Target Manhattan

Grofeld (Cont’d)

Two weeks minimum, he was saying. To get people out of New York in case of emergency. And here we had a threat that was measured in minutes!

That was why nobody had suggested trying to clear the streets?

I’d had a brief conversation with Deputy Commissioner Toombes about that earlier. We’d decided against it. Complete news blackout. Of course most of the news agencies around the city had been calling the department, asking what the hell that plane was doing up there. We’d kept a lid on it. Given out vague stories about a publicity stunt, some Hollywood promotion. We couldn’t very well make the truth public, Mr. Skinner. We’d have had a panic on our hands. There could have been riots, looting, the whole enchilada. Screwballs on rooftops trying to shoot him down with twenty-two rifles. No, there was never any question of informing the public of the danger.

Let’s get back to the chronology of events. Ryterband broke down and begged forgiveness-when, about two thirty?

Roughly, yes.

Then what happened?

As I said, everybody was talking at once. Voices were rising, and so were tempers. Mr. Azzard was buttonholing people, trying to convince us we ought to take a chance and try shooting him down over the East River and hope he’d go down in the drink instead of hitting Brooklyn or one of the bridges. That time of day traffic piles up pretty heavy on those bridges, and some of them carry subway trains. Mr. Toombes and Mr. Rabinowitz were over in a corner arguing with General Adler at the tops of their lungs, trying to talk him out of his idea of shooting the plane down over Harlem.

What were you doing?

Listening to Sergeant O’Brien and Mr. Harris. They were the only ones in that room who were making any sense.