Collins, Max Allan - Nathan Heller 08 (21 page)

“What do you want with me, Moran?”

“I like ‘Jim’ better. You’re readin’ a threat into this, Nate. No threat. I
am
your friend. And I admire ya for lookin’ inta this killin’.”

“You do?”

He sat back, viewed me appraisingly. “What are ya doin’ goin’ aroun’ the dock board, anyway? Three of the five members are ex-Huey bodyguards, and Seymour Weiss hisself is head man. What a setup for dope and other smugglin’ payoffs, and general waterfront shakedowns…. Those boys must be gettin’ nice and rich—even a dumbbell like Messina.”

“I hear
all
the bodyguards got cushy jobs.”

“That’s the truth. Big George McCracken? He’s buildin’ superintendent out at LSU, now—soakin’ up this federal money that’s flowin’ again. Murphy Roden got appointed assistant superintendent of the state coppers.”

“And none of ’em are going to like me poking around in this case. Not when maybe they accidentally shot their boss.”

He looked at me over the tinted glasses. “
If
it was an accident.”

“What are you saying?”

He shrugged. His voice was so soft it was barely audible. “I’m not saying anything. But sottiethin’s been botherin’ me a long, long time…and you’re the first person who I can maybe risk sharin’ it with.”

“Sharing what?”

He sat forward, keeping his voice sotto. “Last year, ’round when you came callin’, some of these guys bringin’ them Chief slot machines down from Chicago was shootin’ their mouths off to Dandy Phil about the Cermak rubout”

The back of my neck began to tingle.

“They said to Dandy Phil, ‘If Huey Long’s givin’ ya money trouble, you oughta do what Frank Nitti done.’ And Dandy Phil says, ‘What?’ And they tell Dandy Phil, ‘Nitti bumped him.’ And Dandy Phil says, ‘You’re kiddin’.’ And they say, ‘Kiddin’ my ass! He bumped off the goddamn mayor of Chicago!’”

It was true. Most people thought a crazed assassin named Zangara had missed, when he shot Mayor Cermak, who’d been standing near FDR at a rally for the President-elect at Miami in 1932. Others—like me—knew that Roosevelt was not Zangara’s target; knew that Zangara had been a one-man Sicilian suicide squad out to avenge the corrupt Cermak’s own failed attempt to have Capone’s successor, Frank Nitti, killed.

“Are you listenin’, Nate?”

I nodded numbly.

“Anyway, they told Dandy Phil, ‘Do it right, set it up from the inside, and the most important thing—find yourself a patsy. Do that, and it’ll get written off as a political assassination.’”

“When…when was this?”

“When they was bringin’ down one of the first loads of them Chiefs. Probably a few weeks before you come down, last year. Of course, they was prob’ly jus’ shootin’ off their big mouths…. You
are
familiar with the Cermak hit, Chicago boy like you?”

“I’m familiar with it,” I said. “Too familiar.”

“And why’s that?”

I could barely get the words out. “I was there—in Miami. I was working as one of Cermak’s bodyguards.”

“Ouch! Remind me not to hire you for protection,” Diamond Jim said, bugging his eyes. “Aw! Here’s the waiter. Hope you’re hungry, Nate….”

State Police Headquarters was on the outskirts of Baton Rouge, out Florida Boulevard, in a flat, lushly wooded area. The building was new—a V-shaped white-washed brick two-story with its blunt bottom facing Foster Drive. I pulled my rental Ford into a driveway that divided to form a circle with a garden in the middle. Like the dock board building, this was a pedestrian structure whose appearance was gussied up: vivid flower beds were all around it, with moss-draped oaks here and there, providing a Louisianian touch.

Over the two front doors in the blunt bottom of the V were the bas-relief words: louisiana state police. A pair of troopers in spiffy green-and-black uniforms were coming out as I went in. At the reception counter inside the front door, a policewoman in gray sent me down the left wing of the V, where on either side was a row of offices with frosted glass and names.

One of them was
MURPHY RODEN, ASSISTANT SUPERINTENDENT
.

