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office, looking at the bulletin boards, the government-issue desks, the battered water fountains. It seemed like a place where people in charge of prisons should work: claustrophobic, colorless, quiet.
    She thought about poor Randy Boggs, serving three years in his tiny cell.
    The first thing you think is Hell, I’m still here
….
    A tall man in a rumpled cream-colored suit walked past her, glancing down at her pass. He paused. “You’re press?”
    Rune didn’t understand him at first. “Oh, press. Yeah. I’m a reporter.
Current Events
. You know, the news—”
    He laughed. “Everybody knows
Current Events.”
He stuck his hand out. “I’m Bill Swenson. Head of press relations here.”
    She shook his hand and introduced herself. Then she said, “I guess I’m looking for you. I have to talk to somebody about interviewing a prisoner.”
    “Is this for a story?”
    Rune said, “Uh-huh.”
    “Not a problem. But you don’t have to go through us. You can contact the warden’s office directly for permission and then the prisoner himself to arrange a time to meet if the warden agrees.”
    “That’s all?”
    “Yes,” Swenson said. “What facility?”
    “Harrison.”
    “Doing hard time, huh?”
    “Yeah, I guess it would be.”
    “Who’s the prisoner?”
    She was hesitating. “Well …”
    Swenson said, “We’ve got to know. Don’t worry— I won’t leak it. I didn’t get where I am by screwing journalists.”
    She said, “Okay, it’s Randy Boggs. He was convicted of killing Lance Hopper.”
    Swenson nodded. “Oh, sure, I remember that case. Three years ago. Hopper worked for your company, right? Wait, he was
head
of the Network.”
    “That’s right. Only the thing is, I think Boggs is innocent.”
    “Innocent, really?”
    Rune nodded. “And I’m going to try to get the case reopened and get him released. Or a new trial.”
    “That’s going to make one hell of a story.” Swenson glanced up and down the halls. “Off the record?”
    “Sure.” Rune felt a chill of excitement. Here was her first confidential source.
    “Every year there’re dozens of people wrongly convicted in New York. Sometimes they get out, sometimes they don’t. It’s a scary thing to think it could happen.”
    “I think it’ll make a good story.”
    Swenson started down the hall back toward the exit. Rune followed him. He said, “They’ll give you the phone number of the warden in Harrison at the main desk.” He escorted her through the security gate and to the door. She said, “I’m glad I ran into you.”
    “Good luck,” he said. “I’ll look forward to that show.”

    chapter 5    
     
    WHEN RUNE CLIMBED UP THE GANGWAY ONTO HER HOUSE boat, which was rocking gently in the Hudson River off the west side of Greenwich Village, she heard crying inside. A child’s crying.
    Her hand hesitated at the deadbolt then she unlocked the door and walked inside.
    “Claire,” Rune said uncertainly. Then, because she couldn’t think of anything else to say, she added, “You’re still here.”
    In the middle of the living room the young woman was on her knees, comforting three-year-old Courtney. Claire nodded at Rune and gave her a sullen smile, then turned back to the little girl.
    “It’s okay, honey.”
    “What happened?”
    “She just fell. She’s okay.”
    Claire was a few years older than Rune. They looked a lot alike, except that Claire was into a beatnik phase, while Rune shunned the antique look for New Wave. Claire dyed her hair black and pulled it straight back in a severe ponytail. She often wore pedal pushers and black-and-white-striped pullovers. Her face was deathly white and on her lips was the loudest crimson lipstick Max Factor dared sell. The only advantage in her rooming here— since she’d stopped paying rent—was that her fashion statement added to the houseboat’s decor, which was 1950s suburban.
    After Claire had lost her job at Celestial Crystals on Broadway and been