The pub was called the Red Lion and it stood on a street in the East End of London that had been a working class street for two hundred years and would be a working class street for two more hundred years because streets in the East End were not things that changed, they were nodes in a network that had been built before the internet and before electricity and before the concept of individual liberty, they were nodes in a network of relationships that held the community together the way a hub holds a wheel together the way a single person holds a network together the way a single node can hold an entire network in existence until that node breaks and the network fragments and the fragments drift apart and the people who were connected through the node are disconnected and the disconnection is not noticed until it is too late and the too late is a lifetime. Danny O'Connor was fifty-one years old and he was the hub, not by choice but by function, by the accumulated weight of ten thousand small interactions that had made him the central node in a network of relationships that spanned three generations of families in the East End, the way a hub is not chosen, it becomes the hub through the accumulation of connections, the way Danny had become the hub through ten thousand conversations in the Red Lion, through ten thousand favors exchanged, through ten thousand pieces of information passed, through ten thousand problems solved and ten thousand problems created and ten thousand truths told and ten thousand lies tolerated and the hub was not Danny the person, the hub was Danny the function, the way a node in a network is not the physical object that occupies the space but the pattern of connections that passes through that space, the way Danny was not a man but a set of relationships, the way a hub is not a person but a topology, the way the Red Lion was not a pub but a convergence point, the way the street was not a street but a sequence of nodes, the way the East End was not a place but a network, the way a community is not a collection of individuals but a graph of relationships, and Danny was the hub, the central node, the person through whom everything passed, the person who knew everyone and everyone knew him and the knowledge was the connection and the connection was the network and the network was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph had a hub and the hub was Danny and Danny was the hub and the hub was Danny and the two were the same thing, the person and the function, the node and the network, the man and the graph. The first connection in the network was the oldest, dating back to 1963 when Danny had been twenty-three years old and had first walked into the Red Lion and had bought a round for the men who were sitting at the bar and the men had accepted the round and the acceptance had been the first connection and the connection had accumulated over twenty-two years into the hub status that Danny occupied in 1985, the way connections accumulate in a network, the way a node becomes central through the accumulation of edges, the way Danny had become the central node through ten thousand rounds bought and ten thousand conversations held and ten thousand problems solved and ten thousand secrets kept and ten thousand truths told and ten thousand lies tolerated and the accumulation had produced a hub, a node with more connections than any other node in the network, a node through whom information flowed and favors flowed and money flowed and problems flowed and solutions flowed and the flow was the network and the hub was the point of maximum flow and maximum flow meant maximum importance and maximum importance meant that when the hub broke, the network would break, the way a wheel breaks when the hub breaks, the way a network fragments when the central node fails, the way a community dissolves when the person who holds it together dies or leaves or stops functioning, the way Danny was stopping. The stop began in October 1984, when Danny developed a cough that would not go away, the way a node begins to fail when it can no longer process the flow that passes through it, the way a hub begins to fragment when it can no longer maintain the connections that define it, and the cough was a physical symptom of a functional failure, the way Danny's body was failing the way his function was failing, the way the hub was degrading, the way the central node was losing its ability to maintain the edges that connected it to the rest of the network, and Danny tried to maintain the connections, tried to walk into the Red Lion every day and buy rounds and hold conversations and solve problems and keep secrets and tell truths and tolerate lies, tried to maintain the hub function despite the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the growing knowledge that his body was failing and the function was failing and the network was failing because the hub was failing and a network without a hub is not a network, it is a collection of disconnected nodes, the way a community without its central person is not a community, it is a collection of isolated individuals who no longer know each other because the person who connected them is gone. The second connection was the most critical, the connection that held the entire network together, the connection between Danny and the police, specifically a sergeant named Hayes who was fifty-three and had known Danny for thirty years and had used Danny as an informant, the way hubs are used in intelligence networks, the way central nodes are exploited for the information that flows through them, the way Danny had provided Hayes with information about drug dealers and gang members and corrupt officials in the East End for twenty years, the way information had flowed from the network through Danny to the police and the police had used the information to make arrests and the arrests had reduced crime and the reduced crime had made the East End safer and the safer East End had maintained the network and the network had maintained the community and the community had maintained the hub and the hub had maintained Danny and the cycle had been self-sustaining for twenty years until the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the growing knowledge that the cycle was breaking. Hayes came to the Red Lion on a day in February 1985 and he sat at the bar next to Danny and he said, I need information, and Danny said, I do not have it, and Hayes said, you always have it, and Danny said, not anymore, and Hayes looked at him and he saw the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the degradation of the hub and he understood that the information flow was stopping and the understanding was the beginning of the end because the police depended on the information and the information depended on Danny and Danny was failing and the failure would cascade through the network the way a hub failure cascades through a network the way a community's central node fails and the connections fragment and the fragments drift apart and the people who were connected through the hub are disconnected and the disconnection is not noticed until it is too late and the too late is when the drug dealers return and the gang members return and the corrupt officials return and the crime returns and the network that had been maintained by Danny's hub function for twenty years fragments and the fragments are too small to maintain order and the order that had existed collapses and the collapse is not caused by a single event but by the failure of a single node, the hub, the person who held the network together, the way a wheel collapses when the hub breaks, the way a network collapses when the central node fails, the way a community collapses when the person who connects everyone stops connecting. The third connection was the most personal, the connection between Danny and his daughter, Sarah, who was twenty-six years old and lived in a flat in Shoreditch and came to the Red Lion once a week and sat with her father and listened to him talk about the network and the connections and the hub and the flow and the information and the favors