The Gangster (30 page)

“Hunt and McBean?”

“Oh, of course you know. This was a strange one. Wait ’til you hear this, Isaac . . . Could I have a little more wine?”

“Take mine.” Bell tipped his glass into hers, and cleared the plates and flatware and stacked them in the corner. “How was it strange?”

“I picked up Ed Hunt at a party the Boss sent me to and took him to the hotel where the Boss had booked me a room. What I didn’t know was the Boss hid in the closet. All of a sudden, when Hunt fell asleep, he stepped out of the closet. I almost jumped out of my skin.”

“You saw his face?”

“No. It was dark. I never saw his face until this afternoon. Anyhow, he shooed me out—sent me to the next job—and next
I hear, Hunt had a heart attack. Well, I have to tell you, Isaac, if he was going to have a heart attack, it would have been while I was still there.”

Bell said, “As I understand it, a stiletto played a role in the heart attack.”

“Big surprise,” said Francesca.

“You said you went on to the next job. What was that?”

“Hunt’s cousin, McBean. The Boss gave me strict orders. Don’t hurt him. Just put him to sleep and go home. Which I did. Just like with Hunt. Then I learned at confession that McBean’s alive and kicking, not like Hunt. So I’m thinking they made a deal. You hear anything about that?”

“I heard heroin changed hands,” said Bell.

“Which reminds me of a job I don’t think I told you about yet . . .”

Bell listened. One story blended into another, which reminded her of another. Suddenly, he asked, “What did you say?”

“I was telling you how he confessed to me.”

“Would you repeat that, please. What do you mean ‘confessed’? Branco confessed to you?”

“I mean, one night he confessed to me. In the church. I was trying to figure out how to do this guy he wanted dead. All of a sudden, it was like I was the priest, and he started telling me about the first man he ever killed—when he was eight years old, if you think I’m bad. You know what he said? It was ‘satisfying.’ Isn’t that a strange word to talk about murder. Satisfying? And when he was only eight?”

“I wouldn’t know,” said Bell. “What do you think?”

“I wouldn’t call it satisfying. I’d call it, like, finishing. Completing. Like, ‘That’s over,’ if you know what I mean. Anyway, then he told me how he killed a padrone who robbed him.”

“How does he kill?”

“He plans and he hides.”

“What do you mean?”

“He gets close to kill. To get close, you have to plan. Study the situation. Learn it cold. Then make a plan.”

“He told you that?”

“He taught me: Plan what to pretend. Pretend you’re reading a newspaper. Pretend you’re busy working. Or pretend you need help. To throw ’em off. You know what I mean, Isaac? He makes an art of it.”

“Of killing.”

“Yes, if you want to call it that.”

“So Branco was your teacher?”

“He taught me how to do it and not get killed. I owe him a lot, you could say. But what’s the difference now?”

“What else did he tell you?”

“You’re not listening, Isaac. He didn’t
tell
me that; he
taught
me.”

“Get so close that they can’t be afraid?”

“
Plan
to get so close that they let their guard down.”

“Thanks for the advice,” said Bell.

“What advice?”

Bell whipped the automatic from his shoulder holster and pressed the muzzle to her forehead.

“What are doing?”

“Francesca, reach into your blouse with two fingers.”

“What are you talking about, Isaac?”

“Lift out of your corset the steak knife you palmed at dinner.”

“What if I don’t?”

“I will blow your brains out,” said Bell.

“You’d be doing me a favor. Quicker than hanging. And a lot quicker than being locked in the bug house.”

Bell slid the muzzle down her nose and chin and neck and touched it to her shoulder. “This won’t kill you, but wherever you end up—bug house, prison, even escape—you’ll never use this arm again.”

The knife rang on the concrete.

“You look like a wreck,” said Archie Abbott when Isaac Bell finally stumbled into the Van Dorn field office.

Bell shook sleet off his coat and hat and warmed his hands over a radiator. “I feel like I’ve been up a week with that woman. She would not shut up.”

“Did she tell you anything useful?”

“How Branco will attempt to kill TR.”

“How does she know?”

“She was his apprentice. She knows how he operates. It won’t be a sniper or a bomb. It will be up close.”

They reported to the White House early in the morning. The President was exercising on a rowing machine. Van Dorn did the talking. When he had laid out the threat in succinct detail, he concluded, “For your own safety, Mr. President, and the good of the nation, I recommend curtailing your public appearances. And avoid al together any in the vicinity of the Catskill Aqueduct.”

