Meanwhile, membership at Llenarch was slowing down, so Paul began working around the clock at Con Ed to try to keep up with his growing debts.
19
Uli felt a strange sense of calm when he thought about Paul’s relationship with Teresa. They worked really well together. And he took an immediate liking to her two kids. When she learned that he had moved out of his place to save money and was living in his Con Ed office, she insisted he move in with her.
One afternoon she popped in for an unannounced visit at his office and learned he hadn’t come in at all that day. Teresa had divorced her first husband for cheating on her; for this reason, she’d been discreetly checking on Paul every once in a while. Usually he was at work, but occasionally he would simply vanish. When he’d come home, he always seemed quiet, even contrite.
She started suspecting the worst and hired a private investigator. After a month, she learned from her gumshoe that Paul had attended ribbon cuttings for five new city parks and even the Triborough Bridge. The PI further reported that Paul would always stay in the back of the crowd and remain long after everyone else had left.
One night over dinner, she delicately confessed what she had done and apologized for it. He didn’t say a word.
“Paul, you have to push your brother out of your head. The feeling of betrayal will eat you alive. I know cause I went through this with Mike.”
“Envy, jealousy … that’s only a small part of it. When I see Robert and all he’s doing with his life … well, it’s the life I expected to live. His very existence is a monument of my failure.”
Driven by Paul’s growing despair, Uli became even more intent on making his own mission a success and finding some way out. As he moved in the direction where he had last seen the murderous miner, piles of stones started appearing in wooden boxes, which turned out to be desk drawers. They covered the ground, though there was not a soul in sight. He kept walking until he eventually came to a corner doorway that opened to a long, narrow corridor.
Inside the passageway, a massive hole had been cut right into the cement wall and the hard stone behind it. A stale aroma of concrete dust and decay vented out. The hole forked off into three different directions; with his flashlight he could see that two of them were dead ends. Following the third channel and passing by several dark caves, he could hear faint snoring and movement. Peering into one of the caves, he realized he was in the presence of sleeping bodies—this was some kind of dank, narrow bunk room. Uli tiptoed away, fearful of waking them.
He eventually counted six tunnels that went varying distances into the earth. The opening of one foul-smelling cave in a particularly remote section of the tunnel system was covered by old sacks hanging from the low ceiling. Pushing through and flicking on his flashlight, Uli could make out dozens of shriveled feet; bodies were piled sideways like cords of wood.
As he ventured forward, he heard more moans and a constant shuffling of feet. The tunnel pitched downhill at a sharp angle for about a hundred feet, then opened into a larger area that seemed to be another supply depot. In fact, it turned out to be a treasure trove of stock. Stacks and stacks of wooden boxes, presumably food, and green metal barrels marked FRESH WATER were piled to the ceiling.
To Uli’s horror, he discovered that what he had been hearing was a chain gang, a paddle wheel of filthy men and women—not particularly old, all nearly naked—shackled together at their wrists and ankles. Their lower quarters were spattered in dirt and excrement. They held wooden boxes and desk drawers loaded with stones and dirt. Uli watched them dump the contents of their boxes into a large pile in the depot area, then one-by-one loop back down into the same broad tunnel they had just exited—a human conveyor belt.
Strangely, though, there seemed to be no guards monitoring the activity. After twenty minutes, Uli stepped boldly into view. “Excuse me!” he said to one and all.
Some looked up as they passed, but no one said a word. They just continued dumping rocks and shuffling back into the service tunnel.
“Who’s in charge here?”
None replied.
“Are you being held against your will?”
Nothing.
Drawing closer, Uli realized two things: First, the workers weren’t really chained; they were merely tied loosely together with frayed rope. Second, they were all exhibiting some type of dementia or possibly late-stage Alzheimer’s. Uli shoved past the two lanes down a short tunnel in search of guards, or at least supervisors. Soon he arrived at a large dome-shaped room, where the tragic chain gang picked up boxes and then turned around. Not a single monitor or guard was anywhere in sight. As best as Uli could tell, each drone worker was simply following the lead of the person in front of him or her.
Uli squeezed past them back up to the supply depot.
Ignoring the human conveyor belt, he headed over to the mountain of stock. Unmarked wooden crates filled the place, much like those he had seen under guard at the depot near the catch basin.
Moving along the far wall of the room, Uli started looking through the crates. Most were filled with C-ration crackers straight from World War II. There were enough survival rations here to feed a small army.
A moment later, Uli tripped over a small pile of dirty metal rods—digging tools. A large case of candles and a small box of matchsticks were sitting on one of the crates. Uli pocketed some matches, then lit a single candle and rummaged through the stock for food. Aside from the ubiquitous crackers, there were boxes of aspirin, lime juice, and NoDoz. After chomping down two tins of crackers, he popped open one of the barrels of fresh water. It tasted heavenly. At that moment, a bedraggled young woman broke out of the line and grabbed Uli’s arm.
“Benny!” she groaned.
Jumping back in shock, Uli could immediately see that the poor woman was suffering from severe dementia. The rope attaching her to the chain gang had snapped. Gently pulling her off, he looked in her eyes and said, “I’m not Benny.”
