The Chase (24 page)

With great relief after their narrow brush with disaster, Bell and Bronson pulled off their goggles and wiped them clean of the mud and silt that splattered the lenses.

“It would have been nice if that garage guy had warned us,” said Bronson, soaked by their ordeal.

“Maybe they're close-lipped in these parts,” Bell joked.

“That was where the flash flood took out the phone and telegraph lines.”

“We'll contact your counterpart in the Los Angeles office when we stop for gas again.”

The road flattened out and appeared well maintained for the next ninety miles. Bell, with his ear tuned to any miss of the brawny engine's cylinders, let the Locomobile run as fast as he dared over the dirt-and-gravel road, thankful there were no sharp turns, and especially happy the tires held without going flat.

Finally, his luck ran out when he hit a stretch of the road that was rock infested but worn smooth by eons of rain. He slowed to save the tires, but one became embedded with a sharp stone and hissed flat within a hundred yards. One of the spares was quickly thrown on the axle and, with Bronson patching the tube once again, Bell continued his mad dash toward Los Angeles.

San Luis Obispo and Santa Maria came and went. Then they dropped down in altitude as the road ran along the Pacific Coast. The ocean glittered blue under the sky, turning white as the breakers rolled onto the white sandy beach that was flecked with black rocks.

Outside of Santa Barbara, they became airborne over a large hump in the road, crashing down on the other side with an impact that knocked the wind out of Bronson, who was amazed that the sturdy car held together without flying to pieces.

They entered Santa Barbara, where they refueled, filled the radiator with water, and installed the spare tire. A quick stop was made at the railroad depot, where Bronson sent a wire to his fellow agent Bob Harrington asking him to meet them at the Los Angeles railroad terminal.

Instead of taking the treacherous winding road called the Grapevine over Tejon Pass before plunging down into Los Angeles, Bronson directed Bell to run the Locomobile along the railroad tracks that were laid with far more gradual turns. The rough ride strained the automobile's chassis as it rolled through the narrow pass below the 4,183-foot summit, but it held together until they reached the long slope leading down into the San Fernando Valley.

At last, the worst was behind them. Now they were in the homestretch, and the Locomobile was pressing hard and gaining on Cromwell's private train with every mile. According to Bronson's time estimate, they were only fifteen minutes behind. With luck, they just might reach the Los Angeles railroad terminal ahead of the Butcher Bandit.

Most cheering was the sight of tall buildings in the far distance. As they neared the outskirts of the city, the traffic began to build. Bronson marveled at Bell's physical endurance. His blue eyes, hard and unblinking, never left the road. The man was born to sit behind the wheel of a fast car, Bronson thought. He looked at his watch. The hands on the dial read four-twelve. They had averaged over sixty miles an hour for the four-hundred-mile run.

Traffic thickened the closer they came to the main part of the city and Bell began his now accustomed routine of swerving around horse-drawn wagons and buggies and automobiles. He was vastly relieved when the dirt road finally became paved with bricks. He raced in and around big red trolley cars that rode tracks down the center of the street. He was surprised by the number of automobiles he rushed past, unaware that there were over two thousand of them traveling the streets of the mushrooming city of one hundred twenty thousand.

Bell found the thoroughfares of the City of Angels were considerably wider than those of San Francisco, and he made good time with more room to negotiate around the traffic. They passed through downtown, heads turning in awe at the speed of the red Locomobile. A police officer blew his whistle and became angered when Bell ignored it and sped on. The policeman jumped on his bicycle and took up the chase but was soon left far behind, until the automobile was completely out of sight.

The big train depot came into view as Bell rounded a corner on two wheels. A man in a brown suit and wide-brimmed hat was standing on the curb at the entrance frantically waving his arms. Bell braked to a stop in front of Bob Harrington, the Van Dorn agent in charge of Southern California operations. At first, Harrington didn't recognize Bronson. The man in the mud-encrusted leather coat and helmet looked like an apparition until the goggles were raised.

