“Jim Gordon,” the mayor said, “can tell you the truth about Harvey Dent—”

Talking with his mouth full, Gilly nodded at the sheets of paper Gordon had been reviewing.

“Jesus, Gordon, is that your speech?” he said, spewing crumbs. “We’re gonna be here all night.” Gordon hastily covered the papers.

“Maybe the truth about Harvey isn’t so simple, congressman.”

“—so I’ll let him tell you himself,” the mayor concluded. He stepped away from the podium. “Commissioner Gordon?”

Another round of applause rose from the assembled partygoers.

That’s my cue, Gordon thought glumly. He gulped down the last of his drink and made his way to the dais, feeling like a convicted felon approaching the gallows. He stepped up to the mike and took out his speech, even as a battery of doubts assailed him.

“The truth?” he began.

Unwanted, an ugly memory flashed before his mind’s eye. He saw Harvey Dent as he truly remembered him. The left half of Dent’s face had been burnt away, leaving behind a hideous expanse of charred muscle and scar tissue. A bloodshot eye, ablaze with madness, bulged from a naked socket. A ragged gap in his cheek offered a glimpse of exposed jawbone, while a strip of raw gristle stretched vertically across what remained of Harvey’s smile.

By contrast, the right side of his face remained just as handsome as ever.

No longer the crusading district attorney, Harvey menaced a small boy with a loaded handgun. The boy, Gordon’s own precious son, trembled in the madman’s clutches, trying bravely not to cry, even as Gordon pleaded desperately for his child’s life.

Unmoved, Dent flipped a coin. . .

Gordon forced the ghastly memory from his mind. He gazed out at the audience, wondering if they were finally ready to hear what he had to say. Harvey’s portrait, the portrait of a hero, loomed silently behind him. Gordon pondered his options—and his motives. Was clearing his own conscience worth risking all that had been accomplished in Harvey’s name?

“I have written a speech telling the truth about Harvey Dent,” Gordon admitted, making up his mind. He folded up his papers and stuffed them inside his jacket, close to his chest. “But maybe the time isn’t right.”

“Thank Christ for that,” Gilly muttered at the bar, a tad too loudly.

“Maybe all you need to know,” Gordon said, “is that there are a thousand inmates in Blackgate Prison as a direct result of the Dent Act. These are violent criminals, essential cogs in the organized crime machine that terrorized Gotham for so long. Maybe for now all I should say about Harvey Dent’s death is this—it has not been for nothing.”

The crowd clapped enthusiastically—all except for the figure on the balcony, who silently turned away and disappeared into the upper reaches of the mansion. Watching him out of the corner of his eye, Gordon saw him vanish.

Can’t blame him, Gordon thought. I didn’t say anything worth hearing.

Feeling like a coward, he retreated from the dais. Doubts followed him, as they had every day for eight long years. Had he done the right thing? Or had he simply chickened out?