Wayne of Gotham by Tracy Hickman Page B

the sounds of its afternoon traffic a muffled encroachment on the peace of the park itself. Autumn leaves from the great maple trees lay scattered across the blush of green lawns and the walkway beneath his feet. It might have been pastoral, but that was not within the sphere of Bruce’s own world.
    He had come with his own purpose, his own vision colored and narrowed by his focus. His intention had been merely to observe the house at the woman’s address, but then she had emerged alone, walking down the street of facing brownstones and continuing into the riverside parkland beyond.
    He approached Curtis Point, a small section of the park that jutted out beneath the high, double-arched span of the Schwartz Bypass bridge almost directly overhead. Curtis Point was the perfect overlook for downtown Gotham. Most of the benches had been placed facing southward toward the might and majesty of the skyscrapers across the river, and several of the city’s tourist brochures featured images of that vista taken from this vantage point.
    One bench, however, in deference to the original design of the park, faced to the west and was usually studiously shunned by its patrons from the brownstones across the parkway who brought visitors or tourists to the park for the view. It faced an aspect just beyond the point where the tidal Falstaff Branch of the Gotham River converged with the Sprang River. There, the island known as the Narrows was formed by these two tidal rivers and the greater Gotham River to the west.
    There, on the eastern point of the island, rose the dark collection of Georgian and Gothic towers known as Arkham Asylum.
    There, on the usually shunned bench, sat the lone figure of the woman.
    â€œWe seem to always be meeting in parks,” he said to her.
    Amanda Richter did not turn to face him, but she did smile as she replied. “Of all the parks in all the towns in all the world … you walk into mine. Gerald … Grayson, isn’t it?”
    â€œYes,” Bruce lied as he sat down on the bench with studied, casual ease. “You remembered.”
    â€œSurprised?” Amanda said, still facing the towers of Arkham. “I remember everything … too many things. What brings you to me, Gerald Grayson?”
    â€œJust chance, I—”
    â€œFate,” Amanda interjected with conviction, her smile fading. “Fate brought you to me.”
    â€œActually, it was more like Ms. Doppel,” Bruce said, turning toward her and lying his arm along the backrest of the metal bench. “I tried to find you at home, but instead encountered Ms. Doppel, herself on her way out to look for you. I told her I’d bring you home.”
    â€œHome … where is home?” Amanda said. She wore an outdated cardigan sweater, pearls, and a long skirt. Her hair was pulled back and her eyebrows thinned to narrow lines. She looked as though she had stepped out of the past. “Some people call Arkham home. For some, it’s the only home they know.”
    â€œIs it home for you?” Bruce asked.
    â€œIt was home for my father,” she answered, her voice wistful and her eyes slowly shifting focus to another time. “His life was there … even when he was home. Arkham was where his heart resided, deep and locked away. There he truly lived … and there he died so completely that even his memory was buried with him. And my father was where my heart lived, and I died there, too.”
    â€œYour father, Ernst Richter?”
    Amanda slowly turned toward him. “What do you know of—”
    â€œPeople like the Waynes are very careful about their visitors, but they don’t often keep too close a watch on their gamewarden,” Bruce shrugged. “After you visited their grounds the other day, they did a complete dossier on you, the most curious thing about which was how thin it was compared to most.”
    â€œYou regularly read the Wayne security reports, Mr.