Lethal Legacy
Linda Fairstein
When Assistant District Attorney Alex Cooper is summoned to Tina Barr's apartment on Manhattan 's Upper East Side, she finds a neighbor convinced that the young woman was assaulted. But the terrified victim, a conservator of rare books and maps, refuses to cooperate with investigators. Then another woman is found murdered in that same apartment with an extremely valuable book, believed to have been stolen.
Alex discovers that the apartment belongs to a member of the wealthy Hunt family, longtime benefactors of the New York Public Library. As Alex, Mike, and Mercer meet each member of the eccentric family, they like them less and less. But does that mean they could be capable of murder? The search for the answer leads them to forgotten underground vaults in lower Manhattan where the Hunt patriarch took his greatest secrets to the grave – literally.
In this beguiling mix of history and suspense, the New York Times bestselling author of Killer Heat truly outdoes herself as she takes readers on a breathtaking ride through the valuable first editions, lost atlases, and secret rooms and tunnels of the great New York Public Library.
Linda Fairstein
Lethal Legacy
Book 11 in the Alex Cooper series, 2009
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My earliest childhood memories of books are of those from which my mother read to me every night before I went to sleep. I still have the frayed volumes of poems by Robert Louis Stevenson and A. A. Milne, and the stories of Beatrix Potter and E. B. White. I remember the first time she took me to the public library in our small city, and with what delight I left that day carrying the three books the librarian entrusted to me. Our favorite weekly excursion-an hour of pure happiness with my mother-was the trip downtown to return the small stack I had selected and replace it with another.
Most bibliophiles love reading about books, too, and for me, the opportunity to do some of my research with literary treasures was a thrilling experience. One foundation for my exploration was a 1923 tome I picked up at an antiquarian book fair-Harry Miller Lydenberg’s History of the New York Public Library. I studied Phyllis Dain’s A Universe of Knowledge, Nicholas Basbanes’s A Gentle Madness, Ingrid Steffensen’s The New York Public Library: A Beaux Arts Landmark, and a slim little book published by Educare Press, The Waldseemüller World Map (1507).
One of the most riveting articles I relied on for an understanding of the world of rare map collectors appeared in The New Yorker’s Annals of Crime, called “A Theft in the Library” by William Finnegan. As always, my research notebooks were teeming with clippings from the New York Times, whether about the structural bones of Manhattan buildings or transparency in the boardroom’s of libraries and museums, or even the obituaries of long-forgotten individuals.
Perhaps the most extensive private collection devoted to cartography was in the unique library of England ’s Christopher Henry Beaumont Pease, the second Baron Wardington. The essay written by Lord Wardington for Sotheby’s 2006 sale of Important Atlases from his library captured the passion these treasures inspired, and the elegant descriptions in that catalog helped me design the volumes that line the bookshelves of my fictional characters.
My dear friends Cynthia and Dan Lufkin invited me to their spectacular apartment when they moved to a landmarked building on Central Park West several years ago. It’s still a mystery to me how elements of their stunning home took such a sinister turn in my imagination, but I am grateful for that introduction to the chapel over cocktails.
Dr. Cecilia Crouse, chief of the Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office forensic science laboratory, is a woman I admire enormously. She solves crimes, saves lives, does justice every day, and trains scores of young scientists to do the same. Cece is a great force for good against evil in this world, and she remains my DNA guru.
Paul LeClerc, President of the New York Public Library, has the most splendid professional home in America. He has called libraries “the memory of humankind, irreplacable repositories of documents of human thought and action,” and I agree with him that the NYPL is such an institution, par excellence.
David Ferriero, Andrew W. Mellon Director of the New York Public Libraries, was my brilliant personal guide through all the amazing wonders of the great library. The NYPL was founded in 1895, he said, with the mission of making the accumulated knowledge of the world freely accessible to all, without distinction as to income, religion, nationality, or other human condition. David knew that I was likely to invent murder and mayhem within the historic walls of the central library as a result of the time he spent with me, but still he led me from the rooftop to the basement stacks and through every secret passageway in between, and put me in the hands of each scholarly curator and conservator along the way.
