“If it ain’t, that New York pilot is going to Europe.”

“Can you put me aboard it?”

“I’ll let you do the talking.”

Darbee altered course slightly. After fifteen minutes of pounding across the Lower Bay, they passed under the immense overhanging stern of the Mauretania and veered alongside the pilot boat. There were several pilots on board—some waiting to be put on incoming ships, others just retrieved from outbound vessels—and they eyed Darbee’s oyster boat warily.

“Now,” Bell shouted.

Darbee steered alongside the lowest part of the afterdeck. Even the pilot boat was considerably higher than the oyster boat. Bell jumped, got his arms over the gunnel, and pulled himself in. “Van Dorn!” he shouted. “Boarding Mauretania.”

ONE HOUR INTO HIS SHIFT IN THE No. 4 boiler room, Christian Semmler feared that his perspiration would penetrate the oilskin that protected the Talking Pictures plans. He was sweating like a pig. The other stokers had long ago stripped off their shirts.

The stoking gong gave the signal to shut the door of the furnace into which he was scooping coal. He dropped his shovel and looked in the half-dark, clanging madness for a hiding place that was safer than his soaked clothing. Knowing he had only seconds before a gang boss or an engineer officer shouted for him to get back to work, he stumbled into a coal bunker. Parnall Hall and Bill Chambers were shifting coal to the front.

“Stand watch!” he ordered, and when they turned their backs, he stuffed the flat oilskin into a narrow slot between the side of the bunker and a frame where it would be safe until the end of his shift. A stoking gong rang.

“You’re up!” Hall warned, and Semmler darted back to the fire aisle, scooped up a shovelful of coal, and spread it on the flames. The pace was accelerating as the ship forged into the open ocean, gaining speed, and the bells rang faster. A door shut. Another opened. Semmler bent to scoop from the pile the trimmers had dropped at his feet. Someone stepped on his scoop.

He looked up.

“Leaving town, General?” asked Isaac Bell.

BELL FEINTED A HARD RIGHT, AND when Semmler slipped the phantom punch with his usual speed, Bell was ready to hit his jaw with a left, which tumbled the German across the fire aisle. Semmler crashed into a hot bulkhead and stood swaying, trying to shake off the effect of the heavy blow. He had a long coal-blackened bandage on his cheek.

Bell was already moving in on him. He feinted again, this time with his left, and landed a right to the jaw. Semmler went flying. He skidded along the fire aisle, bounced off a stoker scrambling out of the way, and regained his feet. The blow had knocked the bandage from his face, revealing a long string of finely fashioned sutures. Bell threw another punch. This was not a feint. The Acrobat fell again.