“I can’t risk you undercover. Besides, is there anyone left who doesn’t know you’re a Pinkerton?”
Jack squinted, unsure if that was an observation in his favor or against. “No, Sir,” he replied, bracing himself.
“So get yourself out of those cowpoke duds. You’re an agent.”
“Aye, Sir,” beamed Jack, exhaling.
“Go over to The Golden Rule. The department store just up Main. See Mr. Anderson there. He’ll get you correctly togged.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“He’ll charge the Pinkerton account.” They heard a knock at the door, and McParland invited the person in—a hotel clerk who said, “Mr. McParland, there’s a telephone call from a Reverend Sanders, at the front desk.”
“Can he not call this one?” asked McParland, pointing to the wood telephone box on the wall.
“No, Sir. Some wiring has become fouled, crossed as I understand it. It’s being worked on. Please accept our apologies.”
“That’s fine.” Then to Jack: “I’ll be back in a moment,” and left.
Jack took a seat on a couch to wait but eventually grew restless and returned to the table to examine the map, then studied the few books and other items on McParland’s shelves.
The door banged open and McParland quick-stepped to the table. “Where’s his hat?”
“His hat?”
“Did you find Forty-Two—Agent Farrington?”
“Not yet,” said Jack, disappointed that McParland referred to Forty-Two as an agent too. “We’re looking for him.”
“He brought all this,” McParland groused, “but where’s Orchard’s hat? I want that damned hat.”
“The one he said wasn’t his?” Jack saw his boss’s glance. “Yes of course, Orchard was lying about it.”
“Aye. I knew it. I knew it. Mother Mary, I knew it. Certainly he was a lying. I wondered why he said it wasn’t his. Thank the Lord we kept it, didn’t leave it with him.” McParland looked hurriedly about the room, then stopped. “But why didn’t Farrington bring it over? Everything else is here.”
“Maybe he left it—thought it wasn’t Orchard’s.”
“Get it,” barked the chief. “Find Agent Farrington and get it.”
“Yes, Sir. If I may ask, what’s important about it?”
McParland was calming now. “According to that reverend I just spoke with, Orchard had something hidden in it awhile back—some note of paper. Something from Haywood. Any luck, it’s still there, and whatever’s on it is written in Haywood’s hand.”
“All right,” said Jack, picking up his own hat.
McParland moved to the mantel to pack his pipe. He nodded at the table. “Before you go—what do all those things tell you?”
Jack stared at the items, but nothing came to mind that hadn’t already been said. His thoughts were swimming about Orchard’s hat. He had to focus. He revisited each item aloud. “The fishing line: he used it to pull a cork from a vial of this acid, detonating the bomb.” He pointed to the nearly empty bottle that still reeked of sulfur. “A flyer from the WFM, connecting Orchard to them. This plaster chunk—a piece from what held the bomb together in the snow. And some plaster powder from his room.”
McParland struck a match across the hearth and lit his pipe. Aromatic blue vapor enveloped the man. “That’s just the surface of the story, son.”
Jack’s face lifted at hearing the chief’s use of the word “son.” What did that mean? It means you need to figure this out, dummy, he scolded himself.
“What’s the new item there?” pressed McParland.
“This,” said Jack, pointing at the additional plaster shard.
“Aye, a piece of the loaded dice we made. Compare the plasters.”
Jack pinched some collected from Orchard’s room.
“Taste them.”
Jack put his tongue to the powdery room plaster, then the shard from the site, then the dice sliver. “They’re not the same. Well, these two are,” Jack said, pointing at the site shard and the dice sliver. “But the powder is more bitter, I guess.”
“Correct.”
“This one’s plaster of Paris,” Jack said, holding the bomb shard.
“They’re all plaster of Paris, just two different kinds. We obtained ours from the mercantile here. It’s construction plaster. The sort a bomb maker would use if he was familiar with mining—construction and dynamite. Same as we found at the site.”
