Chapter Nine

Jewish Cemetery

At the Dispatch, Nellie had covered several suicides of both men and women.

Even though more men committed suicide in the nineteenth century than women—four times as many—the act itself was always associated with women. Suicide was seen as a weakness, a feminine malady. Women were even condemned for the way they killed themselves—usually by poison rather than something more assertive, such as a knife or a gun. Her editor had little interest in considering what might drive a woman to take her own life. Suicide was simply confirmation that women were the weaker sex.

And so, given the common thinking of the day, DeKay’s narrative rang true, and it saddened her. In her struggle to enter a man’s world, Nellie had begun to see Emma as a model, a hero. The literary accomplishments, the work with immigrants, the battles against the powerful and the corrupt against staggering odds … if Emma could accomplish so much, then maybe Nellie could as well. That was the hope, the inspiration. But apparently it had proven too much for Emma. She had given up and practically welcomed the cancer because the arsenic provided her a way out.

Suddenly Nellie’s aspirations seemed futile. With sentries manning the doors at every turn, from thick-headed Flaherty to wily Cockerill, the image of Emma had fortified her in taking them on. Now, no matter how ambitious and combative she was, it all seemed too daunting.

She would have to tell Pulitzer. She would do more investigating, of course, and not merely take DeKay’s word for it, but she would just be going through the motions. Pulitzer would be furious and confuse the messenger with the message and want nothing more to do with her. It wasn’t fair; she was just telling him the truth, but it would be human nature for him to hold it against her.

She tried to think of a way out. DeKay and Barker would have a convincing response to anything she managed to get printed. They would say it was a suicide, that Emma had taken her own life because she was overwhelmed with the cancer “and other problems”—code for female frailty—and people would doubtless believe them. DeKay would almost certainly use the Times to tell his story, after which Emma Lazarus would be totally discredited. Pulitzer would be even angrier, and Nellie would be relieved of her duties. If journalism were a true profession, she could simply write the truth as she saw it and let the chips fall where they may, but it didn’t work that way. Newspapers wrote to their audience, gave them what they wanted to read. As a reporter, you delivered to that audience what the publisher wanted delivered, and Pulitzer had no interest in delivering up Emma Lazarus as a suicide.

Nellie left the Times building feeling sick and shattered. Worse yet, the fears she tried to keep at bay—that she was destined to wind up back in Pittsburg writing gardening and fashion stories the rest of her life—came roaring back.

Why did people kill themselves? Maybe that could be the story. To most people, suicide was simply the sign of a troubled soul, but there had to be more. She thought of going to see Ingram. He understood these things as well as anyone she knew. But she shied away, afraid of what he might say about women as a weaker sex and self-conscious of seeming helpless in his eyes.

Suddenly she had a thought, a wild, bizarre thought. Impulsively she went back inside, to the Times sitting room. DeKay had left. The steward was cleaning off the table.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I need to go to Queens.”

“What part, miss?”

“Cypress Hills. The Shearith Israel cemetery.”

“The Number 14. Right outside.”

“Thank you.”

It was an hour train and ferry ride to the cemetery, even though Emma had lived a short walk from Newspaper Row. Burials in Manhattan had been outlawed for forty years; people who had never set foot in Queens or Brooklyn in life now resided there for all eternity in death. Going to the cemetery was a totally irrational act; she knew that as she boarded the train. She should be looking for proof that the death had not been a suicide, not wasting time visiting the gravesite. But maybe staring at Emma’s tombstone would give her an idea or possibly a deeper understanding of the woman. She didn’t exactly expect Emma to make a suggestion from the grave, but she was just desperate enough to be open to that possibility.

The ride only made her more fretful, she realized, as she finally stepped off the horsecar in a remote part of Queens. It was a small cemetery, no more than 120 plots. Despite the warm June weather, the ground was still a foot deep in snow, seven weeks after the Great Blizzard. A caretaker directed her to the tombstone, which was simple enough: granite, two feet high, inscribed with “In Memory of Emma Lazarus, Daughter of Moses and Esther Lazarus, Born July 22, 1849 – Died November 19, 1887.” No religious markings, no reference to her as poet or champion of the poor. Nearby were the gravestones of Emma’s mother and father, equally simple. Nellie thought of her own father’s gravesite by the mill he had started in Apollo. She had no desire to be buried beside her half-brothers and sisters, who had made life so difficult for her and her mother. Her fantasy was to make enough money to buy the mill outright and keep the rest of the family away from her father. Only she, her mother, and her full siblings would be buried alongside him.