My lifelong love affair with librarians reached a fever pitch while working on this book. David’s enthusiasm for the world he inhabits is impressive and infectious. He and Zelman Kisilyuk led me from the rooftop through the treacherous stacks with great care. Isaac Gewirtz educated me about the Berg Collection; John Lundquist let me explore the Asian and Middle Eastern works; Shelly Smith and her colleagues in the Barbara Goldsmith Preservation Division helped me understand the critical nature of their work-and the incomparable gift bestowed on the NYPL by Barbara; and Alice Hudson, and her assistant chief Matthew Knutzen, thrilled me with their displays of the breathtaking and vulnerable riches of the Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division. I borrowed a bit of Alice ’s wisdom and spirit to enliven the plot.
Everyone should have a friend like Louise Grunwald. She’s smart, beautiful, funny, wise, and fiercely loyal to her many, many friends. Her quiet generosity never ceases to amaze me, and she exercised it this time to open the massive doors of the NYPL and place me into the hands of David Ferriero.
My team at Doubleday-led by Steve Rubin and Phyllis Grann-is the class of the field in the publishing world and includes Alison Rich, John Pitts, John Fontana, and Jackie Montalvo. To Esther Newberg and everyone at ICM-especially Kari Stuart-goes my gratitude for helping make my dream of a writer’s life come true.
Wherever you are, use your libraries and support them. And when you are in New York City, come visit the great New York Public Library and behold its treasures.
My mother was the kindest person I have ever known, with the most enormous heart and a dazzling smile that invited all comers to share in her happiness. Among the very best things she ever did for me-and there are many-was to nurture my love of books and reading. She is forever, as I said in the dedication of my second novel, simply the best. Dearest Bobbie, rest in peace.
And like all the books before it, this one is for Justin, always-my first reader, my great warrior.
ONE
“I want you to open the door for me.”
Only silence.
“Look through the peephole,” I said. “I’m not a cop. I’m an assistant district attorney.”
I stepped back and squared off so the woman inside the basement apartment could check me out. The hallway and staircase had been cleared of men in uniform, including the detail from Emergency Services poised to knock down her door with a battering ram, which was there when I arrived at the scene a short while ago at one o’clock in the morning.
I didn’t hear any sound from within. No sense of her movement.
“My name is Alexandra Cooper. You’re Tina, aren’t you? Tina Barr.” I didn’t say what my specialty was, that I was in charge of the DA’s Office Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit. The police weren’t certain she had been assaulted by the man who had earlier invaded her home, but several of them thought she might reveal those details to me if I could gain her confidence.
I moved in against the metal-clad door and pressed my ear to it, but heard nothing.
>
“Don’t lose your touch now, Coop.” Mike Chapman walked down the steps and handed a lightbulb to the rookie who was holding a flashlight over my shoulder. “The money on the street’s against you, but I’m counting on your golden tongue to talk the lady out so those guys can go home and catch some sleep.”
The young cop passed the bulb to Mercer Wallace, the six-foot-six-inch-tall detective from the Special Victims Unit who had called me to the brownstone on the quiet block between Lexington and Third avenues in the East Nineties.
Mercer reached overhead and screwed it in, illuminating the drab, cracked paint on the ceiling and walls of the hallway. “Somebody-most likely the perp-shattered the other one. There are slivers of glass everywhere.”
“Thanks, kid,” Mike said, dismissing the rookie. “No progress here, Detective Wallace?”
“We haven’t got a homicide,” I whispered to Mercer. “And they sell lightbulbs at the bodega on Lex. I don’t know why you think we needed Mike, but please get him off my back.”
