The Tomb That Ruth Built (A Mickey Rawlings Mystery)

by Troy Soos

  He bared his teeth in that wolf-like leer of his. “What—you afraid you’re gonna get jumped? I don’t need to set you up like that. I told you: I can get to you anytime, anyplace.”

  “Following me from the ballpark is no great accomplishment.” I didn’t know what he was up to, but I knew it wasn’t going to be good. I figured if I failed to cooperate, it might at least throw him off his game a little.

  Kessler’s smile, fake as it was, vanished. “Hey! I got tipsters all over the five boroughs. There ain’t a ballplayer or a jockey or a fighter does anything in this city that I don’t know about.”

  That explained how he knew I’d be at Katie Day’s, I thought. With Rothstein’s penchant for fixing every kind of sporting event, it made sense that he kept tabs on anyone he might be able to bribe or blackmail into helping him.

  I crossed my arms and stood my ground. “If you have something to say to me, you can say it right here. But make it quick.”

  Kessler was clearly taken aback. This encounter was not going at all as he had planned. “Look,” he said. “You’re misunderstanding me. See, we thought you could be scared off the Pollard thing, but we was wrong. So I got a little something for you from my boss.” He reached into his jacket and I prepared to spring at him if a gun emerged. With two fingers, he pulled a thick manila envelope partway out of an inside pocket, just enough for me to see. “Your salary ain’t much,” he went on. “We figure we could help you out with that—give you a little bonus, you might say. And all you need to do to earn it is nothin’.” He eyed me meaningfully. “And I mean absolutely nothin’. If you take this, and go poking into Spats Pollard again, we’ll take a refund outta your dead hide.” Baring his teeth again, he added, “I don’t expect you want me to hand this over to you in front of the whole world to see. You pick a place, we’ll step inside, and you’ll find yourself with a nice chunk of pocket money.”

  I didn’t budge. “You tell Arnold Rothstein I don’t need his money. And if anything does happen to me, friends of mine are going to come looking for you, Leo Kessler.”

  Mentioning those names was like a one-two punch to Kessler’s gut. He stammered, “Have it your way... I was just relaying the offer… But if you don’t want…” Kessler made sure the envelope was tucked back securely in his pocket and began inching backwards. “We’ll be seeing each other again.” He tugged down his hat, turned, and strutted away.

  I had no doubt that we would meet again, but I figured it wouldn’t be for a while. Kessler would want to find out how I knew his name and of his connection to Rothstein. Before he could do anything more, he’d have to find out how much I really knew and if I really had the “friends” that I’d mentioned. That should buy me some time—and I didn’t think I’d need much more of it, because I felt I was close to a solution.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The one-week road trip was something of a respite for me. Away from New York, I thought over everything that had been going on this year, from my role on the Yankees, to the Spats Pollard murder, to my life with Margie.

  While I was away, I telephoned Margie every day. During my absence she stayed in a bungalow at the Griffith studio, as we’d discussed, and she had seen nothing of Leo Kessler. I didn’t expect that she would, since it would probably take him some time to sort through what I had said to him, but I was reassured to know she was safe.

  In Washington, I not only had time to think, I had a quiet hotel room in which to do it. During our stay in the nation’s capital, Babe Ruth barely spent a minute in the team’s quarters. Miller Huggins could hardly punish him for breaking curfew, though, because on two of those nights Ruth stayed at the White House as a guest of the president. Ruth later told me about the poker game he’d played in the Yellow Oval Room. The card players included President Harding, Secretary of the Navy Edwin Denby, Attorney General Harry Daugherty, whose son Draper had briefly been named as a suspect in the Dot King murder, and several senators whose names Ruth couldn’t remember. As they played cards and smoked cigars, Mrs. Harding mixed cocktails for the men. It was no secret that Harding liked his whiskey, and the Babe told me that some of the president’s best booze was confiscated bootleg liquor that had been diverted to the White House by the Treasury Department’s Prohibition Unit.

