American Conspiracy

by M. J. Polelle

  “They came to me. I didn’t go to them. I just told them what I knew.”

  “You rat fink.” Wobbling on his feet, the uniformed officer to the right of Murphy followed up his companion’s accusation with a swing.

  Murphy ducked. The swing glanced off his shoulder.

  Mondocane lunged and snapped at the attacker’s leg. Leone heaved the dog back with the leash before he could do more than rip a pant leg with his teeth.

  “The commander’s a brother. Brothers stick together,” the uniformed officer shouted at Murphy. “Only the brotherhood understands the daily shit we put up with.”

  “You sold out your brother, Murph,” the plainclothes officer chimed in. “You betrayed us all when you betrayed our brother.”

  “The commander’s not my brother officer. He would have let the Outfit kill Marco, my partner here, if he had his way.” He put his hand on Leone’s shoulder. “This foreign cop is my brother. Not the commander.”

  “Don’t call us for backup,” said the officer working undercover. He gave Murphy the finger.

  Mondocane growled and bared his teeth.

  The two stepped back and let them leave Dugan’s Pub.

  “We won’t lift a finger for a snitch,” the uniformed officer said. “If I did come, I’d likely shoot you instead of the perp.”

  Murphy cocked his fist, ready to deck the speaker. Holding back his partner’s fist, Leone said, “La madre degli idioti è sempre incinta.”

  “Speak English, not Spanish,” said the undercover cop. “Or go back to Mexico where you came from.”

  Leone led Murphy away. When they had walked a block in silence, Jim asked Marco, “What did you say back there? Trying to figure out what the hell you said cooled me off.”

  “The Italian saying is translated . . . the mother of idiots is always pregnant.”

  “You got that right.” He threw his arm around Marco. “Thanks, bro.”

  Jim’s cell buzzed inside his peacoat. The first deputy superintendent was on the line.

  It had to be trouble.

  The chief of the Bureau of Detectives informed him that in light of Commander Jack Cronin’s abrupt resignation, he was in charge of the Thirteenth District until further notice.

  Chapter Forty

  JANUARY 20, 2029

  INAUGURATION DAY

  WASHINGTON, DC

  Off duty, Detectives Jim Murphy and Marco Leone lingered around the donated TV in a corner of the Thirteenth District’s roll-call room. Together with district patrol officers, they hooted when an announcement interrupted their favorite TV sitcom.

  Dallas Taylor, elected by the Senate as vice president, automatically became president of the United States when the deadlocked House of Representatives failed to elect a president by noontime.

  “Thank God, we finally have a president . . . even if it’s through the back door of the vice presidency,” the desk sergeant blurted out passing through the roll call room.

  The newscaster continued: Nine vice presidents before had risen to the Oval Office by the death or resignation of the incumbent president. None before had ever risen because of the failure of the House of Representatives to elect a president before Inauguration Day. Leading constitutional experts affirmed that Dallas Taylor, unlike other vice presidents, only held the presidency until the House of Representatives got around to electing a president sometime after Inauguration Day.

  Special programming on the life of interim president Dallas Taylor followed right afterward and preempted the normal January 20 broadcast schedule. A montage of images from Taylor’s earlier life flashed across the screen. Baby Dallas in her mother’s arms with proud father looking on. Girl Dallas winning tap-dancing contests across the country. Young-adult Dallas undergoing river baptism near her home in Dallas, Texas, and graduating from law school.

  From real-life judge to megastar “Judge Dallas” on a nationally syndicated afternoon TV show. From there the charismatic descendant of slaves entered the House of Representatives, then the Senate, the vice presidency, and now bumped up to president of the United States . . . until the House elected a new president of the United States. Only in America.

  “What do you know of her?” Marco asked Jim.

  “Nothing good.” He gritted his teeth, remembering the candidate’s anger when he stopped her on Lakeshore Drive for driving a suspected stolen vehicle. “Usual loudmouth politician. She chewed me out for racial profiling and filed a beef with the commander for giving her a speeding ticket.”

  “What transpired?”

  “The commander’s a magician. He made the problem disappear without my knowledge.” Jim folded his hands as if in prayer. “I pray we never meet again.”

  The TV programming switched to an update of the breaking-news announcement that Dallas Taylor had become president. As her first act of office, President Dallas Taylor ordered the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to lower the level of military alertness from DEFCON 3 to DEFCON 4.

  Despite her causing trouble for him, he found himself . . . grudgingly . . . admiring her courage in making a four-star general back down from the unprecedented act of raising an alertness level on his own authority.

  Chapter Forty-One

  “Don’t get high and mighty with me,” Sebastian Senex shouted into his office telephone. “I didn’t ask anything illegal. Just suggest to your head of the environmental division she shouldn’t sue Promethean Pharma . . . until we have a president of the United States.”

  “We have one,” said Bryan Murphy at the Justice Department. “Dallas Taylor.”

  “That woman’s only an acting president . . . a placeholder until the House elects the real one.”

