Second Street Station (27 page)

Chief Campbell was right. Every newspaper turned Mary down. The mayor refused to see her. Even George Westinghouse, Edison’s competitor, didn’t want any part in it. There seemed to be some bizarre code among these men that allowed them to trick, cheat, and sabotage each other, but tattling was somehow viewed as poor form. Mary considered Tesla, but, partially due to Edison, he already had a reputation as a crackpot, and no one would believe him. There was one option left. It wasn’t a perfect one, but it would have to suffice.

It was dusk when Mary got home. She opened her apartment door to discover her place was a total mess. Her mattress was flipped, and her things had been tossed every which way. At the far end to the right of the window, cloaked in shadows, a man sat in a chair. The only thing she could definitively make out was the shape of the bowler hat he was wearing.

“So you were the little girl on the train,” the Bowler Hat began.

“Get out of here.”

He paid her no attention. Standing, he indicated her apartment. “And this is how your life turned out. It’s really quite sad.”

“I said get out!” Mary demanded.

He stepped toward her. She tried to flip him, but he was expecting it and avoided her grasp. After a quick kick to her stomach, she was the one who wound up crashing to the floor. Mary tried every move she had ever learned, but he had an answer for all of them. The Bowler Hat bounced her around the room. Books and pictures went flying. She crashed into a mirror, cracking it. He had been brushing up on his defense techniques, concentrating on jujitsu. Wei Chung had made him look foolish, and he was determined for that not to happen again. But it didn’t matter. In this case, he was clearly the more skilled fighter.

Mary’s energy was quickly fading, and the Bowler Hat was through toying with her. He punched her in the face. It was a crushing blow, and she went down hard.

“I heard about your jujitsu. I had hoped you’d be more competitive.”

He kicked Mary, and she groaned. She had never felt this much pain.

“Give me the journal!” he commanded her.

“I don’t have it.”

The Bowler Hat landed another devastating kick. It didn’t matter that she was a woman. He had a job to do. By now she was completely helpless. He grabbed Mary by her hair and dragged her to the cracked mirror. He pulled her head up, so Mary could see the reflection of her bruised and bloodied face.

“Look,” he said, “a sweatshop girl going nowhere. You think anyone cares if you live or die?”

He pulled out the dagger he had used to kill Wallenski and put it to her neck.

“Last time. Give me the journal.”

Mary was breathless, clinging to consciousness. She barely managed to say, “I don’t have it. I gave it away, you baboon.”

Through the years, the Bowler Hat had beaten information out of many people. He could easily tell a lie from the truth, and Mary sounded like she was telling the truth. He still needed verification.

“Who has it?”

“Your friend J. P. Morgan,” Mary answered.

The Bowler Hat was frustrated. His job was to get the journal, and this woman was making it impossible. He had been fortunate enough to be trusted with yet another assignment to prove his worth. He couldn’t fail, and Mary stood between him and success. He was ready to end this bitch’s worthless life. Then he stopped and released her hair, letting her head bang to the floor. He needed to think this out thoroughly before acting. He had to decide if killing this woman was good business. He had been slipping lately, and he couldn’t trust his instincts.

Before long, the Bowler Hat concluded that this killing would not be good business. Her death would not help him complete his mission and would only complicate matters. A dead former heroine creates much more attention than one who was simply beaten up. He would tell his employer who had the journal, and his employer could decide what the next move would be. He sheathed his knife and started to clean up, looking for any clues of his presence that he might have left. The Bowler Hat was proud of himself for making this decision. It would serve him well.

Mary had suffered a terrible beating, but when the Bowler Hat had lifted her head up to the mirror, she hadn’t seen her bruised face. She had seen only one thing: Wei Chung’s necklace hanging down from his neck. It enraged her, it energized her, and it gave her purpose. While the Bowler Hat was covering his tracks, she quietly dragged herself to the kitchen cabinet.
The roasting pan,
she thought. She had to get to Charles’s pistol. It was the only way.

The Bowler Hat was ready to leave when he heard a voice.

“You’re the one who killed Wei Chung,” stated Mary, coolly and calmly.

He turned to see her pointing a pistol at him. She had caught him off guard. Normally, he would have denied it immediately and started chatting as a distraction until he saw an opening to take her. But he knew he had waited too long.

Mary stared at the man before her. He had murdered the Chungs, the Frenchman, Wallenski, and countless more. He was not a man. He was a beast, a killing machine, and he had to be stopped.

The Bowler Hat could see the hate behind Mary’s eyes, and he had no choice. He made his move. The first bullet that entered his body slowed him down. The second brought him to his knees, but he was still inching forward, reaching out for her. It was only then that he realized his slipping wasn’t recent. It had started twelve years ago when he let that little girl on the train live. The next three bullets propelled him backward, and he collapsed to the floor.

Mary stood over him. She’d had six bullets in her pistol, but it only took five to kill the Bowler Hat.

J. P. Morgan had requested yet another meeting with Thomas Edison. Edison was in the middle of many projects, and he was getting tired of dropping everything for Morgan. As his carriage stopped in front of Morgan’s house, he made up his mind. He was going to put an end to these impromptu meetings. He would tell Morgan that if he wanted to see him, he could make an appointment like anyone else.

Morgan was seated at his desk when his butler escorted Edison in and left. Morgan smiled broadly, like Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat.

“Glad you could come, Tom,” he said.

Edison sat, immediately knowing that he was in trouble. Before long, Edison found himself agreeing to cede control of Edison Electric to Morgan. He would stay on for as long as Morgan desired and then leave when Morgan no longer found him useful. He had become that dancing puppet and Morgan was holding all the strings.

As Edison left, Morgan happily drummed his fingers on the cause for Edison’s immediate surrender. It was a book, a book that had eluded Edison and was known as the Goodrich journal.

Tina Chung was pregnant. That’s why she was irritated when she was summoned to her principal’s office during lunchtime. Tina was eating for two now, and she didn’t want to miss a meal. It was hard enough continuing to work when she was in her ninth month, but Tina and her husband had their eyes on a house and they needed the income. She couldn’t take a chance of being replaced because she took time off for her pregnancy.

The principal was not happy.

“I thought I made it perfectly clear, many times,” he said, “that no one could receive personal mail here at the school.”

“I’m well aware of that rule,” said Tina, somewhat mystified. “I’ve never given this address to anyone.”

“Then how did this happen?” The principal handed her a letter.

Tina looked at it. She had no idea where it came from. It had no return address, and the only writing on it was her name in care of the school. She opened the envelope, and there was no letter inside. But what it did contain was more than astonishing. It was a miracle. Her lips began to quiver, she lost all composure, and she burst into tears.

What Tina held in her hands was her father’s necklace. Wei Chung had promised his daughter she could have it to pass down to her children. And now, somehow, from the grave, he had fulfilled that promise. Her family’s legacy would continue.

Her sobbing increased.

The principal didn’t know what to do. He offered her water. He asked if she wanted to lie down. He was afraid she was going to have the baby right there in his office.

Tina knew that was not going to happen. She knew from now on everything was going to be all right. And she was going to cry for a long while. They were tears of sadness and also tears of uncontrollable joy.