“My God, Horace, I didn't recognize you,” said the intense man with a tanned face and sharp features. At six foot five inches, Harrington towered over Bell and Bronson.

Bronson stiffly stepped to the pavement and stretched his aching muscles. “I doubt if my own mother would know me.” He turned and pointed at Bell, still sitting exhausted behind the wheel. “Bob, this is Isaac Bell. Isaac, Bob Harrington.”

Bell pulled off his driving glove and shook Harrington's hand. “Good to meet you, Bob.”

“I heard a lot about your exploits, Isaac. It's an honor to meet
you
.”

Bell wasted no more time in pleasantries “What's the status of Cromwell's private train? Are we in time to stop it?”

Harrington slowly shook his head. “Sorry to have to tell you, but the regularly scheduled passenger train pulled off on a siding in Ventura and let it go through. When it came to Los Angeles, it bypassed the depot and took the express track south to San Diego. By doing that, it cut off nearly half an hour.”

“How long ago?” asked Bell, his hopes dashed.

“About twenty minutes.”

“We would have beat it by ten minutes,” Bronson observed morosely.

Bell looked at the tired Locomobile, wondering if there was enough left in her for the final dash. He knew, without looking in a mirror, that he was more exhausted than the automobile.

Harrington studied the worn-out men. “I can have my agents in San Diego apprehend Cromwell when his special train stops at the San Diego depot.”

“He's too smart to get off at the depot,” said Bell. “He'll stop the train outside of town and enter in one of his many disguises.”

“Where do you think he's headed?”

“One of the local banks.”

“Which one?” queried Harrington. “There are at least ten.”

“The one with the most assets.”

“You honestly believe a lone bandit will attempt robbing the San Diego Wells Fargo Bank?” Harrington asked skeptically. “It's the most secure bank in Southern California.”

“All the more reason he'd attempt it,” answered Bell. “Cromwell loves a challenge.”

“I'll telephone ahead and have my agents standing by the entrance.”

Bell shook his head doubtfully. “He'll spot them and call it off. Unless we can catch him in the act, we still haven't enough evidence to convict. And your agents have no idea what he looks like, and, if they did, they'd never see through his disguise. He's
that
good.”

“We can't stand around and let him waltz into the bank unhindered,” protested Bronson. “He'll murder everyone inside.”

Bell turned to Harrington. “Tell your agents to close the bank until Horace and I get there.”

“You're not continuing on to San Diego?” Harrington asked incredulously.

“Yes,” Bell said simply as he wearily climbed behind the wheel of the Locomobile. “What's the fastest way out of town to the south?”

“Just stay on the road that runs alongside the railroad tracks. It will take you straight south to San Diego.”

“What's the condition?”

“Well maintained all the way,” said Harrington. He stared doubtfully at the tired machine. “You should make good time if your automobile holds up.”

“She got us this far,” said Bell with a tight smile. “She'll see us through.”

“Tell your agents we're on our way,” Bronson said tiredly. He looked like a man stepping up to the gallows.

Harrington stood for a few moments watching the Locomobile roar down the road. Then he slowly shook his head and walked to the nearest telephone.

Ten minutes later, Bell reached the outer limits of the city and aimed the eagle ornament on the big brass radiator down the open road toward San Diego. Even after the wild ride from San Francisco, Bronson still marveled at Bell's expertise and mastery at timing the engine rpms and judging the precise moment to engage the clutch and grip the tall brass lever that meshed the unsynchronized gears.

Bell's weary mind was divided between his driving over the road ahead and the image of Jacob Cromwell robbing another bank and killing everyone in it. As they closed in on their destination, his nerves tightened and his blood churned with adrenaline while the faithful engine beat with the steadiness of a healthy pulse.

