The Broken Window

He paused at the extensive lists of the consumer products bought by Arthur and his family (they were described by the creepy phrase “tethered individuals”). There was no doubt that anybody reading the dossier could have learned enough about his buying habits and where he shopped to implicate him in the murder of Alice Sanderson.

Rhyme learned about the country club Arthur belonged to, until he had quit several years ago, presumably because he’d lost his job. He noted the package vacations he’d bought; Rhyme was surprised he’d taken up skiing. Also, he or one of the children might have a weight problem; somebody had joined a dieting program. A health club membership for the entire family too. Rhyme saw a lay-away purchase for some jewelry around Christmastime; a chain jewelry store in a New Jersey mall. Rhyme speculated: small stones socketed in a large setting-a make-do gift, until times were better.

Seeing one reference, he gave a laugh. Like him, Arthur seemed to favor single-malt whisky-Rhyme’s new favorite brand, in fact, Glenmorangie.

His cars were a Prius and a Cherokee.

The criminalist’s smile faded at that reference, though, as he recalled another vehicle. He was picturing Arthur’s red Corvette, the car he’d received from his parents on his seventeenth birthday-the car in which Arthur had driven off to Boston to attend M.I.T.

Rhyme thought back to the boys’ respective departures for college. It was a significant moment for Arthur, and for his father too; Henry Rhyme was ecstatic that his son had been accepted by such a fine school. But the cousins’ plans-rooming together, jousting over girls, outshining the other nerds-didn’t work out. Lincoln wasn’t accepted by M.I.T. but went instead to the University of Illinois-Champagne/Urbana, which offered Lincoln a full scholarship (and had some panache back then because it was located in the town where HAL, the narcissistic computer in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, was born).

Teddy and Anne were pleased their son was going to a home-state school, as was his uncle; Henry had told his nephew that he hoped the boy would return to Chicago often and continue to help him with his research, possibly even assist in his classes from time to time.

“Sorry you and Arthur won’t be rooming together,” Henry said. “But you’ll see each other summers, holidays. And I’m sure your father and I can swing some trips out to Bean Town for a visit.”

“That might work out,” Lincoln had said.

Keeping to himself that while he was devastated he hadn’t been accepted by M.I.T., there was an upside to the rejection-because he wanted never to see his goddamn cousin ever again.

All because of the red Corvette.

The incident had occurred not long after the Christmas Eve party at which he’d won the concrete piece of history, on a breathlessly cold day in February, which, sun or cloud, is Chicago’s most heartless month. Lincoln was competing in a science fair at Northwestern in Evanston. He asked Adrianna if she wanted to accompany him, thinking that he might go for the marriage proposal afterward.

But she couldn’t make it; she was going shopping with her mother at Marshall Field’s department store in the Loop, lured by a big sale. Lincoln had been disappointed but thought nothing more of it and concentrated on the fair. He won first place in the senior division, then he and his friends packed up their projects and carted everything outside. Fingers blue and breath clouding around them in the painful air, they loaded the gear in the belly of the bus and sprinted for the door.

It was then that somebody called, “Hey, check it out. Excellent wheels.”

A red Corvette was streaking through campus.

His cousin Arthur was at the wheel. Which wasn’t odd; the family lived nearby. What did surprise Lincoln, though, was that the girl beside Arthur, he believed, was Adrianna.

Yes, no?

He couldn’t be sure.

The clothes matched: a brown leather jacket and a fur hat, which looked identical to the one Lincoln had given her at Christmas.

“Linc, Jesus, get your ass in here. We gotta close the door.”

Still, Lincoln remained where he was, staring at the car as it fishtailed around the corner on the gray-white street.

Could she have lied to him? The girl he was considering marrying? It didn’t seem possible. And cheating on him with Arthur?

Trained in science, he examined the facts objectively.

Fact One. Arthur and Adrianna knew each other. His cousin had met her months ago in the counselor’s office where she worked after class at Lincoln’s high school. They could very easily have exchanged phone numbers.

Fact Two. Arthur, Lincoln now realized, had stopped asking about her. This was odd. The boys had spent plenty of time talking about girls but recently Art hadn’t once mentioned her.

Suspicious.