Murder on Millionaires' Row
Page 33
The New York Times
October 11, 1885
THE GREAT MINE SPRUNG
A girl’s hand unlocking the mighty force
THE GRAND SPECTACLE WHICH A CITY TURNED OUT TO SEE—A SOLID WALL OF WATER HANGING TREMBLING IN MID-AIR—A SHOCK WHICH WAS FELT FOR MILES IN EVERY DIRECTION—THE SUCCESSFUL CONCLUSION OF NINE YEARS OF WORK
Three hundred thousand pounds of rackarock and dynamite, the greatest single charge of explosives ever used, thundered yesterday morning in the depths of the East River, and Flood Rock, the great barrier that stood at the entrance of Long Island Sound, was shattered into fragments. The long labor and thoughtful study of Gen. John Newton and his corps of assistants culminated in a momentary but magnificent display of upheaved waters, and another triumph of human skill over the resistance of nature was recorded.
Those who wanted to see the explosion sought the various points from which a good view could be obtained. Before 9 o’clock crowds began to move up town. The cross streets east of the upper end of Central Park were full of people moving toward the East River. Down town great numbers of people were climbing to the tops of high buildings. The bulk of the crowd, however, assembled opposite the scene of the explosion. Men, women, children, dogs, and goats mingled in one broad, variegated mass. Hundreds of people gathered on the tops of the big breweries and other tall buildings that loom one above another on the easterly decline of the city. Away up on the tops of chimneys and on the outermost pinnacles of roofs could be seen the irrepressible, never-to-be-left small boy, filled with the American instinct for getting to the top and looking down on the whole business. Trees had their usual load of sightseers and lamp posts were opportunities to be embraced with avidity.
People held their breath. Eyes were strained and riveted on the bare brown rock. There was a deathlike silence.
Away it flew, that viewless spark, to loose three hundred thousand chained demons buried in darkness and the cold, salt waves under the iron rocks. A deep rumble, then a dull boom, like the smothered bursting of a hundred mighty guns far away beyond the blue horizon, rolled across the yellow river. Up, up, and still up into the frightened air soared a great, ghastly, writhing wall of white and silver and gray. Fifty gigantic geysers, linked together like shivering, twisting masses of spray, soared upward, their shining pinnacles, with dome-like summits, looming like shattered floods of molten silver against the azure sky. Three magnificent monuments of solid water sprang far above the rest of the mass, the most westerly of them still rising after all else had begun to fall, till it towered nearly 200 feet in air. To east and west the waters rose, a long blinding sheet of white. Far and wide the great wall spread, defying the human eye to take in its breadth and height and thickness. The contortion of the wreathed waters was like the dumb agony of some stricken thing.
For a trembling moment the sublime spectacle stood sharp against the sky, like a mighty vision of distant snow-capped mountains. Then down, down, and still down the enormous mass rushed with a wild hissing, as if ten thousand huge steam valves had been opened. The yellow waters of the river were riven and torn into immense boiling masses of white foam.… And when the spray had sunk down and the waters of the river filled with brown mud lay boiling around the site of the great explosion, there lay the old rock, torn into myriads of pieces and scatted with débris, a ragged, smoking dun-brown mass.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ERIN LINDSEY has lived and worked in dozens of countries around the world, but has only ever called two places home: her native city of Calgary and her adopted hometown of New York. She is the author of the Bloodbound series of fantasy novels from Ace. Murder on Millionaires’ Row is her debut mystery. She divides her time between Calgary and Brooklyn with her husband and a pair of half-domesticated cats. Visit her online at erin-lindsey.com, facebook.com/ELTettensor, and twitter.com/ETettensor, or sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Map
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Author’s Note
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
MURDER ON MILLIONAIRES’ ROW. Copyright © 2018 by Erin Lindsey. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
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Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover illustration by Gary Redford
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-18065-0 (trade paperback)
ISBN 978-1-250-18066-7 (ebook)
eISBN 9781250180667
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First Edition: October 2018