Flynn
Page 7
"The World is running out of food, space, air, fuel, fresh water. Population density causes people to be in conflict with each other increasingly. As our natural resources diminish, competition for them must increase through wars and other acts of hatred. Union is impossible. Prisons are overcrowded; Courts are delayed years in hearing cases because of the jam: Justice is impossible. The Earth, crawling with so many people, is militarily indefensible in the event of attack from Outer Space. There can be no Liberty for ourselves or our Posterity; there can be no domestic Tranquility; there can be no general Welfare if the world is such that no one has room to move!
"Therefore, We say to you, let us embark, without hatred, while there is still time to do so lovingly, upon a program of continuous mass murder! "Our program:
"1. Wherever two or more are gathered together, murder them.
"2. Destroy hospitals, medical schools, and other life-support systems.
"3. Encourage the natural proclivities of our politicians to wage war, especially thermonuclear war.
"4. Promote the carrying of personal concealed weapons; incite riots; encourage civil insurrection.
"5. Germinate your fellow person with as many diseases, especially fatal, at your disposal as you can.
"6. In your loving killing, be without class, racial, religious, or ethnic bias: kill generally, without prejudice.
"Remember our Motto: Do the World A Favor— Drop Dead."
"Ah, the little darlings," Flynn said as Cocky came in the door carrying the small tea tray. "Just the reading you want with a nice cup of Papaya Mint tea. Their parents are proud to have brought them into the world, I'm sure."
Next to the article was the headline: business leaders resist hsl message — Fear Concert, Theater Business Off — Religious Leaders Scorn Group.
Flynn had a sip of his tea while Cocky went to the chessboard.
"That's the old stuff. Up the nose it goes. Now, what else do we have here?"
"Insp.—I talked to Paul Levitt, sportswriter for the Herald-American. Says Marion Torker' Henry, who lost World Middleweight Crown to Percy Leeper last night, is not such a good boxer, although rated number one in this country. Nickname is not really Torker,' but that's how it is spelled in newspapers. Suspects Mafia jockeyed him into number one position, a lot of money has been invested in him, and suggests Forker's manager, Alf Wal-bridge, be investigated. Did not discount possibility Leeper was paid off to throw fight and then didn't do so. Might explain his leaving the country so soon after the fight."
"Ah, Cocky," said Flynn, "you're percolating today. And not a word to you!"
"Insp.—Thought occurs to me there was plenty of time to make and put aboard that airplane this morning a bomb by anyone involved with either Daryl Conover (Curtain time: 10:48) or Percy Leeper (boxing match was called at 11:03), as long as they had the materials. The mob has. Would a theater producer?"
The last note read: "Insp.—Checked with Beverly police. Producer Baird Hastings (who changed his name from Robert Cullen Hastings, known as "Bob" Hastings in the Army) has taken out a license to buy dynamite to blast out a rock ledge behind his house in Beverly Farms."
"Good work, Cocky! The man's a genius! And the tea's not bad, either."
Flynn put Cocky's map in his pocket.
"If anyone inquires for me, tell them I'm wending my way home by subway and bus, and will mark the grave of anyone who dares call me tonight."
Cocky answered the phone.
"Meantime," continued Flynn, "you can figure out what to do with your imperiled Rook."
Mouthpiece pressed against his left shoulder, Cocky said, "Inspector Hess, FBI."
"Him," Flynn said from the door, "you can tell I've stepped down to the corner for a wee dram, and good night!"
Eleven
"Dreadful big matters involved here," said Flynn as he pulled off a sock.
He had already told Elsbeth everything, including N. N. and the If adi Minister of the Exchequer.
In bed, she opened her Robinson's Medieval and Modern Times.
"The more you chase big matters," said Elsbeth, "the more likely it is to be some little schnook scared of dying alone." She turned the page. "Come to bed."
Twelve
Hearing the front door open caused Flynn to call out from the dining room, "Are you going to appear with the toast every morning?"
Grover stood in the doorway.
"What on earth happened to you?" asked Elsbeth.
Grover said, "I have received orders to bring you to Logan Airport, Inspector. Hangar D."