“And this?” Jack pointed to the powder collected from Orchard’s room.
“That,” McParland began as he touched the powder, “is a type of physician’s plaster. It’s used for setting bones. Feel how fine the grain is? It wouldn’t work for bomb construction. Not very well. Different strengths and set times. Wouldn’t work for dice either. Would fall apart.”
Jack stared, his mind growling with informational digestion. “So he wasn’t making dice … but not a bomb either?”
“Not from that stuff.” McParland shook his head. “When Orchard first saw the powder, when I pointed it out, he seemed surprised. Do you recall? And I think he was, truly. He knew he hadn’t put there. A man will often reveal himself in the first instance of revelation.”
Jack picked up the acid bottle. “Was this his?”
“Might be. Probably not. The fishing line was his. It was deep in his bag, and he gave no reaction when I brought it out. So, someone wants us to have no doubt it was Orchard. They spilled some plaster around the backside of his washbasin—only they used the wrong kind. Somewhere there is a half jar of surgeon’s plaster. Somewhere in this town. I assure you.”
“Then Orchard may not be our man, I mean, if—”
“Oh, he’s our man, most certainly. The fact they wanted us to find him, to know it was him, only makes it more certain. They want us confident it was him. Why?”
Jack paused, then spoke the only thing that seemed to make sense. “So we’d stop looking.”
“Exactly. I might make a detective of you yet. So we wouldn’t look for anyone else. Maybe to give time for someone else to get away. But then they’d want to kill Orchard before he could talk to us. Before he was arrested.”
“My … All right,” mumbled Jack.
“How do you know Miss Capone, the flower who brought us Orchard’s name?”
“I don’t know her. Not really.”
“You were clearly taken by her charms. If I wasn’t married, and was thirty years younger … Regardless, I think we witnessed a bit of performance.”
“She came to me, said she knew I was a Pinkerton,” said Jack. “A couple days later, she came back, telling me about a suspicious man. So I brought her to you.”
“She’s one of Haywood’s girls, I think.”
“How do you know?”
“Get old as me, doing this,” began McParland, “and some things will seem to magically appear—they reveal themselves to you. You’ll just know.” He tamped his pipe again. “Find out who she talks with, socializes and trades with—whose bed she’s in.”
“Yes, Sir,” replied Jack. He turned and sneezed.
“Bless you. The smoke?”
“I don’t think so. Perhaps the plaster dust.”
“Just don’t get sick, son. I need you.”
“No, Sir, I won’t.” Jack beamed. “May I ask … when I introduced her to you, you already knew her name—I think.”
“That’s good that you noticed. I’d heard her name before, just hadn’t placed it with her face. A few months ago, our men saw her on a train out of Denver, coming here. She was stooging carrying a baby, but it was just a bundle of newspapers. They wired me about her, gave me her name, but I didn’t think much on it—a girl not wishing the attention of men while traveling. That is, until you introduced her to me.” He took another considered puff on his pipe. “If you can’t see your missteps
, then your enemy has you, and then … Well then, you’re no good to anyone. Especially when you’re gathering information.”
“I’ll investigate her, Sir, but why would she tell me anything?”
“Because if I’m right, that she’s with the Federation, then she’ll try to turn you, make you a spy for Haywood.”
“What?” Jack’s heart raced at the insinuation.
“She flirted with you, got you to trust her—”
“I don’t trust her,” he snapped.
“She told you about Orchard, so you ushered her into the Idanha, direct to me. Right?”
“Yes, Sir, but—”
“You trusted her.”
Jack looked at the floor. His future with the Pinkertons seemed to be swinging like a pendulum from one moment to the next.
“It’s all right. In fact, it’s good in this instance.”
“Ok,” muttered Jack, feeling his fate arc back again.
McParland continued, “She’s setting her claws in you. So let her. She’s coming for you. Mark my words. Next, she’ll tell you how good the Federation is—how bad we are—how much she admires you. She may offer you her body.”
