Page 75 of Clive Cussler The Iron Storm
Bell noted the time and penciled in an entry on the meticulous log Grimm maintained.
He turned the helm a few points to the south so they would keep the island to starboard as they sailed for New York. Soon the beaches were scrolling by. There was the occasional beach house, too, but all were still shuttered for the now-ending winter. Bell rued that there were no proper harbors on Long Island. Had it been summer and the population at their elevated levels, he could have hitched aride on the Long Island Railroad at Southampton or paid a driver to take him to the city. On more than one occasion he’d taken his Simplex Crane Model 5 to nearly seventy-five miles per hour on the Long Island Parkway. It could have saved him hours. Instead, this part of the island was all but abandoned for another few months and the trains only ran once a week. He was stuck with theAlice N. giving her best, but managing only seven knots as the breeze started to falter.
In his mind’s eye he saw theSaarlandcreeping through New York Bay, low and menacing like a jungle cat, her big guns trained and elevated, while the great city off her bows lay as supine as a sacrificial victim on some pagan altar. Every second brought Manhattan closer to the range of those massive cannons. He could imagine the first salvo, fire belching from the barrels and quarter-ton shells hurtling through the sky. He saw the impact, saw buildings blown apart so that bricks turned into shrapnel that scythed down pedestrians in every direction. He heard the panicked screams and could feel the chalky dust on the back of his throat.
The images filled Bell with impotent rage. There was nothing he could do but keep the fishing boat trimmed and on a tack to maximize every bit of the wind hitting her sails.
“Hey, gents,” he called down into the salon. “We’re parallel to Long Island now. We’ve no reason to think theSaarlandhasn’t beaten us here by days, but I think we should keep a watch for her just in case.”
“Prudent idea,” Grey said. He popped up from below a moment later with a pair of binoculars hanging from a strap around his neck.
As New York was America’s busiest port it was little wonder there was so much shipping funneling into the lower bay. The size and type of vessels was countless, but traffic was mostly dominatedby freighters trailing long tethers of dissipating coal smoke. Notably there were no large passenger ships heading into New York from Europe or going eastward toward the deadly ring of U-boats attempting to blockade the British Isles.
It was twilight by the time they reached the lower bay leading into New York Harbor. There was too much shipping to keep the sails out, so Bell and Caleb dropped them for the final leg of the journey.
“What’s it mean that we haven’t heard those guns?” Caleb asked as they furled the sails for storage in the large locker. “Did we actually beat them?”
Bell was contemplating the exact opposite; that Rath had already come and gone and once they reached the harbor proper they would see parts of the city aflame against the backdrop of the nighttime sky. The other thought darkening his mood even further was that he’d been wrong about Rath’s intentions all along, that he’d never intended to attack New York and that he had some other nefarious mission for the infernal machine he’d stolen. Rath could have his sights on another city, or maybe he had gone after shipping, as Churchill had intimated to his government to obtain their cooperation.
He voiced none of this to Caleb, who so wanted to win this race even if he didn’t fully grasp the consequences of losing. He’d never witnessed the horror of a modern artillery attack, as Bell had firsthand. Instead he said, “I doubt it, unless they had some major mechanical failure.”
They soon passed between Staten Island and Brooklyn through the Verrazano Narrows and entered the upper bay. Everything seemed normal. The two boroughs were well lit, there were no people trying to flee, no unusual boat traffic of gawkers looking for a betterangle at the destruction, nothing at all to indicate the city had been attacked.
Bell wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Finally lower Manhattan came into view and Bell let out a breath of relief. The city blazed in all its glory, the high-rise buildings were all aglow as they stretched into the darkened sky. There were no fires. There were no panicked throngs. There was no monstrous warship just off Governors Island making ready to open fire with her eleven-inch cannons. There was nothing but the hustle of the city, which many said never slept.
“What say you, Beacon Hill?” Grimm asked, using the nickname he’d dropped after the storm. Zane Grey noticed, but said nothing.
“Not sure,” Bell replied. “I doubt we beat them here and I am almost positive I deduced Rath’s intention. Let’s stick to our plan. Put me ashore at the ferry dock, find someplace to berth theAlice N., and make your way to the Van Dorn offices at the Knickerbocker Hotel. That’s on Broadway and Forty-Second. I appreciate you gents supporting me on this.”
“We’ve come this far,” Grey said. “There’s no way I’m not sticking around to find out how it ends.”
“Let’s hope with egg on my face,” Bell said, “and that battleship sold for scrap.”
39
Bell called the Van Dornoffice from the Staten Island Ferry Terminal in lower Manhattan using a nickel he’d borrowed from Grey. The few dollars in his pocket to pay for the cab ride he’d soon take to Midtown had also come from the legendary writer. If Grey took Bell up on his offer about chartering theAlice N.for the rest of the summer, this was little more than chump change.
“Van Dorn Detective Agency, how may I help you?” a young woman answered when the call went through.
“Betsy?”
“Yes,” she replied warily.
“Bets, it’s Isaac Bell.”
“Oh, hi, Mr. Bell,” she said, her voice going up an octave.
“Has anything unusual happened recently, anything about a German battleship?”
“No, sir. People are talking about the Zimmerman telegram—”
Bell cut her off. “Listen, I want you to call up a team. I need Archie,James Dashwood, and Eddie Tobin, if he’s back. Have them come into the office pronto. Has there been any communications from Franklin Roosevelt? The assistant secretary of the Navy?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Bell. I only answer the phones at night and rarely talk to the others.”
“Never mind that. I also want you to send a telegram to Lullenden Manor.” Bell forgot to get the phone number. “It’s in Surrey, England, and belongs to one Winston Churchill. The Western Union man can get the address. Marion is there. Tell them I am back in New York. No sign of my quarry, but I’m still hunting. Got all that?”