“The aqueduct is the great enterprise of our age,” said President Roosevelt, “and I worked like a nailer to start it up when I was Governor. The very least I can do as President is lend my name and presence to the good men who took over the job. They’ll be at it for years, so celebrating the Storm King Siphon Tunnel is vital for morale.”

“Would you have the history books forever link the Catskill Aqueduct to your assassination?”

“Better than the history books saying, ‘TR turned tail and ran.’”

“I seem to have failed,” said Van Dorn, “in my effort to explain the danger.”

President Roosevelt hopped off his machine. “I grant you that
J. B. Culp’s tendencies toward evil are indisputable. Culp is the greatest practitioner of rampant greed in the nation. His underhanded deals rend a terrible gulf between the wealthy few and the millions who struggle to put a meal on the table. Unchecked, his abuses will drive labor to revolution. He is as dangerous as the beast in the jungle and as sly as the serpent. But you have not a shred of evidence that he would attempt to assassinate me.”

“Nor do I have any doubt,” said Van Dorn.

“You have hearsay. The man is not a killer.”

“Culp won’t pull the trigger himself,” said Isaac Bell.

The President glanced at Van Dorn, who confirmed it with a grave nod.

“Of course,” said Roosevelt. “A hired hand. If any of this were true.”

“Antonio Branco is no hired hand,” said Bell. “He is personally committed to killing you. He’ll call in a huge marker that Culp will be happy to pay.”

“Poppycock!”

Van Dorn started to answer. Isaac Bell interrupted again.

“We would not be taking up your valuable time this morning if the threat were ‘poppycock,’ Mr. President. You say you worry about revolution? If the atmosphere is so volatile, couldn’t a second presidential assassination, so soon after the last, trigger that revolution?”

“I repeat,” Roosevelt barked. “Poppycock! I’m going to the Catskill Mountains. If your lurid fancies have any basis in truth, I’ll be safe as can be on the Navy’s newest battleship.”

“May I ask, Mr. President, how do you happen to be traveling to the Catskill Mountains by battleship?”

“Up the Hudson River to Kingston, where we’ll board an Ulster & Delaware special to inspect the reservoir, eventually take the special down to the siphon.” He laughed and said to Van Dorn, “Shall I order the railroad to lay on an armored train?”

“I’ll see to it,” said Van Dorn.

“I’ll bet you will and slap the government with a mighty bill.”

Van Dorn’s expression could have been a smile.

Isaac Bell said, “Sir, will you please agree to obey closely instructions your Secret Service corps issue for your protection?”

“Of course,” the President answered with a sly grin. “So long as I can make my speech . . . Listen here, young fellow, you run down those supposed criminals. I’ll speechify the greatest aqueduct ever dug and”—he plunged a hand into his pocket and he pulled out a crumpled bill—“five bucks says my battleship and I finish first.”

Isaac Bell slapped down a gold coin. “Double it.”

“You’re mighty sure of yourself.”

“You’ll have to trade your battleship for ice skates, Mr. President. Last time I looked, the Hudson River was freezing solid.”

“
Connecticut
’s eleven-inch armor belt will smash ice.”

Isaac Bell held off reminding the Commander-in-Chief that USS
Connecticut
’s armor tapered to only four inches in her bow, but he could not resist saying, “Far be it from me to advise a military man, Mr. President, but how do your admirals feel about the
Connecticut
smashing ice with her propeller blades?”

TR threw up his hands. “O.K., O.K. I’ll take the train. That satisfy you?”

“Only canceling your public appearances until we nail Culp and Branco will satisfy me.”

“Then you’re bound for disappointment. I’m going and that’s all there is to it. Now get out of here. I have a country to run.”

Bell and Van Dorn retreated reluctantly.

“Wait!” Roosevelt called after them, “Detective Bell. Is that true?”

“Is what true, Mr. President?”

“The Hudson River is freezing early.”

“It’s true.”

“Bully!”

“Why ‘bully,’ sir?”

“They’ll be racing when I’m there.”

Van Dorn asked, “What kind of racing?”

“Fastest racing there is. Ice yacht racing.”

“Do you race, sir?” asked Bell.

“Do I race? Cousin John founded the Hudson River Ice Yacht Club. His
Icicle
cracked one hundred miles per hour and won the Challenge Pennant. Ever been on an ice yacht, Detective?”

“I skippered
Helene
in the Shrewsbury regattas.
”

“So you’re a professional?”

“I was Mr. Morrison’s guest,” said Bell, and added casually, “Culp races ice yachts, you know?”

