Richard Hawke - Speak of the Devil

There’s general agreement that the success of the South Street Seaport mall has been somewhat less than what either the Rouse Company or the merchants who pay their exorbitant rents to do business there had hoped it would be. I can recall stopping at the place with Margo one Christmas Eve and our being two of seven shoppers in the entire mall; a hired chorus of around twenty had stood at the garland-wrapped railing overlooking the main floor and serenaded us with holiday tunes.

Probably the most consistently thriving businesses in the pier’s mall are the ones on the top floor, the one with the most glass and the best views: the Brooklyn Bridge to the north, the Brooklyn waterfront and promenade directly across the river, and to the south, Governors Island and the top half of the torch arm of the Statue of Liberty.

This is the Pier 17 food court. And this is where Angel Ramos screwed up while attempting to plant a homemade bomb behind one of the large potted plants that dot the terra-cotta floor.

THE CROWD OF ONLOOKERS WAS SOMEWHAT LARGER THAN WHAT YOU generally get for these sorts of things. This was because, in addition to the naturally curious, several hundred shoppers and salesclerks had safely fled the pavilion as word spread of a madman somewhere in the building with a bomb. Even as I arrived, scattered pockets of people were fleeing across the wooden deck between the pier and the street with their arms over their heads. The police had already set up sawhorses and barrier tape. Several officers dashed forward to escort the panicked people the final few feet. One of the people fleeing the pavilion was old St. Nick himself. The big guy was dragging along a stumbling elf by the arm.

Behind the barrier was the row of police. Dozens of them and more coming. The patrol cars parked at every imaginable angle. And behind the police cars, funneled into the narrow Ye Olde cobbled area of Fulton Street, stood the crowd of onlookers.

I’d gotten a fragmented piece of the story from one of the cops mobilizing just outside Carl Schurz Park. “Some nut is holding a group of people hostage at Pier 17,” he’d said. “They say he’s got a bomb.”

I parked my car at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge and jogged along South Street, in front of the fish market stalls. The gawkers were sparse here, and I was able to get right up to the barrier. I heard mutterings from some of the cops that the mayor was allegedly on his way. Not too many seemed thrilled by the prospect.

“We got our fucking hands full here.”

“He thinks we got time for a fucking photo op?”

As Remy Sanchez moved from behind one of the stanchions holding up the FDR Drive, I called out to him: “Sanchez!”

He looked around, then spotted me. A policeman near me was trying to keep me from the barricade, but Sanchez called to him, “Let him in!” and I ducked under the tape. Sanchez was barking into his walkie-talkie. “No! Do you understand the word ‘no’? Just wait, is what I said.” He lowered the walkie-talkie. “Cox is in there.”

“ Cox ? Where?”

He waved his walkie-talkie toward the pier. “In there somewhere. Son of a bitch. Rule number one in these situations is you stand down. Any cop knows that. Rule number one is not running like a madman across an open space and going inside. That doesn’t make heroes, that makes dead men.”

I looked over at the pier. The public space was a good hundred yards from the pavilion building. “So what happened?” I asked.

“A man was spotted acting suspiciously by a worker at one of the food joints up there. We think the worker confronted the guy. This is what we’re hearing from some of the people who managed to get away. The worker was shot. He’s still in there. Somehow the shooter managed to corral a bunch of people, and he’s holding them on the top floor. We don’t know exactly how many. He let one person go. A messenger. She says he’s got a bomb. She says the guy’s out of his mind. He wants money. He wants a helicopter. He wants a boat. He wants to talk to the mayor. Son of a bitch doesn’t know what he wants. We’re trying to establish communication.”

“What he wants is ten million dollars,” I said.

Sanchez made a long face. “Well, so do I. And how do you know this?”

“Long story.”

“I take it this is our nut job from last week,” Sanchez said.

“That’s the short version.”

“So he’ll kill those people if it comes to it. We can’t count on this being a bluff.”

“I wouldn’t count on it.”

“Holy mother.”

Sanchez’s walkie-talkie crackled, and he barked into it. I caught the word “sharpshooters.” I scanned the phalanx of police officers. I was surprised Tommy Carroll hadn’t arrived on the scene yet. One Police Plaza was under a mile away. A police van was making its way slowly down the cobbled street, parting the sea of onlookers. Sanchez clicked off his walkie-talkie.

“If I get my hands on Cox, I’m going to strangle him. There’s no way he can approach that guy without endangering the hostages. Goddammit, we need control here. A cowboy cop is not what we need.”

“Cox knows the perp,” I said. “He knows the guy holding the hostages.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“Another long story.”

“Jesus, Malone, you’re just one big fat storybook, aren’t you? Well, I don’t have time to listen to them all right now. You stay put and keep your nose clean. This is police business. If the situation drags on, we’ll light a campfire and let you tell some of your stories.”

“Gracias,” I said.

Sanchez grunted and moved off. I spotted another face I recognized-that of Officer Patrick Noon. He was standing a head above anyone near him, about thirty feet away from me. He was looking in my direction, but if he spotted me, he chose not to show it.

The van that had been inching its way through the crowd reached South Street. The rear doors flew open and a dozen or more helmeted policemen piled out. They were wearing external bulletproof vests and carrying automatic weapons. I spotted an identical van pulling up to the barricades from the south. A small army poured out of this one as well. Sirens sounded overhead, simultaneous with the thwocka-thwocka-thwocka of a low-flying helicopter. The elevated FDR Drive runs right past Pier 17, roughly level with the upper floors of the mall. I was sure that traffic had been stopped in both directions. I took a few steps out from under the highway and looked up. I spotted several slender rifle barrels resting on the guardrail. The sharpshooters were already in place. The firepower was building up.

Cox. I pictured him dashing across the hundred-yard open area to make his way to the pier building. This wasn’t heroic, not any more than his shooting Roberto Diaz at point-blank range had been. I knew what it was. It was the same move as the one he’d pulled in the Municipal Building. A preemptive one. Cox had no intention of standing by while police negotiators attempted to set up a link to Angel. He couldn’t risk it. Whatever Leonard Cox’s entanglement was with Angel Ramos, it now appeared that he would do anything in his power to keep Angel from having the opportunity to spell it out.

Cox wasn’t on any rescue mission. He was on the hunt.

Another burping siren sounded, this one from a black sedan making its way down South Street, the same direction I’d come from. A news van was hot on its trail. As the car eased to a stop, I ducked out from behind the tape and slipped unseen to the nearest fish stall and moved quickly behind it. I peeked back around the corner. Martin Leavitt was emerging from the sedan. I thought of James King’s story about his cousin’s crush on the younger Leavitt. The news van screeched to a halt, and Kelly Cole bolted from the passenger side and ran on tippy heels swiftly over to where Leavitt had paused to survey the scene. She was beckoning her cameraman to hurry along. Her hair bounced as if she were in a shampoo commercial. Even from this distance, I could see Leavitt lighting up as she approached. The man couldn’t help himself; he was the ultimate flirt. I thought again about Margaret King, about seventeen-year-old Maggie King. Remy Sanchez was making his way over to the mayor. The news cameraman got his equipment up on his shoulder and flipped on his lamp. Cole reached for Leavitt’s elbow to guide him closer, into the shot. He reached for hers as well. The two shared a little laugh. Even from where I was standing I could read the look on Sanchez’s face. He obviously felt this was no time for a goddamn tea party.