31 Bond Street (8 page)

October 1856

V
isiting the marshland of New Jersey on an October morning to examine real estate was an activity like going to the opera—a refined form of leisure wrapped tightly in the concept of wealth. Samuel picked her up on Twenty-fourth Street and brought her to the riverbank at the foot of Christopher Street. Emma carried an overnight bag. Samuel would ferry her across the river, and Dr. Burdell would meet her on the other side to give her a tour of his property. He would offer her a piece to buy, and she intended to accept.

After much thought and discussion, she had put aside a sum with which to purchase some land—it was money left by her husband for Augusta’s dowry. Dr. Burdell had convinced her that this land investment would swiftly gain in value. Although she was taking a gamble, she felt assured that the transaction would be successful and would secure a significant gain. Instead of feeling anxious, she felt closer to her goal, as if she were a bird gliding gracefully in circles, high above her prey.

Emma sat on the deck on a canvas chair, settling herself among
the crude fittings of the small craft. There were just the two of them on the boat. Samuel steered silently, like a sentinel, his dark skin outlined against the sky at the stern. The boat glided past the dockyards, glassworks, distilleries, and furnaces of Greenwich Village, following the river motion south. The city split away as the river opened into the wide mouth of the harbor, swelling like an upturned silver dish.

They sailed toward New Jersey, into the narrow strait of the Kill van Kull, and the boat seemed lost in miles of grassland. Occasionally Emma looked up from her book, squinting into the blue and green expanse. Miles away, in the distance, a southbound train left a smudge of black against the horizon. The whistle blew, setting off a flock of egrets rising on the wing, thousands of them, spreading across the reeds, like a fluttering cloud.

Emma asked Samuel questions: “How far do the marshes stretch? How far is Newark? Do any roads pass over this land?” Samuel, wary, gazed toward the horizon and answered in monosyllables, only saying what was necessary. Emma kept her hand to her brow, shielding the glare. “Which part is Dr. Burdell’s land? she asked.

Samuel pointed to a promontory of discarded shells on the marsh side of New Jersey, “Past that ridge, it was the Indian’s road,” he said, of a faint white line shimmering into the salt marsh. All along New York harbor were small islands dotted with bone white beaches formed of shells, piled into middens and mysterious mounds. The Indians had used shells as currency, and these ancient shell paths formed bridges and roads through the lowlands, marking a path to the riches they once associated with the sea.

It was from an Indian that Samuel learned everything about the harbor—about the marsh elder, goosefoot, and sunflower, which produce edible seeds, and about the otters and giant bullfrogs, a freakish species that sing before a summer rain. He could have told
her about his lazy summer days in a dugout canoe, dipping a bucket into the water, with Katuma, a Lenape, whose ancestors had once ruled this watery kingdom, and who worked the oyster barges. On lazy days, they fished together. Just below the surface was a harbor’s bounty of oysters, clams, scallops, mussels, and whelk that burrow in the sandy waterbeds.

And it was the Indians who had aided him and other runaway slaves through the Maryland swamps when he fled North. Tribes still lived along the fingers of land that jutted into the eastern waterways, and when they encountered a starving Negro fugitive, they fed him, teaching him to catch and roast a duck, and to smear his body with bear grease to ward away the bugs and the smell of the dogs.

Since coming to New York, Samuel had found work at the stables and was hired to drive Dr. Burdell. He spent his days riding papers and satchels up and down the streets of New York, or ferrying him along with other men back and forth across this piece of harbor, all the while hearing mischief wrapped in deeds and schemes that had no place under God’s sun.

“Where does the water end and the solid land begin?” Emma asked, dismayed, looking at the tall reeds and grasses that spread for miles.

“This swamp can swallow a man,” was all he said.

They reached the shore of Elizabeth Port, a tiny hamlet with whitewashed houses and a single church. It was afternoon, and Dr. Burdell was waiting near the dock with a buggy. Samuel drove while Emma and Dr. Burdell surveyed the land. They bounced along a dirt road that bordered the sea, flanked by rich meadows that seemed to lift up out of the swamp with deeply rooted stands of trees. The horse stopped when its hooves began to sink into the sticky mud. Ahead was the watery amorphous vista: a patchwork of meadows and marsh that spread for miles inland where one could see the tips of barns on a far horizon.

