House of Thieves (4 page)

“Mr. Cross, I want you to know that I'm not angry at you for what you did. But I will be less lenient if something like that should happen again.”

Kent reminded Cross of a schoolmaster sitting in his wood-paneled office, reprimanding a recalcitrant student. Cross himself sat stiffly, balanced on the edge of the settee, watching Kent pour tea. Aunt Caroline would have envied the quality of the silver. In a multitiered stand on the tea table were a variety of pastries, but Cross had lost all appetite since the delivery of the ice that morning.

The Dakota was like a huge European château, a riot of steep gables, turrets, finials, and dormers clad in olive-colored stone and salmon-colored brick. Its sheer enormity was amplified by its position on the Upper West Side, surrounded by vacant lots and shacks. It gave the impression of a mountain that had risen out of nowhere. From Central Park, it reminded one of a fortress in the middle of an enchanted forest, like in a fairy tale.

Despite its far-flung location, it had quickly become a highly fashionable place to live. Kent's apartment was magnificent. He and Cross sat in a beautiful library lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. A vista of Central Park stretched across the tall windows behind them.

“How many lumps do you take?”

“Two, no milk.”

Kent handed him his cup and settled back in his green overstuffed velvet armchair. He sipped his tea with a look of great pleasure.

“Quite a place, Mr. Cross, hmm? Like living in a palace without having to own it.”

Cross didn't reply.

At that moment, the front door to the apartment opened. A short, elegantly dressed woman with chestnut-colored hair followed by three small children walked past the open door of the library.

“Mr. Cross, meet my wife and children,” Kent said in a jolly voice. “Hello, Millicent. How was the outing?”

“Oh, wonderful. The children so loved the ponies.”

Cross rose and smiled at the beautiful woman, who beamed back at him.

“It's such a pleasure, Mr. Cross,” Millicent said.

“Mr. Cross is a new business associate. And these rascals are Bill, Henry, and Abigail.”

The children, all of whom were well dressed and well mannered, bowed to Cross and then raced off in three different directions.

“If you'll excuse us, my dear, Mr. Cross and I have business to discuss. Tonight at dinner, you must tell me all about your day. I wish I'd been there.” Kent followed his wife out, closed the sliding doors, and returned to his seat. “I'm so glad we were able to come to an understanding, Mr. Cross,” he said. “I'm sure we can do business together.”

“Nothing is to happen to my son,” Cross said.

“Or Helen, Granny, Charlie, and Julia—as long as you keep our agreement.”

Cross was visibly shaken. After that morning, he knew what this man was capable of. Kent would kill his entire family without batting an eye. He was sure of it.

“I enjoy doing business with a family man,” Kent said amiably. “There's so much collateral.”

“Where is George?”

“In very pleasant circumstances. I'll notify him that his debt is forgiven, but I won't tell him of our arrangement. Don't worry—if you keep your end of the bargain, he'll never know. George will be back in his apartment in a few days. I just hope he can deal with his ‘little weakness.' You do know there are hundreds of gambling dens in New York City besides mine. But that's your problem now.”

Cross blinked. In all the confusion, he hadn't thought about that.

“Let me explain how our business arrangement will work,” Kent said, setting down his teacup. “You will choose buildings you've designed that contain articles of great value—cash, stock certificates, gold, merchandise such as expensive clothing, fine linen, silverware, and jewelry. You will help me plan each robbery by giving me drawings of these places and telling me where items worth stealing can be found. And after each robbery, the value of the goods will be deducted from George's debt.”

“Promise me that, once it's paid back, I'm free of this.”

“Why of course. I don't think you're cut out for a life of crime, Mr. Cross.” Kent gave him a wink. “But you are a talented architect. That Chandler Building—and those tall arches! I envy your talent. I wish I could do something like that.”

Cross was silent. Coming from this merciless bastard, it hardly felt like a compliment.

“The next step will be for you to take some time—one week, say—to choose a building. Then we will meet to discuss whether your plan is feasible. It takes a criminal eye to evaluate these things,” Kent said. “You'll want to pay off the debt immediately, of course. But for our first effort, let's choose something modest. And bring copies of the drawings. I understand that with the new blueprinting process, it will be easy for you.”

Kent was sharp. Only a few years ago, copies of architectural drawings had to be traced over by hand, a long and tedious process. But with the introduction of blueprinting, all that had changed. Now, a photosensitive coating could be applied to a sheet of paper, which would be placed behind the original linen drawing. The contraption was put in a wood frame that sat out in the sun, developing a perfect image on the paper like a photograph.

“Yes,” Cross said, nodding. “I can bring you your own copies of the drawings.”

