Such questions were not exactly the kind what would’ve revived our weakened enthusiasm; and by seven o’clock the whole bunch of us were strewn around the Doctor’s parlor, dozing. The rain had finally lightened up, and I was lying in front of one of the open French windows on the carpeted floor, letting the cool air that the storm had brought into the city play over my face and lull me into the first really decent rest I’d had all day. Still, it was a light sleep, one easily interrupted by noises from outside; and the noise what I heard coming from that direction at about seven-thirty was one what was at once so familiar yet so out of place that I honestly couldn’t tell if I was asleep or awake:
It was the forceful, high-pitched sound of Mr. Roosevelt’s voice.
“Wait here!” it was saying; then I heard the sound of a carriage door closing. “I shall want you to take us to the yard as soon as we’ve had a chance to speak with the others!”
“Yes, sir!” came a crisp, efficient answer, one what caused me to roll over and look outside.
And there he was, all right, the assistant secretary of the navy, done up in his best black linen and walking side by side with an older man who wore a navy officer’s uniform.
“Holy Christ,” I mumbled, rubbing my eyes to make sure I wasn’t seeing things. “Holy Christ!” I repeated, loud enough for the others to start coming out of their slumbers. Unable to stop myself from breaking into a smile, I scrambled to my feet and began shaking whatever shoulders I could grab fastest. “He’s here! Doctor-Miss Howard-it’s Mr. Roosevelt! He’s here! Holy Christ!”
At this news the others got to their feet, looking just as confused and unsure of their senses as I’d felt-that is, until they heard the sound of the front door opening.
“Doctor?” came the bark from downstairs. “Moore! Where in thunder are you all?” Heavy footsteps pounded on the stairs as the shouting continued. “And where is the brilliant Sara Howard, that former secretary of mine?”
A few more heavy steps, and then those unmistakable features began to appear in the shadows at the top of the stairs: in a sort of reversed version of Mr. Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat, Mr. Roosevelt generally became visible grin first, his big teeth standing out in even the deepest blackness. Next to be seen were the small, squinting eyes behind the little steel-rimmed spectacles, and finally the square head, the broad mustache, and the huge barrel chest, the last of which had been built up, after enduring a childhood of terrible asthma, to become one of the most powerful in the world.
“Well!” he cried out, as he moved down the hall followed by the much calmer-and very wise-looking-navy officer. “I like this! Crime and outrage running rampant, and you all lollygagging about as if there -were no action to be gotten!” He put his hands to his hips as he came into the parlor, still grinning from ear to ear; then he shot his right paw out to the Doctor. “Kreizler! Delighted to see you, Doctor, dee-lighted!”
“Hello, Roosevelt,” the Doctor answered with a smile. “I suppose I should’ve known you wouldn’t miss this chance.”
“Hell,” Mr. Moore said, “we all should’ve known.”
Making his way around the room, Mr. Roosevelt pressed the flesh hard with everybody, and accepted a warm hug from Miss Howard. He was especially glad, it seemed to me, to find that the Isaacson brothers were there, and still on the police force-for it was himself who’d brought them in, as part of his effort to loosen the grip what the Irish clan of Tammany hirelings had on Mulberry Street. When he finally got around to saying hello to me, I’d gotten so excited by his presence and the new hope it seemed to bring that I was shifting from foot to foot nervously. Still, there must have been much of the morning’s sadness left in my face, for Mr. Roosevelt’s smile shrank a little as he leaned down to shake my hand and look into my eyes.
“Well, young Stevie,” he said, with real sympathy. “You’ve had a hard time of all this, I understand. But don’t doubt this, my boy-” He put one of his tough hands on my shoulder. “We have come here to see that justice is done!”
CHAPTER 54
As the Isaacsons began to sort through all their house-breaking equipment and weapons, figuring out what we’d need for our final assault on Number 39 Bethune Street, the rest of us rushed to get into suitable clothes for the mission: you didn’t often stand still, and you never wasted time, when Mr. Roosevelt was around. Once we were reassembled in the parlor, the former police commissioner took a moment to introduce us to his companion.
“Lieutenant William W. Kimball of the United States Navy,” Mr. Roosevelt said proudly, almost as if the officer was one of his own kids, instead of a man what obviously had a few years on him. Quite a few years, in fact: when it came my turn to shake hands with the officer I wondered why, at his age (almost fifty, it turned out), he was still stuck with such a low rank. It wasn’t until later that somebody explained to me that his situation wasn’t unusuaclass="underline" being as the navy hadn’t seen any real action since the Civil War, advancement had gotten to be a very slow process. “Lieutenant Kimball lectures at the Naval War College,” Mr. Roosevelt continued, “and has no equal when it comes to the business of war plans.”
“Why, Roosevelt,” Mr. Moore mocked, “are you planning a war?”
Mr. Roosevelt held up a finger. “Now, now, Moore, you won’t snare me with any of your reporter’s questions. The navy is always developing contingency plans, in the event of conflict with any power.”
“I shouldn’t have thought that we required any strategic planning for what we are to undertake tonight,” the Doctor said, studying Lieutenant Kimball curiously. “Though you are of course welcome, Lieutenant.”
“Thank you, Doctor,” the lieutenant answered gamely; but even though he seemed to have some of the swagger (along with the usual large mustache) of a sailor, you could tell from his voice that he also had far more brains than your garden-variety naval man. “It’s not my war planning, though, that prompted Mr. Roosevelt to ask me along. I have some other areas of expertise that he thought might be useful.”
“Indeed!” Mr. Roosevelt agreed, pounding on the lieutenant’s back. “Kimball, here, is a man ahead of his time. I hear nothing but battleships, battleships, battleships, from most of our officers, but Kimball has put his mind to developing the weapons that will determine the course of naval warfare in the next century, rather than the last. Torpedoes! Submarines! I tell you, that French novelist Verne has nothing on the lieutenant, here.”
That comment snagged my interest, for the Doctor’d often given me books by Mr. Jules Verne to read, and the Frenchman’s tales of life under the sea, trips to the moon, and powerful new weapons had kept me up late more than one night, wondering just what sort of a world we were actually heading for. “Is that true, Lieutenant?” I asked, as respectfully as I knew how. “Will we really fight underwater, like Captain Nemo?”
The lieutenant smiled and reached out to tousle my hair some. “Oh, yes, Master Taggert-but without Nemo’s electrical guns, I’m afraid. At least for the moment. The torpedo will be the submarine’s principal armament, and together with torpedo boats they will become the deadliest enemies of all ships.”