“No, no. But the architecture that turned Chicago into the White City was the impetus for what the builders did here, in the Grand Central zone.”
“What’s that?” Mike asked.
“They stood to gain a fortune from creating something that was not only safer in terms of train travel, but that would make this complex the center of the sprawling city. That would rid it of slums and shantytowns,” Gleeson said. “The railroad tracks had already been sunk below street grade by the commodore.”
“Cornelius Vanderbilt?”
“Yes, Detective Chapman. But Commodore Vanderbilt died in 1877. Twenty-five years later, the chief engineer of the New York Central Railroad came up with the concept of air rights. Do you know what that means?”
“I think so,” I said.
“Vanderbilt dredged the area north of Grand Central that we now call Park Avenue-home to some of the world’s most expensive real estate-and ran the trains below street level. Dug deep trenches in the ground to lay the tracks. Saved lives by doing that. Threw up iron fences and plotted patches of grass. That’s when they changed the name of the street.”
“What do you mean?”
“Down below Union Square, where the road begins, it’s still Fourth Avenue, named like all the numbered avenues. Once the trains were laid in and the flowers planted, they tried to class it up by dubbing it Park Avenue.”
“Seems to have taken,” I said, thinking of all the glorious flower displays in the meridians throughout each season and the sparkling Christmas tree lights.
“People used little footbridges to cross the avenue, and all the flying cinders from the steam engines stayed down in the ditches, no longer setting fire to everything around the old rails.”
“Clever,” Mike said.
“Then, with the introduction of electric trains after 1900, this fellow named William Wilgus-the chief engineer-took the commodore’s concept a step further.”
“He covered the tracks,” Mercer said. “They were already dug below the surface, and these gents figured that they could pave right over the damn things. Enclose them completely. Get them out of sight altogether and build on top of the train tracks.”
“Exactly. Not only did Vanderbilt and his successors buy up all the land around Grand Central for eventual development, but then Wilgus had the genius to envision great office buildings and private clubs rising on Park Avenue, right above the tracks themselves.”
“So this area that had once been such an eyesore,” Mike said, “and so dangerous, was going to be converted into a canyon of high-rent profitability. They sold air rights to the properties that sat on top of the New York Central Railroad tracks.”
“Which not only led to the building of some of the most famous structures in New York City, but it also gave the Central enough income to pay for the conversion of its entire system from steam-powered locomotives to electric trains.”
“What does any of this have to do with coincidence?” I asked.
“It’s this architectural plan that defies the coincidence among your murders, Ms. Cooper,” Gleeson said.
“Architecture? I don’t understand.”
“You must first be aware that a single entity, the New York Central Railroad, controlled a thirty-block area of Midtown Manhattan-as a direct result of Vanderbilt’s entrepreneurial instincts. And all of that property was tethered to its magnificent centerpiece-this very Grand Central Terminal.”
“I’m following you.”
“So this complex of buildings was created, mostly in the nineteen twenties, after Grand Central was opened,” Bruce Gleeson said, sketching an outline on the conference table with his forefinger. “Over here, practically adjacent to where we’re standing, was the Biltmore Hotel. Very fancy. A destination for long-distance train travelers.”
We all nodded.
“Beyond that, across Vanderbilt Avenue, was the Yale Club,” Gleeson said, drawing an imaginary line from point to point.
“You could reach that from this terminal, too?” Mike asked.
“Absolutely. Next came the Roosevelt and the Commodore, both grand hotels in their day. Then the US post office, because the New York Central carried mail, by contract with the government. That’s on Lexington Avenue, back to DePew Place.”
I heard the words “DePew Place” and looked at Mike, who was concentrating on the movement of Gleeson’s fingertip.
“A civic center was created here, with the added feature that people could move from Grand Central to hotels and to office buildings within the complex without ever venturing onto city streets. At least twenty-five thousand of them every day.”
Mike picked up the narrative. “Because there are underground tunnels and passages that connect this building to all of the others, am I right?”
“Not just tunnels and passages, but an underground city, Detective Chapman. Designed and executed as that,” Gleeson said. “They named it Terminal City.”
I placed my palms down on the table and leaned in, tracing another line in the dust on the tabletop from the location of DePew Place, dragging it slowly up Park Avenue. “How far north do these tunnels go, Mr. Gleeson?”
“To 50th Street, Ms. Cooper. The railroad owned the land up to 50th Street.”
The men watched as my finger crossed the pretend streets and came to a stop on the corner of Park Avenue. “Right here?” I asked.
“Right there,” Gleeson said. “That’s why I’m afraid the answer to your problems can’t be attributed to any coincidence, as you thought. Think of your first victim, Ms. Cooper, and where her body was found. The last great tower built as part of Terminal City was the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.”
TWENTY-THREE
“Terminal City,” Mike said. “You ever hear of it, Coop?”
“No.”
Bruce Gleeson had left us in the situation room while he went back to his office to try to find one of the old-timers who could talk us through the maze of underground links. Rocco Correlli was on his way to headquarters to give Commissioner Scully an update.
“Me neither,” Mercer said. “I thought I knew every inch of Manhattan.”
“But don’t you think I’m right?” Mike said, turning to Mercer. “The perp starts his spree in the Waldorf, moves closer in to the terminal on DePew, then actually commits a homicide just yards from the lower concourse. Next thing has to be something explodes right inside the terminal. That’s the way this bastard is moving.”
“You’re talking a bomb?” I asked.
“Get a grip, blondie. I haven’t taken it that far yet. They got sniffers downstairs, don’t they? I’m not saying he’s got-they’ve got-a bomb. But it’s an explosive situation. I mean that this guy is intent on leading us right into Grand Central, with a dramatic purpose, is what I think.”
“He’s clearly familiar with places we don’t even know about. Gleeson better find us a guide to this behemoth.”
“Who’s going to help us figure out what his grudge is?” Mike said, speaking to no one in particular. “There’s more ways into this building than into a wedge of Swiss cheese. And there’s no single button that closes every entry in the joint. So it’s impossible to do a total lockdown, if it came to that.”
“No way,” Mercer said.
“We don’t know who or what we’re looking for-perp or next potential vic. Scully needs to get this body ID’d,” I said. “Carl Condon is probably collateral damage, especially if he was just hired to steal the trunk. The association-the motive we’re looking for- has to be some nexus between the two women.”
“What if our bad boy used to work here?” Mike said. “He’s got a head start on the whole thing that will be impossible to overcome.”
“Or if he grew up around this place, like his old man used to work here,” Mercer said. I knew he was thinking about how his own father, a lifelong Delta Air Lines employee, had taken him out on the tarmac and into the hangars of LaGuardia as a kid, long before the restrictions of 9/11 became commonplace. “He’ll know more crevices and uncharted cubbyholes than we’ll be able to find.”