Cleopatra’s Dagger, page 15
A decade earlier, at Kit Burns’ Sportsman’s Hall, terriers were pitted against rats in a brutal death match. (The most prolific of these dogs, a fox terrier by the name of Jack Underhill, reputedly dispatched a hundred rats in less than twelve minutes in Secaucus, New Jersey.) Burns was shut down in 1870 by the ASPCA, formed only four years earlier, but that did not dampen people’s appetite for illicit forms of entertainment.
The more unsavory establishments were located downtown, many on the notorious Bowery, while others were scattered along Broadway. Some of these dens of iniquity enjoyed enviable longevity—John Morrissey’s gaming house at 818 Broadway lasted for more than thirty years. Most of the public gambling “hells” were sordid establishments catering to drunks, sailors, and rubes, as well as unsuspecting tourists. The most infamous were little more than brawling dens along the East River waterfront. Anyone who stepped inside such a place risked being robbed, drugged, mugged, or murdered.
Gambling was also available to the well-heeled in the genteel mansions of Park Row. The gaming came with elaborate dinners, crystal chandeliers, and fine wines to soften the victims’ willingness to part with their cash. The surroundings might be lavish, but the result was the same: the house always won.
One of the most famous—or infamous—of these dens of iniquity was Harry Hill’s Concert Saloon, at the corner of Houston and Crosby Streets, where any woman who entered was presumed to be for sale. The “concert” part of the saloon usually consisted of several soused gentlemen on various instruments. The dancing, if it could be called that, was required of the men, and expected of the women. In reality, it was an extended form of foreplay, which might or might not lead to sex. Although not permitted on the premises, it was generally understood that if a gentleman left with a lady he had encountered at Harry Hill’s, it was to engage in some form of sexual congress. In any case, the gentleman was expected to buy drinks for the lady, as well as himself. Anyone not complying with these rules would be asked to leave, and if he had any sense at all, he would do so at once, as the second request might come with a more insistent physical component.
Apart from the usual gamblers, gangsters, and gawkers, Hill’s clientele included politicians, writers, policemen, and other members of “respectable” society. These gentlemen—and indeed, anyone favored by Harry—were permitted to drink without being required to engage a lady in dancing. It was not uncommon to see a judge, police captain, or well-known author lingering at the bar, although when the young Mark Twain accompanied some friends to Harry Hill’s in 1867, he left shortly after rejecting the advances of a rather persistent young lady, after realizing her true intent.
It was to this esteemed locale that Elizabeth repaired, armed perhaps with less knowledge than might be deemed advisable for a young lady unaccustomed to such places. But such young ladies did not often carry weapons in their purses, Elizabeth thought as she felt the reassuring hardness of her grandfather’s Stormdolk. She paused for a moment outside the establishment, recognizable by the singular red-and-blue lantern hanging over the entrance. The night was warm, and raucous laughter, shouting, and singing crested over the strains of an out-of-tune piano and a tinny violin cranking out “Buffalo Gals.” Drunken voices in various stages of tunefulness bleated out the lyrics.
Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight
Come out tonight,
Come out tonight?
Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight
And dance by the light of the moon?
It occurred to her that this was a terrible idea, an utterly foolish notion. It was suddenly obvious that, even with a dagger in her purse, she would be better off turning around and going straight home. Sweat bloomed on her palms, her breath quickened, and she felt dizzy. Elizabeth was not the same person she had been the day before; she would never be that person again. A part of her had been sliced away. The easy confidence she’d once worn like a protective cloak was gone forever. Why had she not waited a day, until she could ask Freddy to join her? He would have agreed, and his presence would have made all the difference. Inside the saloon, there was the sound of glass breaking, followed by bellows of laughter.
“How would your mother react if she knew what you were up to?” said a voice behind her. She turned to see Carlotta, a half smile on her face.
“I expect she would throw a fit.” Elizabeth looked back at the saloon, its windows blazing with light. “I must apologize for the way I treated you earlier. You did not deserve it.”
“I quite agree.”
“Yet you came here to meet me.”
