House of Thieves (13 page)

Cross didn't want to go to the Lees' dinner party, but he and Helen had already accepted the invitation. A popular saying held that if a man who had accepted a dinner invitation died, his executor had to take his place.

Hand-lettered invitations on thick, white vellum arrived a full three weeks before the event. At the same time, flowers had been ordered, a French chef had chosen the menu, and Mrs. Lee had purchased a new silver service. Society parties were expected to be a show of magnificent ostentation, and the hostesses never failed to live up to this obligation.

The Crosses' carriage pulled up to the Lee mansion the customary thirty minutes prior to the eight o'clock meal time. Located on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Sixty-First Street, the house was a wide, four-story, French Empire model with an English basement.
A
dull, uninspired design
, Cross thought. Footmen outfitted in black-and-gold livery stood by the red carpet that ran from the curb to the front door, opening the carriage doors and bowing to the guests, all of whom were dressed the same: men in white tie and tails, women in light summer evening gowns with long gloves. Honoria Lee, a middle-aged woman whose beauty had barely faded over the years, stood in the gilt-paneled reception hall, greeting her guests.

“Helen, how beautiful you look,” she gushed. It pleased Cross that instead of his wife having to flatter, she was always flattered herself. “And, John. So lovely to see you. Go see who you're escorting.”

Cross walked to a table where small white envelopes inscribed with the names of the gentlemen guests were arranged. Locating his, he opened it to find a card: Elizabeth Burnham. The wife of an insurance company owner, she was beautiful, with raven hair and piercing blue eyes, but exceedingly insipid and dull. It would be like talking to a rock all evening. Still, in society, beauty excused a great many failings. And it was bad form for a gentleman to complain about his escort. Cross strolled into the drawing room, a palatial space adorned with Chinese vases full of red roses, mahogany paneling, a white marble floor, and a sparkling crystal chandelier.

A crowd had assembled around the Tarletons, the guests of honor, who had recently arrived from London. Everyone in Cross's set was a rabid Anglophile, loving every intricacy of British aristocratic life, from cricket to pheasant shooting to tweed suits. Sir Henry was regaling the crowd with descriptions of the renovation to Castle Twickham, his ancestral home. Tarleton, John understood, was one of the few British elites who still had a substantial fortune. Many British lords had seen their riches frittered away by prior generations and had had to sink to the humiliating state of marrying young American heiresses—“dollar princesses,” the press called them—who might rejuvenate their fortunes and save their estates.

Sir Henry and his plump wife, Deidre, were basking in the glow of New York society's admiration. They interrupted their boasting to meet Helen, with whom the couple was immediately captivated.

On the outskirts, Cross milled about, nodding to people he knew, paying compliments to ladies, and conducting an informal architectural survey of the house. He enjoyed appraising the proportions, detailing, and finishes of all the houses he was invited into.

He felt a tap on his shoulder, and there was Stanford White.

“Hello, Stanny. I knew you'd be here. You did their place in Newport, I recall?”

“Oh yes. And I never turn down a good meal,” White said, patting his belly. It had grown considerably since the two men had worked together at H. H. Richardson's office.

“What are you currently working on?” Cross asked.

“Christ, I just came from Columbia Bank, a job I did on Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second. They want alterations to the banking hall. Idiots. It's fine the way it is.”

Cross nodded. All of White's buildings were special. Though he envied his friend's incredible talent, he had long ago acknowledged that he could never surpass him as a designer. The bank building was unique and original—all Stanny's work was. Done in the Classical Revival style, it had a pair of balconies covered by flat roofs and supported by slender Ionic columns, which gave the big building a wonderful sense of lightness.

“Where'd you put the vault?”

“They wanted it in a subbasement. That's where the safe-deposit boxes are.”

“Is the vault all steel or encased in cement?”

“Steel.”

“Did you put in one of those new alarm systems?”

“It's just an electric line connecting to a police precinct. Why? You got a bank project?”

