The Death Instinct

'Don't answer him, Mac,' said Fall. 'Ignorant talk – that's all it is.'

'Answer him?' said McAdoo. 'I would sue him for slander if it weren't so palpably risible.'

'How much did they promise you?' Littlemore asked McAdoo. 'Or were you just getting back at Wilson?'

McAdoo bristled. 'Why would I want to "get back" at my own father-in-law?'

'Maybe because he took the nomination from you?' answered Littlemore. 'You were going to be the next president of the United States. Must have been so close you could taste it. But Wilson took it away. All because you married his little girl, thinking it was your ticket to the White House. Kind of backfired, that move. Wilson stayed a step ahead of you all the way, didn't he?'

'Let it go,' Fall said to McAdoo. 'He's just baiting you.'

'Woodrow Wilson,' replied McAdoo, 'will go down in history as a president so bedazzled with his role as Europe's peacemaker that he didn't see the war being made against us by our neighbor to the south – the first president since 1812 to permit an attack on American soil.'

'Sure, if only there had been an attack,' said Littlemore. 'But there wasn't. You just made it look that way. You figured you'd hire some men to bomb Wall Street, make it look like the Mexicans did it, rustle up a little war – and come out a billion dollars richer. Lamont owns the land across from the Treasury Building. He digs a tunnel to the one spot where the gold is vulnerable while it's being moved – the overhead bridge between the two buildings. Then on September sixteenth, Mexican Independence Day, you pulled the trigger. You covered your tracks too. Nobody knew. But you made one mistake. You were overheard by Ed Fischer.'

Fall laughed out loud. Then the Senator spoke more quietly: 'That's your evidence? We were overheard by a certified lunatic? I hate to break it to you, son, but I never talk anywhere I can be overheard.'

'You've talked here before. In this corner. Outside the Oyster Bar.'

'How would you know?' replied the Senator. 'And what if I have? Nobody can hear us.'

'Ed Fischer can,' said Littlemore. Lowering his voice to the quietest whisper, the detective added: 'Come on out, Fischer. Tell Mr Fall whether you can hear him.'

'Indeed I can!' cried Edwin Fischer's voice from across the crowded gallery. Soon they could see him practically bounding through the crowd. 'It's just like before,' he said jauntily when he reached them. 'The same voices – out of the air!'

'What on earth?' said McAdoo. 'What is this?'

Fall looked at Fischer as if he were a species of exotic bird that ought to be exterminated. 'Is this your idea of a joke, Littlemore?'

'I don't think Commissioner Enright finds it funny, Mr Senator,' said Littlemore as Fischer was followed by Enright and Stankiewicz. 'Commissioner Enright, could you hear the Senator and Mr McAdoo talking just now?'

'Every word,' said Enright.

'Stanky – did you hear them?'

'Sure did, Cap.'

'Eddie?'

'"I hate to break it to you, son,'" quoted Fischer, imitating Fall's Western twang, '"but I never talk anywhere I can be overheard.'"

'Good gracious,' said Mrs Cross. 'They really could hear you.'

'It's a trick,' said Fall, looking up at the ceiling and down to the floor. 'You got a wire here somewhere. It's a policeman's trick.'

'No wire, Mr Senator,' said Littlemore. 'It is a neat trick though. We detectives discovered it a couple of years ago, after the Terminal opened. If you stand right where we're standing now, just outside the Oyster Bar, folks on the exact opposite side of the hall can hear everything you say, loud and clear, even if you whisper and even if there's a crowd in between. I asked Fischer earlier today if that's where voices came to him.'

'It was my favorite place,' declared Fischer. 'I used to hear so much out of the air.'

'You and Mr McAdoo,' said Littlemore, 'had dinner here in July. Big Bill Flynn was with you. Flynn met Fischer that night – here in Grand Central. Afterward, Fischer came down to his spot over there and listened. The two of you must have been on your way out of the restaurant. You stopped. You whispered, positive that nobody could hear you. But you were wrong.'

'The Treasury owed me millions,' McAdoo protested. 'That's all I ever said. It was a purely hypothetical-'

'Shut up, Mac,' interrupted Fall sharply. His countenance softened into a broad smile: 'Mr Fischer, I don't believe I've had the pleasure. You're the tennis champion, am I right? Heard a lot of fine things about you. Albert Fall's the name. You ever been introduced to me, son? Or to Mr McAdoo here?'

'Never,' replied Fischer, sticking out his hand, 'but I'm delighted to make your acquaintance.'

The Senator didn't shake Fischer's hand: 'Then you can't be sure it was us you heard back in July – especially if the voices you heard were whispering.'

'I didn't say I was sure,' replied Fischer candidly. 'But your voices certainly sound similar.'

Fall laughed again. 'Congratulations,' he said to Littlemore. 'Your evidence is a lunatic who never saw us before but thinks maybe possibly he heard voices similar to ours whispering something last summer. You couldn't indict a flea with that evidence. Mac, Mrs Cross – time to go.'

'If I'd been trying to indict you, Fall,' replied Littlemore. 'I would have waited and brought you down when I had more. Instead I just blew my whole case against you.'

As Mrs Cross draped his overcoat on him, Fall asked, 'And why would you do that?'

'Because I need something from you.'

The Senator chuckled: 'Boy, are you ever mixed up. In future, when you want something from me, I'd recommend you try a different tactic.'

'Really?' said Littlemore. 'I got two witnesses here, one of whom is the Commissioner of the New York Police Department, who will confirm that Fischer could hear you and Mr McAdoo from all the way across the hall and that Fischer recognized your voices as the ones he heard talking about the Wall Street bombing three months before it happened. Not enough to convict, but plenty enough for a newspaper. Especially when people start looking into your Mexican documents. It'll take a while to prove the forgery, but we will. You'll deny you knew they were forged, but my witnesses will tell the papers they heard you say you didn't care if the documents were forged or not. How do you figure the headlines will read? Senator Fall Takes Country to War on Tissue of Lies?'

Fall didn't reply.

'That kind of story could put a serious crimp in a man's legal career, Mr McAdoo,' Littlemore continued. 'Not to mention his getting back into politics.'

'Let's hear what the detective wants,' said McAdoo.

'Meantime,' continued Littlemore, 'those three senators and Mr Houston – the ones who, according to your forged documents, were taking bribes from the Mexican government – I'm guessing they won't let you off the hook so easy, Mr Senator. When they find out what you did, they'll want to hold hearings or something, won't they? With all that going on, I can't see President Harding naming you to his Cabinet. Can you, Mrs Cross?'

'No, I can't,' she agreed.

Fall took a long draw at his cigar. 'What is it you want me to do?'

'Call off the war.'

'I don't make that kind of decision,' said Fall gruffly. 'Harding isn't even president yet.'

'You better find a way, Mr Senator,' said Littlemore. 'Otherwise, you can kiss your Cabinet position goodbye.'

A piece of tobacco leaf was caught between Fall's front teeth. He sucked it in and spat it out to the floor of Grand Central Terminal. He looked at McAdoo, who nodded. 'There will be no war,' said Fall. 'Hope you're proud of yourself, boy.'

The Senator buttoned his overcoat. He turned to go.

'The one thing I'll never understand,' said Littlemore, 'is how you could kill so many of your own countrymen. You didn't need to pick noon. You could've done the bombing anytime – at night. You're not just a traitor, Fall. You're some kind of monster.'