The houses were historical only in the sense that they were old. They were mostly three and four storey dwellings, which — like drunken men — lurched heavily against each other for support. The roofs had gaps in them, many of the windows were no more than holes in the walls to which ragged blankets had been nailed, and the doors hung crookedly on their hinges.
The streets which ran in front of these houses were no better than the houses themselves. They had been hurriedly constructed of cheap concrete slabs, many of which were broken or missing. In some of the alleys there was no paving at all, but only a compacted dirt floor that would become a river of mud in heavy rains. And everywhere there was garbage — a detritus that even the poverty-ravaged inhabitants no longer had any use for.
Blackstone stood and watched two uniformed policemen who — no doubt for a substantial fee — were escorting a group of middle-class people around the area.
How those respectable people gawped and pointed — as if they were viewing a freak show!
But at least freaks were paid for being stared at, Blackstone told himself. At least they got something out of their humiliation.
Not so the actual residents of Five Points. All they got from their well-dressed visitors was a reminder that somewhere beyond this decay there was a better life to be had — but that it was a life which was not for them.
Blackstone shifted his attention from the visitors to the inhabitants — and especially those who were boys, and aged around fourteen or fifteen. Some of these boys were prowling pointlessly up and down the streets, like bears confined in a cage that was far too small for them. Others loitered on street corners, looking out disinterestedly at a disinterested world.
There were dozens of such boys.
Perhaps even scores of them.
Any one of them could be a member of the six-hundred-strong Five Points Gang — any one of them could be the boy who Herr Schiller had seen gun down Inspector Patrick O’Brien.
And this was the place that Nancy had fled to from the van Horne mansion of Fifth Avenue. This — according to Florence, the envious scullery maid — was where she was now living high on the hog.
But if she did live there, he had certainly not been able to find her during the course of that early evening.
‘Never heard of no Eddie Toscanini,’ lied a youngish man, whose breath reeked equally of whiskey and tooth decay.
‘There ain’t no girl called Nancy livin’ round here,’ an old woman — who was so bent with age and poverty that she was almost doubled-over — mumbled unconvincingly before hobbling off.
But the youngish man and the old woman had at least spoken to him, Blackstone thought. They hadn’t just lowered their heads and hurried on without saying a word, as most of the others who he had approached had done.
He did not blame any of the people for their reluctance to talk to him. In fact, he could quite understand why they acted as they had. Because even a man in a shabby suit had untold wealth in the eyes of the residents of Five Points — and that meant that he was not to be trusted.
The sun was starting to set. Soon it would be dark, and in Five Points it would darker than in most of the city, because street lighting seemed to be one more thing that the area was not deemed worthy of.
The darker it got, the more dangerous this place would become, he told himself — and while he was not afraid of danger, he had never been a man to recklessly court it.
He would return to Five Points the following day, after he had attended Inspector Patrick O’Brien’s funeral, he decided.
But the next time he came here, he would not be alone. Next time he would bring with him someone who just might be able to turn his fruitless search into a successful one.
TWENTY-ONE
It was a little after nine o’clock in the morning, and though the early mist blown up from the river had finally dispersed, a distinct chill still lingered in the air.
In the Calvary Cemetery, Queens, the funeral cortège was making its way slowly towards the chapel. It was led by the hearse, a truly splendid vehicle which was panelled in delicately lacquered wood and pulled by four jet-black horses. The hearse was followed by three private carriages. And behind the carriages were the rest of the mourners, who were making this solemn journey on foot.
Blackstone was at the very back of the cortège — so far back, in fact, that he might have been said not to have been part of it all. There were reasons for this. Religion — any religion — made him distinctly uncomfortable. Besides, he felt something of a fake even being at the funeral of a man he had not even known existed until he was already dead.
He wished that Alex Meade were there instead of him, while he himself manned the observation post outside Mrs de Courcey’s brothel. But when he had suggested that, the sergeant would have none of it.
‘I’m a New York City police officer, and you’re not,’ Meade had said. ‘I’m the one with the shield.’
‘But this isn’t a police operation,’ Blackstone had countered. ‘Not an official one. I don’t need a shield to make sure that O’Shaugnessy’s keeping to his side of the deal.’
‘Anyway, I know what to look out for, and you don’t,’ Meade had said, almost frantically. ‘There are hundreds of ways to smuggle supplies into the brothel. Ways which I’d spot, and you’d miss entirely.’
It was all nonsense, Blackstone had thought.
But he hadn’t argued the point further, because they both knew the real reason that Meade didn’t want to go to the cemetery.
Blackstone looked beyond the cortège, to the chapel which lay ahead. It was an impressive and ornate structure, with a cupola at its centre, and a pair of elaborate towers, one each side of the arched doorway. It looked like no Christian building he had ever seen before. Rather, it reminded him of the mosques he had known during his soldiering days in India.
The cortège drew up in front of the chapel. Mary O’Brien and her family emerged from the first carriage, Commissioner Comstock and the Chief of the Detective Bureau from the second.
The third carriage had been carrying the six police officers in full dress uniform who were to act as pall bearers. They heaved Patrick O’Brien’s coffin on to their shoulders and carried it into the chapel. The rest of the mourners soon followed them.
