Shadow of the Bomb (A Snap Malek Mystery)

by Robert Goldsborough

  "Well, what do you think?" I posed.

  He shook his head. "I really don't know. Everyone is devastated, to say nothing of being terrified. I've never seen the campus like this before."

  Chester came by with coffee for each of us. I ordered my hamburger plate and Lazar opted for a steak sandwich.

  "Does anybody you've talked to have a theory?" I asked.

  "No, not even Theo Ward, who came up with that nonsense the other day about Irene Bergman when we were at Hutchinson Commons."

  "Other than Irene, what did Bergman and Schmid have in common?"

  Lazar ran a hand across his bushy salt-and-pepper mustache. "Well, all of us–Ward, Rickman, Overby, and me–have been increasingly convinced that both of them had been working under cover at the Met Lab on…whatever is going on over there."

  "Do you know of any others who are working at the Met Lab?"

  "No."

  "And none of you know for sure what's really going on in that lab?"

  He sighed. "We don't. As we've been telling you, security is really tight."

  "And what about the security and safety of everyone on the campus?"

  He laughed. "We're all very concerned about that, of course. For one thing, there are a lot more police cars patrolling the streets around here now."

  "I should think so. I called the school's administrative office today, and they told me your president, Hutchins, is sending out a bulletin to be posted in every university building today urging all students and faculty to make sure their doors are locked at night, and that they don't open them to anyone they don't know."

  "That's all well and good," Lazar said between bites of his steak, "except from what we read in the papers, yours included, and hear around campus, both Arthur and Schmid likely knew the man who strangled them."

  "So it would seem. The question now is: Who will be targeted next?"

  "A grim thought. By the way, I came across something curious yesterday that I haven't mentioned to anyone, which is why I suggested we have lunch."

  "I'm all ears."

  "Well, as you know, several of the campus buildings have been boarded up and there are armed guards posted in front of them, suggesting some sort of secret activity."

  "So I've noticed."

  "These are classroom buildings with laboratories in them, which seem like natural places to conduct experiments, correct?"

  "Correct. I fail to see where you're going with this."

  "Well, there's another building that is boarded up and guarded, and it's not where you would expect to see experimentation going on."

  "As I said, you have my full attention."

  "Stagg Field."

  "The old football stadium?"

  Lazar nodded. "I walked by the west side grandstand the other day, and they have an armed guard, a soldier, posted at the entrance gate along

  Ellis Avenue." "It's just a deserted grandstand, though, right?"

  "Pretty much. But there are some squash courts down underneath the stands, although I'm not sure they are still being used. I don't get over that way very often."

  "Seems like an unusual place for scientific goings-on."

  "That's what I thought, too," Lazar said as Chester put our sandwiches in front of us. "So I played dumb, said I lived in the neighborhood and was just passing by. And I asked the soldier what was going on inside. He looked at me blankly and shook his head, then said he was just told to stand guard and not let anybody in under any circumstances. I couldn't get another word out of him, even when I brought up the weather."

  Just then, something clicked in. "I seem to remember at the funeral that the minister, or whoever the speaker was, said something about Bergman being a big fan of the school's football team," I said.

  "Strange as it seems, he was. I think most of the faculty, and probably most of the students as well, didn't really care much when football got dropped here a few years back. But Arthur was an anomaly. He loved going to the games and was bitterly disappointed about the abandonment of the sport."

  "That might explain something he said to me at this very bar."

  Lazar gave me a blank stare. "Yes?"

  "You may remember my telling you that when I voiced concern about how the war was going, he said something to the effect that 'If you knew what I know, you wouldn't be worried about us winning the war.'"

  "I do remember. For me, that was one more piece of evidence that Arthur was somehow involved in what I am convinced must be research into a nuclear weapon."

  "Well, he said one more thing right after that, when I pressed him as to what he meant. His words were 'At the place where we surrendered…that's where we shall rise again.' Does that suggest anything to you?"

