The Race ib-4

by Clive Cussler

  “Lips do not bear thinking about until you win the race,” he said. “Drive my airplane. Win the race. And don’t forget, when you win the race, Josephine, America’s Sweetheart of the Air will be a made woman with heaps of money. And Marco, the inventor of the winning Celere Monoplano, will be a made man, with Italian Army contracts to build hundreds of aeroplanes.”

  “What has it been like for you to look at me all this time?”

  “What is it like? Like it has always been from the first day I set eyes on you. Like an ocean of joy that fills my heart. Now, let’s get your machine fixed.”

  ISAAC BELL TRIED TO SLEEP in a blanket roll under the monoplane, but his mind kept seizing on Harry Frost’s strange statement. Suddenly he sat up, galvanized by an entirely different and even stranger thought. He had been struck by his aeroplane’s resilience – and grateful for it saving his life – even before Andy Moser’s admiring remark that Di Vecchio “built ’em to last.”

  Bell pulled on his boots and ran to the rail-yard dispatch shack, where they had a telegraph. The peculiar strength of the American Eagle stemmed from multiple braces and redundant control links. Not only had its inventor used all the best materials, he had anticipated structural failure and designed to prevent catastrophe.

  Such an inventor who built to last did not seem to be the sort of man to kill himself over a bankruptcy. Such a man, Bell thought, would rise above failure, seeing a bankruptcy as nothing worse than a temporary setback.

  “Van Dorn,” he told the New York Central Railroad dispatcher. He had a letter of introduction signed by the president of the line. But the dispatcher was delighted to help anyone in the air race.

  “Yes, sir. What can I do for you?”

  “I want to send a telegraph.”

  The dispatcher’s hand poised over the brass key. “To whom?”

  “James Dashwood. Van Dorn Agency. San Francisco.”

  “Message?”

  Bell listened to the dispatcher tap the letters of his message into the Morse alphabet.

  INVESTIGATE DI VECCHIO SUICIDE.

  SPEED CELERE INVESTIGATION.

  ON THE JUMP!

  22

  “LOOK AT HER GO!”

  Throttle full, Antoinette engine discharging a high-pitched snarl that sounded like ripping canvas, Josephine’s yellow monoplane streaked past Weehawken, New Jersey, at first light.

  “Spin her over!”

  Isaac Bell was already at the Eagle’s controls, having learned by telephone that Dmitri Platov and the Van Dorn mechanicians had worked all night to replace Josephine’s alettone and its wind-mangled mounts. The aviatrix had just taken off from Bedloe’s Island. Bell had his Eagle positioned at the head of the pier he had landed on the day before to take off over the river. His Gnome rotary was already warm and ready to fly. It blatted to life on one pull of the propeller.

  “Chocks!”

  They yanked the chocks from the wheels, and the monoplane started rolling. Andy and his helper ran beside the wings, steadying them, as Bell raced across the smooth boards between the railroad tracks and soared after Josephine.

  He stayed close behind her as they flew up the middle of the Hudson River, eyeing the ships and boats for signs of Harry Frost, rehearsing flying with one hand and swiveling the rifle with the other. After fifteen miles, the two yellow aeroplanes veered toward the New York side, where the city of Yonkers stained the sky with smoke.

  Although Bell was following Josephine’s aeroplane, he practiced navigating by a race map sketched with pertinent landmarks. With the stiff paper strapped to his leg, he traced the oval Empire City Race Track, which grew visible a couple of miles inland beside a huge pit of mud where steam shovels were digging a new reservoir for New York City.

  Bell saw Thoroughbreds cantering around the track on their morning workouts, but the racetrack’s infield was deserted of flying machines, and the only hangar train in the rail yard was the long yellow Josephine Special. He learned upon alighting behind Josephine that every other flying machine still in the race had already taken off for Albany.

  While the mechanicians poured gasoline, oil, and water in Josephine’s tanks, and gasoline and castor oil in Bell’s, they reported that even though Steve Stevens’s double Antoinette twin-propellered tractor biplane had turned in the best time from Belmont Park to Yonkers, the cotton planter was mad as hell at Dmitri Platov for helping Josephine fix her plane at the Statue of Liberty.

