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messages. With no other recourse, Vincenzo left the office at two o’clock. On the way out, he noted that the cable channel’s floor was mostly vacant.
    The walk home took almost thirty minutes. Harper Cable wasn’t the only employer that had dismissed its workers, and the streets and sidewalks of midtown Manhattan were thoroughly congested. He had a Land Rover parked in the basement of Metropolitan Tower, but if the streets along Central Park’s south side were anything like midtown, he wouldn’t be getting anywhere fast. It also had less than a quarter of a tank of gas left, he remembered. There was virtually no chance of him being able to refuel if he took to the streets, and the possibility he might run out of gas after making it no farther than West Seventieth Street didn’t seem very appealing.
    With that sobering thought, Vincenzo marched through the hot, early June afternoon, threading his way through the crowd. Every corner was blocked by an undulating throng of people fighting to get across the intersection. Their progress was slowed even more by the fact that they had to wend their way past the cars and trucks and buses that filled the streets. Arguments broke out between motorists and pedestrians, and one fistfight broke out, despite the four uniformed police officers standing next to a nearby parked cruiser. Outside the Hilton Hotel at the corner of Sixth Avenue and West Fifty-Fifth Street, a filthy bald man with a long beard stood, holding a placard in grimy hands. The sign read:
    THE END HAS COME.
    CHOOSE TO MEET MY GOD
    OR TO MEET YOUR DEVIL
    “ Choose! ” the man bellowed when his washed-out blue eyes found Vincenzo.
    Tony tried to put some distance between himself and the obviously crazy man dressed in soiled, ragged clothes, but there was nowhere to go. The crush of the crowd was too strong, and he was carried toward the man against his will.
    “ Choose! ” the man shouted again, looking at Vincenzo directly. “Choose, now! My god or your devil! ” He was missing teeth, and the strong stench of urine clung to the placard-bearer like a heavy cloak. “Choose!” The man stepped toward Vincenzo, reaching out with one grubby hand. His fingernails were cracked and caked with weeks’ worth of grime.
    Vincenzo caught a whiff of excrement as the man bore down on him, and he suddenly had an idea just what the grunge under the man’s nails might be. He raised his left leg and kicked out, catching the placard evenly and driving the man back into the crowd. “Don’t touch me!” he shouted then pushed on, moving up Sixth Avenue.
    The doomsayer cackled behind him. “It’s the devil for you! Burn in hell! Burn in hell, you fucking kid toucher!”
    Broken glass crunched beneath Vincenzo’s feet, and he glanced to his left. A small family jewelry store had been vandalized, and the big plate glass windows that had formed the storefront littered the sidewalk in thousands of shards. An alarm was whooping, and he caught a glimpse of a couple of masked figures—and several people in business and casual attire, as well—going through the store and filling bags, pockets, and purses with anything they could get their hands on. A man in a blue suit with gray pinstripes picked up a chair and slammed it against a display case containing Rolex and Tag-Heuer watches. Glass imploded, and the man threw the chair aside and reached in for his winnings.
    “Let us through! Let us through!” a female cop screamed, as she and her much bigger but apparently less zealous partner pushed their way into the crowd, heading for the jewelry store.
    A siren blared, and Vincenzo saw another police car fighting to merge into the lane nearest the sidewalk, its lights flashing. He pushed onward, passing the cops as they edged toward the jewelry store, hands on the butts of their pistols.
    At the next corner, a Sabrett hot dog pushcart was tipped over, spilling its load of water, wieners, and condiments into the street. The yellow and