BooksBarbecue
Back The Deal Goes Down
Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. Other Titles
  3. Dedication
  4. CHAPTER ONE
  5. CHAPTER TWO
  6. CHAPTER THREE
  7. CHAPTER FOUR
  8. CHAPTER FIVE
  9. CHAPTER SIX
  10. CHAPTER SEVEN
  11. CHAPTER EIGHT
  12. CHAPTER NINE
  13. CHAPTER TEN
  14. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  15. CHAPTER TWELVE
  16. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  17. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  18. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  19. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  20. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  21. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  22. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  33. CHAPTER THIRTY
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  43. CHAPTER FORTY
  44. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  45. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  48. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
  53. CHAPTER FIFTY
  54. CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
  55. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

One foot in front of the other.

Don’t trip or get caught by a fallen branch or an uprising root.

Don’t let loose stones roll your feet out from under you and twist your ankle.

Slowly. And step and step.

Breathe. And breathe.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

A GYPSY QUEEN IN A FAIRY TALE

“They used to race ice yachts on the Hudson River.

The Roosevelts, the Rockefellers, the Astors, the Livingstons. Not ice boats. Ice yachts. Sixty-eight-foot-long.

A thousand feet of sail. Eighty miles an hour. The fastest vehicles on Earth back in the nineteenth century.”

LARRY BEINHART, WHERE WE’VE BEEN

THE EAST BANK OF THE Hudson River was a gold coast as rich as the North Shore of Long Island where F. Scott Fitzgerald set The Great Gatsby. A low ridge runs parallel to the water. The Astors, Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, Roosevelts, and Livingstons built mansion after mansion from Westchester to Albany along that highline. They were landscaped in emulation of England’s stately homes. The trees were cleared for the view, except, always, for a few that would stand in isolated grandeur. The forests were replaced with vast lawns, immaculately groomed green carpets covering the slopes down to the water. Often formal gardens, large and small, were added. With gardeners to keep the shrubs and flowers as watered, fed, trimmed, and primped as their owners.

That Gilded Age is gone, but their side of the river still seems tidier, more kempt, better mannered, than our side.

I picked up Allison from Rhinecliff station.

She asked me if we could stop by Bard, for fifteen minutes or so, on the way.

—

Bard is about eight miles straight north from the station, on Route 103, a two-lane local road.

Almost everything you’d see on your left, toward the river, is the land of the great estates. You pass Ferncliff. Now a nursing home. You cross 199, which would take you to the bridge over to Kingston. Poet’s Walk is next. Then Rokeby Mansion, owned by the Astors and Livingstons, and still occupied by their heirs, but shabby with the paint peeling from the walls. Then there’s Union Theological Seminary, completely hidden away, originally owned by the Livingstons, who sold it to John D. Rockefeller so he could build a monastery for the Christian Brothers. Then it went to Rev. Sun Myung Moon for his Unification Church. It’s currently on the market for $17,000,000 or so. Edgewater, another Livingston mansion is nearby. It belonged to Gore Vidal from 1950 to 1969. A smaller mansion, Sylvania is the next property to the north.

Then there’s Montgomery Place, which Bard had recently purchased, to add to the next two, Ward Manor and Blithewood, which make up the college campus. Blithewood Mansion is now the Levy Economics Institute.

“You said you were on the verge of graduation.”

“Yes, about a semester to go.”

“I have a question…”