  “De idea is dat,” they mimicked Platov affectionately, “every peoples racing together.”

  “So Mr. Stevens yelled at poor Dmitri,” the mimics went on, switching to a Southern drawl, “Y’all is a socialist.”

  Bell noticed that Josephine did not join in the laughter. Her face was tight with tension. He assumed that she was deeply upset to be so far behind this early in the race. Ordinarily polite and pleasant to everyone, she was railing at her mechanicians to “Hurry it up!” as they made further repairs to her whirlwind-damaged wing.

  “Don’t worry,” Bell said gently, “you’ll catch up.”

  The tall detective motioned one of the Van Dorns on her support train to join him. “Any idea why that flap fell off the wing?”

  “She got caught in a pocket tornado.”

  “I know that. But could the hinge have been weakened beforehand?”

  “Sabotage? First thing I looked for, Mr. Bell. Fact is, that machine’s never been out of our sight on the ground. Mr. Abbott made that darned clear. We watched like hawks for sabotage. We slept next to it at Belmont. With one man always awake.”

  Andy and his helper arrived in a Thomas Flyer via a ferry from the Palisades of New Jersey before Josephine’s mechanicians were finished. They drove it up the ramp into the American Eagle Special, and Bell sent the train ahead.

  It was noon before Josephine could take to the sky.

  She circled the grandstand for Weiner of Accounting’s deputy to record her departure time, climbed to a thousand feet, and headed north. Isaac Bell flew a little above and a quarter mile behind. His race map said it was a hundred and forty miles to Albany’s Altamont Fair Grounds. The route was easy to follow, the New York Central Railroad tracks hugging the east bank of the river, until, above the city of Hudson, he saw a number of short lines merge in from the east. At that confusing junction, the race stewards had marked the correct tracks to follow with long white canvas arrows.

  The two monoplanes proceeded north without incident, eventually overtaking Bell’s white-roofed Eagle Special train, which was loafing along waiting for them to catch up. The fireman shoveled on a little more coal to keep pace with the flying machines.

  Suddenly, ten miles short of Albany, Bell saw Josephine drop in a steep volplane.

  Isaac Bell followed her down in a longer series of descending loops and was still high up when she alighted on a freshly mown hayfield outside the village of Castleton-on-Hudson. Through his field glasses, he could see why she had found a place to land. Steam was gushing from the Antoinette. Something had gone wrong with the motor’s water cooling.

  Bell swung back toward the New York Central tracks. He flew low over the Eagle Special and pointed where he’d come from, and then spotted the yellow-roofed Josephine Special, which was highballing to catch up. He swooped in front of the locomotive and turned in the direction where Josephine was. The train stopped at the next siding, where the Van Dorn had already parked. Brakemen jumped down, waving a red flag in back and throwing a switch in front so the special could pull off the main line.

  Bell alighted beside Josephine and told her that help was on the way. It came aboard two roadsters, Preston Whiteway’s Rolls-Royce, with two detective-mechanicians, who got straight to work on her machine, and Bell’s Model 35 Thomas Flyer, with Andy Moser, who replenished gas and castor oil and adjusted the Gnome. Josephine’s problem turned out to be more complicated than a broken water hose. The entire water pump was shot. The Thomas Flyer raced back to the train to get the new part.

 
“Mr. Bell,” said Andy, “it’s going to take them two hours at least.”

  “Looks that way.”

  “Could I ask you a favor?”

  “Of course,” said Bell, hand deep in his pocket, thinking Andy needed a loan. “What do you need?”

  “Take me up.”

  “Flying?” Bell said, puzzled, because Andy was terrified of heights and never wanted to fly. “Are you sure, Andy?”

  “Don’t you realize where we are?”

  “Ten miles short of Albany.”

  “Twenty miles west of Danielle. I was wondering could we fly over that Ryder Asylum, and you waggle the wings and maybe Danielle will see us?”

  “It’s the least we can do. Spin her over and hop on. We’ll buzz by real close.”