I knocked.

“Come on in,” Murphy’s voice said.

I stepped inside. Blond, rugged Roden, looking fit and trim as ever in white shirt and blue tie, was on the phone, swiveled to one side in his desk chair, looking out the window at the driveway flower garden.

His office was the opposite of Messina’s: half a dozen file cabinets, a desk cluttered with paperwork and folders, and numerous framed photos of Murphy with the likes of the late Governor O.K. Allen, current Governor Leche and, of course, the Kingfish. There were also watercolor prints of aircraft from the World War on one wall, and a model Fokker atop one of the file cabinets.

“I’ll be jinks swing!” Murphy said, as he swiveled around just enough to see me; his brown eyes lighted up. Into the phone, he said, “I’ll get back to ya, Ted—ol’ pal of mine just dropped by.”

He hung up, stood behind the desk and stretched his hand across, grinning. “I wondered when you’d get around to me!”

I shook his hand, pulled up a chair. “You heard I was in town?”

“Who hasn’t?” He sat. “You want some coffee?”

“No thanks. So what do you hear? Is somebody going to shoot me, for poking around?”

He rocked gently in his chair; his smile was wicked. “I don’t think they decided, yet—’cept maybe for Joe Messina.”

“I barely asked him a question,” I said. “He just blew the hell up.”

Murphy shrugged. “Sore point, with him. He’s tore up with the possibility he mighta shot Huey. They had him in a private madhouse for a couple weeks, while back.”

“No kidding?”

“If I’m lyin’, I’m dyin’. They had him in a jacket that buckles up in back, if ya get my drift—he bawled his head off all day, all night, hollerin’ about how he killed the best friend he ever had. Pitiful.”

“Did he?”

“Did he what, Nate?”

“Kill the best friend he ever had?”

Murphy rocked; his mouth was smiling, but his eyes weren’t. “What’s your angle on this one, kid?”

“Well, that kinda depends on who I’m talking to, Murph.”

He snorted a laugh. “I know that about you. But if you try the truth out on me, maybe I’ll try it out on you.”

“Sounds fair enough. I’m working as an impartial investigator, mutually acceptable to both the insurance company and Mrs. Long.”

“The double-indemnity issue, huh?”

“Right.”

His eyes narrowed. “Just how impartial are you?”

“I lean toward Mrs. Long, frankly. She got a raw deal on the financial end of the stick—seems to me all her late husband’s cronies are a hell of a lot more flush than she is.”

“Includin’ me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

Now his smile turned sly. “This is awful noble of ya, Nate, takin’ Mrs. Long’s part in this. How much is she slippin’ ya under the counter?”

I grinned. “Why, is that kind of thing just not done in Louisiana?”

He grinned back. “Why, hell, no. That’s for them graft-happy Northerners, up in Chicago and such.”

“Your turn.”

“Pardon?”

“The truth.”

He rocked in his chair. “First, answer me: you think this is goin’ to go public?”

“If I can prove something that contradicts the public record? Hard to say. It shouldn’t—it’s a private matter, between Mrs. Long and her insurance company. But I suppose there’s no guarantee the lid’ll stay on…. That would ultimately be up to Mrs. Long.”

“I don’t think she’d do that,” he said. “I don’t think she’d trade her martyred husband for a damn fool shot down by his own overzealous men.”

I said nothing; just waited for him to convince himself. He wanted to talk. I just had to sit and wait and let him.

Finally, he stopped rocking; sat forward. He folded his hands, prayerfully. “The truth is, Carl Weiss did shoot the Kingfish. I saw the gun in his hand. I saw him shoot the damn thing at him, point-blank.”

“And it’s that simple?”

He looked away from me. After a long time, he said, “I didn’t say it was…simple.”

“What is it, then?”

He gazed at me with eyes that were a hundred times more intelligent than Joe Messina’s but every bit as tortured.

“The doc shot him, all right, but it’s possible…just possible, mind you…that one of our bullets clipped Huey in the back, as he was runnin’ off.”

