Free City of God by Beverly Swerling

of them every day. It’s a different matter entirely.”
    “You’re right, of course. I shall speak to the director.”
    She made a face. “You will have no joy of Dr. Grant. Don’t waste your breath.”
    “The senior attendant before me…”
    “Was as venal and greedy as Grant himself. To be allowed to continue here the students had to pay him an extra dollar a week beyond the customary three. And he spent his time in a lucrative private practice in the town and only came to Bellevue to collect what he could.”
    He’d wondered why his rooms, though a quite decent suite at the top of the building, had the air of not having been lived in for some time. “I see. What do you suggest I do, then? It all sounds rather hopeless.”
    “The only solution is to go over Grant’s head to the Common Council. But you can’t do so publicly. Grant would sack you at once. He has the power to do that.”
    “Then…”
    “You have one possibility. I have considered it myself, but there is an old and bitter quarrel standing in the way.”
    “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”
    “Samuel Devrey,” Manon said. “He’s a more distant cousin, but a cousin nonetheless. And he has a seat on the council.”
    “But if the Turner and Devrey family feud still counts for anything, and if you, a Turner by marriage, can’t see him, why should I be—”
    Manon shook her head. “I’m not referring to that ancient trouble. I don’t even know what it was about. The unpleasantness between me and Sam Devrey is something entirely different.”
    After Joyful died and she heard about the opium (as inevitably she did), she’d gone to Mr. Astor to plead against the scheme, just as Joyful would have done. Her arguments counted for nothing. The profits were going to be enormous, Jacob Astor assured her. Young Sam Devrey had it all in hand, and Astor would see she had her fair share; he was, after all, an honorable man. She had, of course, refused any share in the money, and despite other interests they might have been said to have in common, she had not spoken to Astor or Sam Devrey again.
    “What’s between Cousin Samuel and myself doesn’t involve you,” Manon said. “But if anything is going to be done about Bellevue, it is the council that must do it. They can get rid of Tobias Grant for a start. See him, Cousin Nicholas. See Cousin Samuel. It’s the only thing to do.”
     
    “Starting to snow,” Sam Devrey said. “Middle of March and apparently winter’s not yet done with us.” Idle chatter to fill the awkward silence until this Dr. Nicholas Turner got around to saying what he’d come for.
    The two men faced each other across a mahogany writing table in Sam’s private office. The table was pristine and gleaming. The paperwork of Devrey Shipping was done in the hurly-burly of the outer room where half a dozen clerks stood behind tall desks. Even in here with the door closed there was a persistent hum from the activity outside.
    “Not quite the end of winter yet,” Nick agreed. He looked out the window; the snow seemed to have stopped. The ground floor of the Devrey counting house was a few feet above street level. Most buildings in New York were so constructed; the intent was to keep the smell of horse manure at a distance. It also meant that all Nick could see beyondthe window were the tops of men’s stovepipe hats bobbing along Little Dock Street. There were no bonnets among them. The press of commerce had driven the ladies from what the locals referred to as the down the town thick of things. It had driven away much else besides, Nick knew. Old two-story counting houses like this one were fast becoming obsolete. “I hear Devrey’s is to have new premises, Cousin Samuel.”
    “We are, Dr. Turner.” True, they were cousins, but most of the blood they shared was bad. Sam preferred not to acknowledge the relationship. “But somehow I don’t think our new premises are what you’ve come to talk about.” The new