The next morning Jim left early for the gym. Mae left the
apartment house, too. She took the kids to her sister's house, and
then she crossed the Hudson River to New York City.
She was going to the small part of the city known as the Upper
East Side. It was an area of beautiful houses, expensive apartment
buildings, and fine hotels. Some of the richest people in the
country lived on the blocks along the city's Central Park.
Two streets away, the buildings weren't quite so beautiful, but
they were still home to wealthy people. In front of each apartment
building, a uniformed doorman stood guard.
When she reached the tall building, she looked up, trying to
guess how many floors it had. She went through the beautiful
entrance hall to the elevator. On the fifteenth floor, she moved
down the line of doors.