shit, you know, they say ‘clear,’ and electrocute you? Like, ER?”

“No, it’s complicated.”

Earring Man frowned.

“I didn’t mean that,” Arthur said quickly. “It’s not that you couldn’t understand it. It’s just hard to explain. Quality-control systems for dialysis. And-”

High Voice: “Make good money, huh? Hear you had a nice suit when you got prossed.”

“I got…?” Oh, processed. “I don’t know. I got it at Nordstrom.”

“Nordstrom. The fuck is Nordstrom?”

“A store.”

As Arthur looked back down at Earring Man’s feet the con continued, “I saying, good money? How much you make?”

“I-”

“You going to say you don’t know?”

“I-” Yes, he was.

“How much you make?”

“I don’t…I’d guess about six figures.”

“Fuck.”

Arthur didn’t know if this meant the amount was a lot or a little to them.

Then High Voice laughed. “You got a family?”

“I’m not telling you anything about them.” This was defiant.

“You got a family?”

Arthur Rhyme was looking away, at the wall nearby, where a nail protruded from mortar between cinder blocks, meant to hold a sign, he assumed, that had been taken down or stolen years ago. “Leave me alone. I don’t want to talk to you.” He tried to make his voice forceful. But he sounded like a girl approached by a nerd at a dance.

“We trying to make civil conversation, man.”

He actually said that? Civil conversation?

Then he thought, Hell, maybe they are just trying to be pleasant. Maybe they could’ve been friends, watched his back for him. Christ knew he needed all the friends he could get. Could he salvage this? “I’m sorry. It’s just, this’s a really weird thing for me. I’ve never been in any trouble before. I’m just-”

“What you wife do? She a scientist too? She a smart girl?”

“I…” The intended words evaporated.

“She got big titties?”

“You fuck her in the ass?”

“Listen up, Science Fuck, here’s how it gonna work. You smart wife, she goin’ to get some money from the bank. Ten thousand. And she gonna take a drive up to my cousin in the Bronx. An’-”

The tenor voice faded.

A black prisoner, six-two, massive with muscle and fat, his jumpsuit sleeves rolled up, approached the trio. He was gazing at the two Latinos and squinting mean.

“Yo, Chihuahuas. Get the fuck outa here.”

Arthur Rhyme was frozen. He couldn’t have moved if someone had started shooting at him, which wouldn’t have surprised him, even here in the realm of the magnetometers.

“Fuck you, nigger,” Earring Man said.

“Piece of shit.” From High Voice, drawing a laugh from the black guy, who put an arm around Earring Man and led him away, whispering something to him. The Latino’s eyes glazed and he nodded to his buddy, who joined him. The two walked to the far corner of the area, feigning indignity. If Arthur weren’t so frightened he would have thought this was amusing-faced-down bullies from his children’s school.

The black man stretched and Arthur heard a joint pop. His heart was thudding even harder. A half-formed prayer crossed his mind: for the coronary to take him away now, right now.

“Thanks.”

The black guy said, “Fuck you. Them two, they pricks. They gotta know the way it is. You unnerstand what I’m saying?”

No, no clue. But Arthur Rhyme said, “Still. My name’s Art.”

“I know the fuck yo’ name. Ever’body know ever’thing round here. ’Cept you. You don’ know shit.”

But one thing Arthur Rhyme knew, and knew it with certainty: He was dead. And so he said, “Okay, then tell me who the fuck you are, asshole.”

The huge face turned toward him. Smelling sweat and smoky breath, Arthur thought of his family, his children first and then Judy. His parents, mother first, then father. Then, surprisingly, he thought of his cousin, Lincoln. Recalling a footrace through a hot Illinois field one summer when they were teenagers.

Race you to that oak tree. See it, that one over there. On three. You ready? One…two…three…go!

But the man just turned away and stalked across the hall to another black prisoner. They tapped fists together and Arthur Rhyme was forgotten.

He sat watching their camaraderie, feeling more and more forlorn. Then he closed his eyes and lowered his head. Arthur Rhyme was a scientist. He believed that life advanced via the process of natural selection; divine justice played no role.

But now, sunk in a depression as relentless as winter tides, he couldn’t help wondering if some system of retribution, as real and invisible as gravity, existed and was now at work, punishing him for the bad he’d done in his life. Oh, he’d done much good. Raised children, taught them open-minded values and tolerance, been a good companion to his wife, helped her through a cancer incident, contributed to the great body of science that enriched the world.

Yet there was bad too. There always is.

Sitting here in his stinking orange jumpsuit, he struggled to believe that by the right thoughts and vows-and faith in the system he dutifully supported every election day-he could work his way back to the other side of the scale of justice and be reunited with his family and life.