House of Thieves (14 page)

“On arriving at the ball, the guests will find you standing at your mother's right. She will do the introducing. Then you will dance the German with the gentleman
she
selects to lead.”

“Yes, Granny.”

Julia and Granny were walking along Broadway together. They would always be together from this point on, for Julia's coming-out meant that she needed a chaperone. And, to her horror, her mother had designated Granny, not a maiden aunt, for this grave responsibility. Granny had taken up her duties with an enthusiasm bordering on mania. Her granddaughter's well-being and social worth were at stake; the task was not to be left to an amateur.

“A chaperone is the guardian angel of a well-bred girl,” Granny declared. “She must always be by her side.”

Julia had a very difficult time concealing her anguish.

A widow in her seventies, Granny lived alone in a three-story brownstone overlooking Madison Square. It was the heart of what Julia called Knickerbocker Land. When she wasn't at the Cross house interfering in the family's lives, Granny spent her days sitting at the tall window in the front parlor, surrounded by at least a dozen cats, watching the world go by. It was like staring at an aquarium, a source of constant fascination for her.

This morning, Julia had told her mother she was to meet Lavinia Stewart on West Thirty-Second Street to look at a crystal punch bowl at Fernbach's. This wasn't quite true. First, she had an appointment with John Nolan. Then she would see the punch bowl. Granny's accompaniment threw her plans into disarray. There was no possible way of getting rid of her.

“Above all,” Granny said, “never paint your cheeks. Complexion comes from within.”

“I promise I won't.”

They passed storefronts stocked with every kind of product, protected from the hot August sun by striped awnings. The streets brimmed with the usual flood of carriages, horse-drawn trolleys, and wagons. The stench of horse manure and urine was particularly pungent for so early in the day.

“It is perfectly correct for you to refuse an offer of a dance with a man, but you
must
then sit that dance out. Never accept another offer for the same dance. It
just
isn't done.”

Julia ignored that, as she'd done for all the advice she'd been given for the last eight blocks, consumed by the question of what to do about her rendezvous with Nolan. Reluctant to stand him up, she decided to steer her grandmother in the right direction and then improvise.

“Granny, let's turn at Thirtieth. I want to see something in a shop window.”

This didn't interrupt Granny's discourse in the least. She continued to lecture on about taking cold baths every morning. Julia saw a hat shop window on the northwest corner of Sixth under the elevated railroad and crossed the street. Above, a train thundered past, and Granny stopped talking for almost ten seconds. She had never ridden on an elevated railroad and she never would, she exclaimed when it was gone. They threaded their way through the crowds to the shop, and Julia pretended to be interested in its wares, sweeping the streets with her eyes.

“Excuse me, ma'am. I believe you dropped this.” A young man handed Granny her rose-colored velvet purse with a smile.

“My goodness, yes,” Granny exclaimed, bewildered. “I can't understand how I lost it. It was tucked in my handbag.”

“Why, Mr. Nolan, how good to see you again,” Julia said cheerfully.

Confused, Granny turned her head from Julia to Nolan and back to Julia. “You know this man, Julia?” It was her sworn duty to keep Julia from making improper acquaintances.

“Of course. You remember the Nolans on East Twenty-Sixth Street. Very close friends with the Roosevelts,” Julia said with a big smile, shooting a wink at Nolan. “Their son, Theodore, is going to run for mayor.”

Once Granny heard a familiar Knickerbocker name like Roosevelt, she began to calm down.

“Young John here was with me at Doddsworth Dancing Academy. In fact, that's where you met him, Granny. You said that you'd never seen a young boy dance a more elegant German. You must remember.”

Granny looked at the boy. Julia knew she was thinking that he
was
quite handsome and well dressed.

“Thank you so much, Mr. Nolan. You came around at exactly the right time. There were four hundred dollars in that little purse,” Granny said in a surprisingly friendly voice.

Julia saw Nolan frown. “Mr. Nolan, this is my grandmother, Mrs. Arabella Rutherford.”

Recovering, he shook Granny's hand. “A great pleasure, ma'am.”

“We're just doing some shopping,” said Julia.

“For Miss Cross's coming-out ball,” Granny added proudly.

“A ball for Miss Cross? How nice. Please, let me escort you. So many wonderful things to buy in this district. It would be an honor to carry your parcels.”

“Indeed, yes, I love to shop here,” Granny gushed. Julia could see she was falling for Nolan's charm and good looks.

“What's your favorite thing in the world, Mrs. Rutherford? Something you don't have enough of, I mean?”

“Cats.”

