The Interpretation of Murder

Chapter Fourteen

In the 1870s, a fanciful profusion of Victorian high Gothic sprang up on a triangular plot of land at the corner of Tenth Street and Sixth Avenue, contrasting incongruously with the otherwise disreputable workingman's neighborhood. The new polychromatic courthouse was a jumble of steeply sloping roofs, with gables and pinnacles jutting out at every height and angle; its watchtower was crowned by a 170-foot turret. A five-floor prison in the same style was attached to this courthouse, and to the jail was attached another grand edifice, which housed a marketplace. Collectively, the place was known as Jefferson Market; the conceit was that institutions of law and order ought not to be sequestered from those of daily life.

By day, criminal cases of great import were tried in the Jefferson Market courthouse. After hours, the same tribunal became the city's Night Court, where vice cases were processed. As a result, the Jefferson Market jail was occupied largely by prostitutes awaiting disposition and punishment. It was here, in this jail, that Littlemore found a frazzled but unhurt Betty on Wednesday evening.

She was in a large, crowded holding cell in the basement. Some twenty-five or thirty women were detained within, standing in small knots or sitting on long narrow benches against the walls.

The cell was divided between two classes of prisoner. There were about fifteen young women in working outfits like Betty's — simple dark, solid-colored skirts, down to their ankles, of course, and white long-sleeved blouses. These prisoners were from the shirtwaist factory where Betty had for half a day been an employee. A few of these girls were as young as thirteen.

Their colleagues were another dozen women, of various ages and far more colorful in their accoutrements and cosmetics. Most were loud and conspicuously at their ease, being familiar with the surroundings. One, however, was louder than the others, complaining to the guards and demanding to know how a woman in her circumstances could be kept in jail. Littlemore recognized her at once; it was Mrs Susan Merrill. She was the only one with a chair, which the others had deferentially yielded to her. Over her shoulders was a burgundy wrap, in her arms a baby, sleeping peacefully despite the uproar.

Littlemore's badge got him inside the jailhouse, but it couldn't get Betty out. They stood only a few inches from each other, separated by the floor-to-ceiling iron bars, speaking quietly. 'Your first day of work, Betty,' Littlemore said, 'and you went on strike?'

She had not gone on strike. When Betty arrived at the factory that morning, she went directly to the ninth floor and joined a hundred other girls sewing. There were, however, at least fifty empty stools in front of idle sewing machines. What had happened was this: the day before, a hundred fifty seamstresses had been fired for being 'union sympathizers.' That evening, in response, the International Ladies Garment Workers Union called a strike against Betty's factory. As the next morning wore on, a small band of laborers and unionists gathered in the street below, shouting up to the workers on the floors above.

'They called us scabs,' Betty explained. 'Now I know why they hired me so quick — they were replacing the union girls. I couldn't be a scab, Jimmy, could I?'

'I guess not,' said Littlemore, 'but what did they want to go and strike for anyway?'

'Oh, you wouldn't believe it. First of all, it's hot, like a furnace. Then they charge the girls rent — for everything: lockers, sewing machines, needles, stools to sit on. You don't get half the pay they promise you. Jimmy, there was a girl there worked seventy-two hours last week, and she made three dollars. Three dollars! That's — that's — how much is that?'

'Four cents an hour,' said Littlemore. 'That's bad.'

'And that's not the worst thing either. They lock all the doors to keep the girls working; you can't even go to the bathroom.'

'Geez, Betty, you should have just left. You didn't have to go and picket, with people smashing windows and all.'

Betty was half indignant, half confused. 'I didn't picket, Jimmy.'

'Well, what did they arrest you for?'

' 'Cause I quit. They told us we'd go to jail if we quit, but I didn't believe them. And nobody was smashing windows. The policemen were just beating people up.'

'Those weren't policemen.'

'Oh, yes, they were.'

'Oh, boy,' said Littlemore. 'I got to get you out of here.' He beckoned to one of the guards and explained to him that Betty was his girl and wasn't part of the strike at all; she was in the lockup by mistake. At the words 'my girl,' Betty looked down at the floor and smiled with embarrassment.

The guard, a pal of Littlemore's, answered penitently that his hands were tied. 'It ain't me, Jimmy,' he said. 'You got to talk to Becker.'