“You told me at your flat you were going here.”
“But why did you—”
“Because I know you did not mean what you said. Something is troubling you, and—”
“Please do not inquire further.”
“I was about to say that, therefore, I forgive you. And you do not have to go in there—you can still back out. There is no need to prove yourself to me or to anyone.”
“You can leave if you wish, but I intend to follow through,” Elizabeth said firmly, in an attempt to inspire herself with confidence. In spite of her bravado, her stomach felt hollow and her legs weak.
“I’ll not desert you,” said Carlotta. “Lead on, Spirit.”
Elizabeth recognized the quote from A Christmas Carol. “I thought you were Jewish.”
Carlotta rolled her eyes. “Yes, but I read.”
Taking a deep breath, Elizabeth squeezed through the narrow side door next to the main entrance. A handwritten sign over it read “Women Only”—men were expected to come in through the front door, where they were charged twenty-five cents for the privilege. The side entrance led the women up a short, rickety staircase. After climbing the uneven steps, which seemed hardly fit to bear their weight, they emerged onto the main floor of the saloon.
The scene they encountered was like something out of Dante’s Inferno. Several of the Seven Deadly Sins were on bold display, most prominently lust, closely followed by gluttony, in the guise of reckless consumption of alcohol. The room was plainly furnished. Apart from the boxing posters plastered on the walls, the decor consisted of little more than simple wooden tables and empty beer barrels, with a few chairs scattered along the edges of the hall. It was packed with members of both sexes. The men were somewhat older than the women, who were festively dressed, some quite expensively. The men had the hungry look of underfed dogs, while the women displayed a false gaiety covering a watchful wariness. The more intoxicated ones looked more vulnerable, their inhibitions dulled by drink.
The room was clotted with bodies and cigar smoke; a long bar stretched along one wall, while a stage took up the one opposite. Upon it were seated a handful of unenthusiastic-looking musicians. The violinist, a cadaverous man in a mangy toupee, sawed away at his instrument stoically, while a pudgy pianist pounded the keyboard with fingers as thick as sausages, a bowler hat perched rakishly upon his head. A third man stroked a bass violin with a languid look on his long, clean-shaven face.
The patrons were either dancing, drinking, or singing, some engaged in all three at once. A few muscular men roamed the room watchfully—Elizabeth took them to be Harry Hill’s famed bouncers, charged with enforcing the rules posted on the large sign tacked to the wall: “PEOPLE WHO ARE DRUNK MUST LEAVE THE PREMISES.”
Looking at the hooting, hollering clientele gallivanting around the dance floor, Elizabeth concluded that Harry Hill had a very lenient definition of being drunk. Waiter girls circulated the room. She imagined the fresh-faced girls ten years from now, the bloom of youth gone, struggling to make their way in a city that neither knew nor cared they existed. Now they were dressed in finery, swirling on the dance floor in the arms of some would-be swell in his cheap suit and cheaper shoes, feeling like the belle of the ball, but most of the men were there for only one thing. Down deep, the girls no doubt knew this, but they kept up a brave front, as if each of the young and not-so-young swains they danced with was a potential husband.
“What do we do now?” Carlotta asked as a couple of men approached the two women, grinning widely.
“How now, lovelies?” said the shorter of the two, a balding, bullet-headed man with a diamond tiepin and a swagger to match. “Never seen you two here before.”
The taller one was good-looking in a country-rube sort of way. His homespun suit was too small, gawky arms protruding from the sleeves, his bony wrists exposed. He stood by shyly as his companion strutted and chatted up the women.
“Live around here, do you?” the balding one said, licking his lips.
The women exchanged a glance when a third man approached, shouldering his way through the crowd so confidently that Elizabeth knew at once who he was.
Harry Hill was a squarely built, muscular man of middle years with short graying hair and a lined, expressive face. His burly build bespoke the boxer he used to be—his saloon was noted as much for its displays of pugilism as its prostitution.
“Well, now!” he crowed. “What have we here, eh? Two young lovelies, come ta spend the evening with ol’ Harry.” His accent was a strange mixture of New York working class and British—it was well-known that he’d been born in Surrey.