  “She’s not essentially different from the nine previous vice presidents who took over when a president died or resigned.”

  “No president died or resigned or was unable to perform presidential duties,” Senex said. “I can read the Constitution as well as any overpriced lawyer. It doesn’t say what her authority is when Congress hasn’t selected a president by Inauguration Day.”

  “Under the Twenty-Fifth Amendment even a vice president taking over as acting president during a president’s disability has full presidential power. It shouldn’t matter how they got to the Oval Office.”

  “Stop trying to change the subject.” He wasn’t going to let Murphy off the hook. “Are you going to protect Promethean from environmental lawsuits . . . or not?”

  Suffering from a splitting headache, Senex wanted this call over.

  “Even if we don’t file suit, the Environmental Protection Agency will go after you. Promethean Pharma’s Illinois plant emitted methylene chloride in violation of EPA standards for air quality.”

  “I didn’t help you get promoted to deputy attorney general only to hear excuses.” Senex’s secretary offered him a Tylenol with water. “Put in a good word for me with the EPA, you hear?” He popped the Tylenol.

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “If you can’t see well enough . . . get eyeglasses. I want action.”

  “Let’s get something clear. I can’t help you with your Tampa facility. It’s leaching ammonia into the Florida aquifer and endangering drinking water.”

  “That’s been clear for a long time . . . too long.”

  “You admit it, then?”

  “When have I ever admitted a violation? Listen more carefully, Bryan. It’s been clear you can’t do anything.”

  “Sorry, but the problem’s too big and all over the media. The EPA found the stuff winds up in the Gulf of Mexico, poisoning fish.”

  Bryan Murphy didn’t have to tell him. The nineteen-year-old girl near Tampa who set herself afire with kerosene outside the facility in protest had created a firestorm of bad press for Promethean Pharma. As a record number of get-well wishes flooded her hospital room, Promethean was bec
oming the poster child for corporate pollution.

  The echo chamber of news outlets reverberated with the words she proclaimed to bystanders before torching herself . . . You, the elders who run the world, you are destroying the future of your children on the altar of your money-grubbing materialism.

  “For once I agree with you, Bryan.” He waved his secretary out of the office with the empty water glass. “You’re not high enough on the totem pole to help with that one.”

  Either Brock Brewster or Roscoe Corker would deep-six any lawsuits for violation of federal air and water pollution standards when one or the other became president. It didn’t look like Murphy would come through. And if he didn’t come through, his hope of a political career was over.

  “One more thing,” Murphy said. “You’ve offered our best environmental litigators lucrative positions at Promethean Pharma. You did it just when they were ready to bring lawsuits against Promethean and other pharmaceutical companies.”

  “What a coincidence.”

  “It doesn’t look good, Mr. Senex. It doesn’t look good at all.”

  “This isn’t a beauty contest, damn it.”

  “Did they accept?” Murphy asked.

  “Of course. With the salary and prestige I offer, what did you expect?”

  “You’re open to obstruction of justice.”

  “There was no court proceeding in progress, or even an active investigation for that matter. My lawyers say I’m in the clear. There’s only one question you’ll have to answer, sooner or later, if we’re to continue our relationship.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Are you on my side or not?”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  “I am not Czech. I come from Slovakia.” The scowl of the Kinzie Steel supervisor looked fierce behind the Vandyke beard. “Two countries now, not one. Don’t you read newspaper?”

  Jim Murphy resisted going defensive with the big-biceped steelworker in Mickey Mouse suspenders and hard hat. Although the steelworker carried a chip on his shoulder, he didn’t want to waste time knocking it off. He pretended to listen so he could get through the useless witness statement as quickly as possible.

  The supervisor cracked a hard-boiled egg on the lunchroom bench.

  “I’m here, like you wanted. What do you have to say?”

  He popped the egg into his mouth and jawed it. Yolk crumbs the color of the hard hat stuck to his chin. Lovely.

  “I dunno if I want to talk. You no look like cop.”

  “These are my street clothes. I’m a detective.”

  “I dunno. I talk to your boss instead.”

  He had worked enough domestic abuse cases to know the type. They compensated for inferiority feelings by putting others down. Playing nice-nice would get him nowhere. He knew what might. “OK, Senex warned me not to waste my time with you.” He put his notebook back into his pocket. “Said you were a dumb foreigner.”

  “That crook say that? I talk plenty about that crook.” He put down his open-faced sandwich of ham and red peppers on sourdough rye. “Customers say steel too brittle. They will not pay. They want to know why.”

  “Why should the police care?”

  “One customer think police might care.”

  “Who?”

  “First . . . do me favor.”

  “What?”

  “I have noisy neighbor. Never stops music late at night.” He took a bite out of his sandwich. “Can you say to him to stop?”

  “Sure.” A five-minute phone call was about the right price . . . not a minute more.

  “Go-o-o-o-d,” the Slovak said, speaking with his mouth full. He swallowed the sandwich bite with the throat contraction of a boa constrictor.

