Текст книги "The Striker"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

Соавторы: Justin Scott
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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

50

I wish I’d been there to watch him drown,” Joseph Van Dorn said heavily. “I taught that man every trick I knew. It never occurred to me until it was too late that I created a monster.” He shook his head, rubbed his red whiskers, and looked probingly at Isaac Bell. “It makes a man wonder, will he create another?”

“Relax, Joe,” said Mack Fulton. “Isaac’s just a detective.”

“And a pretty good one,” said Wally Kisley, “once he masters the art of bringing criminals in alive.”

“Or at least a corpse.”

The Van Dorns were waiting for a train in a saloon close to Union Station. Prince Henry of Prussia was sailing home on the Deutschland, and the Boss was taking them all to New York for what threatened to be a wild scramble.

“How wide was the space between the wheel and the boat?” asked Archie.

“Three feet,” Bell answered. “But to survive without me seeing him, he would have had to dive under the blades and then stay underwater and swim a long ways off before he surfaced.” Bell had relived Clay’s dive over and over in his mind, bitterly aware that if he had captured him alive, he would be much closer to identifying the real provocateur behind Henry Clay.

“We’ll get him one of these days,” Van Dorn said magnanimously. “There’s no statute of limitations on murder. At least the strike is over. The miners aren’t all that happy, but they’re heading back to work, and their families will be living in houses instead of tents.”

“Company houses,” said Bell.

“Yes, of course. Did your young lady show up yet?”

“Not yet.” Bell had no idea where Mary was.

Wish Clarke walked in with his carpetbag.

“Wish looks like he lost his best friend.”

“Or dropped a bottle,” said Mack.

Wish did not sit. “Son, do you have a moment?” he asked and walked to a table in a far corner. Bell followed.

“Sit down, Isaac.”

“What’s the matter?”

“While they were dismantling the wreck of the Vulcan King, they found—”

“Clay’s body? It drifted—”

“I’m so sorry, Isaac. They found your girl.”

“What?”

“Scalded to death when the boiler burst. Looks like she was engaged in sabotage.”

“But that can’t be,” Bell gasped.

“Maybe not, son. But you showed me her letter. She might have done what she thought she had to do.”

“Where is– Where do they have her?”

“Remember Mary as she was, Isaac.”

“I have to see her.”

“No, Isaac. She doesn’t exist anymore. Not the girl you know. Let her be the girl you remember.”

Bell turned toward the door. Wish blocked him. Bell said, “It’s all right. I just have to tell her brother.”

“Jim knows.”

“How did he take it?”

“He refuses to believe it. He swears she wrote him that she was going to New York to confront the man staking Henry Clay.”

“Who?”

“She didn’t put it in the letter.”

Bell said, “I will find him if it takes every minute of my life.”

Wish Clarke laid a comforting hand on Isaac Bell’s shoulder. “Keep in mind, son, when you never give up, time’s on your side.”

EPILOGUE

A Smoke-filled Room

1912

The Congdon Building’s elevator runner reached for the intercom. “May I have your name, sir? I gotta call ahead.”

“Don’t,” said Chief Investigator Isaac Bell. He opened his coat to show his gold Van Dorn Agency badge and the butt of a Browning automatic polished by use.

* * *

It was hot and smoky in James Congdon’s office, and ashtrays were deep with cigar butts. Congdon, bright-eyed and flushed with victory, recognized Bell when the detective walked in without knocking. He welcomed him warmly.

“Chief Inspector Isaac Bell. I haven’t seen you since you relieved me of a carload of money playing poker on the Overland Limited back in ’07.”

“If I had known then what I know now, I’d have taken more than your money.”

“I recall it as a friendly game – if expensive.”

“You’re under arrest, Judge James Congdon, for murder in the coalfields.”

Congdon laughed at the tall detective.

“I have no time to be arrested. My train is taking me to the convention in Chicago with enough delegates to nominate me to run for vice president of the United States.”

“Then I’ve caught up with you just in time to save the life of your running mate.”

Congdon laughed again, and mocked him, “Never give up? Never? I know you’ve been sniffing around for years, but you’ll never link me to any murders in that strike. Fact is, thanks to me intervening with the coal operators and persuading President Roosevelt to mediate, the strike ended peacefully. Everyone got something they wanted – the miners received a small raise, the producers were not forced to recognize the union – and there’ve been no coal strikes since.”

