The Gangster (Isaac Bell 9)

BLACK HAND SHUTS DOWN AQUEDUCT

WATER FAMINE THREATENS CITY

Bell cornered the pressure tunnel contractor who had welcomed the Van Dorn protection. He was a hearty, bluff, serious man with no nonsense about him. Like many of the contractors, he personally supervised his job. Was it true, Bell asked, that the likelihood of encountering water-bearing seams had been predicted?

“Between you, me, and the lamppost, diamond drill borings ahead indicated we’d run into water. Not so much it would stop excavation of the siphon tunnel, but enough to have to deal with. We knew we’d have to grout off the seam.”

“How many people knew?”

“Just a handful, and all in the ‘family’—engineers, me, fellows operating the diamond drill.”

“Could any of them have told the Black Hand?”

“I don’t follow you, Detective.”

“I showed you the letter,” Bell said. “I’m asking whether the Black Hand caught a lucky break that you hit water right after they threatened the tunnel? Or did the Black Hand know you would hit water and timed their threat to coincide with it?”

“The Black Hand extorts Italian labor, not American engineers. You can bet no one told them directly. But all it would take is one guinea a little smarter than the rest, cocking his ears for the inside word.”

Bell said, “In other words, the Black Hand rode free.”

“Truth will come out soon enough. The tunnel is doing fine.”

But Antonio Branco’s damage was done, thought Bell. The Black Hand looked powerful; the aqueduct looked vulnerable. He was hurrying from the contractor’s shack when a long-distance telephone call came in from an anxious Joseph Van Dorn, who had just returned to New York.

“Were any of our boys drowned in the flood?”

“There is no flood.”

“The newspapers say the Hudson River flooded the tunnel.”

“Utterly untrue,” said Bell. “Unfortunately, the Black Hand will take credit for sabotage.”

“They just did. We got another letter.”

“Was it addressed to Marion?”

“Like the last. He crows about the flood and threatens worse if the city doesn’t pay.”

Isaac Bell said, “We have to hit them before they attack.”

“Agreed,” said Van Dorn. “What do you propose?”

“Catch Branco with Culp.”

“How do you intend to do that?”

“Raid Raven’s Eyrie.”

34

Twelve brawny, athletic Van Dorn detectives studied the illustrated map of Raven’s Eyrie that Isaac Bell chalked on the bull pen blackboard. He had left his undercover men at Storm King when Van Dorn authorized hauling in reinforcements from Philadelphia, Boston, and Baltimore. They listened, commented, and queried while Bell pointed out features of the estate the raiders would hit upon.

“Main house. Gymnasium, including guest quarters and Culp’s trophy room. Stable. Auto garage. Boathouse. Wall—two miles around and, at a minimum, eight foot high, enclosing one hundred sixty acres. Front gate and gatehouse. Service gate. Workers’ barracks.”

“How do you happen to know your way around, Isaac?”

“I got myself invited and stayed for dinner. The front gatehouse is impregnable. Steep approach and a gate that could stop locomotives. Culp even has rifle slits in the tower. The service gate’s not much easier. But there’s a high spot in the wall, here—out of sight of the service gate tower—where fit younger detectives can scramble over with grappling hooks, then drop rope ladders for the fellows who belly up to free lunches. We’ll cut telephone wires, and the private telegraph, as we go over. They’re a few yards farther along the wall.”