The Race

  Bell concealed a proud smile, and asked sternly, “What do you conclude?”

  “Gas is a heck of a way to get away with killing someone.”

  “Did you turn up any clues that would support such speculation?”

  “Di Vecchio had a big bump on his head, the night clerk told me, like he fell out of bed when he passed out. Could have woke up groggy, tried to get up, and fell. Or he could have been conked on the head by the same fellow who turned on the gas. Trouble is, we’ll never know.”

  “Probably not,” Bell agreed.

  “Could I ask you something, Mr. Bell?”

  “Shoot.”

  “Why did you ask me to investigate his suicide?”

  “I’m driving the last flying machine Di Vecchio built. It does not operate like a machine made by a man who would kill himself. It is unusually sturdy, and it flies like a machine made by a man who loved making machines and was looking forward to making many more. But that is merely an odd feeling, not evidence.”

  “But if you add your odd feeling to the odd bump on Di Vecchio’s head, together they’re sort of like a coincidence, aren’t they?”

  “In an odd way,” Bell smiled.

  “But like you say, Mr. Bell, we’ll never know. Di Vecchio’s dead, and so’s the fellow who might have conked him.”

  “Maybe . . .” said Isaac Bell, thinking hard. “Dash? This engine in the Paris air meet that Di Vecchio said Celere bought with a woman’s money. You said some sort of engine. What did you mean by ‘some sort of engine’?”

  Dashwood grinned. “That confused the heck out of the poor nuns. Threw them for a loop.”

  “Why?”

  “The fishermen called it polpo. Polpo means ‘octopus.’”

  “What kind of engine is like an octopus?” asked Bell. “Eight-cylinder Antoinette, maybe.”

  “Well, they also call the octopus a devilfish. Only that doesn’t make sense when it comes to engines.”

  Bell asked, “What happened when the nuns got confused?”

  “The fishermen tried another word. Calamaro.”

  “What is that? Squid?”

  “That’s what Maria said it meant. Maria was the pretty nun.”

  “An engine like a squid or an octopus? They’re quite different, actually: squid long and narrow with tentacles in back, octopus round and squat with eight arms. Dash, I want you to go to the library. Find out what Mr. Squid and Mr. Octopus have in common.”

  EUSTACE WEED, Andy Moser’s Chicago-born helper who Isaac Bell had hired so Andy could spend time investigating the mechanical causes of the racers’ smashes, asked for the evening off to say good-bye to his girl, who lived on the South Side.

  “Just get back before sunrise,” Andy told him. “If the weather holds, they’ll be starting out for Peoria.”

  Eustace promised he’d be back in plenty of time—a promise he knew he would keep if only because Daisy’s mother would be sitting on the other side of the parlor door. His worst fears proved true. At nine p.m., Mrs. Ramsey called from the other room, “Daisy? Say good night to Mr. Weed. It’s time for bed.”

  Eustace and the beautiful red-haired Daisy locked eyes, each certain it would be a better time for bed if Mother weren’t there. But Mother was, so Eustace called, politely, “Good night, Mrs. Ramsey,” and received a firm “Good night” through the closed door. In an unexpected flash of insight, Eustace realized that Mrs. Ramsey was not as coldheartedly unromantic as he had assumed. He took Daisy in his arms for a proper good-bye kiss.

  “How long before you’re back?’ she whispered when they came up for air.

  “We’ll be racing three more weeks, if all goes well, maybe four. I hope I’ll be home in a month.”

  “That’s so long,” Daisy groaned. Then out of nowhere she asked, “Is Josephine pretty?”

  In his second wise flash of insight that evening, Eustace answered, “I didn’t notice.”

  Daisy kissed him hard on the mouth and pressed her body against his until her mother called through the door, “Good night!”

  Eustace Weed stumbled down the stairs, his head reeling and his heart full.

  Two toughs were blocking the sidewalk, West Side boys.

  It looked to Eustace like he had a fight on his hands, and one he wasn’t likely to win. Running for it seemed the better idea. He was tall and thin and could probably leave them in the dust. But before he could move, they spread out and, to his astonishment and sudden fear, flashed open flick-knives.