T
HE TIME SPED AWAY SWIFTLY AS THE
L
OCOMOBILE
ate up the one hundred twenty miles between the two cities in nine minutes under two hours. The last light was glimmering over the ocean to the west when they dropped down from Mount Soledad toward the heart of the city that opened up before them like a carpet of buildings tinted gold by the final rays of the setting sun. Though the Locomobile sported huge acetylene headlamps, Bell did not wish to take the time to stop the car and light them. “How's our gas?” Bell asked in a rasping voice, his mouth coated with dust.

Bronson turned in his seat, unscrewed the big gas tank cap, and dipped a stick down to the bottom. He withdrew the stick and stared at the moisture at its very tip.

“Let's just say we'll have to finish the race on fumes.”

Bell nodded without answering.

The grinding strain had taken its toll on him. After hours of twisting the big steering wheel in a thousand gyrations to turn the stiff linkage to the front wheels, his arms felt numb, as if they were no longer a part of his body. His ankles and knees also ached from constant clutch, accelerator, and brake pedal action. And both his hands were blistered inside his leather driving gloves. Yet Bell drove at full throttle the last few miles, forcing the Locomobile to leap toward the final destination like a bear sprinting after an elk.

The Locomobile was badly worn down, too. The knobby tread on the Michelin tires was nearly shredded, the wheels were wobbling from the beating they had endured, the faithful engine was beginning to emit strange noises, and steam was billowing from the radiator cap. Still, the magnificent machine pushed on.

“I wonder what's in Cromwell's mind,” said Bell. “He's too late to commit robbery today. The bank is closed until tomorrow morning.”

“This is Friday,” answered Bronson. “The banks in San Diego stay open until nine o'clock in the evening.”

They were sprinting down India Street, parallel to the railroad tracks, with the depot no more than a mile away, when Bell flicked his eyes from the road for an instant and glanced in the direction of a train with only one car that was slowing to a halt.

The locomotive pulling the private Pullman car came to a stop on a siding four tracks over from the street. Smoke lazily rose from its stack as the engineer vented steam from exhaust tubes. The fireman had climbed on top of the tender, preparing to take on water from a large wooden tank. With the growing darkness, lights blinked on in the Pullman car, which was now parked a mile away from the depot and the city's downtown.

Bell knew immediately that this had to be Cromwell's private train.

He did not hesitate. He spun the wheel hard left and sent the Locomobile bouncing wildly across the railroad tracks. By the time he had bounded over three tracks, he had blown all four of the badly worn tires and rolled the rest of the way up to the train on the rims of the wheels, showering sparks like meteors as they smashed against the steel rails.

Bronson said nothing. He had been frozen in confused shock, until he saw the train and realized what Bell had up his sleeve. Excitement grew to elation at knowing that, after their five-hundred-mile daredevil drive, they had finally come within spitting distance of their goal.

Bell slammed the Locomobile to a stop across the tracks in front of the locomotive. Its momentum finally spent, the battered automobile sat forlornly with its overheated engine crackling, its radiator hissing steam, and the smell of shredded tires. Its mad and wild chase had come to a fitting climax in front of the quarry it had pursued through the backwoods of hell.

“We may be jumping the gun,” said Bronson. “He hasn't attempted to rob the bank yet. We can't arrest him without a crime.”

“Maybe. But on the drive down here from San Francisco, I had much to think about. Better we take Cromwell now, before he has time to act. If he sees through our trap again, we're lost. I'll worry about gathering enough evidence to convict him later. Besides, he's not on home ground. He can't call in expensive attorneys to get him out on bond.”

Bell was well aware that no one had had the time to exit the train during the few minutes since it had come to a standstill. He climbed from the automobile and walked unsteadily toward the Pullman car, the aches and pain and weariness slowly falling away. He halted abruptly, and slipped between the Pullman and the coal tender, as two stewards wrestled a motorcycle from the car to the ground beside the track.

He waited patiently for a few minutes until a man dressed in the uniform of a railroad conductor stepped from the Pullman car and threw one leg over the seat of the motorcycle that Bell recognized as a Harley-Davidson. The man's back was to Bell as Bell stepped silently alongside the Pullman car and stopped only when he was no more than five feet behind the man, who was leaning down to open the fuel valve to the carburetor in preparation for starting the engine.

