I moved around the tight space, running my hands over the concrete walls, trying to find anything that could be a lever or pressure point. I knocked on the walls and stamped on the floor but heard only solid thunks. Panic rose again, but I pushed it down. There had to be a way out. This place was just a foyer to something bigger. It had to be. I went over the whole room once. Then again. And again. After about a half an hour, the room was becoming stuffy. There was no air coming from anywhere. "I'm going to die here. No you're not. Shut up. Don't be dramatic. Don't be dramatic. I'm in a fucking coffin. Shut up. OK. OK. You're going to be OK."
I sat down on the floor and concentrated on calming myself down. Deep breaths in…and out…and in…and out. I took a yoga class once on one of my I'm-going-to-get-in-shape kicks, and the instructor taught us some breathing techniques that I tried to remember. The teacher was this elastic, dark-haired beauty who kept saying, "Good. That's good, guys," Even when she was demonstrating something, she would tell us we were doing great. In…and out…and in…and out.
I opened my eyes to the small, dark room. "I'm going to get out of here," I told it. I stood up and walked the perimeter again. There had to be something. I looked at where the column entered the floor. I touched it. My fingers came back covered in oil. Someone had to oil it. Oil didn't just get on columns by itself, right? A machine like this had to be maintained. There was no point in having a complicated platform-lowering machine unless it led somewhere. I put my hand back on the column. I felt around the base. There was a slight draft. I breathed in deeply. There was a way out. I just had to find it.
Another walk around the room. The walls, the floor, and the ceiling were all rough concrete. I ran my hands along the uneven surfaces. I closed my eyes and put both hands on a wall. I pushed. Nothing. I pushed harder, still nothing. I went to the next wall and tried it again. Nothing. The third wall I pushed moved back with a lurch. I snapped my eyes opened. A breeze hit my face and I filled my lungs with the air. It smelled of mold, dirt, and damp. I pushed harder. The whole wall moved back another foot. A string of bulbs illuminated a long hall that ended in what looked like elevator doors.
There is Only One Residence in the Park
I walked down the hall, constantly turning back to see that my wall was still open. I reached the doors and pushed an unmarked button next to them. The doors opened. Inside was a silver room that had to be an elevator. I stepped in. There was no panel of buttons, but after the doors slid shut, I felt it move up. Moments later I was standing at the entrance to a study. A large, dark, wooden desk faced me. On the walls, paintings of Revolutionary War battles hung. Ships cannoned each other in the dark night, illuminated by orange bursts of ammunition. I stepped into the room, the elevator doors closed behind me, then two bookcases moved to cover the doors.
I walked to the window. A manicured lawn dotted with statues, and in the distance, Hell's Gate. As far as I could tell, the building was in the park. So I wasn't in Eighty-Eight East End anymore. But what building was in the park? There is only one building in the park--Gracie Mother-fucking Mansion. The door opened behind me, and the mayor of New York City walked into the room.
He stared stock-still, the door open behind him, one foot in the room, one out. He looked shorter than on TV, but there was no mistaking his stocky frame, his thinning blond hair and his famous blue eyes. "Books move," I said and pointed at the bookcases hiding the entrance to the elevator. His eyebrows moved together to form a confused expression. "The books move," I tried again and pointed enthusiastically at the shelves. His eyebrows got closer.
"There's an elevator," I managed. His face broke into the most wonderful, charming smile, and I suddenly wished I had a baby so that he could kiss it.
"I don't know how you got in here," he laughed a conspiratorial laugh, "or why, but I like you." He nodded, agreeing with himself.
"I voted for you."
"Thank you." He looked genuine when he said it.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know I was breaking into your house. There's an elevator behind those books." He walked over to his desk and opened a drawer, then closed it.
"I don't know about that." He laughed again. "But one thing I do know is that you are very creative." Two security men--huge, hulking men in dark, ill-fitting suits--burst through the door. They didn't pause; they didn't talk; they rushed me. I hit the ground hard. One was on my chest, and I could barely breathe. The other pointed a gun at me.