  “The boss wants to see you,” one said. “You gonna come quiet?”

  Eustace looked at the knives and nodded his head. “What’s this about?”

  “You’ll find out.”

  They fell in on either side and walked him a couple of blocks to a street of saloons, where they entered a dimly lighted establishment and led him through the smoky barroom to a back-room office. The saloonkeeper, a barrel-bellied man in a bowler hat, vest, and necktie, sat behind a desk. On it, heated by a candle, bubbled a little cast-iron pot of boiling paraffin. It gave off a smell similar to the burnt castor scent of Gnome engine exhaust. Beside the pot was a short length of copper pipe, a water pitcher with a narrow spout, a leather sack a little longer than the pipe, and a vicious-looking blackjack with a flexible handle and a thick head.

  “Shut the door.”

  The toughs did and stood by it. The saloonkeeper beckoned Eustace to approach his desk. “Your name is Eustace Weed. Your girl is Daisy Ramsey. She’s a looker. Do you want to keep her that way?”

  “What do you—”

  The saloonkeeper picked up the blackjack and dangled the heavy end so that it swung side to side like a pendulum. “Or do you want to come home from the air race to find her face beaten to a pulp?”

  In his first flush of panic, Eustace figured it was mistaken identity. They were thinking he owed gambling debts, which of course he didn’t because he never gambled except when shooting pool, and he was too good at it to call it gambling. Then he realized it wasn’t mistaken identity. They knew he was working on the air race. Which meant they also knew that he was working on the flying machine owned by the chief investigator of the Van Dorn Detective Agency. And they knew about Daisy.

  Eustace started to ask, “Why—” He was thinking this had to do with Harry Frost, the madman trying to kill Josephine.

  Before he could finish his question, the saloonkeeper interrupted in a silky voice. He had eyes that reflected the light as if they were as hard and polished as ball bearings. “Why are we threatening you? Because you’re going to do something for us. If you do it, you will come home to Chicago and find your girl Daisy just like you left her. You got my promise, the word goes out tonight: anybody so much as whistles at her, he’s dragged in here to answer to me. If you don’t do what we ask, well . . . I’ll let you guess. Actually, you don’t have to guess. I’ve already told you. Understand?”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want you to tell me that you understand before we go on to what we want.”

  Eustace saw no way out of this mess other than to say, “I understand.”

  “Do you understand that if you go to the cops, you’ll never know which cops are our cops.”

  Eustace had grown up in Chicago. He knew about cops and gangsters, and he’d heard the old stories about Harry Frost. He nodded that he understood. The saloonkeeper raised an inquiring eyebrow and waited until Eustace repeated out loud, “I understand.”

  “Good. Then you and Daisy will live happily ever after.”

  “When will you tell me what you want?”

  “Right now. Do you see this here pot?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you see what’s in there boiling?”

  “It smells like paraffin.”

  “That’s what it is. It’s paraffin wax. Do you see this?” he held up the three-inch length of three-quarter-inch copper tubing.

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know what it is?”

  “It’s
a length of copper pipe.”

  “Blow out the candle.”

  Eustace looked puzzled.

  The saloonkeeper said, “Lean down here and blow out the candle so the paraffin wax stops boiling.”

  Eustace leaned down, wondering if it was a trick, and they were going hit him or throw the boiling wax in his face. The back of his neck tingled as he blew out the candle. No one hit him. No one threw hot wax in his face.

  “Good. Now we’ll wait a moment for it to cool.”

  The saloonkeeper sat in complete silence. The toughs at the door shifted on their feet. Eustace heard a murmur of conversation from the saloon and a bark of laughter.

  “Pick up the copper tube.”

  Eustace picked it up, more curious now than afraid.

  “Dip one end in the paraffin. Careful, don’t burn your fingers on the pot. Still hot.”

  Eustace dipped the tube in the paraffin, which was congealing and growing solid as it cooled.

  “Hold it there . . .” After sixty seconds the saloonkeeper said, “Take it out. Good. Dip it in that water pitcher to cool it . . . Hold it there. All right, now you gotta move quick. Turn it over so the wax plug is down . . . That’s a plug you made, you see, the wax plugs that end of the tube. Do you see?”