  Bell was not surprised that Andy had a map. The lovesick mechanician had even marked the asylum with a red heart. They found a rail line they could follow into the closest town and took off, Andy squeezed in behind him, reading the map. At sixty miles per hour and boosted by a west wind, Bell was in sight of the gloomy red brick building in less than twenty minutes. He circled it repeatedly. A face appeared at every barred window. One of them had to be Danielle’s. A flying machine was a startling sight for the vast majority of people outside a big city who had never seen one. The halls were probably alive with inmates, nurses, and guards, gawking, exclaiming. The Gnome’s distinctive exhaust sound would surely alert Danielle that it was her father’s machine even if she could not see it.

  Poor Andy’s face expressed a jumble of joy and sadness, excitement and frustration.

  “I’m sure she hears us!” Bell shouted.

  Andy nodded, understanding Bell was only trying to help. Bell descended deeper into the valley and circled close over the turret where he had interviewed Danielle in Ryder’s private rooms. He checked the railroad watch he had hung from the king post. Plenty of time and fuel, he thought. Why not kill two birds with one stone: give poor Andy a break, and ask Danielle about the death of her father.

  The lawn was broad inside the wall. He put the Eagle down easily. Guards came running, urged on by Dr. Ryder, who glued a smile to his face at the unwelcome sight of Isaac Bell.

  “Quite an entrance, Mr. Bell.”

  “We’ve come to visit Miss Di Vecchio.”

  “Of course, Mr. Bell. She’ll need a moment to get ready.”

  “Bring her out here. I imagine she will enjoy a breath of fresh air.”

  “As you wish. I’ll bring her shortly.”

  Andy was staring at the bleak structure, with its small barred windows. “That man doesn’t like you,” he observed.

  “No, he doesn’t.”

  “But he obeys you.”

  “He has no choice. He knows that I know his banker. And he knows that if he ever harms a hair on Danielle’s head, I will paste him in the snoot.”

  The first thing Bell noticed about Danielle was that her white patient’s dress was brand-new. The second was that she regarded Andy Moser more like a kid brother than a boyfriend. He backed away to let them have a moment together. Andy was tongue-tied. Bell called, “Andy, why don’t you show Danielle what you’ve done to her father’s machine?”

  Andy fell to the task eagerly, and Danielle walked around it with him, oohing and ahhing, and stroking the canvas with her fingertips. “Many improvements,” she announced at last. “Is she still temperamental, Mr. Bell?”

  “Andy’s turned her into a lamb,” said Bell. “She’s rescued me more than once.”

  “I never realized you already knew how to fly.”

  “He’s still learning,” Andy said grimly.

  “Your father built a real sweetheart,” said Bell. “She’s amazingly strong. The other day, a stay was damaged, and the others held together for it.”

  “Elastico!” said Danielle.

  “Was your father elastico?” Bell asked gently.

  Her big eyes lighted in happy memory. “Like biglia. India-rubber ball. Rimbalzare! He bounced.”

  “Were you shocked how he died?”

  “That he killed himself? No. If you stretch banda too much, too many times, it breaks. A man breaks when too much goes bad. But before, he was rimbalzare. Is Josephine piloting Celere’s monoplano in the race?”

  “Yes.”

  “How does she fare?”

  “Behind by a full day.”

  “Brava!” Danielle smiled.

  “I was surprised to learn that Marco had another machine in the race. A big biplane with two motors.”

  Danielle sneered, “Who do you think he stole that from?”

  “Your father?”

  “No. Marco copied the biplane from a brilliant student he befriended in Paris. At the École Supérieure des Techniques Aéronautiques et de Construction Automobile.”

  “What was his name?”

  “Sikorsky.”

  “Russian?”

  “And part Polish.”

  “You knew him?”

  “My father lectured at the École. We knew everyone.”

  “Do you know Dmitri Platov?”

  “No.”

  “Did your father?”

  “I never heard the name.”

  Bell weighed another question. What more could he learn about her father’s suicide from her that might be worth the pain it might cause? Or should he rely on James Dashwood to ferret it out in San Francisco? Andy surprised him, stepping closer and muttering through tight lips, “Enough. Give her a break.”

  “Danielle?” Bell asked.