“Damn, I’ve listened to Blondie charm full-on perverts into boarding the bus for a twenty-five-to-life time-share at Sing Sing. I’ve seen her coax confessions from the lying lips of the deranged and demented. I’ve watched as weak-willed men-”
Mercer put his finger to his lips and pointed at the staircase.
“Tina, these two detectives are my friends. I’ve worked with them for more than ten years.” I paused to cough and clear my throat. There was still a bit of smoke wafting through the hallway. “Can you tell me why you don’t want to open up? Why it is you won’t trust us? We’re worried about your safety, Tina. About your physical condition.”
Mercer pulled at my elbow. “Let’s go up for a break. Get some fresh air.”
I stayed at the door for another few minutes and then followed Mike and Mercer to the small vestibule of the building and out onto the stoop. It was a mild October night, and neighbors returning to their homes, walking dogs, or hanging around the ’hood were checking on the police activity and trying to figure out what was wrong.
The uniformed sergeant from the Twenty-third Precinct, whose team had been the first responders, was on the sidewalk in front of the building, talking to Billy Schultz, the man who had called 911 an hour earlier.
“What’s the situation behind the house?” Mike asked Mercer as I caught up with them on their way down the front steps.
“Two cops stationed there. Small common garden for the tenants. Back doors from both the first floor and Barr’s basement apartment, but no one has moved since they’ve been on-site.”
“What do you know about the girl?”
“Not much. Nobody seems to,” Mercer said. He turned to the man standing with the sergeant, whom I guessed to be about forty, several years older than Mike and I. “This is Mike Chapman, Billy. He’s assigned to Night Watch.”
Mike worked in Manhattan North Homicide, which helped staff the Night Watch unit, an elite squad of detectives on call between midnight and eight a.m., when precinct squads were most understaffed, to respond all over Manhattan to murders and situations, like this one, that the department referred to-with gross understatement-as “unusuals.”
“Billy lives on the first floor,” Mercer said. “He’s the guy who called 911.”
“Good to meet you,” Mike said. He turned to me. “What’s her name?”
“Tina Barr.”
“She your friend?” he said to Billy.
“We chat at the mailboxes occasionally. She’s a quiet girl. Keeps to herself. Spent a lot of time gardening on weekends in the summer, so I ran into her out back every now and then, but I haven’t seen her much since.”
“Lived here long?”
“Me? Eighteen years?”
“Her.”
“Tina sublets. A year, maybe more.”
Mike ran his fingers through his thick black hair, looking from Billy to me. “You sure she’s in there?”
“I could hear a woman crying when I first got here,” I said. Whimpering was a more accurate word.
“Tina was sobbing when I knocked on her door,” Billy said.
“But she wouldn’t open up for you?”
Billy Schultz adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose while Mike scrutinized him. “No, sir.”
“Why were you knocking? What made you call 911?”
“Mercer gave us all this, Mike. Let me get back inside.”
He held his arm out at me, palm perpendicular like a stop sign. “Don’t you want the chronology from the horse’s mouth? Primary source. Catch me up, Billy.”
I had one hand on the wrought-iron railing but stopped to listen. “I’m a graphic designer, Detective. Worked late, stopped off for a burger and a couple of beers on my way home,” Billy said. He was dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt. There were smudges of ink or paint on his jeans, too dark in color to be blood, I thought. “It was about twelve-thirty when I got near the building. That’s when I saw this guy come tearing out the front door, down the steps.”
“What guy? Someone you know?”
Billy Schultz shook his head. “Nope. The fireman.”
Mike looked to Mercer. “Nobody told me about that. The fire department got here first?”
“Not for real,” Mercer said.
“I mean, I assumed he was a fireman. He was dressed in all the gear-coat, boots, hat, even had a protective mask of some kind on. That’s why I couldn’t see his face.”
“Did you stop him? Did he talk to you?”
