Pete Hamill - Forever

“I hope I haven’t caused more trouble than it’s worth,” he said.

“It was worth it,” she said, and giggled.

“What will you do?”

“Pay a few visits.”

While the mob still chanted, the countess slipped out the back door, dressed warmly against the cold. When she returned three hours later, the mob was gone.

“They won’t be back,” she said.

“Who did you visit?”

“Certain gentlemen who would rather not have their private tastes made public.”

The mob showed up over the following months at other places run by women but did not return to Duane Street. Hughie Mulligan and his boys had created one of the first true New York rackets: They would protect the houses from themselves. That is, if they were paid a fee, nobody would bother the madams, their women, or their business establishments. And through connections at Tammany Hall, they’d make certain that no fool of a politician would try to pass a law in Albany that would close the houses. They did not try again to move against the countess.

“But be careful, Cormac. Hughie Mulligan won’t forget what you did.”

“I know.”

Then one night, after a mild summer when only 213 New Yorkers died of cholera, the countess came to wake up Cormac in his room. The clock said 1:20. He sat up.

“What is it?”

“They have a plan,” she said, her voice breathless. “They’re going to burn out some blocks downtown, get rid of the old wooden houses, and…”

“Wait, slow down.”

She calmed herself and explained how she had learned from a favored customer that a certain group was planning to burn out some of the old streets, because the land titles and squatting rights were now too complicated to deal with. Later, they would help move the rich up to the new districts in Greenwich Village, where they could come to work on the new horse-drawn omnibuses. The speculators among them already owned the land up in Greenwich and were investing in the omnibuses. The mechanics, the apprentices, and the poor would be forced into the houses off Chapel Street, where many other poor now lived (including the children of Africans). Others would be directed to the houses of the Five Points. Everything below Wall Street would be rebuilt and devoted to business.

“And who is this favored customer?”

“I can’t speak his name. I call him the Wax Man. He likes, well…”

“And the name of his group?”

She sighed. “They don’t have a name. But they are real.” “And why would the Wax Man tell you?”

“He was drinking wine, a lot of wine, he was getting… I suppose the word is sentimental. He wanted me to know—so that I could buy land now, in Greenwich Village, or along Bond Street, or even farther into the country. He was offering me a favor. A piece of the information. It’s not the first time.”

Cormac wrapped a blanket around himself against the seeping September cold.

“I should put this in the newspaper,” he said, knowing that Bryant would surely find some excuse to refuse its publication.

“Never,” she said. “They’ll kill you, and worse…” (smiling broadly) “they’ll kill me .”

They both laughed. She took Cormac’s hand and led him across the hall to her room, closing the door behind them. She talked a lot about how real estate was the most important of all businesses in the town whose true god was Mammon. That was why she thought the Wax Man’s raving was more than raving. She rang for a maid and ordered two omelettes, fresh bread, and a bottle of water. She swore Cormac to secrecy. “This is not about some stupid thugee like Hughie Mulligan,” she said. “This is about the big boys.” And then mentioned names. Ruggles, Hewett, Vandermeer, Astor. “They’re not thinking about Saturday night,” she said. “They’re thinking about the future. A future we can’t imagine, and they can.”

Months passed. There was no fire. There was at least serious talk now about building a reservoir in Croton, high in Westchester, and digging a system of pipes to carry fresh water to the city. That was still the distant future, and it was still merely talk, but the newspapers were finally behind it, in the name of the expanding metropolis. In the present, Cormac was more grateful than ever for water and the aroma of lavender and clean flesh. His hands grew a bit looser on the keys of the piano. The playing of the countess, in contrast, was richer and more supple. He understood better the theory of half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes, of semiquavers and time stops, but his execution of the theory remained mechanical and crude. The countess was kind and patient.

Cormac worked hard at the newspaper, mentioned the rumors of an impending fire to Bryant, asked discreet questions of Beatriz and other friends on the streets, but he heard nothing more that was concrete. Neither did the countess, although the Wax Man continued making his Thursday night visits to the various rooms of the house. Sometimes he brought his own candles.

Cormac was careful in his movements, his eyes searching Duane Street before leaving the house. He avoided the frontiers of the Five Points at night, when the friends and associates of Hughie Mulligan might be watching from ambush. On most days, the sword was too bulky to strap to hip or back, but he did start carrying one of the revolvers he’d taken from Hughie’s boys. He kept this hidden from editors and other reporters, and did not even tell the countess. On several Sundays he went off to the north on a rented horse to practice shooting at targets in the woods.

The stranger arrived in November. It was just after midnight, and Cormac was sitting back, deep in a plush chair, while the countess played an aching tune, full of longing. His eyes were closed, and he saw rain-washed streets and gabled rooftops and a river. The music was full of the river, the water flowing through time.

Then, from beyond the door, he heard the music of a violin.

Playing in counterpoint to the music of the piano.

The countess stopped playing, and he saw shock in her eyes. She did not move. The violin continued, picking up the melody of aching loss and an unseen river.

She got up without looking at Cormac and walked to the door. She paused while the music played, then turned the knob and opened the door.

A man in a cape was standing there, playing the violin. He didn’t look at her, for his eyes were closed, his square jaw pressed into the chin rest, his brow crumpled into concentrated creases. His left hand moved subtly on the strings, there seemed no movement at all with the bow, yet he was pulling music from his instrument that was charged with enormous delicacy and power. The countess touched her mouth. The stranger kept playing and then glided deftly into a diminishing passage of farewell.

He finished and stood there, his brow still furrowed.

“Hello, Monsieur Breton,” she said. “Come in.”

He stepped across the threshold, his hazel eyes taking in the room and falling upon Cormac, who was now standing. The countess closed the door. The stranger did not move and neither did Cormac. For the first time, he saw the countess appear awkward.

“Cormac, this is Yves Breton,” she said in French. “Yves, Cormac O’Connor.”

Cormac stepped forward and offered a hand. M. Breton ignored it, busying his hands with bow and violin. His cape was dirty, his shoes slippery with black city mud.

“Can I get you a drink?” Cormac said.

“Yes,” M. Breton said. “Cognac.”

His tone was dismissive, and he turned to the countess. “You’re playing again,” he said.

“Yes. I tried to give it up, but—”

She shrugged and gestured toward a chair. M. Breton looked in an inquisitive way at Cormac, who was returning with a small glass of cognac. He did not take the offered chair. In a sacramental way, he placed the bow and violin on a table, then sipped the cognac, thrust a hand in a trousers pocket, and stared at the countess. Cormac thought: Too theatrical by far.