  During our three-game series against the Athletics, I did have to share a hotel room with Ruth. He never made it in exactly by curfew, but only missed it enough to irritate Huggins. He always arrived in time to get a good night’s sleep, and he always came in sober. The Babe was keeping to his promise that he would devote himself to baseball this season. His batting average topped .350, he’d slammed ten home runs, and no one was telling him to change a thing. The two of us had a number of conversations in Philadelphia, mostly about baseball and how we were going to demolish the rest of the American League this year.

  I also asked Ruth again about making the movie for Tom Van Dusen. He agreed that he would sign a contract with the Griffith Studio but wouldn’t do any filming until the baseball season was over. His overriding priority was to lead the New York Yankees to the team’s first world’s championship. I was delighted to hear him so optimistic and so dedicated.

  I let Margie know about the Babe’s answer so that she could relay it to Van Dusen. She was happy at the news and grateful that I’d spoken to him. There was more that I had to tell her, and I hoped it would make her even happier, but it would have to wait until the team returned to New York.

  By the time the Yankees did pull into Pennsylvania Station again, the entire ball club was riding high. We had extended our lead in the standings, and confidence was growing that we would make it to the World Series. It seemed to me that everything was going as well as could be—except for that nagging problem of the dead Spats Pollard and the live Leo Kessler.

  Early in the morning of my first full day back home, Karl Landfors telephoned and said he thought he could help with my predicament. “I want you to meet somebody,” he said. “He might be able to provide some information.”

  “Another gangster?” I asked.

  “Oh, much better than that,” Landfors replied smugly. “A writer!”

  * * *

  In the afternoon, with no game scheduled, I walked beside Karl Landfors through a light, chilly drizzle down Broadway toward the southern tip of Manhattan. Both of us were in good moods, although I worked hard not to reveal the reason for mine. As much as I wanted to share my news with Landfors, I knew I should wait for another time.

  Landfors, for his part, was as exuberant as a little boy on his way to a county fair. The writer we were about to meet was evidently a hero to him, the kind of muckraking journalist Landfors himself aspired to be. According to Landfors, the man had been writing exposes since the 1890s, most notably a series in Harper’s Weekly that uncovered election fraud by Tammany Hall and rampant police corruption. Those articles helped lead to an investigation by the state senate, the election of a reform mayor, and a house-cleaning of the New York City Police Department. It also led to a number of death threats directed at the man who revealed the extortion, bribery, and graft by which the city had been operating. Undaunted, he had continued to monitor the activities of police, politicians, and criminals over the years, and Landfors believed he could help me unravel a few matters with the Pollard case.

  When Landfors had told me we were going to meet a writer, I’d initially wondered if we’d be visiting the squalid type of place where he’d been staying in Greenwich Village. It was a pleasant surprise when we arrived at a well-maintained home on Pearl Street in the Battery. The architecture of the house was of such an antiquated style that it might have been built by one of the more affluent of the early Dutch settlers who’d come to the island in the 1600s. The three-story structure was topped by a hipped roof with sloping sides and a railing around the top. Its yellow brick exterior featured subtle embellishments of granite and marble, with freshly painted black ironwork.

  We were greeted at the door by a middle-aged
housekeeper with a cheerful face and a welcoming demeanor. She led us through a wide hallway to a library at the rear of the home. From all that I could see, the furnishings were elegant but not ostentatious. Everything appeared comfortable, orderly, and meticulously clean.

  When we reached the open door to the library, it occurred to me that Landfors had never mentioned the name of the man we’d come to see. He had been so busy regaling me with the famous writer’s accomplishments, that he had omitted that piece of information.

  The library was of modest size, its Sheraton style furniture was minimal, and the room was completely lacking in feminine touches. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases were built into three of its walls. Even that wasn’t enough shelf space, for many volumes had to be wedged in horizontally atop other books. These weren’t gilt-and-leather volumes displayed for decoration or to impress visitors; these had the used appearance of books that had been read and studied.

