Official Policy
Loosely inspired by true events.
The rhythmic clatter of train wheels echoed in Emory Fitch’s ears, but it couldn’t drown out the pounding in his chest. The leather satchel in his lap pressed into his thighs, its buckles worn from weeks of desperate handling. It wasn’t the weight of the files inside that made his legs ache—it was the weight of what they meant.
Somewhere behind him, Treasury agents were closing in. He’d spotted them in Cleveland: two men in dark coats, their eyes sweeping the platform. They lingered near the schedules, their polished shoes conspicuous among the scuffed leather boots of everyday travelers. Emory had avoided their gaze, slipping into the train car just as the whistle blew.
The train lurched, and he tightened his grip on the satchel. Pittsburgh was the next stop—a crowded city with enough back alleys to keep him hidden. He had a meeting scheduled there, one that could change everything if he lived long enough to keep it.
He turned his head slightly, glancing at his reflection in the train window. His face was hollow, his eyes rimmed with sleepless red. The man staring back looked older than his thirty-six years.
Emory hadn’t always been this man—the kind who sweated through his shirts at the sound of footsteps behind him, who barely slept for fear of what awaited in the dark. When he joined the Prohibition Bureau as a chemist, he thought he’d be helping to save lives. Alcohol was a scourge, tearing families apart, fueling crime. If they could make industrial alcohol undrinkable, they could stop bootleggers from turning it into poison.
“It’s just chemistry,” Franklin Harrow had said one day in the lab, his tone as casual as if he were ordering lunch. “Add methanol to the formulas. Make it lethal.”
“What if they still drink it?” Emory had asked, though he already knew the answer.
Harrow didn’t look up from his papers. “Then they’ll learn not to.”
At first, Emory believed in the mission. The logic was clean, precise, the kind that fit neatly into formulas on a chalkboard. But by the winter of 1926, the reports were piling up: blindness, convulsions, agonizing deaths.
Louise Stanton had been twenty-three when she died. Emory had watched her seize in a hospital ward, her mother sobbing at her bedside. The young woman had collapsed at a New Year’s Eve party after drinking bootleg gin. By the time Emory arrived, she was blind, her optic nerves destroyed by methanol poisoning.
“She didn’t know,” her mother cried, gripping Louise’s limp hand. “She didn’t know it was poisoned.”
Emory stood in the corner, his notepad untouched. The doctor had muttered something about “an inevitable consequence,” but the words felt like a slap. Louise had been smiling in the photograph her mother clutched—a moment of joy frozen before her brutal death.
When Emory returned to the lab, he tried to alter the formulas, lowering the methanol concentration. Harrow noticed.
“Collateral damage,” Harrow said flatly, tossing Emory’s altered report onto the desk. “Sentimentality doesn’t belong here.”
That night, Emory began stealing files.
The diner in Pittsburgh was dim and smelled faintly of burnt coffee and onions. Emory sat in a booth near the back, his satchel tucked against his side. His eyes darted to the door every time the bell jingled, his nerves stretched thin.
The young man who finally entered looked out of place, his tweed jacket slightly too big and his hat pulled low over his ears. Harold Payne’s sharp eyes scanned the room before they landed on Emory, and he crossed the floor in quick strides.
“You’re Fitch?” Harold asked, sliding into the booth.
Emory nodded, pushing the satchel across the table. “It’s all here. The formulas, the reports, the death tolls.”
Harold opened the bag, rifling through its contents. His face paled as he read. “This is worse than we thought,” he murmured, his fingers trembling as he turned the pages.
“More than 10,000 dead,” Emory said quietly. “And counting.”
Harold glanced up. “Why come to us? Why now?”
“Because someone has to,” Emory replied. His voice cracked under the weight of his guilt. “It’s too late to save the ones who’ve already died. But it’s not too late to stop it.”
Harold closed the satchel and adjusted the strap on his shoulder. “This could bring down the whole Bureau.”
“That’s the idea,” Emory said, his voice bitter.
The sound of boots on the stairs froze them both. Heavy, deliberate, and far too close.
“They’re here,” Harold whispered, his voice tight with fear.
Emory rose abruptly, pulling Harold to his feet. “Go. Get this to Ida Tarbell! It’s the only way!”
“What about you?” Harold asked, his voice rising in panic.”
“I don’t matter. Go!” Harold replied.
Emory’s eyes darted to the window, the glass fogged with condensation. “Out the back. Run. Get to Tarbell. Get it published.”
For a moment, Harold hesitated, his knuckles white on the satchel’s handle. Then he nodded, shoved the back door open, and rushed into the night. Emory stayed by the door, his breath shallow as he reached for the bolt.
The agents burst in a moment later. Emory didn’t bother to run.
Harold’s boots slapped against the cobblestones as he sprinted through the alley, the satchel bouncing against his back. The cold air burned his lungs, his heart hammering with the rhythm of his feet.
Behind him, the agents shouted, their voices sharp and urgent. He turned a corner, slipping on the wet stones, his knee scraping as he stumbled.
The first gunshot rang out, splitting the night.
Harold fell forward, the satchel slipping from his shoulder as his hands hit the ground. He tried to crawl, his palms scraping against the cobblestones, but the second shot came before he could escape.
The satchel landed inches from his outstretched hand, its contents spilling into the rain-soaked alley.
The agents arrived moments later. One of them kicked the papers into a pile, the ink bleeding into the wet ground.
“Burn it,” one of them said coldly.
A match struck, its sulfuric bite mingling with the damp air. The flames licked hungrily at the edges of the files, curling the pages into blackened ash.
The fire consumed the last evidence of their crimes, just as bureaucracy would consume the names of its victims. Each page carried truths too heavy to hold, truths about a government that had poisoned its own people and buried the consequences in red tape and silence.
By some estimates, around 50,000 Americans would die from alcohol intentionally tainted by their government—the names of both the innocent and the guilty erased, their stories largely forgotten.
It wasn’t just the poison that killed them, but a nation who had abandoned the idea that government is supposed to protect the people and not the other way around.
No one was ever prosecuted for these crimes.
Disclaimer: This story is a fictionalized account inspired by real events, including the events and names of the people involved and may, for the sake of fictional expediency, also contain amalgamations of characters or wholly, made up characters used for creative purposes,. While the narrative incorporates historical figures and events to preserve the historical record, it includes fictionalized elements, characters, and dialogue. The story does not claim to represent the actual thoughts, actions, or experiences of any individual, living or deceased.
I didn't know any of this. OMG