“We are dividing the land into lots, one hundred acres each. Each piece starts at the water and runs inland. Where the water is shallow it will be dug deep for docks and berths,” said Dr. Burdell, waving his hand along the salt marshes. “The dredged mud will be poured for higher land and roads. A railroad runs south from Hoboken, crossing this expanse of marsh, before it heads on to Philadelphia.” Emma was glad he did not suggest they get out of the carriage where the mud would be sucking at their shoes. “There are only two lots left,” he said. “You can see the best one from here—it ends at the Bound Creek, a freshwater stream that bisects this part of the marsh.”

Since they were on a rise, she could see the shell mounds and a clear stream starting at Newark Bay, cutting into the marshland, a spiraling creek that made a demarcation going east to west. “Farther up, the Hackensack and the Passaic Rivers converge, so the coal barges pass by here as well.” He spoke with such authority that one would think that all the commerce in the harbor was waiting to berth in this spot where now there were only bugs and spiny creatures and enormous fields of useless grasses, swaying for miles. “Buyers have been discreet in purchasing these lots, but it will soon result in a frenzy of speculation once the builders and financiers come on board.”

“Turn around, and head back,” Dr. Burdell ordered Samuel, directing him to turn back to Elizabeth Port. Samuel was familiar with the route and took little direction. They headed toward the village and stopped before a small wooden building that had a sign for a country notary. Dr. Burdell and Emma stepped inside, and the notary nodded a greeting. Dr. Burdell took papers from a satchel and spread them along a central table. He unrolled a map that had thin lines bisecting the furrows and marshes into rectangular plots. Emma studied the survey, trying to make sense of the markings. Dr. Burdell put his hand on her arm, and she felt his grip tighten
as she hesitated. “That is the section I shall choose,” she said, finally, pointing to a dotted line that marked a plot along the water’s edge. She recognized a hook shape on the map that corresponded to a promontory she had seen from the boat ride; from the water it had looked like a bone that was raised out of the water, its dry ridge continuing like a highway through the wetland. The line of the freshwater creek was within its boundary. She hesitated again, and then nodded. “Yes, this is the one I will take.”

“The lady has a large amount of money at her disposal,” Dr. Burdell said to the notary, as if that oblique flattery were designed to impress the countryman. “She has chosen a gem of a property.” Then he said to Emma, “You would do well to purchase the other plot to reap the most profit when we resell the land.”

“One parcel will be enough for now,” replied Emma with a laugh, as if land lots were casually dispensed like cards dealt at a table. The notary prepared the deed, marking her parcel by number. She bent over, dipped the pen in the ink, and carefully attached her name. Her banker would prepare a note assigned to Dr. Burdell for ten thousand dollars. She trembled at the precariousness of her action. Her own reserves were nearly gone, and this sum was the total of Augusta’s dowry, but she felt strangely protected by the sense of fortune that had brought Dr. Burdell to her on that summer day in Saratoga. She felt as if she were purchasing a slice of the sky, and that profits would rain down from the heavens.

Darkness covered the countryside when the buggy arrived at Fairbanks’s Public House. Dr. Burdell instructed Samuel to post the horse and to sleep in the barn. Then he engaged a room for the night, signing the inn register as Dr. and Mrs. Burdell. He ordered supper sent up to the room, and they ate at a table set beside a roaring wood fire. They drank cherry and currant wines served with fresh game.

“You will not be disappointed,” he said as he tore the flesh off the
bird. The firelight broke his face into patches of orange and shadow, illuminating his grinning teeth as he devoured his meal. The brisk country air, the candlelight instead of gas, and the remote howling of wolves in the woods brought on a rich, deep indolence. Relieved of the tension of respectability and the confines of the city, Emma Cunningham succumbed to the aromatic fumes of woodsmoke and to Dr. Burdell in the goose down bed.

New York Times
, February 13, 1857.