“I’m Elizabeth van den Broek,” Elizabeth said, offering her hand.
Hill seized her hand and shook it warmly. “Ah, yes, indeed—of the Fifth Avenue Van den Broeks. I know yer father—a fine gentleman, indeed! Welcome, welcome!” He turned to Carlotta, bestowing upon her a toothy smile. “And who might this be?”
Carlotta did not return his smile. “‘This’ is Carlotta Ackerman,” she replied tartly. “Of the Orchard Street Ackermans.”
“Allow me t’welcome you properly,” he said, completely missing her sarcasm. Wrapping an arm around each of their shoulders, he bellowed, “Come have a drink on ol’ Harry!” He escorted them away, much to the disappointment of their would-be suitors, who watched dejectedly as Hill whisked them through the haze of cigarette and cigar smoke toward the bar. Elizabeth felt many eyes upon them as they wove past groups of patrons, who momentarily interrupted their carousing to check out Harry’s latest favorites. He was known for taking a shine to certain guests, treating them with deference and respect. Of course, the fact that they tended to be members of society’s upper strata was no coincidence.
Hill’s words echoed in her ears. I know yer father. How, exactly, she wondered, had a man such as Harry Hill crossed paths with a man who was not only a respected judge but a paragon of integrity? She could not imagine her father setting foot in such an establishment, but the past twenty-four hours had shattered enough of her beliefs that she no longer trusted her own judgment.
“Come along, luv,” Hill said, pulling her toward a bar stool. “What’ll it be, then? Drinks are on ol’ Harry tonight!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“A drink on ol’ Harry” turned out to be a watery affair, a much-diluted glass of whiskey. Carlotta opted for gin, and Elizabeth doubted she had fared any better.
“Now then, what brings you to my humble establishment?” he asked Elizabeth. “I mean, bein’ as how you’re a judge’s daughter an’ all?”
Elizabeth set her glass of watered-down whiskey on the bar. The surface was sticky to the touch, tacky from years of beer steins and whiskey glasses. She resisted the urge to wipe her hands on one of the bar rags wielded by the tattooed bartender. Tall and ruddy faced, he had a tattoo of an anchor on one sunburned forearm and a mermaid on the other, so she took him to be a sailor. A long, thin scar snaked across his sinewy neck. She imagined how he might have received such a wound. For all she knew, after leaving Harry’s, he would venture down to Water Street to help shanghai some unlucky drunk into forced servitude aboard one of the many vessels docked there. He grinned at her, displaying a gold front tooth, but she avoided eye contact. Not to be discouraged, he turned his attentions on Carlotta, but was rewarded with such a withering stare that he nearly dropped the beer stein he was filling.
Elizabeth turned to Harry Hill. “How is it you know my father?”
Hill cleared his throat nervously. “Well, I mean, everyone knows yer father, yeah? He’s quite a respected judge, ain’t he?”
Before she could reply, there was a loud commotion on the dance floor. People stopped what they were doing to watch—a fight was considered good entertainment. Even the musicians stopped playing to observe the action, no doubt glad for the break.
The short pug-faced man who had been Elizabeth and Carlotta’s would-be suitor had squared off with another man, a middle-aged working-class fellow with a solid build and a bristle of blond hair.
“Git away or I’ll brain ya!” said the blond fellow. Elizabeth took him to be a farmer; his face and neck were sunburned, and he had the look of a hayseed, with powerful arms and strong, weathered hands.
“Oh, you will, eh?” said the bullet-headed fellow. “I’d like ta see you try!”
The farmer tore off his jacket and tossed it into the crowd. “I’ll make mincemeat out a’ ya!”
“Go on, then—take yer best shot!”
A circle had formed around the two combatants, with people shouting and cheering them on. A couple of men were hastily taking bets on the outcome. Even the women’s eyes were shining, as they slapped their legs and hollered as vigorously as the men. Clearly this was all good fun to anyone who attended Harry Hill’s.
