The Anarchist (22 page)

Norris said, “We need information, not an entertaining quotation.”

“Information, quotation,” Quimby said with delight. “That makes a fair rhyme—I must remember it. Why, sir, you’re a poet and you don’t even know it.”

Savin reached into the outside pocket of his suit coat and produced a wad of cloth, which he laid on the table.

Norris spread it out with his fingers. “Satin, I believe. Yellow with blue flowers, a pattern that suggests a woman’s dress—and these brown stains: Blood? I think so. That’s interesting.” He handed the cigar to Quimby.

Savin struck a match and lit the cigar. “Quimby saw fit to give us this piece of material before we went to work on his other ear.”

Once the cigar was lit, Quimby relaxed in his chair, his legs crossed.

Norris concentrated on the preparation of a second cigar. “This material might have been torn from the dress of a woman,” he said. “Perhaps a prostitute who went by the name of Clementine and worked at Big Maud’s establishment.”

“Exactly—and a great loss it was.” Cigar smoke enshrouded Quimby’s head.

“She was working down on the canal, when somebody beat her to death. I suppose we could check with the girls at Big Maud’s to see if Clementine had a dress like this.”

“I assure you, sir,” Quimby said, “she came down to the canal in that dress.”

Norris leaned toward Savin, who struck another match and lit the cigar. “She was found naked except for a yellow hat—not unusual, considering her profession. I think she was beaten with something like rope, the kind used on the docks and barges.”

“Precisely,” Quimby said. “A short length of line tied into a knot known as a monkey fist. A rather popular weapon among canawlers.”

“Tell him how you know this,” Savin said.

Quimby drew on his cigar, and then pondered the ash.

“I must admit,” Norris said to Savin, “that I’m philosophically opposed to interrogation methods that result in bloody skulls because there are other parts of the body that are far more vulnerable, and though the results aren’t as apparent to the eye, the
results
—what you learn from such encounters—are invariably not only true but useful.”

“You must give me a demonstration,” Savin said pleasantly.

“For instance, I’m particularly fond of the dislocated shoulder,” Norris said. “It’s quick and easy, and there’s no chance of bloodstains on your suit. It’s also easily corrected. Out, in.”

He pushed back his chair, but stopped when Quimby cleared his throat, and said, “There is barge called the
Glockenspiel.”

Savin said, “Belongs to that German, yes.”

“Klaus Bruener,” Norris added. He opened his palm on the table, a sign of mild disappointment. “That’s where Clementine was found, Quimby. We know that.”

“But you didn’t find her dress there,” Quimby said, in mock surprise.

“My men went over every inch of that boat,” Savin said.

“The Bruener boy hid it,” Quimby said. “That poor, dear, mute lad.”

“How’d he have her dress,” Norris asked, “if he found her naked in the canal?”

Quimby’s eyes grew large with wonder. “That is the very question, isn’t it?”

“You saw something,” Norris said.

“More like what I heard, but you know how utterances can fuel the imagination.” Quimby folded his arms, his stare suddenly hard and uncompromising. “I want my release, and enough money to get out of Buffalo. Fifty dollars.”

“Right,” Norris said. “Your comrades down the hall aren’t going to take kindly to the fact that you’ve been in here, chatting with the police and smoking cigars.”

“Indeed, this presents me with a dilemma.”

“And consider another side to your dilemma,” Norris said. Quimby shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “This piece of cloth,” Norris continued. “If it belonged to Clementine—and I don’t doubt that it did—we have to consider how it came into your possession: rape and murder, and then you throw her in the canal, where this mute boy finds her.”

“Yes, a likely scenario,” Quimby said. “But why would I keep the evidence?”

“A memento?” Norris said. “A reminder of a few moments of carnal bliss?”

Quimby laughed, revealing gnarled brown molars and a chipped incisor. “Surely, that theory will hold up in court about as well as my aged member.”

“Give us the rest,” Savin said as he got up from his chair suddenly, “and you can walk with your fifty dollars. Think it over, Quimby. We’ll be back after we have a drink. Or rather, Detective Norris will be back. You know how persuasive Pinkertons can be.”

“Yes, in and out.” Quimby watched Norris stand up. “You’re a
Pinkerton?” For the first time there was no pretense, just awe shot through with fear.

“Jesus H., you didn’t mistake me for a policeman?” Disgusted, Norris turned away as Savin opened the door. “Could use that drink first,” Norris said as they left the room. “I haven’t separated a shoulder since I left Washington.”

When Savin closed the door, he said, “That’ll give him something to think about during intermission.” As they walked down the corridor, the young policeman came to attention, his back to the stone wall.

They went upstairs to Savin’s office, a well-appointed room in a corner of the building, which was quite dark because there were blankets hung over the windows. “In case of rocks,” Savin said. He went to his desk, where he took a bottle of whiskey and two glasses from one of the drawers. “I’ve hardly been out of this place for days,” he said, pouring them each a dram. He placed one of the glasses on the far side of the desk, and then sat down.

“Why don’t you give me ten minutes with Czolgosz?” Norris sat in the leather-padded chair that faced the desk. He took a sip of whiskey, strong, peaty stuff. “I’ll deliver the name of every anarchist between here and Chicago, with Emma Goldman’s name at the top of the list.”

“I’m afraid it’s not possible at the moment. He’s not here.”

“Czolgosz has been moved?” Norris glanced toward the blanketed windows. “A good idea, considering this mob.”

