Death of a Robber Baron (14 page)

 

At midmorning, Prescott arrived at Broadmore, his usual confident self. Pamela met him in her parlor and passed on Lydia's request that he investigate her husband's affair with Helen Allen.

He chuckled. “George Allen has charged me with the same task. Let's look for Jennings.”

He was easily found. From the porches of the cottage, he was surveying the preparations. Puffing out his chest, his diamond lapel pin glittering in the sunlight, he struck the pose of a proud, confident potentate. He rarely smiled. From time to time he would give a curt order to Wilson. The steward would convey it to the gardener, the stable master, the cook, the housekeeper, or one of the other principal servants in the household staff. Jennings created the impression that his eye was on everyone. They should give their best effort and make no mistakes. Helen Allen wasn't in the picture—yet.

Pamela and Prescott took a walk through the cottage and its grounds. As she gazed at the men clearing vegetation from the pond and the others cleaning the bathhouse, she remarked, “I don't know half of the men and women working here today. That makes me uneasy.”

Prescott shrugged. “Wilson or one of his men should have investigated the new, temporary staff before hiring them.”

“Still, I'm concerned,” Pamela persisted. “Wilson could have been extra careful in hiring because he would want to please Jennings, hoping to receive a generous pension and to retire with dignity. Or he's probably—and rightly—convinced that Jennings will show him no mercy or respect, regardless of how well he prepares the celebration. In that case, he could hire tramps, clean them up to look like decent, temporary workers, and pay them to beat and rob Jennings.”

“You may be on to something, Pamela. The celebration will offer Wilson opportunities for revenge.”

C
HAPTER
24

 

A
t dawn Pamela rose from bed, still half asleep. The songs, loud shouts, and bursts of laughter from young people tenting on the lawn had kept her awake until near midnight. She threw on a robe and shuffled out onto a porch facing west. The sky was cloudless. In the distance Lake Mahkeenac lay still, its surface a smooth, glassy mirror. The air was sweet and fresh. Pearls of morning dew sparkled on the grass. She drew deep breaths and stretched out her arms toward the mountains. Nature promised a glorious day.

She performed her morning toilette and stepped out into the hall. Visitors who had arrived yesterday and spent the night in the guest rooms were still asleep. But their servants in the attic had begun to stir.

Led by the steward and the housekeeper, the staff was preparing breakfast for early risers, raising more tents, and making other last-minute arrangements. Pamela breakfasted with Lydia on a porch that gave a view of guests coming from the Curtis or the neighborhood. Lydia smiled or frowned, depending on whether they suited her. She turned livid when Helen Allen came into view together with her husband, George. He had forced a smile onto his face.

This was Pamela's first opportunity to see him undisguised. Today, he was clean-shaven, though a thief nonetheless. The beard he had worn that evening in Macy's jewelry department probably still lay in his closet at home on Gramercy Park. The thought of meeting him again this day caused her a frisson of fear.

Pamela shifted her eyes from Allen to study her mistress's reaction. Lydia seemed fatigued and tense.

“Did you sleep well last night?” Pamela asked.

“Frankly, no,” Lydia replied. “Mr. Jennings and I had a sharp, very unpleasant disagreement in his study. He refused to be civil with his son, John. When I pressed him, he became rude, threatened me with divorce, and ordered me out. Then for hours, I lay fully awake. A sense of dread gripped me. Finally, I took a dose of laudanum and went to sleep.” She sighed.

Pamela gave her a sympathetic smile. “It should be a bright and happy day. That also might calm your nerves.”

Lydia nodded mechanically. “The animosity between my stepson and my husband tortures my soul. I fear it can only get worse.” She shook herself. “Let's talk about business. Do we have sufficient cash on hand for the musicians and other providers?” She gave Pamela a key to the cash drawer in the desk.

Pamela opened the drawer and counted over a hundred dollars. “There's enough here,” she replied.

“And there's more in the safe,” Lydia added. “My husband claims that I keep too much cash at home. But I say that bankers cannot be trusted. Just look at the hundreds of bank failures in this country since January. Thousands of people have lost their life savings. I haven't lost a cent.”

She had confided to Pamela that most of her money and personal financial papers were in locked boxes in a secret room off her bedroom, hidden behind a full-length mirror. “You should know just in case something happens to me,” she said. Even her husband probably didn't know exactly how much she had or where she kept it. Pamela, however, had apparently won her trust.