“The Harley is a good machine,” Bell said calmly, “but I prefer the Indian.”

The man on the motorcycle froze at the sound of the familiar voice. He slowly turned and saw an apparition standing behind him. Eerie illumination fell from overhead electric lights along the railroad siding. The figure wore a short leather coat over jodhpurs and boots that looked like they had been dragged through a swamp. A pair of goggles was pushed back on his head, revealing strands of blond hair coated in dried mud. But there was no mistaking the face, the piercing eyes, and the begrimed mustache that covered the upper lip.

“You!”

“Not very original,” Bell said cynically. “But since I used the same expression at the bank in Telluride, I won't criticize.”

A silence came over the two men that seemed to last a lifetime, but it was only the few seconds that it took Cromwell to see that the apparition really was Isaac Bell. Cromwell just stood there in growing disbelief, his face suddenly turning pale.

“You were dead!” he gasped. “I shot you!”

“Twice, as a matter of fact,” said Bell with a hard edge to his voice. His right hand gripped the 1905 Colt .45 automatic, its muzzle aimed squarely between Cromwell's eyes and held as steady as an iron bar in concrete.

For the first time in his life, Jacob Cromwell was taken completely off guard. His agile mind, filled with overconfidence, had never considered how he would act should the time ever come when he was apprehended. The unthinkable was never dwelled upon. He had always thought of himself as untouchable. Now he stood face-to-face with his archenemy, who should have been dead. He felt like a captain whose unsinkable ship had run up on the rocks.

Cromwell's Colt .38 was in his coat pocket, but he knew Bell would blow his brains out before he could reach for it. Slowly, he lifted his hands into the air in abject defeat.

“What happens now?” he asked.

“I'm going to borrow your special train to take you back to San Francisco. There, I'll turn you over to the police, until such time as you're tried for murder and hung.”

“You have it all mapped out.”

“The day had to come, Cromwell. You should have quit when you were ahead.”

“You can't arrest me. I have committed no crime.”

“Then why are you disguised as a railroad conductor?”

“Why don't you shoot me now and get it over with?” Cromwell asked, his composed arrogance coming back on keel.

“A mere slap on the hand for your crimes,” Bell said caustically. “Better you have plenty of time to think about the hangman's noose tightening around your murdering neck.”

Bronson came from around the rear of the Pullman car, his Smith & Wesson double-action .44 revolver drawn and pointed at Cromwell's chest. “Nice going, Isaac. You nabbed our friend here before he could commit another crime.”

Bell handed Bronson a pair of Tower nickel-plated, double-lock handcuffs. The agent wasted no time in snapping them on Cromwell's wrists. Then he gave the bandit a thorough search and found the .38 Colt automatic.

“The weapon you used to commit three dozen murders,” Bronson said with a cold voice.

“Where did you come from?” Cromwell demanded at seeing Bronson and knowing with certainty that these men would not hesitate to shoot him if he gave the slightest indication of trying to escape.

“Isaac drove us from San Francisco in his automobile,” he answered as if it were an everyday event.

“Impossible!” snorted Cromwell.

“I thought so, too,” said Bronson, leading Cromwell up the steps into the Pullman car, where he took his own handcuffs, placed them around Cromwell's ankles, and roughly shoved him onto a couch.

Bell walked back up the track and stared sadly at the mauled Locomobile. A barrel-chested man carrying an oil can in the coveralls and denim striped hat of a locomotive engineer came up behind him and stared dumbly at the automobile.

“How in God's name did that derelict come to be on the tracks in front of my engine?”

“It's a long story,” said Bell wearily.

“What's going to happen to it?”

Bell spoke quietly, almost reverently: “It's going to be shipped back to the factory in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where it will be rebuilt until it is as good as new.”

“Fix this wreck?” said the engineer, shaking his head. “Why bother?”

Bell looked at the Locomobile with a loving expression in his eyes and said, “Because she deserves it.”