The Assassin (Isaac Bell 8)

“I had a job as an electrician’s helper. That’s a ground wire you’re messing with.”

He grabbed her arm. “Man, you’re skinny.”

—

Isaac Bell left Grady Forrer far behind as he ran full tilt up the refinery hill, through the front gates, and across Constable Street. He had noticed The Hook saloon. It looked like an old sea captain’s house with a widow’s walk on the roof. He shoved through the swinging doors.

The barroom was empty except for a floor manager, who shouted from behind the bar, “We’re closed!”

“Where are the cops watching the widow’s walk?”

“Home,” said the floor manager. “We don’t pay off cops to hang around— Hey, where you going?”

Bell paused at the foot of the stairs only long enough to turn the full force of his eyes on the man. “Stay there, you won’t get hurt.”

He bounded up three full stories, then into a sweltering attic, and up steep stairs onto the widow’s walk fully expecting to find the assassin aiming her rifle. But the room was empty. Nellie was not in it. Thunder pealed. He stalked to the windows and glared out at the refinery. He knew with every fiber in his being that he was close. But she was not here.

—

A derringer slug in the shoulder had knocked the fight and the curiosity out of the nosy bartender. Nellie pointed the gun in his face, fished steel handcuffs from the bottom of her tool bag, and tossed them to him. “Put one on your wrist.”

Stunned and disbelieving, he did as he was told.

“The other on the cable. Above, there, where it’s nailed to the wall.”

“Hey, wait. It’s lightning outside! It’ll electrocute me.”

“Better odds than this bullet,” she said. “Who knows if lightning will strike?”

“It hit yesterday. Twice last week.”

Nellie laughed. “Didn’t anybody ever tell you? Lightning can’t strike twice.”

“It’s the highest building on the street, higher than the tanks. It gets hit all the time. Why do you think they have four separate rods?”

“Bullet?”

He gave a terrified groan and clicked the manacle around the cable.

—

Isaac Bell racked his brain, trying to figure out what Nellie was up to now. Having the house right next to the refinery was a powerful opportunity. How would she use it if not to shoot from this brilliantly situated observatory?

Leaning a hand on the window frame as he gazed upon the storm, he felt a thick, rounded ridge on the sash. It looked and felt like it had been painted over and over for decades. But it was not made of wood like the rest of the room. Rope? No, cable. Metal cable. Still trying to winkle out Nellie’s deranged thoughts, he picked at it idly with his boot knife and saw a gleam of brass or copper. He traced it up to the ceiling, out the wall, under the gutter, and onto the roof. He flung open the window, thrust head and torso into the rain, and swung gracefully onto the sill. There he stood to his full height with his back to the four-story drop and traced the cable onto the flat roof, where it split into four separate strands. The strands went to the four corners. On each corner was a full-size bronze replica of a whaler’s harpoon.

“Nellie,” he whispered, “I underestimated you.”

Thunder pealed. Bell looked down and, as if he had conjured her with his voice, saw a slight figure hurry across Constable Street. It was her, carrying a tool bag long enough for her gun. Lightning flashed. Nellie stopped and looked up at the widow’s walk. Their eyes met.

Bell shouted with all the power in his lungs to the Van Dorns at the gate, “Get her!” A thunderclap drowned out his voice. Nellie blew him a kiss, and a bolt of lightning wider than a man plunged from the heart of the sky.

43

Ten million volts of electricity stormed down the ground wire, electrocuted the bartender manacled to it, and raged out the sewer and under Constable Street. Fumes from spilled oil were trapped in the refinery storm drains. These the lightning ignited. Fireballs shot from the drain grates. At the far end of the cable Nellie Matters had strung, the electricity jumped through the air and drilled a hole in the steel wall of a naphtha tank.

—

Isaac Bell heard the Standard Oil fire whistles chorus ghostly screams.