The Striker (Isaac Bell 6)

“How are you making out with investors?”

“Near fully subscribed— I must run, but here’s my card. Perhaps, we’ll meet, again.”

Finnerty handed Van Dorn his card and was out the door.

* * *

Isaac Bell was pacing in the front hall when Van Dorn bustled into the Yale Club at Forty-fourth Street. Even impatiently pacing, Van Dorn thought, the young detective glided like a panther — precision-cocked to spring.

“Sorry, Isaac. Tied up in a meeting.”

Bell led the way to a pair of wing chairs in a quiet corner of the lounge. He related in detail what had happened at the Gleason jail and laid out his suspicions. Van Dorn listened attentively, intrigued again by Bell’s speculation about a provocateur but still dubious about the evidence.

“I’m hoping you can spare me some men to get to the bottom of this, sir.”

“Your own squad?”

“It’s too big for one detective.”

“Not possible,” said Van Dorn. “We are stretched to the breaking. Prince Henry is dragging us around the country like the tail of a kite and now he’s threatening to extend his visit. They love him everywhere he goes and he’s having a ball.”

Bell spoke urgently. “Before I went down in the mine, I did as you suggested and learned everything I could about the coal business. The mines employ half a million men. Hundreds of thousands more work on the railroads and barge tows that transport it. In a nutshell, coal is the most important business in America.”

“That nutshell does not alter the fact that the Van Dorn Detective Agency has other fish to fry,” Van Dorn growled back.

Isaac Bell did not appear to hear him. “Coal is indispensable for heat, for coke to make steel, for smelting ore, for electricity generation for lights, pumps, elevators, and agriculture wells, and for fuel where wood is scarce. Coal powers ocean liners, battleships, and railroad trains.”

Van Dorn nodded impatiently, thinking, All the more reason to invest some part of my savings in Jack Finnerty’s supercoal. He said, “I am aware that the wealth coal underpins is unimaginably immense, and the benefit to the entire nation is incalculable, as is ensuring a steady sup

ply.”

“But such wealth has the potential to stir the worst in men of all stripes,” Bell persisted, “be they labor, owner, or financier.” He took a deep breath. “I could begin my investigation with Wally Kisley and Mack Fulton, and Wish Clarke.”

Van Dorn could not conceal his surprise. “Only them?”

“Kisley is expert in explosives. Fulton’s been working labor cases since the Haymarket Riot. And the boys all say that Wish Clarke is the toughest fighting man in the agency, which I observed to be true when you let me work with him in Wyoming and again in New Orleans.”

“You would be the youngest squad leader in the history of the agency.”

“No, sir. You were younger when you led your first squad.”

“Times were simpler back then…”

“Coincidentally,” said Isaac Bell, “your first squad consisted of Kisley and Fulton and an apprentice named Wish, for ‘Aloysius,’ Clarke.”

It was Van Dorn’s turn to take a deep breath.

“O.K., you can have Weber and Fields,” he said, using the agency nickname for Kisley and Fulton whose jokes reminded everyone of the vaudeville comics. “They’re in Chicago. God knows where Wish Clarke is.”

“I can find him.”

“If you can find him, you can have him.”

“Could I also have Mr. Bronson?”

Joseph Van Dorn’s bushy eyebrows would have shot no higher if Isaac Bell had demanded the combined services of heavyweight champion Jim Jeffries, President Roosevelt and half his Rough Riders.

“Horace Bronson,” the Boss answered coldly, “is engaged in San Francisco.”