and the problems and the solutions and the secrets and the truths and the lies and the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the growing knowledge that the hub was failing and the network was fragmenting and the community was dissolving and the dissolution was not dramatic, it was gradual, the way networks fragment gradually, the way hubs fail gradually, the way people die gradually, the way Danny was dying gradually and the network was fragmenting gradually and the community was dissolving gradually and the dissolution was the loss of connections one by one, the way edges are removed from a graph one by one until the graph is no longer connected, the way the East End was no longer a community when the connections were gone, the way the Red Lion was no longer a convergence point when the hub was gone, the way Danny was no longer a hub when he could no longer maintain the connections, the way a person is no longer a function when the function stops, the way Danny was no longer Danny when the hub stopped and the hub was Danny and Danny was stopping and the stopping was the failure and the failure was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the dissolution and the dissolution was the end of the community and the end of the network and the end of the hub and the end of Danny and the end was gradual and the gradual was the loss of connections one by one and the one by one was the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the visits from Hayes that became less frequent and the rounds that were bought less often and the conversations that were held less sometimes and the problems that were solved less and the secrets that were kept less and the truths that were told less and the lies that were tolerated less and the flow that was reduced and the reduction was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the loss of the network and the network was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was losing edges and the edges were the connections and the connections were the relationships and the relationships were the people and the people were the community and the community was dissolving and the dissolution was the loss of Danny and the loss was gradual and the gradual was the hub failing and the failing was the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the death that was coming and the death was the final loss of the final connection and the final connection was the one between Danny and himself, the connection that held the hub together, the connection that made Danny Danny and the hub Danny and the function Danny and the graph Danny and the network Danny and the community Danny and the East End Danny and the Red Lion Danny and the street Danny and the two hundred years Danny and the future two hundred years that would have a different hub or no hub at all and no hub means no network and no network means no community and no community means the East End is just a place on a map and not a graph of relationships and not a hub and not a function and not a person and not a lifetime of ten thousand connections and not a cough and not a fatigue and not a pain and not a death and not an end and not a beginning and not a hub and not a network and not a community and not an East End and not a street and not a pub and not a round and not a conversation and not a favor and not a problem and not a solution and not a secret and not a truth and not a lie and not a connection and not a node and not a hub and not a graph and not a network and not a community and not a place and not a map and not a two hundred years and not a future and not a past and not a lifetime and not a death and not an end and not a beginning and not a hub and not a Danny and Danny was the hub and the hub was failing and the failing was the end and the end was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the dissolution and the dissolution was the loss and the loss was the cough and the fatigue and the pain and the death and the death was the final connection lost and the final connection was the one between Danny and himself and the self was the hub and the hub was Danny and Danny was the network and the network was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was fragmenting and the fragmenting was the loss of edges and the loss of edges was the loss of connections and the loss of connections was the loss of relationships and the loss of relationships was the loss of people and the loss of people was the loss of community and the loss of community was the loss of the East End as a living thing and the East End was becoming a place on a map and not a graph and not a network and not a community and not a hub and not a function and not a person and not Danny and Danny was dying and the dying was the hub failing and the failing was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the dissolution and the dissolution was the end and the end was gradual and the gradual was the loss of one connection after another after another after another until there were no connections left and the graph was empty and the hub was gone and the network was gone and the community was gone and the East End was just a place and the place was on a map and the map was not a graph and the graph was gone and the hub was gone and the connections were gone and the flow was gone and the information was gone and the favors were gone and the problems were gone and the solutions were gone and the secrets were gone and the truths were gone and the lies were gone and the rounds were gone and the conversations were gone and the Red Lion was just a building and the building was on a street and the street was in the East End and the East End was a place and the place was not a network and the network was gone and the hub was gone and Danny was gone and the cough was gone and the fatigue was gone and the pain was gone and the death was here and the death was the final connection lost and the final connection was the one between Danny and himself and the self was the hub and the hub was Danny and Danny was the end and the end was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the dissolution and the dissolution was the loss and the loss was everything and everything was gone and the graph was empty and the hub was gone and the network was gone and the community was gone and the East End was just a place and the place was on a map and the map was not a graph and the network was not a place and the place was not a community and the community was not a graph and the graph was not a hub and the hub was not a person and the person was not Danny and Danny was gone and the gone was the end and the end was the fragmentation and the fragmentation was the dissolution and the dissolution was the loss and the loss was the network and the network was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was empty and the hub was gone and the connections were gone and the flow was gone and the information was gone and the favors were gone and the problems were gone and the solutions were gone and the secrets were gone and the truths were gone and the lies were gone and the rounds were gone and the conversations were gone and the pub was just a building and the building was on a street and the street was in a place and the place was not a network and the network was gone and the hub was gone and the person was gone and the person was Danny and Danny was the hub and the hub was gone and the gone was the end and the end was the loss and the loss was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was empty and the empty was the end and the end was Danny and Danny was the hub and the hub was the network and the network was the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was gone and the gone was the end and the end was the loss and the loss was the connections and the connections were the relationships and the relationships were the people and the people were the community and the community was the East End and the East End was the graph and the graph was the network and the network was the hub and the hub was Danny and Danny was gone and the gone was everything.