Much farther downtown, Jack knew, there were no luxurious hotel rooms, no balloons or floats. On the Lower East Side, Loisaida, the holidays found citizens of the 0-Nine at soup kitchens and food pantries, at the Bowery Mission, where the hungry, homeless families and the poor eagerly awaited a traditional hot turkey meal with all the trimmings, with the rest of the citizenry giving thanks, There but for the grace of God go I. Holy Cross, St. Mary’s, St. Mark’s Shelter: Soup kitchens scattered throughout the precinct gave them all something to be thankful for, even for one day.
The holidays were a humbling time for them; the displays of cheery celebration, and religious and commercial spectacles were not theirs. To them it was only another year of struggle passing by.
In Chinatown, most Chinese people didn’t celebrate a traditional Thanksgiving, but the holiday provided an excuse for them to get together and feast on a meal of seafood, pork, chicken, and baby bok choy. Lobster Cantonese instead of turkey, rice instead of mashed potatoes, with winter melon and lotus root soup. Extended families gathered around da bean lo, hot-pot casserole-style cooking.
Jack didn’t have fond memories of the holidays. Pa had never felt he had a lot to give thanks for, and hadn’t been a big believer in Christmas either, so Jack rarely received gifts. His one big thrill had been getting something from the Fifth Precinct PAL, when he’d line up with all the other “deprived” Chinatown kids hoping for a holiday handout. He remembered one year getting trampled in the mad rush of the older kids and parents to get a free toy. Trampled for a Popeye-the-Sailorman figure. He cried, but was still happy to have the free gift. When he brought it home, Pa had derided him for getting run over for a stupid gwailo doll.
Jack reached the cashier at the same time that his cell phone jangled and broke his reverie. He paid for his soup, and flipped open the phone.
It was the dayshift duty sarge, telling him patrol had responded to a call and found multiple bodies, very dead, at One Astor Plaza, down from the Barnes amp; Noble bookstore.
Sergeant Donahoe was in the blue-and-white downstairs at the scene.
Manhattan South was responding to holiday road rage auto fatalities on the Westside Highway, so they were reaching out to Jack.
“On my way,” Jack said, pocketing the phone.
He finished the soup in a big swallow, turned up his collar, and emerged onto the frozen street. He made his way west, through the East Village, the icy wind already tearing at his face, icy needles prickling his eyes every step of the way.
Face and Death
One Astor Plaza was a twenty-story curved glass tower, a luxury high-rise condominium building seamlessly shoehorned into the middle of a neighborhood crossroads that spread out to include the Public Theater, the NYU and Cooper Union campuses, the East Village and NoHo. It was a doorman residence, had security in the lobby, and a concierge behind a black marble counter. A Commercial Bank branch anchored the rest of the main street floor. A two-bedroom unit cost 1.5 million dollars and the project had sold out during construction.
The sculpted neo-modern glass building towered over the main avenues that ran north-south through Manhattan, over the major eastside subway hub, and dominated that entire commercial corner of Cooper Square.
A big overweight man, Sergeant Donahoe, stepped out of the squad car.
“I’ve got Wong up there,” he said.
Police Officer Wong, Jack knew, was a rookie patrolman, a Chinese-American portable who could speak several Chinese dialects.
“Eighteen-A,” Donahoe continued. “You got the building manager, the security guard, the grandmother, all up there. The fire lieutenant’s at the fireboard in the lobby. Talk to him first.”
Jack sucked in a deep gulp of cold air. “What do you have?” he asked, steeling himself.
Donahoe gave him a sad look and shook his gray-haired head.
“It’s the whole family. .” He paused and before he could continue, Jack had turned and was heading for the lobby.
The fire lieutenant, another tall Irishman, explained that they’d come to the scene because a ceiling smoke detector had activated and the alarm had gone out through the fireboard.
“When we got to the floor, there was no smoke,” he said. “But the ceiling detector was a combination type that also detected carbon monoxide.”
“So it was the carbon monoxide that set it off?” Jack asked.
“We took several readings,” the lieutenant said. “The CO levels were over eighty parts. And ten parts is unsafe.”
“Eight times lethal,” Jack noted.
“Hell of a thing on Thanksgiving Day. Anyway, my men are done upstairs.” The lieutenant added, “We’re just resetting the fireboard now.”
“Thanks for your help,” Jack said, grateful for the heads up as to what he was walking into.
Jack had heard many other cops deride the firefighters as thieves, referring to how they would take money and property from fire scenes. Quite often control of a crime scene that involved a fire was contested between the two commands, cops versus firefighters. Jack never saw it; he thought the firefighters had a tough job entering burning buildings, especially in winter. Even though he knew that the FDNY was still segregated-mostly white, mostly Irish-he had to give them respect for the hazardous jobs they did.
The elevators were fast, industrial quality steel polished into an elegant design.
The door to 18A was open, with yellow Crime Scene tape running across it. The firefighters had cranked open all the windows and evacuated all the residents of the eighteenth floor. P.O. Wong stood by the door with the building manager who nervously jangled a set of master keys. Jack introduced himself to the manager, nodded to Wong.
“I’ll need a statement from you,” he said to the manager. “Also, the security report, and information about the tenants.”
The manager was in shock. His face was pallid, voice shaky. He said sadly, “Certainly. I’ll be in my office on the main floor. It’s a terrible, terrible thing.” He walked slowly to the elevator.
Wong, who was shorter than Jack and built like a bulldog, pulled off one end of the yellow tape.
Jack asked him, “Wong, when accidents happen, do you think it’s destiny?”
P.O. Wong answered, “Well, this sure wasn’t an accident, but it could be destiny.” A puzzled look cross Jack’s face when he saw the Chinese grandmother seated on a folding chair just outside the apartment door.
“We had a hard time calming her down,” Wong told him. “She only speaks Taiwanese.”
Jack put his pen to his notepad. “Tell it,” he said quietly, glancing at the old woman.
“Grandma there gets a panicked phone call from Taiwan,” Wong began. “The in-laws are freaking out that something bad was going to happen here. They had received a letter from their son, the tenant, just today.”
Jack looked up from his pad.
“It sounded like he was saying good-bye,” Wong continued.
The old woman glanced at Jack, who was running worst-case scenarios in his mind.
“It took her a coupla hours to get here from Jersey,” Wong went on. “And then there was a delay at the front desk, the language problem, and they wanted to make sure who she was, things like that. They called upstairs, there was no answer. Then the building manager came up with the grandma and security, and used his master keys. Both locks were locked. When they opened the door the corridor detector went off.”
“So then the fire department arrived,” Jack commented.
“A few minutes after. So then we went into the apartment.”
Jack stepped inside the apartment, followed by Wong. At their feet was a crumpled-up quilt, crushed against the inside of the door.