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“In addition,” Bell pressed, “I recommend that Van Dorn Agency specialists listen in the various immigrant neighborhoods of the cities that have navy yards-German, Irish, Italian, Chinese-for talk of spying, rumors about foreign governments paying for information, and sabotage. The dreadnought race is international.”
Van Dorn considered that with a hollow chuckle. “We could be looking for more than one spy. Told you this is beyond our usual.”
“If not us,” retorted Isaac Bell, “who?”
17
TWICE THAT AFTERNOON ICEMAN WEEKS ADMINISTERED beatings notable for their viciousness and the fact that neither left marks not covered by clothing. He was an expert, exercising skills he had honed since boyhood shaking down peddlers and collecting debts for loan sharks. Compared to longshoreman and carters, a skinny bellboy and a frightened little laundress were pieces of cake. The pain grew worse as the day wore on. As did the fear.
Jimmy Clark, the bellboy at the Cumberland Hotel, received the first seemingly endless flurry of fists in the alley behind the pharmacist where he went to exchange last night’s take for tonight’s cocaine. Weeks emphasized that his problems would be nothing compared to Jimmy’s problems if the bellboy didn’t do exactly what he was told. Any sort of double cross would make this event a happy memory.
Jenny Sullivan, the apprentice laundress at the Yale Club, caught hers in an alley half a block from the Church of the Assumption, where she had gone to pray for relief of her debt.
Weeks left her vomiting with pain. But so important was her role in his plan that when Weeks stopped hitting the girl, he promised that if she did as he ordered her entire debt was canceled, paid in full. As she dragged her aching body to work, her pain and her fear were unexpectedly mingled with hope. All she had to do was stand lookout at the club’s service door at a late hour when no one was around and steal a key to unlock a third-floor bedroom.
18
ISAAC BELL AND MARION MORGAN MET FOR DINNER AT Rector’s. The lobster palace was as famous for its mirrored green-and-gold interior, its lavish linens and silver, its revolving door-the first in New York-and its glittering patrons as it was for its crustaceans. Situated on Broadway, it was two blocks from Bell’s office in the Knickerbocker. He waited out front under a gigantic statue of a gryphon ablaze in electric lights and greeted Marion with a kiss on her lips.
“I’m sorry I’m late. I had to change clothes.”
“I was, too. I just got done with Van Dorn.”
“I have to at least try to compete with the Broadway actresses who eat here.”
“When they see you in that getup,” Bell assured her, “they will run back to their dressing rooms and blow their brains out.”
They pushed around the revolving door into a brilliant room that held a hundred tables. Charles Rector gestured frantically to the orchestra as he rushed to greet Marion.
The musicians broke into “A Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight,” the title of Marion’s first two-reeler about a detective’s girlfriend who stopped the villain from burning down a town. At the sound of the music, every woman flashing diamonds and every gent dressed to the nines looked up to see Marion. Bell smiled as an appreciative buzz rippled across the restaurant.
“Miss Morgan,” Rector cried, seizing her hands in his. “When last you honored Rector’s you were making newsreels. Now everyone is talking about your moving picture.”
“Thank you, Mr. Rector. I thought the musical accompaniment was reserved for beautiful actresses.”
“Beautiful actresses are a dime a dozen on Broadway. A beautiful moving picture director is as rare as oysters in August.”
“This is Mr. Bell, my fiancé.”
The restaurateur squeezed Bell’s hand and pumped heartily. “My congratulations, sir. I can’t imagine meeting a more fortunate gentleman on the Great White Way. Would you like a quiet table, Miss Morgan, or one where the world may see you?”
“Quiet,” Marion answered firmly, and when they were seated and the Mumm was ordered she said to Bell, “I am astonished he remembered me.”
“Perhaps he read yesterday’s New York Times,” Bell smiled. She was so pleased by her reception, and there was lovely high color in her face.
“The Times? What do you mean?”
“They sent a fashion reporter to the Easter Parade last Sunday.” He unfolded a clipping from his wallet and read aloud:
“ ‘One young woman, who strolled after tea from Times Square to the Fifth Avenue parade, caused a sensation. She wore lavender satin and a black, plume-laden hat, the size of which caused men to step aside to give her room to pass. This dazzling creature walked as far as the Hotel St. Regis, and then departed toward the north in a red Locomobile motorcar.’
“And speaking of red, your ears are.”
“I am mortified! They make it sound as if I were sashaying up Fifth Avenue seeking attention. Every woman there was dressed up for Easter. I only wore that hat because Mademoiselle Duvall and Christina bet me ten dollars I didn’t have the nerve.”
“The reporter got it all wrong. You were attracting attention. Had you been seeking it, you would not have skedaddled in that red Locomobile but would have sashayed up and down the avenue until dark.”
Marion reached across the table. “Did you see this strange article on the other side?”