“From now on, it's better to meet elsewhere. You'll be told where to go and when.” Kent rose from his chair. The meeting was over. “Please don't think me rude, but I have a Presbyterian Hospital board meeting in an hour over on East Seventy-Second,” Kent said apologetically as he escorted Cross to the foyer. “But before you go, you must see my latest treasure.”

He led Cross to a large oak table with carved legs and removed a heavy sheet of paper, revealing what looked like a very old, yellowed parchment.

“An early eighth-century illuminated manuscript from France. Isn't it magnificent?”

Though Cross didn't give a damn, he pretended to be impressed out of courtesy. After taking a respectful amount of time to examine the gold-leaf-flecked pages, he nodded and walked toward the library doors.

“Henceforth, Mr. Cross, you must learn to think like a criminal. Coming from your background, that may be difficult,” Kent said as he slid open the paneled doors.

“It didn't seem to be an obstacle for you.”

Kent gave a roar of laughter. “I suppose Griffith told you all about me. True, Princeton didn't give me much training for my line of work. You're a Harvard man?”

Cross nodded.

“A satisfactory school, but they have no eating clubs, unlike Princeton. So uncivilized,” he said. “Do take a look around the building before you go. You'll find it most interesting.”

“I walked through right before it opened. The architect, Henry Hardenbergh, is a friend of mine. It's a remarkable building,” Cross said softly, looking up at the ceiling. “The best apartment building in the city. I wish I had done it.”

In the courtyard of the Dakota, Cross drew a deep breath and looked up at the four seven-story-high stone walls surrounding him. He felt like a mouse trapped in a box.

At the corner of Seventy-Second Street, he walked across Eighth Avenue into Central Park. The Transverse Road that cut across the vast green space was filled with carriages. It was the time of day when, rain or shine, society people paraded themselves. Various conveyances, pulled by teams of sleek horses with two men in full livery atop the box, traveled back and forth on the carriage drives. Every day without fail, hordes of onlookers lined the roadways of the park to watch the Knickerbockers, the parvenus, and the famous pass by in unending procession. Pure vanity, not fresh air, was what brought the society women to Central Park each afternoon. Cross paid them no mind. Instead, lost in thought, he veered off on one of the winding paths through the trees.

George was safe, he told himself, and that was all that mattered. He could do nothing to stop his own involvement with Kent; no one was coming to rescue him. Griffith had been murdered before his meeting with Byrnes in the police department. Cross was on his own.

He had no choice but to become a criminal in order to save not only George's life, but the rest of his family's as well. With his loved ones in danger, he shouldn't be doubting what he had to do. And still—still he wavered. Was it out of some conviction that resorting to crime went against all that he believed? It wasn't a matter of faith. Cross hadn't been brought up in a religious family—society people went to church every Sunday, Easter, and Christmas because it was expected of them, but it was all for show.

Was he afraid? Did he make a moral objection to committing crime as cover for this fear?
Yes
, Cross thought. He secretly knew this to be true. Deep down, he
was
a coward. More than twenty years ago, during the Civil War, he faced the decision of whether to fight. He hired a substitute to serve in his place. Not to pursue business or a professional career, like the other men of his class, but because the thought of being ripped apart by a volley of rifle or artillery fire in some far-off field terrified him.

War had seemed a noble and abstract concept to him. Then he saw Matthew Brady's photographs of the dead on the battlefield. No one had ever shown the cruel reality of war in such a way. The illustrated papers depicted only the victorious, marching to glory. Brady's pictures were unbelievably real, a harsh image of bullet-ridden corpses rotting in the sun. That was someone's son or brother lying there, Cross had thought, the soldier's eyes and mouth wide open and frozen in shock, hundreds of flies buzzing about the open wounds. Cross's mind transposed his own face onto one of the corpses, and he actually shook with fright.

It was his father who told him of the substitute law. He was secretly overjoyed. Though he put up a pretense of wanting to fight, his father, a successful businessman who didn't give a damn about slavery and saw the great profit to be made from the war, browbeat him into hiring a substitute. Cross was saved because his father could afford the three-hundred-dollar payment. But his older brother, Robert, refused to sit out the war. He volunteered immediately.

While the war raged, Cross gave his choice no mind. But the Union won, and the returning warriors were admired and worshiped. His brother and the others had probably been scared to death. Yet they chose to serve. Robert had even won a medal for gallantry in action, which made Cross feel even more a coward. Ever since, a sense of shame had dogged his heels. And he was still a coward; he had proved that with his vacillations. But no matter how scared he was, he
had
to do this. Even if it meant getting himself killed.

