The Hostage

Tom Silver did not know Chicago well, for he had spent little time here, but it was the largest city he had ever seen. It was shaped by the lakefront and the branches of the river, which were constantly busy with commercial traffic. Ten railroads converged on Chicago, sixteen bridges spanned the river and canal, and hundreds of thousands of people made their home there.

Now its heart was on fire. This was the inferno, like the dreaded one in the Old Testament stories he used to read to Asa.

The thought of Asa brought Tom’s grim purpose back into focus. Tonight he would have his revenge. Nothing—not even the flames of hell—would stop him.

“You going to wait this out?” Lightning Jack asked, seeming to read Tom’s thoughts.

“Makes no sense to wait,” Tom pointed out. “If the fire spreads to the North Division before I get there, I’ll lose him for sure.”

“Then you had best be quick. It could be a convenience, eh? If the house burns, you won’t have to worry about evidence being found.”

Tom studied his oldest friend, his mentor, the man who had raised him. Lightning Jack duBois had found Tom, a five-year-old abandoned in a cabin in the north woods, sitting blank-eyed next to the stiff corpse of his mother. She had died of starvation, and Tom’s fate was not far behind, except that the tough old voyageur had intervened.

Since that long ago day, Tom had given Jack all his loyalty and trust. Just as Asa had trusted Tom.

“What is that look, eh?” Lightning Jack made a face. “You want to abandon the plan?”

“You know better than that.” Tom felt hard, driven. The killing would be a purification ritual, a way to wash his soul clean of the black rage that consumed him. At least, that was what he kept telling himself.

Lightning Jack’s brow drew down in a scowl. “It is no crime, but retribution.”

Arthur Sinclair was a murderer, though no doubt his soft white hands were unsoiled, even in his own eyes. He employed underlings to do his work for him, but he was just as guilty as if he had slain seven souls with his bare hands.

“I still think you should let me go with you,” Lightning Jack said, resting his hand on the handle of his hunting knife.

“No.” Tom buckled on his cartridge belt. Truth was, Lightning Jack lacked a cool head. He tended to let passion get the best of him, and rage made him reckless. He despised Arthur Sinclair with a virulence that poisoned his heart, for his heart was the thing Sinclair had taken from him.

Tom’s hatred for Sinclair was different. Colder, more precise. The clarity of his hatred made him better equipped to kill. Lightning Jack was too volatile. He wore his grief for Asa like a hair shirt, and it made him wild and vulnerable.

“Shipping traffic’s heavy,” Tom pointed out. “You’d best stay here and look after the Suzette.“

“Spectators, I’m guessing,” Lightning Jack said. “Refugees. Like ants swarming in a flood. They have nowhere to go.”

Tom scanned the shoreline, picking out a train depot by a breakwater, towers and smokestacks, all pulsating in firelight. People trapped at the lakeshore waved their arms, signaling to the passing boats.

Lightning Jack watched as Tom holstered the Colt police revolver they’d bought at the Soo Locks. “Do you have enough cartridges?” Lightning asked.

“Jesus, how many times do you want me to shoot him?” Tom opened his buckskin jacket to reveal the row of ammunition in his belt loops.

“Seven,” Lightning said as Tom tied the thin leather strap of the holster around his thigh. “Go now. Time is short. I’ll keep the Suzette ready to weigh anchor.”

Tom lowered the dinghy into the water and began to pull toward the shore. The lake boiled with wind-whipped waves that crested and sloshed over the sides. Some of the boats he passed were gearing up to rescue refugees from the fire. If he were a better man, he would join the rescue effort. But he wasn’t here to save anyone. He was what circumstances had made of him, and in his heart there was no room for anything but hatred.

Every now and then he glanced over his shoulder at the waterworks north of the river. The structure still seemed to be intact, its gothic spire a black arrow against the noxious orange sky. Maybe the tower was close enough to the lake to survive the fire. So long as the pumps and bellows of the waterworks remained safe, the flames could be brought under control.

Yet he could not help noticing it was a losing battle. The high wind howled and stormed with hellish fury. Firebrands rained harder and thicker from the sky, sparking up blazes each place they touched. By the time he found the Sinclair mansion, the fire would not be far behind.

Tom tied up at a rubble-built bulkhead, securing the dinghy beneath an outcropping of rock. Under the circumstances, he had to be cautious. A panicked victim of the fire would not think twice about stealing a rowboat, and it was a long swim back to the steamer.

He hauled himself out and scrambled up the embankment. Emerging onto a brick-strewn street, he immediately felt a blast of the fire’s hot breath. His caribou hide shirt and trousers would protect him from the flying sparks—for a while, at least.

A couple of distant explosions startled him as he made his way along the north bank of the river. He passed banks and hotels, McCormack’s Reaper Works, shops and theaters, parks and boulevards. People looked out the windows of nearly every tall building, their gazes turned toward the fire. Eerily, the night grew lighter with each passing moment. He could pick out street signs and people standing in groups, talking excitedly. A short distance away, tugboats on the river screamed for the bridges to be turned to let them through, but the huge crowds gathered on the shore prevented the bridge operators from doing their job. The fire from the west blew toward the forest of masts and rigging. Good thing Lightning Jack had agreed to lay-to offshore. There was no safe place in the city tonight.

