Smiling, he sauntered from the men’s room and across the bustling lobby, which was suddenly swarming with railroad detectives. With only seconds to spare, he brushed past station attendants who were closing the gates to the smoky train platforms. A locomotive shrieked the double Ahead signal, and the Overland Limited, a luxury flyer made up of eight first-class Pullmans, dining car, and an observation-lounge car, began to roll east for Cheyenne, Omaha, and Chicago.
The Wrecker strode alongside the last car, the observation-lounge, matching its pace, his eyes everywhere.
Far ahead, just behind the baggage car, he saw a man leaning from the steps of the first Pullman, holding on to a handrail so he could swing out to get a clear look at whoever was catching the Limited at the last minute. It was six hundred feet from there to where the Wrecker was reaching for a handrail to pull himself aboard the last car of the moving train, but there was no mistaking the sharp silhouette of a hunter.
The head of the train moved out of the shadow cast by the station, and he saw that the man leaning out to watch the platform had a full head of flaxen hair that gleamed like gold in the light of the setting sun. Which meant, as he had suspected, that the hunter was none other than Detective Isaac Bell.
Without hesitation, the Wrecker gripped the handrail and stepped onto the train’s end platform. From this open vestibule, he entered the observation-lounge car. He closed the door behind him, shutting out the smoke and noise, and luxuriated in the peace and quiet of a first-class transcontinental flyer decorated with heavy moldings, polished-wood panels, mirrors, and a thick carpet on the floor. Stewards were carrying drinks on silver trays to passengers lounging on comfortable couches. Those who looked up from newspapers and conversation acknowledged the well-dressed late arrival with the sociable nods of brother clubmen.
The conductor broke the mood. Flinty of eye, hard of mouth, and impeccably uniformed, from his gleaming visor to his gleaming shoes, he was imperious, brusque, and suspicious like conductors everywhere. “Tickets, gents! Ogden tickets.”
The Wrecker flourished his railway pass.
The conductor’s eyes widened at the name on the pass, and he greeted his new passenger with great deference.
“Welcome aboard, sir.”
THE FAVORED FEW
15
OCTOBER 14, 1907
EASTBOUND ON THE OVERLAND LIMITED
“TAKE ME TO MY STATEROOM IMMEDIATELY!”
Isaac Bell would be racing to the back of the train to see who had boarded last minute, and the Wrecker intended to confront the detective at a time of his own choosing.
The conductor, obsequious as a palace courtier serving a prince robed in ermine, led the Wrecker down a window aisle to a large suite in the middle of a car where the train was smoothest riding.
“Come in! Shut the door!”
The private suite, reserved for the railroad’s special guests, was palatially fitted with hand-carved cabinetry and an embossed-leather ceiling. It included a sitting room, a sleeping compartment, and its own
bathroom with a marble tub and fixtures of pure silver. He tossed his Gladstone bag on the bed.
“Any ‘interests’ on your train?” he asked the conductor, meaning were there other important personages aboard. He made the inquiry with a confidential smile and slipped the conductor a gold piece.
No guest of the Southern Pacific Railroad Company had to tip to ensure lavish treatment and fawning service. But the conductor of a transcontinental train, like the purser of an Atlantic liner, could be a useful confederate and a source of inside information about the powerful passengers traveling across the country. The combination of pretended intimacy and cold cash was an investment that would pay off in spades. And indeed it did, as the conductor answered freely.
“Mr. Jack Thomas, president of First National Bank, got on at Oakland, along with Mr. Bruce Payne, Esquire.”
“The oil attorney?”
“Yes, sir. Mr. Payne and Mr. Thomas are very close, as you can imagine.”
“Money and petroleum law make fast bedfellows,” the Wrecker smiled, encouraging the conductor to keep talking.
“Judge Congdon and Colonel Bloom, the gentleman in coal, have been on the train since Sacramento.”
The Wrecker nodded. Judge James Congdon had joined with J. P. Morgan to buy Andrew Carnegie’s steel trust. Kenneth Bloom owned coal in partnership with the Pennsylvania Railroad.
“And Mr. Moser of Providence, the mill owner, whose son sits in the Senate, sir.”
“Capital fellow,” said the Wrecker. “His father’s textile interests are in good hands.”
The conductor beamed, basking in the proximity of such celebrated plutocrats. “I am certain that they would be honored if you would join them for dinner.”