The Boss, and How He Came to Rule New York

“Dave’s all right,” returned Big Kennedy. Then coming around to me: “Now let’s get down to business. You understand how the charge is murder, an’ that no bail goes. But keep a stiff upper lip. The Chief is out to put a crimp in you, but we’ll beat him just th’ same. For every witness he brings, we’ll bring two. Do you know who it was croaked th’ Blacksmith?”

I told him of the Sicilian; and how I had recognized the knife as I drew it from the throat of the dead man.

“It’s a cinch he threw it,” said Big Kennedy; “he was in the crowd an’ saw you mixin’ it up with th’ Blacksmith, an’ let him have it. Them Dagoes are great knife throwers. Did you get a flash of him in the crowd?”

“No,” I said, “there was no sign of him. I haven’t told this story to anybody. We ought to give him time to take care of himself.”

“Right you are,” said Big Kennedy approvingly. “He probably jumped aboard his boat; it’s even money he’s outside the Hook, out’ard bound, by now.”

Then Big Kennedy discussed the case. I would be indicted and tried; there was no doubt of that. The Chief, our enemy, had possession of the court machinery; so far as indictment and trial were concerned he would not fail of his will.

“An’ it’s th’ judge in partic’lar, I’m leary of,” said Big Kennedy thoughtfully. “The Chief has got that jurist in hock to him, d’ye see! But there’s another end to it; I’ve got a pull with the party who selects the jury, an’ it’ll be funny if we don’t have half of ‘em our way. That’s right; th’ worst they can hand us is a hung jury. If it takes money, now,” and here Big Kennedy rolled a tentative eye on young Morton, “if it should take money, I s’ppose we know where to look for it?”

Young Morton had been listening to every word, and for the moment, nothing about him of his usual languor. Beyond tapping his white teeth with the handle of his dress cane, he retained no trace of those affectations. I had much hope from the alert earnestness of young Morton, for I could tell that he would stay by my fortunes to the end.

“What was that?” he asked, when Big Kennedy spoke of money.

“I said that if we have to buy any little thing like a juror or a witness, we know where to go for the money.”

“Certainly!” he lisped, relapsing into the exquisite; “we shall buy the courthouse should the purchase of that edifice become necessary to our friend’s security.”

“Aint he a dandy!” exclaimed Big Kennedy, surveying young Morton in a rapt way. Then coming back to me: “I’ve got some news for you that you want to keep under your waistcoat. You know Billy Cassidy – Foxy Billy – him that studied to be a priest? You remember how I got him a post in th’ Comptroller’s office. Well, I sent for him not an hour ago; he’s goin’ to take copies of th’ accounts that show what th’ Chief an’ them other highbinders at the top o’ Tammany have been doin’. I’ll have the papers on ‘em in less’n a week. If we get our hooks on what I’m after, an’ Foxy Billy says we shall, we’ll wipe that gang off th’ earth.”

“Given those documents, we shall, as you say, obliterate them,” chimed in young Morton. “But speaking of your agent: Is this Foxy Billy as astute as his name would imply?”

“He could go down to Coney Island an’ beat th’ shells,” said Big Kennedy confidently.

“About the knife which gave James the Horseshoer his death wound,” said young Morton. His tones were vapid, but his glance was bright enough. “They’ve sent it to the Central Office. The detectives are sure to discover the pawnbroker who sold it. I think it would be wise, therefore, to carry the detectives the word ourselves. It will draw the sting out of that wasp; it would, really. It wouldn’t look well to a jury, should we let them track down-this information, while it will destroy its effect if we ourselves tell them. I think with the start he has, we can trust that Sicilian individual to take care of himself.”

This suggestion appealed to Big Kennedy as good. He thought, too, that he and young Morton might better set about the matter without delay.

“Don’t lose your nerve,” said he, shaking me by the hand. “You are as safe as though you were in church. I’ll crowd ‘em, too, an’ get this trial over inside of six weeks. By that time, if Foxy Billy is any good, we’ll be ready to give the Chief some law business of his own.”

“One thing,” I said at parting; “my wife must not come here. I wouldn’t have her see me in a cell to save my life.”