"Whose orders?"
"Captain Reagan's, sir. Speaking for the Commissioner."
"Hess," said Flynn.
"What happened to you?" Elsbeth asked.
Grover's right eye was closed and purple. He had a red welt on his left cheekbone. The right side of his upper and lower lips was puffed and red.
Grover said nothing.
"Some coffee, Sergeant?" Elsbeth asked. "Jenny, get the Sergeant a cup."
"I wouldn't drink coffee in this house—"
"Come, come now, Grover," began Flynn.
"Your sons did this to me!" Grover pointed dramatically at Elsbeth's head. "Your Goddamned brats! I'm gonna kill 'em!"
"Such language, Sergeant," said Elsbeth.
"I swear, I'm gonna kill 'em. I'm gonna beat the shit out of them. One by one."
"You can't beat them together," said Flynn, "I take it."
"Okay, so I grab for both of them when they come out of the subway, over at Harvard Square. I shout at them. I identify myself as a police officer, They run through four lanes of traffic across the street. Push through crowds of decent people the other side of the street. Knock a professor-type on his ass. One goes left; the other one goes right. I commence chasing the one that goes left."
"The one you had the greater chance of catching," observed Flynn. "Must have tripped over something."
"I catch the little bastard outside the Paperback Booksmith. Slam his head into the corner of the door. Grab his hands behind his back. I almost get the cuffs on him but the Goddamned knapsack kept gettin' in the way. A big crowd gathers, everybody watchin', sayin' 'Boo!,' shoutin' 'Leave the kid alone!' I identify myself as a police officer. Suddenly, the other one appears from nowhere, hits me sideways, lands on my back, knockin' me off balance. Once I'm spun around, he belts me in the face. I still had grab ahold the wrist of one of them. He belts me the other side of the face. I fall back against this table they got books out on for sale. It smashes against the store window. Behind me, I hear the big, plate-glass store window coming down. I goes, T'm a police officer, Goddamn it!' They began to get away. Bouncin' off the table, I grab ahold one of their knapsacks. Suddenly, the other one whips around and butts me in the stomach with his head like a goat. With the window comin' down behind me and all, I had to let go of the knapsack. Then that one whips around and gets me in the mouth with the back of his hand, sendin' me sideways." Grover touched his lip gently. "If I had fallen straight back, I could have got decapitated!"
Winny, over his scrambled egg, said, "Wow!"
"They got away?" asked Flynn.
"The little bastards." Grover's dark look at Elsbeth was purposeful.
"They weren't hurt?" asked Elsbeth.
"They're gonna be!"
"What happened then?" asked Winny.
"The manager come out of the store, purple-faced, fists all ready to go. I figure the crowd will calm down faster if I remain sittin' on the sidewalk. They're hurling imprecations at me. The little bastards are nowhere to be seen. They disappeared like the crowd swallowed them, instead of anybody comin' to the aid of an officer in distress. The manager, he's screamin' at me.
"I identify myself as a police officer.
"Then two of these Cambridge cops come amblin' up, swingin' their nightsticks, blue suiters just as shitty as they come. 'He's no cop,' they says to the manager. 'We never saw him before.' So I shows 'em my Boston Police badge. 'I'm a Sergeant in
the Boston Police,' I says. 'Oh, you're a Boston Policeman,' they say, makin' a big thing out of it. 'Then what are you doin' operatin' in Cambridge? What would your boss say if he knew you were operating in Cambridge?' Still sittin' there, glass all around, I shouts, 'My boss is Inspector Flynn, the Goddamned nut, and you can talk to him about it.* "
"They never did," said Flynn.
" 'Inspector Flynn?' goes one. 'Tell us another. Over here in Cambridge we don't believe any such man exists.'"
Still standing in the doorway of the dining room, Grover looked tired and dejected, hands loose at his sides.
After a moment, he shook his head slowly.
His lips moved, soundlessly.
"Poor Grover." Jenny dusted the toast crumbs from her fingers.
