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“Are you O.K., Isaac?” asked Joseph Van Dorn.
“Where is Josephine?”
“Camped out on Bedloe’s Island, fixing her flying machine. Where are you?”
“Who’s watching her?”
“Six of my best detectives and twenty-seven newspaper reporters. Not to mention Mr. Preston Whiteway, circling on a steam yacht, beaming searchlights for your fiancée to shoot moving pictures by. Are you O.K.?”
“Tip-top, soon as I get a propeller, a new wing stay, and a Remington autoload.”
“I’ll send word to Marion you’re O.K. Where are you, Isaac?”
“Weehawken stockyards. Frost got away.”
“Seems to be making a habit of that,” the boss observed coolly. “Did you wing him at least?”
“I took off one of his ears.”
“That’s a start.”
“But it didn’t stop him.”
“Where’s he headed?”
“I don’t know,” Bell admitted. His head ached, and his jaw felt like he’d been chewing thornbushes.
“Do you think he’ll try again?”
“He assured me he will not stop trying until he kills her.”
“You spoke?” The tone of Van Dorn’s voice suggested that if Bell could somehow see through telephone wire, he would be facing sharply raised eyebrows.
“Briefly.”
“What’s his state of mind?”
Isaac Bell had thought of little else since he swam ashore.
“Harry Frost is not insane,” he said. “In fact, in a strange way he’s enjoying himself. As I warned Whiteway in San Francisco, Frost knows he’s been dealt his last hand. He’s not going to fold his cards until he sets the casino on fire.”
Joseph Van Dorn said, “Nonetheless, the lengths he’s going to to avenge his wife’s supposed seduction would fit most folks’ definition of insane.”
“Let me ask you something, Joe. Why do you suppose Frost didn’t kill Josephine when they were still together?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why did Frost shoot Marco instead?”
“Put an end to the affair, hoping she’d come back.”
“Yes. Except for one thing. Having killed Marco – assuming he is dead-”
“He is,” Van Dorn interrupted. “We’ve been down that road.”
“Having killed, or tried to kill, Marco,” Bell replied evenly, “why is Frost now trying to kill Josephine?”
“He either is insane or just plain old-fashioned crazed with jealousy. The man was known for his temper.”
