Clive Cussler - The Striker

“We won’t stay friends if I just go fishing. Do you happen to have a name I could lay on them?”

“His name is a bit of a dead end so far,” Bell admitted and fell silent again.

At length, Van Dorn asked, “Where’s the rest of your gang?”

“Weber and Fields are in Pittsburgh with Archie. Mack discovered a county sheriff is making secret arrangements to extradite union leaders back to West Virginia for the murder of Black Jack Gleason.”

Van Dorn gave an admiring whistle. “Mack must have burrowed mighty deep into the sheriff’s office to find that.”

“Wally claims that the sheriff’s girlfriend took a shine to Mack.”

“I’d have thought Mack’s seducing days were over.”

“And Wally’s collected rumors of a radical attack on the railroads.”

“What sort?”

“Trestle bombings, Wally thinks.”

Van Dorn shook his head. “Lunatics.”

“Plenty of lunacy to go around. Pittsburgh is bracing for the marchers. Half the Monongahela Valley is joining up along the route. So the Pinkertons and the Coal and Iron Police are offering a bounty for city prisoners released early to fight the strikers.”

“Good God! How’d your squad find that out?”

“Archie infiltrated the Coal and Iron Police.”

“He’s only an apprentice.”

“Archie convinced them he’s on the lam from Idaho for beating a miner to death with his fists. They welcomed him like a brother.”

“That is very dangerous for an apprentice to be alone inside. Too dangerous. What if they tumble to him? He doesn’t have the experience to see it coming, and with no one to back him up, God knows what will happen.”

“Anyone who challenges Archie Abbott’s boxing skills will quickly cease to doubt his story.”

“I’ll shake Archie’s hand, but I want you to take him off that job.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve already shifted Archie from the Coal and Iron Police to shadow someone slightly less dangerous.”

“Who?”

“You want to know what Mary Higgins is up to. Well, so do I.”

“Any hint?”

“She’s back in Pittsburgh. And she still refuses Van Dorn protection. That’s why I put Archie on her.”

Van Dorn gave a faint smile. “You must trust your friend immensely to let him shadow a girl you’re sweet on — don’t bother denying that.”

Bell grinned back. “I’m hoping that Archie recalls the only boxing match he lost.”

“Back to business. What’s your next step?”

The mirth left the young detective’s face. He looked the Boss in the eye. “I am about to identify the provocateur.”

“You are?”

“With your help.”

“Me? How?”

“Start by looking at this.”

Bell’s hand flicked to his boot. He laid his throwing knife on Van Dorn’s desk.

“I’m looking at it. What about it?”

“You gave it to me.”

“I give one to all my apprentices.”

“The man who got the drop on me in the Tombs cellar was packing the same knife.”

“Shows he knows his business. It’s a good one.”

“It was identical.”

“I get them from a cutler in Connecticut. His craftsmen turn out thousands. What are you up to, Isaac?”

Bell said, “This man knows a lot about me. He knew about my sleeve gun.”

Joseph Van Dorn looked amused. “Isaac, if you were a stranger and I ran up against you in a dark cellar, I’d check for a sleeve gun so quick it would make your head spin.”

“He also knew about the one-shot in my pocket.”

“You can bet I’d look for one of those, too. Though, first, I’d inspect your shoulder holster — remove the heavy artillery.”

“He did that, too. First.”

“Like I say, everything you reported about him suggests a fellow who can handle himself.”

Bell picked up his throwing knife. He balanced it on one finger and flicked it gently with another to make the light play on it.

“Mr. Van Dorn, do you remember who taught me how to throw a knife?”

Van Dorn laughed. “I tried. But you were so damned bullheaded, you insisted on that overhand throw they taught you in the circus.”

“It’s got more power. The knife travels farther and hits harder.”

“Overhand looks fancy,” Van Dorn shot back. “But it’s slower and not as accurate.”

“Than what?”

“ Than what? You know what. What are you talking about?”

“Say it, please.”

Van Dorn gave him a puzzled look. At length, quizzical wrinkles furrowed his brow as it dawned on him that his young detective was asking for a reason. “Sidearm. Overhand is slower than a sidearm. And, in my experience, less accurate.”

“Speaking of accurate, his main artillery is a Colt Bisley.”

A peculiar look flickered across Van Dorn’s face. He tugged reflexively at his beard.

“Yes,” he said slowly. “As I said, a professional through and through.”

“Mr. Van Dorn, you know this man.”

“If I know him, I’ll get him. Who is he?”

“I don’t know his name.”

“What does he look like?”

“Big fellow. Broad in the shoulders. Light on his feet.”

“What color hair?”

“I don’t know.”

“Eyes?”

“He’s got yellow eyes.”

Van Dorn stared. “Are you sure?”

“I saw them.”

“Did Rosania?”

“Rosania was not quite as sure. But I saw them twice. In the coal mine. And in the Tombs. Yellow and gold, almost like a wolf.”

Van Dorn surged to his feet and grabbed his hat.

“Where are you going?”

“I’ll take care of this.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Stay where you are!” Van Dorn shouted. “I’ll take care of it myself.”

He pushed so hard out the door that it banged against the wall of the detectives’ bull pen, knocking street maps and wanted posters askew. When he shoved through the hall door, frosted glass shattered. Then he was gone, storming down the hotel’s grand stairs, barreling across the lobby, and shouting on Broadway, “Cab! You there. Stop now!”

He leaped aboard, next to the driver.

“Wall Street!”

By the time Bell reached the sidewalk, the cab careened around the corner on one wheel, and the horse broke into a gallop.

“Wall Street!” the hotel doormen told Isaac Bell Mr. Van Dorn had bellowed at the cabbie.

Bell ran full tilt to Sixth Avenue, climbed the steep covered stairs to the Elevated three at a time, and reached the platform just as a downtown train pulled away. The next seemed like it would never come.

Isaac Bell jumped off the el at the Rector Street stop, pounded down the stairs and across Rector, cut through Trinity Church’s cemetery, and bolted across Broadway, dodging six lanes of streetcars, wagons, autos, freight vans, and carriages. He stopped at the head of Wall Street, praying he had gotten there before Joe Van Dorn. He had never seen the Boss so disturbed and knew his rage would make him reckless, which was a dangerous state in which to confront the provocateur.

But now that he was here, how to find him?

Wall Street stretched nearly half a mile between the soot-blackened graves in Trinity’s cemetery to the East River docks and was lined on both sides by innumerable buildings. The cab Van Dorn had hailed was one of thousands of identical black horse-drawn two-wheelers, and all that Bell had seen of the driver was a wizened man in a black coat and a flat cap.

Many cabbies wore a tall black stovepipe. He could eliminate them as he ran down Wall Street. But his best clue would be an exhausted horse with its coat lathered from galloping top speed from Forty-third Street. He found one in the second block, forelegs spread wide, head down, flanks heaving.