Flynn said, "Grover, having listened to you just now, I can say I think you missed part of the point. You were supposed to pretend to be arresting them. Your effort wasn't supposed to be successful. If you were really trying to get the handcuffs on one of them, you were going a bit too far. You caused yourself more grief than you needed."
"I figured if I got one of them—" Grover lowered his head again.
"—You'd end up lookin' better to the crowd; your pride would be intact," concluded Flynn. "That wasn't the point! I wanted both of them working!"
"Well, they are, Da," said Jenny reasonably.
"It's just that Sergeant Whelan got bopped," added Winny. "Good and bopped."
Standing up from the table, Flynn said, "He got nothing less than he deserved."
"I really am sorry, Sergeant," said Elsbeth. "My sons are so vigorous. They're a handful for anybody!"
"Ah, the darling boys." Flynn was putting on his overcoat. "And to think, I raised them myself!"
Thirteen
In the huge, gloomy, freezing airport hangar, Hess fixed Flynn with a sideways, bloodshot eye.
"Where's your stupid sidekick?"
"I ordered him home," said Flynn, "for a sick day. He took a bit of a thumping last night—in the line of duty, of course—and was so full of resentment and smarts I didn't think he should have to work the day. That, and all the stopping and waiting outside pawnshops I've had him do, has gotten him demoralized, it all has."
"Pawnshops?" Hess asked absently. "What've pawnshops got to do with it?"
"Yes," said Flynn. "We stopped at three or four on the way in, just a quick look in each one, you know. I looked at as many on my way home last night. So far, no luck. You'd be surprised how many pawnshops there are in the world."
"Double-talk," Hess said. "Interpreted loosely, you and your idiot guardian tied one on last night, and you could get up this morning, and he couldn't."
"Oh?" said Flynn. "And were we with you last night?"
"You were not," said Hess, moving closer to the assembled group of Fibbies and Cabs. Hess's mild manner may have been because he had been standing separated from the group when Flynn entered. And Flynn, a foot taller and considerably broader in the shoulder, had stood between the group and Hess, very close to him. And said nothing. "You certainly weren't."
Baumberg was clearing his throat.
The hangar was strewn with pieces of Zephyr Flight 80 to London.
The tail section, almost intact, chewed off just aft of the coach galley, looked more of the sea than of the air: a leviathan, its radio antenna still giving it a look of forward movement.
The front of the airplane had been twisted off, again at about where the forward galley was. Flynn peered into the charred tunnel. Men with lights on extension cords were working on the instrument panel.
A row of double seats, which Baumberg said were from the first-class, port-side section, were intact, the upholstery saltwater-soaked. Each seat belt had been cut. The bodies had been removed.
Apparently the people in these seats, attached to their seats, attached to each other, had ridden down the sky together to the sea.
Sections of both wings had been found; only three of the four engines; other large and small pieces of the airplane lay about, not yet in any order.
"For anyone who doesn't know already," Baumberg was trying to be heard in the hangar, "we are now reasonably certain this aircraft was blown up by a bomb in a suitcase situated in the rear starboard luggage hold."
"What do you mean, 'reasonably certain'?" said Hess.
"Well," said Baumberg, "we still haven't found the other starboard engine. Nothing definite should be said until we do. Especially as that engine was on the side the explosion took place."
"You mean," began young Ransay, slowly, "that it is possible that one of the starboard engines could have caused the explosion?"
"Not really," said Baumberg.
Ransay said, "How? You mean, some element in the engine could have blown up, fallen back into the cargo hold, and blown up again?"
"No." Baumberg's eyes were so tired they were devoid of expression. "I don't know what I'm saying. We have evidence, as you've seen, that an explosion happened from within the rear starboard luggage hold. The metal around that cargo hold received the major, outward-blowing impact of the explosion. All the other evidence indicates the blow originated from that place and only that place, both by direction and quality of impact."
"Then why are you talking about the engine?" asked Ransay.
"Because we haven't found it yet," answered Baumberg. "I guess I'm being academic."
"You're being stupid," said Hess.
Baumberg's face turned slowly, tiredly, to anger.
"Mister Baumberg," said Flynn. "Do we know yet what the rest of the cargo was?"
