The Gangster by Clive Cussler (free novels .txt) 📕

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.”

“Why don’t we cut the electricity while we’re at it? Put ’em in the dark.”

“Culp has his own power plant. It’s here.”

“You drew it like a church.”

“The power plant looks like a church. The steeple masks the smokestack. Now we’ve confirmed that Mrs. Culp is here in New York in their mansion on 50th Street, which makes things easier.”

“Screaming wives,” said a grizzled veteran from the Boston field office, “take all the fun out of busting down a door.”

“Worse than kids,” said another.

“There are no kids. But there are plenty of staff. Mrs. Culp has taken her majordomo with her, but there is everything else, from footmen, to cooks, to housemaids, to groundskeepers.”

“How about bodyguards?”

“Culp keeps a couple prizefighters in the gymnasium. They’ve got a room downstairs. So we’ll need a couple of boys to get them into manacles.”

“O.K. to shoot ’em in the leg if they resist?”

“Use your judgment.”

“Where do we take Culp and Branco?”

“Culp’s a big wheel in the Hudson Valley, so Mr. Van Dorn strongly suggests we avoid the local constabulary. We’ll have a boat here”—Bell pointed at the boathouse pier—“to run us across the river. Then hightail it to a New York Central special standing by at Cold Spring and straight to Grand Central. NYPD Captain Mike Coligney will come aboard at Yonkers and make the arrests the second we cross the city line.”

“What charge?”

“Harboring a fugitive for Culp. With more to come.”

“How about trying to kill the President?”

“If we can pin it on him,” said Bell. “The primary goal is to knock Culp out of commission so he can’t kill him.”

“What do we charge Branco with?”

“We’ll start with the murder of Brewster Claypool. That should give the DA time to establish a Black Hand case. Same goal, though: Take him out of action before he can do more damage.”

“How solid is the Claypool murder charge? Keeping in mind what the Italians do to witnesses.”

“Solid,” said Bell. “I’m the witness.”

“I have an idea,” said J. B. Culp.

The magnate was on his feet, looming over his desk in the trophy room, fists planted on the rosewood. Antonio Branco was pacing restlessly among the life-size kills. Culp waited for him to ask what his idea was, but the self-contained Italian never rose to the bait.

Culp tried again to engage him. “We kill two birds with one stone . . . Can you guess how, Branco?”

Branco stopped beside a suit of armor and ran his fingers across the chain mail. “We kill Roosevelt,” he said, “when he makes his speech at the aqueduct.”

Culp did not conceal his admiration. Branco was as sharp as Brew Claypool, as cynical, and as efficient. Lee’s and Barry’s corpses had disappeared as if they had never existed, along with their possessions and every sign they had ever occupied the rooms under the gym. The difference between Claypool and Branco was that Branco also had teeth, razor-sharp teeth.

“Good guess,” said Culp.

“Easy guess,” said Branco. “What better proof that the city can’t manage its water system than to drown the President in the aqueduct?”

“Drown? Is that how you’re going to do it?”

Branco said, “I promised not to saddle you with things you shouldn’t know,” and walked between the elephant tusks that framed the fortress door.

“Where are you going?”

“As I promised, you will not be saddled,” said Branco and walked out.

Culp lumbered after him. “Hold on, Branco. I want to know when you’re coming back.”

“Later.”

Branco followed a winding path through a forest of ancient fir trees and down the slope between the outside entrance to his rooms and the estate wall. Near the wall, he slid through a low break in a rock outcropping that opened into a small cave under the wall.

Only an experienced