February 16, 1857

H
enry Clinton’s new law office was in the Mercantile Building on top of a bluff on Spruce Street, where the city sloped down to the waterfront. The Mercantile Building was brick and marble, five stories high, with an octagonal tower. It was topped with a gold dome, obscured now among the cornices of taller buildings that had crowded around it. A weather vane tipped the dome, still visible through the rooftops, of the young god Mercury, with wings on his feet and helmet, his slender body rotating in the wind.

It was the octagonal room at the top of the building that Clinton had rented. Originally used as a watchtower, ship owners went up with telescopes to spot their errant ships. With the shipping concerns now concentrated at the wharves, the garret office at the top of the building had fallen into disuse, for the scenery was too distracting for other professions. The eight windows in the cupola
created a kaleidoscope of the city, with views of the avenues spilling into the watery continents of two rivers flowing into the brilliant blue harbor, whisked into a silvery sheen when the wind rippled the surface.

James Snarky sat on top of one of the window ledges, his legs dangling. Clinton had hired the brash clerk from Armstrong and Clinton, promising him a small raise. What had set him apart from the other dutiful clerks in Armstrong’s office was his connection to the rough-and-tumble world of reporters. Snarky had started off as a writer for the
Tribune
but switched to a job clerking in a law office because the salary was better and he had an ailing mother to support, but his passion was for the jargon of the city beat. There was nothing that James Snarky enjoyed more than placing bets at the card games that were played on crates in alleyways between the newspaper offices along Park Row. Clinton had assigned Snarky the job of keeping abreast of the reporters and of using his nose for investigation, to get the inside scoops. Released from the moribund atmosphere at Armstrong and Clinton, Snarky came to work each day in the attire of the newspaperman: plaid pants, two-toned shoes, and a bowler hat.

Barnaby Thayer swiveled on an oak chair in front of a rolltop desk, chewing the pointed end of a pen. Thayer was a young trial lawyer who had been a junior litigator for a firm on State Street. At the death of one of the partners, the other retired, leaving Thayer out of work with a young wife and a newborn. He had contacted Henry Clinton, with an inquiry about employment. It was Elisabeth who had remembered the overture by the ambitious young man. Thayer’s credentials and letters of recommendation were impressive, including high praise from a circuit judge. At Columbia Law School, he had studied under Dr. J. W. Gideon, the dean of Medical Jurisprudence, which was a newly formed discipline that applied the knowledge of anatomy and medical science to criminal
law. Now employed by Clinton, Thayer had been assigned to enlist Dr. Gideon as a defense expert. Thayer also oversaw a laboratory at the Medical College of technical men skilled in the new science of forensic analysis. They could identify the corpuscles of blood by microscope, or isolate a red stain on a silk dress and determine if it came from wine, grape juice, or the blood of an ox. Thayer had also enlisted a squadron of undergraduates who buried themselves in the Columbia Law Library, doing the voluminous case research and acting as clerks for the case, preparing the motions that would be needed as the case moved to trial.

Thayer wore a wrinkled tie, hastily knotted. His jacket had been quickly brushed, most likely in a dusky room, for it showed signs of missed lint and what appeared to be stains from his baby on the right shoulder. In his late twenties, he still looked like a freshman. His hair was thick and slightly unruly, flopping forward over his face. He had a strong jaw that flashed the winning combination of a broad smile and straight teeth. Clinton did not have the means to engage a top litigator, so this promising, but slightly unkempt, young man would have to do.

Clinton paced the room, looking through legal briefs that were spread everywhere on wide tables.

“The
Herald
got the best dispatch on her,” said Snarky, from his perch on the windowsill. “All the papers will be scrambling after it tomorrow.”

“I dread to hear it,” said Clinton.

“Begins something like this—Emma Cunningham Burdell, born Emma Hempstead, in Brooklyn—was remarkable chiefly for a well-developed bosom, and voluptuous form. She had more than ordinary powers of fascination over men and was known to give a man a favor…”

“I am sure such a flattering portrait has nowhere to go but down,” said Thayer.

“Meekham from the
Herald
got himself over to the Surrogate’s office in Brooklyn,” continued Snarky. “He looked up the family will. Her father was a rope maker and didn’t leave her much except a Bible and a chest of drawers.”

