an elevator accident. A million other perils came to mind before something like that. Hit-and-run, botulism, alien abduction would all be higher up on the list. How many elevator mishaps did New York have in a year? One? Two, maybe?
Barbara went looking for a coffee, although what she needed was something much stronger. She came back to the ER, asked the woman at admitting how Paula was doing and whether she’d been moved to a room.
The woman, eyes focused on a computer screen, said she would check when she had a chance.
“I’ve got a number for her parents,” Barbara offered.
The woman kept staring at the screen and tapping away at the keyboard.
Fuck it, Barbara thought.
She wandered into the curtained warren of the emergency ward, peeking into the various examining areas to see whether she could find Paula.
It didn’t take long.
Paula lay in a bed, connected to various wires and tubes and machines, including a beeping heart monitor. The woman’s face was mottled with blue and purple bruises, and her body had been immobilized. Barbara assumed she’d have suffered multiple fractures. If she’d been standing when that elevator hit bottom, the shock wave would have run straight up her entire body, shattering bones, particularly those in her legs, compressing her insides. It would be like jumping off a building.
God, what must it be like to be in a plunging elevator? Barbara wondered. Knowing what’s coming? Knowing there’s nothing you can do about it?
Barbara hoped a doctor or nurse would appear so she could get an update on her condition. If they asked if she was family, she’d tell them she was Paula’s aunt or a much older sister.
As she took another step closer to the bed, it occurred to Barbara that Paula was pretty close in age to her own daughter, Arla. Paula was in her early twenties, Arla would be twenty-five on her next birthday, Barbara thought.
I should call her.
Paula stirred slightly, her head shifting slightly on the pillow.
“Hey,” Barbara said softly.
Paula’s eyes did not open.
“Don’t know if you can hear me or not, but it’s Barbara. Barbara Matheson, from Manhattan Today. From your internship?”
Nothing.
Paula’s right eye opened a fraction of an inch, then closed.
“I’ve called your folks,” she said. “In Montpelier. Hope that was okay. Figured you’d want them to know. They’re coming.”
Paula’s lips parted, closed, parted again.
“You want to say something?” Barbara asked.
Her lips opened again. Paula’s tongue moved slightly.
“Don’t push yourself. It’s okay. Save your strength.”
But then a word, light and as soft as a feather, drifted from Paula’s mouth.
“What was that?” Barbara said, turning her head sideways, placing her ear an inch from Paula’s lips.
She whispered the word again, just loud enough for Barbara to hear.
“Floating.”
“Floating?” Barbara said.
“Like floating.”
Barbara pulled away, nodding. “I’ll bet,” she said. “You were basically in freefall. You’d have felt weightless, and—”
The heart monitor went from a beep to a sustained, alarming tone.
“What the—”
Barbara looked at the machine, saw the flat line travel across the screen.
“Oh, shit,” she said.
She threw back the curtain and called out: “Hey! Hey! I need help here!”
From the far end of the ward, a nurse came running.
Later, when it was over, and Barbara had made the call to Paula’s parents to tell them that there was no longer a sense of urgency, she found her way to a bar over on Third north of Fiftieth and ordered a scotch, neat.
She was on her fourth when it occurred to her that maybe “floating” was not a reference to plummeting in the elevator. Now Barbara wondered whether Paula was being slightly more metaphorical as she slipped away. In the short time she’d worked at Manhattan Today, Paula had shown a flair for words.
By late afternoon, just about everything anyone could want to know about the elevator accident at the Lansing Tower was available. Everything, that is, except for why it had happened.
Various news sources had posted brief profiles on the dead. They were:
Paula Chatsworth, twenty-two, single. Tribeca resident, originally from Vermont, worked for Webwrite, a firm that produced copy for firms working on their online presence. Paula had initially survived the elevator plunge, but later died at the hospital.
Stuart Bland, thirty-eight. Lived with his mother in Bushwick. He’d held a variety of odd jobs, none for very long, including a stint at a dry-cleaning operation. That, police speculated, might have been where he acquired a FedEx ID. The courier company reported that he was not, and never had been, an employee, which got the police wondering what he was up to. Found on the floor of the elevator was a script with his name attached. Initial speculation was that Bland hoped to meet with someone in the building to discuss the project, although there was no record of him having made an appointment.
Sherry D’Agostino, thirty-nine. Vice president of creative at Cromwell Entertainment. Married to Wall Street stockbroker Elliott Milne. Mother of two children: a daughter, five, and a son, eight. She lived in Brooklyn Heights. “An immense loss,” said Cromwell president Jason Cromwell, “both personally and professionally. Sherry had an unerring eye for talent in all fields and was not only a vital member of our team, but a close, personal friend. We are beyond devastated.”
Barton Fieldgate, sixty-four. Estate lawyer at Templeton Flynn and Fieldgate. Married forty years, father of five. Lived in an $8 million brownstone on West Ninety-Fifth. Said Michael Templeton: “That something like this could happen, in our own building, is unimaginable. Barton was a friend and colleague of the highest order. He will be missed.” There was also a report that the firm was already in the process of suing the owners of the Lansing Tower for failure to maintain the elevators properly.
The cause of the accident was under investigation by multiple agencies, including the fire department and the city body that oversaw the licensing and operation of elevators and escalators. New York, it was pointed out, had thirty-nine inspectors to check on some seventy thousand of them.
Richard Headley was flopped on the office couch in Gracie Mansion, the official New York mayoral residence, jacket off, feet on the coffee table with his shoes still on, tie loosened, and remote in hand. He was looking at the large screen bolted to the wall, flipping back and forth between the various six o’clock news reports. He’d decided to stay awhile on NY1.
They had a few seconds of his arrival at the Lansing Tower, then a clip of him conferring briefly with Morris Lansing, the major New York developer—and long-time friend of the mayor’s—who owned the skyscraper.
The door opened and Valerie Langdon walked in, moving quickly so as not to obstruct the mayor’s view of the news.
“Get me Morris,” Headley said, muting the TV and handing her his cell phone. “I want to see how he’s doing.” He glanced at his aide. “You know who he is now?”
“I