  “The bottom is plugged.”

  “Now take the pitcher and pour the water into the tube. Careful, it doesn’t take much. What would you say that is, two tablespoons?”

  “Just about,” Eustace agreed.

  “Now, holding it upright, not spilling it, take your finger of your other hand and dip it in the wax . . . Don’t worry, it won’t burn you . . . Still warm, might sting a little, is all.”

  Eustace dipped his index finger into the warm, pliable wax.

  “Almost done,” said the saloonkeeper. “Scoop up some wax on your finger and use it to plug the other end of the tube.”

  Eustace did as he was told, working the wax into the opening and smoothing the edges.

  “Do it again, work it in a little more, make sure it is sealed watertight—absolutely watertight. Do you understand?”

  “I understand.”

  “O.K., turn it over. Let’s see if no water drips out.”

  Eustace turned it over tentatively and held it out the way he used to present A+ projects in shop class.

  The saloonkeeper took it from his hand and shook it hard. The plugs held. No water escaped. He dropped it in the leather sack, tugged the drawstrings tight, and returned it to Eustace Weed. “Don’t let it get so warm it melts the wax.”

  “What am I supposed to do with it?”

  “Keep it out of sight ’til somebody tells you where to put it. Then put it where he tells you.”

  Utterly mystified, Eustace Weed weighed the sack in his hand and asked, “Is that all?”

  “All? Your girl’s name is Daisy Ramsey.” The short, round saloonkeeper picked up the sap and slammed it on his desk so hard the pot jumped. “That is all.”

  “I understand.” Eustace blurted quickly, though he understood very little, starting with why the saloonkeeper went through the whole rigmarole with the wax pot. Why didn’t he just hand him the wax-sealed tube in the sack?

  The man looked hard at him, then he smiled. “You wonder why all this?” He indicated the pot.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “So if you lose that which I gave you, you got no excuse. You know how to make another. You’re a flying-machine mechanician, top of the trade. You can make anything. So when someone tells you where to put it, you’ll be ready to put it where he tells you when he tells you. Understand?”

  “I understand.”

  “O.K., get outta here!”

  He signaled the toughs.

  “They’ll see you safe out of the neighborhood. You’re a valuable man now, we don’t want folks wondering why you got bruises. But don’t forget, don’t let nobody see that there tube of water. Anybody starts asking questions, and the city of Chicago loses a pretty face.”

  They started him out the door. The saloonkeeper called, “By the way, if you’re wondering what it is and how it’ll work, don’t. And if you happen to figure it out and you don’t like it, remember Daisy’s pretty little nose. And her eyes.”

  ISAAC BELL DROPPED DASHWOOD around the corner from the Palmer House at a small hotel that gave out-of-town Van Dorns a discount. Then he drove to the Levee District and parked on a street that hadn’t changed much in a decade. Motortrucks lined up at the newspaper depot instead of wagons, but the gutter was still paved with greasy cobbles, and the ramshackle buildings still housed saloons, brothels, lodging houses, and pawnshops.

  By the dim light of widely scattered streetlamps, he could make out the intersection of old and new brick where Harry Frost’s dynamite had demolished the depot walls. A man was sleeping in the doorway the frightened newsboys had huddled in. A streetwalker emerged from the narrow alley. She spotted the Packard and approached with a hopeful smile.

  Bell smiled back, looked her in the eye, and pressed a ten-dollar gold piece into her hand. “Go home. Take the night off.”

  He did not believe for one minute that the Van Dorn Detective Agency had run Harry Frost out of Chicago. The criminal mastermind had left town under his own steam for his own reasons. For it was chillingly clear to Bell that Harry Frost was as adaptable as he was unpredictable. Roving in that Thomas Flyer, the city gangster would take deadly, free-ranging command of the Midwest’s prairies and the vast plain beyond the Mississippi while the politicians and bankers and crooks in his Chicago organization covered his back, wired money, and executed his orders.