Now there were only two of them left out in the chill air — the driver of the hearse, and the policeman who was far away from home.
It was a strange funeral in some ways, Blackstone thought. The hearse and the carriages were lavish — almost in the extreme. Yet most of the mourners were, judging by their dress, from a humbler background.
He found himself wondering how someone in Mary O’Brien’s financial position could have afforded such an expensive send-off.
And then he realized that, of course, she wouldn’t have needed to.
Because Patrick O’Brien had been a serving officer, killed in the line of duty, and it would be the New York Police Department, not Mary herself, that would be footing the bill.
But that, apparently, was all the support that the department was prepared to give, for though there was a fair turnout of other mourners, there was a notable absence of policemen.
Blackstone recalled the funerals of brother officers that he had attended back in England. There had been rank upon rank of blue-uniformed men around the graveside, standing stiffly to attention and paying their last heartfelt respects to their fallen comrade. The sense of loss which filled the air had been enough to make a grown man cry — and many of the grown men there had, indeed, succumbed to it. And later, when they had finished politely sipping their glasses of port with the widow, they had taken over a whole pub and got blind drunk.
No one in the New York Police Force, it would appear, had liked the honest, upright policeman. No one would later drink to his memory. speaking of the dead man in terms which shifted from admiring to the maudlin and then going back to the admiring again.
No, it was even worse than that, Blackstone admitted to
himself. Most of the officers, involved in illegal activities as they were, would be glad that he was dead — and it was looking more than possible that one of those officers had actually ordered his death.
‘You look like a man deep in thoughts about mortality, which is about right for a funeral,’ said a voice just to his side.
Blackstone turned to look at the speaker. He was a man who appeared to be only in his mid-thirties, though his complexion was already mottled with broken red veins.
‘Are you a friend of Patrick O’Brien’s?’ Blackstone asked.
‘A relative,’ the other man replied. ‘His cousin.’
Blackstone held out his hand. ‘I’m Sam Blackstone.’
‘And I’m the black sheep of the O’Brien family,’ the other man said. ‘The name’s Dermot.’
‘What makes you the black sheep?’ Blackstone asked.
‘Now isn’t that just obvious?’ Dermot replied. ‘It’s the drink that brought about my current status, sir!’
But he said it so lightly that Blackstone couldn’t help smiling.
‘Yes,’ Dermot mused, ‘in many Irish families there’s serious competition for the title of chief drunk, but the O’Briens are a relatively sober lot, and I achieved my eminence without really trying.’
‘Shouldn’t you be in the chapel?’ Blackstone asked.
‘Wouldn’t be welcome,’ Dermot said. ‘Oh, Patrick wouldn’t have minded — he was always one to tolerate weakness in others — but his parents would. They’re almost as ashamed of me as they are proud of their son.’
‘And they were proud of him, were they?’
‘Bursting with pride! And I’m proud of them for being proud of him.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Patrick’s father is a cobbler, and his mother is a cleaner,’ Dermot said. ‘They’re not as poor as they might have been if they’d stayed in the old country, but America’s been no picnic for them, either.’
‘Yes?’ Blackstone said, still not quite getting the point.
‘Patrick was a bright feller, and everybody knew it from the start. If he’d put his mind to it, he could have been a successful Wall Street lawyer by now, and his aged ma and pa could have been living in the lap of luxury. But he didn’t want to be a lawyer. He wanted to be a policeman, and — by God — an honest policeman. And did his parents stand in his way? Did they try to persuade him to chase the big bucks? No, sir, they did not! They gave him all the support and encouragement that any son could wish for.’
‘How do they get on with his wife?’ Blackstone asked, curious.
‘With Mary? They get on famously with her — and who wouldn’t? And they adore them three grandchildren of theirs.’
The chapel doors opened and the pall bearers emerged, carrying the coffin on their shoulders.
‘I’d better be going,’ Dermot O’Brien said.
‘Come to the graveside with me,’ Blackstone urged him. ‘The family won’t mind.’
‘Ah, there speaks a man who doesn’t know the family,’ Dermot said, without rancour. He looked briefly at the coffin and then at Blackstone again. ‘Most Irishmen go to the wake and show their respect for the dead by getting roaring drunk,’ he continued. ‘Did you know that?’
‘Yes, I did,’ Blackstone said.
‘But me, I’m a contrary sort of feller,’ Dermot told him. ‘For one day — and one day only — I’ll be showing my respect for Patrick by staying sober.’
Then he turned, and walked quickly towards the cemetery gates.
Blackstone stood some distance from the open grave, watching as the priest closed his prayer book at the end of his final act in what — as with all funerals — was a series of final acts.
The priest stepped back, and Mary O’Brien — black veiled — took his place at the edge of the grave. Once there she stood perfectly still for a few seconds, gazing into the distance — as if already contemplating life without her husband — then she bent down, took up a handful of soil, and threw it on the coffin.