 

As the sun climbed above the hills into a cloudless, azure sky, guests crowded onto the broad, grassy terrace in front of the cottage. Musicians installed themselves in the shaded bandstand and were soon filling the air with John Philip Sousa's rousing, patriotic marches. Children played games of chance with toys for prizes, crowded around booths dispensing ice cream and lemonade, and took pony rides. After breakfast some men had gone to the Lenox Club's nine-hole golf course for a leisurely round. Others joined the ladies in games of croquet.

Late in the morning, the band sounded a fanfare, announcing the track and field events. Guests gathered at the equestrian exercise track near the stables.

“Now the celebration becomes serious,” said Lydia, sitting at Pamela's side in the shade of a parasol. “Every year for a decade my husband has challenged the neighboring great houses to send their best athletes to compete in track and field events as well as swimming and shooting. They are mostly young college men from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia.”

She waved to one of the athletes walking by.

“He's a neighbor attending Yale,” she explained. “Throughout the past decade, our own son, John, has dominated the competition and was often crowned by his father with the prize, a laurel wreath. Since their falling-out this year, however, the competition was in doubt. Fearing that John might win the crown again, his father was reluctant to stage the contest. His neighbors shamed him into agreeing to continue.”

Pamela watched John Jennings nearby, limbering up. He appeared to be in superb condition, though several years older than his competitors.

In the races that followed, he easily bested them on the track and in throwing the javelin. From there they went down to Lily Pond, changed to light, tight-fitting swimming clothes, dove off the pier, and swam across and back.

His body glistening in the sun, John Jennings emerged from the water again the clear winner. He and the other contestants changed to dry clothes and gathered in front of the bandstand for the laying of the laurel wreath on this summer's champion. Lydia and Pamela took front-row seats.

The band again played a fanfare, and a crowd assembled. But Henry Jennings was nowhere to be seen. After an awkward moment, a neighboring gentleman stepped forward and laid the wreath on John's still-damp head. The defeated young men shook his hand and congratulated him. He acknowledged them graciously, but Pamela could read the hurt in his eyes. She glanced at Lydia. Struggling to smile, she approached her stepson with outstretched arms.

“He's an extraordinary athlete,” whispered Prescott, who had sidled over to Pamela. He had been checking temporary workers in the kitchen. “There's talk of reviving the ancient Olympic Games in Greece. I would choose John Jennings to represent our country.”

“What do you make of his father's absence?”

Prescott frowned. “There's bad blood between them. Henry Jennings has always looked upon this patriotic celebration as an opportunity to proclaim his convictions. If he worships anything, it's the self-made man, fit and free, the product of unbridled competition especially in business—himself, in other words. John has angered his father by refusing to marry and have a son and by rejecting his mad pursuit of wealth.”

Pamela asked, “Isn't John Jennings ‘fit and free and competitive'?”

“In athletics certainly, but not in business.” Prescott continued in a whisper, “Unfortunately, in his father's eyes he's also not a man, if you perceive my meaning.”

She sighed. “It's tragic. The hatred of each for the other is mutual.”

A bustle of activity interrupted their conversation. As guests continued to arrive, a troop of servants set up more tables and chairs. Large trays of food soon followed. Prescott asked Pamela, “Can we talk somewhere privately?”

“Come to my parlor in fifteen minutes,” she replied.

 

They sat on the porch off Pamela's parlor and exchanged notes on the festivities. “Thus far, there's no sign of an impending disaster,” Prescott remarked, then added, “And I haven't seen Helen Allen and Henry Jennings together.”

“There they are,” Pamela exclaimed, pointing toward the two lovers below, apparently engaged in an intimate conversation. “She's insisting about something.”

“They may be arranging a rendezvous. I had better follow them.” He started to leave.

She cautioned, “They're separating. You follow him; I'll follow her.”

 

Helen Allen glanced furtively over her shoulder. Fortunately, Pamela was keeping a safe distance and had ducked behind a great oak tree. Helen walked slowly toward the greenhouse in the garden behind the cottage. The low rectangular building was deserted. The gardener and his assistants were working at the festive dinner. After looking in vain for her lover, Helen let herself in.

Pamela hurried around to the backside of the greenhouse and into a patch of tall, thick raspberry bushes. She drew her gown tightly to her body to avoid the thorns and edged through narrow, irregular paths between the bushes up to the greenhouse. All the windows were wide open to allow the summer's heat to escape.

