When?
A lot faster than we’d expected. Incredibly fast reaction. I mean he had to absorb what was happening to him, and then he had to understand he was being attacked, and then he had to decide what to do about it, and then he had to hit the bomb-release lever. He got all that done in not more than three seconds flat. It was fantastic. There was no way to have predicted he’d have reacted so fast.
Give us your eyewitness recollection, please.
The bombs seemed to fall from the plane just a split second after he’d been hit by the jet exhausts from the fighters. Long before he was over the river. Of course the bombs arched outward. He’d been in a steep turnfl when we hit him, and his forward momentum had been accelerated by the crashing blow of the jet exhausts. But just the same, he was still over Manhattan when he released the bombs. That was what we hadn’t anticipated. It was my fault. Mine and Harris’. We just hadn’t counted on him being so goddamned fast.
Go on.
We could see the bombs weren’t going to hit anywhere near the middle of Harlem. But at first-as the bombs fell away, for several seconds that were real agony-we couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t hit those high-rise buildings west of Broadway. The angle of our viewpoint was flat and we couldn’t really make out the trajectory. It looked like half of the Upper West Side was going to blow up, though.
And in the end…
They’re building a new sewage-treatment plant on the river side of the Henry Hudson Parkway. There are dozens of very tall cranes there. Construction machinery. The parkway itself has been closed for repairs, so there was no traffic on it. The bombs dropped in sticks on the highway overpass and about four of them crashed into that high tangle of construction cranes and booms. It was earsplitting. The shock wave knocked us around-in the air like a kite. A good deal of shrapnel went up, but because of the slant of the bomb fall, it all went out toward the river. It was a hell of an explosion-series of explosions. Incredible wreckage up there, as you know. The highway’s been buckled for nearly a quarter of a mile, and that sewage plant’s a complete ruin. But there were no casualties. That was the miracle. A watchman was stunned on the construction site, but he was inside the shack and it saved him. He’s recovered. There wasn’t anybody else there-they’re union workers, they’d quit work at four thirty.
Then none of the bombs actually went into the river as you’d intended?
Only two of them. They went in just offshore. The two explosions were still making incredible geysers of water when Craycroft’s plane was shot down.
How did you feel at that moment? Can you recall?
Scared shitless, Mr. Skinner. If those jets had been two seconds later, every last one of those bombs would have blown up an apartment house.
Azzard (Cont’d)
We didn’t tumble to what he was up to until it was almost too late. Don’t forget, we weren’t eyeballing him. I had a surveillance team tracking him by radio-the bleeper in his belt. We thought he’d gone into a hideout. Finally the signal started to move very slowly. When my team reported that to me, I told them to get the hell over there in a hurry. I realized what it was. He’d gone aboard a boat.
Your men reached the harbor and he was still in sight?
Yes. They made visual contact, commandeered a launch-a private speedboat, actually-and went after him. This was after the blowup. As they approached, they called out to him. Informed him that his partner had been shot down. I guess he hadn’t heard the explosions, that far out on the island. It’s quite a few miles from where Craycroft went down. Anyhow, they were close enough to see he was shocked by the news. They ordered him to heave to.
Did he comply?
No. He opened his boat up to full speed.
And your men gave pursuit?
Yes. The launch was much faster than Ryterband’s fishing boat. But the way he was zigzagging, they couldn’t get close enough to get aboard his boat. They fired a few revolver rounds overhead.
What did he do then?
You know what he did, of course.
I’d like to hear it from you, Mr. Azzard. We get various versions of all the events from various witnesses. You had the official reports of your own agents, who were eyewitnesses. What did Ryterband do?
He threw two bulky duffel bags overboard into the water. Then he made a sharp turn across the bows of my agents’ boat-almost swamped them-and while they were sorting themselves out, Ryterband jumped overboard.
He disappeared?
Yes. We never found him.
You made attempts to recover his body and the money?
Yes. But Long Island Sound is far too deep and turbulent to be dragged. We never recovered either the money or Ryterband’s body.
How far was that from the nearest land?
About eight miles.
Brian Garfield
Target Manhattan
Grofeld (Cont’d)
In the wake of the events, were efforts made to recover portions of the B-17 and Craycroft’s body?
We dragged the river. A lot of the debris had been carried away by the current, but we came up with a substantial portion of the forward fuselage. The cockpit. It was pretty near intact. A few of the windows had blown out, from concussion. The rest were still coated with paint.
You never found his body?
No.
Ryterband’s body hasn’t been recovered either?
Nor the five million dollars ransom, for that matter.
Was either man known to be a strong swimmer?
Ryterband was a pretty good swimmer as a boy. I wasn’t able to find out about Craycroft.
Skinner
Dear Mr. Mayor:
Enclosed are edited, partial transcripts of interviews with some of the participants in the Craycroft affair.
To date the inquiry has produced more questions than answers. By way of a preliminary report to the commission, I prefer to let the witnesses’ testimony speak for itself.
There is evidence of human error and bureaucratic foot-dragging, but there is also evidence of extraordinary competence and initiative. Captain Henry L. Grofeld, NYPD, should be singled out for particular commendation. It may be suggested that certain men of faulty judgment were found to be in dangerous positions of power during the critical moments, but the most deadly thrust of the crisis was averted by decisive men. That such men were called upon and were available may be regarded as lucky coincidence; yet I am inclined to believe it was largely a matter of natural selection. Mr. Jack Harris, Sergeant William J. O’Brien (NYPD), and Mr. David Eastlake of the Federal Reserve Bank may seem at first glance to have been fortuitously placed, but one can also infer that when crises occur, men will appear who are willing and able to confront them.
One cannot be sure that the solutions offered in media res by Brigadier General Michael J. Adler, Jr., or by Joel Azzard, District FBI Director, might not have proved as minimally destructive as the method actually employed. Men of goodwill but of different persuasions often find common ground on which to pool their resources in time of urgent crisis. To coin a cliche, adversity brings out the best in us all.
For those reasons I do not believe any useful purpose would be served by empaneling an additional superagency designed to deal with extraordinary crises which may occur in future. Freak incidents, by definition, cannot be anticipated or prepared for. Adding another layer to the bureaucracy would not contribute usefully to the pool of talent currently available-a pool whose flexibility, as we have seen, is a major virtue. We cannot codify every possible crisis; we can only muddle on.
Sincerely,
Robert Wendell Skinner, Ph. D.