MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
1904—St. Louis
It was madness inside the Jefferson Hotel. Jack stopped short not three steps into the lobby. Dark-suited police were everywhere. Some were talking to groups of people clad in evening finery—women in satin dripping with jewels and men in sharply cut tuxedoes that would have made even a Vanderbilt green with envy—while others had created a border around the room and watched any new arrivals with suspicious eyes.
“You can’t come in here now,” one of the officers barked at Jack, but the man’s voice was enough to bring him back to attention. And the morphine he’d just ingested was enough to make him not care. He stepped past the man without bothering to argue.
The man took him by the arm and whipped him around. “I said you can’t—”
“I was told to come,” Jack said, cutting him off.
“By who?” the officer blustered, narrowing his eyes.
“By me,” a voice said from behind the officer.
“Chief Matson, I presume?” Jack said, jerking free of the other officer’s grasp. He held out his hand in greeting.
The chief was a short man, stout and sturdy with the eyes of a hawk. “It’s good to finally meet you, Mr. Grew,” the man said as he shook Jack’s hand. “But I’m afraid it’s been a waste of your time.”
The man’s words cooled some of the easy warmth the morphine had spread through Jack’s veins. “You said they were here,” Jack said, his voice clipped.
“They were, but they’re gone now,” the police chief said.
“Gone.” The impossibility of the word was a punch in the stomach. “They can’t be gone. Didn’t you have men at all the exits?”
“Every one, regular and service alike. They didn’t get out any of the exits.”
“Then they have to be here,” Jack said, trying to keep his tone level. “Have you searched the whole hotel?”
“We don’t need to,” Matson told him.
Jack could practically feel the vein in his neck throbbing. Even with the morphine to dampen the noise and confusion of the lobby, the chief’s words sparked his temper. “Why the hell not?”
“What’s the point? We saw them disappear,” the chief said. “Hell, half the force saw it. Just about five minutes ago.” The chief pointed to a spot not twenty yards from the front door. “We had them surrounded, all their escapes blocked. They were there one minute and then—boom—they were gone, just like that. Like they were ghosts.”
I was right. They laughed behind my back and called me a fool, but I was right.
“ ’Course, I don’t believe in ghosts,” the chief of police said. “So I called the Guard.”
“The Guard?” Jack felt like the world had narrowed until he could concentrate on only one thing.
“The Jefferson Guard. They take care of any problems we have round these parts with illegal magic.”
“They didn’t take care of this one,” Jack said darkly. “This is unacceptable, Chief Matson. You assured me that you could secure the area for Roosevelt’s arrival.”
The chief bristled, his heavy jowls wobbling as his cheeks turned red. “I have the utmost faith in our people to make sure everything is secure when the president arrives. Hey, Hendricks, come on over here,” the chief called.
Across the room, a ruddy-faced man with a high forehead and a mop of honey-colored hair lifted his head. “I’ll be done in a second.”
“You’ll be done now,” the chief snapped forcefully enough to draw the attention of everyone in the room. He turned back to Jack and huffed in annoyance. “The Guard thinks that because the city council has given them free rein, they’ve got some standing, but they’re still just amateurs.”
“Hendricks, meet Mr. Jack Grew,” the chief said once the other man had come over. “He’s here to help prepare for the president’s visit at the gala. I was just assuring him that we have everything under control.”
Hendricks kept his hands tucked behind his back and his chin lifted. Up close, the man was younger than Jack had expected. He couldn’t have been more than twenty, but he had the kind of broad shoulders and lean, strong features that made Jack puff out his own chest a little more.
“Hendricks here is a colonel with the Guard,” the chief explained. “He can explain everything we have set up. I’ll leave Mr. Grew with you, Colonel?”
“Yes, sir,” the guy said, his expression never flickering.
“Right, then. You’ll be in good hands.” He gave Jack a rough pat on the arm before he walked off to find another of his officers.
“You have questions about our security measures?” Hendricks asked.
“This Guard . . . What is it?” Jack asked.
“The Jefferson Guard is tasked with protecting St. Louis from illegal magic,” Hendricks said, reciting the words as though from memory.
“What does that entail, exactly?” Jack asked, eyeing the man.
“We do what the normal police can’t.” The colonel’s eyes were emotionless when they met his. “We use a specific set of skills and tools to hunt Mageus who refuse to assimilate themselves as productive members of society.”
Even with the haze of morphine dulling the brightness and noise around him, Jack felt his attention peak. “Really? You hunt Mageus?”
Hendricks nodded. “We show them back to the gutters and the prisons where they belong. We eliminate the danger they pose to proper society.”
“Excellent,” Jack said, reaching for the vial of morphine cubes. “Absolutely outstanding.”