Marion Morgan took a closer look at the girl. She seemed physically strong for one so petite. Strangely so. In fact, behind Katherine’s breathless, little-girl manner, Marion sensed something slightly peculiar. But didn’t the camera also often transform peculiarities into characteristics that charmed the movie audience? She was tempted to confirm whether this girl indeed had qualities the camera would love, and an invitation was on the tip of her tongue. But there was something about her that made Marion uncomfortable.
Beside her, Marion felt Lowell Falconer plumping up again as he did whenever he saw a pretty girl. The woman approaching was the tall brunette who had been making eyes at Isaac earlier.
Lowell stepped forward and extended his hand.
Marion thought that Dorothy Langner was even more striking than the descriptions she had heard. She thought of a term uttered by her long-widowed father now that he was finally stepping out in late middle age: “A looker.”
“Dorothy, I am so glad you came,” said Falconer. “Your father would be very proud to see you here.”
“I’m proud to see his guns. Already mounted. This is a splendid shipyard. You remember Ted Whitmark?”
“Of course,” said Falconer, shaking Whitmark’s hand. “I imagine you’ll be a busy fellow when the fleet replenishes at San Francisco. Dorothy, may I present Miss Marion Morgan?”
Marion was aware of being carefully measured as they traded hellos.
“And of course you know Katherine,” Falconer concluded the introductions.
“We came up together on the train,” said Whitmark. “I hired a private car.”
Marion said, “Excuse me, Captain Falconer, I see a gentleman Isaac asked me to meet. Nice to meet you, Miss Langner, Mr. Whitmark, Miss Dee.”
THE POUNDING OF THE WEDGES suddenly stopped. The ship was fully on her cradle. Isaac Bell headed to the stairs for a final look below.
Dorothy Langner intercepted him at the top of the stairs. “Mr. Bell, I was hoping to see you.”
She extended her gloved hand, and Bell it took it politely. “How are you, Miss Langner?”
“Much better since our conversation. Vindicating my father won’t bring him back, but it is a comfort, and I am very grateful to you.”
“I am hoping that soon we will have definitive proof, but, as I said, I personally have no doubt that your father was murdered, and we will bring his killer to justice.”
“Whom do you suspect?”
“No one I am prepared to discuss. Mr. Van Dorn will keep you appraised.”
“Isaac-may I call you Isaac?”
“All right, if you want.”
“There is something I told you once. I would like to make it clear.”
“If it’s about Mr. Whitmark,” Bell smiled, “be aware he’s headed this way.”
“I will repeat,” she said quietly. “I am not rushing into anything. And he is leaving for San Francisco.”
It struck Bell that a key difference between Marion and Dorothy was how they regarded men. Dorothy wondered whether she could add one to her list of conquests. Whereas Marion Morgan had no doubt she could conquer and therefore was not inclined to bother. It showed in their smiles. Marion’s smile was as engaging as an embrace. Dorothy’s was a dare. But Bell could not ignore her desperate fragility, despite her bold manner. It was almost as if she were putting herself forth and asking to be saved from the loss of her father. And he did not believe that Ted Whitmark was the man to do that.
“Bell, isn’t it?” Whitmark called loudly as he bustled up.
“Isaac Bell.”
He saw tugboats gathering in the river to take charge of the hull when she hit the water. “Excuse me. I’m expected on the ways.”
YAMAMOTO KENTA HAD STUDIED photographs of American warship launchings to choose his costume. He could not disguise that he was Japanese. But the less alien his clothes, the farther he could roam the shipyard and the closer he could approach the distinguished guests. Observing his fellow travelers on the train up from Washington, he was proud to see that he had dressed perfectly for the occasion in a pale blue-and-white seersucker suit and a pea green four-in-hand necktie matched by the color of his straw boater’s hatband.
At the shipyard in Camden, he doffed the boater repeatedly in polite acknowledgment of ladies, important personages, and older gentlemen. The first person he had run into upon arriving at the remarkably up-to-date Camden shipyard was Captain Lowell Falconer, the Hero of Santiago. They had spoken late last fall at the unveiling of a bronze tablet to commemorate Commodore Thomas Tingey, the first commandant of the Washington Navy Yard. Yamamoto had given Falconer the impression that he had retired from the Japanese Navy holding the rank of lieutenant before returning to his first love, Japanese art. Captain Falconer had given him a cursory tour of the arsenal with the notable exception of the Gun Factory.
This morning, when Yamamoto congratulated Falconer on the imminent launch of America’s first dreadnought, Falconer had replied with a wry “almost dreadnought” on the assumption-from one sea dog to another-that a former officer of the Japanese Navy would recognize her shortcomings.
Yamamoto touched his brim once again, this time for a tall, striking blond woman.
Unlike the other American ladies who streamed past with chilly nods for “that puny Asiatic,” as he had heard one murmur to her daughter, she surprised him with a warm smile and the observation that the weather had turned lovely for the launching.
“And for the blooming of the flowers,” said the Japanese spy, who was actually comfortable with American woman, having secretly romanced several high-ranking Washington wives who had convinced themselves that a visiting curator of Asian art must be soulfully artistic as well as exotically Asiatic. At his flirtatious remark, he could expect her to either stalk off or move closer.
He was deeply flattered when she chose the latter.
Her eyes were a startling sea-coral green.
Her manner was forthright. “Neither of us is dressed as a naval officer,” she said. “What brings you here?”
“It is my day off from where I am working at the Smithsonian Institution,” Yamamoto replied. He saw no bulge of a wedding ring under her cotton glove. Probably the daughter of an important official. “A colleague in the Art Department give me his ticket and a letter of introduction that makes me sound far more important than I am. And you?”
“Art? Are you an artist?”
“Merely a curator. A large collection was given to the Institution. They asked me to catalog a small portion of it-a very small portion,” he added with a self-deprecating smile.