Manhattan Lockdown

by Paul Batista

  “I told him to be here.”

  “He isn’t.”

  “Have someone call that guy Rothstein, the joker, who’s always with Fortune. And tell him that I’m going to call the president in fifteen minutes unless Mr. Fortune is here or it’s confirmed that he’s on his way.”

  Lazarus stood at a window in a first-grade classroom that faced east. Directly across Madison Avenue was the quaint Crawford-Doyle Book Store, closed; the coffee shop at the corner of Madison and 82nd Street, which Lazarus had been told was a favorite place for tourists, was also closed. The explosions more than three days ago had been so powerful that the windows of the Nectar Coffee Shop were all shattered.

  The final death toll—final unless more bodies were found in the debris inside the museum—was 1,766 people, at least 300 of them from foreign countries. Lazarus, although he now commanded what was in effect a force of more than 100,000 agents, had never been in the military or a war. As he looked down 82nd Street toward Fifth Avenue, beyond which he could see a narrow segment of the broken stone façade of the museum, he detected an odor he didn’t recognize. He said to the armed guard who stood next to him, “What’s that smell?” There was a joke in his department that he was so security conscious, so concerned about his own safety, that he slept every night with fully armed guards on either side of him.

  The guard, who wore full combat gear, including a helmet, was a veteran of three tours of duty in Iraq. He hesitated before he answered. Although he’d spent hundreds of hours with Harlan Lazarus, Lazarus had never said a word to him. “That’s the smell of rotting flesh,” the guard finally said.

  Al Ritter, Lazarus’ chief deputy, walked into the classroom. “He refuses to come over.”

  “Refuses?”

  “Rothstein says that Fortune is calling a press conference in an hour to announce that the lockdown of Manhattan will be lifted in three hours.”

  Lazarus reached for the special cell phone he carried in a holster attached to his belt. There were only four numbers on that phone. One was President Carter.

  Ritter said, “There is something else I need to tell you, Judge, something we just learned. It concerns Raj Gandhi.”

  “And who is that?”

  “The reporter for the Times who posted the blog about the police commissioner.”

  “You mean the dead reporter? Gandhi?”

  “That’s right,” Ritter said.

  “So what is it?”

  “We’ve just arrested the killer.”

  “I’m just about to call the president of the United States, Al. Why do I need to know about this?”

  “Because the man we’ve arrested is a mobster, an ex-con, named Tony Garafalo.”

  “How the hell did an Indian reporter get killed by a mobster?”

  “He’s a special mobster. He’s the lover of Commissioner Carbone. In fact, they’re so close that she’s been keeping him at the Regency Hotel since Sunday. Apparently she can’t function without whatever it is that he’s been giving to her for the last year or so.”

  “Human nature,” Lazarus said, “is a marvelous thing.” He laughed. It was probably the second time in the three years in which Ritter had worked with him that he heard Lazarus laugh.

  “There’s more,” Ritter said. “Our people found out that Mr. Garafalo had been feeding his pillow talk with Commissioner Carbone to Mr. Gandhi. Apparently the commissioner becomes talkative when Mr. Garafalo does whatever he does to her.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Mr. Gandhi was a techie-kind of guy. He recorded every conversation he had on his cell phone.”

  “That,” Lazarus said, “can be a dangerous habit.”

  “It was. Gandhi was getting calls from a guy who imitated a crank from Queens or Brooklyn. Garafalo is the ventriloquist. Of course he never gave his name or said where he was getting his information. The commissioner must have whispered sweet nothings into Tony’s ears about the state-of-the-art dark prison on Pier 37 and her special anti-terror unit. Garafalo knew about the arrests of Arabs on the hit list Carbone’s people created.”

  “And this Italian guy told a reporter for the Times about this? Will wonders never cease? Why?”

