Bell saw a cloud of sparks as it landed in the shimmering bed of cherry red coals. In the half second he took to reach the firebox door, the canvas was burning brightly. He had to pull it out before the fire burned though the canvas and ignited the fuse.
Bell grabbed a fireman’s rake, reached into the blaze, caught the strap, and yanked. The strap burned through, and it broke. He thrust the rake again, caught the wooden frame, which was drenched in flame, and pulled it out. The pack fell, smoldering, at his feet. “Pull the fuse,” he shouted to the nearest coal miner and tore after Henry Clay, who was racing sternward on the freight deck.
Clay ran out of space where the boiler deck overlooked the White Lady’s fifty-foot stern wheel. Bell caught up. The wheel was throwing spray as paddle blade after paddle blade climbed out of the water behind the boat, circled through the air, and plunged down to push again. Henry Clay turned with a smile on his face and a derringer in his unwounded hand and fired. The bullet seared the heel of Bell’s hand. His thumb and fingers convulsed. His gun fell to the deck and bounced into the narrow slot between the back of the boat and the stern wheel.
Clay’s smile broadened in triumph. “I’ve waited a long time for this.”
He squeezed the trigger. Isaac Bell was already swinging, hoping that the only thing that would slow down the rogue detective would be talking too much. Before the slug had emerged from the barrel, Isaac Bell’s left fist smashed Clay’s jaw.
The shot missed.
Bell feinted with his wounded right hand, punched Clay with another powerful left. It staggered Clay, and he reeled backwards to the edge of the stern.
“Give it up,” said Bell. “It’s over.”
Clay looked at him incredulously. “It’s never over.”
He flew at Bell, cocking his left hand in a powerful fist. He tried to raise the right Bell had wounded and could not. An angry light filled his amber eyes, and he glared at his arm as if it were a traitor.
“I’m taking you in,” said Bell. “We’ll recommend mercy if you reveal who paid for this. Who’s the boss?”
“It’s never over,” Henry Clay repeated. He swung his good arm. Bell took the punch, rolled with it, and counterpunched, rocking Clay back on his heels.
“You can’t fight me with one arm. Give it up.”
“It’s never over,” Clay said again. But even as he spoke, he turned away.
Bell suddenly realized that Clay was so desperate to escape that he would risk certain death by trying to dive into the narrow strait of water between the White Lady’s stern and her churning wheel. Without Henry Clay, he had no case against the man backing him, no way to discover the identity of the true murderer, the real provocateur.
Bell lunged for him, and as fast as Henry Clay was, Isaac Bell was faster. He seized Clay’s militia tunic in his right hand and started to drag him from the edge. But this time, the young detective was the fighter betrayed by a wound. The bullet that had disarmed him had robbed his hand of too much strength. Thumb and fingers feathered apart. Clay tore loose and dived into the seething water.
Isaac Bell watched the wheel wash spewed by the slashing paddle blades. But Henry Clay’s body never broke the surface of that endless rolling wave behind the boat.
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
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.”