  "Typical of Arthur to be so cryptic and mysterious. But I'm afraid I'm not picking up anything from that comment."

  "Maybe I'm reading that riddle of his all wrong, but to me it says that 'the place where we surrendered' is Stagg Field, where football is no longer played. And that it also is 'where we will rise again' through the development of some sort of weapon that will win us the war. Which would tend to indicate that some sort of experimentation or research may be going on over at that football stadium."

  Lazar made a face. "That's pretty far-fetched, Mr. Malek."

  "Agreed. I do have a tendency to let my imagination run away with me sometimes."

  "On second thought," Lazar said after a pause of several seconds, "you may be onto something, although I don't know how anyone would ever find out. Things are locked down so tightly around here."

  "True. But I think I'll stroll by the field after lunch. Is there going to be a funeral for Schmid?"

  "Not here. As I understand it, the body is going to be shipped back to Switzerland after the police are through with it."

  "Was there any suspicion–from you or from any of your colleagues–that Schmid might have been a German spy?"

  "None whatever. He had been in this country for years, and he hated the Nazis–they apparently had jailed an uncle of his in Germany who is half-Jewish. Also, if I were to guess, I'd say Dieter had a security clearance. I'm almost positive he was part of that Met Lab group, given that we saw so little of him recently."

  After we finished eating, I walked over to the campus with Lazar and kept on going west to Stagg Field, which ran from 56th to

  57th Street just east of Ellis. As I looked through a low fence at the south end of the stadium, I saw that the field itself was overrun with weeds and encrusted with the remains of a recent light snowfall. The grandstands that rose along both sides on the field were topped with castellated towers looming above like some sort of Gothic amphitheater, and weeds were even growing between cracks in the concrete where the seats once had been. A sad remnant of what years before had been a football powerhouse under the famous coach, Amos Alonzo Stagg. I walked around to the gated entrance leading to the west grandstand on Ellis and, sure enough, there was a soldier in khakis, standing with his rifle at his side, as if awaiting an inspection.

  "Hello, soldier, chilly day to be out here."

  "Yes sir." No emotion in the voice, no expression on the young face.

  I looked up at the Gothic façade. "You know, years ago, I worked as an usher at football games here. Hard to believe now, but this was a big-time college stadium, with maybe 50,000 in the stands on a Saturday afternoon, to see Chicago play the likes of Michigan and Minnesota."

  "Interesting," he said, sounding not at all interested.

  "Yes, indeed," I went on, rubbing gloved hands together. "Haven't been back for years, but this place holds great memories for me. Mind if I go in and have a look around, just for old times?"

  "Sorry, sir, but it's off-limits to the public."

  I raised my eyebrows. "Is that so? Now why would a poor old run-down football stadium be closed to the public? Doesn't make a whole lot of sense, does it?"

  "I wouldn't know, sir. Orders, you understand."

  As we were talking, three men in overcoat
s and hats approached the entrance from the north, pulling out badges with their photographs on them. I recognized one from the day I had lunch at Hutchinson Commons–Enrico Fermi.

  The soldier looked at the badges and waved all three of them through. "So some people are still using this place, eh?" I posed to the sentry.

  "If they have the proper identification," he said stiffly

  "So I can't even go in and have a peek at the field?"

  "No sir."

  "All right, soldier. Thanks anyway, and stay warm," I said, tipping my hat and walking south on Ellis.

  Chapter 19

  The next day, I phoned the city desk from my apartment on

  North Clark Street, telling them I would be an hour late showing up on my beat because of some family business. They could hardly object, as I had been putting in extra hours on the Hyde Park murders. My "family business" was actually a stop at Police Headquarters, 11th and State, but then, I thought of several of the people down there as a sort of family. I walked into the press room at 9:15 to a chorus of jeers.

  "Well if it isn't old what's-his-name," Packy Farmer brayed. "Back from the wilderness of the South Side."

  "Have you come to see how first-class reporters work?" Dirk O'Farrell added.

