Bell thought a moment. Mrs. Comden had not been in New York but had stayed in the West with Hennessy. “Since you inquire about my friend, I have to ask you who told you that.”
“Kincaid. Who do you suppose? He was with her in New York when she met Abbott. Please understand, Bell, I am fully aware that he would say anything to undermine any rival for her hand … Which he will get over my dead body.”
“Lillian’s too, I imagine,” said Bell, which drew a smile.
“Although,” Hennessy went on, “I must admit that this president talk is a new wrinkle. I may have underestimated Kincaid …” He shook his head in amazement. “I’ve always said I’d rather have a baboon in the White House than Theodore Roosevelt. We should be careful what we wish for. But at least Kincaid would be my baboon.”
Bell asked, “If you would accept a baboon in the White House, provided he was your baboon, would you take him as a son-in-law?”
Hennessy dodged that question, saying only, “I’m asking about your friend Abbott because when I have to weigh suitors, I want to know my options.”
“All right, sir. Now I understand. I will tell you what I know. Archie Abbott-Archibald Angell Abbott IV-is an excellent detective, a master of disguise, a handy fellow with his fists, a deft hand with a knife, deadly with a firearm, and a loyal friend.”
“A man to ride the river with?” Hennessy asked with a smile.
“Without reservation.”
“And his circumstances? Is he as poor as Kincaid claims?”
“He lives on his detective salary,” said Bell. “His family lost everything in the Panic of ‘93. His mother stays with her brother-in-law’s family. Before that, they were reasonably well-off, as the old New York families were in those days, with a good house in the right neighborhood.”
Hennessy looked at Bell, sharply. “Could he be a gold digger?”
“Twice he walked away from wealthy young ladies whose mothers would be thrilled to marry them into as illustrious a family as the Abbotts. One was the only child of a man who owned a steamship line, another the daughter of a textile magnate. He could have had either for the asking. In both cases, their fathers made it clear they would take him into the business or, if he preferred not to work, simply put him on an allowance.”
The old man stared hard at him. Bell held his eye easily.
Hennessy finally said, “I appreciate your candor, Bell. I won’t be around forever, and I’m pretty much the only family she has. I want to see her set before anything happens to me.”
Bell stood up. “Lillian could do a lot worse than Archie Abbott.”
“She could also do worse than First Lady of the United States of America.”
“She is a very capable young woman,” Bell said neutrally. “She’ll deal with any hand dealt her.”
“I don’t want her to have to.”
“Of course you don’t. What father would? Now, let me ask you something, sir.”
“Shoot.”
Bell sat back down. As much as he wanted to join Marion, there was a question troubling him that had to be answered.
“Do you really believe that Senator Kincaid has a chance for the nomination?”
CHARLES KINCAID AND EMMA COMDEN had walked in silence past the special’s insistently sighing steam engine, past the train yards and into the night, beyond the glare of the electric lights. Where the ballast laid for new rail ended, they stepped down to the newly cleared forest floor that had been brushed out for the right-of-way.
The stars were vivid in the thin mountain air. The Milky Way flooded the dark like a white river. Mrs. Comden spoke German. Her voice was muffled by the fur of her collar.
“Be careful you don’t twist the devil’s tail too hard.”
Kincaid responded in English. His German, honed by ten years studying engineering in Germany and working for the German companies building the Baghdad Railway, was as good as hers, but the last thing he needed was someone to report he had been overheard conversing in a foreign tongue with Osgood Hennessy’s mistress.
“We will beat them,” he said, “long before they figure out who we are or what we want.”
“But every way you turn, Isaac Bell thwarts you.”
“Bell has no idea of what I have planned next,” Kincaid said scornfully. “I am so close, Emma. My bankers in Berlin are poised to strike the instant that I bankrupt the Southern Pacific Company. My secret holding companies will buy it for pennies, and I will seize controlling interests in every railroad in America. Thanks to Osgood Hennessy’s ‘empirizing.’ No one can stop me.”