And now he would be in jail again, for two years.
Evalyn wasted no time finding a new cause. In June of ’32, to the dismay of her socialite friends, she began championing and funding the “Bonus Army,” the depression-racked World War veterans who were seeking aid from the government; the government, of course, responded with tear gas and terrorism. But God bless Evalyn and her good heart for trying to help. And the Bonus Army was a hell of a lot better place for her to spend her money than Gaston Bullock Means.
As for the Means tip about Violet Sharpe, Inspector Welch followed up on it, all right. Welch had already been suspicious, as Violet’s stories had continued to shift-the movie theater she said she’d attended March first evolving into a roadhouse called the Peanut Grill, the boyfriend’s name finally coming back to her-Ernie-but leading to her falsely identifying a cabbie named Brinkert when the real “Ernie” was a beau of hers named Miller.
Not surprisingly, Welch questioned Violet repeatedly, particularly in the month following the discovery of the corpse of a child, and on June 10-the day after a particularly pointed interrogation-Violet reacted with panic and anger to the news that Welch was on his way back for another round. At Englewood, she apparently poisoned herself, rather than be questioned by the persistent Welch again. Cyanide.
I felt a little bad about that. I’d helped focus Welch-a thick-headed third-degree artist if ever I met one-on the girl. Not that I figured she was blameless; but so much information died with her.
Professor Condon was considered a suspect, grilled by the cops, humiliated by the public (one letter promised Condon a look at a picture of the child’s kidnapper, and the enclosure was a small mirror); but he held up far better than Violet Sharpe. And much of the press attention he seemed to thrive on, pontificating at the drop of a hint.
Betty Gow’s beau, Red Johnson, was deported; Betty herself, when the Hopewell household broke up, went back to Scotland. The Whatelys stayed on, maintaining the estate for the eventual return of the Lindberghs, who had moved “temporarily” to Next Day Hill, the Morrow estate at Englewood, shortly after the discovery of the little body less than two miles from their Hopewell house.
But butler Ollie took sick-he became increasingly nervous, and troubled by internal pains; he survived an emergency operation for a perforated ulcer, then died four days later. His widow stayed in the Lindberghs’ employ, though her employers forever abandoned the unlucky Hopewell house, donating it to be a welfare center for children.
In mid-August, Anne Lindbergh gave her husband a second son. Lindy beseeched the press and public to allow the boy to “grow up normally”; at the Englewood estate, the cranky fox terrier Wahgoosh was made second- in-command to a surly police dog named Thor, who was known to shred the clothing and flesh of intruders. Kidnap threats against the infant were an everyday occurrence, the notes now requesting money to
There was something else, which struck me as very strange: when the name of the boy was finally released to the press, it turned out Anne and Charles had christened him “Jon.”
Even without the “h” out, that seemed a hell of a choice.
I quit the force and went into business for myself in December 1932. The Lindbergh case had long since become something I followed in the papers, like everybody else. I began to wonder if they’d ever find the kidnappers. If Capone had really been behind it-he was in the Atlanta pen, now, as Eliot predicted-I didn’t figure they ever would.
On the other hand, that ransom money was out there, and in 1933, the country went off the gold standard, meaning anybody with gold certificates had to turn them in by May first or face the legal consequences. That, thanks to Frank Wilson and Elmer Irey’s insistence on paying out the ransom in gold notes, ought to flush out the kidnappers.
Or the extortionists.
I continued to think it might have been an interloping group with inside info that had contacted Jafsie; with that kid buried in so half-ass a fashion, so near the estate, in woods that had been searched time and again, the kidnappers themselves seemed unlikely to risk going after any dough. They had fucked up that night, accidentally killing the kid maybe when the ladder broke, or when they were fleeing the house, and faded into the night and history.
At least, that was my theory. And when the gold notes were tracked, I’d be proven right or wrong.
A New York City dick named James Finn, a lieutenant, had been keeping in his Manhattan precinct office a large city map charting the path of the surfacing gold notes for over a year, when the gold-standard situation started crowding his map with pins.
I had never met Finn, but apparently he was in touch with Schwarzkopf and even Lindbergh in the early days-just another cop being kept at arm’s length.
Anyway, it was Finn who made the bust. September 19, 1933.
They only got one guy: a German carpenter in the Bronx. Following it from Chicago, in the papers, I figured Finn and the feds would soon shake the rest of the gang out of this Hauptmann guy.
The papers claimed he was Jafsie’s “Cemetery John.”
I had thought about calling Slim with my condolences, when I first heard about the body of his little boy turning up in those woods; but I figured I was the last person he’d want to hear from. I’d got very drunk, sitting by the phone, making my mind up, and got a little weepy, which was the rum talking.
Lindbergh called me, but better than two years later. Not long after they caught the kraut, in fact. A long- distance call so crackly it might have been from another planet, not New Jersey. On the other hand, my experiences in New Jersey led me to believe it just might be another planet.
“Nate,” Slim said, “I’ve been negligent in thanking you.”
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “I wish I could have done more.”
“You wanted to. Sometimes…I wonder how things might be different, if I’d listened to you.”
“Not much. Frankly…if you’ll forgive my bluntness, Colonel, it’s obvious your son died the night of the kidnapping. Nothing we could have done differently would change that.”
“Those evil bastards would be in jail now.”
“Maybe. But this clown Hauptmann will cough up his accomplices. Wait and see.”
I heard him sigh. Then he said: “That’s what we’re counting on. I understand you’re in private practice, now.”
“That’s right. A-l Detective Agency. I’m the president. Also the janitor.”
He laughed. “Same old Nate. If I ever need a detective, I know who to call.”
“Right,” I said. “Frank Wilson.”
He laughed again, wished me well, and I wished him and Anne and their new son the same. And that was that.
It felt strange, sitting on the sidelines, after having been in the midst of this famous affair, early on. Not that I minded. Sometimes I thought about Lindbergh; fairly frequently I thought about Evalyn. Bittersweet memories.
Nonetheless, it was reassuring knowing that this case was behind me-that it was, in fact, virtually solved.
3
26
It was a little after nine o’clock on a morning that, judging by what I could see past my scenic view of the el,
