The Titanic Plan (35 page)

Reaching into the mattress again, Henry pulled out a bundle of ripped kitchen towels he had braided together to make a rope. “I made somethin’ like this when I broke outta the orphanage. Dropped it out the window and climbed down. Worked like a charm.”

“
You are, how you say, a busy bumble bee, my friend.”

“
I figure we leave tonight.”

“
Tonight?!”

“
Yeah, just after the midnight check. Perfect time to make a break for it.”

“
Tonight’s a little soon,” Franco said anxiously.

“
You got anything better happenin’? It’s gonna be easy. We pull the bar out, zip-zap, and we’re out the window. The wall on the far side of the yard is near the railroad tracks. We go over with the second rope I made and slide down to the tracks. We’re outta here so fast no one’s gonna notice we’re gone till mornin’. And by that time we’ve havin’ breakfast with your mama on Mulberry Street.”

“
Breakfast with mama…” Franco said wistfully.

“
So, you wanna go?”

Franco drew a long breath. “I dunno. It is very dangerous.”

“
What’s dangerous is rottin’ away here. You wanna stay, fine. But I’m gone tonight, with you or not. I jus’ figured it would be the right thing to invite you to come and taste your mama’s pancakes instead of waitin’ eight years till you’re paroled.”

Franco looked through the bars of their small cell window. The sun had just set and the summer’s light was still glowing over the horizon. “Okay, yes, Henry my friend, I go with you.” Franco slapped his mattress, regaining his enthusiasm.

Midnight, and Henry and Franco were under their covers. After the prison guard checked their cell and walked on, Henry leapt from his bed and quickly sawed through the last sliver of the bar. He pulled it out then knotted the end of the towel rope to a sturdy bar. Slipping through the narrow opening, Henry shimmied down twenty feet to the ground. He looked up, waiting for Franco to follow. But Franco didn’t appear. “I can’t wait here forever, Franco,” Henry whispered.

Franco finally poked his head through the gap in the bars. Henry waved, beckoning him down. Franco crossed himself then swung one leg out the window while awkwardly holding the braided towels. “Just fall back,” Henry said. But Franco didn’t move. “I’m stuck,” he said in panic. “I’m too big.”

Time was wasting. Henry was ready to dash across the prison yard when Franco popped through the bars. His momentum swung him out from the limestone walls like a pendulum.

“
Slide down,” Henry said.

“
I can’t,” Franco whimpered, clinging to the towel-rope in complete terror. The faces of other prisoners began peering out from the windows of other cells. They watched Franco let go of the rope and fall into the yard. He groaned as he hit the dirt.

Henry rushed to him. “Let’s go. We gotta go.”

“
Yeah, let’s go,” Franco replied, but didn’t move. Henry grabbed him around his waist and jerked up.

“
Owww…my foot,” Franco groaned. “It is in pain, Henry.”

“
I’m goin’ across the yard. Follow me if you can. But I can’t wait,” Henry said emphatically, then took off over the sparse grass of prison yard, sprinting toward the high prison wall.

“
I’m coming, my friend,” Franco called, limping after Henry.

Running full out, Henry remembered that Franco was in jail because he was an absolutely lousy thief. Now, to his dismay, Henry understood why. Reaching the wall, Henry looked back. Franco was in the middle of the yard, grunting with each labored step. Henry pressed himself onto the wall and dug his fingers into a seam between the bricks. He had examined this wall numerous times during recreation periods, noting the crevices and knobs he might get a toehold onto. He balanced his weight forward, inching up, twisting his small hands into the narrowest of cracks, sliding his feet into scant fissures, until, inch-by-inch, like a meticulous spider, he made his way to the top.

There were three long strands of barbed wire that ran along the top of the wall, anchored by steel poles every ten feet. Henry was nimble enough not to be ensnared in the wire. He tied his second towel-rope to one of the poles and threw it back into the prison yard for Franco, who was just reaching the wall.

“
Pull yourself up,” Henry whispered to Franco.

“
Yes,” Franco called back loudly. “I will pull myself up.” Franco grabbed the rope and began grunting, trying to tug his round body skyward. “It is very difficult, my friend.”

“
Use your feet to anchor you. Then climb.”

“
Right,” said Franco.

High-pitched whistles began cutting through the darkness. Then a siren screamed out.

“
C’mon Franco, ya gotta hurry.”

Franco braced both feet against the wall and, like a mountain climber, began scaling the limestone bricks. “It hurts, Henry, like hell, my foot, it hurts.”

“
Keep going, Franco, you’re almost there.”

Franco was straining; his teeth were clenched, his face poured perspiration – partly from the oppressive humidity, partly from the physical strain, but mostly from pure fear. A spotlight from the guard tower began combing the prison yard. “Just a little more Franco,” Henry said, holding out his hand to his friend. But Franco stopped, frozen, five feet from the top.

“
I can’t do it, Henry, it is too much.”

“
Jus’ keep pullin’ the rope. You can do it, Franco.”

“
Yes, I can do it,” Franco said and pulled one more time, hand over hand. Then he stopped again. Henry saw a squad of guards pouring into the prison yard.

“
You hafta do it, Franco! Now!”

The roving spotlight found Franco and Henry on the wall.

“
Climb, Franco. Climb!!!”

Henry heard a soft sob and noticed Franco, still frozen on the wall, was crying, his tears mixing with the torrents of sweat that were flooding off his face. A shot rang out. “Stop!!” “Halt!!” “Go no further!!”