"Don't move!" the one on my chest yelled in my face. His breath huffed and puffed onto my cheeks. I gasped for air.
"You're under arrest," the one with the gun told me. I gasped for breath.
"Don't hurt her," I heard the mayor say. I squeaked. I saw spots. "You're crushing her."
"Sir, we need to evacuate you," I heard a woman's voice say.
"Don't be ridiculous. She's just a confused girl."
"Don't move."
"Can't breathe."
"Dammit, she can't breathe."
"Sir, we need to evacuate you."
"Get off her."
"Sir. I must insist."
"Get off her." The large man was suddenly off me, and I coughed, desperate for air. I felt bruised and unable to breathe. "Are you OK?" Those famous blue eyes searched my face. He was down on his knees, holding my shoulders. "You're going to be OK. Breathe slowly. Slow." I tried to take my time, but panic seized my lungs and I couldn't breathe. "You got the wind knocked out of you. It will pass," he told me, but it was not the blow that was constricting my breath. It was fear. I knew that hot breath. I recognized the man who had bowled me over. He was that faceless, hulking figure who barreled off the train away from me, and now I was on the floor in front of him without my breath. "Slowly," Kurt Jessup told me again, "slowly." The big man watched me watch him. Did he know I knew who he was? Gasp. "Slowly." Jessup massaged my shoulder. Gasp. And what about this guy? He was the big man's boss, Gasp. He had to be involved. Breathe, breathe, breathe.
The mayor stood up and offered me his hand. I took it, and he pulled me off the floor. A woman with a pinched face and an expensive red suit stood next to the desk, trying to hide her indignation. The mayor turned to his bodyguards.
"Thank you, gentlemen. You can wait outside." They left without a word, but my attacker scowled as he followed his partner out the door. His retreating back was hauntingly familiar. "Samantha, you can go, too. Thank you for responding so quickly." Her nostrils flared, but she left, leaving us alone again. "Now, what's this about an elevator?" he asked, smiling.
"Um. There's an elevator behind the bookcase," I said, unsure how to act or what was happening.
"Who told you that?"
"No one. I found it. It connects to the basement of Eighty-Eight East End Avenue."
"Really?"
"Yes."
"Will you show me?"
"I don't know how to open it."
"I think if you opened it once, you can open it again." He smiled at me.
"I can try."
"That's all anyone could ask." I walked over to the bookcases and stared. Did he really not know how to open the thing? Was there any doubt that he was involved in this? He'd known both victims; he had a secret tunnel leading from his office to the basement of Eighty-Eight East End. Was there any way he was innocent?
"As you can tell, I'm a little obsessed with the Revolutionary War," the mayor said behind me. I scanned the books, Great Ships of the Revolutionary War, The Turning Point of the War for Freedom, A Guide to Revolutionary War Battle Sites.
"I see."
"I am especially interested in the ships of the period. I'm an avid sailor and diver, you know."
"I've heard that," I said, pretending I didn't know about him and Tate being scuba buddies. As if I didn't suspect they'd found the Hussar.
"You know, this area, the whole Hudson Valley, was crucial to the Revolutionary War," he said. I turned to see him looking at me expectantly, leaning lazily against his giant desk.
"
I remember something like that from school, I guess." He took this to mean I was interested.
"You know, the H.M.S. Hussar sank right there." I was looking at a wall sconce to the left of the bookcase, wondering if it was a lever that would reveal the elevator, so didn't see where he was pointing, but I knew he meant Hell's Gate. "She was a British ship. Part of a Cork fleet. They were privateers, which is pretty much the military version of pirate ships." I pulled on the sconce, then pushed on it. "The Hussar is not famous for any great battle she was in or her effect on the outcome of the Revolutionary War, but rather for the amount of gold and treasures that were on board when she sank." I moved to the other side of the bookcases to the sconce's twin. I said nothing, but my mind was racing.