  "No, for that I'd have to go over to the press room at the County Building, or maybe to the City Hall," I shot back. "Mac, are these miscreants treating you okay?" I asked MacAfee.

  "Oh yes," he said, standing. "Do you want to use your desk?"

  "Sit down. It's your desk now, for as long as you're here. I'm just a visitor passing through."

  "Well, since you've been down on the South Side, you have truly made a mess of things," Anson Masters rumbled. "Can't you stop people from killing each other on that damned campus?"

  "What are you complaining about, Antsy? Look at all the headlines your paper is getting," I fired back. "And those outraged editorials as well."

  "Well, I can tell you that we are loving it," Eddie Metz chimed in.

  "Of course you are," Farmer said. "This stuff is just the kind of meat that the Times thrives on."

  "Well, your own rag hasn't exactly been shy and reserved in its coverage," Metz said, referring to Farmer's Herald American. "Particularly that headline, 'Another Ghastly Killing in the Halls of Ivy.'"

  "Ah, I cannot begin to tell all of you how much I have missed this warmth and camaraderie," I announced. "But as stimulating as the conversation here is, I fear I must be on my way to faraway places. Mr. MacAfee, would you do me the honor of accompanying me out into the hall?"

  Mac nodded and we stepped into the corridor. "This is your turf right now," I told him, "so whatever you say goes. With your permission, I would like to go downstairs and question Fahey about the current status of the Dieter Schmid investigation, and I am happy to have you there with me. What do you think?"

  Mac looked at me with those earnest blue eyes of his. "Snap, whatever you want is just fine with me. You were good enough to let me switch beats with you during Flora's pregnancy, so I think you should go down and see Fahey alone. Be warned, though, that he's not in the best of humor these days."

  "So what's new?" I replied, heading downstairs.

  "Well…a face from the past," Elsie Dugo exclaimed as I entered her anteroom. "What brings you back to our corner of the world?"

  "I couldn't stand to go another day without seeing your shining countenance."

  "Uh-huh. So my face is shiny, is it?"

  "Don't twist my words, you lissome lassie. Is the lord and master at home?"

  "Last I looked, he was." She pressed the button on her intercom and told Fahey that "An old friend is here to see you."

  "Friend? I don't have any friends," came the squawky reply. "Send whoever it is in."

  "Whaddya mean, you don't have any friends?" I said as I strode into Fahey's office. "Who but a friend would bring you a whole pack of Luckies, unopened?" I tossed them onto his blotter.

  "Well, I'll be damned. Did the brass at the Tribune decide they couldn't do without you here?"

  "I'll take that as a thank-you for the smokes. And in answer to the question, I'm still on the South police beat. Just thought that I'd stop by for old times."

  He tore open the cigarette pack and eyed me dubiously. "To answer the question you haven't asked, but no doubt are about to, there hasn't been a break in the U of C case yet. Or are you here to give me some news?"

  "Don't I wish."

  Fahey lit up and scowled. "There are times when I hate this job, and this is one of them."

  "A lot of pressure right now?"

  He nodded. "Not only from the press and City Hall, but from the Feds as well."

  "FBI?"

  Another nod. "Arrogant goddamn bastards. They treat us like a bunch of stupes. Had one of 'em in here yesterday in his goddamn dark suit and dark tie and snap-brim hat–no offense–and he was grilling me about our procedures and how he thought that we could be more efficient. Couldn't understand why we hadn't nailed Bergman's killer. He told me that if we'd gone about this right–whatever that means–we would have caught the murderer and there wouldn't have been a second killing. Prick."

  "Did he have any helpful suggestions?"

  "Of course not! He told me the Bureau would begin its own investigation, that national security is at issue. Said that Hoover himself is taking a special interest in the matter."

  "Just what you need."

  "Yeah. God, I hope to hell we find whoever did it, before those pompous jackasses do."

  "Their interest just about clinches what the folks I've talked to down on the Midway have suspected all along."

