Manhattan Lockdown

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CARL SCHURZ PARK was a gem which few people even in Manhattan knew. Gracie Mansion was at the northern end of the jewel-like grounds. The park was only the depth of a city block. It ran from Gracie Mansion to the far end of East 83^rd Street. Quiet East End Avenue was its western border. To the east was the river and an esplanade that overlooked vistas of the river itself and in the distance the Triboro Bridge, the shoreline of Queens, Roosevelt Island and, to the south, the 59^th Street Bridge. The park had graceful stone paths, ancient trees, alcoves with benches, flower beds, a small playground and two popular fenced dog runs, one for the big dogs and the other for the small dogs. There were sloping lawns where young men and women sunbathed.

Roland Fortune, who took pride in knowing every street, park, and neighborhood in Manhattan, arranged for his press conference at the heart of the park. It was a stone and granite area next to the esplanade where two large staircases divided to lead to a gorgeous walkway that formed the main entrance to Carl Schurz Park at East 86^th Street and East End Avenue.

It was another glorious morning in the stricken city, slightly cooler than the three previous days. Through Irv Rothstein’s marvel of contacts with the press and Hans Richter’s magician-like tactical abilities, clusters of microphones and wires had been assembled in an hour at the heart of the park so that Roland could stand with a background of flowers, trees, and the nineteenth-century stone walkways behind him. A city in which thousands of deaths had just taken place was made to appear like the most famous European capitals, the work of master landscape architects of the late nineteenth-century.

It took fewer than three minutes for Roland, wearing a blue blazer, slacks, and a fresh white shirt, to walk from Gracie Mansion’s terrace to the press conference. The benign light from the early morning sun over the East River gave his whole presence a kind of relaxed radiance. Gina Carbone walked with him.

Roland began, “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Consistent with my promises since the start of this crisis, I have current information for you. The first and most important is that I have issued ten minutes ago an order lifting the lockdown of Manhattan.”

A small group of early morning walkers, for the most part people with their dogs, had gathered at the unexpected sight of reporters and the mayor of New York City suddenly materializing in their beloved park. There was applause.

Roland briefly acknowledged the applause. “The lifting of the lockdown will take place gradually and in an orderly fashion over the next several hours, beginning now. Commissioner Gina Carbone is here with me. Let’s be clear: her skill, ingenuity, and command abilities have made the lifting of the lockdown possible. Manhattan is safe enough to be reintegrated with the world.”

Gina, who looked almost as radiant as Roland in the fresh sunlight, nodded and smiled slightly.

“This is not to say,” Roland continued, “that the danger has passed. Over the last two days, the remarkable members of the New York City Police Department have engaged in war-like battles, all of which they have won, and they have thwarted attacks on landmarks of national, indeed international, importance, such as St. Patrick’s Cathedral. The commissioner, with the assistance of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, has ongoing efforts in place to trap and neutralize terrorists who may-and I stress may -still have cells in Manhattan or elsewhere in the city with more plans for assaults and mayhem. But we believe the major sources of danger have been eliminated or neutralized.”

A reporter’s voice rang out. “Commissioner Carbone, what can you tell us about Tony Garafalo?”

Roland said, “We are not here to comment on anything other than essential information. We’re not going to be distracted by trivia. The people of Manhattan are interested in one thing only, and that is their safety and the restoration of order, reconstruction, and the return to the wonderful vibrancy of this stricken paradise known as Manhattan. Even as we speak, the barriers at every bridge and tunnel are being taken down, although there will continue to be checkpoints at both ends of each tunnel and bridge to be sure that those who have done damage will be caught. There are no places where the evil can hide or to which they can escape.”

Roland paused and extended his right arm. “You see around us here one of the gems of this city, Carl Schurz Park. There are thousands of miraculous places in this city. Several of them have been defaced and desecrated by the cowards who carried out these attacks. Every place that has been damaged will be restored. While we can never rule it out, Commissioner Carbone and I are confident that the people responsible have been arrested or are dead or that we know who they are and where they are. And, to them, we say, We are coming for you. There’s no place to hide.”