'Beck?' asked Littlemore, his eyes lighting up. 'Is Beck here?'

The guard led Littlemore down the hall to a room where five men were drinking, smoking, and playing a noisy game of cards beneath a flickering electric bulb. One of them was Sergeant Charles Becker, a bullet-headed fireplug of a man with a powerful baritone. Becker, a fifteen-year veteran on the force, worked the most vice-ridden precinct in Manhattan, the Tenderloin, where the city's glittering casinos and brothels, including Susan Merrill's, mixed with the gaudiest lobster palaces and vaudevilles. Becker's presence at the jail was a stroke of good fortune for Littlemore, who had spent six months as a beat officer in Becker's squad.

'Hey, Beck,' Littlemore called out.

'Littlemouse!' boomed Becker, dealing cards. 'Boys, meet my little brother detective from downtown. Jimmy, this here's Gyp, Whitey, Lefty, and Dago — you remember Dago, don't you?'

'Dago,' said the detective.

'Couple two-three years ago,' Becker told his cronies, referring to Littlemore, 'this guy solves a pump-and-jump for me. Hands me the perp' — this was pronounced poyp — 'who's been paying the price ever since. They always pay the price, boys. What you doing here, Jimmy, bird- watching?'

Becker heard him out, nodding, never taking his eyes from the poker table. With the roar of a man who savors a grand display of magnanimity, he ordered the guards to let out the detective's bird. Littlemore thanked Becker profoundly and hurried back to the cell, where he collected Betty. On their way out, Littlemore poked his head into the card room and thanked Becker again. 'Say, Beck,' he said. 'One more favor?'

'Name it, little brother,' replied Becker.

'There's a lady in there with a baby. Any chance we could let her out too?'

Becker stubbed out a cigarette. His voice remained casual, but the jocularity of Becker's cronies suddenly came to a halt. 'A lady?' asked Becker.

Littlemore knew something was wrong, but he didn't know what.

'He's talking about Susie, boss,' said Gyp, whose real name was Horowitz.

'Susie? Susie Merrill's not in my jail, is she, Whitey?' said Becker.

'She's in there, boss,' answered Whitey, whose real name was Seidenschner.

'You got something going with Susie, Jimmy?'

'No, Beck,' said Littlemore. 'I just thought — with her having a baby and all — '

'Uh-huh,' said Becker.

'Forget I said it,' Littlemore put in. 'I mean, if she — '

Becker bellowed to the guards to let Susie out. He added to this command several choice imprecations, expressing outrage at a baby's being locked up in his jail and yelling that if there was 'any more babes' in the lockup in future, they should be brought directly to him. This remark produced a gale of laughter from his crew. Littlemore decided he had better go. He thanked Becker a third time — this one generating no reply — and led Betty away.

Tenth Street was nearly deserted. A breeze stirred from the west. On the jailhouse steps, in the shadow of the massive Victorian edifice, Betty stopped. 'Do you know that woman?' she asked. 'The one with the baby?'

'Kind of.'

'But, Jimmy, she's a — she's a madam.'

'I know,' said Littlemore, grinning. 'I've been to her place.'

Betty slapped the detective across the jaw.

'Ow,' said Littlemore. 'I only went there to ask her some questions about the Riverford murder.'

'Oh, Jimmy, why didn't you say so?' asked Betty. She put her hands to her face, then his. She smiled. 'I'm sorry.'

They embraced. They were still embracing a minute later, when the heavy oaken doors to the jail creaked open and a shaft of light fell on them. Susan Merrill was in the doorway, burdened with the baby and a hat of enormous proportions. Littlemore helped her out the door. Betty asked to hold the baby, whom the older woman willingly gave over.

'So you're the one who sprung me,' Susie said to Littlemore. 'I guess you figure I owe you something now?'

'No, ma'am.'

Susie cocked her head to get a better look at the detective. Reclaiming the baby from Betty, she said, in a whisper so faint Littlemore could hardly hear it, 'You're going to get yourself killed.'

Neither Littlemore nor Betty responded.

'I know who you're looking for,' Susie went on, the words barely audible. 'March 18, 1907.'

'What?'