“Totally irrelevant,” said Clinton, half listening as he sorted through the papers on the table.

“She was a looker, all right,” continued Snarky. “The husband, George Cunningham, was older, rich, and thought she was fetching. Meekham says Cunningham paid for a date with her, and then kept her on as a mistress. She had the daughters out of wedlock, but he put them up in fine style. He already had a wife, an invalid, who was wasting away in the family mansion. Well, happily, she died, and finally George Cunningham married Emma, making an honest woman of her.”

“Now that is the touching story of a Brooklyn girl made good,” said Thayer, rubbing his hand through a thick lock of dark hair. “If only her happy tale had ended there.”

“Meekham looked up Cunningham’s will, and Emma got the money from a life insurance policy when he died. So the
Herald
will be running a story on her first marriage—gold digger, paid woman, the girls born out of wedlock, etc, etc.”

“None of this is important,” repeated Clinton, his concentration never leaving the documents.

“Well, here’s the relevant part,” said Snarky. “The District Attorney’s office calls in Meekham, Finnerty, and some guys from the
Herald
, for a visit in the hallowed office of His Elegance.”

“I hope the press boys wore their most eye-popping plaids,” said Thayer.

“A meeting with the District Attorney? What about?” Clinton was now facing Snarky, leaning against the table. Clinton conjured an image of Oakey Hall, his feet on his desk, his striped trousers stretching crisply before him, addressing the reporters with his
languid drawl. Leather books and legal circulars would be strewn among volumes of Shakespeare and subscriptions to the theatre.

“Seems the DA wants the press boys to know that he is thinking about exhuming George Cunningham’s grave. The official verdict at the time of his death was congestion of the brain, death by drinking. But now they want to look at the body again.”

“Good Lord!” said Thayer. “Will he stop at nothing? Now they intend to imply she killed her first husband. None of this can be used in court. They are manipulating the press. This is unprecedented.”

“Even the medical examiners are saying that the idea of exhuming the body after so long a time has elapsed is nonsense.” Clinton was listening now, but with a distracted look on his face. “The other part that’s relevant,” Snarky continued, “is that George Cunningham ran the family’s liquor business into the ground—they say he guzzled away the family fortune. After his death, his creditors got everything, including the big old house on Jay Street, but they couldn’t touch the life insurance or the daughters’ dowry. A life insurance payment of twenty thousand dollars went to Emma, and now the DA is implying that she may have done him in, just like she did Burdell, to get after his money.”

“This is running tomorrow?” asked Thayer, agitated. “Maybe we should visit Greeley at the
Tribune
and have a little conference with him. And James Raymond at the
Times
.”

“No, let it all come out all at once,” said Clinton, wearily. “Just like a mudslide, the faster it exhausts itself in a pile, the better.”

“I am glad you can be so sanguine,” said Thayer. “Our hides are on the line.”

“It is Emma Cunningham’s body that hangs, not ours, something to keep in perspective.” The stair creaked, and John’s fair head came into view as he mounted the stairs to the garret, lugging a wicker basket covered with a checkered cloth, filled with lunch.

“Ah, my fleet-footed friend, I see you have visited my wife. Is it quince pie?” asked Clinton.

“She says to tell you, no pies on Tuesday,” John said, hoisting the basket onto the long table. The smell of baked chicken and herbs emerged as John lifted the cloth and unloaded piles of biscuits and bread. Plates were laid out all around, and John handed one up to Snarky.

“Thanks, lad. You’re worth your weight in gold,” Snarky said, tucking a napkin under his chin. Clinton and Thayer pushed papers away from the table to make room for their meal. There was an envelope in the basket and Clinton picked it up.

At breakfast that morning, Elisabeth had a law book at the table when he came down. “If she is a witness at the inquest, is she compelled to testify?” she asked, flipping through for the citation. The Coroner’s inquest had dragged on; it was now two weeks old, an unprecedented length of time, and Emma Cunningham was still sequestered by Connery in her bedroom upstairs.

“In essence, yes,” Clinton answered. The Coroner had interviewed close to a hundred acquaintances of Dr. Burdell, medical colleagues, neighbors, shopkeepers, and servants, but he was saving Emma Cunningham and her daughters for last.

