What a Fine, Handsome Son You Have
Bang!
The shot rang out, and Brandon pulled out his earplugs to ask,
"How much capital are you looking to put into play?"
"Start with a hundred thousand dollars."
"Whoa—that much?"
I started to raise the pistol toward the target again, and he hurriedly jammed the plugs back in.
Bang!
Bang!
"All of it into stocks?"
"Yeah. Open the account. For now the list I pulled is U.S. Steel, DuPont, Boeing, Coca-Cola, Pan American Petroleum and Transport, and Morse Dry Dock and Repair."
"Ohhh, you’ve already got a list…"
Brandon shoved the earplugs in again.
Bang!
Bang!
Before long the magazine was empty. I dropped the empty stick and looked at him.
"Want a turn before we go, Brother?"
"N-no, I’m good."
"Then shall we head up?"
"Yeah."
I tucked the Colt M1911 into my coat and left the range. Instead of the office we stepped out onto the first floor of the twin building.
The left half of the ground floor was Intima, the lingerie boutique. Until now the right half had simply been used as storage; the shutter stayed down day after day, and for the building’s image alone it needed to come alive.
"I’m thinking of putting an investment-management firm right here. What do you say?"
"You’re going to run an open office?"
"Everything has to be legal."
The skyscrapers clustered on Wall Street; the financial offices that opened in the Lower East Side preferred the first or second floor so no elevator was required. Jewish and Italian independent brokers especially liked the street-level access.
Brandon looked at me, clearly surprised.
"If you take outside clients it might as well be a real company."
"That’s exactly how you avoid suspicion."
I rolled the warehouse door up. Lingerie stock was stacked high. Brandon’s eyes, sweeping the space, took on a peculiar hunger and fighting spirit—something that could just as easily be called greed.
"Can you handle it?"
"If you trust me with it!"
"Then tell me what the office needs and how many people."
He thought a moment, then his eyes lit up.
"Actually… there are a few guys I used to work with. Can I bring them in?"
"No objection. But understand one thing."
I fixed him with a sharp stare.
"If anyone tries to pull something behind my back, they’ll die in ways they can’t even imagine. Oh—and that wasn’t directed at you, Brother."
"…I-I would never. They’re all solid."
Skill would prove itself soon enough. We agreed he would bring me the head-count and furniture list in a few days.
That day, after Uncle Noah, the second son Brandon too crossed fully into the family business of crime.
June 29, 1918.
Mother and I rode the carriage toward Union Square for the event hosted by the ILGWU.
"An investment house… just hearing it sounds impressive. But can Brandon really manage it?"
"I’ll make sure he can."
"Even if he slips up, don’t be too hard on him. Overlook the small things."
"He’s my older brother, after all."
Mother smiled as if proud of me.
"My son really does think things through."
What I had meant was that, precisely because he was the elder brother, he had even less room to fail—but she took it her own way.
In any case, even after the firm was set up, Brandon’s role would be limited. I would tell him which stocks to buy and how much; he would simply execute. There was a reason I had put Rosenthal, not Uncle Derek, at the head of SCL: I wanted to watch Derek’s temperament and ability first. I was not naïve enough to hand everything to family just because they were family.
"Oh—speaking of which, Ted’s been fretting over Pierce lately."
"Pierce—Uncle Ted’s eldest?"
"That’s right. He got into the Armour Institute in Chicago, took a bartending job to help with living expenses, and the police picked him up."
"His father’s a cop."
"Exactly. Ted’s calling in favors left and right to get him out."
This family of ours. Absolute chaos.
Even without me pulling them in, ready-made family members were already scattered about—and there might be more. I did not want to blame the blood on Mother’s side. If I needed an excuse, it was simply that for a poor Irishman trying to get by, Manhattan and Chicago were places where the temptation of crime hung in the air like oxygen. Look away for a second and you were halfway to becoming a criminal yourself.
So what kind of crime had Brother Pierce committed?