“Ah, yes…I'm looking into any new vault systems,” Cross said. He added in a low voice, “Maybe I could look at your drawings?”

Avery Lee, their host, approached. Beside him was a man sporting a magnificent waxed mustache.

“Gentlemen, this is Count Sergei Aleksandrov, of the court of the Czar in Saint Petersburg. I'm privileged to have him as my house guest.”

Both men bowed, impressed by the man's aristocratic bearing. The count was the very model of what an aristocrat should look like—very tall, lean, and strikingly handsome.

“Count, these are two of New York's finest architects. Perhaps they might design a home for your visits to America?”

“That would be wonderful. Much more pleasurable than imposing on friends or living in a hotel,” the count said in perfect but heavily accented English. Bowing, he excused himself.

“Stanny, John, have you heard about these robberies in the city?” Lee growled as soon as the count was out of earshot. “It's unbelievable. A whole mansion cleaned out! Where the hell are the police?”

Cross stared down at the polished marble floor.

“What do you make of it, Mr. Cross?” Lee asked.

A butler called out, “Madame, dinner is served,” saving Cross from having to answer. He and the other men in the room scurried about like mice, looking for the women they had been assigned to escort. As per strict custom, Mr. Lee led the way into the dining room with Lady Tarleton. The rest of the guests followed, with Mrs. Lee and Sir Henry entering last. On the dinner table sat twenty-four place cards, arranged to ensure that husbands and wives were well separated and that the guest of honor, Sir Henry, sat to Mrs. Lee's right.

Cross thought the table impressive, even by New York standards. Down its center and raised a few inches above the white embroidered damask tablecloth was a continuous sheet of plate glass. Beneath it, dozens of tiny electric lights glowed, giving the cut-glass bowls of carnations spaced every three feet a magical aura. Each seat had a setting of Sèvres china, laid with ten pieces of engraved silver from Gorham that included a fork for oysters, a fork for fruit, and separate knives for bread, fish, and meat. Five different kinds of glasses for the sparkling water, wines, champagne, hock, and claret flanked the setting.

Cross pulled out a chair for Mrs. Burnham and then seated himself, unfolding his napkin, which held a dinner roll. Next to his plate was the usual small party favor—tonight, a silver cigarette case. His dinner companion found a jeweled brooch. Cross examined the handwritten menu, inscribed on gilt-edged vellum. Chesapeake Bay oysters on the half shell to start, chicken consommé à l'Italienne, Spanish mackerel à la Maître d'Hôtel served with hock, soft shell crab farcies with Johannisberger sparkling wine, and perdrix aux truffes. Honoria always put forth a good spread. French chefs were more prized than jewels in New York society, and the Lees had one of the finest. Everything was cooked at home instead of catered, which made a vast difference in quality.

Cross set about engaging Mrs. Burnham in conversation. He decided to set the bar high and work down to banalities about the weather.

“Do you think Parliament will grant home rule to Ireland, Mrs. Burnham?”

“I…wouldn't really know, Mr. Cross.”

A footman appeared at his left with a plate of oysters. All dinner parties were served à la russe. The footmen stood by the side of each guest, offering him or her each course instead of passing platters of food on the table,
à la française
. Without the clutter of multiple dishes, society dinners could boast elaborate centerpieces of the sort on Honoria's table.

Cross changed tactics and tried something he knew was closer to Mrs. Burnham's heart.

“Tell me, Mrs. Burnham. Which do you feel are superior—gowns from Worth or gowns from Pingat?”

She lit up at the question. “Worth, Mr. Cross, always Worth. In fact, I just received a trunk last week. We had visited the showroom in Paris in the spring to place the order, and I tell you, Mr. Cross, we weren't disappointed.”

“That gown looks magnificent on you.” The expected response.

Mrs. Burnham blushed. For the next twenty minutes, she spoke enthusiastically about her clothes, only stopping to offer an aside about how handsome Count Aleksandrov was.