  “Contact customer, Ambrose Storage Tank Company. Senex say his tests show steel fine. Company not believe Senex. Company has Vulcan Metallurgy in Chicago do test. Steel failed test.”

  “Why is that important?”

  “Metal expert at Vulcan . . . smart man like me.” The Slovak rapped on his hard hat with his knuckles. “He say strange chemicals found in steel. He tell me is suspicious.”

  “Why?”

  “Expert not say. You contact expert at Vulcan Metallurgy.” The Slovak removed his hard hat. “I remember. He go on vacation tomorrow. He want to see you today.”

  He could stop off at Vulcan Metallurgy on the way back to district headquarters.

  “Before you go. Here is name and telephone number of neighbor.”

  The Slovak handed him a slip of paper.

  He pocketed the slip.

  “Neighbor sleep during day. Angry if people wake him up. He is a police officer like you.”

  “Just what I need.”

  “Do not forget to call.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of forgetting.”

  Later that day, a bald-headed man in polyester red pants and orange polo shirt burst through the swinging doors into the reception room of Vulcan Metallurgy. “Hi, I’m Ollie, the chemist. This way, Detective Murphy.”

  As they walked into the laboratory, Ollie waved him over to the optical spectroscope that analyzed and measured the percentage of chemical elements in steel samples. He explained how the spectrometer recorded the percentages of twenty-three different elements found in steel samples. And then he reexplained it.

  The chemist reminded Detective Murphy of his old high school chemistry teacher. He had the same habit of repeating himself as though he were teaching a class of dense adolescents.

  “Any questions?”

  “No.”

  “Take a look,” Ollie said.

  He gave up pretending to understand the chemical symbols running across the screen in various percentages. The high point of his chemistry class had been learning on his own how to make a stink bomb from match heads and ammonia. The prank had earned him a week of detention at Saint Ignatius High School. “What am I looking at?”

  Ollie rolled his eyes. “Let me explain. But, please, Detective Murphy, ask a question if you don’t understand. There’s no such thing as a bad question, only bad answers.”

  The chemist held forth on how Ambrose Storage Tank Company had asked his employer to do some purity tests on samples of steel it had purchased from Kinzie Steel. Ambrose complained the steel had recently grown harder and more brittle. Kinzie Steel said no problem existed.

  “Who was right?”

  “Ambrose Storage Tank Company.” Ollie bent over to look at the results flickering on the monitor. “Carbon is the most important element in steel production.” He scrolled the monitor with his finger to check out the phosphorus percentage. “The levels of carbon and phosphorous are especially elevated when compared to earlier samples.” He added, “Got that?”

  “Yeah, I got it.” He bent down to look at the symbols in a knowing manner. “Any other impurities?”

  “Sulfur content is too high.” Ollie scratched his bald head. “We ran a different test to confirm these results. Came up the same.”

  “How’s the steel harmed?”

  “Sulfur made the steel harder but with a loss of ductility.” Falsely assuming he didn’t know the meaning of ductility, the chemist continued, “That means the steel got too brittle. It couldn’t be stretched like before. Got it?”

  “Let’s move on, Ollie.”

  The chemist walked over to a machine clamping the ends of a steel bar. “Watch.” He activated the machine, which tested tensile strength up to sixty thousand pounds of pull at each end. “Want me to explain tensile strength?”

  “I get it. You should know I did pass chemistry.” He failed to add: just barely.

  The machine whirred and the bar broke in two. Ollie examined the halves. “Much too brittle compared to earlier samples. Too dangerous for Ambrose to use.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Only that the
nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen levels were also elevated. The excess nitrogen aggravated the brittleness problem.”

  “Is that all?”

  “Why yes? You can draw your own conclusions.”

  “Just tell me why you thought I should waste time coming here.”

  “Waste time? Maybe, maybe not.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You said you got everything I told you. Can’t you figure it out?”

  “I don’t have time for twenty questions.”

  “You say you passed chemistry. Remember the acronym called CHNOPS?”

  He felt a sweat coming on. On the tip of his tongue.

  What was it?

  “Got it! . . . The six most common elements of life.”

  “Bingo, Detective Murphy.” Ollie gave him a high five. “Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, and sulfur.”

  “Why would Kinzie Steel want to add these elements?”

  “Beats me.” Ollie smiled slyly. “Unless life got into the molten steel.”

  “Like plants and animals falling . . . or dumped . . . into the vats.”

  “Yep.”

  “Say.” He stroked his chin. “Are you saying they could even come from—”

  “Humans?”

  “How about an answer and not a question.”

  “I only deal with chemicals. Humans are your turf.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  In the community sunroom of Northwestern Hospital, Jim Murphy promised himself he’d only wait fifteen minutes more. He came only because his sister had implored him. Commander Jack Cronin let out word to Katie that he wanted to see his godson. To determine whether he would have felt remorse had he not come, he imagined the commander’s death occurring without a hospital visit. No feeling came. Only the same frozen indifference.