A Chicago crime story from a week earlier suddenly floated up. Waiters slipping Mickey Finns into customers’ drinks—sometimes for tips, sometimes simply to rob them. It looked minor at first glance, yet the story had traveled all the way to New York for a reason: four arrests, more than a hundred waiters detained, a full-scale organized racket that even the waiters’ union was tangled in. The couple who manufactured and sold the drug had been taken as well. Follow-up pieces revealed that three people had died after the same drug was used at a college-club party.
I had paid attention for a particular reason. That drug was the same Mickey Finn I had used to poison Archie Roselli. The truly chilling part was the timing: if Roselli had died at the same moment as the Chicago cases—or even a day later—an autopsy would have proved it was murder, not suicide.
At any rate, Brother Pierce was almost certainly mixed up in the drug business. Anthony and a few of the men would be leaving for Chicago soon. I was not about to leave family scraping by on doped-up customers. Time to let Pierce swim in deeper water.
"I hope it works out."
Mother nodded, then gazed out the window.
"Still, leaving Liam and Roa alone makes me a little uneasy. Nothing will happen, will it?"
"Liam can look after himself. Roa’s at Mr. Walcott’s place—he’ll take good care of her, and she has a friend there."
"That pharmacist used to look so gloomy, but lately he seems to have something to smile about. He even greets me first now."
"Business must be picking up."
George Walcott had finally shaken free of the loan sharks and their threats. With Union men helping, he had only recently recovered the two pharmacies that had been stolen from him; once things settled he planned to push hard on chain expansion. The capital, of course, would come from me.
"Ma’am, we’ve arrived at Cooper Union’s Great Hall."
As we stepped down, Mother glanced at the bag in my hand. Inside were the masks.
"Do we really need to bring those?"
"While we’re here we might as well do business. I also packed the special ones you made."
Articles about the flu spreading like wildfire had begun to appear, yet the market stayed stubbornly still. People simply did not care about masks or hand sanitizer. Maybe only the second great wave, when it swept the entire continental United States, would wake them up.
The factory and the lingerie shop already held more than twenty thousand masks in inventory. I had planned to find bulk buyers; then I revised the plan. Donating them would raise Free Your Body’s profile just as well. And tonight there happened to be someone in the hall who could make that happen—someone who might even open the door to a large contract.
The venue, ten minutes from Union Square on Elizabeth Street, was a symbolic space for the ILGWU, the Socialist Party, and the women’s suffrage movement. Evening had fallen; under the bright lights a fair crowd already milled about the entrance.
Mother and I approached wearing our masks.
"Welcome, ma’am. May I see your invitation?"
"This is my son."
We lowered the masks. The guard looked from me to Mother and back, tilting his head, then decided there was no problem and waved us through.
Even if we had wanted to keep the masks on, we could not. People stared as if we were the strange ones. Wearing them inside the hall felt almost rude, a nuisance.
Bare-faced, we stepped into the auditorium. Faces I half-recognized appeared—ILGWU members who had once helped Mother at her picket lines. They were talking among themselves when they spotted her and blinked.
"Mrs. Nora Graves? Is that really you?"
"It is. It’s been so long."
"Wow—you look completely different!"
Mother was wearing the dress I had given her at Christmas. Fifty dollars, if I remembered right, yet it performed far above its price. Even I could no longer see the tenement sweatshop worker who had once marched with a picket sign.
"And the gentleman with you…?"
"My eldest son."
"Kieran Graves."
When a white mother introduced an Asian son, the reactions were usually the same: pupils dilating, a visible scramble for the correct social response. The more polished or well-bred managed a calm face; the ILGWU people belonged to that class.
"My, what a solid, handsome son you have."
"Thank you for saying so."
Mother immediately hooked her arm through mine. I had noticed it before: whenever anyone praised me she never bothered to hide her delight. Even if the words were pure politeness she still glowed. Of course it was not mere politeness. Even I had to admit the suit fit me rather well.
