Senator Brogan picked up the propeller again and rolled it reflectively between his palms. He looked intently at Kessler. "Nothing seems really conclusive, does it? You know some of the wild rumors that have been going around about this crash?" Kessler nodded and started to speak. Brogan held up his hand. "Let me finish. You know and I know — or at least we think we do — that there's nothing to most of these rumors. And I'm not even talking about the wilder ones, like the little people from outer space who are knocking our airplanes down without leaving a trace. You get three or four of these unexplainable accidents and somebody is sure to come up with a really crackpot idea. The general public will not be convinced that this sort of thing can happen with no discoverable reason. Usually we have no way of reconstructing what happened before the accident. Just a couple of unintelligible remarks on the radio, as there were here, and then everyone is dead, the plane is totally demolished, and witnesses on the ground come up with ten different hysterical accounts — if there are any witnesses at all!"
"But this was a little different, after all, senator," Kessler interjected.
Brogan held up his hand again. "Just let me have my say. You know we folks down here in Washington always have a lot to say and we hate being interrupted." He smiled briefly. "This sort of thing has been going on in aviation history for the last fifty years — these unexplained accidents — and there's nothing especially new about this last one. You're shaking your head, but let me continue. One of the reasons they are now getting so much attention is that with the big jets the loss of life is apt to be pretty appalling when an accident does happen, but the actual number of accidents per flight — as you well know — is far fewer than it used to be and has been going down steadily over the years."
Kessler, slumped deep in his chair, fingers arced together before him, stared morosely but said nothing. "Secondly," Brogan went on, "it is not true that these accidents are happening more to American planes than foreign ones. Again it is chiefly that we are scheduling more and more flights. On the law of averages we are doing very well. You know how many crashes the foreign carriers have chalked up in the last year. And just about the same proportion are these so-called unexplainable crashes. It's not that they are unexplainable! It's simply that we don't have the information that would explain them! The very circumstances preclude that. Am I making any sense?"
Kessler nodded. "Yes, senator, I suppose you are, but it doesn't make me any happier. I want to find out why and stop them."
"So do I, I assure you. But let me finish briefly. Among the other wild rumors are suggestions that we are being sabotaged by foreign agents or by their tools. Well now, I'd be the last one in the world — you know my record — to deny the possibility of some folks doing this if they thought they could get away with it. If I thought for one moment — or if I thought that you thought for one moment — that there was some international sabotage going on here, I'd say go on with your investigation till you get the answer!"
Brogan flung himself back dramatically in his big chair, throwing out his arms. "Meanwhile, what are you accomplishing? You've spent — and I happen to know this for a fact — almost a million dollars on this investigation. By your own account you have personally talked to two thousand people about it! You have kept this accident in the public eye and given it far greater importance than it deserves — through no malicious fault of your own, to be sure! But what have you got? Nothing. Exactly what I came up with. Nothing. Tell me, for example, where you got with the political possibilities of this thing. I know you didn't overlook it!"
Kessler smiled wearily. "Just about everything you say is true, George. Only, you see, I would probably never have ended up running this investigation if I were the sort of person that comes up with a question mark for an answer. I said 'human error' in my report, but that doesn't satisfy me. I want to know what human error. I don't think anything happens without a reason. Somehow I feel that it's all there, the answer, in those couple of million details we've pieced together about the plane and the crew and the passengers and it's staring me in the face if I could only see it."
"I agree with you." Brogan raised his hand again in his imperious gesture then dropped it to the desk. "No. I asked to have my say. Now you have yours." He sat patiently.
Kessler grinned. "Thanks, senator. As for the political sabotage possibilities, you've undoubtedly seen a copy of my confidential report. Three of the passengers had definite subversive connections in the past. I know, I'm not trying to make much of this. Their associations all date back to the 1930s and one of them was just a girl flirting with a Communist fellow student, but we didn't want to overlook any possibilities. Pearlow, on the other hand, was Russian born. He's the one who barely survived another airline crash three years ago."
"Pearlow was perfectly loyal. Just an ironic coincidence, that's all. I know the papers tried to make something out of it but I find it hard to believe that you took it seriously. As for Stepowski, he testified openly about his past here in Washington five years ago."
"I know. I even know that Stepowski's favorite television program was 'I Led Three Lives.' I tell you there's very little I don't know about anybody who was aboard, with one possible exception."
Brogan was alert. "Who's this?"
"Oh, it's no great mystery, senator. Robert J. Spencer, of Keokuk, Iowa. We know quite a bit about him, actually, but it's all third hand. He was a retired court stenographer, seventy-three years old, going to New York for his sister's funeral at the time of the crash. He boarded the plane at Chicago. He took a train to Chicago because he didn't like to fly, then he got sick there, apparently from some mushrooms he picked at home and had for lunch before he left. He had to lay over in Chicago for a day and then he got on the plane at the last minute so he wouldn't miss the funeral."
"Sounds to me as though you knew everything about him."
"Funny thing, though," said Kessler, "I have yet to speak to a single person who ever exchanged ten words with Robert J. Spencer. He lived alone, a complete recluse. Neighbors never saw him. Probably his sister would have been able to tell me something about him but she's dead. Actually, while I'm here in Washington I'm going to stop by and see an old acquaintance of his, a Miss Valeria Schmitt. They worked together as court stenographers in Iowa City more than twenty-five years ago. They were engaged but they never married. She moved here during World War II and they never saw much of each other after that." He shrugged. "I know it's a long shot, but I don't want to miss a chance."
Senator Brogan shook his head, smiling. "I have to admire you, Kessler. But may I express some little reservation? Do you really think looking up an acquaintance of Mr. Spencer's from twenty-five years ago is going to help materially in solving the mystery of a plane crash that occurred just last February? Or that the taxpayers could be very happy at this sort of expenditure of their money?"
Kessler flushed darkly and leaned forward in his chair, clasping his hands. "Senator," he said, his voice cracking a little, "the taxpayers are not spending a cent currently on this investigation. My staff has been dismissed or returned to their regular duties. I went off the payroll three weeks ago. My final report has been submitted. I'm doing this at my own expense because I feel that I have to. I'm not satisfied. There has to be an answer!"
Brogan turned the emotion away from himself with professional skill. "Bob, look," he said, addressing Kessler by his given name for the first time during their interview, "I'm not criticizing you personally for a second. And that's not why I asked you to stop by. I asked you to come over and see me as a favor. You're not working for me and I don't pretend to be in any position of authority as far as your investigation goes. I asked you here because I'm deeply concerned myself about these accidents and I wanted to know if you could enlighten me in any way. May I say one personal thing though? Aren't you getting emotionally involved in this?"