The toast-rack trolley—an open-sided electric streetcar that Bell rode out from the Golden Triangle—ran on tracks that paralleled those of the Amalgamated Coal trains. Passing Amalgamated from the inland side, the trolley offered views of locomotives pushing empties under the tipple and snaking them out full, and occasional distant glimpses of the barge wharves that ringed the Point. The operation seemed to Bell to be mechanically perfect, as if each barge and railroad was a minute cog in an immense and smooth-running wheel. He jumped down when he saw Jim Higgins standing at a trolley stop with his hands in his pockets.

“How you getting on, pardner?”

“Not good, Isaac. Not good at all.”

“What’s wrong?”

“The mineowners armed every bum with a gun. Then they let the jailbirds out and gave them ax handles. They’re blocking the march, and the hotheads are yelling, ‘Let the working people take guns and shoot down the dogs who shoot them!’”

Bell said, “If they do, the governor will call up militia with rifles and Gatling guns.”

“I know that. In fact, he’s already put them on alert. But the hotheads are talking each other out of the good sense to be afraid.”

“Mike and Terry told me you gave ’em the slip.”

“I need solitude to think.”

“They also told me you find something attractive about this Amalgamated operation.”

“It’s about as up-to-date as can be,” Higgins answered vaguely. He glanced away from the tall detective’s probing gaze and changed the subject. “Somehow, I’ve got to convince the Strike Committee to stand up to the hotheads.”

“I’m afraid I’ve got bad news on that score,” said Bell.

“Now what?”

“The Strike Committee was just rousted onto a special train headed for Morgantown, West Virginia.”

“What?”

“The Allegheny County sheriff extradited them to stand trial for the murder of Black Jack Gleason.”

Jim Higgins’s shoulders sagged. “They didn’t blow up Gleason’s yacht.”

“I’m sure they didn’t,” said Bell, “since they were in Chicago at the time. But proving that will take months.”

Higgins looked around for a place to sit, saw none, and stared helplessly at Isaac Bell. “Now it’s all on me,” he said. “But they’ve got me blocked at every turn.”

“Maybe Mary can help.”

Higgins shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Do you know what she’s up to?” Bell asked bluntly.

“She’s gone her own way.”

Bell asked, “Is she in danger?”

“If I believed in God, I’d say, God knows.” Jim Higgins lifted his eyes to the giant tipple. Suddenly, to Bell’s astonishment, he straightened his shoulders and stood tall. A thin smile crossed his face, expressing, Isaac Bell thought, a sad farewell to hope or a final good-bye to illusions.

“Whoever built this tipple knows his business. He’s got himself the center of coal distribution, east, west, north, and south.”