When we left our story Jancy Hall and her lover had ridden off in a cloud of burning embers as their first act of revenge had been accomplished against the first of the California Seven. Major Raithburn's mansion had been burned to the ground, somewhat as predicted. But unexpectedly, the Major had been found shot dead under mysterious circumstances. As we return to our story it seems that a less puzzling conundrum may have appeared at Jancy's door.
* * * *
Conspirators at the banquet will cause to flash
The iron from the ship:
One will have his vessel brought to the great one,
When through the evil the latter mortally wounds the former. Nostradamus Century X #2
The bang came at five a.m. Not expecting anyone, Jancy peered through the peephole and saw-of all people-Commodore Whitehead, looking back at her with one of his fat-frog grins. She opened the door, and he shot her dead!
That was the first of Jancy's nightmares, but not the worst. The second was about Tonio and the fear: "What if Tonio doesn't marry me?"
More frightening still was the realization that she may be the one to blame. She was the one who had revived Tonio's dream of revenge. What a fool she had been! There were seven men who had stormed his mother's home and took her life and her land. Tonio's revenge could take years to fulfill.
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Dawn's early light fell on Jancy's sleepy face, and with the sunup came a somber order for her to report to the War Office. Jancy's purported 'gift of seeing' had aroused the authorities.
First daylight had also landed on a 200-foot double-decker being docked along the Potomac River. On the banks, the Professor had found Tonio sketching the swank vessel, depicting it with a blast of steam ripping its hull.
The Professor nodded, then reached into his pocket for the small photograph of the seven men on whom Tonio sought revenge.
On the photo an "X" had been drawn over the face of Major Raithburn. "One has been eliminated," the Professor said, "the good news is that I can identify the remaining men, the bad news is that these men are spread across the States."
"No care. I travel, I find."
The Professor turned back to the photograph and continued their conversation in Italian, an easier form to communicate with Tonio.
What follows is a translation of their conversation.
The Professor began. "The big man is Tommy O'Halloran, a builder who has erected a large number of inferior homes in Philadelphia. The fat man is Arlen Rooney. He owns and runs a war-stirring newspaper plant in New York City."
As the Professor moved his finger to Commodore Whitehead, he tapped the image. "The Commodore is the key man. The two men standing next to him are located out West. The one dressed as a minister, is a small-town mayor, and the one with the ten-gallon hat still runs The Lucky Seven Mine in Colorado."
The Professor added a footnote. "There is something else you should know, is that all seven men came from Dirt."
Tonio protested. "Dirt, no! They from riches!"
The Professor explained. "No, Dirt is a town. It is in California.
It is where the Seven started, where they began making their money."
The Professor pointed to the last male in the photograph. "This is the man who brings you here, let's us say he is the second of the Seven you wish to seek revenge on. His name is Sir Richard Bumgardner. He received his title because of his great theatrical productions in his native England and he has named his yacht The Lucky Seven after that past association"
Tonio stared at the steamer in the Potomac. " His boat is next. Then I will get the rest of them."
Putting the photo back in his jacket, the Professor began leafing through Tonio's workbook, and soon noticed that it was more than the standard magician's sketchbook with its usual compilation of false bottoms and secret compartments. "Dear boy, these illusions are so dynamic that we must carefully select the illusions you will eventually allow you to gain access to Sir Richard's yacht."
As the Professor tucked the notebook under his arm he added, "But first I need money. A thousand dollars for Sir Richard in order for me to gain entry into his life, and another thousand for me as my fee to prepare the prerequisites"
Their conversation then returned in English.
"You know the 'requisiti preliminari'."
Without pausing, Tonio dropped several gold nuggets on top of the notebook. "You take book. You pick. Then I blow up boat. Boom!"
As the Professor prepared to ride away, he delivered his last comment in Italian. "Dear boy, Sir Richard keeps his craft fully protected. We will have to lower his guard before you can lower the boom. In other words, you must not tip your hand before you tip his canoe."
-
In the meantime, Jancy had arrived at 17th and Pennsylvania Avenue where the War Department was operating in its sleepless fashion around the clock. The block-long building had been anchored in that location without much fuss since 1820. Now, however, with the war on, wary guards were strung along the half dozen columns above the stone steps, demanding identity from all who sought to enter.