“Daphne!”
shouted the President. “Fast as greased lightning!” He flashed a toothy grin. “Just goes to show you, Bell, the Almighty puts some good in every man—even J. B. Culp.”

The President’s hearty ebullience offered an opening and Bell seized it. “May I ask you one favor, sir?”

“Shoot.”

“Would you make your speech at the Hudson River Siphon your only speech?”

Roosevelt considered the tall detective’s request for such an interim that Bell saw reason to hope that the President was finally thinking of the assassination that had flung him into office.

“O.K.,” he answered abruptly. “Fair enough.”

Joseph Van Dorn was staying on in Washington, but he rode with Isaac Bell on the trolley to the train station. “That was a complete bust,” he said gloomily. “One speech, ten speeches, what’s the difference? Everywhere he stops, the reckless fool will wade into the crowds—knowing full well that McKinley got shot while shaking hands.”

“But his only
scheduled
appearance will be the speech. Branco will know precisely where and when to find him at the Hudson Siphon—the only place the President will be a sitting duck.”

“That is something,” Van Dorn conceded. “So how do we protect the sitting duck?”

Isaac Bell said, “Clamp a vise around Branco. Squeeze him.”

“To squeeze him, you’ve got to find him.”

“He’s holed up in Culp’s estate.”

“Still?” Van Dorn looked skeptical. “Where’d you get that idea?”

“Culp’s private train,” answered Bell. “I sent Eddie Edwards to nose around the crew. Eddie bribed a brakeman. It seems that ordinarily by November, Culp spends weekdays in town, but the last time he left the property, he took his train to Scranton and came back the same night.”

“I wouldn’t call that definitive proof that Branco’s holed up with him.”

“Eddie’s brakeman is courting a housemaid at Raven’s Eyrie. She tells him, and he tells Eddie, that Culp is sticking unusually close to home. She also says the boxers don’t live there anymore. And we already knew that Culp’s wife decamped for the city. Add it all up and it’s highly likely that Branco’s in the house.”

“Yet Branco’s been to town, and he’s still bossing his gangsters.”

Bell said, “I have your Black Hand Squad working round the clock to find how he gets out and back in.”

The letter was waiting for Joseph Van Dorn when he got to the New Williard.

THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON, D.C.

December 1, 1906

Joseph Van Dorn
Van Dorn Detective Agency
Washington, D.C., Office
The New Williard Hotel

Dear Joe,

Your Isaac Bell has a given me a bully idea. I will deliver only one prepared speech whilst inspecting the Catskill Aqueduct. In so doing, I can concentrate all my efforts on a big splash to boom the waterworks enterprise.

So before I go down the Storm King Shaft to fire the hole-through blast, accompanied by the newspaper reporters, I will speak to assembled multitudes on the surface. To this course, I have asked the contractors to gather their workmen at the shaft house and build for me a raised platform so all may see and hear.

“May the angels preserve me,” said Joseph Van Dorn.

Hearty Regards,
Theodore Roosevelt

P.S. Joe, could I prevail upon you to accompany my party on the tour?

Deeply relieved by the unexpected glimmer of common sense in the postscript, Van Dorn telephoned a civil servant, a former Chicagoan who now led the Secret Service protection corps. “The President has asked me to ride along on the Catskills trip. I don’t want to get in your way, so I need your blessing before I accept.”

His old friend gave an exasperated snort, loud enough to hear
over the phone. “The Congress still questions who should protect the President and whether he even needs protection. Nor will they pay for it, so I’m juggling salaries from other budgets. And now they’re yammering that one of my boys was arrested for assault for stopping a photographer from lunging at the President and Mrs. Roosevelt with a camera that could have concealed a gun or knife. In other words, thank you, Joe, I am short of qualified hands.”

“I will see you on the train,” said Van Dorn. And yet, in his heart of hearts he knew that when some bigwig persuaded the President to let him stand beside him, the founder of the Van Dorn Detective Agency would end up too far away to intercept an attacker.

Between the Raven’s Eyrie wall and the foot of Storm King Mountain, the estate’s telegraph and telephone wires passed through a stand of hemlock trees. Isaac Bell and a Van Dorn operative, who had been recently hired away from the Hudson River Bell Telephone Company, pitched a tent in the densest clump of the dark green conifers.

Bell strapped climbing spikes to his boots and mounted a telegraph pole. He scraped insulation from the telephone wires and attached two lengths of his own wire, which he let uncoil to the ground. He repeated this with the telegraph wires and climbed back down, where the operative had already hooked them up to a telephone receiver and a telegraph key.