“Two years ago?”
Chief Rand looked startled. “Why did you say that?”
“Because it was two years ago that Dr. Chappel disappeared in New York.”
“Oh,” Rand said. “No, there’s no connection. I thought maybe you knew something when you mentioned two years. It hasn’t been quite that long, really, but it was close.”
He got up from behind the strangely-shaped plastic desk and began to pace back and forth the length of the office.
He said, “Joad, in the last year—let’s consider that period, although it started nearer two years ago—out of every ten major crimes committed in Chicago, seven are unsolved. Technically unsolved, that is; in five out of those seven we know who’s guilty but we can’t prove it. We can’t get a conviction.
“The underworld is beating us, Joad, worse than they have at any time since the Prohibition era of seventy-five years ago. If this keeps up, we’re going back to days like that, and worse.
“For a twenty-year period now we’ve had convictions for eight out of ten major crimes. Even before twenty years ago—before the use of the lie-detector in court was legalized, we did better than we’re doing now. ‘Way back in the decade of 1970 to 1980, for instance, we did better than we’re doing now by more than two to one; we got convictions for six out of every ten major crimes. This last year, it’s been three out of ten.
“And I know the reason, but I don’t know what to do about it. The reason is that the underworld is beating the lie-detector!”
Bela Joad nodded. But he said mildly, “A few have always managed to beat it. It’s not perfect. Judges always instruct juries to remember that the lie-detector’s findings have a high degree of probability but are not infallible, that they should be weighed as indicative but not final, that other evidence must support them. And there has always been the occasional individual who can tell a whopper with the detector on him, and not jiggle the graph needles at all.”
“One in a thousand, yes. But, Joad, almost every underworld big-shot has been beating the lie-detector recently.”
“I take it you mean the professional criminals, not the amateurs.”
“Exactly. Only regular members of the underworld—professionals, the habitual criminals. If it weren’t for that, I’d think—I don’t know what I’d think. Maybe that our whole theory was wrong.”
Bela Joad said, “Can’t you quit using it in court in such cases? Convictions were obtained before its use was legalized. For that matter, before it was invented.”
Dyer Rand sighed and dropped into his pneumatic chair again. “Sure, I’d like that if I could do it. I wish right now that the detector never had been invented or legalized. But don’t forget that the law legalizing it gives either side the opportunity to use it in court. If a criminal knows he can beat it, he’s going to demand its use even if we don’t. And what chance have we got with a jury if the accused demands the detector and it backs up his plea of innocence?”
“Very slight, I’d say.”
“Less than slight, Joad. This Gyp Girard business yesterday. I know he killed Pete Bailey. You know it. The evidence you sent me was, under ordinary circumstances, conclusive. And yet I knew we’d lose the case. I wouldn’t have bothered bringing it to trial except for one thing.”
“And that one thing?”
“To get you here, Joad. There was no other way I could reach you, but I hoped that if you read of Girard’s acquittal, after the evidence you’d given me, you’d come around to find out what had happened.”
He got up and started to pace again. “Joad, I’m going mad. How is the underworld beating the machine? That’s what I want you to find out, and it’s the biggest job you’ve ever tackled. Take a year, take five years, but crack it, Joad.
“Look at the history of law enforcement. Always the law has been one jump ahead of the criminal in the field of science. Now the criminals—of Chicago, anyway—are one jump ahead of us. And if they stay that way, if we don’t get the answer, we’re headed for a new dark age, when it’ll no longer be safe for a man or a woman to walk down the street. The very foundations of our society can crumble. We’re up against something very evil and very powerful.”
Bela Joad took a cigarette from the dispenser on the desk; it lighted automatically as he picked it up. It was a green cigarette and he exhaled green smoke through his nostrils before he asked, almost disinterestedly, “Any ideas, Dyer?”
“I’ve had two, but I think I’ve eliminated both of them. One is that the machines are being tampered with. The other is that the technicians are being tampered with. But I’ve had both men and machines checked from every possible angle and can’t find a thing. On big cases I’ve taken special precautions. For example, the detector we used at the Girard trial; it was brand-new and I had it checked right in this office.” He chuckled. “I put Captain Burke under it and asked him if he was being faithful to his wife. He said he was and it nearly broke the needle. I had it taken to the courtroom under special guard.”
“And the technician who used it?”
“I used it myself. Took a course in it, evenings, for four months.”
Bela Joad nodded. “So it isn’t the machine and it isn’t the operator. That’s eliminated, and I can start from there.”
“How long will it take you, Joad?”
The little man in the red suit shrugged. “I haven’t any idea.”
“Is there any help I can give you? Anything you want to start on?”
“Just one thing, Dyer. I want a list of the criminals who have beaten the detector and a dossier on each. Just the ones you’re morally sure actually committed the crimes you questioned them about. If there’s any reasonable doubt, leave them off the list. How long will it take to get it ready?”
“It’s ready now; I had it made up on the chance that you’d come here. And it’s a long report, so I had it microed down for you.” He handed Bela Joad a small envelope.
Joad said, “Thank you. I won’t contact you till I have something or until I want your cooperation. I think first I’m going to stage a murder, and then have you question the murderer.”
Dyer Rand’s eyes went wide. “Whom are you going to have murdered?”
Bela Joad smiled. “Me,” he said.
He took the envelope Rand had given him back to his hotel and spent several hours studying the microfilms through his pocket micrographer, memorizing their contents thoroughly. Then he burned both films and envelope.
After that Bela Joad paid his hotel bill and disappeared, but a little man who resembled Bela Joad only slightly rented a cheap room under the name of Martin Blue. The room was on Lake Shore Drive, which was then the heart of Chicago’s underworld.
The underworld of Chicago had changed less, in fifty years, than one would think. Human vices do not change, or at least they change but slowly. True, certain crimes had diminished greatly but on the other hand, gambling had increased. Greater social security than any country had hitherto known was, perhaps, a factor. One no longer needed to save for old age as, in days gone by, a few people did.
Gambling was a lush field for the crooks and they cultivated the field well. Improved technology had increased the number of ways of gambling and it had increased the efficiency of ways of making gambling crooked. Crooked gambling was big business and underworld wars and killings occurred over territorial rights, just as they had occurred over such rights in the far back days of Prohibition when alcohol was king. There was still alcohol, but it was of lesser importance now. People were learning to drink more moderately. And drugs were passe, although there was still some traffic in them.