  "Which is?"

  "That both Bergman and Schmid were involved in a super-secret research program to develop some sort of weapon, very likely what's called a nuclear one."

  "We've heard some similar stuff," Fahey growled. "Myself, I don't know nuclear from nickels, but apparently, this is big, really big."

  "That's what I'm told by these wiseheads I've hooked up with. They know something's going on; they're just not sure exactly what it is. And some of them think it's insane to be messing around with dangerous weapons material right in the middle of a city."

  "I agree with them on that. Why don't they take whatever it is they're fooling around with and go out in some damn desert?"

  "That's something you'd have to ask a guy named Enrico Fermi."

  "Who's that?"

  "He's the guy who's apparently running these experiments. Famous in science circles, I'm told. Got one of those Nobel Prizes a few years back."

  "Well, how wonderful for him," Fahey snapped. "So maybe I should interview him about the killings, eh?"

  "Don't you think those friends of yours in the dark suits and snap-brim hats already have?"

  The chief scowled. "Of course they have. I was being sarcastic."

  "I didn't notice," I said, taking a Lucky out of the pack on Fahey's desk and lighting up. "Well, I'm off to beautiful Hyde Park, land of students and slayings. I'll see if I can find a murderer for you before the FBI does."

  "Well for God's sake, be careful," Fahey snarled. "The last thing we need is a third murder down there–and of a newspaperman at that."

  "Thanks for your kind thoughts and your solicitousness," I said over my shoulder as I went out into the anteroom and winked at Elsie, who did the same. "Come back again sometime, will ya?" she said.

  "With you here, how could I possibly stay away indefinitely?"

  "Oh, how I miss that sweet talk. Your young Mr. MacAfee seems like a fine gent, but he is very shy, unlike yourself."

  "Haven't I told you that after I was born, they threw away the mold?"

  "I do believe you have. Now you take care down there on that South Side, hear?"

  "I hear, ma'am. You don't have to worry about me. Before you know it, I'll be back here toiling at my old stand and coming to see you every day."

  "I can hardly wait," she said, rolling her dark brown eyes with exaggerated
coquetry.

  Chapter 20

  The first day of December, a Tuesday, was bitterly cold, all the more depressing because winter would not officially start for three more weeks. I felt chilled through after my short walk from the Illinois Central depot at

  53rd Street to the Hyde Park police station. "Can't you crank up the heat in this place?" I asked Sgt. Mark Waldron.

  "Now, Snap, you've lived through many a Chicago winter, as have I. And I cannot believe you haven't built up some tolerance over all that spell."

  "Some things you never get used to, Mark."

  He smiled. "I suppose not. Your paper and all the others certainly have been giving this part of town a lot of ink lately, not that I'm surprised."

  "Well, how often do two professors get killed, and in such a short span? How's your boss taking it?" I nodded in the direction of Lieutenant Grady's office. Waldron shrugged. "Pretty much the way you'd expect. He's feeling some of the heat, of course, but most of it is being directed at Headquarters."

  "I'll say. I was just in Fahey's office, and he is not what I would term a happy fellow."

  "If you think our good Fergus is feelin' the heat, think what it must be like for the Commissioner in his office up in City Hall. To say nothing of the Mayor himself, our stalwart Mr. Kelly."

  "Yeah, they're all taking a pounding from the press. And from the Crime Commission. And it appears that no less than J. Edgar Hoover has also developed an interest in the case."

  He raised his eyebrows. "That so? Who'd have thought that our little corner of the world would become so important?"

  I spent the rest of the morning phoning the other precincts on the South Side in search of news, and the pickings were pretty slim.

  The Gresham station had hauled in a guy accused of bilking little old ladies by claiming to be a termite inspector. He was charging them five bucks to check out their floor joists to see if the little fellows were gnawing at them. The Englewood precinct nailed a prostitute who was working a corner adjoining the local high school. Apparently, some of the students were spending their lunch money on something other than lunch.