"It is said that the Hussar went down with not only the payroll for the British troops on board, but also commandeered treasure from several American ships. Some say one-and-a-half billion dollars' worth of treasure rests at the bottom of Hell's Gate." Why was he telling me this, I wondered. The sconce had a brass base from which an elegant arm curved toward the ceiling. On top, a white shade rested on a low-wattage bulb.
"Of course, with all of the changes made to the East River since 1780, it is highly unlikely that the wreck is still there." I pulled on the sconce. "The rock the ship struck that caused its sinking doesn't even exist anymore." I pushed on the base. "It was destroyed when Hell's Gate was cleared in the mid-1800s. You know, it was the largest man-made explosion prior to the atomic era. It sent a 150-foot tower of rock and foam into the air. It's really quite a fascinating event in New York history. Do you have much interest in the city's history?" I was taking the shade off the lamp when I realized that he wanted a response. I turned to see him standing next to the giant windows framing Hell's Gate. The water swirled brown and silver behind him. He was smiling at me, waiting for an answer. He did not look like a killer, a monster who strung up his good friend and demolished the face of another. He looked like a history buff excited by his topic.
"I guess, as much as anyone else," I answered.
"You seem like a very curious person to find your way in here. That seems like the act of a curious person."
"I wouldn't describe myself as curious." I blushed and turned away. I didn't know what to do. Was he a madman toying with me, or a political figure trying to understand how I sneaked into his office?
"I have always found this city's history fascinating. History in general, of course, but New York's in particular. It is, after all, the greatest city in the world." I scanned the space between the bookcase and the wall. The cases had slid into place, so there must be some kind of track. I couldn't see one, but that didn't mean it wasn't there. I looked at the wall, the path the case would have to travel to reveal the elevator. It looked like a normal wall, white with a high baseboard and crown molding.
"Wouldn't you agree? Don't you think this is the greatest city in the world?"
"Yes. That's why I live here."
"Were you born here?"
"I moved here five years ago," I said without turning around. There was something discolored on the baseboard to the right of the bookcases. It looked like a shoe scuff, but I wasn't sure. I bent over to look at it more closely.
"That's one of the things I love about New York--everyone is from somewhere else. Even me," he chuckled. "My parents brought me here from Germany when I was only six months old." The scuff was indeed a scuff. "Where are you from?"
"Beacon."
"That's on the Hudson, right?"
"Yes, about an hour north of the city."
"Are your parents still there?"
"No." I took a couple of steps back, trying to figure out what to look at next. The two bookcases and the two wall sconces were the only things on the wall. Paintings hung on all the other walls, but this one had large empty spaces on either side of the lamps.
"So where are--"
"Why are there no paintings on the walls?"
"There're lots of paintings on the walls." I turned to look at him. He was smiling at me as if I were a small and amusing child who had just mispronounced a word.
"There aren't any paintings on that wall." I pointed at the empty wall.
"I don't know. I don't do my own decorating." He shrugged his large shoulders and looked around the room as if he'd never been in it before. I looked at the other paintings of Revolutionary War ships blowing the shit out of each other.
"You picked the paintings, didn't you?"
"No. I have a decorator."
"Did she put in the bookcases?"
"No. He didn't."
"Anything else that came with the room?"
"Those lights," he pointed at the lights I had been toying with," and let's see. Oh, this." He walked over to a bust of George Washington that sat on a pillar next to an overstuffed armchair. I walked over to it and pushed on Washington's forehead. His head flipped back and the bookcases slid apart to reveal the stainless steel doors of the elevator. The doors opened, and the small cubed space of the mysterious elevator was exposed.
Big Surprise
"Oh, my God." The mayor was staring at the elevator, his mouth agape. I watched his face. Was this was really the first time he'd seen the elevator? He took a step toward it, then stopped and looked some more.
"Would you like to go for a ride?"
"Yes. Yes, I would." We stepped inside. He looked around us as the doors closed. "Where are the buttons?" he asked.
"There aren't any." The elevator started down.
"How deep does it go?"
