The Assassin (Isaac Bell 8)

Wally and Mack typically were not intimidated; the old guys had known Van Dorn too long and the self-satisfied Weber & Fields grins on their gnarly faces gave Bell hope. They looked more confident than their grasping-at-straws cable report about Spike Hopewell’s so-called tricks up his sleeve. Maybe good news.

Bell glanced at Van Dorn and stepped out the door. The Boss lumbered after him.

“What’s up?”

“You’re spooking my boys.”

“Your boys aren’t delivering.”

“Why don’t you let me buy you a drink at the Normandie after I straighten them out?”

Bell returned to the bull pen alone.

“When I left for Baku, you were pursuing various leads on the Army sharpshooter, the gunsmith who improved the assassin’s Savage 99, the exhumation of Averell Comstock’s body, and the tricks that Spike Hopewell claimed to have up his sleeve. That no news awaited me in Constantinople or Berlin or Bremerhaven on my way home suggests unfruitful pursuits. Did the situation improve while I steamed across the Atlantic?”

Wally and Mack grinned. The rest were silent.

“Archie. How’d you make out with the general’s daughter?”

“No dice.”

“Who gave you the shiner?”

“She took a swing at me.”

“Why?”

Wally Kisley laughed. “The young lady took insult, misled that Princeton, here, was romancing her. Just when the spooning should commence, Princeton says he has business wi

th her father.”

Archie hung his head. “I misinterpreted her motive for inviting me to visit when he was out of the house.”

“Boom!” said Wally. “Smack in the eye.”

“When I went back to try again, the butler said she was ‘not at home.’ So what I’m thinking, Isaac, is maybe it’s time for me to get back to work in Chicago. Rosania is—”

Bell said, “Write down her name and address for me.”

He turned to the head of Van Dorn Research. “Grady. How did you do with Dave McCoart?”

“We’ve eliminated every gunsmith in the country except for two in Hartford and one in Bridgeport. But none of those fellows have panned out yet.”

“None of them ever worked on a 99?”

“None that admit it. I’m fairly convinced that the Hartford gunsmiths are in the clear. Fairly convinced. But the detective I sent to Bridgeport—a pretty good contract man we’ve used in Connecticut—was suspicious. But he could not shake the guy’s story, and he was smart enough to back off before he tipped his hand. It will be worth sending a regular man.”

“I’ll go,” said Bell. “How did we do with the New York coroner?”

“He won’t exhume Mr. Comstock without a court order. The court refused on legalistic grounds that essentially came down to the judge’s belief that an eighty-three-year-old should have been dead anyway.”

“But what about Mrs. McCloud in the fire and her son in the river?”

“The judge expressed no faith in the likeliness of connections joining the Five Points Gang, the West Side Gophers, and the Standard Oil Trust.”

“Sounds like we need another judge.”

“The next judge concurred with the former’s incredulity.”