From the moment of my arrival at the Tombs, I had not ceased to think of Apple Cheek and her distress. Anne would do her best to comfort her; and for the rest – why! it must be borne. But I could not abide her seeing me a prisoner; not for her sake, but for my own.

“Well, good-by!” said young Morton, as he and Big Kennedy were taking themselves away. “You need give yourself no uneasiness. Remember, you are not only right, but rich; and when, pray, was the right, on being backed by riches, ever beaten down?”

“Or for that matter, the wrong either?” put in Big Kennedy sagely. “I’ve never seen money lose a fight.”

“Our friend,” said young Morton, addressing the warden, who had now returned, and speaking in a high superior vein, “is to have everything he wants. Here is my card. Remember, now, this gentleman is my friend; and it is not to my fancy, don’t y’ know, that a friend of mine should lack for anything; it isn’t, really!”

As Big Kennedy and young Morton reached the door, I bethought me for the first time to ask the result of the election.

“Was your father successful?” I queried. “These other matters quite drove the election from my head.”

“Oh, yes,” drawled young Morton, “my father triumphed. I forget the phrase in which Mr. Kennedy described the method of his success, but it was highly epigrammatic and appropriate. How was it you said the old gentleman won?”

“I said that he won in a walk,” returned Big Kennedy. Then, suspiciously: “Say you aint guying me, be you?”

“Me guy you?” repeated young Morton, elevating his brows. “I’d as soon think of deriding a king with crown and scepter!”

My trial came on within a month. Big Kennedy had a genius for expedition, and could hurry both men and events whenever it suited his inclinations. When I went to the bar I was accompanied by two of the leaders of the local guild of lawyers. These were my counsel, and they would leave no stone unturned to see me free. Big Kennedy sat by my side when the jury was empaneled.

“We’ve got eight of ‘em painted,” he whispered. “I’d have had all twelve,” he continued regretfully, “but what with the challengin’, an’ what with some of ‘em not knowin’ enough, an’ some of ‘em knowin’ too much, I lose four. However, eight ought to land us on our feet.”

There were no Irishmen in the panel, and I commented on the fact as strange.

“No, I barred th’ Irish,” said Big Kennedy. “Th’ Irish are all right; I’m second-crop Irish – bein’ born in this country – myself. But you don’t never want one on a jury, especially on a charge of murder. There’s this thing about a Mick: he’ll cry an’ sympathize with you an’ shake your hand, an’ send you flowers; but just th’ same he always wants you hanged.”

As Big Kennedy had apprehended, the Judge on the bench was set hard and chill as Arctic ice against me; I could read it in his jadestone eye. He would do his utmost to put a halter about my neck, and the look he bestowed upon me, menacing and full of doom, made me feel lost and gallows-ripe indeed. Suppose they should hang me! I had seen Sheeny Joe dispatched for Sing Sing from that very room! The memory of it, with the Judge lowering from the bench like a death-threat, sent a cold thought to creep and coil about my heart and crush it as in the folds of a snake.

There came the pawnbroker to swear how he sold me the knife those years ago. The prosecution insisted as an inference drawn from this, that the knife was mine. Then a round dozen stood up to tell of my rush upon Jimmy the Blacksmith; and how he fell; and how, a moment later, I fronted them with the red knife in my clutch and the dead man weltering where he went down. Some there were who tried to say they saw me strike the blow.

While this evidence was piling up, ever and again some timid juryman would glance towards Big Kennedy inquiringly. The latter would send back an ocular volley of threats that meant death or exile should that juror flinch or fail him.

When the State ended, a score of witnesses took the stand in my behalf. One and all, having been tutored by Big Kennedy, they told of the thrown knife which came singing through the air like a huge hornet from the far outskirts of the crowd. Many had not seen the hand that hurled the knife; a few had been more fortunate, and described him faithfully as a small lean man, dark, a red silk cloth over his head, and earrings dangling from his ears.

“He was a sailorman, too,” said one, more graphic than the rest; “as I could tell by the tar on his hands an’ a ship tattooed on th’ back of one of ‘em. He stood right by me when he flung the knife.”

