He could feel the bridge shaking violently now that the train was off it. A glance below showed the Cascade Canyon River raging like an ocean in a hurricane. Mind reeling from a lack of oxygen and lost blood, he felt himself getting giddy as he desperately pried up spike after spike.
Who’s the Wrecker now? he thought. The tables were turned. Isaac Bell, chief investigator for the Van Dorn Detective Agency, was battling with every ounce of his failing strength to derail a train.
It was getting harder to breathe, and he could see a bubble of blood rising and falling from the wound in his chest. If Kincaid’s sword had punctured his chest cavity and he didn’t get help soon, air would fill it and collapse his lung. But he had to free an entire length of rail first.
THE WRECKER WAS NOT as grievously wounded as Bell, but he was equally determined. He had regained consciousness as Bell shambled past with a spike puller. Now, ignoring a bullet lodged between two ribs, he was running, doubled over, as fast as he could toward the coal train. The detective’s spike puller told him all he had to know. Bell meant to derail the burning train into the river to divert floodwater from the weakened piers.
He reached the locomotive, dragged himself up to the cab, and shoveled several scoops of coal into the firebox.
“Hey, what are you doing?” shouted a trainman, climbing the ladder to the cab. “Mr. Bell said to leave the train here.”
Kincaid drew the long-barreled revolver he had taken from his Thomas Flyer and shot the man. Then he set the locomotive steaming ahead with a sure hand on the throttle and sand valve. The drive wheels bit smoothly, the couplers unslacked, and the locomotive drew the coal cars onto the bridge. The Wrecker saw the probing white beam of the headlight fall on Isaac Bell, who was struggling to loosen the rail.
THE HEAVY COAL TRAIN dampened the vibrations shaking the bridge. Feeling the difference, Bell looked up into the blinding beam of a locomotive headlamp and knew instantly that his derringer shot had not killed Charles Kincaid.
The locomotive was bearing down on him. He felt its wheels grinding the rails. Now he saw Kincaid thrust his head from the cab window, his face a mask of hatred. His mouth spread in a ghastly grin of triumph, and Bell heard the steam huff harder as the Wrecker opened the throttle.
Bell ripped the final spike out of its crosstie. Then he hurled his weight against the crowbar, battling with fading strength to shift the loosened rail before Kincaid ran him over.
Bell felt the front truck wheels roll onto his rail. The weight of the engine was holding it down. Summoning his last strength, he moved it the vital “one inch between here and eternity.”
The locomotive slipped off the rails and slammed onto the ties. Bell saw the Wrecker with his hand on the throttle, saw his triumph turn to despair as he realized that he was about to drag the burning train off the bridge and down to the river.
As Bell turned and ran, the V-shaped engine pilot on the front of the locomotive struck him. Like a fly swatted by a giant, he tumbled ahead of the locomotive and over the edge of the deck before catching himself on a girder. Wedged in the steelwork, Isaac Bell watched the locomotive crash over the side. It was a long, long way down, and for a moment the entire train seemed suspended in the air.
The locomotive and the string of cars thundered into the river with a splash that deluged the banks. Stream and smoke billowed. Even submerged, the fire continued to glow cherry red in the gondolas. But the cars were heaped in a tight string across the riverbed like the closely bunched islands of a barrier beach that protected the mainland from the power of the ocean. Floodwater tumbled over and around them, its force dissipated, its impact diminished.
The Cascade Canyon Bridge stopped shaking. The fallen train had diverted the flood. And as Isaac Bell passed in and out of consciousness, he saw the electric work lights blaze to life again as bargeloads of railroad men swarmed back into the caissons to buttress the piers.
59
BRAVING A BLIZZARD, CROWDS GATHERED BEFORE A GRAYSTONE mansion at Thirty-seventh Street and Park Avenue to watch the guests arrive at the wedding of 1908’s winter season: the union of a son of Old New York and the daughter of a shirtsleeve railroad titan. Those observing a handsome couple crossing the snowy sidewalk to mount the steps of the mansion assumed that the tall, impeccably dressed gentleman with the golden mustache was gripping the arm of the beautiful woman at his side so she would not slip on the ice. The opposite was true, but no one heard Isaac Bell say to Marion Morgan, “Who needs a walking stick when he has a strong woman to lean on?”
