“May we join you?” Harry asked.
The officer glanced up from his paper, blinked, and smiled. “Miller, I haven’t seen you in years. Sit down. I like company.” He put the paper aside and tentatively studied Pamela.
“The missus?”
“My partner, Mrs. Pamela Thompson. We’re taking a lunch break.”
During the meal the two men caught up on news about old mutual acquaintances. In the exchange, Harry managed to bring up Dan Kelly. “What’s he doing these days?”
“He’s one of the guards at Tammany Hall. You’ll see him at the main door in an hour. During elections he earns city money as a poll watcher. Eats and sleeps in Sadie’s boardinghouse up the street. Otherwise, he’s in Tammany Hall’s poolroom.”
Harry looked doubtful. “He used to be called The Knife and spent some time in jail for cutting up a guy. Has he changed his ways?”
“I guess you can say that he’s now on the right side of the law,” the officer replied. “I’m told that he gathers information for the police and collects payments for their protective services.”
Pamela caught Harry’s eye. He nodded slightly. So Kelly was now a police informer and a feared thug who forced neighborhood merchants and proprietors of gambling dens and houses of prostitution to pay into the police department’s protection rackets.
After lunch, Pamela and Harry observed Kelly from a distance outside the busy Fourteenth Street entrance to Tammany Hall. He was a short, thin man, nearly bald, with sharp features and a sallow complexion. For about an hour, he studied everyone entering the building with quick, keen glances. Then another man took his place.
While Pamela went off to Sadie’s boardinghouse, Harry followed Kelly into a saloon. He walked up to the bar, where the bartender offered him a beer, “compliments of the house.” Kelly took the beer without a smile or a thank-you and joined a pair of ruffians at a table off to a side of the room. He appeared to give them instructions, his hands chopping the air to stress his points.
While nursing a beer, Harry noticed how most customers watched Kelly with fearful eyes and darting glances. A few others couldn’t fully conceal their dislike. He didn’t appear to notice. Behind Kelly’s back, another man slouched in a chair, his cap pulled down to his eyebrows, and mimicked Kelly’s gestures. Alcohol must have fortified his courage, Harry thought.
His beer finished, Kelly left the saloon, while his companions remained at the table. Harry picked up his glass and approached the slouching man. “May I join you?” Without waiting for an answer, Harry signaled a waiter for two beers and sat down. “I’m Harry, could I have a word with you?”
“Sure. They call me Fred.”
Harry asked evenly, “I wonder why Dan Kelly gets special treatment here?”
“He has the ear of the ward boss and can do favors for people he likes. The bartender is one of them.”
“Do you know Kelly well?”
“Yes, but I don’t care to talk about him when I’m drunk. I’ll go home and sober up. Thanks for the beer, but I couldn’t drink it.” He walked out the door on shaky legs. Seconds later, Kelly’s two companions got up from their table and followed Fred.
As soon as they were out the door, Harry went after them.
Fred walked a couple of blocks and turned into a narrow passageway. The two ruffians followed him. Harry kept a short distance. When he rounded the corner into the passage, he saw that one of the ruffians had pinioned Fred’s arms behind his back and the other had drawn a knife.
Harry dashed up to them and knocked the knife out of the ruffian’s hand with his blackjack. The two ruffians fled, leaving Fred swaying on his feet. Harry caught him before he fell. “I saw that those two men meant to harm you. May I take you home?”
“I’d be obliged to you. They knocked me on the head. I’m dizzy.”
Harry took him under the arm and they walked slowly to the entrance of a boardinghouse. Harry rang the bell.
The landlady opened and exclaimed, “Mr. Grant! You look dreadful.”
Harry explained what had happened, then helped Fred up the stairs to his room. Harry told him, “Stay in the house. The ruffians may lurk in the neighborhood for a few days, waiting for you. Your landlady will care for you. I’ll see you tomorrow. Hopefully, you’ll feel better.”
Meanwhile at Sadie’s boardinghouse, Pamela met the landlady and identified herself as a private investigator looking for a missing young woman who was said to have known Dan Kelly. Pamela concocted the woman’s name and general physical appearance.