“I’d never let—”
“Come now! Let’s be honest men.”
“I mean, I would never spy—”
“I know. That’s precisely why you will.”
“I will? I should?”
“Aye, I want you as a double, Jack. Outwardly, you’re a Pinkerton. While to them, you’re a Federation spy. But, in truth, you’re a spy for me. And only me. Almost a triple agent. I was your age when I was a triple, inside the Molly Maguires. Did you know that?”
“Yes, Sir, I did. But how should I—”
“Just be yourself. You’re a Pinkerton letting himself spy for Haywood. You won’t give him any useful information, of course, and you’ll tell me everything you learn.”
“Of course, Sir.”
“Most importantly, tell no one. No one. I’m your only contact in this. No one else. Carry on with your work as an agent—not an operative, as I said. No more ‘Twenty-One.’ Go see Mr. Anderson and get yourself dressed correctly.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“While you’re at it, keep your eye on Agent Farrington.”
“For Orchard’s hat?”
“That too. See if he has it. Get it to me.” McParland paused, took a deep breath, then clamped his pipe as he spoke. “But I’ll wager it’s long gone.”
“Agent Farrington destroyed it?”
McParland was pacing. “If Haywood intended to kill Orchard before we could get there”—he removed the pipe and gestured with it—“then the man sent would’ve already been in the Saratoga when we were there. Or at least coming quick. Maybe someone on staff there, like Miss Capone.”
“She doesn’t strike me as the murdering sort, I wouldn’t say,” said Jack, choosing his words in ones and twos like deli selections.
McParland peered at Jack. “If you underestimate her, you may well lose your life. Don’t do it.” He shook his head. “No, her job was to tell us about Orchard, not to kill him. She was here at the Idanha when we ran to the Saratoga. Remember?”
“Yes, of course, Sir.”
“But the one sent to kill Haywood, he—or she—might also have been on the Saratoga staff, or was a guest, or someone who just walked in. Someone out of place perhaps. So, who’d we find skulking down the stairwell that night?”
“Agent Farrington.”
“Precisely. He said he’d found Orchard suspicious and followed him. But Orchard hadn’t been out in a while. So, how had Farrington just followed him there? No, Farrington being there was too coincidental. And coincidences are fictions of the mind, Agent Garrett. Never accept them in the manner they present themselves. Don’t be fooled into seeing them as simply curiosities or odd events. Anything that seems a coincidence should be an alarm in your ear, a foghorn in the night. Always.”
“Aye, Sir,” Jack said. “You first suspected him that night?”
“First? A few days ago, when he was in this office. But, yes, that night too. As did you.”
Jack’s brows lifted quickly. It was still an adjustment, realizing the chief apparently had mind-reading skills. It was like trying to grow accustomed to a talking dog—startling no matter how many times it says hello. “Yes,” Jack said, “Something wasn’t right about Forty-Two already being there.”
“There was something awry, all right,” said McParland. “Saw it in his eyes. Heard it between his words.”
“Between—”
“Tune your ears to the spaces, son. A man will tell you more between his words, than with the words themselves. Listen to spaces and watch his eyes. Watch where a man looks between his sentences, when he thinks you aren’t looking. Look then.”
“Only a man?”
McParland gave a snorty laugh. “If you figure how to read women … Well, then hell, enlighten us all, will ya?”
<><><>
– 23 –
FRIDAY
February 8, 1907
After exiting the Southern Pacific’s San Francisco depot on Townsend Street, Steve Adams walked a half block northwest along Third Street before halting and removing his earthy-green plaid cap, dumbfounded by what he saw. The city lay in ruins ten months after it had been crushed by an earthquake mother and then eaten by her fire spawn. As far as he could see ahead, and over to his right, and over to his left, was nothingness where once had been a growing American metropolis, a western gateway to the eastern world. Where blocks upon blocks of 28,000 buildings had stood, now was a hilly wasteland of brick and stone skeletons, the sooted bones of what few dead buildings remained. And between those ruins was scraped earth, latticed by dirty streets of wagons, cranes, and work crews moving toward and from huge mounds of debris, three stories tall in places, wagoning the refuse by type to the shoreline where it expanded the city that had once been. Adams resumed walking, and by the time he passed Brannon Street and approached Bryan Street, he had forgotten about the Pinkertons trailing him since Ogden.