This was unfamiliar territory to Tom, but he knew where Sinclair lived. He had studied the location on a map, and the route was branded on his memory.

He had not reckoned on having to navigate a sea of humanity, though. Men, women, children and livestock surged along the main thoroughfares, pushing toward the lake. Overloaded carts, drays, mule trucks and express wagons clogged the roadways. In his entire life, Tom hadn’t seen so many people. Some were dressed in nightclothes, others in evening wear. Carts and carriages clattered past with little heed for the safety of the pedestrians. Men dragged trunks behind them; women clutched quilts and kettles and drawers stuffed with belongings. People fled, their arms filled with books and mementos, bundled clothes, odd-shaped bags and even a metal safe or two.

What did a person save when faced with losing everything? Tom wondered. Priceless antiques, irreplaceable photographs, quilts and curios made by the hands of loved ones long dead. And money, of course. There was always that.

The rumble of collapsing buildings drowned out the shouting and caused children and horses to panic. Everywhere he looked, Tom saw carts running out of control or crashing into buildings or trees and left abandoned. One carriage, with a crest on its door that read “The Emma Wade Boylan School,” lay on its side, the team still struggling in its traces.

Three young women, dressed in silks and lace, quarreled on the boardwalk near the fallen carriage.

“I say we leave them,” the brown-haired woman said.

“We’ll not abandon the horses,” the black-haired one retorted. “We must—”

“Move aside.” Tom yanked his bowie knife out of the top of his boot. Feminine gasps greeted the sight of the glittering blade, and they fell back, clearly horrified. He sliced through the traces that bound the horses to the coach, then slapped the beasts’ rumps to drive them off down the street.

The well-dressed woman gaped at him. “He…you…the horses!”

Her companion said, “Now what shall we do?”

The redhead lifted her gaze to the flaming sky. “Pray,” she said.

Tom didn’t wait around to see the outcome of the argument. He had a job to do.

As the crowd and the smoke pressed upon him, he felt a sharp hunger for the harsh, empty majesty of the north woods wilderness. Soon, he told himself. In just a short while, he would be back where he belonged. But first he had to find his target—the house on Huron Avenue. Then he could head home to Isle Royale. There, he would try his best to endure a life that had been irrevocably changed by Arthur Sinclair.

He wondered what it would feel like to kill the man who had killed Asa. Would his heart exult in dark, cleansing joy? Would he be filled with pure glee? Would the satisfaction of revenge drive away the loss and betrayal that had consumed him since the disaster? Perhaps he would feel nothing at all. He would welcome the numbness. Feeling nothing would be a blessing after the months of suffering through soul-killing grief.

Tom had killed in the war. As a courier, he’d been used by General Whitcomb of the 21st Michigan in the way a hunter used bloodhounds. But being in the war had not given him a taste for murder.

He pressed on harder, faster, seared by the blowing heat. He passed a lanky boy burdened with a shaggy dog that kept trying to escape its young master’s arms. The boy was about fourteen, the age Asa had been when he died. Tom tried not to see the struggling youth, tried not to hear the kid saying “Easy, Shep. Take it easy. I’ll keep you safe.” He tried not to remember the way a boy’s rounded face could look so damned earnest and protective. Tom felt relieved when the youth and his dog veered off toward the lake.

If he had lived, Asa would have been fifteen in the spring. He would have had his birthday in March, and maybe Tom would have given him a bowie knife or deer rifle to mark his step toward manhood. The two of them would have sat by the stove, tying flies or playing checkers. Even now, months after the accident, Tom could picture the complete absorption in Asa’s face when he worked on a fishing fly. He could still hear Asa’s laughter in his heart.

I miss you, Asa.

Turning down a nearly deserted side street, he walked faster, breathing hard as anticipation built, tasting smoke and ash in his throat. The smell of burning timber and the sight of falling cinders reminded him of being in the thick of battle. He never should have gone to war. Lightning Jack had warned him that it would steal his spirit.

Just as he had warned Asa about working at the mine.

Asa hadn’t listened any better than Tom had, in his youth. Bored by the routine of island life and winters spent under the tutelage of a demanding scholar, Tom had run away to join the fighting. What he had seen and done during those dark years had turned his soul to ice. Only the gift of Asa had dragged Tom back into the light. Now that Asa was gone, there was nothing to keep him from falling into darkness once again.

Firebrands and cinders rained thickly over the streets, and each brand ignited a new fire. Men posted on rooftops tried to defend some of the larger buildings, but the bright dervishes of flame made a mockery of their efforts. Distant explosions pocked the night, each greeted by frightened screams.

At a broad street, the crowd flowed northward, following a long strip of green space bordering the lake. Family members shouted at one another to hurry. Tom broke off from the surging refugees and headed in the opposite direction.