The Second Assassin

by Paul Christopher

  With the hood of the raincape tight across his neck and forehead, Bone crouched in the bottom of the boat, his legs curled around the duffel bag, his hand gripping the tiller of the electric outboard as he piloted it across the lagoon, trying to keep an equal distance between the curtains of spray around the perimeter and the potential disaster of the boat being silhouetted against the gas jets and the coloured sprays of water.

  According to his calculations, at full throttle it would take the little motor three minutes to run the length of the lake but Bone knew it could easily take another minute or even two at the half throttle necessary for the last part of the traverse. Although fewer people watched the show from the wide span across the river at the western edge of the lagoon, there would be some, and he had to guide the flatboat into the egress floodway on the first try. If he missed he would be seen and if he was seen he would be remembered, or worse, reported to one of the fifty or so policemen who patrolled the grounds.

  Still counting the seconds off in his head, Bone looked up briefly and was startled to see how close he was to the west-side floodway. He twisted the tiller handle sharply, cutting almost all the power, sliced through the misty curtain at almost the precise spot he’d aimed for and vanished into the darkness under the bridge. Less than ninety seconds later the thundering music reached its crescendo, timed to the blazing firework canopy high above.

  Then everything vanished in a single instant, the twinkling sparks of the fireworks winking out, the music falling silent, the roaring water from the fountains crashing down, all twenty tons of it slamming into the lagoon like a massive ocean breaker crashing against a cliff. Strangely, the sudden silence and the darkness was the most dramatic moment of the show and for a few seconds the crowd around the lagoon stood in stunned amazement and then burst into wild applause.

  As the people began to clap, Jane Todd felt a hand drop down onto the shoulder of her jacket. She turned to find herself staring at a dark-faced Sam Foxworth. Behind him was a quartet of clean-shaven, earnest-looking young men in dark, expensive hats and dark, expensive suits, and behind them was a pair of bulky, wide-shouldered men with harder faces and cheaper suits. The two larger men stepped forward.

  ‘Michael,’ said Hennessy, grinning coldly. ‘Come to arrest me, have you?’

  ‘You know this guy?’ Jane asked.

  ‘Michael Murphy,’ Hennessy explained. ‘Head of the commissioner’s Confidential Squad. Time was, we were pals.’

  ‘You’ve been suspended pending an investigation,’ said Murphy.

  ‘Investigation of what?’

  ‘Who’s to say?’ Murphy shrugged. ‘I was just told to bring you along.’ He poked a thumb in the direction of his burly companion. ‘Billy’s here to lend a hand if you get edgy.’

  ‘Not edgy,’ said Hennessy. ‘Just a little disappointed.’

  ‘I do as I’m told,’ said Murphy. ‘Are you coming along?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Hennessy. He turned to Barry. ‘My best to your lady friend,’ he said and went off with the two New York City detectives without a backward glance.

  ‘Speaking of your lady friend, where is she?’ Foxworth asked Barry.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Miss Connelly.’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘Miss Todd? Do you know where she is?’

  She nodded at Barry. ‘Like he says.’

  Foxworth turned to one of his men. ‘Is there a jail here?’

  ‘There’s a lockup in the administration building.’

  ‘Put them in it,’ said Foxworth.

  ‘What are you charging us with?’ asked Jane.

  ‘You’re not under arrest,’ said Foxworth. ‘I’m taking you into protective custody. If I think of something to charge you with later, I’ll let you know.’

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Saturday, June 10, 1939

  Red Bank, New Jersey

  Sir Alan Lascelles, Knight Commander of the Victorian Order, assistant private secretary to His Royal Majesty and English gentleman, stepped across the wooden railway ties, smoking a cigarette, enjoying the silence and the early-morning mist, wondering at the vicissitudes of life that could take you from Buckingham Palace and the corridors of power to a railway siding on the outskirts of the seaside resort town of Red Bank, New Jersey. Somehow it didn’t seem the sort of thing that would be included in your obituary in the Times.