She stared at Emma’s grave. “What happened to you, Emma?” she mused. “You didn’t kill yourself. I know you didn’t. Tell me what happened.”

She felt someone watching her. She looked around and saw a man standing by a hansom, staring at her. A big, rough-looking man, he wore clothes several sizes too small for him, which made him look all the larger, and he made no effort to avert his eyes. He was intimidating, especially in this remote cemetery, yet he took no step toward her.

“No need to be afraid, miss.”

“What do you want?” she asked. He stood between her and the only way out.

“I’m supposed to take you back to Manhattan when you’re finished.”

“Who sent you?”

“That you’ll find out in due time, miss. I’ll just wait here until you’re done.”

“Suppose I don’t want to go with you.”

“Then my employer would be upset, with both of us.” He climbed up the hansom to the driver’s seat. “You take your time, miss.”

Nellie turned back to the grave and addressed the headstone.

“Emma,” she entreated in a low voice, “what are you doing? What is happening?”

No answer. Nellie just shook her head and headed over to the hansom.

The driver took her to the northwest corner of Eighth Avenue and Twenty-Third Street and into the largest theater in New York, Pike’s Opera House, a former burlesque venue made over into the offices of the most feared man in the history of Wall Street.

If Emma Lazarus represented all that was good in the human condition, Jay Gould represented all that was bad. The press dubbed him Mephistopheles only because they couldn’t think of anything worse. At a time when the only punishable crime on Wall Street was outright fraud—and some would question if even that were the case—Gould made a fortune in stocks using insider information and spreading disinformation to buy low and sell high. At one point, he owned both of the largest transportation and communication companies in the country. But it was his methods more than his power that made him so despised. In 1868, at the age of twenty-eight, he had brought the great Cornelius Vanderbilt to his knees by bribing state court judges into awarding Gould the Erie Railroad, the main route from the Great Lakes to New York City. In 1872, he and his partner James Fisk set off a national panic and five-year depression when they cornered the gold market in the United States after bribing the brother-in-law of President Grant to keep the government’s gold off the market. When the price of gold had tripled from its original level and Grant finally ordered the release of the government’s gold, the brother-in-law tipped off Gould ahead of time, allowing him to sell at the peak while most of Wall Street’s other investors, who had bought in as the price rose, were ruined. If Gould had cornered the gold market simply to become rich, that would have been venal enough, but later testimony before a congressional committee revealed his true intentions: with the price of gold rising and the dollar dropping, Midwestern farmers would want to ship more of their crops to foreign markets, and Gould, who had a virtual monopoly on the nation’s railroads, would jack up freight rates and amass even more wealth.

While working at the Dispatch, Nellie had met Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick, phenomenally wealthy men in their own right, but they were manufacturing geniuses. They made things and managed people. Gould, though, was a financial genius. He bought and sold companies and bought and sold stock, with no interest in managing anyone. If one of his companies performed poorly, he was indifferent since it was usually a monopoly and he could already get top dollar for it.

Although the building at Eighth and Twenty-Third was garish enough, Gould’s offices were modest, almost stately, and bore none of the trappings Nellie associated with robber barons. Nellie noted just two armed guards and a male secretary outside the door to the inner office. When the hansom driver escorted her in, the secretary at the desk merely nodded, rose, and glided into the interior office. A moment later, Jay Gould himself emerged to greet her.

“Miss Bly. Thank you for coming. My name is Jay Gould.”

He was a small man in his early fifties, no more than five foot four inches tall. He had tiny, delicate hands; a full, black beard flecked with gray; a low forehead; and piercing, almost fanatical eyes. There was no glad-handing or charming banter. Jay Gould did not mince words.

“I trust my driver conducted himself properly,” he said, directing her inside to a chair and sitting down behind the desk. Nellie felt the almost hypnotic power of his eyes and his mind. She barely even took in the office.