“Even if that lie were truth,” Bell answered quietly, “even if you got away with every killing in the coalfields, you will die for the murder of Mary Higgins.”

“Mary Higgins died while sabotaging a company steamboat,” Congdon said. “But I can’t allow accusations to confuse gullible voters.” He raised his voice and shouted through the closed door to an adjoining office. “Mr. Potter! I need you.”

A well-built middle-aged man with a beard that was showing flecks of gray limped into the office carrying a leveled Colt Bisley.

Isaac Bell looked him over. “‘Mr. Potter,’ you will disappoint the many who hoped that Henry Clay drowned in the Ohio River.”

Congdon said, “Mr. Clay became Mr. Potter so that I could help him live in great comfort, free of the electric chair.”

“In exchange,” said Bell, “for killing your enemies and rivals.”

Congdon said, “I’m disappointed that you don’t seem one bit surprised. I had hoped to see your jaw drop.”

“Joseph Van Dorn suspected years ago that Clay had to be your assassin. Who else, he asked, could be as cold-blooded? And he described you to a T, Congdon: a man wise enough to see Henry Clay’s talents and greedy enough to employ them.”

Clay’s expression turned cold at Bell’s mention of Van Dorn. “That bulge in your coat where you used to pack your Colt Army, and subsequently a Bisley, is now, I’m informed, a Browning No. 2. Put it on Mr. Congdon’s desk.”

Bell surrendered his favorite pistol of many years, a Belgian-made semiautomatic modified to fire an American .380 caliber cartridge.

“I presume you replaced the sleeve gun I took away from you in New York. Drop it, too.”

Bell shook the derringer out of his sleeve and handed it over.

“And the pocket pistol.”

“You have a long memory,” said Bell.

“It’s kept me alive. Put it on the desk.”

Bell placed the tiny one-shot on the desk.

“And the knife in your boot.”

“Want me to throw it at anything?”

“If you still can, hit the edge of that bookshelf.”

Bell threw overhand. The knive struck like a flash of lightning.

James Congdon howled in dismay. The blade had pierced the portrait of his latest wife, depicted as a shapely goddess in silk gauze, and stood quivering in the lady’s nose. Bell used the distraction to glide behind the shimmering white Rodin marble.

“Sorry, I missed.”

Clay leveled his gun.

“What if you miss me and shoot your boss’s favorite statue?”

Clay started toward him, saying, “I’ll get so close, I can’t miss.”

“Be careful!” Congdon shouted.

As Clay turned to assure him, Bell whipped his two-shot derringer from his hat.

“Drop it!”

Henry Clay stopped in his tracks. His startled expression seemed to shout Where the hell did that come from?

Bell said, “Live and learn. Toss your gun over there, on the carpet.”

Clay shrugged with a faint knowing smile and did as Bell ordered. Then he looked at Judge Congdon. The old man caressed the bronze statuette on his desk. “You’re wrong, Chief Inspector. The statue you’re hiding behind is not my favorite. This is my favorite.”

“I can’t believe you prefer that little thing to this magnificent marble.”

In answer, the financier jerked the steam lever.

* * *

Isaac Bell, Henry Clay, and James Congdon all looked up at the ceiling.

Only Bell smiled.

He stuck out his hand. Warm water dripped onto his palm.

“It appears to be raining in your office. And on your parade.”

Congdon jerked the steam lever again. Nothing happened. Frantically, he tugged the statue again and again, slamming it down, jerking it upright, slamming it down.

Bell said, “I thought it sensible to shut the steam-conditioning valves to your office.”

Congdon’s long, thin frame sagged, and he slipped off his feet into his chair.

“But how did you know?”

Bell moved swiftly forward and swept the guns off the desk onto the floor before Congdon or Clay got any ideas. “Judge Congdon, you are under arrest for the murder of Mary Higgins.”

Henry Clay’s expression shifted from flummoxed to deeply puzzled.

“You were out of the room earlier, Clay. You didn’t hear me charge your boss with murdering a young woman in 1902.”

“Are you crazy, Bell?”