'I know who, and I know what. You don't know, but I know. I ain't doing nothin' for free, though.'

'What about March 18, 1907?'

'You find out. And you get him,' she hissed, with a venom so violent she put a hand over the baby's face as if to protect her from it.

'What about that day?' Littlemore pressed again.

'Ask next door,' whispered Susie Merrill, before disappearing into the gathering dusk.

Rose swept us out of the apartment — a kindness on her part. She certainly didn't want Freud involved in cleaning up. As for Brill, he looked as numb as a soldier with DaCosta's syndrome. He would not be coming to dinner, he said, and asked us to make an excuse for him.

Jones took the subway to his hotel, which was farther downtown and less expensive than ours, while Freud, Ferenczi, and I decided to walk to the Manhattan, cutting through the park to do so. It is extraordinary how empty New York City's largest park can be in the evening. At first we traded hypotheses about the extraordinary scene in Brill's apartment; then Freud asked Ferenczi and me how he ought to reply to President Hall's letter.

Ferenczi declared that we must send a denial at once, preferably by wire, explaining that the misconduct alleged against Freud was actually committed by Jones and Jung. The only question, as Ferenczi saw it, was whether Hall would take our word for it.

'You know Hall, Younger,' said Freud. 'What is your opinion?'

'President Hall would accept our word,' I answered, meaning that he would accept mine. 'But I have been wondering, Dr Freud, whether that might not be precisely what they want you to do.'

'Who?' asked Ferenczi.

'Whoever is behind this,' I said.

'I am not following,' said Ferenczi.

'I see what Younger means,' Freud replied. 'Whoever did this must know these allegations concern Jones and Jung, not myself. So: they induce me to incriminate my friends, at which point Hall can no longer say he is confronted by mere rumor. On the contrary, I will have corroborated the accusation, and Hall will be obliged to take responsible measures. Possibly he bars Jones and Jung from speaking next week. I keep my lectures, at the expense of disgracing two of my followers — the two best placed to carry my ideas to the world.'

'But you cannot say nothing,' Ferenczi protested, 'as if you are guilty party.'

Freud considered. 'We will deny the charges — but that is all we will do. I will send Hall a short letter stating the facts: I am married, I have never been dismissed from employment at any hospital, I have never been shot at, and so on. Younger, will that put you in an awkward position?'

I understood his question. He wanted to know if I would feel bound to inform Hall that while Freud was innocent of the charges, Jones and Jung were not. Naturally, I would do no such thing. 'Not at all, sir,' I answered.

'Good,' Freud concluded. 'After that, we leave it to Hall. If, for the sake of this "handsome donation," Hall is prepared to keep the truths of psychoanalysis from being taught at his university, then — you will forgive me, Younger — he is not an ally worth having, and America can go to the dogs.'

'President Hall will never agree to their terms,' I said, with greater conviction than I felt.

Outside the Jefferson Market jail, Betty Longobardi had five words for Jimmy Littlemore. 'Let's get out of here.'

Littlemore was not so eager to leave. He led Betty toward Sixth Avenue, with its river of men and women streaming north on their way home from work. At the corner, a few steps from the ornate courthouse entrance, Littlemore stopped and wouldn't budge. Over the earthshaking roar of an elevated train, he told Betty excitedly about his eventful day.

'She said you were going to get killed, Jimmy,' was Betty's reply, which struck Littlemore as less appreciative of his achievements than he had hoped.

'She also said we should ask next door,' he answered. 'It's got to be the courthouse. Come on; we're right here.'

'I don't want to.'

'It's a courthouse, Betty. Nothing can happen in a courthouse.'

Back inside, Littlemore showed his badge to the clerk, who told them where the records office was but expressed the opinion that nobody was likely to be there at this hour. After climbing up two flights of stairs and working their way through an empty maze of corridors, Littlemore and Betty came upon a door marked records. The door was locked, the room behind it dark. Breaking and entering was not the detective's ordinary modus operandi, but under the circumstances he felt justified. Betty glanced around nervously.

Littlemore jimmied the lock. Shutting the door behind them, he switched on an electric lamp. They were in a small office with one large desk. There was a rear exit. This was unlocked; it opened onto a more capacious storeroom. Here they saw cabinet after cabinet of labeled drawers. 'There are no dates,' said Betty. 'Only letters.'

