The Double Vice: The 1st Hidden Gotham Novel by Chris Holcombe (free ebook reader txt) 📕

was nothing but dirty speakeasies and overcrowded slums. But many didn’t know about Sugar Hill. Sugar Hill was where Harlem’s rich and famous lived, where castle-like mansions and stately townhouses and rowhouses lined the streets like in New York’s gilded age, when the Vanderbilts and the Rockefellers lived on Fifth Avenue before they retreated from the city. El told him once that Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway lived up this way, and Dash wondered—or rather, hoped—they might see them at Zora Mae’s party. Harlem Royalty, indeed.

The mansion, which took their breath away, was a wood and stone wonder done up in the Queen Anne style. The first story was awash in gray stone and granite, the second story covered in crimson red–painted shingles matching the roof, the attic done up in white. The left-hand side of the house was box-y, utilizing a typical A-frame at the top. But the right-hand side was rounded, climbing upwards towards a gumdrop turret. Windows were everywhere, all opened—those that weren’t stained glass, that is—and music and laughter spilled out onto the street below. Inside the window frames were the shadows of patrons, some standing, others dancing, all radiating joy. The porch below was decorated with electric lights on a string, like those at Coney Island. Potted plants with large, elephant-like leaves stood on either side of the door, as big and elaborate as the headdresses on Broadway dancers.

Dash and Finn were the only whites in line and, just as Zora Mae had warned, they got more than a few wary glances their way.

“Isn’t this just grand,” Finn purred, oblivious to the stares. “I’m going to have a hard time picking just one man tonight.”

“Finn, stay focused. We’re not here to have a good time.”

“You know, if you stay this serious, you’re going to die a young death.”

We all very well may if I can’t figure a way out of this mess.

They got to the porch stairs and walked up to the stoop. Above the front door was a long, rectangular piece of stained glass. Underneath it stood a tall man in a black tuxedo and white gloves. He gave them a baleful look. “Gentlemen?”

They placed Karl’s blue cards onto the blinding white of his outstretched palm.

The doorman looked down and saw the color of the card that, as Zora Mae claimed, was the all-clear for whites to enter.

The doorman looked up and said, “Welcome to Dante’s Inferno. Upstairs is Heaven, where angels and their singing will great you. The ground floor is Purgatory, where you may pause to consider the state of your soul. And the basement is Hell, where sinners are greeted with open arms. Enjoy.”

As they walked into the foyer, Finn muttered, “I love the drama of this party! So theatrical.”

Dash looked at Finn. “We shall we start?”

“Can we just stop and marvel at this hall? Dear goddess, no wonder they call this place Sugar Hill. Look at how much sugar is on display!”

Dash, having grown up in wealth, looked around to see the hall through Finn’s eyes. Mahogany wood archways carved into intricate patterns led to rooms to their left and right. Glass panels embedded in the opened doors portrayed Victorian men and women in a variety of poses, stories that must’ve meant something to the owners. A silver chandelier with six bulbs encased in crystal hung above their heads, as did the carved wood ceiling. This was Old Money through and through.

It reminded Dash so much of his former family home, he felt slightly ill. “It’s grand, alright,” he managed to say.

“It’s more than grand! It’s capital!”

Dash was puzzled. “Capital?”

“A British sailor I entertained last night said it often. I think I’m going to adopt it from now on.”

Recovered, Dash asked again, “Where shall we start? Or do you want to stand and stare some more?”

“No reason to be a bearcat.” Finn considered their options. “Let’s go up to Heaven and begin our descent down. Just like Dante.”

Dash nodded. “The lady hath spoken.”

They found a wooden staircase and ascended to a landing filled with angels in white sheets and robes, their wings sewn to their backs and sparkling behind them. The walls were also covered in white sheets, and miniature Roman-Greco columns lined the floor in even lines. Heaven was apparently the Parthenon.

Dash and Finn were directed to a doorway to their left, where they were greeted by Gabriel, a massive black man wearing a royal blue robe that flowed around his muscular frame. Unlike the other angels, his wings were golden, fanning out to the sides and arching above his head. Heavy eyeliner made Gabriel’s eyes appear even more striking and a slight dusting of makeup emphasized the sharp angle of his cheeks and jawline.

“Gentlemen,” he said, his voice booming with granite, “welcome to Heaven. The Good Lord has been expecting you.”

He opened the door and the free form, bent notes of jazz washed over them. The room they entered was essentially a ballroom with a vaulted ceiling high above their heads and chairs pushed against the walls, leaving the floor in the center wide open. People filled the space, doing dances Dash had never seen before. Complicated moves that had shoulders rolling, hips rocking, hands up in the air with fingers waving, legs bowing out and coming back in. Twirls, turns, kicks, and slides. One couple even performed a flip.

Makes my club look absolutely tame.

Like in Pinstripes, some of the men danced with other men. Same went for the women. No one seemed surprised or offended by what they saw, which meant this party was a safe place. A few whites stood at the perimeter, clearly intimated by the sheer physicality of the other dancers.

A six-piece band played at the other end of the room, its members dressed in white. All the instruments—drums, bass, piano, cornet—were painted white. A singer, a beautiful black woman with short hair and smooth curves, wailed about lost love in a voice that was so spirited, it sounded as if she were celebrating