  A tall figure wearing cavalry boots and a flat-brimmed cavalry hat stepped out of the fog in front of him, a rifle at port arms across his barrel chest and a holstered revolver on the hip of his dark blue motorcycle jodhpurs. He was a New Jersey State Police trooper, one of the swarm that had surrounded the train when it pulled onto the siding just before dawn. Lascelles had clearly reached the edge of whatever safety zone had been laid out by the local authorities. The trooper stared at Lascelles and Lascelles stared back, wondering how the man would react if he decided to continue his walk and go around him. Instead Lascelles deferred to the very large policeman, dropped his cigarette end on the cinders on the side of the road, ground it out with the toe of his shoe, then turned and headed back to the train.

  The last official day of the tour was clearly going to be arduous. Foggy or not, it promised to be another day of wilting heat. Even so Lascelles couldn’t help but feel relieved. The queen had managed to get in and out of Washington without offending anyone and the king had managed several private talks with President Roosevelt and a number of other key people, including J. P. Morgan of the Morgan Bank, several Vanderbilts and John D. Rockefeller Jr., head of the Chase National Bank and Equitable Trust.

  There had been another important meeting at the embassy dinner the night before, which the king and Roosevelt attended but which the queen, thankfully, did not. His Majesty had asked the advice of Lindsay, the ambassador, and the president regarding the possibility of the royal family going into exile, perhaps in Canada, in the event of war. Lascelles had kept his own counsel on the subject but Lindsay was quite blunt and so was Roosevelt. Even though His Majesty considered himself both ill-fitted and ill-prepared to be a king in wartime, the idea of him abandoning his people in their darkest hour would almost certainly be perceived as cowardice. To affect any lasting alliances he would have to remain in England until flight was the only option.

  Ambassador Lindsay quietly reminded His Majesty that the last English king to face invasion had been Harold II, who died at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, surrounded by a few of his loyal men. Roosevelt then graciously offered to give the queen and the two princesses, Elizabeth and Margaret, asylum should hostilities break out. The king just as graciously declined, knowing perfectly well that if he didn’t cut and run, then neither would the queen nor the little princesses.

  The subject was dropped, the guests at the embassy were rejoined for a final cocktail and then, just before midnight, the Roosevelts and the Lindsays accompanied the king and queen to their waiting train, which left the station a few minutes later, heading north towards New York. At 4:30 a.m. they reached the railway siding outside Red Bank and paused, waiting for daylight and their trip by motor car to the waiting warship docked at Fort Hancock on Sandy Hook, some twelve to fifteen miles distant.

  The observation platform at the rear of the royal train appeared out of the mist. Lascelles stepped around it and continued forward until he reached his own car. Another uniformed New Jersey trooper was waiting beside the metal stepping stool leading up into the car, this one without a rifle but with the same stern, automaton-like expression on his face. Lascelles found himself wondering if the men were chosen for the width of their jaws and the thickness of their necks. The trooper saluted and Lascelles climbed up into the car, looking forward to coffee and another cigarette or two before the king awoke and the day began.

  At five minutes to nine the royal train lumbered slowly across the train bridge spanning the Navesink River and pulled into the gaily decorated railway station in the little town of Red Bank. The entire town had c
ome out to see the train and its occupants. A great roar of applause broke out as the king and queen stepped out on the observation platform of their car. The queen, predictably enough, was wearing a blue ensemble complete with matching parasol against the threatening sun, while the king had chosen a dark grey morning suit and a grey top hat rather than a uniform since today’s festivities were relatively unofficial.

  The Red Bank Volunteer Fireman’s Band struck up ‘God Save the King’ and the royal couple stepped down from the train. The governor of New Jersey and his wife were introduced, followed by the mayor of Red Bank and his wife. After a few minutes of posing for the photographers, the king and queen were handed into the large Packard limousine awaiting them and the procession set off for Sandy Hook and Fort Hancock.