  “Yes, Mr. Bell?”

  “Marco Celere convinced Josephine that he is the sole inventor of her aeroplane.”

  Her nostrils flared and her eyes flashed. “Thief!”

  “I wonder whether you could give me some. . ammunition to convince her otherwise?”

  “What does she care?”

  “I sense disquiet. Doubt.”

  “What does it matter to her?”

  “At her core is something honest.”

  “She is very ambitious, you know.”

  “I wouldn’t believe everything I read in the papers. Preston Whiteway’s competitors have only just begun to support his race.”

  Danielle gestured angrily at the wall. “I see no papers here. They say newspapers will confuse us.”

  “Then how do you know Josephine is ambitious?”

  “Marco told me.”

  “When?”

  “He was boasting when I stabbed. He said she was ambitious, but he was even more ambitious.”

  “More ambitious? She wants to fly. What did he want? Money?”

  “Power. Marco didn’t care about money. He would be a prince, or a king.” She tossed her head and laughed angrily, “King of the toads.”

  “What is there about Josephine’s machine that is indisputably your father’s invention and not Marco Celere’s?”

  “Why do you care?”

  “I am driving a machine your father invented. I have a strong sense of your father’s genius and his skills and maybe his dreams. I don’t think they should be stolen from him, particularly as he is not here to defend himself. Can you give me something I can use to defend him?”

  Danielle closed her eyes and knitted her brow. “I understand,” she said. “Let me think. . You see, your monoplano, she was made later. After Marco made his copy. Marco is like a sponge. He remembers everything he ever sees but never has his own idea. So Marco’s monoplano has no improvements that my father made in yours.”

  “Like what? What did he improve? What did he change?”

  “Alettoni.”

  “But they look exactly the same. I compared them.”

  “Look again,” she said. “Closer.”

  “At what?”

  “Cardine. How do you say? Pivot. Hinge! Look how the alettoni hinge to your aeroplane. Then look at Josephine’s.”

  Bell saw the startled expression on Andy Moser’s face. “What is it, Andy?”

  “The boys were saying her flaps
were lightly seated. The pintles were too small. That’s why the flap fell off.”

  Bell nodded, thinking hard. “Thank you, Danielle,” he said. It had been a productive visit. “We have to go. Are they treating you well?”

  “Better, grazie. And I have lawyer.” She turned to Andy and gave the mechanician a dazzling smile. “Thank you for visiting me, Andy.” She extended her hand. Andy grabbed it and shook it hard. Danielle rolled her eyes at Bell and said, “Andy, when a lady gives you her hand, it is sometimes better to kiss it than shake it.”

  Bell said, “Andy, get the machine ready to start. I’ll be there in a minute.” He waited until Andy was out of earshot. “There is one other thing I must ask you, Danielle.”

  “What is it?”

  “Were you ever in love with Marco Celere?”

  “Marco?” she laughed. “Mr. Bell, you can’t be serious.”

  “I have never met the man.”

  “I would love a sea urchin before I would love Marco Celere. A poisonous sea urchin. You have no idea how treacherous he is. He breathes lies as another man breathes air. He schemes, he pretends, he steals. He is truffatore.”

  “What is truffatore?”

  “Imbroglione.”

  “What is imbroglione?”

  “Impostore! Defraudatore!”

  “A con man,” said Bell.

  “What is con man?” she asked.

  “A confidence trickster. A thief who pretends to be your friend.”

  “Yes! That is Marco Celere. A thief who pretends to be your friend.”

  Isaac Bell’s quick mind raced into high gear. A murdered thief whose body was never found was one sort of mystery. A murdered confidence man whose body disappeared was quite another. Particularly when Harry Frost had cried in bewildered anguish, “You don’t know what they were up to.”

  Nor did you, Harry Frost, thought Bell. Not until after you tried to kill Marco Celere. That’s why you didn’t kill Josephine first. You didn’t intend to kill her at all. That twisted desire came later, only after you learned something about them that you thought was even worse than seduction.

  Bell was elated. It had been a most productive visit indeed. Although he still did not know what Marco and Josephine had been up to, he was sure now that Harry Frost was not merely raving.