The white-gloved footmen continued to serve the food and pour the alcoholic beverages. Finally, desserts of pudding, ices, Bavarian creams, petits fours, and glaces aux marrons were offered, along with a fruit-and-cheese course. By this time, Cross had given up trying to engage Mrs. Burnham in conversation and had begun talking to Marmaduke Scott, who sat across the table.

Scott had made a fortune importing beef from the West in the new refrigerated railroad cars. Cross hoped the conversation would swing to possible architectural commissions, like a summer place in the Berkshires, where it was much cooler. These dinners were often a gold mine for new jobs. But Scott was in a foul mood.

“It took an hour to go four blocks in my carriage on Broadway this morning,” he growled, wolfing down strawberries drenched in sweet wine. “Four blocks. Traffic crawled like a slug, I tell you. It's damn impossible to get anywhere in New York.”

“And the dust and the manure is shocking,” Mrs. Burnham said.

“They said the elevated trains would reduce traffic by half. What a lot of nonsense. Traffic is ten times worse. We need new ways of traveling. Perhaps under the ground.”

“Exactly,” Mrs. Burnham said. “Years ago, I remember my father taking me for a ride on Mr. Beach's underground railway on Broadway. It was so wonderful. Such a shame it went bankrupt.”

Cross's eyes widened, and the spoonful of Bavarian cream that was about to enter his mouth stopped in midair. Setting down his gold dessert spoon, he turned to Mrs. Burnham and smiled.

“Elizabeth Burnham, you are an amazing, magnificent creature.”

“I assume this must be urgent, as you've summoned me down here at two a.m.” Kent was in evening dress and top hat, his expression frosty.

“I'm glad I didn't get you out of bed,” Cross said. He'd made the call when the gentlemen at the Lees' party had retired to the smoking room for brandy and cigars.

Kent frowned. “Millicent and I had just walked in the door from a dinner party at Sherry's—very tired, mind you—when you called.”

They were standing in the shadows of the huge U.S. Post Office, south of city hall on the east side of Broadway. There was barely a breeze, but the night air felt good after the hot day.

“I designed Fidelity National across the street,” Cross said, pointing to a narrow, six-story brick building, its huge, arched entry supported by polished granite columns.

“A very handsome bank, I'm sure. But unfortunately, I experienced a recent mishap robbing a bank in the daytime,” Kent said. “It's made me cautious.”

“It was you who tried to blow the vault at Manhattan Merchants & Trust,” Cross said, shocked in spite of himself.

“With very poor results. Houses of society people are more lucrative—and less of a risk.”

“Suppose you robbed a bank over a weekend.”

“Please continue, Mr. Cross.”

“Back in '70, a man named Alfred Beach, the editor of
Scientific
American
, had a new idea for public transportation. His train traveled not aboveground, but below,” Cross said.

“I remember. He built an experimental underground tunnel with his own money so the Tweed Ring wouldn't find out.”

“For an underground pneumatic railway, propelled by blasts of compressed air.”

“Where was it?”

Cross pointed directly in front of them, at Broadway. “There. In front of my bank.”

Kent walked to the curb and looked down at the cobblestone street. It was brightly illuminated by the electric streetlights.

“It's a ten-foot-wide, brick-lined tunnel that went one block, along Broadway from Murray Street on your left to Warren Street on your right. After the panic in '73, Beach couldn't get financing to continue it and went bust. He rented the thing out as a wine cellar and shooting gallery. Then he gave up and sealed it in '74.”

“So it's still down there,” Kent said with a smile.

“There's a sealed plate around the corner on Warren where the entrance was. Come on.”

At this hour, Cross thought they'd be alone, but the area was thick with streetwalkers. They walked to the west side of Broadway and past the bank. “Where's the vault?” Kent asked.

“In the basement toward the front of the building—in line with the bottom of the tunnel.”