  Seated at a mahogany desk was a silver-haired man writing in a journal with a fat fountain pen. He had thick, old-fashioned Franz Josef whiskers that swooped down from his sideburns and over his lip. When he saw us, he removed a pair of small, wire-rimmed spectacles from his face and stood. His clothes were as quaint as his facial hair; he wore a pearl gray cutaway suit with a high stiff collar and a Windsor tie.

  “You must be Mickey Rawlings,” he said with an easy smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Marshall Webb.” He was in his seventies, a good six feet tall, trim, and had a strong handshake. Except for the regal whiskers, he reminded me a bit of Connie Mack.

  Like the room itself, Webb’s manner was gracious if a bit formal. He greeted Karl Landfors like an old friend and asked the housekeeper to bring us coffee and tea. When she left, Landfors and I took chairs and Webb sat back down at his desk.

  Looking directly at me with clear, intelligent eyes, Webb said, “Karl has explained your situation to me. I hope you don’t mind him confiding in me; I assure you I can be discrete.” When I said I’d be grateful for his advice, he asked, “What can I help you with?”

  “Well, I think I’m getting close to figuring this out. But I’m not sure who I can go to about it. I’d like to pass it on to the police, but the detective who’s supposed to be working the case seems determined to do absolutely nothing. That has me stymied, and it makes me suspicious. I can’t imagine a police officer intentionally letting a murder go unsolved unless he’s getting paid to look the other way.”

  Webb mulled that over for a moment before answering. “He could be an honest cop who’s simply handcuffed, so to speak.”

  “How so?”

  “The murdered man was a bootlegger, correct? With underworld ties?”

  “Yes,” I answered. “There’s no doubt about that.”

  “Illegal liquor is a big business in New York—and everyone gets a share.” Webb toyed with the fountain pen as he proceeded to explain. “In order to avoid police raids and remain in operation, a speakeasy in this city typically pays a hundred dollars a week to the local precinct captain. Bootlegging is considered a service instead of a real crime, so the police generally have no qualms about taking their cut—after all, bootleggers have ‘customers,’ not ‘victims.’ ” He laid the fountain pen on the journal. “The problem comes when there’s a disagreement between bootleggers. Since their business is illegal, they can’t take their disputes to court. So they settle their problems with guns and knives and bombs. Investigating the violence can present a quandary for the police: How do they go after someone who is paying them graft? Even if a particular officer isn’t the recipient, his superiors might be, so he’s stymied.”

  The housekeeper brought us the drinks and a plate of scones. Webb and I opted for coffee, while Landfors accepted a cup of tea.

  When we were left alone again, Webb asked me, “What’s the name of this detective?”

  “Jim Luntz, Forty-fourth precinct.”

  He jotted a note. “I’ll make some inquiries. I still have some connections.”

  Landfors gushed like a baseball fan talking about his favorite ballplayer’s heroics, “There’s nothing Marshall Webb can’t find out—especially when it comes to police corruption. After his Harper’s Weekly series was published, so many police were under indictment that the city had to cancel the annual police parade!”

  Webb smiled, laugh lines crinkling the corners of his eyes. “To be fair, Teddy Roosevelt was responsible for canceling that parade—1895, it was, the year he became police commissioner.” With an approving nod, he added, “T. R. did a fine job cleaning up the department.” He spread his long-fingered hands. “But, of course, corruption is an evil that’s never kept in check for very long.”

  “Speaking of evil,” I said, “another question I have is whether or not Arnold Rothstein is involved. A couple of the men I’ve encountered in this case have connections to him.”

  “Rothstein,” repeated Webb, almost choking on the name. He ran a finger over his whiskers as if trying to comb Arnold Rothstein out of them. “If there’s a major crime in this city, there’s a good chance he’s involved—but never at the street level. Rothstein is a financier and a mentor to up-and-coming criminals. They call him ‘The Brain.’ Part of his genius is that his connections go far beyond the usual gangs, who limit their memberships to their own ethnic groups. Rothstein takes in Jews, Italians, Irish—anybody who can make money for him. The only color he sees is green. He’ll provide financing for all sorts of enterprises, and he’ll give orders for his henchman to carry out, but you won’t see him directly involved in street crimes.”

