W. Griffin: Deadly Assets

Tony had bought Lauren a genuine Bavarian felt hat, dark green with a brown feather in the hatband, which she now wore at a rakish angle while sipping a warm cup of Glühwein , red wine spiced with clove, cinnamon, and orange. He wasn’t sure if it was the alcohol or the weather-it had snowed heavily the previous night and looked like it might again-that caused her high cheeks and perky nose to glow with a cute rose hue.

Lauren, looking more closely at the area surrounding the sculpture, realized that her idea was far from an original one. There clearly was a line of at least twenty people waiting for a turn before the artwork and the lit Christmas tree behind it. The line wound around the circular granite fountain behind the piece. But she didn’t mind.

She pointed at it.

“What?” he said.

“I want a photo of us in front of that, Tony,” she announced, tilting her head back to look up at him, her bright eyes beaming beneath the brim of green felt.

Over a tight long-sleeved black top she wore a sleeveless white goose-down jacket. Tony, in brown corduroy pants, flannel shirt, and a fur-collared black leather bomber jacket, had on a floppy red-and-white Santa hat.

“Of course you do,” he said, and smiled at her. “You want a photo with everything.”

“Let’s go, then!”

She grabbed his hand and led the way, weaving through gaps in the heavy crowd. As they went, Tony caught the smell of meat grilling, then looked around and saw a trail of smoke drifting up from a wooden hut. Its signage read BRATWURST MIT SAUERKRAUT. He suddenly felt hungry.

They reached the back of the line for the sculpture. After a moment, Lauren realized that it was moving faster than she’d expected. And then she saw why, and smiled: The people in line were helping each other. When someone was ready to pose in front of the artwork, they would hand their camera to the person in line behind them, who then stepped up to take their picture. Then that person would take their turn, and the next in line would take that person’s photo.

Not ten minutes later, Lauren and Tony were kissing in front of the LOVE artwork and the forty-something woman who’d joined the line immediately after them was snapping their picture with Lauren’s cell phone.

Lauren retrieved her phone and thanked the woman. Then, inspecting the images and smiling from ear to ear, she and Tony moved away from the sculpture. After a few steps, Lauren stopped beside the fountain.

“Hold this, babe,” she said, handing him her cup. “This shot is amazing. I want to post it!”

As her fingers flew across her cell phone, she said aloud what she was typing: “At LOVE with my Love in the City of Brotherly Love! Love, love, love this place!”

She looked at him and smiled.

“I’m so happy,” she added.

He leaned over and kissed her rosy cheek.

“And I’m happy you’re happy,” he said, then added: “How about hungry? Those brats back there smelled great.”

“Sure. I can always eat,” she said, taking back her Glühwein and grasping his hand. “Lead on.”

Lauren sipped her wine as Tony worked a path through the thick crowd. It was tight, and he repeatedly smiled politely and said, “Excuse us,” as they brushed past. At one point, he found a gap. He took it, and a moment later bumped shoulders hard with someone he passed. He didn’t see who it was, but he certainly heard it was a male when the guy muttered, “Asshole!”

Still, Tony replied, “Sorry,” and kept moving-until a split-second later he heard Lauren make a terrible moan and felt her grip loosen. She suddenly stopped.

Tony glanced back and said, “You okay?”

At first Tony thought that Lauren had spilled the cup of red wine on herself. But then he saw that the stain on her white jacket was a bright red-and that it was spreading quickly.

She had a look of pain and confusion in her eyes. She slipped down to the granite.

“Lauren!” Tony said.

A woman screamed and backed away as he dropped to his knees and held Lauren. The crowd formed a circle around them.

“Please,” Tony yelled, looking up over his shoulder, “someone call an ambulance!”

Not a minute later, the crowd parted as a uniformed Philadelphia police officer came running up.

“Hang on, Lauren,” Tony said, stroking her head as she just gazed back. Her face had turned pallid, the rosy color on her cheeks and nose gone.

The officer got down on one knee. “I radioed for paramedics. Be here any moment. What happened?”

“I–I don’t know,” Tony said, a tear slipping down his cheek. “We were just walking, then. . this.” He waved his hand helplessly at the blood-soaked jacket.

“What’s her name?” the officer said, placing his ear close to her nose and mouth.

Tony heard her make a gurgling sound.

“Lauren,” he said.

“Lauren, can you hear me?” the officer said, then raised his voice: “Help is coming! Hold on! Talk to me, Lauren!”

There was no immediate response.

But then a trickle of blood escaped the corner of her mouth and her nostrils. Her eyes became glazed.

The officer put his right index and middle fingertips to the side of her neck for a long moment.

“Oh, shit ,” the officer said softly.

Tony jerked his head to look at him.

The officer met his eyes, then looked at Lauren, and slowly shook his head. “I’m really sorry. .” he said, then automatically crossed himself, touching his right fingers to his forehead, his chest, and then his left and right shoulders.

There were gasps from the crowd.

Tony struggled to breathe. Tears now flowed down both cheeks.

“But. . but. .” he said, then cried out, “Lauren!”

Slowly rocking her, he buried his face in her neck and began sobbing.

Franklin Square

Sixth and Race Streets, Philadelphia

Saturday, December 15, 10:20 A.M.

Not a half hour later and a dozen blocks away, Melanie Baker, an attractive thirty-two-year-old brunette, had just helped her daughter, Abigail, climb off the seat of a fiberglass replica of a giant bald eagle in flight on the Liberty Carousel.

“Santa now! I want to see Santa!” the six-year-old said, pointing across the snow-covered park to the big white tent nearby. It had a huge sign reading NORTH POLE and a pair of twenty-foot-tall striped candy canes marking the entrance. Elves in green outfits seemed everywhere, most handing out real candy canes to the children.

Melanie looked over her shoulder, scanning the heavy crowd. She glanced at her cell phone and saw that her husband had just sent a text: “Almost there.”

Having forgotten his wallet, he had run a dozen blocks to retrieve it from their apartment in the Northern Liberties section, just north of Center City.

Melanie adjusted the fleece stocking cap, a white one dotted with little green Christmas trees, over Abigail’s sandy blond hair as she looked in her eyes. “You want to wait for Daddy?”

Abigail shook her head. “Santa now? Please?” She pronounced it peas .

Melanie glanced at the big white tent and thought, Well, they probably have heaters in there.

“Okay, Abby, okay,” she said, smiling. “Daddy can catch up. Let’s go see Santa.”

Melanie walked Abigail over to where they had left their stroller with those of the other visitors. She slipped her handbag over the right handle and, holding Abigail’s hand, pushed the stroller through the gate in the low black iron fence that surrounded the carousel. Then they went onto the brick walkway and joined the crowd of families headed to the white tent.

Franklin Square, dating back to 1682, was one of the five original public spaces that William Penn designed when laying out the city. It had gone through rough periods over the years-the worst most recently in the 1960s, when it was a squalid area all but abandoned to the homeless for years on end.