“Get ’im, William! He’s just a country bumpkin!”
“Go on, then, Caleb—show the city boy who’s boss!”
“My money’s on you, Will!”
“Pound ’im to a pulp!”
Before they could engage in combat, Harry Hill launched himself across the dance floor, accompanied by two of his bouncers. Seizing the stocky fellow by the back of his collar, Hill lifted him as if he were a child. The man struggled to free himself, but Hill dragged him to the front door, tossing him into the street as if he were made of papier-mâché. Meanwhile, his two henchmen closed in on the farmer, escorting him somewhat less roughly to the end of the bar, where they allowed him to cool off a bit before ejecting him into the street.
There was a collective sigh of disappointment from the crowd as they saw their source of entertainment so quickly dispatched. The impromptu bookies sullenly returned people’s money, and everyone returned to their previous activities with somewhat dampened enthusiasm.
“Sorry ’bout that,” Hill said, rejoining the women at the bar. He had the same pleased-with-himself look Elizabeth remembered seeing on her border collie when he had successfully fetched a ball. “Now then, what was I sayin’?”
“You were telling Elizabeth how you knew her father,” Carlotta remarked drily.
“Never mind about that,” Elizabeth said, pulling the photograph of Sally from her purse. “Do you know this girl?” she asked Hill. He studied it a little too long, and she knew, whatever his reply, it would be a lie.
“Nope, can’t say she looks familiar,” he said, scratching his head. “But I get a lot a’ folks in here every night.”
“I was told she used to work here.”
His expression of bemusement deepened, and Elizabeth braced herself for the next lie.
“I don’t handle the hirin’ of our waiter girls. That job falls to Martin.”
“Can I speak with him?”
“He ain’t here tonight.”
“When will he be in?”
“Well, he’s here most nights, but he’s took to his bed a coupla days past—a touch of the lumbago, don’ cha know.”
Carlotta frowned. “Lumbago?”
“Yeah, torments him somethin’ awful. Gets worse in damp weather. Say,” he said brightly, “you wouldn’t be lookin’ fer employment now, would ya?”
“Certainly not,” said Elizabeth.
“She has a job,” said Carlotta.
“That’s too bad. I could use a coupla new waiter girls right now.”
“She’s a reporter,” Carlotta added.
Harry Hill frowned and scratched his head. “Fer a newspaper?”
“The New York Herald.”
He managed a smile. “How about another drink, then? On the house.”
“Thank you, but we must be going,” Elizabeth answered.
“What’s the rush? Stay awhile—have some fun! Things are jes warmin’ up.”
“Mr. Hill, I don’t think—”
“I’ll look after yer. Let no one say Harry Hill don’ take care a’ his friends!”
“Perhaps another time,” Elizabeth replied. “Good night, Mr. Hill.”
“It was a pleasure meeting you,” Carlotta said, shaking his hand, but her eyes were cold.
A few men whistled as they headed toward the exit, and one or two tried out some rude remarks as they passed.
“Hey, Red! Does the carpet match the drapes?”
“Heya, honey, how ’bout a dance?”
Elizabeth and Carlotta pushed through the weathered wooden door, which was dented and scarred from years of pounding by fists, boots, and beer steins. There were some deep cuts that looked like knife marks, and even a couple of bullet holes.
“He’s lying,” Carlotta said once they were outside.
“I wonder what he’s hiding,” Elizabeth mused.
The two women headed east on Houston Street. They had not gone far when a carriage pulled up in front of the building.
“That’s odd,” said Carlotta as a cadre of well-heeled young men spilled out of the vehicle, whooping and laughing. Most of them were dressed in evening clothes, sporting top hats and fancy canes.
“Indeed it is,” Elizabeth agreed, as a sudden wind whipped in from the west. Carlotta grabbed her hat to prevent it flying from her head. Elizabeth did the same and was about to fasten hers with a pin when one of the young swells caught her eye. Tall and gangly, he did not seem to fit his expensive clothing. She could not be sure in the dim gaslight, but he looked very much like Jack Astor.