“A detective recovering from a punctured lung ...”
“Only slightly. Never would have made it, otherwise.”
“... nearly bleeding to death, infection, and pneumonia, is who.”
“If that cameraman takes my picture, I’ll shoot him.”
“Don’t worry. I told him that Picture World would fire him and throw his family in the street if he points it anywhere near you. Do you have the ring?”
“In my vest pocket.”
“Hold tight, darling, here come the steps.”
They made it, Bell pale with effort. Butlers and footmen ushered them inside. Marion gasped at the flowers arrayed through the foyer and up the grand staircase. “Sweet peas, roses, and cherry blossoms! Where did they get them?”
“Anywhere it’s spring beside the father of the bride’s railroad tracks.”
The father of the bride hurried up to greet them. Osgood Hennessy was dressed in a pearl-gray morning coat with a rose boutonniere. Bell thought he looked a little lost without Mrs. Comden at his side and grateful for a friendly face. “Marion, I’m so glad you came all the way from San Francisco. And you, Isaac, up already and full of go.”
“A wedding without the best man would be like a hanging without the rope.”
Marion asked if the bride-to-be was nervous.
“Lillian nervous? She’s got seventeen bridesmaids from all those fancy schools she got kicked out of and ice water in her veins.” Hennessy beamed proudly. “Besides, there has never been a more beautiful bride in New York. Wait ‘til you see her.” He turned his head to favor J. P. Morgan with a chilly nod.
Bell whispered to Marion, “That record will fall if we decide to marry in New York.”
“What was that?” said Hennessy, sending Morgan off with a per functory slap on the shoulder.
“I was just saying, I should check in with the groom. May I leave Marion in your care, Mr. Hennessy?”
“A pleasure,” said Hennessy. “Come along, my dear. The butler told me we’re supposed to wait till after the vows to drink champagne, but I know where it’s kept.”
“Could I see Lillian first?”
Hennessy pointed the way upstairs. A knock at her door elicited squeals and giggles inside. Three girls escorted her to Lillian’s dressing table, where more girls hovered. Marion had to smile at how her extra years seemed to awe them.
Lillian jumped up and hugged her. “Is this too much rouge?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“You’re heading toward a bridal suite, not a bordello.”
Lillian’s school friends convulsed with laughter, and she told them, “Go away.”
They sat alone a moment. Marion said, “You look so happy.”
“I am. But I’m a little nervous about ... you know, tonight ... after.”
Marion took her hand. “Archie is one of those rare men who truly love women. He will be everything you could desire.”
“Are you sure?”
“I know the type.”
BELL FOUND ARCHIE ABBOTT in a gilded reception room with his mother, a handsome woman with an erect carriage and a noble bearing whom Bell had known since college. She kissed his cheek and inquired after his father. When she glided off, stately as an ocean liner, to greet a relative, Bell remarked that she seemed pleased with his choice of bride.
“I thank the Old Man for that. Hennessy charmed the dickens out of her. She thinks this
mansion is extravagant, of course, but she said to me, ‘Mr. Hennessy is so marvelously rough-hewn. Like an old chestnut beam.’ And that was before he announced he’s building us a house on Sixty-fourth Street with a private apartment for Mother.”
“In that case, may I offer double congratulations.”
“Triple, while you’re at it. Every banker in New York sent a wedding gift ... Good Lord, look who came in from the great outdoors.”
Texas Walt Hatfield, longhorn lean and windburned as cactus, swaggered across the room, flicking city men from his path like cigarette ash. He took in the gilded ceiling, the oil paintings on the walls, and the carpet beneath his boots. “Congratulations, Archie. You struck pay dirt. Howdy, Isaac. You’re still looking mighty peaked.”
“Best-man nerves.”
Hatfield glanced around at the elite of New York society. “I swear, Hennessy’s butler looked at me like a rattlesnake at a picnic.”
