The Wrecker

24

IN THE DARK HOLD OF THE STEAM LIGHTER LILLIAN I, WONG Lee was finishing his intricate wiring by the light of an Eveready wooden bicycle lantern powered by three dry cell “D” batteries. Wong Lee was grateful for it, recalling with no nostalgia the old days of connecting dynamite fuses by the light of an open flame. Thank the gods for electricity, which provided light to work by and power to ignite detonators with uncanny precision.

ISAAC BELL EXITED THE Jardin de Paris through the canvas rain curtains and pounded down a steel stairway attached to the outside of the Hammerstein Theater. He landed in an alley and ran to Broadway. It was two blocks to the Knickerbocker Hotel. The sidewalks were jammed with people. He darted into the street, dodging traffic, raced downtown, tore through the lobby of the Knickerbocker, and bounded up the stairs to the Van Dorn Agency, reached under the startled front man’s desk for the secret door-lock switch, and burst into the back room.

“I want Eddie Edwards on the powder pier. Which is the telephone line to Jersey City?”

“Number one, sir. Like you ordered.”

Bell picked up the telephone and clicked repeatedly.

“Get me Eddie Edwards.”

“That you, Isaac? Are you bringing us home a Follies girl?”

“Listen to me, Eddie. Move the Vickers machine gun so you can cover the water as well as the main gate.”

“Can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Those five powder cars block the field of fire. I can cover one or the other, but not the gate and the water both.”

“Then get another machine gun. In case he attacks from the water.”

“I’m trying to borrow one from the Army, but it ain’t gonna happen tonight. Sorry, Isaac. What if I put a couple of riflemen on the end of the pier?”

“You say the powder cars block the field of fire? Put your machine gun on top of them.”

“On top of them?”

“You heard me. Position your machine gun on top of the dynamite cars so they can swivel the gun in either direction. That way, they can cover the gate and the water. On the jump, Eddie. Do it now!”

Bell cradled the earpiece with great relief. That was what he had forgotten. The water. An attack by boat. He grinned at the other detectives, who had been listening avidly.

“Manning an automatic machine gun on top of a dynamite train ought to be plenty incentive to stay awake,” he said.

He sauntered back to the theater, feeling much less worried, and slipped into his seat just as the curtain came down on the Follies’ first act.

“What was that all about?” Abbott asked.

“If the Wrecker decides to attack from the water, he’s going to run head-on into a Vickers automatic machine gun.”

“Good thinking, Isaac. So now you can relax by introducing me to your friend.”

“Senator Kincaid?” Bell asked innocently. “I wouldn’t call him a friend. We played a little draw, but …”

“You know who I mean, you son of a gun. I am referring to the Southern Pacific Helen of Troy whose gorgeous face launched twelve steamboats.”

“She strikes me as much too intelligent to fall for a Princeton man.”

“She’s getting into the elevator! Come on, Isaac!”

Crowds of people were waiting for the elevators. Bell led Abbott through the canvas rain curtains, down the outside stairway, and into the cavernous lobby on the ground floor that served all three theaters in the building.

“There she is!”

Lillian Hennessy and Senator Kincaid were surrounded by admirers. Women were vying to shake his hand while their husbands elbowed one another trying to make Lillian’s acquaintance. It was doubtful that their wives noticed or even cared. Bell saw two of them slip their calling cards surreptitiously into Kincaid’s pocket.

Taller than most, and experienced in barroom brawls and riot control, the Van Dorn detectives parted the crush like a squadron of battleships. Lillian smiled at Bell.

Bell focused his gaze on Kincaid and Kincaid looked his way with a friendly wave.

“Isn’t the show wonderful?” the Senator called over heads as Bell drew near. “I love the theater. You know, I heard you talking with Kenny Bloom about running off to the circus. For me, it was the stage instead of the circus. I always wanted to be an actor. I even ran off with a touring company, before sanity prevailed.”

“Like my good friend Archie Abbott here. Archie, meet Senator Charles Kincaid, a fellow thwarted thespian.”

“Good evening, Senator,” Abbott said, extending his hand politely but missing Kincaid’s hand entirely as he gaped at Lillian.

“Oh, hello, Lillian,” said Bell casually. “May I present my old friend Archibald Angel Abbott?”

Lillian started to bat her eyes in the style of Anna Held. But it seemed as if something she saw in Abbott’s face made her look again. He had compelling gray eyes, and Bell saw them working full steam to keep her attention. Her gaze traversed the scars on Abbott’s brow and took in his red hair and sparkling smile. Kincaid said something to her, but she did not seem to hear as she looked Abbott squarely in the face and said, “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Abbott. Isaac has told me all about you.”