“You're a cat lover! So am I,” Nolan said. “It just so happens that I know where there's the most incredible collection of cats—and all for sale.”

“Really?” There was obvious pleasure in Granny's voice. Without any children left in her house, cats had become her surrogates, offering endless unconditional love. She'd had scores of them over the years and lavished attention on them. It was such a paradox to Julia: Granny, so rock hard and uncompromising in her feelings toward humans, was so loving and affectionate to her cats. In her will, her surviving animals were due a sizable bequest. Her cats would have a higher yearly income than 99 percent of New York.

“The place is just on the next block, on Thirty-First. Would you like to see?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Tell me more about the plans for Miss Cross's ball.”

As they walked, Granny rattled off the details, down to the pattern on the Dresden china settings. Nolan listened with great curiosity, peppering her with questions. They stopped in front of an ordinary-looking brownstone, and Nolan led the way in.

The first thing Julia noticed was the odd smell. Not noxious, but almost alluring—rich and smoky. Instead of the usual layout of rooms off the central hallway, there were cubicles furnished with small plush sofas. Each one held a little round table and an oriental rug. Very respectable-looking men and women lay inside, smoking what looked like a pipe. The windows were shuttered from within, making the interior very dark. But throughout there were dozens and dozens of cats of all different colors and sizes, perched on tables and the arms of sofas, sleeping on the cushions, pacing the hallway.

“My goodness, so many beautiful cats,” Granny exclaimed and began to walk around, petting and caressing the cats. Granny was so distracted that she didn't seem to notice the people lying about.

A smiling Chinaman wearing a blue-and-gold quilted jacket with shiny black pantaloons approached. “Lady like kitties,” he said.

To Julia's astonishment, Granny returned the smile and nodded. As far as Julia knew, she had always found anything different from Knickerbocker society vulgar and disgusting. Yet she treated the Chinaman as though he was a Van Rensselaer.

“Oh, yes. Are any for sale?”

“All kitties for sale. Which one you like?”

“Oh dear, there's too many to choose. That calico is amazing, and that tortie! Adorable.”

“No hurry. You sit here.” The Chinaman pointed to a sofa. He began to gather cats and arrange them like throw pillows. “You sit, lady, here. I bring you
Li
Yuen
. That ‘Fountain of Beauty' in English.”

Granny perched primly on the sofa and began to caress the cats, which purred loudly as they rubbed against her. “They're so friendly,” she said with glee.

At Julia's side, Nolan beamed with pride.

Instead of bringing tea, which Julia had thought Fountain of Beauty was, the Chinaman brought her aunt a long ivory pipe, a little box, and what looked like a lamp.

“This
yen
tsiang
,” he said, pointing to the pipe, and then holding up the box. “This
yen
hop
.” He pointed to himself. “And I Wah Kee.”

He took a tiny blob of what looked like grease from the
yen
hop
, put it in the jade bowl of the pipe, and lit the lamp. Then he placed the pipe in Granny's hand, motioning her to hold the pipe bowl over the lamp and inhale.

“Granny, you really shouldn't be doing this,” said Julia, alarmed.

“Fiddlesticks, Julia,” snapped Granny. “My Uncle Hector was in the opium trade with Warren Delano. Made a fortune. Warren's daughter, Sarah, married James Roosevelt up in Hyde Park a few years back, and I was at the wedding. Uncle Hector told me the smoke had definite medicinal qualities. It might be just the thing for my lumbago.”

Granny lay back on the sofa and calmly inhaled, then coughed.

“Take in slow, hold, let out slow,” tutored Wah Kee, giving her a solicitous smile.

“Besides,” Granny continued, a stern gaze fixed on her granddaughter, “this is good manners. Like smoking a peace pipe in an Indian village. It's a token of this yellow devil's gratitude for buying his cats.”

Granny looked over at the cubicle directly across from her. “Isn't that the mother of your schoolmate, Ellen Bentley?”

Indeed, a woman in a royal-blue princess dress, puffing away on a sofa, was Ellen's mother. She seemed to be in a state of hazy bliss, her eyelids drifting down with each inhale.

Closing her eyes, Granny continued to smoke. The cats snuggled up around her.

“It's almost noon, Miss Cross,” Nolan whispered in Julia's ear. “The cockfight will be starting soon. If we leave now, we can make it. Remember, the bird that won for you last time, General Sherman, is fighting.”

Julia nodded and moved toward her grandmother, extending a hand to bring the elderly woman to her feet. Granny looked up, annoyed, a glassy look in her eyes.