“Where is he?”
“Waiting for you,” Uli answered, deciding that deception was kinder than the truth. He pointed her back toward the others and she slowly stumbled away. Uli returned to his crates.
A sudden loud crash was followed by low moans coming from a small utility closet. The poor woman was on the ground—apparently she had wandered inside and climbed up on something which then collapsed. After Uli helped her out and directed her back down the service tunnel from where she had come, he checked out the closet. Turning on his flashlight again, he saw that a large rectangular fuse box had been dislodged and was hanging by a bunch of old cables. The wall next to the utility closet had a stack of crates leaning against it. Moving them carefully forward, Uli discovered that the utility closet serviced an old freight elevator. When he located a pipe and pried open its door, he found that the elevator shaft was packed solid with concrete, utterly impassable.
20
If Paul’s mother had left him a hundred-thousand-dollar principal ten years earlier, Uli thought, it would’ve been a great help, but since it was the beginning of America’s greatest depression, there just weren’t a lot of good investments. And since Mr. Robert, of all people, had been assigned as the executor of his trust, Paul knew it would forever doom their relationship to one of suspicion and antagonism.
Robert deemed that the best investment he could find for his older brother was in purchasing a loft at 168 Bowery and letting the business that occupied the space pay out a monthly rent that more than covered the mortgage. This investment would be far safer than the stock market and would yield a larger return than any bank or bond. The problem was, the clothing company that occupied the loft was doing no better than the rest of the country. They had cut their staff down to a skeleton crew, and though they weren’t going out of business, they were hanging on by just a thread. After the first two years, they were barely able to make their rent. Paul was only seeing a fraction of the money that he expected. When he finally demanded to inspect a financial report of hi
s principal, he was horrified to see that both his brother and cousin—as well as a collection agent—were drawing income from his minuscule profit. Paul convinced Teresa to borrow ten thousand dollars from her father to help pay off his creditors.
By 1933 the Depression was in full swing and to Paul’s great dismay, Con Ed terminated his position. But the summer was a scorcher that year, and since he had already closed all the club’s side businesses, greatly reducing overhead, the pool actually started earning money again.
One morning in February 1934, Paul opened the New York Times to read that Robert was running on the Republican ticket for governor of New York. He closed the paper and shoved it into the garbage can without mentioning a word of it to Teresa. Upon learning the news later that day, she said that perhaps he should contact his sister. But he still felt betrayed by her because of the disinheritance.
“She always liked you, Paul,” Teresa argued. “Give her a chance.”
When he finally got up the strength to call Edna and ask about Robert’s run for public office, she said, “I learned about it in the newspapers just like you.”
Exasperated, Paul told Teresa that he didn’t want to hear anything more about Robert. Nonetheless, he continued researching his brother’s progress. Robert’s office published an aggressive campaign schedule to challenge the incumbent, Governor Herbert Lehman, who was trailing in the polls.
“If that son of a bitch gets elected,” Paul lashed out, “I’m moving to Pennsylvania!”
“Now just calm down,” Teresa reasoned.
“Don’t ever tell me to calm down!”
Over the next few days, she found him increasingly difficult to deal with. Paul was in an obvious slump. In the mornings he stopped getting dressed; he just sat around in his T-shirt and boxers staring out the window.
After a lot of thought, Paul decided that this was his lot in life. His younger brother was destined to be successful and he was doomed to live in his shadow. The sooner I simply accept I’m a failure, the easier life will be.
“I don’t think that’s true at all,” Teresa said when he shared his pessimistic outlook. “I just think he’s having his time in the sun. Think about it: You launched a great business smack in the middle of a terrible depression. Any other time and you’d have been right up there with Rockefeller. Just wait, you’ll have your day.”
Feeling as though Teresa was his only rock to stand on, he finally proposed marriage and she accepted. Not wanting to get another awkward rejection from Robert’s wife, Paul didn’t bother to invite his brother, though Edna came to the ceremony.
With a family to support now, Paul contacted everyone he knew, trying to reignite his electrical engineering career, but there were only a handful of places hiring someone with his broad expertise. That May, out of the blue, he got an invitation to have lunch with a mysterious Mr. Paul Windels. It turned out that Windels was a close personal friend of Mayor Fiorello La Guardia.
The “Little Flower” had a serious problem and had asked Windels to help him find the right man to fix it. He sensed that Con Edison was vastly overcharging the City of New York on its monthly electricity bill. Finding a properly qualified person who could prove such a thing would be a challenge in such a small, tightly networked profession. Despite this, Windels had been referred by no less than four different people to Paul Moses. All seemed to agree that he had the perfect combination of faith in the public trust and bottomless knowledge of such particulars.
“So he’s looking for a consultant?” Paul asked Windels.
“Actually, he’s looking to appoint someone as Commissioner of Water, Gas, and Electricity, but of course it doesn’t pay much considering the vast amount of work the post requires.”
It was the break Paul had been waiting for. He told Windels that he was very interested in the job regardless of the salary.
“You probably already know this,” Paul added, “but my brother Robert, who is currently running for governor, is the city’s Parks Commissioner.”