“He startled me and has taken me out of my way, but no, he did not mistreat me.”

“I apologize for the inconvenience. He will, of course, take you home. Or to Dr. Ingram’s. Whichever you prefer.”

Nellie managed to cover her surprise at the pointed reference. “Why am I here, Mr. Gould?” she asked with irritation.

“I had hoped to delay our initial meeting, but your conversation with Mr. DeKay this morning forced my hand. I thought we should speak before you did anything rash.”

How could he have known about her meeting with DeKay? She hadn’t told anyone. Gould, a self-made man, would have no use for a weasel like DeKay, and no one else knew about it. Then she remembered the steward who had poured coffee in the sitting room. He had lingered in the back of the room, straightening up and tending to some editors in another corner. She had asked him which train would take her to the Cypress Hills Cemetery in Queens, and he directed her to the #14. The waiter must have passed along this information to Gould, who then would have dispatched one of his men to the cemetery. She nearly shook her head in admiration. That Gould would have an employee at The New York Times on his payroll impressed her, but only for a moment.

Given his reputation, she told herself, she should not have been the least bit surprised. “What was it about our conversation that forced your hand?” she asked.

“You are about to be the victim of a monstrous fraud, Miss Bly. Emma Lazarus would never have taken her own life.”

For a man who had made an enormous fortune being coldly rational, Gould made his pronouncement with surprising passion.

“I didn’t realize you were acquainted with Miss Lazarus.”

“Few people did. We preferred it that way.”

She studied him closely.

“There was nothing untoward about it, Miss Bly,” he said. “I admired Miss Lazarus for several years. It was a pleasure to make her acquaintance.”

Gould did not seem the kind of man to whom admiration came easily. “How exactly did you meet?”

“I take my daily constitutional every morning at five. It allows me to think in peace, without investors or lawyers pestering me. I began to notice a woman who also took walks in the neighborhood at the same hour. We would nod hello. One morning, I happened to see her emerge from a house three blocks from mine. I knew who lived there—I was aware of her father through common business associates—and when I realized who she was, I introduced myself.”

“The two of you became walking companions?”

“You might say that.”

A flash of almost boyish embarrassment crossed Gould’s face. He was at heart a shy man, and he knew how preposterous it sounded that he and Emma Lazarus—poet, humanitarian, patrician—would be friendly.

“What was it you had admired about her, Mr. Gould? You don’t strike me as a poetry reader.”

“No, I don’t have the patience for poetry. My wife is the poetry reader. I admired what Miss Lazarus did after the Union Hotel incident.”

“I’m not familiar with that.”

He looked at her with surprise and disapproval.

“How can you investigate her death if you know nothing about her?”

“I’m still learning, Mr. Gould. And if you can help in that regard, I would urge you to do so.”

He stared out the window, recounting his thoughts. “There was a banker named Joseph Seligman,” he said, “a German immigrant and a Jew, who had provided valuable service to this country during the war. At President Lincoln’s behest, he sold millions of dollars in government bonds to Europeans to finance the Union cause. Without him, the President could not have carried on the war, and the country would have dissolved. The President was so grateful that he awarded Seligman a Medal of Merit. Three years later, President Grant asked him to become Secretary of the Treasury, an honor Seligman graciously refused because of family obligations. Grant then received word that Mr. A.T. Stewart sought the position. Have you heard of him at least?”

A.T. Stewart was a household name. He had founded the first department store in America and gone on to be the largest dry goods retailer in the country. His stores became so successful that during the 1870s he was the richest man in America, richer even than Jay Gould.

“Of course.”

“Grant was wise enough to seek Seligman’s counsel on the matter. Seligman recommended against the appointment. He believed the nation’s leading banker required more knowledge than how to sell clothes.”

Nellie had to smile. Gould’s tongue could cut like a scalpel.