  Landfors put his tea cup on the saucer he’d been balancing on his knee. “I have a theory,” he said. “What about Jacob Ruppert? With Prohibition in effect, Ruppert no longer has an outlet for his brewery. Perhaps he went into partnership with some bootleggers—they’re selling the beer right in his ballpark.”

  It didn’t sound like a particularly well-considered theory to me. Landfors simply had a natural suspicion of any wealthy boss or owner. On the other hand, the idea wasn’t impossible.

  Webb gave Landfors the courtesy of appearing to consider the notion carefully. “Jacob Ruppert was quite active campaigning against Prohibition,” he said. “And then he lobbied for increasing the permitted alcohol content in near beer. But as far as I know, he was open and aboveboard in all those efforts—and when they failed, he complied with the new law. Besides, the breweries have converted to making malt syrup now, and they’re doing quite a good business with the new product.” Malt syrup, perfectly legal, was used to make homebrewed beer.

  Landfors appeared disappointed. He comforted himself with a scone and a sip of tea.

  A hallway clock chimed the hour. Webb smiled and said, “I’m sorry I can’t speak with you longer. I promised my wife I’d help her at Colden House—it’s a shelter she runs not far from here. There’s always something that needs attention.” He didn’t sound at all reluctant to go, and he spoke lovingly of his wife as he briefly told us about her work at the women’s shelter.

  Landfors and I stood and thanked him for his time.

  “I promise I’ll look into these matters,” Webb said to me. “Can I contact you through Karl?”

  “That would be best,” I said. “I have to go on the road again soon.”

  “Well, gentlemen,” said Webb, adjusting the perfectly tied knot of his tie. “Feel free to stay and enjoy your tea and coffee. But I’m off to see Rebecca.”

  I noticed there was an eager glint in his eyes like a young suitor courting his first sweetheart. It was touching to see someone of his age so obviously still in love. I hoped Margie and I would be like that.

  * * *

  That night, I put into action the plan I’d been concocting for more than a week. I’d gone over it a hundred times, and revised it a hundred more. By now, I had every detail worked out to perfection—in my imagination, at least.

  The evening started well. When Margie got home from work, I surprised her by telling her
that we were going to have a night out. It would be our first since we’d been to the Club Durant. She dressed for the occasion in a stylish golden frock with white embroidery and a scoop collar that I knew would be a distraction for me. I donned a suit that I knew she liked; it took several attempts to knot the tie, however, since my fingers were feeling about as nimble as stone.

  I kept our destination a secret, even whispering it to the taxi cab driver so she wouldn’t hear. The trip took more than an hour, and the taxi meter ticked off quite a fare, but this was a special night and well worth the cost.

  When the cab turned into the sandy drive of the Sea Dip Hotel on Coney Island, Margie exclaimed, “What a sweet idea!”

  “I thought you might like it,” I said, my voice trailing as I saw the condition of the place. The hotel hadn’t aged well over the past decade, and hardly looked as I remembered. Several windows were boarded over, there was little paint remaining on the weathered exterior, and a flag flying from a rooftop turret was in tatters.

  Margie went on, “The place where we first met. Well, not ‘met’ because we met at the Vitagraph. But where we first had dinner. And danced.” She laughed. “Tried to dance.” For some reason, she sounded as flustered as I felt. Was my nervousness contagious, or did she suspect something?

  After paying the cab driver, we went up the creaking porch and found that the rundown lobby was nearly empty. I began to wonder if the place was still in operation, and was disappointed that the evening I had envisioned wasn’t taken shape as I had hoped. The Sea Dip Hotel had once been one of the jewels of Coney Island, with a sumptuous dining room and first-rate service. Now it had deteriorated to just another seaside ghost of a place that had once been full of life. I was considering a change of venue, but Margie remained enthusiastic, so we went inside. An elderly clerk, incongruously dressed in a formal morning coat with striped trousers, was absorbed in a newspaper. I asked him if the dining room was still serving dinner.