“She’s not living here,” said the landlady. “Mr. Kelly lives alone in a small basement apartment. I keep track of who comes and goes. He moved in about seven years ago and is a quiet tenant who regularly pays the rent.”
“Does he have any female visitors?”
“From time to time, he brings one home but she doesn’t stay overnight. That’s not allowed. In the first few months he used to have a particular visitor but she stopped coming. I think they had a falling out.”
Pamela showed interest.
The landlady shook her head. “She’s not your missing young woman. Kelly called her Alice Curran.”
With this new lead Pamela narrowed her search to Alice Curran. She might have known Kelly about the time of the cabdriver’s murder. Her family name was common Irish. There would be dozens of Alice Currans. Still, she might have had a brush or two with the law and be known to the police. Pamela would speak to her friend, Larry White.
Larry had come home from police headquarters for supper. Pamela joined the family meal. When the table was cleared, Larry lingered. “I think you have a question for me, Pamela.”
“Yes, have you heard of Alice Curran?” Pamela briefed him on the Kelly investigation and described Alice. “I know she’s a needle in the proverbial haystack. Nonetheless, could you find her for me?” She gave him the bits of information that she had gathered.
“I’ll try,” he replied. “I assume that she was a prostitute and might appear in police lists from 1887. But don’t raise your hopes. By now, she might have lost her wits or her life.”
CHAPTER 10
A Missing Person
Tuesday, November 20
The next morning, Pamela and Harry went to Fred Grant’s boardinghouse and inquired about him. Mrs. Scott, his landlady, told them that he had been with her for several years and worked as a clerk in Tammany Hall. He had occasional visitors, all of them presentable men and women. She didn’t know their names or what they did.
Pamela and Harry climbed upstairs to his room. Fully dressed, he was sitting at a table, the remains of breakfast before him. He had sobered up but complained of a headache that reminded him of yesterday’s assault.
Harry introduced Pamela as a social worker and friend. “Can I be of help?” she asked Grant sympathetically. “How shocking to be attacked in broad daylight!” She offered him a small oilcloth bag filled with crushed ice. “Put this on your head. It’ll reduce the swelling. Your landlady has more crushed ice for you in the kitchen. As the ice melts, the bag will leak a little. Wrap it in a towel.”
He put the bag on his head and leaned back. “I appreciate your kindness.” He motioned for them to sit facing him at the table.
“Your head must still be hurting,” Pamela continued. “So we won’t be long. Do you know the two ruffians who attacked you?”
He nodded. “Paddy McBride and Bill Cook. They work in Kelly’s protection racket.”
Harry added in an aside to Pamela, “According to Officer Malone back in January 1887, they also witnessed Kelly stab the cabdriver.”
“Yes, I recall,” commented Pamela ironically, “they just happened to be there at the time.” She turned to Grant. “Tell us why Kelly attacked you.”
“He must have noticed that I made fun of him behind his back. He demands respect and resents that I’ve always disapproved of him. So, he set out to punish me.”
“Was he going to kill you?”
“No,
typically, he would have slashed my face to leave a scar. That would serve as a warning to me and others never to speak ill of Dan Kelly.”
Pamela winced. “Your dislike for Kelly appears deep. How long have you known him?”
“We grew up together in Hell’s Kitchen. He was born in a brothel near the docks and raised in foster homes. A runt, he learned early in life how to use a knife to survive. Over the years, he has perfected that skill. He can thrust and slash faster than the eye can follow, and he throws the knife with deadly accuracy.”
“Amazing!” Pamela encouraged Grant to continue.
He smiled wryly. “Once in our youth, we went to a circus and watched a man in fancy clothes throwing knives at a pretty girl standing with her back to a large board. His knives came very close but never scratched her. Kelly went right home, drew a figure on a board, and started throwing knives like the man in the circus. He was soon good at it and tried to force neighborhood girls to stand at the board. Their parents called in the police. By that time, he was already a petty thief so the police put him away.”