“He flew by me, like there was a forest fire on Lexington Avenue he had to get to. Almost took me out. Even that didn’t seem odd until I looked up the street for his truck but there wasn’t one around. Just weird.”
“What did you do then?”
“I unlocked the door to the vestibule, and as soon as I got inside, I could smell smoke. I could see little waves of it sort of spiraling upward from the basement,” Billy said. “We don’t have a super who lives in the building, so there was no one for me to call. I figured whatever happened had been resolved. By the guy I thought was a fireman. But I wanted to check it out, make sure there was nothing still burning.”
“Sarge, you want to get me that mask?” Mercer said.
The older man walked to the nearest squad car and reached in for a paper bag while Billy Schultz talked.
“I went downstairs first. It was pretty dark, but I could make out a small pile of rubble in the corner of the hallway, a couple of feet from Tina’s door. Nothing was burning-no flames-but it was still smoldering. Kicking off a lot of smoke. That’s when I knocked on her door.”
“Did she answer?” Mike asked.
“No. Not then. I didn’t hear anything. I figured maybe she wasn’t home. I ran up to my apartment, filled a pitcher with water, and came back down to douse whatever was still smoking. Figured the other firemen must have gone off to a bigger job and that the last one-the guy who almost plowed me down-was trying to catch up with them.”
The sergeant passed the bag to Mercer, who put on a pair of latex gloves from his pocket before opening it.
“It’s when I went downstairs the second time that I heard Tina.”
“What did you hear, exactly?” I asked.
Billy cocked his head and answered. “I knocked again, just because I was worried that the firemen might have left her there even though there was still something smoldering in the hallway. She was weeping loudly, then pausing, like to inhale.”
“Words,” Mike said. “Did she speak any words?”
“No, but I did. I told Tina it was me, asked her if she was all right. I was coughing myself from the smoke. I told her she could come up to my apartment.”
“Did she answer you?”
“No. She just cried.”
“How do you know it’s Tina Barr you were talking to?” Mike asked.
Billy hesitated. “Well, at that point-I, uh-I just assumed it, Detective. She lives there alone.”
“What next?”
&nbs
p; “I went home to get a bucket and broom. Swept some of the trash into the bucket to throw out on the street-”
Mike glanced at the sergeant. “Yeah, we got it, Chapman. Looks like amateur smoke bombs.”
“The sobbing was so bad by then, I called 911, from my cell. Maybe she was sick, overcome by the smoke. I waited out here on the stoop till the officers came. Three minutes. Not much longer. That’s when Tina went berserk. That’s when I knew it was her, for sure. I recognized her voice, when she was yelling at the cops.”
Mercer removed a large black object from the bag and dangled it in front of us.
“Yeah,” Billy said. “That’s what the fireman had on his face.”
“Found it halfway up the block,” the sergeant said. “Right in the perp’s flight path.”
“That’s not department gear,” Mike said. “It’s a gas mask. Military style.”
It was a black rubber helmet, with two holes for the eyes, and a broad snoutlike respirator that would fit over the mouth, with a long hose attached.
“Couldn’t see a damn thing,” Billy said. “It covered his entire face.”
“What did the cops do?” Mike asked.
“I led them down to the basement. They knocked on Tina’s door and one of them identified himself, said they were police. That’s when she started yelling at them to leave her alone. I mean screaming at them. Freaked out. Sounded like she collapsed-maybe fell onto the floor-crying the whole time.”
“What makes you think she’s alone in there?”
“We’re guessing,” Mercer said. “She’s the only one to make a sound-no scuffling, no struggling, no other voices. But that’s another reason ESU won’t leave.”
Mike prodded my side with his fingers as we started up the front steps. I went back in the vestibule toward the basement staircase.
“One of the cops told Tina he just wanted to make sure that the fire hadn’t affected her,” Billy said, drawing a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe his smoke-fogged glasses. “Asked her if she could stand up and look through the peephole at his badge, for identification. She went wild.”
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