“What did you do to him?”
“Said I’d scalp him if he didn’t head me toward you. We gotta talk, Isaac.”
Bell stepped close and lowered his voice. “Did you find the body?”
Texas Walt shook his head. “Searched high and low. Found a shoulder holster that was probably his. And a boot with a knife sheath. But no body. The boys think coyotes et it.”
“I don’t believe that,” said Bell.
“Neither do I. Critters always leave something, if only an arm or a foot. But our hound dogs turned up nothing ... It’s been three months ...”
Bell did not reply. When a smile warmed his face, it was because he saw Marion across the room.
“Everything’s deep in snow ...” Texas Walt continued.
Bell remained silent.
“... I promised the boys I’d ask. When do we stop hunting?”
Bell laid one big hand on Texas Walt’s shoulder and the other on Archie‘s, looked each man in the eye, and said what they expected to hear. “Never.”
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
DECEMBER 12, 1934
GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN
ISAAC BELL FASTENED HIS CLIMBING SKINS TO HIS SKIS ONE LAST time and dragged his sled up a steep slope that was raked by windblown snow and slick with ice. At the top stood Kincaid’s castle. Before he reached it, he stopped to peer at a halo of electric light several hundred yards away that marked the checkpoint of armored vehicles where German soldiers guarded the road that led to the main gate.
He saw no sign that they weren’t huddling from the storm and resumed his climb, veering toward the back of the castle. The looming structure was a testament to Kincaid’s resourcefulness. Even in defeat, he had managed to salvage enough to live in comfort. Towers flanked the ends of a great hall. Lights where the guards and servants lived shone at the bottom of the far tower. A single window lit in the near tower marked Kincaid’s private quarters.
Bell stopped in the drifts beside the ancient walls and caught his breath.
He took a grappling hook from the sled, twirled out a length of knotted rope, and threw it high. The iron grapnel was wrapped in rubber and bit quietly onto the stone. Using the knots for handholds, he pulled himself up to the edge. It was littered with broken glass. He cleared an area with his sleeve, pulling the glass toward him so it fell silently outside the wall. Then he pulled himself over the top, retrieved the knotted rope, lowered it inside the wall, and climbed down into the courtyard. The lighted window was on the second floor of the five-story tower.
He worked his way to the thick outer door and unbolted it, leaving one bolt engaged so the door wouldn’t swing in the wind. Then he crossed the courtyard to a small door in the bottom of the tower. Its lock was modern, but Van Dorn’s spies had ascertained the maker, allowing Bell to practice picking it until he could do it blindfolded.
He had no illusions about an easy arrest. They had almost caught Charles Kincaid eighteen years ago, but he had slipped loose in the chaos that wracked Europe at the end of the World War. They had come close, again, during the Russian civil war, but not close enough. Kincaid had made friends on both sides.
As recently as 1929, Bell thought he had Kincaid cornered in Shanghai, until he escaped by coming as close as any criminal had yet to killing Texas Walt. He had no reason to believe that the Wrecker was any less resourceful five years later, or any less deadly, despite the fact that he was now in his late sixties. Evil men, Joe Van Dorn had warned with the grimmest of smiles, don’t age because they never worry about others.
The lock tumbled open. Bell pushed the door on oiled hinges. Silent as a tomb. He slipped inside, closed it. A dim paraffin lamp illuminated a curving stairway that led to cellars and a dungeon below and the Wrecker’s apartments above. A thick rope hung down the center as a handhold to climb the steep and narrow steps. Bell did not touch it. Stretching from the roof to the dungeon, any movement would make it slap the stone noisily.
He drew his pistol and started up.
Light shone under the door that led to the Wrecker’s apartment. Suddenly, he smelled soap, and he whirled toward motion that he sensed behind him. A heavyset man in servant’s garb and a pistol in a flap holster at his waist had materialized from the dark. Bell struck with lightning swiftness, burying the barrel of his pistol in the German’s throat, stifling his cry, and knocking him senseless with a fist to the head. Quickly, he dragged the man down the hall, tried a door, found it open, dragged him inside. He slashed drapery cords with his knife, tied the man hand and foot, and used a knotted cord as a gag.