I sat forward. “But there was no talk of two wounds—just an entry and an exit….”

He shrugged. “All I can say is…and I never told a soul on earth this, Nate, goddamnit…I heard Huey cry out a second time. Not as loud. But as he was runnin’ away, he cried out, again.”

“With all those bullets flying, it wouldn’t be surprising if…”

“Nate, either way, it was that son of a bitch Carl Weiss’s fault. No doubt about it.” He slammed a fist on his desk and the paperwork shuddered. “But I have to wonder if one of our bullets didn’t, goddamnit, finish the job.”

“This is just a…feeling on your part. A hunch. A suspicion.”

“A fear,” he said. “And only one person would really know the answer.”

I knew.

“Dr. Vidrine,” I said.

“Vidrine,” Murphy agreed. “The man who operated on Huey. Maybe you should talk to him….”

I shook my head. “But
would
he talk to me? His public statements were that one bullet killed Huey—entry wound, exit wound, front, back. Not two
entry
wounds. Why the hell would he contradict himself, now?”

He blinked. “You mean, you don’t know?”

“Know what?”

His laugh was humorless. “Vidrine’s
already
disgraced. Governor Leche fired him from his job as superintendent at Charity Hospital, and he’s been demoted from dean to assistant professor, out at LSU. Who knows? Maybe if you go talk to him, he’ll come clean. Now, skeedaddle—I got criminals to catch.”

I stood. “I appreciate the lead.”

“No problem,” he said. “Let me know when you’re out from under, so we can go back to the French Quarter and find us a couple more college gals.”

The stalls of the French Market in the Vieux Carré stretched along Decatur and North Peters streets, from Barracks to St. Ann. Though it was late evening—approaching nine o’clock—the stalls under the dark pitched roof of the tawny shed with its decorative ventilation towers and endless row of pillars were hopping with buying and selling. It was Thursday night—time to buy Friday’s fish.

I wasn’t buying or selling; I was looking for something for nothing. Guess at heart I was still a Chicago cop.

At one end of the market was the Café Du Monde. Designed to provide weary teamsters with a rest stop, the café—and another, at the other end, the Morning Call—attracted all kinds. Farmers off wagons and trucks mingled in cheerful anonymity with posh couples in evening clothes, teenage lovers in sweaters and slacks and skirts, and the inevitable camera-carrying tourists.

Dr. Arthur Vidrine was seated in a corner, with his back to the world. But in the mirror that began halfway up the white wooden wall, I could see his dark hair, oval face, cleft chin—and morose expression. He wore a white linen suit, like Dr. Carl Weiss had, one Sunday night last year.

I pulled out a chair at the little black table and sat down. “Thank you for seeing me,” I said.

“I appreciate the opportunity,” he said quietly. He gestured to his small cup of dark steaming liquid. “You must try the café au lait, though if you like your coffee strong, I would suggest the café noir.”

“You’re the doctor,” I said.

A young waiter in white shirt, black bow tie and black pants came for my order. I tried a serving of the powdered-sugar pastries everybody was eating. The waiter called them beignets, and said they were doughnuts, but he wasn’t fooling me: they were square and puffy, with no hole.

“I’m pleased you caught me at the college this afternoon,” Vidrine said between sips.

I’d phoned his office.

“I’m pleased you want to cooperate. I frankly had my doubts.”

He sat forward, his dark eyes burning. “You know I’ve been demoted to a subordinate professorship.”

“Yes…”

He glanced around furtively; the place was about half full. “You weren’t followed?”

“I made sure.”

“But you could be mistaken….”

“No I do this for a living. Nobody in this swamp has the detective skills of a Post Toasties Junior G-Man.”

That actually made him smile, a little.

“Good,” he said. “You know, I can blow the roof off this lousy state….”

“You mind if I take notes? Or would that be indiscreet?”

“Go ahead. As long as you weren’t followed.” He leaned forward even further, as I got out my little notebook. “LSU is riddled with corruption. This laughable president, James Monroe Smith, is embezzling state funds.”

