Page 20 of Angel of Vengeance
Now was the time, Diogenes thought, to assert his role. He rang the bell for the head girl.
She arrived and halted in confusion, then gave a hasty curtsy.
“I am the master now,” said Considine. “Miss Crean has left.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get two other girls with mops and buckets and clean this mess up,” he said, with a wave of his hand. “Scrub it down to the boards; leave no trace.”
“Yes, sir.” She stared at the bloodstain, eyes wide, but no questions asked. The brutal Miss Crean had cowed them well, thought Diogenes.
“And then, when you’re done,” he added, “gather the girls in the chapel. I should like to introduce myself as the new director of the Mission and House of Industry.”
14
THROUGH THE HALF-OPEN DOOR of his office, Warburton Seely, chief inspector of buildings for the City of New-York, eyed the man who had just stepped into his outer chamber. He was dressed in the latest style: an expensive herringbone tweed sack suit with a wingtip collar and four-in-hand tie, low brogues with spatterdashes, a green vest, and a heavy gold watch chain, the ensemble completed with a formal top hat and Malacca cane. He would have been the very picture of a prosperous banker or financier, save for the fact it appeared he’d bought the clothes that very morning.
Then there were his peculiar features. The man had a hideous scar across his pale face. He was unshaven; his hair was long and greasy, fingernails cracked and dirty. Seely could hear the man’s voice as he engaged in conversation with the clerk—a high-pitched, whiny voice with a western drawl so pronounced it was almost a foreign language. He had arrived without an appointment, and it was a wonder he’d managed to get past the municipal police who guarded the inner sanctum of city hall.
“I’m a-here to see Mr. Seely,” the man was saying. “The name is Pendergast. Aloysius X.” He spoke his name as pompously as an English lord, the effect ruined by the ridiculous twang.
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No, I do not. But I ’spect he’ll want to see me.”
“Mr. Seely does not receive visitors without an appointment,” said the clerk, voice laced with contempt. “Now, if you’d care to leave your card—”
“I’m newly arrived from Leadville, Colorado, and they tell me this here Mr. Seely is the man to see if you have—” he coughed with a ludicrous attempt of delicacy— “money to invest in real estate.”
“I’m terribly sorry, sir, but an appointment is necessary. I’ll have an officer see you out.”
Leadville, Seely thought. Wasn’t that where the gigantic silver strike had been made last year?
He rose from his desk and leaned out the half-open door. “Mr. Charles? I think I can find a moment for the gentleman now.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Thankee,” said the man, shuffling into the office, hat in hand, the ruddy scar across his pale face like a streak of blood on marble. After a hesitation, Seely held out his hand. “Good day, Mr.…?”
“Pendergast.”
“Of course. May I offer you a cigar?” As he proffered the box, he closed the door to the outer office.
“Most obliging of you, sir,” said the visitor, taking up a cigar. Seely selected another, lit the man’s cigar, then his own. He gestured to a seat in front of his large desk. “Please sit down.”
The man did so. Seely, settling back into his own chair, could smell the newness of his clothes.
“Now, I understand that you’re from Colorado. May I ask what business you’re in?”
“Well, sir, I was in the mining business. Silver.”
Seely nodded.
“Yessir. God has been good to me, very good to me, when it come to silver. You heard of the Belle Gulch Mine? Twenty-four million troy ounces, not to mention lead, zinc, and bismuth. Well, that there Belle Gulch was my claim.”
“How fortunate for you, Mr., ah…” What was that damned name again?
“Pendergast. Now, Mr. Seely, I’m not one to milk a prized cow dry: I cashed out my claims when the opportunity was ripe, and now I’m here to invest the proceeds. City’s growing. Property is the future. They told me you’re the man to see.”