'There'll be a calendar,' said Littlemore. 'There's always a calendar. Wait till I find it.'

It did not take him long. He returned to the desk, where there were two typewriters, blotters, inkwells — and a stack of leather-bound ledgers, each more than two feet in width. Littlemore opened the first one. Every page within represented a day in the life of the New York Supreme Court, Trial Term, Parts I through III. The pages that Littlemore flipped through all indicated dates in 1909. He opened the second ledger, which proved to be the calendar of 1908, and then the third. Leafing through its pages, he quickly came to March 18, 1907. He saw dozens of lines of case names and numbers, set down by a practiced hand in pen and ink, often crossed out or overwritten. He read aloud:

'Ten-fifteen a.m., day calendar, Part III: Wells v. Interborough R. T. Co. Truax, J. Okay, Wells. We've got to find Wells.' He rushed past Betty back to the storeroom, where in a drawer marked w he found the case of Wells v. IRT: a paper-clipped set of three pages. He looked through them. 'This is nothing,' he said. 'Maybe some subway accident. They never even got to court.'

He went back to the ledger. 'Bernstein v. same,' he read. 'Mensinub v. same. Selxas v. same. Boy, there's at least twenty of these IRT cases. I guess we have to look through them all:

'Maybe those aren't what we're looking for, Jimmy. Isn't there anything else?'

'Ten-fifteen a.m., Trial Term: Tarbles v. Tarbles. A divorce?'

'Is that all?' asked Betty.

'Ten-thirty a.m., Trial Term, Part I, Criminal Term (January Term continued). Fitzgerald, J. People v. Harry K. Thaw.'

They stared at each other. Betty and Littlemore recognized the name at once, as would anyone else in New York and nearly anyone in the country at that time. 'He's the one — ' said Betty.

' — who murdered the architect at Madison Square Garden,' Littlemore finished. Then he realized why Betty had stopped: heavy treading could be heard down the hall.

'Who is that?' she whispered.

'Turn off the light,' Littlemore instructed Betty, who was standing next to the lamp. She reached under the shade and fiddled nervously with the buttons, but the result of her efforts was to switch on another bulb. The footsteps stopped. Then they resumed; they were now undoubtedly approaching the records office.

'Oh, no,' said Betty. 'Let's hide in the storeroom.'

'I don't think so,' said Littlemore.

The footsteps grew close, halting just outside their door. The knob turned, and the door swung open. It was a short man in a fedora and a cheap-looking three-piece suit, the inner breast pocket of which bulged as if he were carrying a gun. 'Ain't there no men's room?' he asked.

'Second floor,' said Littlemore.

'Thanks,' said the man, slamming the door behind him.

'Come on,' said Littlemore, heading back into the filing room. The case of People v. Thaw occupied a good two dozen drawers. Littlemore found the trial transcript: there were thousands of pages in four-inch sheafs, bound by rubber bands. The transcript was illegible in places, with uneven letters, no punctuation, and whole sentences of garbled words. For the date of March 18, 1907, there were only fifty or sixty pages. Littlemore, flipping through them, quickly came upon several sheets of paper that looked different from the others: cleanly typed, organized into separate paragraphs, well punctuated. 'An affidavit,' he said.

'Oh, my gosh,' Betty replied. 'Look!' She was pointing to the words grasped me by the throat and whip.

Littlemore hurriedly turned back to the affidavit's first page. It was dated October 27, 1903, and began, Evelyn Nesbit, being duly sworn, says -

'That's Thaw's wife, the showgirl,' said Betty. Evelyn Nesbit had been described by more than one infatuated author of the time as the most beautiful girl that ever lived. She married Harry Thaw in 1905, a year before Thaw killed Stanford White.

'Before she was his wife,' said Littlemore. They kept reading:

I reside at the Savoy Hotel, Fifth Avenue and Fifty- ninth Street, in the City of New York. I am 18 years of age, having been born on Christmas Day, in the year 1884.

