Bell stepped back, nodding at the elevator operator. “Thank you. Please take me up.”
Bell unlocked the door to his suite and found a study, living room, ornate bath, and bedroom with a canopied bed, all furnished in Victorian elegance. His trunks had been opened and his clothes packed in the dresser and hung in the closet by a maid, a service provided to those who reserved suites. The trunks were not in sight. They had been moved from the room and stored in the basement storage area. Bell lost no time in taking a quick bath and shaving.
He opened his watch and read the time. Thirty minutes had elapsed since he stepped from the elevator. Another fifteen minutes were taken to tie his black tie and insert the shirt studs and cuff links, usually a job that took four hands. It was one of the few times he wished he had a wife to help. Black socks and shoes came next. He did not wear a cummerbund but a black vest instead, with a gold chain running from the left pocket through a buttonhole to the big gold watch in the right pocket. Last, he slipped on a single-breasted black jacket with satin lapels.
One final view of his reflection in a full seven-foot mirror and he was ready for the evening, whatever it would bring.
The charity ball was in full swing when he walked inside the grand ballroom and stood unobtrusively behind a tall potted palm. The ballroom was spacious and majestic. The parquet dance floor was laid in an intricate sunburst design and colorful murals adorned the ceiling. He spied the mysterious woman, seated with her back to him, with three couples at table six. She appeared to be alone, without an escort. He sidled up to the hotel director in charge of the evening’s event.
“Pardon me,” said Bell with a friendly smile, “but could you tell me the name of the lady in the blue dress at table six?”
The director straightened with a haughty look. “I’m sorry, sir, but we frown on giving information on our guests. Besides, I can’t know everybody who comes to the ball.”
Bell passed him a ten-dollar gold certificate. “Will this jog your memory?”
Without a word, the director held up a thin leather book and ran his eyes over the entries. “The single lady at the table is Miss Rose Manteca, a very wealthy lady from Los Angeles whose family owns a vast ranch. That’s all I can tell you.”
Bell patted the director on the shoulder. “I’m grateful.”
The director grinned. “Good luck.”
An orchestra was playing a medley of ragtime and modern dance tunes. Couples were dancing to a song called “Won’t You Come Over to My House.”
Bell walked up behind Rose Manteca and whispered in her ear. “Would you please consent to dance with me, Miss Manteca?”
She turned from the table and looked up. Golden brown eyes looked into a pair of mesmeric violet eyes. She was smooth, Bell thought, but his sudden appearance in evening dress completely stunned her. She lowered her eyes and recovered quickly, but not before her face blushed red.
“Forgive me, Mr. Bell. I did not expect you so soon.”
“So soon?” he asked. What an odd thing to say, he thought.
She excused herself to the people at the table and stood up. Gently, he took her by the arm and led her to the dance floor. He slipped his arm around her narrow waist, took her hand, and stepped off smartly with the music.
“You’re a very good dancer,” she said after he swept her around the floor.
“Comes from all those years my mother forced me to take lessons so I could impress the debutantes in our city.”
“You also dress very well for a detective.”
“I grew up in a city where the affluent men lived in tuxedos.”
“That would be Boston, would it not?”
For once, in his years of investigation, Bell was at a loss, but he recovered and came back. “And you’re from Los Angeles.”
She was good, he thought. She didn’t bat an eye.
“You’re very knowledgeable,” she said, unable to fathom his eyes.
“Not half as knowledgeable as you. What is your interest? How do you know so much about me? Better yet, I should ask why?”
“I was under the impression you like to solve mysteries.” She tried consciously to look past him over his tall shoulder, but she was drawn into those incredible eyes. This was a sensation, a stirring she had not counted on.
The photographs she had been shown did not do him justice face-to-face. He was far more attractive that she had imagined. He also came off as highly intelligent. This she’d expected, though, and could understand why he was so famous for his intuition. It was as though he was stalking her as she was stalking him.
The music ended and they stood together on the dance floor waiting for the orchestra to begin the next musical arrangement. He stepped back and ran his eyes from her shoes to the top of her beautifully styled hair. “You are a very lovely lady. What prompted your interest in me?”
“You’re an attractive man. I wanted to know you better.”
“You knew my name and where I came from before you met me in the elevator. Our meeting was obviously premeditated.”
Before she could reply, the orchestra began playing “In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree,” and Bell led her around the floor in a foxtrot. He held her against him and gripped her hand tightly in his. Her waist was small, made even smaller by a corset. The top of her head came up even with his chin. He was tempted to press his lips against hers but thought better of it. This was neither the time nor the place. Nor were his thoughts on romance. She was spying on him. That was a given. His mind was trying to formulate a motive. What interest could a total stranger have in him? The only possibilities he could conjure up were that she’d been hired by one of the many criminals he had put behind bars, shot, or seen hanged. A relative or friend out for revenge? She didn’t fit the image of someone who associated with the scum he had apprehended over the last ten years.
The music ended, and she released his hand and stood back. “You’ll have to excuse me, Mr. Bell, but I must return to my friends.”
“Can we meet again?” he asked with a warm smile.
She slightly shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
He ignored her negative reply. “Have dinner with me tomorrow night.”