“Why didn’t you seize him?” questioned the State’s Attorney, with a half-sneer.

“Not on your life!” said the witness. “I aint collarin’ nobody; I don’t get policeman’s wages.”

The Judge gave his instructions to the jury, and I may say he did his best, or worst, to drag me to the scaffold. The jurors listened; but they owned eyes as well as ears, and for every word spoken by the Judge’s tongue, Big Kennedy’s eyes spoke two. Also, there was that faultless exquisite, young Morton, close and familiar to my side. The dullest ox-wit of that panel might tell how I was belted about by strong influences, and ones that could work a vengeance. Wherefore, when the jury at last retired, there went not one whose mind was not made up, and no more than twenty minutes ran by before the foreman’s rap on the door announced them as prepared to give decision. They filed soberly in. The clerk read the verdict.

“Not guilty!”

The Judge’s face was like thunder; he gulped and glared, and then demanded:

“Is this your verdict?”

“It is,” returned the foreman, standing in his place; and his eleven fellow jurors, two of whom belonged to my Red Jackets, nodded assent.

Home I went on wings. Anne met me in the hallway and welcomed me with a kiss. She wore a strange look, but in my hurry for Apple Cheek I took no particular heed of that.

“Where is she – where is my wife?” said I.

Then a blackcoat man came from the rear room; he looked the doctor and had the smell of drugs about him. Anne glanced at him questioningly.

“I think he may come in,” he said. “But make no noise! Don’t excite her!”

Apple Cheek, who was Apple Cheek no longer with her face hollowed and white, was lying in the bed. Her eyes were big and bright, and the ghost of a smile parted her wan lips.

“I’m so happy!” she whispered, voice hardly above a breath. Then with weak hands she drew me down to her. “I’ve prayed and prayed, and I knew it would come right,” she murmured.

Then Anne, who had followed me to the bedside, drew away the coverings. It was like a revelation, for I had been told no word of it, nor so much as dreamed of such sweet chances. The dear surprise of it was in one sense like a blow, and I staggered on my feet as that day’s threats had owned no power to make me. There, with little face upturned and sleeping, was a babe! – our babe!

– Apple Cheek’s and mine! – our baby girl that had been born to us while its father lay in jail on a charge of murder! While I looked, it opened its eyes; and then a wailing, quivering cry went up that swept across my soul like a tune of music.

CHAPTER XII – DARBY THE GOPHER

FOXY BILLY CASSIDY made but slow work of obtaining those papers asked for to overthrow our enemy, the Chief. He copied reams upon reams of contracts and vouchers and accounts, but those to wholly match the crushing purposes of Big Kennedy were not within his touch. The documents which would set the public ablaze were held in a safe, of which none save one most trusted by the Chief, and deep in both his plans and their perils, possessed the secret.

“That’s how the game stands,” explained Big Kennedy. “Foxy Billy’s up ag’inst it. The cards we need are in th’ safe, an’ Billy aint got th’ combination, d’ye see.”

“Can anything be done with the one who has?”

“Nothin’,” replied Big Kennedy. “No, there’s no gettin’ next to th’ party with th’ combination. Billy did try to stand in with this duck; an’ say! he turned sore in a second.”

“Then you’ve no hope?”

“Not exactly that,” returned Big Kennedy, as though revolving some proposal in his mind. “I’ll hit on a way. When it comes to a finish, I don’t think there’s a safe in New York I couldn’t turn inside out. But I’ve got to have time to think.”

There existed strong argument for exertion on Big Kennedy’s part. Both he and I were fighting literally for liberty and for life. Our sole hope of safety layin the overthrow of the Chief; we must destroy or be destroyed.

Big Kennedy was alive to the situation. He said as much when, following that verdict of “Not guilty!” I thanked him as one who had worked most for my defense.

“There’s no thanks comin’,” said Big Kennedy, in his bluff way. “I had to break th’ Chief of that judge-an’-jury habit at th’ go-off. He’d have nailed me next.”