“I wish I were,” Isaac Bell answered sadly. “I would give anything to be wrong. But she died a horrible death right here in this office.”

“Mary died in Pittsburgh.”

“Mary Higgins was foundin Pittsburgh. Many were led to believe that Mary was scalded to death helping you blow up the militia’s steamboat.”

Clay shook his head. “Mary didn’t help me. I had no idea she was aboard. She must have used that boy disguise she used in Denver.”

“She was never aboard the Vulcan King. Not alive. She died here, in New York. Mary’s brother swore that she could not have been in Pittsburgh because Mary wrote him that she was going to New York to confront the saboteur’s boss – your boss. No one believed Jim Higgins. But why would he say it unless he was addled with grief or telling the truth? So I asked questions. Turns out, I was not the only man sweet on her.”

Clay was listening closely.

Bell said, “I’ll bet you boasted to her, hoping to impress her– She was the kind of girl a fellow would do most anything to impress. You did brag, didn’t you? Bragged how you had partnered up with the most powerful man in Wall Street.”

“I didn’t brag.”

“Maybe you got puddingheaded when she slipped you the knockout drops.”

“How do you know about that?”

“Give Van Dorns some credit. The pharmacist she bought the chloral from told me. You gave Mary Congdon’s name, didn’t you?”

“I must have.”

“You signed her death warrant.”

Clay looked at Congdon, who was slumped behind his desk. “Did you hurt her?”

Congdon said, “It’s a trick, you idiot.”

Clay looked to Bell. The color of Bell’s eyes had darkened to a steely blue. He directed them straight at the rogue detective. “We never give up,” he said softly. “You know that better than anybody. It was Mr. Van Dorn’s motto from the beginning, wasn’t it?”

Clay stared. Then he lowered his eyes and nodded agreement. “Yes, from the beginning.”

Isaac Bell said, “It took me ten years to trace her steps from Pittsburgh to New York, to Wall Street, to this building, to this office. You know your business, Clay, you know how it works. A word here, a hint there, a memory, a glimpse. It’s easier when it’s a pretty girl who struck the eye. Ticket agents. Train conductors. Landladies. A unionist finally out of prison. Bits. Pieces. Bits of nothing. Suddenly, you get lucky with a clerk who makes change for the El. Right around the corner. A hundred feet from this building. Then back to bits of nothing. Finally, a stroke of luck.”

Bell turned to Congdon.

“The brokerage house of Thibodeau & Marzen went bankrupt in the Panic of ’07. There were lawsuits by the dozen. Judge James Congdon’s name surfaced in court. Turned out you owned the broker. And thanks to an old detective who once told me that sometimes dead ends turn around, I had in my files a copy of a private wire transmitted on Thibodeau & Marzen’s leased telegraph line to Henry Clay’s alias, John Claggart.”

Bell turned back to Henry Clay. “But I still had no final absolute, provable connection. Until, one night, I got lucky again. An elevator runner, a temporary filling in that evening and who left town the day after, was all of a sudden back ten years later. His uncle was still the superintendent of the building. The nephew’s hopes hadn’t panned out. And his uncle gave him a job.”

Bell shifted his gaze to Congdon for a long moment, then back to Henry Clay.

“The lucky detective stopped by – as he had regularly – and this time found the new elevator runner and recognized him as the temporary who had been working that night ten years ago.

“‘Sure, I remember that girl. She was a looker. But, boy, did she look mad.’”

Bell’s voice thickened. “I asked, ‘When did you take her back down?’

“‘Didn’t,’ he said. ‘She never come down on my shift and I was on for darn near ten hours straight.’ And I asked again, ‘You ran her to what floor?’

“‘Top floor. Mr. Congdon’s own private floor.’

“‘Are you sure?’

“‘Sure I’m sure. Orders were, you had to call ahead to go to Mr. Congdon’s floor. I called ahead. Mr. Congdon said, “Bring her up.” I brought her up.’

“Mary Higgins died right here in this office. Right beside your boss’s statue.”

“It was self-defense!” Congdon shouted.

“What?” said Clay.

“She did not come here to ‘confront’ me. She came to kill me.”

Isaac Bell said, “I never doubted that Mary Higgins was a woman of the highest moral standard. You just confirmed it with your confession that you thought she intended to kill you.”