  As the lead car pulled away the king noticed a plump, well-dressed older woman at the edge of the greeting party arguing angrily with the Red Hook mayor and was informed that she was Mrs Charles English, the wife of the mayor of Asbury Park, a neighbouring town. The woman had apparently purchased an enormously expensive bouquet of flowers that were to be presented to the queen but the bouquet had somehow been waylaid and sent to the Red Bank police station.

  Driving along beside the widening river the procession of cars passed more cheering crowds on either side of the highway, once again held back by New Jersey state troopers, all of them armed with rifles, bayonets affixed. Even the strong police presence couldn’t detract from the scenery, much of it reminiscent of English countryside – rich green fields broken by darker patches of forest, parts of the road overhung by towering, ancient elms, their trunks and lower branches gnarled by time.

  Crowds lined the streets of every town and village, most of the spectators frantically waving handmade Union Jacks and cheering, some of them trying to sing ‘God Save the King’ and inadvertently switching to ‘My Country ’Tis of Thee,’ which clearly startled the king and queen, who had no idea that there was another song sharing the same tune as the English National Anthem. Little girls scattered flowers on the road in front of the advancing cars and everybody waved, including the inmates of a small country nursing home, most of them in wheeled chairs or cots assembled on the lawns.

  At the little village of Rumson they turned towards the sea and the landscape changed again, the narrow twisting roadway between the fields and trees giving way to a wide road and esplanade with a wide sand beach sweeping down to the sea on the right. The beach was crowded with morning bathers, who sprinted up to the edge of the road as the royal tourists swept by, the young men and women in their bathing costumes, sunburned and tanned, still dripping wet, contrasting wildly with the formal dresses, morning suits and top hats of the entourage. In the far distance, but visible now rising above the mists, lay the hazy New York skyline, a forest of slender towers like a city of ghosts on the horizon.

  The procession passed through the town of Sea Bright and continued northward up the Sandy Hook Peninsula to Fort Hancock, once part of the fortifications around New York and now a coast-guard station. Warped into the pier was the destroyer Warrington, its entire crew turned out in dress whites around the decks, saluting as the king, the queen and the rest of the entourage were shrilly piped aboard. A neighbouring escort cruiser, already waiting in the bay, let out a roaring royal salute of guns and at that same instant the royal standard broke from the Warrington’s yardarm, the first occasion in the history of the United States that the king’s flag had ever flown from any of its ships’ standards.

  As the Warrington moved out into open water pandemonium broke out over all of Lower New York Harbor. Liners, ferries, tugs and tramp steamers thundered and screamed their welcomes on horns and sirens. Ahead of the Warrington a pair of navy minesweepers cleared a path while astern and on either side an escort of thirty coast-guard vessels fanned out across the wide expanse of water. Overhead a dozen army air corps planes swung lazily back and forth in the brightening haze as the fog finally began to lift.

  Lascelles was summoned to join the king and queen, who stood side by side on the bridge, gazing ahead as they approached Manhattan. In the distance an overloaded tour boat chugged across their bows, the crowds of well-wishers on its upper decks causing a perceptible list even from almost a mile away. As it swung out of the Warrington’s path, hundreds of balloons were released into the sky, each one printed with the Union Jack.

  ‘Quite the we-welcome, don’t you think, Alan?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Lascelles said. ‘Quite exuberant.’

  ‘Exhausting is more like it,’ said the queen. ‘And this insufferable heat!’

  ‘Ba-bad luck, Buffy, I’m afraid.’

  ‘I think we should have been warned,’ the queen responded, giving Lascelles a pouting look, as though he should have had better control over the weather. ‘I don’t know why we have to go to this dreadful exhibition or whatever it is. We should have gone with the president and his wife to the country for the weekend or we should have started for home.’ She let out a long-suffering sigh and gripped her pale blue hat with one gloved hand as a gust of wind threatened to blow it off.

  ‘It’s a World’s Fair, ma’am, and attending it was Ambassador Lindsay’s suggestion some months ago.’