As they walked, the whores called out in low voices, “Fifty cents, fifty cents for a fine time.” Most of the women were poorly dressed hags. Drink, opium, and violence had eaten away any trace of beauty they'd once possessed. But their vulgarity and coarseness were what most offended Cross. New York had a strict hierarchy of whoredom, from the first-class parlor houses in the West Twenties to the streetwalkers at Broadway and Twenty-Fourth, who almost resembled fashionable ladies and brought their clients to respectable quarters to transact business. Then there were these disgusting creatures at the bottom. Only the most depraved and desperate were out this late.

A gap-toothed wench in a torn and soiled dress brazenly confronted Kent.

“Fifty cents for a handsome gentleman like you. What do you say?” she croaked.

With astonishing speed and viciousness, Kent struck her on the head with his cane. She dropped to the sidewalk, crying out in pain. Kent grabbed the gold head of the cane, pulling out a long blade, and held it against her throat. “Stay away from me, you filthy bitch,” he snarled.

Wide-eyed and shaking with fright, the whore crawled away from him, holding the side of her head.

Kent sheathed the blade and continued walking. “How wide did you say the tunnel was?” he asked. He spoke casually, as though he'd just shooed away a gnat.

“Not more than ten feet in diameter. There was only one set of tracks. The air blew the train in one direction and then sucked it back.”

Turning the corner at Warren, they saw the iron plate set in the street. Kent bent and poked at it with his cane. “You're right. This is likely where the station was.”

Rising, he walked quickly around the corner back to Broadway. This time, the whores who saw him coming gave him a wide berth. Kent stopped in front of the bank and smiled at Cross, rubbing the head of his cane with his white-gloved fingers.

“Yes, Mr. Cross, this has great possibilities. I must look into it more closely. Preparation, preparation, preparation. As always, the key to this game of ours. You'll be hearing from me.” He turned to leave.

“Kent.”

Kent stopped.

Cross walked up to him, closer, and closer again. Their faces were six inches apart. “Fidelity National handles big accounts. Edison Electric, Atlantic & Pacific Steamship, B. Altman. The owners were on the bank board that hired me, so I know. There's a good bit of money in there.”

“And I'm sure it'll go far in reducing your son's debt. Good night, Mr. Cross.”

• • •

Honoria Lee laid her head on Count Aleksandrov's shoulder, toying with the soft hair on his chest. “Sergei, you're wonderful,” she cooed.

“And you, my love, are more passionate than any woman in Saint Petersburg.”

“I have everything in life a woman would want—money, houses, clothes—except passion,” Mrs. Lee said forlornly.

“A woman of your quality needs passion, every night.”

“Ha. Avery Lee knows what a 6 percent return on a Pennsylvania Railroad bond will bring, but he knows nothing about passion.”

Aleksandrov laughed. “Mr. Lee is a good provider. That's what matters most.”

“Oh, I suppose.” Mrs. Lee raised herself up to look at the clock on the fireplace mantel. “It's almost five a.m., my dear. You must get back to your room before the servants are about.”

Aleksandrov kissed her on the cheek and rose from the bed, reaching for his robe. He opened the bedroom door a crack to check the hallway, waved, and was gone.

The electric lights were off in the long carpeted corridor, but daylight was creeping in through the windows. Aleksandrov stopped at a door and opened it. Before going in, he took off his leather slippers.

From their breathing, he could tell the Tartletons were sleeping soundly. The guests of honor were housed in a magnificent room with an adjoining sitting parlor. Aleksandrov smiled at the sight of the couple. They probably hadn't slept in the same bed in years, but their hosts had been afraid of offending them by providing separate rooms.

Aleksandrov crept silently to the dresser where Sir Henry's handsome leather billfold sat. Opening it, he found several hundred American dollars, of which he borrowed three-quarters. Rich men like this never kept track of their cash. He spotted the lady's dressing table and quietly slid open the drawers until he found Lady Deidre's jewel case. With an expert's eye, he laid aside the choicest piece, an emerald-and-pearl necklace, and slipped a small ruby brooch inset with tiny diamonds into the pocket of his robe.

Smiling, Aleksandrov left the bedroom.