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“Good-bye?” asked Bell. “We’re on the same ship.”
“We’re sailing Second Class. You’re in First.”
“No. Stay with me. I’ll pay the difference.”
“We will not sit in the same dining room as that man,” said Nellie, turning away without another word to walk briskly to the Second Class gangway.
Edna said, “We can barely stand to be on the same ship. But it’s the fastest way home. I’ve promised a full report to the Sun, and Nellie has got to take command of the New Woman’s Flyover before a certain suffragette tries to steal it. Apparently, Amanda Faire’s husband bought her a balloon.” She lowered her voice, though her sister was far beyond earshot. “Nellie is so distraught about Father. I’ve got to get her home and busy.”
Bell said, “I hope you understand that I’m terribly sorry about your father.”
“You cannot be as sorry as we are,” said Edna. “We’ve lived in fear of this day and now it has happened.”
“You expected him to attack Mr. Rockefeller?”
“We expected him to hurt himself. Since the day Rockefeller broke up his business and stole the pieces. We expected him to kill himself. What you call an attack, Isaac, had exactly the same effect.”
“It is highly likely,” said Bell, “that your father is still alive.”
The German police had dragged the pond beside the tracks and searched the forest with hunting dogs and found no body. They had visited every farm within twenty miles and canvassed doctors and hospitals. Bill Matters had thoroughly disappeared.
“Good-bye.” Edna started after her sister, then turned back and kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you, Isaac.”
“What for?”
“Engineering my job on the Sun.”
“They weren’t supposed to tell you.”
“No one had to tell me. I figured it out on my own. Very flattering.”
“The Sun was lucky to send you to Baku.”
“I meant flattering that you wanted me to come along.”
—
“Last stop,” said Isaac Bell.
Tugboats jetting clouds of coal smoke were working the Kaiser Wilhelm against North German Lloyd’s Hoboken pier.
“Not precisely,” said John D. Rockefeller. “We still have the train to Cleveland.”
“My last stop,” said Bell. He took a letter from his traveling suit and handed it to Rockefeller. “Here is my resignation.”
“Resignation? I am dismayed. Why are you quitting?”
“Standards.”
“Standards? What standards?”
“You had no need to rob Bill Matters. I will not condone his crimes, but you mistreated him badly and for no purpose other than beating him.”
Rockefeller’s lips tightened in a flat line. He looked away, gazing at the harbor, then he looked Bell in the eye. “When I was a boy, my father sharped us to make us strong. He taught us how to trade by taking us again and again. Every time I was soft, he took advantage and beat me in every deal until I learned how to win. It made me sharp.”
“It made you a bully.”
“It’s a habit,” said Rockefeller. “A habit that served me well.”