I remembered President Smith: that ass-kissing yes-man I’d seen in Huey’s twenty-fourth-floor suite at the capitol.

“Really?” I asked. “How do you know this?”

He sneered a tiny smile. “I still have
some
friends. Smith is speculating in whiskey-warehouse receipts….”

“The president of LSU is investing in barrels of whiskey?”

“That’s just the beginning. He’s also playing the Stock Exchange. Trading in hundreds of thousands of dollars of wheat….”

“This is fascinating, doctor, but—”

“And Smith’s crony, this ‘Big George’ McCracken, a former Long bodyguard as you probably know, is up to his eyeballs in kickbacks from contractors and supply houses. McCracken’s also been using WPA workers and materials on his own fancy estate,
and
those of his pals, including Governor Leche himself!”

I hoped my smile was sympathetic. “Dr. Vidrine—this is impressive, and these acts are undoubtedly criminal—and, coming from Chicago, I have no trouble grasping the concept of rampant graft. But it’s
not
the information I’m after.”

The waiter brought me my café noir and my “doughnuts.” I tasted one; it was warm and sweet and delicious.

“Help yourself, doc,” I said.

But he wasn’t in the mood.

“You don’t realize what you’re asking,” he said.

“You want to get even with Long’s political heirs,” I said, and shrugged. “Swell. But corruption in Louisiana ain’t exactly a news flash. You want to do something to get back at ’em? Then you need to tell me what you know about the Long killing.”

Vidrine stared into the little cup of creamy coffee. His face was white; his eyes haunted.

“I found a bullet,” he said softly.

I leaned forward. “What?”

“Inside Senator Long.” He sighed. Shook his head. “I found a bullet.”

“Jesus.”

I could barely hear him over the din of conversation and the clatter of dishes being cleared.

He didn’t look at me as he spoke. “I…I don’t have to tell you about the chaotic atmosphere at the hospital, that night—you were there. What you may not know is there were men standing around as we operated, Huey’s men, bodyguards and political hacks, men who looked like gangsters, who refused to leave. The pressure, the conditions, were appalling.”

He sighed again, closed his eyes, pressed thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose. Then he opened his eyes, sipped his coffee and continued.

“At any rate, two wounds had been noted—and we began the operation under the assumption that the frontal wound was an entry wound and the anterior an exit wound.”

“But once you found that bullet,” I said, “you didn’t have an entry and exit wound anymore—you had
two
entry wounds….”

“It could have meant that,” Vidrine admitted, just the slightest defensive tone creeping in. “But the anterior wound might not have been a penetrating one. It looked more like a bruise, or a small trauma….”

“And with Huey opened up, you couldn’t exactly flip him over to have a closer look.”

Vidrine nodded glumly. He sipped his café au lait; the cup looked like a thimble in a large hand that, frankly, did not look like a surgeon’s.

“Even then,” he said, “even during the operation, I knew I might have made a wrong diagnosis, a tragic decision. If I was dealing with two entry wounds, I’d…” He shook his head. “…I’d condemned the Senator to death.”

“What did you do?”

His eyes pleaded for understanding. “What
could
I do? I…I palmed the bullet.”

The doctor held out his other hand: in it were two spent slugs.

One of the slugs appeared to be a .38, the other a .45.

My mind was doing flip-flops. “Dr. Carl Weiss’s gun was a .32 Browning,” I said.

“And what did the bodyguards carry?” Vidrine asked, sarcasm faintly etching his words.

“They packed .38s and .45s,” I said numbly. “You said you found
one
bullet…. I can count: that’s two.”

He dropped the gray slugs on the table, next to the little plate of square doughnuts.

“The second bullet came from the mortuary,” Vidrine said.

“The mortuary?”

He nodded. “The body had been taken to Rabenhorst Funeral Home. Shortly before dawn, I got my nerve up and went there. Told the undertakers I needed a few moments with the Senator’s body. I undid the sutures, put on rubber gloves and did a little…impromptu autopsy. Nothing major—just probed the retroperitoneal space, got lucky and came up with it.”