But the two Pinkertons had equally forgotten about Adams, at least for the moment—both having fallen into slack-jawed stupor, disoriented by the unfathomably barren hills where 3,000 men, women, and children had so recently perished. They ambled apart, moving through the cluttered vacancy.
Adams turned at what appeared to have been an intersection of streets and entered a makeshift storage yard containing a knot of men, their baritone rumblings directed at a scene before them: three men attempting to start a massive, crawler-tracked steam tractor, its canopy bearing a sign:
HOLT’S CATERPILLAR
“What’s it do?” Adams asked a spectator.
“Railed it in yesterday,” came the reply.
“Over from Stockton,” said another.
Adams frowned at it. “What’s that belt around the wheels? That don’t look proper.”
“A track,” added the first. “Rolls on it.”
The second grinned. “Assuming old Holt can get her running.”
Seeing a Pinkerton nearing, Adams tucked his short frame deeper into the throng, his mind snapping back to his mission: getting to the intersection of Franklin and Grove Streets to kill a man. After the Pinkerton passed, Adams sought directions, which in turn sparked a debate as to whether or not all the homes on Franklin Street had burned. The Pinkerton circled back and Adams knelt, urging one of the men to draw a dirt map to Franklin. Just then Holt’s Caterpillar belched and barked to steaming life, drawing cheers and jeers from the men. That drew the Pinkerton even closer, though now his attention was likewise on the loud machine come alive. Unseen by the Pinkerton, Adams’s small eyes locked on the agent, hand grasping the hilt of his knife.
The Pinkerton continued on, unaware that he had been within six feet of Adams. In turn,
Adams slipped away. And no one in that crowd of men—men working in the long aftermath of one of nature’s most deadly rampages—knew that one of the most deadly humans had been shoulder-to-shoulder among them.
<><><>
– 24 –
SUNDAY
February 10, 1907
Winnie was already at a table in Denver’s Columbine Café when someone held the door open for her sister. Supported by her new green crutches, Neva entered wearing a blue coat with velvet cuffs and collar. Winnie gave a slight wave to show herself, though Neva had already seen her.
“Hello, Sissy,” said Winnie, once Neva had hobbled to the table.
“Can you get my chair?”
“Sure.” Winnie stood, leaning Neva’s crutches against the wall.
“It’s good to see you, Mrs. Haywood,” said the waiter, taking Neva’s coat to hang next to Winnie’s. “It is oddly warm. Can you believe this is February?”
“Yes, it is, Pete,” replied Neva. “My irises are already popping up. Poor things are so confused.” After settling into her seat, straightening her flounce skirt, setting her napkin, receiving her menu, and waiting for the waiter to leave, she looked at Winnie and sighed. “Whew. After all that, I’m going to have to stay the rest of the day.”
“Those are from George?” Winnie nodded at the crutches.
“Un-huh. He’s such a dear.”
“Did Bear say anything?”
Neva lowered her menu and gave Winnie a smile—but like anything that doesn’t fit, it pinched. “No, Bill didn’t say anything. He didn’t notice, of course. Just as well. But look at this,” she said, touching the Irish lace insert of Winnie’s waistshirt. “I like the stitching there—eyelets with tatting. That’s wonderful. Did Bill let you order it from Eaton’s?”
“I saw it in McCall’s,” Winnie said flatly before adding, “Yes.”
“Well, it’s lovely. You deserve those things. You’re so pretty in them. I’m glad he appreciates what you do for him.”
Winnie looked down, lifting her menu. “Same old things,” she observed. “Hmm, a trout roll sandwich. That’s new.”
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