Benton and Scarpetta stopped at the first barrier door, which never opened fast enough, the guard in the control room on the other side busy with the rhythm of gatekeeping. Benton loudly announced that they were coming through, and they waited. He called out again as a man mopped a corridor that led to the recreation room, where there were tables and chairs, a few board games, and an old home gym with no detachable parts.

Beyond that were interview rooms, and areas for group therapy, and the law library with its two typewriters, which like the televisions and the wall clocks were covered with plastic to prevent patients from disassembling anything with components that could be fashioned into a weapon. Scarpetta had gotten the tour the first time she was summoned up here. She was confident nothing had changed.

The white-painted steel door finally slid open and slammed shut behind them, and a second opened to let them through. The guard inside the control room returned Scarpetta’s driver’s license, and she surrendered her visitor’s pass, the exchange made mutely through thick bars as officers escorted in the newest patient, who wore the blaze-orange jumpsuit of Rikers Island. Prisoners like him were temporary transfers, brought here only if they needed medical attention. Scarpetta never ceased to be dismayed by what malingerers would do to themselves to earn a brief stay at Bellevue.

“One of our frequent flyers,” Benton said as steel slammed. “A swallower. Last visit it was batteries. Triple A, double A. Can’t remember. About eight of them. Rocks and screws before that. Once it was toothpaste, still in the tube.”

Scarpetta felt as if her spirit were unzipped from her body like the lining of a coat. She couldn’t be who she was, couldn’t show emotion, couldn’t share her thoughts about Oscar or a single detail he had told her about himself or Terri. She was chilled by Benton’s professional distance, which was always the most extreme on the ward. It was here where he entertained fears he wouldn’t confess, and didn’t need to, because she knew him. Ever since Marino had gotten so drunk and out of control, Benton had been in a quiet, chronic panic he refused to admit. To him, every male was a potential beast who wanted to carry her off to his lair, and nothing she did or said reassured him.

“I’m going to quit CNN,” she said as they headed to his office.

“I understand the position Oscar’s just put you in,” Benton said. “None of this is your fault.”

“You mean, the position you’ve just put me in.”

“It’s Berger who wanted you here.”

“But you’re the one who asked.”

“If I had my way about it, you’d still be in Massachusetts,” he said. “But he wouldn’t talk unless you came here.”

“I just hope I’m not the reason he’s here.”