“My child, I am not ready to leave, and I won't be rushed into making a decision as to which cats I want. If you must run an errand, I shall allow Mr. Nolan to accompany you. You did say he's a close friend of Theodore Roosevelt's family?”

Julia nodded and whispered to Nolan, “Wah Kee will look after her, won't he?”

The Chinaman nodded. “Lady be fine, Mr. Johnnie. You go. She buy cats—two dollar for cat. Good price.”

“Don't worry,” Nolan said to Julia. “We'll be back in an hour.”

George rested his head against the window of the train. Only five minutes out from Grand Central Station, he was struck by how fast the buildings disappeared. An empty landscape met his gaze, vacant lots punctuating the grid of streets. A few isolated brick buildings stood alone, as if they had sprung up from the earth like weeds. The builders, it seemed, were patiently waiting for development to flow north to their doors and increase the value of their property.

Each of the twelve children in his class had a window seat. Their small faces were pressed against the windows, peering out eagerly. None of them, George knew, had ever taken a train ride out of the city. Their world had been a ten-block radius, filled with tenements packed cheek by jowl onto the filthy, crowded streets. It was as if they were on a rocket to the moon. The smallest detail fascinated the children, and it delighted George to see them so excited.

Many of the lots had jumbles of rundown shanties on them, with open fires and chickens, cows, and goats milling around. The children pointed out the animals to one another, laughing happily.

“Look, a castle,” cried Fred Enman.

The vacant blocks had given way to the open countryside of northern Manhattan, which was dotted with farm buildings and the occasional estate and imposing mansion, some of which looked like medieval castles.

Fifteen minutes later, the train crossed the Harlem River into the Bronx.

“Fordham Station. Next station, Fordham Station,” the conductor called.

The train slowed to a stop. George gathered his charges and jumped down to the platform. Joining the crowd of hundreds of race fans, the group climbed Kingsbridge Road up the long hill to the Jerome Park Racetrack. It was a beautiful August afternoon, warm but not hot. The children followed George and passed through the huge, double-arched main gate into a field with a racetrack, bordered on its farside by a hundred-yard-long, two-story grandstand. It was filled to capacity on both tiers, with spectators crowding the rail in front of the building.

The children were stopping to point out anything that interested them. Like a cowboy herding cattle, George directed them across the track to the grass infield. He saw Jonah Kissel carefully gather up a fistful of the soft, reddish dirt and put it in his pocket.

The infield directly across from the grandstand was filled with every imaginable type of expensive carriage and coach. Top-hatted society gentlemen in black frock coats and gray trousers picnicked with attractive young women in brilliant princess dresses. Spread out on the lush, green grass were white linen tablecloths and huge wicker picnic baskets filled with cold food and bottles of chilled wine and champagne. All the teams had been unhitched, and some people ate on the roofs of their carriages to get a better view. The drivers ate off by themselves but within earshot of their masters.

Up on a bluff overlooking the track and grandstand was the clubhouse, the home of the American Jockey Club. It was a white wooden mansion with a red slate mansard roof. It offered luxurious hotel accommodations so that horse owners could entertain guests at lavish balls, put them up for the night, then have breakfast and watch the morning workouts. In the past, George had spent many a wondrous afternoon there.

“George, old boy! Come join us,” yelled a young, red-haired man in a top hat, waving a champagne glass.

“Yes, please come, George,” pleaded his companion, a girl holding a yellow parasol.

Smiling, George tipped his hat and continued on with the children to a large empty area toward the south end of the infield. He put down his picnic basket and told the class to find seats on the grass.

As a child, he'd always taken grass for granted. He was amazed at the effect it had on the children. Whenever he took them to Central Park, they loved rolling around, yanking out clumps, even just touching it. Their world was confined to hard surfaces—stone sidewalks and cobblestone streets. Grass was a revelation.

Sandwiches, apples, and bottles of sarsaparilla were distributed. After passing out cookies, George pulled a deck of cards from his jacket pocket. With thirty minutes before post time, there was room for a lesson. Every outing, he assured Dr. Bennett, had educational value—although he didn't tell him he was taking his students to the track. Bennett would have had an apoplectic fit.

With a deft hand, George flashed a two of spades and placed a four of spades next to it.

“Now, how many spades do I have altogether?”

Hands shot up in the air, but Andy Clayton shouted out “Six!” before anyone else could answer.

“You're supposed to be called on, you idiot,” snarled Ginny Talbot.

“Your turn, Ginny. If I have the nine of diamonds but take away four, I'll have…?”

“Five,” she screamed with glee.

