The Striker

there’ve been no coal strikes since.”

“Even if that lie were truth,” Bell answered quietly, “even if you got away with every killing in the coalfields, you will die for the murder of Mary Higgins.”

“Mary Higgins died while sabotaging a company steamboat,” Congdon said. “But I can’t allow accusations to confuse gullible voters.” He raised his voice and shouted through the closed door to an adjoining office. “Mr. Potter! I need you.”

A well-built middle-aged man with a beard that was showing flecks of gray limped into the office carrying a leveled Colt Bisley.

Isaac Bell looked him over. “‘Mr. Potter,’ you will disappoint the many who hoped that Henry Clay drowned in the Ohio River.”

Congdon said, “Mr. Clay became Mr. Potter so that I could help him live in great comfort, free of the electric chair.”

“In exchange,” said Bell, “for killing your enemies and rivals.”

Congdon said, “I’m disappointed that you don’t seem one bit surprised. I had hoped to see your jaw drop.”

“Joseph Van Dorn suspected years ago that Clay had to be your assassin. Who else, he asked, could be as cold-blooded? And he described you to a T, Congdon: a man wise enough to see Henry Clay’s talents and greedy enough to employ them.”

Clay’s expression turned cold at Bell’s mention of Van Dorn. “That bulge in your coat where you used to pack your Colt Army, and subsequently a Bisley, is now, I’m informed, a Browning No. 2. Put it on Mr. Congdon’s desk.”

Bell surrendered his favorite pistol of many years, a Belgian-made semiautomatic modified to fire an American .380 caliber cartridge.

“I presume you replaced the sleeve gun I took away from you in New York. Drop it, too.”

Bell shook the derringer out of his sleeve and handed it over.

“And the pocket pistol.”

“You have a long memory,” said Bell.

“It’s kept me alive. Put it on the desk.”

Bell placed the tiny one-shot on the desk.

“And the knife in your boot.”

“Want me to throw it at anything?”

“If you still can, hit the edge of that bookshelf.”

Bell threw overhand. The knive struck like a flash of lightning.

James Congdon howled in dismay. The blade had pierced the portrait of his latest wife, depicted as a shapely goddess in silk gauze, and stood quivering in the lady’s nose. Bell used the distraction to glide behind the shimmering white Rodin marble.

“Sorry, I missed.”

Clay leveled his gun.

“What if you miss me and shoot your boss’s favorite statue?”

Clay started toward him, saying, “I’ll get so close, I can’t miss.”

“Be careful!” Congdon shouted.

As Clay turned to assure him, Bell whipped his two-shot derringer from his hat.

“Drop it!”

Henry Clay stopped in his tracks. His startled expression seemed to shout Where the hell did that come from?

Bell said, “Live and learn. Toss your gun over there, on the carpet.”

Clay shrugged with a faint knowing smile and did as Bell ordered. Then he looked at Judge Congdon. The old man caressed the bronze statuette on his desk. “You’re wrong, Chief Inspector. The statue you’re hiding behind is not my favorite. This is my favorite.”

“I can’t believe you prefer that little thing to this magnificent marble.”

In answer, the financier jerked the steam lever.

* * *

Isaac Bell, Henry Clay, and James Congdon all looked up at the ceiling.

Only Bell smiled.

He stuck out his hand. Warm water dripped onto his palm.

“It appears to be raining in your office. And on your parade.”

Congdon jerked the steam lever again. Nothing happened. Frantically, he tugged the statue again and again, slamming it down, jerking it upright, slamming it down.

Bell said, “I thought it sensible to shut the steam-conditioning valves to your office.”

Congdon’s long, thin frame sagged, and he slipped off his feet into his chair.

“But how did you know?”

Bell moved swiftly forward and swept the guns off the desk onto the floor before Congdon or Clay got any ideas. “Judge Congdon, you are under arrest for the murder of Mary Higgins.”

Henry Clay’s expression shifted from flummoxed to deeply puzzled.

“You were out of the room earlier, Clay. You didn’t hear me charge your boss with murdering a young woman in 1902.”

“Are you crazy, Bell?”

“I wish I were,” Isaac Bell answered sadly. “I would give anything to be wrong. But she died a horrible death right here in this office.”

“Mary died in Pittsburgh.”

“Mary Higgins was found in Pittsburgh. Many were led to believe that Mary was scalded to death helping you blow up the militia’s steamboat.”

Clay shook his head. “Mary didn’t help me. I had no idea she was aboard. She must have used that boy disguise she used in Denver.”

“She was never aboard the Vulcan King. Not alive. She died here, in New York. Mary’s brother swore that she could not have been in Pittsburgh because Mary wrote him that she was going to New York to confront the saboteur’s boss — your boss. No one believed Jim Higgins. But why would he say it unless he was addled with grief or telling the truth? So I asked questions. Turns out, I was not the only man sweet on her.”

Clay was listening closely.

Bell said, “I’ll bet you boasted to her, hoping to impress her— She was the kind of girl a fellow would do most anything to impress. You did brag, didn’t you? Bragged how you had partnered up with the most powerful man in Wall Street.”

“I didn’t brag.”

“Maybe you got puddingheaded when she slipped you the knockout drops.”

“How do you know about that?”

“Give Van Dorns some credit. The pharmacist she bought the chloral from told me. You gave Mary Congdon’s name, didn’t you?”

“I must have.”

“You signed her death warrant.”

Clay looked at Congdon, who was slumped behind his desk. “Did you hurt her?”

Congdon said, “It’s a trick, you idiot.”

Clay looked to Bell. The color of Bell’s eyes had darkened to a steely blue. He directed them straight at the rogue detective. “We never give up,” he said softly. “You know that better than anybody. It was Mr. Van Dorn’s motto from the beginning, wasn’t it?”

Clay stared. Then he lowered his eyes and nodded agreement. “Yes, from the beginning.”

Isaac Bell said, “It took me ten years to trace her steps from Pittsburgh to New York, to Wall Street, to this building, to this office. You know your business, Clay, you know how it works. A word here, a hint there, a memory, a glimpse. It’s easier when it’s a pretty girl who struck the eye. Ticket agents. Train conductors.