“Sorry, I’m busy,” she answered, with a haughtiness in her voice. “And even in your fancy tuxedo you couldn’t bluff your way into the Western Bankers’ Ball at the Denver Country Club like you did tonight at the benefit for St. John’s Orphans.” Then she threw out her chin, swept up her long skirt, and walked back to her table.
Once seated, she stole a glance back at Bell, but he was nowhere to be seen among the crowd. He had completely disappeared.
6
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, BELL WAS THE FIRST ONE in the office, using a skeleton key that could open ninety doors out of a hundred. He was sorting through bank robbery reports at the end of the long table when Arthur Curtis and Glenn Irvine entered the conference room. Bell rose to greet them and shook hands. “Art, Glenn, good to see you both again.”
Curtis stood short and rotund, with a rounded stomach neatly encased in a vest whose buttons were stretched to their limit. He had thinning sandy hair, wide megaphone ears, blue eyes, and a smile that showed a maze of teeth that lit up the room. “We haven’t seen you since we tracked down Big Foot Cussler after he robbed that bank in Golden.”
Irvine placed his hat on a coat stand, revealing a thick head of uncombed brown hair. “As I remember,” he said, standing as tall and as scrawny as a scarecrow, “you led us directly to the cave where he was hiding out.”
“A simple matter of deduction,” Bell said with a tight smile. “I asked a pair of young boys if they knew of a place where they liked to hide out from their folks for a few days. The cave was the only location within twenty miles, close enough to town so Cussler could sneak in for supplies.”
Curtis stood in front of the large map of the western United States and thoughtfully studied the little flags signifying the killer’s spree. There were sixteen of the
m. “Got any intuition on the Butcher Bandit?”
Bell looked at him. “Butcher Bandit? Is that what they’re calling him?”
“A reporter from the Bisbee Bugle came up with it. Other newspapers have picked it up and spread the term across the territory.”
“It won’t help our cause,” said Bell. “With that name on everyone’s lips, the law-abiding citizens will come down hard on the Van Dorn Detective Agency for not apprehending him.”
“That’s already started,” Curtis said, laying the Rocky Mountain News on the table in front of Bell. He stared down at it.
The lead column was on the robbery and murders in Rhyolite. Half the column was devoted to the question “Why haven’t law enforcement agencies made any progress in the case and captured the Butcher Bandit?”
“The heat is on,” Bell said simply.
“The heat is on us,” Irvine added.
“So what have we got?” asked Bell, pointing to a stack of files two feet high on the bank crimes piled on the desk in front of him. “I’ve studied the reports while coming west on the train. It appears that all we have is that we’re not dealing with the typical cowboy turned bank robber.”
“He works alone,” said Curtis, “and he’s devilish clever and evil. But what is most frustrating is that he never leaves a trail for a posse to follow.”
Irvine nodded his head in agreement. “It’s as though he disappears into the hell he came from before he leaves town.”
“No tracks are ever found leading into the surrounding countryside?” asked Bell.
Curtis shook his head. “The best trackers in the business have come up dry every time.”
“Any evidence he might have holed up in town until the excitement died down?”
“None that’s ever turned up,” replied Curtis. “After the robberies, he was never seen again.”
“A ghost,” murmured Irvine. “We’re dealing with a ghost.”
Bell smiled. “No, he’s human, but a damned smart human.” He paused and fanned out the files on the conference table. He selected one and opened it, the report on the robbery in Rhyolite, Nevada. “Our man has a very rigid modus operandi that he sticks with on every bank job. We believe he hangs around for a few days studying the town and its people before robbing the bank.”
“He’s either a gambler or a risk taker,” said Curtis.
“Wrong on both counts,” Bell corrected him. “Our man is bold and he’s shrewd. We can assume he does his dirty work using disguises, since the people of all the towns he’s struck never agree on the appearance of suspicious-looking strangers.”
Irvine began pacing the conference room, occasionally examining a flag pinned on the map. “Citizens of the towns recall seeing a drunken bum, a uniformed soldier, a well-to-do merchant, and a small-time freight hauler. But none could tie them to the murders.”
Curtis looked at the carpeted floor and shrugged. “How odd there are no witnesses who can give a credible identification.”
“Nothing odd about it,” said Irvine. “He murders them all. The dead can’t speak.”
Bell seemed to ignore the conversation as if he was lost in thought. Then his eyes focused on the map and he said slowly, “The big question in my mind is why he always kills everyone in the bank during the theft. Even women and children. What does he gain by the slaughter? It can’t be that he simply doesn’t want to leave witnesses to the robberies, not when he’s already been seen around town in disguise…unless…” He paused. “There is a new definition created by psychologists for murderers who kill as easily as they brush their teeth. They call them sociopaths. Our man can kill without remorse. He has no emotions, does not know how to laugh or love, and has a heart that is as cold as an iceberg. To him, shooting down a small child holds the same sensitivity as shooting a pigeon.”
“Hard to believe there are people that cruel and ruthless,” muttered Irvine in revulsion.
