Heist (excerpt)

Portrait of E.L. Doctorow by Matt Collins

Sunday afternoon. A peddler in a purple chorister’s robe selling watches in Battery Park. Fellow with dreadlocks, a sweet smile, sacral presence. Doing well.

Rock doves everywhere aswoop, the grit of the city in their wings. And the glare of the oil-slicked bay, and a warm-throated autumn breeze like a woman blowing in my ears.

At my back, the financial skyline of lower Manhattan sunlit into an islanded cathedral, a religioplex.