“Not all, Miss Hennessy, or you would have fled the room.”

Lillian laughed, Archie preened, and the Senator looked very displeased.

Bell used the excuse of the poker debt to nudge Kincaid away from Archie and Lillian. “I did enjoy our game of draw. And it was a pleasure to receive your calling card, but a check for the amount written on it would stir even better memories.”

“My check will be here tomorrow,” Kincaid replied affably. “You’re still at the Yale Club?”

“Until further notice. And you, Senator? Will you be in New York a while or are you off to Washington?”

“Actually, I’m leaving for San Francisco in the morning.”

“Isn’t the Senate in session?”

“I am chairman of a subcommittee conducting a hearing in San Francisco about the Chinese problem.” He looked around at the mobs of theatergoers trying to catch his attention, took Bell’s elbow, and lowered his voice. “Between us poker players, Mr. Bell, the hearing will mask my true purpose for traveling to San Francisco.”

“And what is that?”

“I’ve been persuaded by a select group of California businessmen to listen to them implore me to run for president.” He winked con spiratorially. “They offered to take me on a camping trip in the redwoods. You can imagine what little pleasure a former bridge builder takes in sleeping out of doors. I told them I would prefer one of their fabled western resort lodges. Antlers, stuffed grizzly bears, pine logs… and indoor plumbing.”

“Are you persuadable?” asked Bell.

“Between you and me, I’m playing hard to get. But of course I would be deeply honored to run for president,” said Kincaid. “Who wouldn’t? It is the dream of every politician who serves the public.”

“Would Preston Whiteway be one of those California businessmen?”

Kincaid looked at him sharply.

“Shrewd question, Mr. Bell.”

For a moment, locked eye to eye, the two men could have been standing alone on a cliff in Oregon instead of in a crowded theater lobby on the Great White Way.

“And your answer?” asked Bell.

“I am not at liberty to say. But so much depends upon what President Roosevelt decides to do next year. I can’t see any room for me if he wants a third term. At any rate, I prefer if you would keep that under your hat.”

Bell said he would. He wondered why a United States senator would confide in a man he had only met once. “Have you confided in Mr. Hennessy?”

“I will confide in Osgood Hennessy at the proper time, which is to say after such an arrangement is consummated.”

“Why wait? Wouldn’t a railroad president be helpful to your cause?”

“I would not want to raise his hopes of having a friend in the White House at this early stage only to dash them.”

The lobby lights flashed on and off, signaling an end to the intermission. They returned to their seats in the rooftop theater.

Abbott said to Bell, “What a wonderful girl.”

“What do you think of the Senator?”

“What senator?” asked Abbott, waving across the boxes to Lillian.

“Do you still think he’s a stuffed shirt?”

Abbott looked at Bell, perceived that he was not asking idly, and answered in all seriousness, “Certainly acts like one. Why do you ask, Isaac?”

“Because I have a feeling that there is more to Kincaid than meets the eye.”

“From the look he gave me when he saw me talking to her, he would kill to get his mitts on Miss Lillian and her fortune.”

“He wants to be president, too.”

“Of the railroad?” asked Archie. “Or the United States?”

“The United States. He told me he’s having a secret meeting with California businessmen who want him to run if Teddy Roosevelt doesn’t stand again next year.”

“If it’s secret, why did he tell you?” asked Archie.

“That’s what I was wondering. Only a complete fool would blab that about.”

“Do you believe him?”

“Good question, Archie. Funny thing is, he said nothing about William Howard Taft.”

“That’s like not mentioning the elephant in the drawing room. If Roosevelt doesn’t choose to run for a third term, then Secretary of War Taft will be the good friend he designates to replace him. No wonder Kincaid wants it secret. He’ll be challenging his own party.”

“Yet another reason not to confide in me,” said Isaac Bell. “What is he up to?”

Across the boxes, Lillian Hennessy asked, “What did you think of Mr. Abbott, Charles?”

“The Abbotts are among the oldest families in New York, except for the Dutch, and they’ve got plenty of Dutch roots under their family tree. Too bad they lost all their money in the Panic of ‘93,” Kincaid added with a big smile.

“He told me that straight off,” said Lillian. “It doesn’t seem to trouble him.”

“It would certainly trouble the father of any young woman he proposed to,” Kincaid needled her.

