The Assay Balance

The cold open

Two floors beneath the midnight pavement of the Financial District, the heavy steel door of Danforth Depository stood ajar. Inside the vaulted assay room, beneath green banker's lamps and rows of gleaming bullion scales, Orville Danforth lay face down across his mahogany examination counter. The back of his skull had been shattered by a single crushing blow from a five-kilogram bronze reference weight, its polished face smeared with dark crimson.

The victim

Orville Danforth, 55, master precious-metals assayer and private depository director

The lineup

• Leland Barstow
• Talia Rostova
• Soren Lind
• Inez Quintana