“Grant heeded Seligman’s advice,” he continued, “and did not offer Stewart the position. Stewart took the decision personally and vowed to bring down Seligman. He died before any revenge could be exacted, but his successors took up the charge for him. Are you familiar with the Grand Union Hotel in Saratoga?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Nor, fortunately, am I. I’m told it is the largest hotel in the world, a favored summer spot for New Yorkers who can afford it. Joseph Seligman and his family took holiday there every summer. The Grand Union Hotel was one of many properties owned by A.T. Stewart, and it remained in the estate upon his death. Now, the executor of Stewart’s estate was a small-minded man named Henry Hilton, who had been Stewart’s personal lawyer. One of Boss Tweed’s lackeys who’d bought himself a judgeship, he suddenly found himself a very wealthy man. The summer following Stewart’s death, in 1877, when Seligman arrived with his family at the Grand Union Hotel, as they had for the ten previous summers, they were told that no rooms were available. Seligman protested that he had reserved several rooms, the same ones the family had always stayed in. But the manager said he had his orders: Judge Hilton had directed that no Jews be permitted to stay at the Grand Union Hotel.”

He said it with such disgust, she wondered for a moment if Gould himself had Jewish blood.

“There was a great public outcry at such treatment of a man who had done so much for this country, while others said with equal fervor that it was Hilton’s property—albeit inherited—and he could do whatever he pleased with it. Sadly, most of the press sided with Hilton, and the event unleashed a terrible amount of hatred against Jews in this country. ‘Hebrews will knock vainly for admission’ became an all-too-frequent sign at finer hotels.”

Nellie wondered where exactly Gould, a laissez-faire stock manipulator, stood on this issue. Sensing the question, he answered it for her.

“My sympathies were with Seligman, for reasons more personal than philosophical. You see, Joseph Seligman was my banker, a man I trusted completely and whom I grew to respect immensely. The outpouring of venom in the press affected him deeply, and within a short time he was dead.”

Gould’s eyes had narrowed at the circumstances of his friend’s death. He paused ever so slightly before going on.

“No one,” he said, “knew quite how to respond to Hilton’s pronouncement. Remember, this was a man who now controlled one of the largest fortunes in the country and had most of the newspapers on his side. And Jews, by their nature and history, shunned controversy. That is when Miss Lazarus stepped forward.”

He leaned forward, sharing a story he clearly relished.

“She turned Hilton’s argument against him. If he was free to decide who could stay at his hotels, well, then people were free not to shop at the A.T. Stewart department store. Miss Lazarus organized a boycott. No Jews, no immigrants, no Irish, no Italians—no one who had ever been slighted or whose parents had ever been slighted—should shop at A.T. Stewart’s. And, of course, nearly every immigrant to this country had felt the terrible sting of bigotry. She managed to spread the word far and wide, and business at Stewart’s department store began to plummet immediately. Miss Lazarus remained in the background—Hilton shared acquaintances with her father—but she was tireless in assembling her forces. Hilton stubbornly clung to his policy, and in fact with great fanfare organized the American Society for the Suppression of the Jews, urging other hotel owners and restaurateurs to turn away Jews. That only gave strength to the boycott. Within six months—only six months, mind you—the A.T. Stewart department store, the largest in the world, was forced to declare bankruptcy, and the man who had driven Joseph Seligman to an early death was publicly humiliated.”

She could hear the approval, and even admiration, in his voice.

“When I realized that the woman on my early morning walks was Emma Lazarus, I introduced myself and told her I was a friend of Joseph Seligman. At that point, we became, as you put it, walking companions.”

“She was indeed a remarkable woman, that is clear,” said Nellie. “But DeKay said she also suffered from dark moods and seized the opportunity to consume arsenic. Why are you convinced he is lying?”

“I make my living judging character, Miss Bly. Every investment I have ever made is based on an assessment of character. And I am wholly convinced that Miss Lazarus did not take her own life.”

“You think DeKay poisoned her?”

“You suspected him of involvement until this morning.”

“Yes. But why would he want to see Miss Lazarus dead? And why would he poison her when he knew she was only months from dying as it was?”

These were the questions that had plagued her the entire day. But Gould had no hesitation in answering.

“To curry favor with Henry Hilton.”

“I don’t understand—”

“Mr. DeKay is looking to elevate his status in New York society,” Gould said impatiently. “In your brief time around him, surely you have seen that. Nothing is more important to his ilk than social standing. Nothing.”

