MCKAY'S STORY
After all, the Mystery Was Easily Explained; The Mystery as to the
identity of the man behind the operations of the liquor-smugglers. The
explanation of the whole situation was unfolded by Captain Folsom
several nights later at the Temple home. He had come from New York
City at the invitation of Mr. Temple, whose curiosity was aroused by
the tales of the boys, and who wanted to hear a connected account of
events. In this matter, Captain Folsom was willing to oblige, more
especially by reason of the aid given the government forces by the
boys.
J. B. McKay was the Man Higher Up. Higginbotham was his agent. This
man, one of the wealthiest realty operators in New York, was a born
gambler. He could never resist the impulse to engage in a venture that
would bring him big returns on his investment. In his realty
operations, this quality had earned him the name of "Take a Chance"
McKay.
When the Eighteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution was
adopted--the prohibition amendment--he watched developments. He felt
certain that liquor smuggling would spring up. In this he was not
mistaken. New York became a vast center of the traffic.
And as he beheld the great sums made by the men bringing liquor into
the country in defiance of the law, the thought came to McKay of how
these individual operators might be united by a strong and ruthless
man, their methods improved, and a vast fortune made by the man in
control. Thereupon he set about obtaining this control.
It was McKay, said Captain Folsom, who organized the motor truck
caravan which brought liquor across the Canadian border into Northern
New York to a distributing center, a night's run to the South, whence
it was sent across the land by express as china and glassware from a
china and glassware manufactory. This factory was mere camouflage. A
plant did exist, but it was nothing more than a storage warehouse at
which the motor trucks unloaded their cargoes.
Police protection was needed, of course, and police protection McKay
obtained. The factory so-called was in the open country, on the
outskirts of a tiny village. The local authorities were bribed. All
along the route from Canada, money was liberally spent in order to
prevent interference from police. Big cities en route were avoided.
The Highway of Grease ("grease" meaning bribery) led around all such,
for in them usually the police were incorruptible.
It was McKay, too, who organized the airplane carriage of liquor from
Canada to points outside New York City and to Stamford, Conn. One of
his planes only recently, explained Captain Folsom, had fallen in a
field near Croton-on-Hudson, with a valuable cargo of liquor aboard
after a night's flight from Canada.
But it was in organizing the importation of liquor from the Bahamas
that McKay reached his heights. He had assembled a fleet of old
schooners, many of which had seen better days and lacked business,
commanded by skippers who were in desperate need of money, and he had
taken advantage of their necessity by making what to them were
tempting offers. Some boats he had purchased outright, others
chartered for long periods.
These boats would work their way up the Atlantic coast to specified
points on the Jersey and Long Island coastlines. Then they would
discharge their cargoes, and men waiting alongshore with trucks would
carry the liquor to distributing points.
More recently, Captain Folsom added, McKay had begun to utilize radio.
To avoid the employment of more than a minimum force of men, was his
primary object. In the first place, big crews made a steady drain in
wages. Likewise, there was an added danger of mutiny when large crews
were employed. The men were bound to realize that, inasmuch as he was
violating the law, he could not appeal for legal retaliation in case
they should seize a vessel and dispose of it and its contents.
Therefore, he decided to depend on trusty skippers, whom he paid well,
and skeleton crews whom the skippers and mates could control.
Thus the radio-controlled boats, which were really not boats at all,
came into existence. And for their control, the station on Long Island
was established and two others, in isolated spots on the Jersey coast,
were in process of construction when the end came. At the time of
Higginbotham's discovery by the boys and their interference in McKay's
schemes, McKay was absent in New Jersey, personally superintending the
construction of the plants.
Higginbotham, in fleeing from the Brownell place, had neglected some
damaging correspondence which would have betrayed McKay's identity as
the controlling power in the liquor smuggling ring. He had fled to
his employer, and told him of the danger.
At the time, McKay had standing offshore an Eagle boat, built for
submarine chasing during the World War, but which two years earlier
the United States government had sold during a period of reduction of
expenses. This boat he had kept in the Bahamas, but recently had
brought North. He intended to use it to protect liquor runners as
escort, the assumption being that, thinking it one of themselves,
other boats of the "Dry Navy" would leave the vessels alone.
How he had obtained possession of the naval uniforms for his men
Captain Folsom did not know. However, the doughty captain assumed
McKay probably had bought discarded uniforms in some manner, or else
had had them made on order.
When Higginbotham reached him with the news, after working his way
through Brooklyn and New York in disguise, having lain hidden several
days in order to avoid the first heat of the search which he knew
would be made for him, McKay had decided to go to the Brownell place
in the sub chaser. He figured its appearance would disarm the
suspicions of the guards left by Lieutenant Summers, and that his men
in uniform would get close enough before their identities were
discovered to carry the place without force. Their superior numbers
would compel surrender on the part of a handful of guards.
Such proved to be the case. One of the guards, however, escaped and,
making his way to the Hampton radio station, had sent out the call
which brought the Nark to the scene just as McKay was making his
escape.