  ‘I’ve been to enough church fêtes in my time,’ said the queen. ‘I don’t need to see another, particularly an American one.’

  ‘This is something more than a fête, ma’am, if you don’t mind me saying. Considering the times the ambassador thought attending an international exhibition of this sort might do something in the way of fostering good relations between England and a number of other countries.’

  ‘Well, bugger Lindsay and his suggestions.’

  ‘I-I really don’t mind, dear,’ said the king. ‘And I’ve always ra-rather wanted to see New York. David used to say it was quite wonderful.’

  At the mention of her brother-in-law’s name the queen turned away, her expression cold. Any mention of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor was anathema to her and the king’s jaw tightened as he realised his mistake. ‘Sorry, Buffy,’ he said.

  ‘Quite all right,’ she answered, turning back to him and glancing at her husband’s secretary. She put on a small martyred smile, looking over the king’s shoulder at Lascelles. ‘It’s just that in my condition I’m liable to faint and I wouldn’t want to embarrass anyone.’ Lascelles turned away, flushing. Dear God, he thought, she’s having her Visitor or she’s with child.

  At eleven fifteen, already half an hour behind schedule, the U.S.S. Warrington eased gently up against the bunting-covered Department of Docks pier and dropped anchor. As the chains rumbled down a dozen bands struck up ‘God Save the King,’ all in different tempos and with variations depending on their sheet music, but it didn’t matter in the least since no one could hear them over the din of New York’s welcome to the royal couple. Car horns blared, another cannonade salute blasted out from the guns at Fort Jay on Governor’s Island, factory whistles screamed and bugles tooted – all of that in turn swallowed up by the thundering cheers from the immense crowd assembled in Battery Park and beyond.

  As the king and queen came down the gangplank and reached the three-hundred-foot-long red carpet laid out before them, Herbert Lehman, the governor of New York, stepped forward with an outstretched hand, followed by the squat, toad-like figure of Fiorello La Guardia, the mayor of New York City, a procession of other notables on his heels. The welcoming ceremony took precisely two minutes and the king and queen, the governor and the mayor walked slowly to the open car that was to convey them to the fair in Flushing Meadows. Behind the lead car, fourteen other limousines, all of them closed, waited for Lascelles and the other members of the royal retinue, traffic duty being attended to by a fully uniformed Lewis J. Valentine, commissioner of police. At his signal the whole parade of vehicles moved off, turning sharply north onto West Street and the elevated highway that ran along beside the Hudson River piers, rather than take the somewhat unsightly East River route.

  Special
Branch, the Secret Service and the New York police had all agreed that other than the threat from Russell in Detroit the king and queen would be most vulnerable on the ten-mile route from Battery Park to the World’s Fair site in Queens. La Guardia had estimated a crowd of more than two million, Commissioner Valentine had predicted three million and, in the end, there were more than four million New Yorkers crowded along the route. Thirteen thousand uniformed policemen, more than half the entire force, had been enlisted to man the wooden barricades to keep back the crowds. For the sake of security a speed of fifty-five miles per hour had been set for the motorcade and the attending squad of motorcycle outriders.

  The high rate of speed along the West Side Highway lasted for less than five minutes. La Guardia, making conversation from the small, uncomfortable jump seat facing the queen, informed her that a million people alone, many of them children, were assembled in Central Park. Hearing this the queen had a brief conversation with her husband, who in turn relayed a message to the driver of their car. The driver, Mayor La Guardia’s own chauffeur, immediately slowed to a more sedate, and visible, twenty-five miles per hour.

  Eventually, after wending their way up to Fifty-ninth Street and driving sedately through the throngs in Central Park, the motorcade turned east onto 122nd Street and headed for the Triborough Bridge. Twenty minutes later and almost a full hour late, the royal procession of motor cars reached the North Corona Gate and drove onto the site of the New York World’s Fair at last.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Saturday, June 10, 1939

  New York World’s Fair