“Well, I don’t see how that will make a difference one way or the other,” Windels replied.
“We’re not on the best of terms, which doesn’t bode well for me if he becomes the next governor.”
“Actually, that might not be true,” Windels speculated. “If he does become the next governor, and polls are giving him the edge, he’ll have to resign his city post anyway.”
That evening over dinner, Paul shared the good news with Teresa. “The job doesn’t exactly come with a big paycheck, but it should make me highly employable for future work.”
Over the next two weeks, Paul was on pins and needles about the appointment. Several times, he had the urge to break down and call his younger brother to see if he could convince him to put in a good word, but he resisted.
One day, however, Windels called to say that La Guardia had unfortunately chosen someone else.
“Who?”
“Joe Pinelli?”
“Who the hell …?” He had never even heard of the man.
“Welcome to the world of politics. Pinelli is an ignoramus, he’s payback to some political boss in the Bronx. I think the mayor mentioned to some bigwig at Con Ed that he was about to hire you. They knew you’d crack down, so they agreed to roll back their rates, provided you weren’t hired.”
“This is unbelievable.”
“Well, it’s between us, because I honestly don’t really know everything that happened. All I know is that La Guardia picked Pinelli and Con Ed agreed to renegotiate their bill. But listen,” Windels added, “if it’s of any consolation, I can throw some consulting work your way.”
Paul felt cheated again, but he was too broke to turn down anything. Furthermore, he didn’t believe Windels had deliberately tried to screw him; he sensed his brother was somehow behind it all once again.
Paul did extensive contracting work for the city at a cheap rate, but it came to an abrupt end only six months later when Windels was dismissed.
Despite Paul’s attempts to turn his leisure club into a year-round social mecca for the northeast, a more modestly priced club opened nearby. With bankruptcy looming, he kept thinking, I had a moneymaker and ruined it.
During one particularly masochistic moment, Paul got in his car and drove to the first day of construction of Orchard Beach up in the Bronx. He watched as his younger brother was chauffeured in a huge Packard to the VIP viewing stand. La Guardia introduced Robert as the man who had single-handedly conceived of and found funds for this wonderful gift to the people of New York: “This is his very first outing as a candidate, so please give a warm welcome to the next governor of the State of New York, Robert Moses!”
As Mr. Robert appeared on the rostrum, and applause died down, Paul began to feel nauseous.
“Hello, ladies and gentleman,” Robert began. “As you all know, I’m running for governor of this great state with your interest at heart. As you might remember, I tirelessly worked as secretary of state under the great Al Smith … and before him I worked under Mayor Mitchel where I … I tried to devise a method of standardization to help eliminate bureaucracy … Well, that didn’t go too well … but, see, that wasn’t my fault. What happened was … well … it’s just too difficult to explain here and now … but if you look at the record, you’ll see that I was stonewalled time and again … It’s too difficult to explain, but let me assure you that this will not happen again if I am governor of this fair state. No sir.” Paul watched as his brother paused and stared blankly over the bewildered crowd. “All I’ll add is if you vote for me, you’ll greatly improve your own lot. Thank you!” Sweating profusely right through his shirt and cotton suit, Robert Moses stepped off the stage.
Paul found himself deeply moved by his brother’s awkward naïvete and began clapping, leading others to join in.
After the ceremony broke up, Robert hurried to his car, but Paul remained in the parking lot. At that moment, he knew there was no way in the world that Robert was going to win this elect
ion; in fact, he would never get elected to any public office. His brother was simply too dismissive of the working man and too arrogant to learn how to grovel.
Ecstatic when he got home that night, Paul relayed his brother’s public humiliation to his wife, who was only happy that he was happy. The next day, he called the Moses for Governor campaign headquarters and requested Robert’s entire schedule of public appearances. As time allowed, Paul would pop in at various appearances and was always pleased to see that even though his brother had shaken off his initial stage fright, he wasn’t really improving his delivery. If he wasn’t bored or arrogant, the man was simply hostile.
One day when Paul felt particularly depressed, he saw that Robert was giving a speech up in Nyack. He drove all the way there, only to discover that it was a press conference.
“Mr. Moses,” one reporter asked, “aren’t you concerned that your public works projects will take vital funds from welfare programs for the people of this state?”
“Please don’t bother me with moronic questions like that,” Robert replied. “The projects will help the people get work, period.”
“But Mr. Moses, Governor Lehman said—”
“He’s even less informed than you are, if that’s possible,” Robert grumbled back.
The man wasn’t merely a bad candidate, he was clearly resentful of the entire campaign process. Comments like “You won’t understand” and “Leave it to the experts” punctuated his extemporaneous remarks. Over the ensuing months, the polls gradually reflected his caustic personality. It was about six months into his run that Paul caught an article about Robert’s slipping numbers. He had now fallen behind the formerly unpopular incumbent. The election had been his to lose and now he was losing it.
The next time Paul saw Robert was at a synagogue in Great Neck. At the end of a wooden speech about how he would improve the economy, the candidate offered to take questions. Someone asked about his faith. Exactly how devout was he?
The Sacrificial Circumcision of the Bronx Page 9