I left my apartment just before sunrise, Saturday, in a rush to find the nearest newspaper.

My new neighborhood coffee shop was a tiny all-night bakery run by a rowdy family of

Pakistanis on Kalorama, in a section of Adams-Morgan that could go from safe to treacherous in one small block. I sidled up to the counter and ordered a large latte. Then I

opened the newspaper and found the one little story I'd lost sleep over.

My friends at Drake & Sweeney had planned it well. On page two of Metro, there was

my face, in a photo taken a year earlier for a recruiting brochure the firm had developed.

Only the firm had the negative.

The story was four paragraphs, brief, to the point, and filled primarily with information

fed to the reporter by the firm. I had worked there for seven years, in antitrust, law school

at Yale, no prior criminal record. The firm was the fifth-largest in the country--eight

hundred lawyers, eight cities, and so on. No one got quoted, because no quotes were

necessary. The sole purpose of the story was to humiliate me, and to that end it worked

well. LOCAL ATTORNEY ARRESTED FOR GRAND LARCENY read the headline

next to my face. "Items taken" was the description of the stolen loot. Items taken during

my recent departure from the firm.

It sounded like a silly little spat--a bunch of lawyers quibbling over nothing but

paperwork. Who would care, other than myself and anyone who might know me? The

embarrassment would quickly go away; there were too many real stories in the world.

The photo and the background had found a friendly reporter, one willing to process his

four paragraphs and wait until my arrest could be confirmed. With no effort whatsoever, I

could see Arthur and Rafter and their team spending hours planning my arrest and its

aftermath, hours that no doubt would be billed to RiverOaks, only because it happened to

be the client nearest to the mess.

What a public relations coup! Four paragraphs in the Saturday edition.

The Pakistanis didn't bake fruit-filled doughnuts. I bought oatmeal cookies instead, and

drove to the office.

Ruby was asleep in the doorway, and as I approached I wondered how long she had been

there. She was covered with two or three old quilts, and her head rested on a large canvas

shopping bag, packed with her belongings. She sprang to her feet after I coughed and

made noise.

"Why are you sleeping here?" I asked.

She looked at the paper bag of food, and said, "I gotta sleep somewhere."

"I thought you slept in a car."

"I do. Most of the time."

Nothing productive would come from a conversation with a homeless person about why

she slept here or there. Ruby was hungry. I unlocked the door, turned on lights, and went to make coffee. She, according to our ritual, went straight to what had become her desk

and waited.

We had coffee and cookies with the morning news. We alternated stories--I read one I

wanted, then one that was of interest to her. I ignored the one about me.

Ruby had walked out of the AA/NA meeting the afternoon before at Naomi's. The

morning session had gone without incident, but she had bolted from the second one.

Megan, the director, had called me about an hour before Gasko made his appearance.

"How do you feel this morning?" I asked when we finished the paper.

"Fine. And you?"

"Fine. I'm clean. Are you?"

Her chin dropped an inch; her eyes cut to one side, and she paused just long enough for

the truth. "Yes," she said. "I'm clean."

"No you're not. Don't lie to me, Ruby. I'm your friend, and your lawyer, and I'm going to

help you see Terrence. But I can't help you if you lie to me. Now, look me in the eyes,

and tell me if you're clean."

She somehow managed to shrink even more, and with her eyes on the floor, she said, "I'm

not clean."

"Thank you. Why did you walk out of the AA/NA meeting yesterday afternoon?"

"I didn't."

"The director said you did."

"I thought they was through."