“Not mine,” Boyd said hastily. “Not mine. But it seems that some secretary put a bunch of file folders on the windowsill of their second-floor offices, and they fell off. At the same time, an agent was passing underneath, slipped on a banana peel and sat down on the sidewalk. Bingo, folders in lap.”
“Wonderful,” Malone said. “The hand of God.”
“The hand of something, for sure,” Boyd said. “Those folders contain all the ammunition we’ve ever needed to get after the FPM. Kickbacks, illegal arrangements with night-clubs, the whole works. We’re putting it together now, but it looks like a long, long term ahead for our friends from the FPM.”
And Boyd went to his desk, picked up a particularly large stack of papers. “This,” he said, “is really hot stuff.”
“What do you call the others?” Malone said. “Crime on ice?”
“The new show at the Winter Garden,” Boyd said blithely. “Don’t miss it if you can.”
“Sure,” Malone said. “So what’s so hot?”
Boyd smiled. “The police departments of seven major cities,” he said. “They’re all under attack either by the local prosecuting attorney or the state’s attorney general. It seems there’s a little graft and corruption going on.”
“This,” Malone said, “is not news.”
“It is to the people concerned,” Boyd said. “Four police chiefs have resigned, along with great handfuls of inspectors, captains and lieutenants. It’s making a lovely wingding all over the country, Ken.”