"Not that deep." The elevator stopped and the doors opened. The long, dim hall stretched before us. I wanted to keep him in front of me, just in case.
"After you." The mayor stepped into the hall, and I followed. "This leads to a small and rather claustrophobic room up ahead. And then we catch a couch up one flight." The mayor turned around, a question on his face. "You'll see." We walked down the hall in silence. The wall was still open and we stepped into the anteroom. The wall began to close behind us. I took a deep breath and reminded myself that there was a way out.
"What's going on?" the mayor asked with panic in his voice.
"It's OK. This happened to me before." The door thunked into place.
"I don't like this." The mayor looked around the stuffy space, his eyes open wide.
"There's got to be some way of calling the couch down. See, this is the pole it will come down on. It's a whole section of the floor, really." Just then the couch began to descend. "Or maybe it's automatic," I said. He nodded but didn't speak as the couch clunked into place. "Have a seat." I motioned to the dusty paisley couch and the mayor looked at me. "It's alright," I assured him.
"I'm sorry. This is just a lot for me to take in all at once." He sat down. A dust cloud poofed up around him. "How long have you known about this?" he asked. I sat down on the couch next to him.
"I found it like an hour ago. I wonder who built it?" He nodded but didn't answer me. The couch began to rise. "I can think of a million reasons a person might want to get into Gracie Mansion, but who could build this kind of thing without it being noticed?" He looked up as we approached the room above. I tried to spy a glint of recognition in his eye but there was nothing. It seemed this was all new to him. The floor locked back into place, and we were in the room of abandoned furniture.
"This is a serious matter of security," the mayor said. "You haven't told anyone about this, have you?" he asked, looking at me as if I were a security risk.
"No. I'd just arrived into your office when you walked in."
"This is very serious." He stood up and walked around the room.
"I know."
"You can't tell anyone about this." He was pacing, head down, lips pursed.
"Do you want to see the path up to the street?" He looked up.
"Definitely. Lead the way." He motioned toward the door. I stood up and headed for the exit. The mayor followed. I heard him stop, and then I heard a scrape on the floor. A
s I turned back, a sign telling me that all visitors had to be announced connected with the side of my head. I flew into a high-backed chair. There was blood in my left eye. I tried to scramble up but couldn't control my legs. I looked down at my feet and didn't understand.
The mayor strode over to me in two swift, determined steps and picked me up by my throat. I clawed at his hands, digging my nails in deep, but his grip tightened. I choked for breath. His blue eyes glittered two inches from my face. I kicked at his knees and his shins. He stood his ground, a slow smile changing the shape of his face. I kicked harder, and his hands tightened. I felt my windpipe close. I struggled, but I just couldn't breathe.
It was as if I were in a horrible dream, one of the ones where you can't muster the strength to hit hard enough or scream loud enough, where you are paralyzed and there is nothing you can do. I let my hands fall from his. I could feel myself giving up, hoping to wake up. I closed my eyes and listened to his labored breathing as he struggled to hold me and squeeze me enough to kill me. That's what he was doing--he was murdering me right here with all this paisley. Kurt Jessup, the mayor of New York, was trying to end me. In that moment, something clicked. My body, drained of energy and oxygen, made one last attempt to keep breathing, keep going, not die. I brought my knee up into his balls.
He cried out the way men will when you knee them in the balls. I pulled away from him. He dropped me, and I hit the ground gasping. Backing away from him on my hands and knees, my brain moving more slowly than my body, I grabbed at my bag. He recovered quickly and came at me again.
His fist connected with my cheek, sending me reeling with spots of light in my eyes, but it didn't hurt. Nothing hurt. I found the Taser in my bag and turned back on him as he grabbed my arm and began to haul me up. I fixed the device on his stomach and pressed the button. He went rigid. His eyes bulged from his tan face. I pulled the Taser back and stuck it to where I thought his heart would be and pressed the button again. I felt his shaking. He fell onto his face on the floor. I put the prongs to the back of his neck and zapped him one more time.