For several months prior to June 1903,1 had been at Dr Bell's Hospital at West Thirty-third Street, where

I had an operation performed on me for appendicitis, and during the month of June went to Europe at the request of Henry Kendall Thaw. Mr Thaw and I traveled throughout Holland, stopping at various places to catch connecting trains, and then we went to Munich, Germany. We then traveled through the Bavarian Highlands, finally going to the Austrian Tyrol. During all this time the said Thaw and myself were known as husband and wife, and were represented by the said Thaw, and known, under the name of Mr and Mrs Dellis.

'The snake,' said Betty.

'Well, at least he married her later,' said Littlemore.

After traveling together about five or six weeks, the said Thaw rented a castle in the Austrian Tyrol, situated about halfway up a very isolated mountain. This castle must have been built centuries ago, as the rooms and windows are all old-fashioned. I was assigned a bedroom for my personal use.

The first night I was very tired, and went to bed right after dinner. In the morning I had breakfast with the said Thaw. After breakfast Mr Thaw said he wished to tell me something, and asked me to step into my bedroom. I entered the room, when the said Thaw, without any provocation, grasped me by the throat and tore the bathrobe from my body. The said Thaw was in a terrific excited condition. His eyes were glaring, and he had in his right hand a cowhide whip. He seized hold of me and threw me on the bed. I was powerless and attempted to scream, but the said Thaw placed his fingers in my mouth and tried to choke me.

He then, without any provocation, and without the slightest reason, began to inflict on me several severe and violent blows with the cowhide whip. So brutally did he assault me that my skin was cut and bruised. I besought him to desist, but he refused. He stopped every minute or so to rest, and then renewed his attack on me.

I was absolutely in fear of my life; the servants could not hear my outcries, for the reason that my voice did not penetrate through the large castle, and so could not come to my succor. The said Thaw threatened to kill me, and by reason of his brutal attack, as I have described, I was unable to move.

The following morning Thaw again came into my bedroom and administered a castigation similar to the day before. He took a cowhide whip and belabored me with it on my bare skin, cutting the skin and leaving me in a fainting condition. I swooned and did not know how long after I returned to consciousness.

'How horrible,' said Betty. 'But she married him — why?' 'For his dough, I guess,' said Littlemore. He leafed through the affidavit again. 'You think this is it? What Susie meant us to find?'

'It must be, Jimmy. It's the same thing that was done to poor Miss Riverford.'

'I know,' said Littlemore. 'But this is an affidavit. Does Susie seem like somebody who knows about affidavits?'

'What do you mean? It can't be a coincidence.'

'Why would she remember the day, the exact day, this affidavit got read in at the trial? It doesn't add up. I think there's something else.' Littlemore sat down on the floor, reading the transcript. Betty sighed impatiently. Suddenly the detective called out, 'Wait a minute. Here we go. Look at the Q here, Betty. That's the prosecutor, Mr Jerome, asking questions. Now look who the witness is, giving the answers.'

At the spot indicated by the detective, the transcript read as follows:

Q. What is your name?

A. Susan Merrill.

Q. State your business, please.

A. I keep a rooming house for gentlemen in Forty-third Street.

Q. Do you know Harry K. Thaw?

A. I do.

Q. When did you first meet him?

A. In 1903. He called on me to engage rooms. Which he did.

Q. For what purpose did he say?

A. He said he was engaging young ladies for work on the stage.

Q. Did he bring visitors to his rooms?

A. Mostly young women of fifteen years and on. They said they wanted to get on the stage.

Q. Did anything unusual happen at any time when any of these girls called?

A. Yes. One young girl had gone into his room. A little later, I heard screams and I ran into the room. She was tied to the bedpost. He had a whip in his right hand, and he was about to strike her. There were welts all over her.

Q. What was she wearing?

A. Very little.

Q. What happened next?

A. He was wild and hurried away. She told me he had been trying to murder her.

Q. Can you describe the whip?

A. It was a dog whip. On that occasion.

Q. Were there other occasions?

A. Another time there were two girls. One of them was undressed, the other was partly dressed. He was whipping them with a lady's riding whip.

Q. Did you ever speak with him about it?

A. Yes, I did. I told him these were all young girls and he had no right to whip them.

Q. What explanation did he make for doing it?

A. He made no explanation at all. He said they needed it.

Q. Did you ever inform the police?

A. No.

Q. Why not?

A. He said if I did he'd kill me.