He had to hurry. The guard would be missed.
He checked the hall outside Kincaid’s door and found it empty and silent. The door was heavy, the knob large. Bell had learned that Kincaid did not lock it, trusting to the walls, the outer door, his guards, and the German solders who blocked the road.
Bell pressed his ear to the door. He heard music, faintly. A Beethoven sonata. Likely on the phonograph, as it was doubtful the radio penetrated these mountains. All the better to muffle the sound of opening the door. He turned the knob. It was not locked. He pushed the door open and stepped inside a room that was warm and softly lit.
A fire flickered and candles and oil lamps cast light on bookcases, carpets, and a handsome coffered ceiling. A wing chair faced the fire with its back to the door. Bell eased the door shut to avoid alerting the Wrecker with a draft. He stood in silence while his eyes adjusted to the light. The music was playing elsewhere, behind a door.
Isaac Bell spoke in a voice that filled the room.
“Charles Kincaid, I arrest you for murder.”
The Wrecker sprang from the wing chair.
He was still powerfully built but looked his full sixty-nine years. Standing slightly stooped and wearing a velvet smoking jacket and eyeglasses, Kincaid might have passed for a retired banker or even a university professor were it not for the scars from his miraculous escape from the Cascade Canyon. A shattered cheekbone flattened the left side of his once-handsome face. His left arm ended abruptly just below his elbow. His expression mirrored his scars. His eyes were bitter, his mouth twisted with disappointment. But the sight of Isaac Bell seemed to invigorate him, and his manner turned mocking and scornful.
“You can’t arrest me. This is Germany.”
“You’ll stand trial in the United States.”
“Are your ears failing with age?” Kincaid mocked. “Listen closely. As a loyal friend of the new government, I enjoy the full protection of the state.”
Bell pulled handcuffs from his ski jacket. “It would be easier for me to kill you than bring you in alive. So keep in mind what happened to your nose last time you tried to pull a fast one while I put the cuffs on you. Turn around.”
Covering Kincaid with his pistol, he clamped one cuff around his whole wrist and the other tightly above the elbow of his maimed arm. He confirmed that Kincaid could not slip it over the protruding joint.
The sound of the cuff locking seemed to paralyze Charles Kincaid. Voice anguished, gaze dull, he asked Isaac
Bell, “How did you do this to me? The German Geheime Staatspolizei intercept everyone that comes within twenty miles of my castle.”
“That’s why I came alone. The back way.”
Kincaid groaned as he abandoned all hope.
Bell looked his prisoner in the eye. “You will pay for your crimes.”
The music stopped abruptly, and Bell realized that it had not been a phonograph but an actual piano. He heard a door open and a rustle of silk, and Emma Comden glided into the apartment in a stylish, bias-cut dress that appeared sculpted to her curves. Like Kincaid, her face revealed the years, but minus the scars and the bitter rage that ravished his. Her lines of age, her wrinkles and her crow‘s-feet, traveled the route of smiles and laughter. Though tonight her dark eyes were somber.
“Hello, Isaac. I always knew we’d see you one day.”
Bell was taken aback. He had always liked her, before he knew she had been Kincaid’s accomplice. It was impossible to separate the spying she had done for the Wrecker from the men he had murdered. He said coldly, “Emma, fortunately for you I have room for only one or you’d be coming with me, too.”
She said, “Rest easy, Isaac. You will punish me by taking him from me. And I will suffer for my crime in a way that only you could understand.”
“What do you mean?”
“As you love your Marion, I love him ... May I say good-bye?”
Bell stepped back.
She stood on tiptoe to kiss Kincaid’s flattened cheek. As she did, she slid a small pocket pistol toward Kincaid’s cuffed hand.
Bell said, “Emma, I will shoot you both if you pass him that gun. Drop it!”
She froze. But instead of dropping the gun or pointing it at him, she jerked the trigger. The shot was muffled by Kincaid’s body. He went down hard, landing on his back.