“Many of the bandits and gunfighters of the past were sociopaths,” said Bell. “They shot other men as easily as if they sneezed. John Wesley Hardin, the famous Texas badman, once shot and killed a man for snoring.”
Curtis looked steadily at Bell. “Do you really think he murders everyone in a bank because he enjoys it?”
“I do,” Bell said quietly. “The bandit gets a weird satisfaction from committing his blood crimes. Another peculiar factor. He makes his escape before the people of the town, including the town sheriff, realized what happened.”
“So where does that leave us?” asked Irvine. “What avenues do we search?”
Bell looked at him. “Another of his routine habits is to ignore any gold and take only currency. Glenn, your job is to check out the banks that were robbed and study their records of the serial numbers on the stolen bills. Start in Bozeman, Montana.”
“Banks in mining towns aren’t in the habit of recording the identifying number of every bill that passes through their hands.”
“You might get lucky and find a bank that recorded the numbers of the currency sent from large city banks to make the miners’ payroll. If you do, we can trace them. The robber had to either spend the money or exchange the currency through bank deposits and withdrawals. A trail he can’t cover up.”
“He could have exchanged through foreign financial institutions.”
“Maybe, but he would have to spend it overseas. The risk would be too great for him to bring it back into the U.S. I’m betting he kept his loot in the country.”
Then Bell turned to Curtis. “Art, you check out all stagecoach and train schedules for any that departed the towns on the same day the robberies took place. If our man couldn’t be tracked by a posse, he might easily have taken a train or stage for his getaway. You can begin in Placerville, California.”
“Consider it done,” said Curtis firmly.
“Are you going to remain here and act as a command post?” asked Irvine.
Bell shook his head and grinned. “No, I’m going out in the field, beginning with Rhyolite, and retrace the robberies. No matter how good the murderer is or how well he planned his crimes, there has to be a stone he left unturned. There must be evidence that’s been overlooked. I’m going to question the mining town citizens who might have seen something, however insignificant, and failed to report it to the local sheriff or marshal.”
“You’ll give us your schedule so we can get in touch by telegraph if we come onto something?” said Curtis.
“I’ll have it for you tomorrow,” replied Bell. “I’m also going to travel through the mining towns that have large payrolls our man has yet to rob. Maybe, just maybe I can second-guess our butcher, set up a trap, and entice him to strike another bank on our turf.” Then he pulled open a drawer and passed out two envelopes. “Here’s enough cash to cover your travel expenses.”
Both Curtis and Irvine looked surprised. “Before now, we always had to travel third class, use our own money, and turn in bills and receipts,” said Curtis. “Alexander always demanded we stay in sleazy hotels and eat cheap meals.”
“This case is too important to cut corners. Trust me, Mr. Van Dorn will okay any monies I request, but only if we show results. The bandit may have everyone believing he’s invincible and can’t be caught, but he’s not faultless. He has flaws just like the rest of us. He will be trapped by a small insignificant mistake he neglected. And that, gentlemen, is our job, to find that insignificant mistake.”
“We’ll do our best,” Irvine assured him.
Curtis nodded in agreement. “Speaking for both of us, permit me to say that it is a real privilege to be working with you again.”
“The privilege is mine,” said Bell sincerely. He felt lucky to work with such intelligent and experienced operatives who knew the people and country of the West.
THE SUN was falling over the Rockies to the west when Bell left the conference room. Always cautious, he closed and locked the door. As he passed through the outer office, he ran into Nicholas Alexander, who looked like he’d j
ust stepped out of an expensive tailor’s shop. The usual shabby suit was gone and replaced by an elegant tuxedo. It was a new image of respectability that he didn’t quite pull off. The inner polish simply was not there.
“You look quite the bon vivant, Mr. Alexander,” Bell said graciously.
“Yes, I’m taking the wife to a fancy soiree at the Denver Country Club later this evening. I have many influential friends here in Denver, you know.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“A pity you can’t come, but it’s only for members of the club in good standing.”
“I understand perfectly,” Bell said, masking his sarcasm.
As soon as they parted, Bell went down the street to the telegraph office and sent a telegram to Van Dorn.
Have set up a schedule of investigations by myself, Curtis, and Irvine. Please be informed that we have a spy in our midst. A woman, a stranger who approached me at the hotel, identified me by name, knew my past, and seemed to know why I was in Denver. Her name is Rose Manteca and she supposedly comes from a wealthy family of ranchers in Los Angeles. Please ask our Los Angeles office to investigate. Will keep you advised of our progress on this end.
Bell
After he sent the telegram to his superior, Bell walked down the busy sidewalk to the Brown Palace Hotel. After a few words with the concierge, who provided him with a map of the city, he was escorted down to the storeroom and the boiler room beneath the lobby, where he was greeted by the hotel maintenance man. An affable fellow in stained coveralls, he led Bell to a wooden crate that had been dismantled. Under a single, bright lightbulb that hung from the ceiling, the maintenance man pointed at a motorcycle that sat on a stand beside the crate and gleamed a dazzling red.
“There she is, Mr. Bell,” he said with satisfaction. “All ready to go. I personally polished her up for you.”
“I’m grateful, Mr….”
“Bomberger. John Bomberger.”