Roasted chestnuts from vendors' carts, fresh cut spruce trees lining the sidewalks, extravagant gifts, opulent dinners, carols at St. Patrick's Cathedral, a warm meal and a few minutes shelter from the cold at one of the charitable food lines . . .
It's Christmas in Gilded Age Manhattan.
For the first time ever an amazing, giant ball will drop along a rod on the roof of the New York Times building to ring in the New Year. Everyone plans to attend the event.
But the murder of a prominent newsman hits a little too close to home. And when a young newspaper woman, a protégé of the great Jacob Riis and old Vassar school chum of Bev's, is the target of a similar attack, it is clear this is not just a single act of violence but a conspiracy of malicious proportions. Really, you'd think murderers would take a holiday.
Something absolutely must be done. And Lady Dunbridge is happy to oblige.