  Bringing a telegrapher in the Thomas was a stroke of warped genius. Harry Frost could send Dave Mayhew climbing up railroad telegraph poles to tap into the wires, eavesdrop on the Morse alphabet, and tell him what the stationmasters were reporting about the progress of the race. Diabolical, thought Bell. Frost had drafted hundreds of dedicated assistants to track Josephine for him.

  A drunk rounded the corner, smashed his bottle in the gutter, and burst into song.

  “Come Josephine, in my flying machine . . .

  “Up, up, a little bit higher

  “Oh! My! The moon is on fire . . .”

  28

  JAMES DASHWOOD CAUGHT UP with Isaac Bell one hundred and seventy miles west of Chicago in a rail yard near the Peoria Fairgrounds on the bank of the Illinois River. It was a sweltering, humid evening—typical of the Midwestern states, Bell informed the young Californian—and the smell of coal smoke and steam, creosote ties, and the mechanicians’ suppers frying, hung heavy in the air.

  The support trains were parked cheek by jowl on parallel sidings reserved for the race. Bell’s was nearest the main line but for one other, a four-car special, varnished green and trimmed with gold, owned by a timber magnate who had invested in the Vanderbilt syndicate and had announced that he saw no reason not to ride along with the rolling party just because his entry smashed into a signal tower. After all, Billy Thomas was recuperating nicely, and was a true sportsman who would insist the show go on without him.

  Whiteway’s yellow six-car Josephine Special was on the other side of the Eagle Special, and Bell had had his engineer stop his train so that the two flying-machine support cars stood next to each other. Both had their auto ramps down for their roadsters, which were off foraging for parts in Peoria hardware stores or scouting the route ahead. Laughter and the ring of crystal could be heard from a dinner party that Preston Whiteway was hosting.

  Dashwood found Bell poring over large-scale topographic maps of the terrain across Illinois and Missouri to Kansas City, which he had rolled down from his hangar-car ceiling.

  “What have you got, Dash?”

  “I found a marine zoology book called Report on the Cephalopods. Squid and octopuses are cephalopods.”

  “So I recall,” said Bell. “What do they have in common?”

  “Propulsion.”

  Bell whirled from the map. “Of course. They both move by
spurting water in the opposite direction.”

  “Squid more than octopus, who tend more toward walking and oozing.”

  “They jet along.”

  “But what sort of motor would my fishermen be comparing them to?”

  “Platov’s thermo engine. He used the word ‘jet.’” Bell thought on that. “So your fishermen overheard Di Vecchio accuse Celere of a being a gigolo because he took money from a woman to buy some sort of engine at a Paris air meet. A jet motor. Sounds like Platov’s thermo engine.”

  A heavy hand knocked on the side of the hangar car, and a man stood perspiring copiously at the top of the ramp. “Chief Investigator Bell? I’m Asbury, Central Illinois contract man.”

  “Yes, of course. Come on in, Asbury.” The contractor was a retired peace officer who covered the Peoria region on a part-time basis, usually for bank robbery cases. Bell offered his hand, introduced “Detective Dashwood from San Francisco,” then asked Asbury, “What have you got?”

  “Well . . .” Asbury mopped his dripping face with a red handkerchief as he composed his answer. “The race has brought a slew of strangers into town. But I’ve seen none the size of Harry Frost.”

  “Did any pique your interest?” Bell asked patiently. As he moved west with the race, he expected to encounter private detectives and law officers so laconic that they would judge the closemouthed Constable Hodge of North River to be recklessly loquacious.

  “There’s a big-shot gambler from New York. Has a couple of toughs with him. Made me out to be the Law right off.”

  “Broad-in-the-beam middle-aged fellow in a checkerboard suit? Smells like a barbershop?”

  “I’ll say. Flies were swarming his perfume like bats at sunset.”

  “Johnny Musto, out of Brooklyn.”

  “What’s he doing all the way to Peoria?”

  “I doubt he came for the waters. Thank you, Asbury. If you go to the galley car on Mr. Whiteway’s train, tell them I said to rustle up some supper for you . . . Dash, go size up Musto. Any luck, he won’t make you for a Van Dorn. You not being from New York,” Bell added, although in fact Dashwood’s best disguise was his altar boy innocence. “Give me your revolver. He’ll spot the bulge in your coat.”