"Derwent and Mahoney?" I asked. "What happened to them? And did Carr succeed in landing the men higher up?"
"Unfortunately," and Quinn smiled rather ruefully, "there is such a thing as the power of money. The government brought suit against the sugar companies implicated in the fraud and commenced criminal proceedings against the men directly responsible for the manipulation of the scales. (It developed that they had another equally lucrative method of using a piece of thin corset steel to alter the weights.) But the case was quashed upon the receipt of a check for more than two million dollars, covering back duties uncollected, so the personal indictments were allowed to lapse. It remains, however, the only investigation I ever heard of in which success was so signal and the amount involved so large.
"Todd, of the Department of Justice, handled a big affair not long afterward, but, while some of the details were even more unusual and exciting, the theft was only a paltry two hundred and fifty thousand dollars."
"Which case was that?"
"The looting of the Central Trust Company," replied the former operative, rising and stretching himself. "Get along with you. It's time for me to lock up."
XXII
"THE LOOTING OF THE C. T. C."
There was a wintry quality in the night itself that made a comfortable chair and an open fire distinctly worth the payment of a luxury tax. Add to this the fact that the chairs in the library den of William J. Quinn—formerly "Bill Quinn, United States Secret Service"—were roomy and inviting, while the fire fairly crackled with good cheer, and you'll know why the conversation, after a particularly good dinner on the evening in question, was punctuated by pauses and liberally interlarded with silences.