"Oh—and you saw the note on the invitation? When they call your name in the second half of the program, you’ll need to come up on stage."
"On stage?!"
Mother’s arm went rigid against mine. Natural enough—the stage of Cooper Union’s Great Hall was the focus of every eye. Seats fanned out in a wide horseshoe; the place hosted not only rallies and symposiums but concerts and plays as well.
I was about to calm her when an unexpected guest recognized me: Big Tom Foley of Tammany Hall.
"Kieran! What brings you here?"
"I came with my mother. You’ve been well, I hope?"
"Ah, the sewing-machine business—didn’t you say she was running a garment factory now?"
Mother quickly slipped her arm free.
"Nora Graves, president of Free Your Body."
"Francis Thomas Foley. Everyone just calls me Big Tom Foley. Pleasure to meet you."
He offered a formal bow. The effect on the surrounding crowd was immediate. A powerful Tammany man from lower Manhattan drew people like a magnet. And because Free Your Body’s brassieres had already made quiet inroads among the women, Mother herself drew curious glances.
I looked Foley straight in the eye.
"How about the masks?"
"Can’t stand the things. Weather’s getting hot—feels like I’m smothering. Sweat pours off me."
When I had last paid him a bribe I had slipped in fifty or so masks, hoping he might open government or institutional channels for a bulk contract. Foley himself had shown zero interest.
"Even if they’re uncomfortable, you ought to look after your health."
"I’ve lived long enough. When the time comes, I’ll go."
For a second I wondered what I had done wrong that, a hundred years later, Americans would still refuse masks during a pandemic. But it was too early to give up.
I spotted a woman with a fur stole around her neck and leaned close to Mother’s ear.
"That’s Anne Morgan, Mother."
J. P. Morgan’s daughter—the woman who had invested when times were hardest. I took the flower-embroidered mask from the bag and pressed it into Mother’s hand.
"Give it to her now?"
"Business time, Mother. Confidence."
Mother put on a radiant smile and approached Anne Morgan.
"I’m sorry—have we met?"
A full year had passed; Anne did not recognize her. Only after Mother explained the old days did Anne’s face light up.
"How lovely to see you again. Time really does fly."
After a few more words Mother offered the mask as a gift.
"Oh my—floral embroidery on a mask?"
"Influenza has been going around."
"Yes, I’ve heard."
Anne held the mask up with two fingers, smiled politely, and dropped it into her bag. No real interest.
"Thank you, Mrs. Graves."
Wrong order. Here was a philanthropist who fought for women workers’ rights and suffrage, a woman who had personally carried medical supplies all the way to the front lines of the Great War. Time for me to step in.
"A pleasure, Mrs. Morgan. Kieran Graves."
Anne started and took a half-step back, startled by the sudden appearance. Only after Mother introduced me did she manage an awkward smile.
"And… what can I do for you?"
"I’ve heard you do a great deal of good work—especially the humanitarian aid you send to the battlefields."
"Mm. And?"
Still lukewarm.
"Influenza is spreading fiercely across Europe. My mother’s company would like to contribute masks."
The corner of Anne’s mouth lifted; now I had her attention.
"Poor sanitation makes people more vulnerable to infection. We would like to provide ten thousand masks for the soldiers and refugees at the front."
"Ten thousand?"
Anne was astonished; Mother was no less so. Counting labor and materials it meant several thousand dollars lost. But returning a portion of what I had taken from the dead to the living did not feel like a loss. And Anne Morgan was rich beyond ordinary comprehension.
"Could you manage another ten thousand? I’ll buy those myself. Let’s send them together through the Red Cross!"
"The Red Cross—perfect."
Exactly the bulk buyer I had wanted most. The Red Cross was already planning a nationwide distribution of masks and disinfectants against the coming wave. If Anne could open that door, when the second pandemic hit I would push hard for a real supply contract.
That, at least, would pay.