City of Dreams (23 page)

His last thought, as he passed from consciousness,
a hell of a way to get rich
.

He did not feel anything when he struck the ground in front of St. Paul’s Chapel.

SEVEN

Wednesday Morning

A
HEADLINE CAUGHT
Peter Fallon’s eye:
FEDERAL STEWARD DIES IN PRESENCE OF GEORGE WASHINGTON
.

Peter was sitting in the New-York Historical Society library, a room that honored the scholar’s art with two-story columns supporting a vaulted ceiling and stained-glass windows celebrating New York history. It reminded him of a small chapel. So he was praying over a thin folder of material about Gilbert Walker.

The article from the
New York Daily Advertiser
for March 12, 1790, described Walker’s service in the Revolution, his six and a half years aboard the
Jersey
, and his death after a fall from a horse, all in the typically florid style of the era:

If the time and place of a man’s passing, and those who attend upon it, reflect the significance of his life, then the death of Gilbert Walker must bear witness to a life of importance, despite his station as a simple steward, for he expired at sunrise, on Broadway, in front of St. Paul’s Chapel, the only witnesses being the only witnesses a man would want, aside from the Savior himself, namely the president of the United States and his secretary of the Treasury
.

Peter wished that the writer had done more reporting and less stylizing. Where had the decedent been coming from? What did Washington say when he . . . deceded? Did Hamilton help him? A little CPR, maybe? A few chest compressions?

Gilbert Walker’s funeral service in St. Paul’s Chapel was also attended by men of importance: Secretary Hamilton, Sam Fraunces, and numerous others who had known him. Mr. Walker died without wife or issue. His body and belongings were claimed by Nancy Hooley, housemaid. He was buried in the chapel graveyard
.

So, thought Peter, Gil Walker’s grave site had been covered by the rain of death on that September day in 2001.

He flipped through the rest of the folder, looking for the identity of “L. R.,” perhaps, or another mention of Nancy Hooley. It did not take long:

W
OMAN
M
AULED TO
D
EATH ON
B
LOOMINGDALE
R
OAD!
Nancy Hooley, housemaid to former loyalist Abigail Woodward, was last night attacked by two mastiffs belonging to Erastus Daggett, owner of Woodward Manor. By the time that Squire Daggett heard the dogs, they had torn loose the veins in the poor woman’s throat and savagely chewed on her limbs. She expired on the scene. The constable says there will be no further action, as the dogs were protecting their property, Miss Hooley having been found trespassing inside Daggett’s fence
.

When Peter sat back, Karen Richards materialized from somewhere in the stacks. “Find anything that helps?”

“Everything helps.” Peter did not whisper, since there was no one else working in the library that morning. “The woman who stole the box, did she give a name and address on the call slip?”

“She said her name was Erica Callow.”

Ms. Richards looked to be in her late fifties. No wedding band, reading glasses on a loop around her neck, hair pulled back and graying all over, a nervous laugh, and a story to tell: “She said she was researching the history of Fraunces Tavern. She called it the beating heart of the city from 1774 to the day that the federal government left.”

“What did she look like?” asked Peter.

“Very pretty. Tall. Blonde. Late forties. Nice shoes. Jimmy Choo, maybe.”

From tall blonde to bag lady in eight months? Peter wondered. And Jimmy Choo’s?

“She had worked twice with our Revolutionary War material. She had read the folder you’ve just read. Then she asked for the actual box left behind by Walker.”

“How had the box come to you?”

“We were in existence long before the Sons of the Revolution opened their museum at Fraunces. And one of our early benefactors was Abigail Woodward, wife of a loyalist who hanged himself. She found the mahogany box in Nancy’s things. She donated it when we opened. It contained the only finial known to have survived.”

“What about this Hooley woman?”

“The one who was mauled to death? She doesn’t leave a lot of footprints on the sands of time. Ditto the one called L. R.”

“How do you think the theft was accomplished?”

“We follow the security procedures of any rare book library, but Erica Callow had established a relationship with us, so our guard was down. I was in the stacks, and my assistant took a call from a gentleman asking a stupid question about the external architecture of the building, a question that my assistant could answer simply by getting up and looking out the window.”

“Do you think the caller was an accomplice?”

“Erica Callow disappeared in the few seconds we were distracted, so I’d say yes.”

“So . . . what’s your take?” asked Peter. “Why would the blond scholar in Jimmy Choo’s steal a finial and a few pieces of printed material in a box?”

“Maybe she liked the story it tells.”

“Of what?”

“A rebellion born in a burst of optimism. A freedom won by great exertion at great expense. An expense that put a government in great debt. A government that decided there was no recourse but to print money.”

“Sounds like us.”

“Either that,” said Ms. Richards, “or she just liked finials.”

A
FTER
P
ETER LEFT
the Society, he crossed Central Park West, so he could walk along the wall of green and not have to wait at every corner for the lights. Then he pulled out his cell phone and called Evangeline.

She was working on a deadline for an article to run in the
Times
travel section: “Honeymoon in New England,” off the notes from their last adventure, which had been anything but a honeymoon.

Peter could hear the
click-tick-click-tick-tick
of her keyboard. He told her what he had learned, which wasn’t much, but it did prompt a question:

“Your bag lady, was she wearing Jimmy Choo’s?”

“Orange Chuck Taylor high-tops. Now I have to finish this piece. Can you entertain yourself until lunch?”

“I have a few other things planned. They don’t call it fun city for nothing.”

“Good. And Peter, I’m sorry for sticking my nose into this.”

“I would have been disappointed if you hadn’t.”

“Be careful.” Evangeline hung up and went back to work. She was writing about the Mount Washington: “. . . the most beautiful hotel in New England, where . . .”

