The snake slithered out from under, coiled again, and tracked Bell with malevolent eyes. Bell raised his pistol, aimed carefully at its head, and fired. The snake attacked at the same instant the gun roared, striking so swiftly that Bell’s bullet missed and smashed the dresser mirror. As glass flew, the snake’s needle-sharp fangs struck Bell in the chest, directly over his heart.

Chapter 20

20

BELL DROPPED HIS GUN AND CLOSED HIS HAND AROUND the snake’s neck.

The animal was shockingly strong. Every inch of its four-foot length writhed with spasmodic, sinewy power as it squirmed to break his grip and strike him again. Its fangs were cocked inside its arrow-shaped head. Yellow venom dripped from its wide-open jaws. Bell imagined that he could see in its eyes a gleam of triumph, as if the serpent were sure that its deadly poison had already won the battle and that its prey would die in minutes. Gasping for breath, Bell reached with his free hand for the knife in his boot. “Sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Snake. But you made the mistake of sinking your fangs into my shoulder holster.”

An Old Blue threw open the door. “Who’s shooting guns in here?”

At the sight of the headless snake still twitching in Bell’s fist, he turned white and pressed both hands to his mouth.

Bell pointed commandingly with his bloody knife. “If you are going to be sick, the facilities are down the hall.”

Matthew the doorman stuck his head in the room. “Are you—”

“Where did that steamer trunk come from?” demanded Bell.

“I don’t know. It must have arrived before I came on.”

“Get the manager!”

The club manager arrived minutes later in his nightclothes. His eyes widened at the sight of the broken mirror, the headless snake twitching on the floor, its head resting on the dresser, and Isaac Bell wiping his knife with a ruined pillowcase.

“Assemble your staff,” Bell told him. “Either Lachesis muta here was not blackballed by the Membership Committee, or one of your people helped him into my room.”

ICEMAN WEEKS WAS HOOFING IT across town, having watched from a stable until Isaac Bell entered the Yale Club and waited to make sure he didn’t come out again. At Eighth Avenue he turned up several blocks, walked under the connector line that linked the Ninth Avenue and Sixth Avenue Els, and knocked on an unmarked door to a house just inside 53rd Street where Tommy Thompson had opened a gambling hall on the second floor. The Gopher guarding the door said, “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Tell Tommy I got good news for him.”

“Tell him yourself. He’s on the third floor.”

“Figured he’d be.”