Chapter 49 – History Lesson
Tommy had his on the rocks and I had mine straight up. God, was it good: cognac, orange liqueur, and lemon juice. The citrus clanged against the ice and the orange sweetened the melody just a little and the cognac banged the bass drum, all coming together in your mouth like a piano, violin and cello trio does to the ears.
We’d managed to go through different doors into different suites, much to the amazement of the bellboy, Tommy with his bags and me with mine. I didn’t see him and he didn’t see me, but we each stood in our rooms and looked at the bed, just about crying. We snapped out of it, at least I did, washed up, me spending extra time removing the GSR, or trying to, in case the idiots actually had called the cops and squealed on us, which I doubted. GSR, that’s gunshot residue for those of you who don’t watch TV crime shows. Of course the hospital would report the injury, but again I doubted the boys would give up any information. Maybe that was wishful thinking, but something told me we were in the clear. My rationalization was helped by the knowledge that Roger and I had a really good lawyer; have to, some of the stuff we get involved in. The stuff was all over my clothes too, so washing really wasn’t doing much good. Who’d think one little bullet would cause so much potential trouble?
I brushed this off and met Tommy down in the lobby and we headed outside for a walk around the beautiful grounds. He asked, “You wash all the stuff off of you?”
“Tried.”
“You going to burn your clothes later?”
“Very funny.” Now he was harping on the shooting, but I realized I was taking it lightly, my intuition in play. We walked down near the river and I explained the history of the place, that it was a winter playground of the super-rich who lived up north a hundred and twenty-five years ago. People like J. P. Morgan, Joseph Pulitzer, William Vanderbilt. They would bring their entire family down for January and February, hunting and playing aristocratic games. They built the hotel structure first as a clubhouse and apartments, but soon they started building private homes around the clubhouse, each trying to out due the others. We walked past Crane Cottage, and I asked him if the name rang a bell. It didn’t, so I said Crane made his millions making urinals and toilets that filled the schools and hospitals of America for the last half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century.
“That’s this place’s claim to fame? Urinals and toilets?”
“By all accounts Mr. Crane was a very cultured man, Mr. Smarty. Ok, how about this? The first transcontinental telephone call was made in 1915 from here because the president of AT&T was a member of the club. The call went from here to Washington DC, where President Woodrow Wilson joined, then to New York City where Alexander Graham Bell connected, and then out to San Francisco.” Tommy said, that’s better. I went on, “I got more. Some guys met here and talked money, big money, finance and stuff, and they agreed we needed an institution to oversee some of this high level financial stuff, and they made some preliminary decisions and policies that became the Federal Reserve.”
Tommy said, “Is it cocktail time yet?” Evidently he’s not impressed with world finance.
“See out in the river? Vanderbilt anchored his yacht there, and died onboard one night.”
“They sew him up in a sheet and do the burial at sea bit? Is he still out there in the pluff mud?”
“You’re not much for history stuff, are you?”
“You’re the one said we’re gonna drink enough Sidecars to render your Plato unconscious and unable to perform his chaperoning duties. That’s what I’m interested in right now. History is fine in its place, which isn’t here and now.”
“What about your Plato?”
“My guy’s not exactly in the same league as your guy. He got banished from the Agora for throwing loaded dice.”
“That’s not what you told me before. You said you can do the platonic thing because you have a strong guy helping you out, watching your behavior, ringing your bell when you get outta line.”
“He sleeps a lot, wasn’t listening when I said that. You steal things. I lie.”