  “Tony and Gina—sounds like the cast of Grease, doesn’t it—grew up together. Their families are part of the immense, closed-off Italian American tribe on Staten Island. Our intelligence people have quickly figured out that Garafalo, whose male relatives were always soldiers in the Gambino family, was upset, and that may not be the right word, when he found out during his trial that the then newly minted detective Gina Carbone was part of the large team that investigated him in the ’90s. He went to jail for seven or eight years for threatening people called to a special grand jury. When he came out, it so happened he met Gina at one of those big Italian barbecues. He had gone straight, he told her. He had taken a job at a Mercedes dealership. He is one extraordinarily handsome man. Carbone was attracted to him. She’s brave, she’s reckless. She’s also a devout Catholic. She believes sinners can be redeemed.”

  Lazarus’ arms were folded. “And Mr. Garafalo holds grudges?”

  “Big time,” Ritter said. “He was looking for a time and place and the right circumstances to hurt her.”

  “And where,” Lazarus asked, “is the commissioner now?”

  “We’re not sure. Until an hour or two ago she was with the mayor, at breakfast.”

  “I want her arrested, too,” Lazarus said.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CARL SCHURZ PARK was a gem which few people even in Manhattan knew. Gracie Mansion was at the northern end of the jewel-like grounds. The park was only the depth of a city block. It ran from Gracie Mansion to the far end of East 83rd Street. Quiet East End Avenue was its western border. To the east was the river and an esplanade that overlooked vistas of the river itself and in the distance the Triboro Bridge, the shoreline of Queens, Roosevelt Island and, to the south, the 59th Street Bridge. The park had graceful stone paths, ancient trees, alcoves with benches, flower beds, a small playground and two popular fenced dog runs, one for the big dogs and the other for the small dogs. There were sloping lawns where young men and women sunbathed.

  Roland Fortune, who took pride in knowing every street, park, and neighborhood in Manhattan, arranged for his press conference at the heart of the park. It was a stone and granite area next to the esplanade where two large staircases divided to lead to a gorgeous walkway that formed the main entrance to Carl Schurz Park at East 86th Street and East End Avenue.

  It was another glorious morning in the stricken city, slightly cooler than the three previous days. Through Irv Rothstein’s marvel of contacts with the press and Hans Richter’s magician-like tactical abilities, clusters of microphones and wires had been assembled in an hour at the heart of the park so that Roland could stand with a background of flowers, trees, and the nineteenth-century stone walkways behind him. A city in which thousands of deaths had just taken place was made to appear like the most famous European capitals, the work of master landscape architects of the late nineteenth-century.

  It took fewer than three minutes for Roland, wearing a blue blazer, slacks, and a fresh white shirt, to walk from Gracie Mansion’s terrace to the press conference. The benign light from the early morning sun over the East River gave his whole presence a kind of relaxed radiance. Gina Carbone walked with him.

  Roland began, “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Consistent with my promises since the start of this crisis, I have current information for you. The first and most important is that I have issued ten minutes ago an order lifting the lockdown of Manhattan.”

  A small group of early morning walkers, for the most part people with their dogs, had gathered at the unexpected sight of reporters and the mayor of New York City suddenly materializing in their beloved park. There was applause.

  Roland briefly acknowledged the applause. “The lifting of the lockdown will take place gradually and in an orderly fashion over the next
several hours, beginning now. Commissioner Gina Carbone is here with me. Let’s be clear: her skill, ingenuity, and command abilities have made the lifting of the lockdown possible. Manhattan is safe enough to be reintegrated with the world.”

  Gina, who looked almost as radiant as Roland in the fresh sunlight, nodded and smiled slightly.

  “This is not to say,” Roland continued, “that the danger has passed. Over the last two days, the remarkable members of the New York City Police Department have engaged in war-like battles, all of which they have won, and they have thwarted attacks on landmarks of national, indeed international, importance, such as St. Patrick’s Cathedral. The commissioner, with the assistance of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, has ongoing efforts in place to trap and neutralize terrorists who may—and I stress may —still have cells in Manhattan or elsewhere in the city with more plans for assaults and mayhem. But we believe the major sources of danger have been eliminated or neutralized.”