“Why does Tammany Hall allow such a dangerous man in its organization?”
“They think of him as a vicious guard dog that they control and can put to good use.”
“We know,” said Harry, “that Kelly stands guard at the entrance to Tammany Hall and watches the polls during elections. Is that all they ask of him?”
Fred fell silent. “My mouth has a way of getting me into trouble. I’ve already said more than I should about Dan Kelly, and not just yesterday in the saloon. I’m grateful for your visit and for the ice. I’m beginning to feel better already. I’ll rest now.”
Harry handed his card to Grant. “Later, you might want to talk to us again and figure out a way to protect yourself. Kelly will hear of this incident and will order his ruffians to try again to punish you. Why should you have to live in fear? He’s a bully. Isn’t it time to confront him?”
Grant replied with a doubtful smile.
In the Irving Street office after lunch, Pamela asked Harry, “When Fred Grant considers his situation, do you think he’ll get back to us?”
“I’m worried for him,” Harry replied. “He may go to Kelly, confess he was drunk when he mimicked him, and beg for forgiveness. Kelly would then ask about us driving away his ruffians. Grant would have to admit that we had helped him. Kelly might pretend to forgive him and defer punishment to a later, more opportune date.”
“So, do you think we should deal cautiously with Mr. Grant?”
Harry nodded. “Kelly might use him to mislead us, even draw us into danger.” Harry glanced at his watch. “An hour from now, Kelly will return to his post at the entrance to Tammany Hall. Fred Grant will have rested, thought things over, and may have come to a decision. Let’s see if he goes to Kelly.”
A few minutes before three o’clock in the afternoon, Pamela and Harry hid themselves in a coffee shop on Fourteenth Street across from the main entrance to Tammany Hall. At three o’clock, on schedule, Dan Kelly assumed his place.
Pamela studied him in her opera glass. His face was a mask, devoid of expression, but his eyes were in constant motion, taking in everything around him. After ten minutes, Fred Grant appeared on Fourteenth Street, walking slowly toward Tammany Hall. Was he going back to work in his office? Pamela wondered.
Near the entrance, he stopped momentarily. Kelly noticed him and glared. Grant walked up the steps and held out a hand. Kelly ignored it, frowning. Grant seemed to plead. Finally, with a rude jerk of his head, Kelly sent him inside, presumably to wait out the hour.
Pamela said to Harry, “I feel very sad for Fred Grant. His attempt to reconcile with Kelly will not end well.”
Harry nodded. “I’ll ask Fred’s landlady to send a message to our office when he returns. There’s nothing more that we can do here.”
That evening while waiting to hear from Grant’s boardinghouse, Pamela and Harry searched through their law firm’s files on Tammany Hall. Prescott had occasionally represented clients associated with Tammany and communicated with the organization’s legal office.
“Here he is!” exclaimed Harry, handing Pamela a brief message. Five years ago, the clerk Frederick Grant informed Prescott that a client was too ill to make a court appearance.
Eventually, their search yielded a sketchy profile of Grant at work. Pamela concluded, “He checks the legal language of Tammany’s business contracts and researches questions from his superior. I’d say he holds a responsible position, similar to Peter Yates’s in our firm.”
Harry was gazing at a message in his hands. “I agree. Grant seems appreciated. His boss, Mr. Dodd, expresses condolences when Grant lost his wife a couple of years ago.”
Late in the evening, as they were about to leave the office, a messenger arrived from Mrs. Scott and reported that Mr. Grant hadn’t returned.
Pamela slowly turned to Harry.
He anticipated her question. “Dead or alive, Grant should turn up in the morning. It’s late. I’ll walk you home now.”
CHAPTER 11
Bellevue Hospital
Wednesday, November 21
Early the next morning in the office, Pamela received another message from Mrs. Scott: Still no word from Fred Grant.
Pamela said to Harry, “We should go looking for him. Where do we start?”
“First stop is the city morgue. Are you willing and able?”
“To be honest,” she replied, “that’s the last place in New York I’d care to visit, but I insist on overcoming my aversion. I’ve already learned that death is unavoidable and distressing.”