“I made no confession.”

“I just heard it from your own lips.”

“It’s your word against mine.”

“And his,” said Isaac Bell.

Henry Clay, who was listening stone-faced, asked James Congdon, “Did you kill Mary?”

Congdon pulled a pistol from his desk. Clay stared at it, his face lighting with recognition. “She told me she could never kill anyone. I believed her. I still do.”

“She changed her mind,” said Congdon. “A lady’s prerogative.”

“Where did you get that gun?”

“I’ll explain after we tend to Mr. Bell.”

“That’s a Colt Bisley. Mary took mine.”

Congdon heard the threat in Clay’s voice and whirled with his pistol.

Clay dove to the carpet with astounding speed, scooped up the gun he had dropped, and shot first, lacing two bullets into the old man’s chest. Congdon tumbled backwards, jerking his trigger as he fell. His bullet struck The Kiss, shattering the marble. Congdon’s eyes locked in mourning on the ruin.

Clay stood over him. “But how did you move Mary’s body to the steamboat in Pittsburgh?”

James Congdon answered with his dying breath.

“You weren’t the only ambitious fool who worked for me.”

Henry Clay’s shoulders sagged as Congdon’s had in his defeat. He shook his head in dismay. Then he turned to Isaac Bell. “You never gave up, and you got the man who killed Mary.”

“But Judge Congdon didn’t kill Terry Fein, Mike Flannery, young Captain Jennings, Black Jack Gleason, and countless others caught in your schemes. Henry Clay, you’re under arrest.”

Clay’s amber eyes were dead with defeat, but his pistol was rising with superhuman speed. Isaac Bell shot it out of his hand. It fell on Congdon’s chest. Clay gazed at it a moment, clutching his fingers. His empty gaze shifted to Bell’s derringer, and his eyes came alive.

“Looks like a .22,” he said. “And only one shot left. Do you think you can stop Henry Clay with one bullet?”

The door behind him banged opened and a big voice boomed, “Isaac couldstop you with one shot between your murderous eyes. But I made him swear to me that I would get the first sevenshots if you gave us the slightest excuse to pull the trigger.”

Henry Clay looked over his shoulder and down the barrel of Van Dorn’s Colt M1911 semiautomatic pistol and raised his hands.

“Pick up that telephone and call Congdon’s train,” Van Dorn ordered.

“Train?”

Isaac Bell explained, “You’ve got a date with the electric chair. Sing Sing’s on the way to Chicago. We’ll drop you there for safekeeping until your trial.”

* * *

Marion Bell knew from experience that after her husband solved a case, he would tell her everything that had happened when he was ready to. But this time was special. When he glided across Wall Street and slipped soundlessly into the auto, she sensed that he wanted to tell her now but couldn’t form the words, and might never.

She started the Marmon, pulled away from the curb into the empty street, steered around the corner, and headed up Broadway. Isaac Bell sat quietly, watching the boisterous late-night city streets. When they got to Forty-second Street, Marion turned left toward the Hudson River.

“Where are we going?” asked Bell. Archie’s town house, where they stayed in New York, was up in the East Sixties.

“Home.”

Bell considered her answer for a couple of blocks. Home was three thousand miles away in San Francisco, where they first met six years ago at the time of the Earthquake. It was a two– or three-month trip in an auto, depending on the weather and the state of the roads, and a Marmon Speedster probably wasn’t up to it. Of course Marion knew that, which meant she had a plan. They had married two years ago on the Mauretania, and he knew her well enough by now to know she had a plan.

“Joe Van Dorn won’t let me off for that long.”

“I’ll bet we could make the Mississippi in ten days.”

“Depending on the roads.”

“And ten nights.”

“We’ll run out of roads beyond the Mississippi.”

“Then we’ll put the car on a special at St. Louis. Home on the train in four days.”

Bell leaned over to read the gauges. “You filled the gasoline tank.”

“There’s a picnic basket in the trunk.”

Marion drove onto the ferry, and they went up to the passenger deck and stood at the railing, watching the lights of Manhattan. In the middle of the river she asked, “What did Congdon say?”

“He confessed.”

“What did yousay?”

“I said good-bye to my old friend Mary Higgins.”