Her children followed her example. Isobel, the eldest daughter, seemed unable to even look into the grave, and when she released her soil, some of it missed completely, and landed instead on the edge of the hole. Emily, the younger daughter, did look into the grave, but with an expression on her face which said she had no idea what was going on, or why she was even there. Benjamin — who was both the baby of the family and the man of the family — behaved with a dignity which went well beyond his years, looking down at coffin with an intense sadness, but — though biting his lip — refusing to cry.
An old couple — almost certainly Patrick O’Brien’s parents — stepped forward. Their obvious suffering was matched by their obvious pride — or so it seemed to Blackstone — and the moment they had retreated from the grave they gathered up their grandchildren and put their arms around them.
Other relatives and friends came next — enacting the same ritual, adding their own handfuls of soil to the grave in which the remains of Patrick O’Brien would soon be allowed to rest in peace.
And then it was all over. The mourners began to move away from the grave, and Blackstone himself was about to turn and take his leave when he saw Mary O’Brien make a discreet — but urgent — gesture which indicated that she wanted him to stay.
It was another five minutes before the handshakes and condolences were finally dispensed with and Mary was free to join him.
‘Sergeant Meade sends his apologies,’ Blackstone said. ‘He wanted to be here himself, but he couldn’t make it.’
He had left it vague, hoping that the widow would, too.
But that kind of evasion seemed not to be a part of Mary O’Brien’s nature, and instead of simply nodding, she said, ‘What I think you mean, Inspector Blackstone, is that Alex is following up a lead in the investigation into my husband’s murder.’
‘Yes, that is what I mean,’ Blackstone admitted.
‘I’m glad he couldn’t come,’ Mary O’Brien said. ‘He’s worshipped my husband, you know, ever since Patrick addressed his Harvard debating society. He would have found the funeral very hard to take.’
She’d hit the nail on the head, Blackstone thought admiringly. Meade’s staying away had had nothing to do with his being the best man to watch the brothel. He hadn’t come to O’Brien’s funeral because it would have been too painful for him to come.
‘But it was very good of you to act as his representative,’ Mary O’Brien said. ‘I want you to know that it’s very much appreciated.’
‘It was the least that I could do out of respect for a fellow officer,’ Blackstone replied.
And the moment the words were out of his mouth, he knew he’d made a mistake — knew that he’d inadvertently reminded Mary of something she’d probably been trying very hard to forget.
‘It is a pity that most of his brother officers in the New York Police Department did not feel under the same obligation as you do,’ Mary said, confirming his worst fears. Then she paused for a second, before continuing. ‘Do you think I sound bitter?’
‘Perhaps,’ Blackstone said carefully. ‘And if you are, then I think you have every right to be.’
‘I’m not bitter at all,’ Mary said, with what seemed to a fierce conviction. ‘And shall I tell you why?’
‘If that’s what you want to do.’
‘I have always believed that we must do the right thing, however much inconvenience — however much pain and suffering — that might cause us,’ Mary told him. ‘And Patrick — though he was sometimes weak, as we are all sometimes weak — did just that. So you see, Mr Blackstone, the fact that there are so few policemen here is not to be taken as an insult to his memory — it is a rather to be regarded as a tribute to the way in which he did the right thing, whatever the cost to himself.’
‘I’m sure that’s true,’ Blackstone said.
But he was thinking, it still hurts you, though, doesn’t it, Mary? You’d still have liked to see those ranks of blue standing by t
he grave.
‘And now that I have buried my husband, I must bury poor Jenny,’ Mary O’Brien said. ‘And I would like to do that as soon as possible. I have a new life ahead of me — a hard one, it is true, but one which must be lived, nevertheless — and I can’t begin that journey until Jenny is laid to rest.’
‘I can understand that,’ Blackstone said.
‘I knew you would. You are a kind man. A sensitive man. In that way, you share many of my husband’s qualities.’ Mary paused for a second. ‘Do you know when they will release Jenny’s body to me, Mr Blackstone?’
‘No, I’m afraid not,’ Blackstone admitted.
‘But, surely, since you’re a policeman yourself. .’
‘I’ve really no idea how they do things over here. But if you asked me to guess, I would say they’ll probably release the body as soon as the post-mortem has been completed.’
Even viewing her through her veil, Blackstone thought that Mary O’Brien looked shocked.
‘The post-mortem?’ she repeated.
‘In England, it’s customary, in a case like this. In America, for all I know, it may even be a legal requirement.’
‘Isn’t the point of a post-mortem to find out how someone died?’ Mary O’Brien asked.
‘Yes, it is.’
‘But everyone knows how she died!’ Mary protested. ‘There’s no doubt about it in your mind, is there?’
‘None at all,’ Blackstone answered. ‘She slit her own wrists. She even told me so herself.’
‘Then why can’t they spare the poor child that last indignity? Why do they have to cut her open?’
‘As I said, it’s probably the law.’
‘The law!’ Mary replied scornfully. ‘And when is the law ever enforced in New York City? Only when it’s convenient! Do you think the Carnegie family or the Morgan family would have to wait for a post-mortem before they were allowed to bury their dead? Of course they wouldn’t! Because they have power! Because they have influence! But because I’m a poor widow, I must wait — I must put off the moment when I can leave the past behind me and begin the struggle that will be the rest of my life. It’s hard, Mr Blackstone. It’s very hard.’
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