There Was an Old Woman

Chapter Fifty-two


Evie left for work the next day at dawn, energized and determined to put in as many hours as she could before she had to travel to the Bronx to spell Ginger at the hospital. She was halfway to Sparkles when she realized that everyone had their garbage at the curb, waiting for pickup. She’d have to remember to ask Finn what the schedule was.

Except for a security guard at reception, the Historical Society offices were dark and empty when she arrived at seven A.M. She waved her arms to coax the automatic lighting into flickering on as she walked from the elevator to her office.

First, she set about trying to confirm Mrs. Yetner’s amazing survival story. Newspapers from the time were full of her friend Betty. Betty Lou Oliver, a twenty-year-old elevator operator, became New York’s sweetheart in the wake of her miraculous survival. Her husband was a navy torpedo man, and he had been on his way home after a year and a half in the Pacific.

Evie found a Daily News photograph of Betty Lou, a slender woman with auburn curls, walking with crutches at Bellevue Hospital, months after the crash. According to the caption, the nurses had nicknamed her “Miss Sunshine.” Evie smiled. She could not imagine Mrs. Yetner ever having been anyone’s Miss Sunshine.

There was nothing in any of the news articles about a second survivor. But Evie did find traces of Mrs. Yetner in the records. A day after the crash, the New York Herald-Tribune listed “Wilhelmina Higgs” among seventeen dead or missing. In later accounts, the official death toll was fourteen and her name was no longer among them.

Still, Evie wondered how on earth anyone could have survived what must have been at least an eight-hundred-foot fall. She found article after article in which “experts” tried to explain what everyone agreed was a miracle.

The most convincing explanation came from a spokesman for Otis Elevator, interviewed soon after the accident. He started by saying that an elevator “free fall” was as unlikely to happen “as finding life on other planets.” In fact, the elevator in the Empire State Building was the one and only instance he’d ever encountered. There were too many fail-safes, ancillary cables whose sole purpose was simply to prevent a disaster if the main cables broke.

The Otis Elevator inspectors found that in this case, however, all the elevator’s cables did fail—including the automatic braking cable. They’d been damaged when the jet engine and burning fuel fell down the adjacent shaft, and so they’d all snapped while the elevator was being lowered. Ironically, it had been those severed cables that probably saved Mrs. Yetner and her friend Betty. The cables had piled up in a tangled coil in the subbasement under the falling elevator. That, combined with compressed air trapped in the shaft by the rapid descent, cushioned the final impact. Betty Lou and Mrs. Yetner had been pulled to safety moments before flames engulfed the elevator pit.

Evie pulled the metal miniature of the Empire State Building from her purse. It was made of pot metal and there was no question that it had gotten so hot that it had begun to melt—another piece of evidence supporting Mrs. Yetner’s story.

She slipped Mrs. Yetner’s bequest, donating her story and the miniature, into a Mylar sleeve. Then she photographed the figure and logged it into the archives along with the audiotape and photographs of Mrs. Yetner. She added a lengthy research note summarizing Mrs. Yetner’s story. Under Provenance, she put: “Gift of Wilhelmina Higgs Yetner.”

As she typed into the system, the name Higgs lit up. That meant another Higgs had made a donation to the Historical Society. Intrigued, Evie scanned through the system. A collection of ceramic pottery shards, attributed to the Siwanoy Indians, had been donated in 1940 by a Mr. Thomas Higgs. That had to be Mrs. Yetner’s father. A research note said they’d been excavated in 1923. That must have been during the development of Snakapins Point.

“I didn’t expect you to be here.” Evie looked up, startled by the voice. Connor was hovering in her office doorway. “How’s your mother doing?”

“Still the same. Thanks for asking. I’ll go back to the hospital this afternoon. Ginger and I are taking turns, though I don’t think my mother realizes we’re even there.”

“It’s important to be there anyway. If not for her, for you. I told you, take the time you need.”

Evie felt a rush of gratitude. “I will. I am.”