Another reporter’s voice: “Commissioner, can you tell us when the dark prison on Pier 37 was built?”

Roland said, “When I had the incredible good fortune to appoint Gina Carbone the NYPD Commissioner, my first and only instructions to her were that she had my complete support in achieving a single objective: protecting the people of New York City from anyone and everyone who would harm them. She was herself a warrior with years of experience in major combat operations in the first Gulf War combined with years of experience in the day-to-day operations of protecting the people of this city. Under her command, the rates for crimes ranging from fare-jumping to murder have fallen to levels much lower than those of cities with fewer than 200,000 people. We have more than seven million people who live here in the safety of ordinary times.”

“Did you,” another voice asked, “know about the dark prison on Pier 37?”

“In the final analysis, the responsibility for protecting the people of this city rests with me. I gave Commissioner Carbone the task of protecting the city as she in her experienced professional judgment saw fit to do.”

“What did you know,” the same voice asked, “about Pier 37 and when did you know it?”

“I knew there were secure facilities established all through the five boroughs of New York City, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island, Brooklyn, and Manhattan, that were designed by the commissioner to give her and her force of almost 40,000 officers the ability to deal with the dangerous unpredictabilities of the world in which we all live. As I now understand it, Pier 37, an abandoned warehouse on the East River waterfront from the era of the classic On the Waterfront film, was reconfigured to serve emergency purposes. I have never set foot on Pier 37. If it was reconfigured by the commissioner, she did that under the general mandate I gave her. She, in other words, had my complete approval.”

“What about the secret arrests and torture reported on the Gandhi blog?”

“I’m assured there were no secret arrests. Everyone-and there are hundreds of people-who has been arrested has undergone the usual processing even in these extraordinary times and either has been or will be brought before a judge for arraignment. Those judges will, as always, ask for pleas of guilty or not guilty and will apply the usual standards that apply to bail decisions on whether to let an accused go free to await trial or to detain him or her. The issue for the judge at that stage always is twofold: Is the person a danger to the community? Is that person a risk of flight? If he or she is one or the other, he or she will be detained. And all of this is a matter of public record.”

“What about torture?”

Just as Gina had instructed him, Roland answered, “There has been no torture. Certainly there has been questioning of detained people. And some leads have proven useful. They were voluntarily given, not forced.”

And then another voice: “We understand just now that the FBI has arrested Antonio Garafalo, a close friend of the commissioner, for the murder of Raj Gandhi, an investigative reporter for the New York Times.”

Roland Fortune was a consummate actor. He made believe the question hadn’t been asked and he made other people believe the same thing. “Even as we speak, delivery trucks containing all the myriads of essential products on which the people of Manhattan rely-food, water, flowers, and, yes, even beer-are arrayed in Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx and have been cleared for entry into Manhattan. Our stores will soon be replenished. The pulse of this vibrant city will soon return to normal. Any threats will be stifled. The only changes Manhattanites will see that will make the city different from the tranquil world of four days ago will be the welcome presence on every street corner of soldiers, police, and military equipment.”

Roland raised his left arm, an embracing gesture. “Manhattan will soon be what it always has been. The streets will be alive with all of our vibrant residents. The subways will reverberate under us, like the flow of blood through healthy, vigorous bodies. Tourists from every nation will fill our streets. Yes, we will have all the noise, the excitement, and all the quiet places of refuge, the museums, the parks, the book stores, the irreplaceable diners, that provide the texture of this greatest of all cities.”

As had so often happened in his flawless and charmed career, Roland Fortune smiled at the reporters gathered in front of him, a motley group of some well-dressed men and women who could have passed for bankers to scruffy people who seemed to have been transported in time from Berkeley in 1968, and said, “Thank you all for coming. Relax, resume your lives.”