"We know, Flynn!" shouted Hess. "The rest of us know. The rest of us who have been working on this case!"
"Would anybody be good enough to share such knowledge with me?" Flynn patiently asked the hangar at large.
"Mail, Flynn! Mail!" screamed Hess.
"I see," said Flynn. "Anything else?"
Baumberg tried to smile. "There was also a shipment of experimental condoms. On their way to India."
"Condoms?" asked Flynn.
"Prophylactics."
"My, my," said Flynn. "If only the Human Surplus League had known. In what way were they experimental?"
Tired, not realizing fully what he was saying, Baumberg said, "I can assure you there was nothing explosive in them."
Everyone had a great laugh.
Baumberg, when he realized what he had said, went into an uncontrollable giggling fit. The man was very near the edge of nervous exhaustion, clearly.
"Mister Baumberg," Flynn said, finally. "Is there any way anyone not traveling aboard that airplane could have gotten a piece of luggage, containing the bomb, into that luggage hold?"
"Of course," said Ransay. "He could have given it— he could have put it into the suitcase of someone who was traveling."
"Or," said Flynn, "it could have been put aboard by one of the luggage handlers."
Baumberg said, quickly, "That's possible."
"Or," said Flynn, "someone who had absolutely nothing to do with the airlines, the airport, or the airplane, could have ambled out to the field anytime between midnight and two o'clock, two-thirty, and stuffed that bomb aboard the airplane? You said that cargo hold had been left opened?"
"No," said Baumberg. "It wasn't left wide open. Of course not."
"Anyone," continued Flynn, "could conceivably have access to it?"
"Well, I suppose so. But airport security—"
"Is airport security really that tight?" asked Flynn.
"No. I suppose not."
"Another thing," said Flynn. "You were going to check to see if any of that luggage raised suspicion?"
"Yes," said Baumberg. "None did. You must realize
that most of the luggage had come from other parts of the country by plane. Presumably, people had already looked at it. For example, the luggage from the San Francisco plane was late. It was trucked straight across from one plane to another. It never entered the building. It was dark. It was two o'clock in th
e morning. Human psychology—"
"And the luggage originating in Boston?" asked Flynn.
"Nothing in it raised suspicion."
"Was it electronically scanned?" asked Flynn.
Baumberg, now, was sweating in the freezing hangar.
"Human psychology being as it is," said Baumberg. "You see, the other luggage, particularly the stuff from San Francisco, well, that wasn't scanned—"
"So the luggage from Boston wasn't either?"
Baumberg swallowed. "No."
"So actually none of the luggage here in Boston went through any kind of security?"
"Not here in Boston. It was looked at, of course, by the man who tickets the luggage. He's trained to make a personal appraisal of the traveler, of the luggage. If the traveler seems nervous or odd in any way, unduly concerned about his luggage; if the luggage itself seems too light, or too heavy—"
"—or if it's ticking," said a Cab.
"—then the luggage man marks that piece of luggage for a special scan, and he sees that it gets it. I repeat that none of the luggage going aboard Flight 80 raised even the slightest suspicion. You see, the luggage was examined, in a way—"
"But none of it was opened or electronically scanned," said Jack Rondell.
"Well, now, opening luggage," said Baumberg. "Cus-
tomers don't like that too much. We'd need keys, per* mission."
"The luggage would have to be opened anyway in London," said Hess. "Go through Customs."
"That's another matter," answered Baumberg. "Customs is a governmental authority. If they say, 'Open your luggage,' you open your luggage. We're a private airline. We're not dealing with citizens, or aliens. We're dealing with customers. Human psychology—"
"Professor Baumberg!" shouted Hess. "Would you believe we have no Goddamned interest in your version of human psychology?"
Rondell looked mildly at Hess, and smiled.
"I guess we can thank you now, Mister Baumberg," said Rondell. "We now know fairly certainly the plane was blown up by something, most likely in a piece of luggage, put in the right, rear cargo hatch in Boston. Our own investigation indicates the bomb was most likely a lot of dynamite—what quantity, we don't know —most likely, as the explosion took place so soon after takeoff, ignited by radio, either from the plane, or from the earth."