  A reporter’s voice rang out. “Commissioner Carbone, what can you tell us about Tony Garafalo?”

  Roland said, “We are not here to comment on anything other than essential information. We’re not going to be distracted by trivia. The people of Manhattan are interested in one thing only, and that is their safety and the restoration of order, reconstruction, and the return to the wonderful vibrancy of this stricken paradise known as Manhattan. Even as we speak, the barriers at every bridge and tunnel are being taken down, although there will continue to be checkpoints at both ends of each tunnel and bridge to be sure that those who have done damage will be caught. There are no places where the evil can hide or to which they can escape.”

  Roland paused and extended his right arm. “You see around us here one of the gems of this city, Carl Schurz Park. There are thousands of miraculous places in this city. Several of them have been defaced and desecrated by the cowards who carried out these attacks. Every place that has been damaged will be restored. While we can never rule it out, Commissioner Carbone and I are confident that the people responsible have been arrested or are dead or that we know who they are and where they are. And, to them, we say, We are coming for you. There’s no place to hide.”

  Another reporter’s voice: “Commissioner, can you tell us when the dark prison on Pier 37 was built?”

  Roland said, “When I had the incredible good fortune to appoint Gina Carbone the NYPD Commissioner, my first and only instructions to her were that she had my complete support in achieving a single objective: protecting the people of New York City from anyone and everyone who would harm them. She was herself a warrior with years of experience in major combat operations in the first Gulf War combined with years of experience in the day-to-day operations of protecting the people of this city. Under her command, the rates for crimes ranging from fare-jumping to murder have fallen to levels much lower than those of cities with fewer than 200,000 people. We have more than seven million people who live here in the safety of ordinary times.”

  “Did you,” another voice asked, “know about the dark prison on Pier 37?”

  “In the final analysis, the responsibility for protecting the people of this city rests with me. I gave Commissioner Carbone the task of protecting the city as she in her experienced professional judgment saw fit to do.”

  “What did you know,” the same voice asked, “about Pier 37 and when did you know it?”

  “I knew there were secure facilities established all through the five boroughs of New York City, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island, Brooklyn, and Manhattan, that were designed by the commissioner to give her and her force of almost 40,000 officers the ability to deal with the dangerous unpredictabilities of the world in which we all live. As I now understand it, Pier 37, an abandoned warehouse on the East River waterfront from the era of the classic On the Waterfront film, was reconfigured to serve emergency purposes. I have never set foot on Pier 37. If it was reconfigured by the commissioner, she did that under the general mandate I gave her. She, in other words, had my complete approval.”

  “What about the secret arrests and torture reported on the Gandhi blog?”

  “I’m assured there were no secret arrests. Everyone—and there are hundreds of people—who has been arrested has undergone the usual processing even in these extraordinary times and either has been or will be brought before a judge for arraignment. Those judges will, as always, ask for pleas of guilty or not guilty and will apply the usual standards that apply to bail decisions on whether to let an accused go free to await trial or to detain him or her. The issue for the judge at that stage always is twofold: Is the person a danger to the community? Is that person a risk of flight? If he or she is one or the other, he or she will be detained. And all of this is a matter of public record.”

  “What about torture?”

  Just as Gina had instructed him, Roland answered, “There has been no torture. Certainly there has been questioning of detained people. And some leads have proven useful. They were voluntarily given, not forced.”

  And then another voice: “We understand just now that the FBI has arrested Antonio Garafalo, a close friend of the commissioner, for the murder of Raj Gandhi, an investigative reporter for the New York Times.”