“But the statute does not say that a coroner can hold persons on suspicion of guilt, only as witnesses. If she were a suspect to the crime, that would be unlawful imprisonment.”

“Exactly,” he said, hastily eating his eggs and toast. He was preparing to serve Coroner Connery with a writ of habeas corpus,
releasing her from the house arrest. Connery was enjoying his time in the limelight, not ready to relinquish his power. No one had ever tried to stop an inquest, or challenge the grim majesty of the Coroner.

“Are you serving the papers today?” she had asked.

“I understand that they will be signed and ready by the afternoon.”

‘Since you will meet all sorts of bedlam when you go to the house to release her, why don’t you take the sheriff along and have his wagons waiting?” said Elisabeth. “That way you can go straight downtown with an escort.”

“That’s a brilliant idea,” he said to Elisabeth. “I hadn’t thought of that. The bedlam will mostly be of the Coroner’s making, and he may even order me to be arrested. With the sheriff present, even in handcuffs, we can make it safely downtown to a hearing on the writs. Then the house arrest will certainly end.”

For a short while the office was quiet except for the avid noises that surround the appreciation of fresh food. “So tell me, John, what is happening at Bond Street?” Clinton asked, between bites. “Who is being called at the inquest today?”

“I wasn’t in the parlors this morning,” John replied. “But neighbors are going in and out, to give testimony. I saw old Mr. Barksdale, from across the street, and the chemist’s son from next door.”

“The newspapers are printing page upon page on the inquest,” remarked Thayer. “Each neighbor’s testimony conjures up imagined scandals that went on behind the walls of that house—Emma had lovers, the daughters had lovers, there were burning smells from the chimney when she burned the bloody clothes. Rumors are breaking faster than waves in a hurricane.”

“She was seen buying a dagger on Pearl Street,” volunteered Snarky through a mouthful of bread, adding to the list. “You can tell a newspaper from a fishwife, by the speed with which they spread
gossip. A fishwife can spread the news up and down Fulton Street in half an hour, but a newspaper reporter gets the word to City Hall before the presses have even rolled.”

“What else, John?” asked Clinton.

“Well, sir, I was up in the girls’ room, cleaning out the stove, and I heard the prison matron tell them they were to come down and talk to the Coroner’s jury in the parlor this afternoon.”

“Today!” exclaimed Thayer.

“The girls got all up in a fuss about what they were going to wear,” said John.

“What frivolity!” Snarky laughed. “You’d think they were preparing for a stage review.”

Clinton stood and started rifling again through the papers. “This is it boys. If the daughters are testifying today that means Connery will be springing Emma’s testimony as well. Who has seen the writs?”

“The copies are all prepared, in the pile on the left,” said Thayer, motioning to the far end of the table. “Shall we deliver them right away?”

“I thought we’d serve them late this afternoon, but now we had better hurry. Snarky and Thayer, I want you to go to Judge Davies right now. Get the signed writs of habeas corpus and we will deliver them to Coroner Connery and forestall the testimony altogether.” Clinton found the stack of papers he was looking for and began to study them.

“Does Mrs. Cunningham go to jail?” asked John, alarmed.

“That’s sure possible, son,” said Snarky. “This might force them to make a criminal arrest and indict her. Locked up, she’ll be protected by the Bill of Rights. As it stands now, she’s a prisoner at the whims of the Coroner, King Connery, Monarch of Rumland. By tomorrow his reign at Bond Street will be over.”

“What about Augusta and Helen?” John asked.

“Nothing happens to them yet. Not unless a grand jury gets some hard evidence against them,” explained Thayer.

The clock struck one. “What time does the inquest resume with the daughters?

“After lunch, right about two,” John told him.

“Let’s go,” said Clinton, pulling on his coat. “Snarky, you go with Thayer to the courthouse, and then find a way to rush the papers to Bond Street. I’ll go get the sheriff, and get him to bring a prison wagon. I’ll have to convince him to move without orders, so make sure the papers are waiting at the house. Hurry, this is what we’ve been waiting for.”