She stopped writing, looked up, looked out the window.
A few things?
What things? A visit to Kathy Flynn, maybe, the red-headed correspondent for MarketSpin .com, once a graduate student at Southwestern Iowa State?

Peter had gone out there to begin a career as a history professor. Evangeline had gone with him. They had been in their twenties. They had lasted two years before they grew bored with the place and each other and Evangeline applied to Columbia School of Journalism. She had always given Peter the benefit of the doubt about Kathy. He insisted that Kathy had
not
slipped off her underpants during office hours in his carrel, at least not until after Evangeline said she was leaving. But she
had
slipped them off.

Still, as Peter said, it had been a long time ago.

So Evangeline got back to writing about the Mount Washington Hotel.

P
ETER WAS WALKING
south, enjoying the day and doing business, too.

He called his office, and Antoine Scarborough answered. “Fallon Antiquaria.”

Antoine had begun a history Ph.D. program at Boston College, but he still worked two days a week for Fallon, while Peter’s Aunt Bernice, a family fixture for four decades, handled the desk the rest of the time.

“I like the way you answer my phone,” said Peter. “Bernice always sounds like . . . Bernice. You sound like—”

“Go ahead, say it. James Earl Jones. I don’t mind.”

“I was thinking Chris Rock.”

“My dad was right. I should’ve gone to law school and gained some real power. Then I wouldn’t have to take this abuse from the man.”

They talked like that, because the Fallons and the Scarboroughs went way back. Antoine’s father had worked for Fallon & Son Construction. And when Antoine and his father had the same argument that Peter had with his father—law school or a history Ph.D.—Peter had given Antoine a chance to see the practical side of the history business.

“Do you need something,” said Antoine, “or can I get back to reading for my three o’clock?”

Peter told Antoine about Gil Walker, Nancy Hooley, a love letter from “L. R.,” and a newspaper article about New Emission. “Check them out. And see what you can find about a place called Woodward Manor.”

“Where was that?”

Peter could hear him jotting notes. “It was on the old Bloomingdale Road, aka Broadway. Find out when it was torn down, who lived in it, stuff like that.”

“How soon do you need this?”

“Yesterday.”

“Like always. What are you on to?”

“Not sure yet. I’ll tell you more later.”

“Like always. Is it big?”

“Not sure yet.”

“Dangerous?”

“Unh . . .”

“Sounds like somebody already chasin’ your ass around the Big Apple.”

“Let’s just say that I had to put on a Yankees hat as a disguise.”

“That’s like me puttin’ on a sheet.”

“Just put on your computer and get to work.”

A
T THE
S
IXTY-FIFTH
Street transverse road, Peter stopped for a red light.

Cabs roared past on their way over from the East Side. A few people hurried along. A police cruiser rolled past, but the officers didn’t even look at him. That was a good sign. The Yankees hat and sunglasses must have done the trick.

The red Stop hand changed to a little walking white pedestrian. As Peter crossed, a voice came behind him. “You seen the papers?”

Peter kept walking. He knew the voice. Joey Berra.

“The
Daily News
got a nice sketch on the front page,” said Joey. “Guy in a Yankees hat and sunglasses. Japanese guy and some lady bird-watcher fingered him.”

“Was Boris chasing Delancey?” asked Peter.

“Don’t know.”

“Why did Delancey come to our apartment?”

“Don’t know.”

“Don’t you know anything?”

“I know Boris won’t be down for breakfast. But I did a few things that’ll make it play like a drug overdose, once they get the toxicology report. So we’ll both be in the clear.” Joey did not look at Peter. He simply walked ahead, eyes on the sidewalk.

“You killed him? Why? To protect Delancey?”

“I’d like Delancey alive, and it was time to pick off one of those motherfuckers.”

“What motherfuckers?” Peter stopped on the sidewalk. “And who’s
we
?”

“
We
, like I told you, is the American people. And keep walkin’, numb nuts. You don’t know who could be watchin’. Neither do I.”

Peter gave a look around, then he kept walking.

“Now, listen,” said Joey. “I’ll give you a chance to get out of this. Delancey led Boris right to your girlfriend’s door, but her address died with him. That stupid fuckin’ Russian hadn’t called his handlers to tell them where he was. I checked the phone.”

“His handlers? Russians?”

Joey didn’t answer. They were coming up to the light for the eastbound transverse entrance off Leonard Bernstein Way.

“Have you met Arsenault, yet?” asked Joey.

“Lunch, today. At his place.”

“Don’t be impressed by the fancy-schmantzy.”

At the corner, the light was green for the eastbound traffic.

“I’m peelin’ off here,” said Joey. “Keep walkin’ south. If you follow me, I’ll stick you with the same needle I used on Boris. You’ll drop right in the middle of Central Park West and some fuckin’ Arab cabbie’ll turn you into Boston roadkill.”

Peter took that as fair warning and stopped.

From the middle of the street, Joey said, “Stay in or out. It’s up to you. But I can’t keep protectin’ you and your girlfriend. And don’t put on that Yankees hat again. Every time you do, I can hear Joe DiMaggio turnin’ over in his grave.”

“Yeah . . . Ted Williams turns over, too.”

“Nah. He don’t turn. He just melts a little.”

S
O
P
ETER HAD
even more to think about as he came into Columbus Circle.

And he was going to have to make a decision. To avoid it, he stopped for a moment at the place where Broadway met Eighth Avenue.

The sun was high, the traffic was swirling, and the surfaces of the city sparkled like a windblown sea on a running tide.

To the west, the Time Warner Center formed the newest and biggest development in New York. But not for long, because the “City that Never Sleeps” was also the “City that Never Stops . . . Changing.” Every newest and biggest gave way to something newer and bigger, sometimes in a year, sometimes in a decade, almost always in a generation.