The city morgue was a plain, single-story building on the huge Bellevue Hospital campus at First Avenue and East Twenty-sixth Street. Harry described Fred Grant to an attendant who led them to a room with four marble-topped tables. “Several bodies were brought in last night. To judge by the size, one of them could be Mr. Grant.”
In a few minutes, the attendant returned with a cart on which a figure lay wrapped in canvas. He exposed the head. The face was flabby and dark, clearly not Grant’s.
The Emergency Pavilion was a short walk away. Harry again asked for Grant. “From your description,” said the attendant, “I think we may have him. Follow me.” He led them down a hallway to a door and knocked lightly. A nurse opened it, raised a finger to her lips, and showed them to the sleeping man’s bedside. His head was bandaged, except for the face. His legs were encased in plaster casts. “He has also been stabbed,” whispered the nurse as she walked with them to a tiny parlor at the end of the hall. “We’ve sedated him. When his condition becomes stable, we’ll move him to a room in the hospital next door. Did you recognize him?”
“He’s definitely Frederick Grant. We were with him as late as yesterday. When and where was he found?”
“Shortly before midnight, a watchman at a construction site off First Avenue heard a man moaning and hurried to the scene. Mr. Grant was lying on the ground, barely conscious. To judge from his wounds and his loss of blood, he was assaulted about an hour earlier. If the watchman hadn’t found him, he would have soon died. His attacker—there could have been more than one—had fled. The police soon arrived and we gave them this information. There was no identification on his person.”
“Hopefully,” said Harry, “we’ll find out more when he regains consciousness. Now we’ll identify him to the hospital authorities.”
After leaving the hospital office, Pamela said to Harry, “Grant’s room might contain information useful to our investigation. We must search it before the police and agents of Tammany Hall arrive. They would surely remove anything damaging to the organization.”
Visibly agitated, Mrs. Scott met Pamela and Harry in the parlor. “A few minutes ago, a pair of ruffians knocked on my door and said Mr. Grant had been injured and taken to the hospital. They claimed he asked them to fetch certain things for him from his room upstairs. I recognized the men from your description and told them to leave. I wouldn’t
open the room until I heard from Mr. Grant himself or from the police.”
Pamela reassured her. “You did well, Mrs. Scott. We’ve just come from Bellevue Hospital, where we saw Mr. Grant, unconscious and badly beaten, perhaps by the same two men you spoke to, Paddy McBride and Bill Cook. I suggest that we go with you to his room and find names and addresses of persons who should be notified of his situation. If we come upon any valuables, we’ll put them in your room for safekeeping.”
Pamela’s suggestion appeared to please Mrs. Scott. She gathered her keys and they went upstairs together. While Mrs. Scott searched for money and valuables, Harry looked for a diary and Pamela browsed in Grant’s file boxes. In a short while, Mrs. Scott found an envelope of cash, a life insurance policy whose beneficiary was a son living in Connecticut, and a pair of gold cuff links. She would notify his son and put the cash and the cuff links in the house safe. In a table drawer Harry found a cryptic diary. He would bring it back to the office for closer study.
An exchange of messages between Grant and Frank Dodd, senior clerk and friend, caught Pamela’s eye. In a message just after Tammany’s defeat in the November election, Grant complained that Dan Kelly’s strong-arm tactics had hurt the club’s reputation even among the Democratic Party’s most faithful voters. Dodd replied that concerned members of the club should band together and get rid of Big Tim Smith and his thugs. Other targets of their criticism were too vague to identify, but reflected their negative attitude toward the current leadership and a desire for change.
“Help me decide, Harry. Should I take these messages with me? If they were to fall into the hands of certain Tammany leaders, they could harm Mr. Dodd. The remaining files are of little interest to us. Tammany can have them.”
Harry reflected for a moment. “Take the personal messages. We’ll arrange to return them to Dodd. If we can gain his good will, he might help us penetrate into Tammany’s dark secrets.”
Death at Tammany Hall Page 9