Nothing gave George more pleasure than seeing his class progress. Each day, they improved. The reformers had thought them underprivileged dolts, rendered hopeless by cruelty and neglect. But George knew better; he had unearthed bright minds.

“Let's go back to multiplication. There's a special kind of multiplication we use at the racetrack. It's called odds, and it's a way of predicting whether a horse will win. If you have a horse at three-to-one odds, and you place a two-dollar bet and it wins, then you multiply two times the three and you win six dollars.”

“Six whole dollars?” Davey Hill exclaimed.

“Indeed. But if you put down five dollars, how much would you win?”

“Fifteen?” Tom O'Hara said.

“Exactly. Tom, you have the makings of a mathematician,” George said with a smile. He glanced at his pocket watch and motioned Sarah Shulski forward. At fourteen, she was the oldest and most mature, the big sister to the group.

“Sarah, I have to see someone, but I'll be back in five minutes. Give them these peppermint sticks and keep an eye on them, will you?”

Sarah, a pretty, dark-haired Jewess, smiled and took the candy. George trotted off to an open-air, wood-framed pavilion on the inside rail of the track. People were crowded eight deep around the round structure, shouting at bookies who were furiously taking down bets on scraps of paper. George fought his way through the crowd to the pooling stand. A lanky man with a black waxed mustache waved and went down the stair to meet him.

“Georgie, I ain't supposed to take bets from you unless it's just two dollars. Toby warned me if I did,” he said. On either side, people yelled and cursed at the bookie for ignoring them.

“A thousand dollars on Sam Brown to win in the first, Jake.”

Jake looked at him in disbelief. “Christ, Georgie, did you say a thousand?”

“A thousand on the nose.”

“He's a five–to-one shot in a mile and a furlong, Georgie.”

“Jimmy McLaughlin's still riding him, right? And he's the best jock in America, right?”

“Well, yeah. But one thousand dollars? Toby told me not to take any more big bets from you. You're goin' to get my ass in trouble.”

“Write it down, Jake,” George said and walked away.

Returning to the class, he motioned them to follow. The children ran after him, laughing and shouting. He brought them up to the thick, white wooden rail lining the track. Most were so short that they had to look out from below it. The children screamed with delight as the horses for the first race were brought up to the starting line, about thirty yards to their left. The horses snorted and stomped and swung their heads up and down and side to side, impatient to run. One reared up, pitching its jockey off.

Heart in his throat, George watched Sam Brown approach the line. He was a two-year-old descendant of a sire in Pierre Lorillard's stable, the finest in America. With racing's best jockey aboard, George's tip from last night told him, the horse was due for a big win.

“I like the brown one,” shouted Andy.

“Nah, the gray one's gonna win,” Sam Mostel yelled.

“The one we want to win has the scarlet and black colors,” George said, pointing out the jet-black thoroughbred. “Cheer with all your might for Sam Brown—that's his name.”

The official starter came alongside the horses, and the jockeys turned their heads in his direction. He raised his right hand, held it there for ten seconds, and then dropped his red flag to signal the start. A dozen horses thundered off, their hooves pounding the dirt track like drums. George could see McLaughlin guide Sam Brown immediately to the front. He meant to control the pace from the start and run the race on his terms.

When the horses flew by, the children went wild with excitement. Sam Brown roared down the track like a locomotive.

“Come on, Sammy,” screamed Andy.

As the field rounded into the final turn for the home stretch, the black thoroughbred led by three lengths. A wonderful feeling of elation seemed to lift George a finger's breadth above the infield grass. Then, ever so slowly, Sam Brown slowed down. It looked as if he were running in reverse. Buckstone caught up and passed him, and George's heart sank like a rock.

But fifty yards from the finish, Sam Brown put on a burst of speed and surged ahead to win by half a length. Crazy with joy, George picked up Sam Mostel and swung him through the air like a rag doll. Seeing their teacher's elation, the class exploded with delight, jumping up and down and hugging one another.

“Wait here with them, Sarah. I'll be right back,” George shouted as he ran off.

As Jake counted out the winnings into George's hand, George slipped a hundred-dollar bill into his pocket. He'd celebrate his good luck by taking the children to a nice dinner and a show. Giving the bookie a smile, George said, “Put the rest on Night Train to win in…”

A hand clamped onto the back of his neck, squeezing like a vise. George thought his head was going to be ripped from his shoulders. Twisting around, he saw Mike Donovan, a red-haired giant, towering above him. Donovan snatched the cash from George's hand with a grim smile.

“Now you only owe Harrigan three thousand, Georgie.”