“So what are you working on now that can’t wait?”

“You’re not going to believe what I’ve got.” She handed him the miniature of the Empire State Building. He turned it over, looking puzzled. “I found a second person who was in that elevator that fell eighty floors after the plane crash.”

“But that’s . . .” His mouth dropped open as he stared down at the little statue, then up at Evie. “She can’t still be alive?”

“She most certainly can. And is. Over ninety and completely coherent. I’ve got her on tape, talking publicly for the first time about what happened. And she’s donating that miniature. She had it with her when she fell.”

“Wow,” Connor said. “I mean, well, wow! This is fantastic. It’s got to be part of the exhibit and—” He stopped. “You know, it seems pretty fantastic that no one knew there was a second survivor and all of a sudden she pops up out of nowhere.”

“I know. I’ve been researching some of the details, but as far as I can tell, it all checks out.”

“Are you going to have Nick integrate her story with the audio we have?”

“Nick?” Evie knew exactly how she wanted Mrs. Yetner’s story merged with what they already had. She practically had it written in her head. “I’m here. I have time to do it myself.”

“It’s your call.” He gave her a long, hard look. “But here’s some advice from a friend. You need to learn to let go. Not just because of your mother. Because it’s part of being in charge. You don’t get to do everything yourself. You have an excellent staff. You should be thinking strategically, not tactically. Giving them opportunities to be creative and giving them credit for it. And meanwhile, coming up with the next great exhibit we’re going to mount and figuring out how to find donors to pay for it.”

In other words, not logging acquisitions and editing copy. Evie knew he was right. There was no reason for her to do what her staff could do. Still, she felt a pang of regret later after she handed the tape over to Maia to digitize and transcribe.

Suddenly, Evie had time on her hands. She paid a brief visit to the Great Hall. Seared in Memory was nearly complete. Some of the pictures she’d taken in the bowels of the Empire State Building had been blown up and mounted. She used her shirtsleeve to wipe a smudge off the Plexiglas over one of them. Then she returned to her office. She checked through her e-mail. Proofread their latest press release, even though it didn’t need proofing. Sent an e-mail asking Maia to add Mrs. Yetner to the list of people invited to the opening and to make sure a VIP ribbon got affixed to her name tag. Then she tucked one of the engraved invitations into her bag. Even if Mrs. Yetner turned out to be too weak to attend, she’d have it as a keepsake.

Finally she sat down to work on a half-finished strategic plan. But her attention kept wandering. Higgs Point. Known to the Siwanoy as Snakapins, land between two waters. It had passed from Finn’s great-grandfather to Mrs. Yetner’s father, who’d chopped it into narrow lots where he’d built modest houses and sold them off. Now, one by one, houses were being leveled.

Evie logged on to the website that gave the Historical Society direct access to the city’s property rolls. She typed in her mother’s address first. A little hourglass blinked a few times, then was replaced by a three-digit BBL number—borough, block, and lot. She entered that number in the Search Deeds box and waited while the system worked.

A list of deeds for the lot came up, the oldest one dated 1925. Evie held her breath as she scrolled through the list. The house had changed hands nine times since then but—Evie exhaled with relief—her mother, at least according to the City of New York, still owned it. The current deed was dated 1980. It had last been updated in 2002, the year her father died.

But what about Soundview Management? Had they succeeded in taking over other properties? Evie changed the search criteria and typed in “Soundview” as well as her mother’s zip code. Up came a list of about a dozen properties. She selected them all and clicked Map.

A map of Higgs Point flashed up on her screen with a dozen virtual pushpins highlighting those addresses. As she sent a copy to the printer, she realized how late it was. She was due at the hospital soon. She grabbed the printout and took a quick glance as she rode down in the elevator. As she’d suspected, Soundview Management owned both properties where houses had been demolished up the street from her mother’s. They owned more lots along Neck Road as well, most of them on the water. Evie stuffed the printout into her bag to examine more closely later.