“I’m not sure I see the connection—”

“In his pursuit of respectability, DeKay has become the protégé of Henry Hilton.”

“The enemy of the woman he loved?!”

“As much as he is capable of love, yes.”

“But Charles DeKay and Henry Hilton … The two of them joining forces seems so out of the question.”

“Never underestimate the lust for social advantage, Miss Bly. People will do anything to achieve it: betray friends, spy on family, murder lovers—”

“You think DeKay poisoned Miss Lazarus at the behest of Judge Hilton?”

“I have no doubt of it.”

“But that would be monstrous. And then to claim it was a suicide—”

“You’ve spoken with him. Would you credit Charles DeKay for integrity?”

DeKay was a cad, that was beyond question. And he arranged for Barker to destroy the blood flasks. But he had seemed so sincere, even sorrowful, that morning. And to murder his companion of ten years?!

“What did Hilton offer him?”

“Sponsorship in a social club. Invitations to dinners and balls. A summer cottage in Newport. An ambassadorship to Germany—Hilton has spent a great deal of money to assure President Cleveland’s defeat this fall. With the business and social contacts acquired through such a position, DeKay would live comfortably for the rest of his life.”

“And in return Hilton would see the demise of the woman he despised?”

“Yes.”

It was a murderous trade with the devil, and yet Nellie had no trouble imagining Charles DeKay—the one she had seen at the opera—making it.

“You see, Miss Bly, these men are scoundrels. If you wrote a news article they found threatening in any way, I am certain harm would come to you. That is why I summoned you here. You need to know exactly what is in store should you continue. Though I would like nothing more than to see these men brought to justice, you must think long and hard before pursuing this matter and appreciate its gravity.”

She beheld him sitting there, the most notorious man in New York, perhaps in the entire country. A man who had destroyed thousands of lives in his financial maneuvers, and yet he was warning her. She wondered if he was just manipulating her like some railroad stock. There was certainly a good chance of it. But DeKay did strike her as craven enough to do all Gould had described. She had no idea what to do. If she wrote about DeKay and Hilton, they would try to destroy Emma’s reputation and, if Gould was to be believed, harm Nellie herself as well. But if she did nothing, two men who ended the life of a remarkable woman would get away with murder.

“There is no firm evidence as to how Miss Lazarus died,” she said, “let alone whether she was murdered. It is pure conjecture.”

“Most of life is conjecture, Miss Bly. That is one thing you understand at my age. The challenge is to reduce the conjecture to likelihood.”

“I don’t know whom or what to believe—”

“Then dig deeper. Sit down with Henry Hilton. Press him for answers. After speaking with him, you’ll know what to do.”

He wasn’t trying to sway her, Nellie thought; he was clever enough to simply leave it to her to decide. She found herself flattered by his vote of confidence. No doubt it was one of his ways of manipulating her.

“I have a few questions for you, Mr. Gould,” she said. “Please … How did you express your admiration to Miss Lazarus?”

“Excuse me?”

“You admired her for the boycott that vindicated your friend. I’m sure you expressed your gratitude in ways other than words.”

He was thrown by the question. That didn’t happen often with Jay Gould.

“I paid for food and shelter for dozens of immigrants and did what I could to find them work.”

“Miss Lazarus appreciated that?”

“Very much so.”

That made sense, she thought to herself. Emma would use the opportunity of Gould’s companionship to help her cause.

“And what did you ask in return?”

“In return? Nothing. She had vindicated my friend. I was glad to help her in some small way.” He sounded almost offended at the question.

“A man in your position does not get there by providing gifts, Mr. Gould. Life for you is bartering. What did you receive in return for your philanthropic gestures?”

Gould nodded wanly.

“She passed along information about her father’s sugar refineries, information I used in market purchases and in setting rates on my railroads.”

Nellie smiled ever so slightly, as did he. She stood up.

“No one can know about this conversation, I take it? Not even Mr. Pulitzer?”

“No one. That can only make your task more difficult. But like me, Hilton has sources in many places.”

He took her by the elbow and leaned close as he led her to the door. “She was an exceptional woman, Miss Bly. Please do her justice. I will assist you in any way I can. But know I am unable to protect you.”