“For the past week he’s been kept downstairs.” Savin got up and went to one of the windows, where he held back the corner of the blanket and looked down into the street. “This crowd ever breaks through, they won’t find Leon Czolgosz, but they may find a cousin or brother.” He lit a cigarette and placed it on the rim of a large chrome-and-glass ashtray that was full of butts. “When word spread that the president was failing, we decided to move Czolgosz. We’ve told no one other than those who were responsible for the transfer.”

“Where is he?”

“The county penitentiary for women,” Savin said. “It’s about a mile from here.”

“Are you trying to reward him?”

“Hardly. Now that the president is dead, Czolgosz will be arraigned Monday, so tomorrow we’ll have to bring him back here. The president’s body is going to lie in state at city hall all afternoon and we want to transfer Czolgosz then. The procession will draw thousands to pay their respects.”

“And the newspaper reporters will be distracted,” Norris said.

“Exactly.”

“I want to be in on it.”

“Thought you would,” Savin said. “I’m organizing the transfer, and I want to do it so that we don’t draw attention. We’ll have plenty of guards at the penitentiary and here, but I want to keep the trip itself very low-key. Two carriages. No sign of uniforms.” For a moment he stared pensively at the sinuous filament of smoke as it rose from his cigarette. “I’ll need you and one other Pinkerton.”

“Of course,” Norris said. “Always when there’s dirty work to be done.”

CZOLGOSZ was kept alone in a cell in what seemed an empty wing of a large prison. There was a small window that allowed him to watch the rain on the cobblestones, and occasionally he heard voices echoing from other cells across the courtyard. They all sounded like women: some high, sweet, even angelic; others angry and demented, keening.

And the guards sitting outside his cell barely spoke to him.
Clearly they’d been given instructions to avoid conversation with him. They whispered among themselves, and he came to realize that they didn’t know he was Leon Czolgosz.

Now that the president was dead, he felt an odd sense of relief. If the president had lived, Thomas Penney had suggested that the sentence for attempted murder could be ten years. The thought of a decade in a cell frightened Czolgosz. He would have failed, and he would certainly go mad. Now they would have to execute him. His work was done. It would be over soon.

He remained at the window, listening for the women. He believed Emma Goldman’s voice would rise up from them. That must be why he was here now, in a place where women were imprisoned, their voices hopeless. Emma understood such despair. She would emerge to lead them all away from here. It was only a matter of time. They were all waiting, and it was in the waiting that they found belief, they found faith. The president was dead. There were no leaders. There were only themselves, and they could not be confined any longer. Together they would find freedom. That too was in the women’s voices.

One of the guards brought dinner: ham, beans, potatoes, and carrots. They had cut the meat and gave him a spoon. The guard, tall, unshaven, with a prominent Adam’s apple, remained in the doorway and watched him eat.

“What’chu do they send you to the women’s penitentiary?” he asked.

“That’s where I am?” Czolgosz smiled. “No wonder the food’s better here.”

“Them women can cook.” The guard folded his arms and put his shoulder against the jamb. “But why they have us hold you over here, all alone? Who are you?”

“You really don’t know?”

The other guard wandered over to the door. He was stout and was still wearing his dinner napkin tucked in his collar. “They just says to keep you here and don’t let no one near you. Like you was something special.”

The tall one said, “You don’t even look dangerous. You’re kind of, you know, pretty. You ain’t no nancy boy?”

Czolgosz shook his head and continued to eat.

“Well,” the other one said, wiping his mouth with his napkin, “he’s got some appetite. And my dinner’s getting cold.”

“I shot the president,” Czolgosz said. “I killed William McKinley.”

Both guards stared at him, until the tall one whispered, “No.”

He put his spoon down on his empty plate. “That’s why I’m here.”

The other one stepped in closer. “You’re that Leon fella?”

The tall one took his shoulder off the doorjamb. “What you go and do that for?”

“So we’d all be free,” Czolgosz said as he put his plate on the corner of the cot. “As long as there are leaders, none of us will ever be free.”

They stared down at him, incredulous. “Free?” the fat one said. “You ain’t free.”

“I’m freer than you’ll ever be,” Czolgosz said. “Me, and those women over there.”

Neither guard spoke, until the tall one said in disgust, “Shoot.”

He left the door and walked down the corridor, leaving it to the fat guard to remove the dirty plate and spoon from Czolgosz’s cell.

WHEN Norris and Savin were sufficiently fortified, they returned to the basement cell where Quimby was being held. “Are you left-or right-handed?” Norris asked, going around to Quimby’s side of the table.

Quimby got out of his chair, knocking it over, and backed up to the wall.

“Earlier you seemed to handle your cigar quite deftly with this one.” Norris grabbed the man’s left arm.

Quimby began to cry. There were no theatrics about it. Loudly, he said, “This is all about some harlot? What do you care about a common prostitute?”

“We don’t,” Norris shouted, placing his other hand on Quimby’s shoulder. “We care about her killer.”

“Listen to me!” Quimby pleaded.

“What
, Quimby? Why would you kill a prostitute?”

“I didn’t!”

“But you know who did,” Norris said. Quimby turned his face until his cheek pressed against the brick wall. “And you know
why
they did it.” Norris was about to pull the arm and shove the shoulder, dislocating the joint.

Quimby tensed, but then said, “They were there, they were there.”

“‘There’ rhymes with ‘where,’ Quimby. Where?”

“By the
footbridge!”
Quimby cried.