The Phantom of Manhattan by Frederick Forsyth Page A

embraces the boy and holds him against her like he was about to be kidnapped.
    ‘What is it?’ she asks in a whisper, evidently badly frightened.
    ‘It’s a toy monkey, ma’am,’ says I, trying to be helpful.
    ‘“Masquerade”,’ she whispers. ‘Thirteen years ago. He must be here.’
    ‘There’s no-one here but me, ma’am, and I did not bring it. The toy came in a box, gift-wrapped. The bell-hop brought it up.’ Meg the maid is nodding furiously to confirm what I say.
    ‘Where does it come from?’ asks the lady. So I take the monkey, which has now gone silent again, and look all over it. Nothing. Then I try the wrapping paper. Nothing again. So I look all over the cardboard box and right on the underside there is a slip of paper pasted on. It says: S.C. Toys, C.I. Then the old memory checks in. About a year last summer I was walking out with a very pretty girl who waited table at Lombardi’s on Spring Street. One day I took her down to Coney Island for a whole day. Of the various funfairs we chose Steeplechase Park. And I recall a toyshop there, full of the strangest mechanical toys of all kinds. There were soldiers that marched, drummers that drummed, ballet dancers on round drums who high-kicked - you name it, if it could be done with clockwork and springs, they had it.
    So I explained to the lady that I thought S.C. stood for Steeplechase and C.I. almost certainly stood for Coney Island. Then I had to explain what Coney Island was all about. She became very thoughtful. ‘These … sideshows … that is what you call them? They have to do with optical illusions, tricks, trapdoors, secret passages, things mechanical that seem to work all by themselves?’
    I nodded. ‘That’s exactly what sideshows at Coney Island are all about, ma’am.’
    Then she gets very agitated. ‘M’sieur Bloom, I must go there. I must see this toyshop, this Steeplechase Park.’ I explain there is a rather large problem. Coney Island is a summer resort only and this is the start of December. It is closed, shuttered up; the only work going on is maintenance, repairs, cleaning, painting, varnishing. Not open to the public. But by now she is nearly crying and I hate to see a lady in distress.
    So I call up a pal on the Commercial Desk at the American and catch him just before he goes home. Who owns Steeplechase Park? Fellow called George Tilyou, along with a sleeping and very secret financial partner. Yes, he’s getting pretty elderly and no longer lives on the island but in a big house in the City of Brooklyn. But he still owns Steeplechase Park and has done since he opened it nine years ago. Does he have a telephone, by any chance? By any chance, he does. So I get the number and place a call. It takes a while, but it comes through and I am talking with Mr Tilyou personally. I explain everything to him, hinting of the importance to Mayor McClellan that New York should extend every hospitality to Mme de Chagny … well, you know, a good old-fashioned spiel. Anyway, he says he’ll call back.
    We wait. An hour. He calls. Different mood entirely, like he had consulted with someone. Yes, he will organize that the gates be opened for one private party. The toyshop will be staffed and the Funmaster personally will be in attendance at all times. Not possible for the next morning, but the one after.
    Well, that means tomorrow, right? So yours truly is going to escort Mme de Chagny personally down to Coney Island. In fact I would say I am now her private guide to New York itself. And no, guys, there’s no point in you all turning up because no-one gets to go in but her, me and her personal party. So for one dirty cape I get scoop after scoop. Didn’t I tell you this was the best job in the world?
    There was only one problem - my exclusive interview, for which I had gone to the hotel in the first place. Did I get it? I did not. The singer lady was so distressed that she rushed back to her bedroom and declined to come out again. Meg