She placed herself at a window opposite the entrance. A southerly breeze blew through the building and might carry snatches of conversation to her ears. A screen of ferns planted inside along the greenhouse wall concealed her.

A single, narrow aisle extended the length of the long, east-west axis. The only place for a conversation was the small entrance foyer by the door. It was hardly a suitable site for lovemaking. For a minute or two, Helen paced the aisle, too preoccupied to notice the hidden Pamela. Then Jennings entered and embraced his lover—coolly, tentatively, thought Pamela.

Helen spoke first. “Your wife seems aware of our relationship. Have you talked to her about it?”

He nodded. “I told her last night that I might want a divorce. She shouted, ‘Over my dead body.' I wasn't surprised. Lydia is religious and convinced that the Bible forbids divorce. This is also her way to punish what she calls my infidelity.”

Helen stared at him for several moments and said in cautiously measured words, “She has offered a plausible alternative to divorce.”

He shrugged. “That's risky. Lydia must feel threatened. That's why she has hired the woman Thompson as her companion and has invited the detective Prescott to this celebration.”

Helen appeared to grow exasperated. “You're clever and ruthless, good at taking risks. That's how you've gotten to where you are now, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the country. Lydia is a weak, dull, ugly old woman, of no use to anyone, a parasite who hasn't earned the wealth she hoards. She's leeching off you, Henry. Forget about divorce. Figure out a way to get rid of her that wouldn't look suspicious.”

Jennings tilted his head in a skeptical gesture. “What about George, your husband? Has he agreed to a divorce?”

“Not yet. But he has the backbone of a jellyfish and is almost bankrupt. He can be bought off with enough money to pay his debts and a little extra.”

“I like your mettle, Helen. You let nothing stand in your way. Still, I'll have to think about your suggestion.”

“Don't take too long. I might lose interest.” She untied her blouse at the throat in a teasing gesture, then drew him into a passionate embrace. He yielded, slightly hesitant.

They left the greenhouse separately. Pamela waited a minute, then set out for the cottage. From a toolshed Prescott called out to her. He had concealed himself there at a short distance from the greenhouse and was eager to find out what she had learned, if anything.

In the shed she told him, “Helen Allen and Henry Jennings want to get married, she perhaps more than he. Lydia Jennings stands in the way and must be removed. Helen told Jennings to find a method that wouldn't draw suspicion. But he didn't say he would do it.”

“Now I understand,” said Prescott. “As Jennings walked past this shed, he seemed unusually preoccupied. We should warn Mrs. Jennings of this threat. She should be careful on the stairs and any other place where a fatal accident could occur.”

Pamela cautioned, “If exposed, the conspirators would deny everything. It's too early to bring in the police. Still, Mrs. Jennings might be safer back in New York.”

Prescott agreed. “You should suggest that to her.”

 

At one o'clock, Pamela and Prescott joined the picnic in progress on the front terrace. They filled their plates at the buffet table and sat with Lydia in the shade near the band. The scent of roasted meat surrounded them. The babble of over a hundred men, women, and children enjoying a glorious festive day in the country made any serious conversation impossible. Her eyes darting about, Lydia was sharply observing her guests, even while she made conversation.

Near the dinner's conclusion, the band played a fanfare for the dessert, concealed under a low tent in the middle of the terrace. A hush of anticipation came over the crowd.

Henry Jennings now mounted the bandstand and faced the crowd. “Fellow Americans,” he began, “today we celebrate not only our nation's independence from Britain, but also our personal freedom. Everywhere in the world, a man's social class or religion, the accidents of his birth or family, determine and limit his achievement in life. Only in this country, I insist, can a strong, resolute, visionary man break through those bonds and fulfill a heroic destiny.”

For a brief moment the crowd was still, taking in this stirring profession of faith, uttered with passionate conviction. Then they burst out in boisterous applause. Many of these wealthy, privileged cottagers apparently shared Jennings's sentiments.

At a signal from Jennings, his servants drew the tent away and revealed a giant rectangular cake. The crowd gasped. The frosting on top depicted in high relief an American flag of 1893 with forty-four stars. On the sides were inscribed
E P
LURIBUS
U
NUM
and
T
HE
U
NION
F
OREVER
.

Jennings gave the band a vigorous signal. They struck up “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and the crowd joined in full-throated voice. Pamela sang along with the others. But out of the corner of her eye she noticed that Prescott was tight-lipped. When they reached the phrases, “And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,” he seemed to struggle for a moment. But he kept his feelings under control.