Read Online The Alienist by Caleb Carr - Free Book Online

and just blocks from Police Headquarters, were Paul Kelly and his Five Pointers, who ruled supreme between Broadway and the Bowery and from Fourteenth Street to City Hall.
    Kelly’s gang had been named after the city’s toughest neighborhood in an attempt to inspire fear, though in reality they were far less anarchic in their dealings than the classic Five Points bands of an earlier generation (the Whyos, Plug Uglies, Dead Rabbits, and the rest), remnants of which still haunted their old neighborhood like violent, disaffected ghosts. Kelly himself was reflective of this change in style: his sartorial acumen was matched by polished speech and manners. He also possessed a thorough knowledge of art and politics, his taste in the former running toward modern and in the latter toward socialism. But Kelly knew his customers, too; and
tasteful
was not the word to describe the New Brighton Dance Hall, the Five Pointers’ headquarters on Great Jones Street. Overseen by a singular giant known as Eat-’Em-Up Jack McManus, the New Brighton was a garish mass of mirrors, crystal chandeliers, brass railings, and scantily clad “dancers,” a flash palace unequaled even in the Tenderloin, which, before Kelly’s rise, had been the unquestioned center of outlaw opulence.
    James T. “Biff” Ellison, on the other hand, represented the more traditional sort of New York thug. He had begun his career as a particularly unsavory saloon bouncer, and had first gained notoriety by beating and stomping a police officer nearly to death. Though he aspired to his boss’s polish, on Ellison—ignorant, sexually depraved, and drug-ridden as he was—the attempt became grotesquely ostentatious. Kelly had murderous lieutenants whose doings were infamous and even daring, but none save Ellison would have dared to open Paresis Hall, one of the mere three or four saloons in New York that openly—indeed, exuberantly—catered to that segment of society which Jake Riis so assiduously refused to believe existed.
    “Well, now,” Kelly said amiably, the stud in his cravat gleaming as he approached, “it’s Mr. Moore of the
Times
—along with one of the lovely new ladies of the Police Department.” Taking Sara’s hand, Kelly lowered his chiseled, Black Irish features and kissed it. “It certainly is more enjoyable getting summoned to headquarters these days.” His smile as he stared at Sara was well practiced and confident; none of which changed the fact that the air in the staircase had suddenly become charged with oppressive threat.
    “Mr. Kelly,” Sara answered with a brave nod, though I could see that she was quite nervous. “A pity your charm isn’t matched by the company you choose to keep.”
    Kelly laughed, but Ellison, who already towered over Sara and me, rose up even higher, his fleshy face and ferret’s eyes darkening. “It’d be best to watch your mouth, missy—it’s a long walk from headquarters to Gramercy Park. A lot of unpleasant things could happen to a girl all alone.”
    “You’re a real rabbit, aren’t you, Ellison?” I said, although the man could have broken me in half without much thought. “What’s the matter—run out of little boys to push around, you need to start on women?”
    Ellison’s face went positively red. “Why, you miserable piece of scribbling shit—sure, Gloria was trouble, a whole bundle of trouble, but I wouldn’t a cooked her for it, and I’ll kill any man says I—”
    “Now, now, Biff.” Kelly’s tone was pleasant, but his meaning was unmistakable: Knock it off. “There’s no cause for any of that.” And then to me: “Biff had nothing to do with the boy’s murder, Moore. And I don’t want to see my name connected with it, either.”
    “Hell of a time to think of that, Kelly,” I answered. “I saw his body—it was worthy of Biff, all right.” In fact, not even Ellison had ever done anything so horrendous, but there was no reason to acknowledge that to them. “He was just a