“Cheers,” Tesla said, raising his filled glass.
“Na Zdorovie,” Henson said in Russian, clinking his glass against the other.
“Do you speak it?” Tesla asked, also in Russian.
Henson knew the scientist was reputed to speak eight languages. “Enough to get in trouble,” he answered.
The mustache lifted. “Then we better stick to English.”
Chuckling, he said, “Maybe we better. You have any idea where the government is holding Henrik?”
“That’s why I called you, as you were the last one to have seen our friend. I wanted to confirm that indeed he was being held by the authorities.”
Eyebrow raised, Henson said, “You just happen to be listening to the radio then? Are you a fan of the Clicquot Club band?”
“I’m not adverse to swing music, Matt. I can still cut a rug,” he said enthusiastically. “But that was my young assistant Stanley. We’d been working late as was not unusual and after knocking off as they say, he turned on the radio just as you were being interviewed.”
“You knew about me and Henrik getting arrested?” Henson asked.
“I did.” Tesla bit into his tea biscuit, crumbs accumulating in his mustache. “I have learned from bitter experience in this country, Matt, that one must be prepared for various possible eventualities. That merit is not always recognized. Other factors can intervene.” He wiped the crumbs away.
He looked evenly at his guest. “Now of course I don’t need to tell you that. But it’s in that regard that I had heard Henrik had surfaced here in town and, well, had certain associates on the lookout for him. That no matter what has happened to him, his understanding of physics is unsurpassed, and I could use his help on several projects.”
Tesla paused, looking into the depths of his tea but not drinking more. He continued, “Still, by the time I heard about the incident and sent inquiries about him to the station house, you both were long gone. And as there was no record of him being there at all, my suspicions were raised.”
“You think you can run him down? Find him, I mean?”
“I shall try. As you will too, is that not so?”
“It is.”
“And what do you know of his latest work?”
Henson considered his next words. “Is it that energy is all around us, Nikola? Unseen, but there, nevertheless?”
“Oh yes, Mr. Henson. I’ve devoted my life to that. I have, to be boastful, discovered the principals for transmitting power without wires. True power I mean. Radio being merely a…” he waved his hand in the air between them, “an expression of the lowest form of that.”
He took his speared cube of sugar and swirled it in his tea. “And is Henrik onto a breakthrough regarding heretofore undiscovered sources of energy?”
“Don’t know, all that bookworm stuff is way over my head. But I do want to find out who those guys in the mask were. Maybe this will lead me to where he is.”
“It is certainly the case that various lines of investigation that start out parallel sometimes cross.”
“On that, what do you know about the Weldon Institute? This effort by a gee named Renwick at futurism? I understand you spoke at a shindig he had.”
A bemused look settled on his face. “I speak at a lot of affairs, for a lot of crackpots.”
“But you do know him?”
Tesla shrugged. “Hugo Renwick and I have had several discussions about how to better society through technology. I’ve consulted on a few of his endeavors. He knew about my earlier patent on a tilted wing craft that could hover like what an autogiro does. Once in the air, the craft assumes the normal functions of an airplane. He even had me out to his airfield in New Jersey, offering my ideas on his experimental craft.” He picked up the butter knife, lifting it straight up then trailing it along horizontally. “Like so, you see?”
“Very interesting.”
“Mind you, his engineers have made substantial progress. I’m not so vain that I won’t admit I didn’t understand that it’s only with a turbine can you solve the problem of stabilizing the airship long enough for the forward motion propellers to take over.”
“You recall where this airfield is? I understand a friend of mine is putting his plane through its paces.”
“I am proud to tell you that even at this age, my memory is…prodigious,” he said, tapping an index finger against his temple. “I was driven out there by chauffer, but I can draw you a most accurate map.”
Henson bit into a biscuit. The promise of the hunt always sharpened his appetite.
“You are referring to the young woman, Miss Bessie, is that not so? The first negro woman to get her pilot’s license, yes? Indeed because of the short-sightedness of this my adopted home, she had to go to France for flight school if I’m not mistaken.”
Henson nodded admiringly. “Yeah, man, she’s something.” He also knew that Robert Abbott, the publisher of the Chicago Defender, a city where Bessie had done some flying, supported her financially in her pursuit of an aviator’s license.
“I would think so,” Tesla agreed.
They talked some more then Henson said his goodbye, each man agreeing to let the other one know should they find Ellsmere. Thereafter, Henson made a phone call to Lacy DeHavilin and took a streetcar over to the Supreme Messenger Service on 44th Street in Mid-Town. He walked into the combination garage and dispatch office. Various cars, light trucks and motorcycles were coming and going or being worked on
“I’m looking for Jerry Culver,” he announced.
Three white men were inside. They all glared at Henson. One of them in a grease-stained khakis shirt said, “We ain’t hiring no coloreds today, boy. Bad enough we already been forced