“And what do you think of Isaac Bell?” Lillian needled back. “Archie told me you and Isaac played cards. I noticed you two deep in conversation in the lobby.”

Kincaid kept smiling, deeply pleased by his conversation with Bell. If the detective was getting suspicious, then pretending that he was one of the many senators who dreamed of becoming president of the United States had to be a convincing demonstration that he was not a train wrecker. If Bell investigated further, he would discover that there were California businessmen, Preston Whiteway first among them, who were shopping for their own candidate for president. And Senator Charles Kincaid topped their list, having encouraged and manipulated the mercurial San Francisco newspaper magnate to believe that the Hero Engineer he had helped make a senator would serve him in the White House.

“What were you talking about?” Lillian persisted.

Kincaid’s smile turned cruel.

“Bell is engaged to be married. He told me he was buying a mansion for his intended… the lucky girl.”

Was there sadness in her face or was it merely the houselights dimming for Act Two?

“JERSEY CITY DEAD AHEAD, chink boy!” yelled the mate “Big Ben” Weitzman, whom Captain Yatkowski had put aboard Lillian I to steer after they threw the steam lighter’s crew in the river. “Shake a leg down there.”

Wong Lee kept working at his own pace, treating twenty-five tons of dynamite with the respect it deserved. Decades of pressing shirts with heavy irons had thickened his hands. His fingers were not so nimble anymore.

He had one detonator left over when he was done and he slipped it in his pocket, maintaining old habits of frugality. Then he reached for the double electric wire that he had strung from the bow of the boat into the hold where the boxes of dynamite were stacked. He had already exposed two inches of its copper core by stripping off the insulation. He connected one wire to one leg of the first detonator. He reached for the second wire and stopped.

“Weitzman! Are you up there?”

“What?”

“Check that the switch at the bow is still open.”

“It’s open. I already checked.”

“If it is not open, we will explode when I touch these wires.”

“Wait! Hold on. I’ll check again.”

Weitzman slipped a loop of rope around the wheel spoke to hold the lighter on course and hurried to the bow, cursing the cold rain. Yatkowski had given him a cylinder flashlight and in its flickering beam he saw that the jaws of the switch the Chinaman had rigged to the tip of the bow were open and would stay open until the bow crashed into the powder pier. The impact would close the jaws, completing the electric connection between the battery and the detonators, and blow up twenty-five tons of dynamite. That, in turn, would set off a hundred tons more on the powder pier, which would make it the biggest explosion New York had ever heard.

Weitzman hurried back to the wheel and shouted down the hatch. “It’s open. Like I told you.”

Wong took a breath and attached the positive wire to the detonator’s second leg. Nothing happened. Of course, he thought wryly, if it had gone wrong he wouldn’t know it, being suddenly dead. He scrambled up the ladder, emerged from the hatch, and told the man steering to signal the schooner. It came alongside, sails flapping wetly, and banged hard against the lighter.

“Take it easy!” yelled Weitzman. “You want to kill us?”

“Chinaman!” yelled Captain Yatkowski. “Get up here.”

Wong Lee launched his creaky middle-aged limbs up a rope ladder. He had climbed much worse in the mountains, but he had been thirty years younger.

“Weitzman!” the captain yelled. “Do you see the pier?”

“How could I miss it?”

Electric lights blazed a quarter mile ahead. The railroad cops had it lit up like the Great White Way so no one could sneak up on them from the yards, but it had never occurred to them that somebody would sneak up from the water.

“Aim her at it and get off quick.”

Weitzman turned the wheel until he had lined Lillian I’s bow with the lights on the powder pier. They were coming in from the side, and the pier was six hundred feet long, so even if she went off course a bit she would still hit close enough to the five boxcars of dynamite.

“Quick, I say!” roared the captain.

Weitzman didn’t need any urging. He scrambled onto the wooden deck of the schooner.

“Go fast!” shouted Wong. “Get us away.”

No one was better qualified than Wong to understand the forces about to be unleashed on the rail yards, the harbor, and the cities around it.

When Wong and the schooner’s crew looked back to check that the steam lighter was on course, they saw a New Jersey Central Railroad ferryboat cast off lines to steam out of the Communipaw Passenger Terminal. A train must have just pulled in from somewhere, and the ferry was taking the passengers on the last leg.

“Welcome to New York!” the captain muttered. When twenty-five tons on the lighter detonated one hundred tons on the powder pier, that ferryboat would vanish in a ball of fire.