The financial capital of the world completely disappeared behind his clenched fist.

Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Seconds before five-thirty on that same morning Sergeant Harry Stemkowsky, the man designated Vets 24, sped down the steep, icicle-slick hill that was Metropolitan Avenue in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. He was in a nine-year-old wheelchair, from the Queens Veterans Administration. Right now he was pretending the chair was a Datsun 280-Z, silver metallic, with a shining T-roof.

“Aahh-eee-ahh!” He let out a banshee screech that pierced the deserted, solemnly quiet streets. His long thin face was buried in the oily collar of a khaki fatigue parka replete with peeling sergeant's stripes, and his frizzy blond ponytail blew behind him like a bike streamer. Periodically he closed his eyes, which were tearing badly in the burning cold wind. His pinched face was getting as red as the gleaming Berry Street stoplight that he was racing through with absolute abandon.

His forehead was burning, but he loved the sensation of unexpected freedom. He thought he could actually feel streams of blood surge through his wasted legs again.

Harry Stemkowsky's rattling wheelchair finally came to a halt in front of the all-night Walgreen Drug Store. Under the parka and the two bulky sweaters he wore, his heart was hammering wildly. He was so goddamn excited-his whole life was beginning all over again.

Today, Harry Stemkowsky felt he could do just about anything.

The drugstore's glass door, which he nudged open, was covered with a montage of cigarette posters. Immediately he was blessed with a draft of welcoming warm air, filled with the smells of greasy bacon and fresh-perked coffee. He smiled and rubbed his hands together in a gesture that was almost gleeful. For the first time in years, he was no longer a cripple.

And for the first time in more than a dozen hard years, Harry Stemkowsky had a purpose.