The Wrecker

52

THE WRECKER WAS HURRYING TOWARD THE LOCOMOTIVES TO signal Philip Dow to blow the dam when he heard their boots pounding behind him.

He looked back. Two brakemen were running fast, signaling with white train-yard lanterns. A skinny youth and a tall, rangy man, wide of shoulder and narrow in the waist. But where was the locomotive they were guiding with their lights? The pair he was hurrying toward were sidetracked, with only enough steam up to keep them warm.

The tall one wore a broad-brimmed hat instead of a railroader’s cap. Isaac Bell Running after him was a boy who looked like he should still be in high school.

Kincaid had to make a instant decision. Why was Bell prowling the yards pretending to be a brakeman? Assume the best, that Bell still had not tumbled to his identity? Or walk toward them, wave hello, and pull his derringer and shoot them both and hope no one saw? The second he reached for his gun, he knew he had made a mistake wasting time to think about it.

Bell’s hand flickered in a blur of motion, and Charles Kincaid found himself staring down the barrel of a Browning pistol held in a rock-steady grip.

“Don’t point that pistol at me, Bell. What the devil do you think you’re doing?”

“Charles Kincaid,” Bell answered in a clear, steady voice, “you are wanted by the law for murder and sabotage.”

“Wanted by the law? Are you serious?”

“Remove your derringer from your left pocket and drop it on the ground.”

“We’ll see about this,” huffed Kincaid. His every mannerism bespoke the aggrieved United States senator put upon by a fool.

“Remove your derringer from your left pocket and drop it on the ground before I blow a hole in your arm.”

Kincaid shrugged, as if humoring a madman. “All right.” Moving very slowly, he reached for his derringer.

“Careful,” said Bell. “Hold the weapon between your thumb and forefinger.”

The only eyes Charles Kincaid had ever seen so cold were in a mirror.

He lifted the derringer from his pocket between his thumb and forefinger and crouched as if to place it gently on the ground. “You realize, of course, that a private detective cannot arrest a member of the United States Senate.”

“I’ll leave the formalities to a U.S. marshal … or the county coroner, if your hand moves any closer to the knife in your boot.”

“What the devil-”

“Drop your derringer!” Bell commanded. “Do not go for your knife!”

Very slowly, Kincaid opened his hand. The gun fell from his fingers.

“Turn around.”

Moving as if in a trance, Kincaid slowly turned away from the grim detective.

“Clasp your hands behind your back.”

Slowly, Kincaid placed his hands behind his back. Every sinew was poised. If Bell was going to make a mistake, he would make it now. Behind him, Kincaid heard the words he was praying to hear.

“Your handcuffs, Dash.”

He heard the steel clink. He let the first cuff snap around his wrist. Only as he felt the cold metal of the second cuff brush his skin did he whirl into motion, turning to get behind the youth and clamp his arm around his throat.

A fist smashed into the bridge of his nose. Kincaid flew backward.

Knocked on his back, stunned by the punch, he looked up. Young Dashwood was still standing to one side, watching with an excited grin on his face and a shiny revolver in his hand. But it was Isaac Bell who was looming over him, triumphantly. Bell, who had knocked him down with a single punch.

“Did you really think I would let a new man within ten feet of the murderer who killed Wish Clarke, Wally Kisley, and Mack Fulton?”

“Who?”

“Three of the finest detectives I’ve had the privilege to work with. On your feet!”

Kincaid got up slowly. “Only three? Don’t you count Archie Abbott?”

The blood drained from Bell’s face, and, in that instant of total shock, the Wrecker struck.