He needed to clear his mind and determine which place to rob. He came to the edge of the lake's south dogleg and sat on the grass bank, watching the fleet of snow-white swans gliding along the still surface. Forming a list of past projects in his head, Cross tried to visualize each one, tried to remember who the client was and where the building was located. But he'd been in practice for fourteen years; there were more buildings than he could recall with any clarity. All the offices, the apartments, Saint Mary's Church on West Sixty-Fourth Street, train stations in the suburbs, the Exchange Hotel, Manhattan Hospital and Dispensary, and scores of houses and cottages. He would have to go back to the office to refresh his memory.

Cross made his way back through the trees to the Transverse Road, following it east until he came to the wide stone steps that swept down from the Mall to the Bethesda Terrace. There, the great fountain stood by the edge of the lake. It was an unbearably hot July day, and dozens of people refreshed themselves in the fine spray carried off the fountain by the breeze. Children stood at the edge, splashing the water at one another. A few ragged urchins, contrary to park rules, were wading. Some society ladies holding brightly colored parasols to keep the heat at bay had even gotten out of their carriages to stroll the Terrace.

Cross stood at the top of the stairs, staring at the scene. Central Park had actually become the democratic meeting ground that its architects, Olmsted and Vaux, intended it to be. Below him, the wealthy rubbed elbows with the lowest of the low, immigrants from the Lower East Side and the Bowery. His class was never this close to such people, not unless they were shining shoes or washing floors. At any time they liked, the men and women of Cross's class could travel to the Berkshires, Newport, or Long Branch for fresh air and nature. But the convenience of Central Park drew them in. For the poor, Central Park was their oasis, easily reachable by horse car or elevated train. There, they could stretch out on the grass for a few hours before returning to the squalor of their everyday lives. Cross saw the park as a masterpiece, a work of art. Everything, save the large rock outcroppings, had been designed and placed by man.

With a sigh, Cross descended to the Terrace and circled the fountain. He was making his way back up when someone called his name. Turning, he saw an old client, William Cook.

“Playing hooky from work, old boy?” Cook was a short man in his early fifties, not fat but exceedingly well fed. A member of the new rich, he'd made tens of millions in the shoe business in Saint Louis. His wife had then forced him to move to New York to breech the walls of Aunt Caroline's high society. Many of the city's millionaires were originally from the Midwest or West Coast. Like the tens of thousands of poor immigrants who streamed through Castle Garden in the Battery, these wealthy people descended upon the city each year, seeking a new life.

While Cook was a “shoddyite,” dressed in only the best suits, he was a good, decent man. He only flaunted his wealth as offensively as he did because he wanted to please his social climber of a wife.

“Hello, Bill. Yes, you've caught me. But why aren't you at work?”

“We're shutting up the house and taking the steamer to the cottage at Newport tonight. Alice loves that place you designed for us, John. I think she likes it more than the one you did in the city.”

“That's kind of you to say.” The “cottage” Cross had designed for the Cooks on Bellevue Avenue in Newport was a twenty-four-room, wood-frame house covered with shingles and surrounded by deep porches. Cross considered it one of the best things he'd done. He loved when a client told him how much they appreciated his work.

“Of course, I wanted to take a stroll in the park before we left. Nice thing about having a home on Fifth Avenue: Central Park is your front yard! I love walking about the place. Lot of good lookers on parade, if you know what I mean,” Cook said and winked.

“Helen and I will be coming up later this month. I'll give you a call. We can meet at the casino,” Cross said, waving good-bye as he trotted up the stairs.

“That would be awfully jolly,” Cook called.

Cross looked back and smiled. The new rich, Granny complained, were always using vulgar British phrases like that.

On Fifth Avenue, Cross walked along the inside of the low stone wall separating the park from the wide sidewalk. He stopped at East Seventy-Eighth Street and surveyed the Cook mansion from behind the trunk of an elm tree. He smiled when he saw the huge Renaissance Revival mansion.

The house looked impenetrable from the outside because a dry moat surrounded it on all four sides. After his first trip to England, Cook had become crazy about castles and moats and wanted one like a child covets a toy for Christmas. A real moat was out of the question for his new city mansion, but Cross had cleverly provided one without water, a stone-lined ditch that was fifteen feet wide and twenty feet deep. It actually had a practical purpose; it accommodated two stories of kitchens, storage rooms, and servants' quarters below the street level, with windows even. To Cook's delight, his architect added iron-and-wood drawbridges to span the moat to the front door and to the rear service entry. At night or when the house was empty, the drawbridges were raised, creating a wide, deep, protective chasm between the sidewalk and the house. But best of all, Cook felt that the unique design meant that he didn't need a night watchman while he was away.

Yes, this will do nicely
, Cross thought.