“So was I.”

“She said that since all the mines are owned by Wall Street operators, the unions should strike simultaneously. The operators are national. We should be national.”

“Did you say you just got into Denver this evening?”

Mary looked him straight in the face. “What do you want me to say?”

“I want you to say that wasn’t you who derailed the ore train.”

“Why?”

“You could have been killed.”

“You could have been killed in Gleasonburg.”

“I would have been if that young miner hadn’t come to my rescue, but that is not the point.”

“Miner hell!” said Mary. “Isaac Bell is a Pinkerton.”

Jim Higgins could not believe his ears. “He can’t be. That’s not possible.”

“I saw with my own eyes.”

“Did he say he’s a Pinkerton?”

“Well, not in so many words. He claimed to be a Van Dorn.”

“There’s a big difference,” Jim argued. “Pinkertons provide strikebreakers to break unionist heads and protect scabs. I’ve never seen Van Dorns doing that. They are a cut above.”

“Have you ever heard of a Van Dorn working for the union?” Mary fired back.

“Bell helped you get out of West Virginia, didn’t he?”

“Bell was spying, brother. Bell tricked us. He’s no better than the rest of them.”

13

LAST STOP, GENTS,” SAID ISAAC BELL AS THE TROLLEY from Morgantown bounced into Gleasonburg. “Round up what you can before dark. Meet back here. Mr. Van Dorn will buy us supper in that saloon,” he added, indicating Reilly’s, where Mary had wangled coffee.

“What I most enjoy about detecting work is the opportunity to travel,” said Mack Fulton, gazing upon Main Street’s unpainted company houses, goats chewing bark from dying trees, piles of broken rock and coal dust, and muddy hillsides logged to ragged stumps for propping timber.

“To see new sights,” said Wally Kisley.

“Broadening our horizons— Get the bags, Archie.”

Wish Clarke passed their bags to the redheaded apprentice but held on to the heaviest, an usually long, reinforced carpetbag that made a muted clank when he set it on the ground.

“Looks like they burned down the jail.” He winked at Isaac Bell. “Most of the courthouse, too. Is that how you cut loose of the lynch mob?”

“I had some help from a lady— O.K., gents, let’s get moving.”

Mack Fulton asked, “Who gets Archie?”

“You two,” answered Bell, and said to Archie, “Help them up stairs and crossing streets.”

Wish Clarke headed for the company store.

Isaac Bell went to the mouth of Gleason Mine No. 1. No longer disguised as a miner, he presented the Pinkerton in charge of the guards a letter of introduction he had not yet used that identified him as a Van Dorn Agency detective working for Gleason.

“What the hell is this supposed to mean? We don’t need no detectives. We’re the detectives.”

“It’s signed by Black Jack himself, and it means you’re ordered to give any Van Dorn who asks for one a safety light and get out of his way. I’m asking for one.”