  Roland Fortune was a consummate actor. He made believe the question hadn’t been asked and he made other people believe the same thing. “Even as we speak, delivery trucks containing all the myriads of essential products on which the people of Manhattan rely—food, water, flowers, and, yes, even beer—are arrayed in Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx and have been cleared for entry into Manhattan. Our stores will soon be replenished. The pulse of this vibrant city will soon return to normal. Any threats will be stifled. The only changes Manhattanites will see that will make the city different from the tranquil world of four days ago will be the welcome presence on every street corner of soldiers, police, and military equipment.”

  Roland raised his left arm, an embracing gesture. “Manhattan will soon be what it always has been. The streets will be alive with all of our vibrant residents. The subways will reverberate under us, like the flow of blood through healthy, vigorous bodies. Tourists from every nation will fill our streets. Yes, we will have all the noise, the excitement, and all the quiet places of refuge, the museums, the parks, the book stores, the irreplaceable diners, that provide the texture of this greatest of all cities.”

  As had so often happened in his flawless and charmed career, Roland Fortune smiled at the reporters gathered in front of him, a motley group of some well-dressed men and women who could have passed for bankers to scruffy people who seemed to have been transported in time from Berkeley in 1968, and said, “Thank you all for coming. Relax, resume your lives.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  THE PRIVATE CORPORATE jet seated just twelve passengers. The aircraft bore no external markings or seals except for the name of the manufacturer Bombardier, the Canadian company selected by the Secret Service for the rapidly assembled flight on the theory that its most important passenger would fly only on a North American-constructed corporate jet. There was not a single symbol of American power or prestige or presence on the jet’s gleaming surfaces.

  President Andrew Carter, as he glanced from the window, was struck again by how the New Jersey Meadowlands, whether he saw them from the ground or the air, were one of the most desolate areas in America. As the jet gradually slowed for its descent into the small Teterboro airport in northern New Jersey, it was less than two thousand feet above the expanse of Meadowlands that always made him think of the title to the Eliot poem The Waste Land. Still-polluted rivers and streams ran through the reeds. There were ragged open areas where car and truck dumps were fully exposed, rusting. Unadorned and anonymous warehouses whose flat roofs were at least two acres large were scattered among the reeds and filthy swamplands. Even the new professional football and basketball stadiums, fed by long ribbons of new highways, looked from above like Lego toys, a failed effort to create a Disneyland in a wastela
nd.

  As the jet banked just slightly, that most spectacular of all man-made views in the world came suddenly into sight: the island of Manhattan. Carter scanned the city skyline beginning at lower Manhattan. The new World Trade Center tower, a triangular, multi-sided building that glinted like a sword and was topped by an immense antenna, dominated the downtown collection of tall office buildings. Then, slightly farther to the north, the skyline gradually declined in the older areas of Tribeca, Soho, and the West Village.

  The president and the passengers on his side of the jet all stared at the familiar, always magical sight: the Empire State Building, still stunning and sleek; the Chrysler Building whose top resembled frozen lava; and the triangular heights of the modern green-tinted Citibank Building. For the first time Andrew Carter saw the new slender apartment building that rose like a needle more than ninety stories above 57th Street. It was black, so tall and thin that it was eerie.

  When the jet made its final adjustment for the landing at Teterboro, the Manhattan skyline slid out of view, like a magical illusion. The president settled into his oversize seat and strapped and snapped on his seat belt. To his right was Roger Fitton, the secretary of defense whom Carter had privately decided to fire just a week before the assault on Manhattan. On the president’s left, in full formal military clothing, was dour, determined General Malcolm Foster, that scrawny native of West Virginia the president completely trusted even though the two men couldn’t have been more different. Carter was naturally eloquent; Malcolm Foster spoke only when he had a fact to convey. Secret Service agents sat silently in the rows of seats behind and in front of the president of the United States.

  The perfectly engineered Bombardier was as quiet as a glider plane when it was two miles from Teterboro. Suddenly Roger Fitton, who had taken a three-minute call on his cell phone, said, “Mr. President, your favorite mayor just finished a press conference.”