Jancy was met at the bottom of the steps by Chester. She wasn't going to tell him about her nightmare and he wasn't about to tell her about his, how he had envisioned himself searching for her, and how he was accompanied by himself, as a boy of seven, how the rain poured down on them, and how when they finally found her, she was rain-drenched in Tonio's arms, an image that caused Chester's younger image to snicker. "Get a load of those two. It's only a matter of time before they go from wooing to screwing."
With the replay of Chester's dream coming to him in an instant, his face immediately turned red and he hid it by lowering his head as he led Jancy by the soldiers guarding the entrance of the War Department.
Once through the huge oak doors, Jancy did what was customary with those who entered. She rubbed the large floor bust of George Washington on his marble dome for good luck.
When she removed her coat, Chester noticed that, while she was tastefully dressed in black and precisely made-up, her corseting had over emphasized her breasts in a pointed way.
Chester lowered his voice to remark, "What did you come dressed for, a spanking?" His comments brought an immediate blush to Jancy's porcelain skin. Now it was she who tried to conceal her blushing by lowering her head as she followed Chester through the busy lobby.
As usual, scores of businessmen were circling the brass with hopes of obtaining a new year's worth of military contracts. Farther down the corridor, things got quieter. All that could be heard was the clicking of heels on the wooden floor.
Rows of offices lined the walls with military men moving from map to map, from office to office, in an effort to integrate their labor. Soon, however, their combined movement came to a standstill as Jancy paraded passed them with her sharpened breasts.
Farther down the hall, by the rear section, came the familiar and nauseating smells of the cafeteria. Dozens of wriggling fish were being roasted on the grill, while on the nearest barstool, the Professor was wrestling with a badly behaving sandwich.
Between attempts to take a bite, the Professor tried updating Jancy on how he was able to downplay her role in recent activities.
"My dear girl, I have convinced the authorities that you were coerced into participating in Major Raithburn's wire-tapping scheme. As for his death, I suggested that he was most likely robbed by someone whom he had cheated, someone whom he had angered enough to set fire to his mansion with the intention of killing him."
Finally the Professor gave up on his sandwich and led Jancy and Chester down the hall. Gathering them close, he continued his remarks in a low whisper. "The authorities fear a disagreeable scandal about the wire tapping by a high-ranking officer, so they are willing to drop the whole affair aside faster than you can say Jeff Davis."
As they moved along hall, the Professor became suspicious of the originality of some of the historic battlefield oils of the War of 1812.
The Professor sniffed the painting and proclaimed to Chester that since he could smell the varnish on the canvases that they were recent reproductions and not those originally handmade some fifty years earlier.
Chester's interest was elsewhere. Jancy had been summoned to a nearby office, where she was requested to enter alone, causing Chester to search out a peeking spot along the door's beveled glass.
Once inside, Jancy was greeted by a fat sergeant named Pokorski, who immediately went into his spiel. "With the war on, unnecessary bloodshed is no stranger to us here at the War Department; but since you, Miss Jancy, were involved in an affair with security implications, you were summoned here to pledge your allegiance to the Union."
Through the glass on the closed door, Chester could see that Jancy was sharing the glass of water she had been offered with a poinsettia plant that obviously had been neglected due to the holiday.
That image sent Chester back again to their days at the orphanage. Having been left on the doorstep, he never knew the date of his birth, but Jancy knew her birth date. She was born on June 6, the same date which, many years before, her favorite plant, the poinsettia, had been formally introduced into America from Mexico.
And on one those June 6 mornings, Jancy woke up and found that her fake poinsettia plant had turned into a real one, birthday magic from two of the nicer nuns, Sister Jane and Sister Nancy.
But wait a minute! Tap, tap, tap! Chester's imagination had run away again. In his mind appeared Sister Brenda with her long wooden pointer in her hand. The nun had intercepted a note that someone else had passed to Jancy, but it was Chester who got the blame. Between the blows from the nun's pointer Chester could hear Jancy's thoughts in his head: "Life is not fair and when I grow up, I swear to get even." Chester answered back in his head: "Revenge is not the answer, Jancy, and anyway you shouldn't swear."