Henry looked down the far side of the wall. It was a good thirty feet to the railroad tracks – a suicide jump. But he had no choice. Franco held fast to the rope, sobbing uncontrollably, knowing that he had blundered again. Henry didn’t bother to say goodbye. He pushed out into the darkness. While he was falling through mid-air, he prepared for the impact by folding his legs under him to absorb the jolt. He crashed then tumbled forward, trying to stop his momentum. He couldn’t; his head smashed into the ground then whip-lashed back. An excruciating pain exploded through his body, starting from his neck, into his shoulders, hips then shooting down both legs. His hamstrings seized up; his back throbbed as if daggers were plunged along the length of his spine. He was face up on the ground, staring at the stars, thinking he was paralyzed. There was no possible way he could get up. And there was no way he wouldn’t try. Henry grunted, then desperately rolled to one side. He had to stand or else the guards would find him. He forced himself to a sitting position then tried to get his feet under his body. He wavered back, gathered whatever strength he had left and raised himself up. A single step caused him to wobble like a punch-drunk fighter. Still, he lurched ahead, staggering from side to side, trying to get his balance. Henry tottered along the tracks until the high, narrow gully of the prison walls opened up. He knew the river was no more than fifty feet away. He wasn’t aware of the gunshots on the other side of the wall nor did he hear Franco’s screams when the barrage of bullets tore through the young Italian’s body. Henry heard nothing until the splash of water echoed in his ears when he tumbled into the Hudson. Then there was silence. He rolled onto his back and let his light body float atop the waters that carried him down river.

CHAPTER 38

In Washington, the magical mood that blossomed at the Taft’s Silver Anniversary party withered as quickly as it arrived. Archie wrote: “Taft is very much worried over these scandals which Congress has unearthed or which they think they have unearthed. He takes these charges seriously...Roosevelt would have called them all a pack of lies and the public would have accepted his statement.”

Taft traveled to his vacation cottage in Beverly, Massachusetts, in late August, but his stay was short. With his support around the country plummeting, the President’s advisors determined that he should travel on a cross-country barnstorming tour to promote his policies and reinvigorate his popularity. The marathon march began in mid-September. Two months later, Taft was still on the road with Archie along for every grueling step of the way. “We have actually traveled on railroads 25,270 miles and at least 3,000 miles by motor and side trips,” Archie wrote in a letter. “We have been on the go for 58 days, and 14 nights we have spent off the train. We have visited 28 states, entertained as many governors and have been flooded by their ridiculous staffs and yapped at by all the Congressmen and ward politicians from Beverly to the Coast and back again. We have made 220 stops and the President has made 380 speeches. We have carried farther and estimated that he has addressed 1,614,850 persons in auditoriums and halls and from platforms and has been seen by 3,213,600 ear-splitting citizens. Do you wonder that our nerves have been disintegrated and that our innards are all upside down?”

The Presidential entourage finally returned to Washington in late November. Amid the stack of correspondence waiting for Archie was a letter from the Department of War. It concerned Archie’s request for the files of Corporal Michael Shaughnessy. It stated that there were no files. In fact, the letter went on to say, there was no record of any Michael Augustus Shaughnessy serving in the United States Army.

But that’s impossible, there has to be a file
. Then it struck Archie; he had seen the file. Not in the War Department, but in the Justice Department, in Stanley Finch’s bony hands. In that case, the only way he would be able to view the contents would be for Finch to allow it. And Archie suspected there was as much chance of that as there was of Mick coming back and clearing up the mystery himself.

* * *

That same November, two months after Henry’s escape, a train sped down the railroad tracks that bordered
Sing Sing
. It did not slow when it skirted the platform and high walls of the prison. From his first class compartment, George Vanderbilt hardly noticed the dark citadel outside. He was engrossed reading
Ethan Frome
, Edith Wharton’s new novel. He would occasionally glance up from the pages and glimpse out the window. Long gone were the days of green meadows and fields carpeted with wildflowers. The grass was brown. Dry leaves were falling from the trees.

Vanderbilt’s train traveled along the Hudson River and pulled into the Highland Falls station. A car was waiting to take him to
Cragston
, the manor of J. Pierpont Morgan. Vanderbilt looked forward to seeing Morgan’s country estate. As some people are connoisseurs of art or wine, Vanderbilt was a connoisseur of manors.

Coming onto the grounds of
Cragston
, Vanderbilt was impressed. The estate reflected the personality of Morgan: expansive yet controlled; elegant, but not overly fussy. When Morgan bought it in 1872, he clear cut the surrounding forest to create a view of the Hudson River from the house. He built stables and tennis courts, a dock for his yacht, put in ponds and green houses, planted formal gardens along with vineyards and fruit trees. Over the decades he constantly remodeled, bringing in his artifacts and art treasures to fill the rooms and line the walls.

Vanderbilt was shown to his room by the butler and informed that Mr. Morgan would meet him at four for tea.
Perfect
, thought Vanderbilt, who then loosened his tie, lay back on a large, canopied bed, and slipped off for a brief nap.

Tea was served in an informal dining room that had an unfettered view of the river. Vanderbilt noticed how relaxed Morgan was. Removed from his business environment, Morgan’s imperious demeanor was reigned in. The imposing visage, the preposterous nose, the uneven complexion, all were softened by Morgan’s comfortable manner. It wasn’t that Morgan became a shrinking violet; he still retained an air of absolute self-assurance that came with decades of wealth and power. But in private he happily didn’t have to work at being J. Pierpont Morgan – he just was.

“
You know, George, I did business with your father,” Morgan began, puffing on a tremendous black cigar. “Helped him move 50,000 shares of New York Central Railroad. He made a lot of money on that transaction.”