Chapter 3. August Fenwick sat at a long table surrounded by the city's early editions.

He was dressed in an elegant morning robe, though the strength of the sunlight that poured through

the windows suggested that it might be closer to noon, despite the breakfast trappings that still

littered the table in the large and airy room.

And while he looked like the very picture of indolence and idle wealth,

Fenwick poured over the crime reports and the dailies spread out before him with the intensity of a predator on the hunt.

For August Fenwick lived a double life.

The only son of the city's wealthiest family he had grown to manhood secure in his privilege and his place.

"'Not even the monster of a depression

"'that had torn so many lives asunder could shake the Fenwick fortune.

"'He came from a long line of men born to great wealth,

"'who spent the balance of their lives amassing still more,

"'and August Fenwick was never expected to be anything more or less than the latest

branch on that tree of greed. Instead, he had chosen to devote his life to justice, to walk a road

of danger and fight against impossible odds as the champion of those oppressed by these desperate

times. He had trained his body to the peak of fitness and his mind in a dozen disciplines, and when at last he felt himself ready he had made an outlaw of himself, as any man must who truly fights for the honest citizen.

Behind a crimson mask he lived a life of secret adventure as the Red Panda, but as devoted as he was to his work, mornings came early, and were not always kind.

From the door to his left there was a small noise.

Fenwick ignored it and continued reading, searching for any clue that might set him upon the

scent of crime, and finding little but padded column inches in every paper in town.

Toronto was enjoying a quiet spell.

"'That much seemed certain.

...