Big Kennedy and I, so to phrase it, were as prisoners of politics. Our feud with the Chief, as the days went by, widened to open war. Its political effect was to confine us to our own territory, and we undertook no enterprise which ran beyond our proper boundaries. It was as though our ward were a walled town. Outside all was peril; inside we were secure. Against the Chief and the utmost of his power, we could keep our own, and did. His word lost force when once it crossed our frontiers; his mandates fell to the ground.

Still, while I have described ourselves as ones in a kind of captivity, we lived sumptuously enough on our small domain. Big Kennedy went about the farming of his narrow acres with an agriculture deeper than ever. No enterprise that either invaded or found root in our region was permitted to go free, but one and all paid tribute. From street railways to push carts, from wholesale stores to hand-organs, they must meet our levy or see their interests pine. And thus we thrived.

However, for all the rich fatness of our fortunes, Big Kennedy’s designs against the Chief never cooled. On our enemy’s side, we had daily proof that he, in his planning, was equally sleepless. If it had not been for my seat in the Board of Aldermen, and our local rule of the police which was its corollary, the machine might have broken us down. As it was, we sustained ourselves, and the sun shone for our ward haymaking, if good weather went with us no farther.

One afternoon Big Kennedy of the suddenest broke upon me with an exclamation of triumph.

“I have it!” he cried; “I know the party who will show us every paper in that safe.”

“Who is he?” said I.

“I’ll bring him to you to-morrow night. He’s got a country place up th’ river, an’ never leaves it. He hasn’t been out of th’ house for almost five years, but I think I can get him to come.” Big Kennedy looked as though the situation concealed a jest. “But I can’t stand here talkin’; I’ve got to scatter for th’ Grand Central.”

Who should this gifted individual be? Who was he who could come in from a country house, which he had not quitted for five years, and hand us those private papers now locked, and fast asleep, within the Comptroller’s safe? The situation was becoming mysterious, and my patience would be on a stretch until the mystery was laid bare. The sure enthusiasm of Big Kennedy gave an impression of comfort. Big Kennedy was no hare-brained optimist, nor one to count his chickens before they were hatched.

When Big Kennedy came into the sanctum on the following evening, the grasp he gave me was the grasp of victory.

“It’s all over but th’ yellin’!” said he; “we’ve got them papers in a corner.”

Big Kennedy presented me to a shy, retiring person, who bore him company, and who took my hand reluctantly. He was not ill-looking, this stranger; but he had a furtive roving eye – the eye of a trapped animal. His skin, too, was of a yellow, pasty color, like bad piecrust, and there abode a damp, chill atmosphere about him that smelled of caves and caverns.

After I greeted him, he walked away in a manner strangely unsocial, and, finding a chair, sate himself down in a corner. He acted as might one detained against his will and who was not the master of himself. Also, there was something professional in it all, as though the purpose of his presence were one of business. I mentioned in a whisper the queer sallowness of the stranger.

“Sure!” said Big Kennedy. “It’s th’ prison pallor on him. I’ve got to let him lay dead for a week or ten days to give him time to cover it with a beard, as well as show a better haircut.”

“Who is he?” I demanded, my amazement beginning to sit up.

“He’s a gopher,” returned Big Kennedy, surveying the stranger with victorious complacency. “Yes, indeed; he can go through a safe like th’ grace of heaven through a prayer meetin’.”

“Is he a burglar?”

“Burglar? No!” retorted Big Kennedy disgustedly; “he’s an artist. Any hobo could go in with drills an’ spreaders an’ pullers an’ wedges, an’ crack a box. But this party does it by ear; just sits down before a safe, an’ fumbles an’ fools with it ten minutes, an’ swings her open. I tell you he’s a wonder! He knows th’ insides of a safe like a priest knows th’ insides of a prayer-book.”

“Where was he?” I asked. “Where did you pick him up?” and here I took a second survey of the talented stranger, who dropped his eyes on the floor.

“The Pen,” said Big Kennedy. “The warden an’ me are old side-partners, an’ I borrowed him. I knew where he was, d’ye see! He’s doin’ a stretch of five years for a drop-trick he turned in an Albany bank. That’s what comes of goin’ outside your specialty; he’d ought to have stuck to safes.”

“Aren’t you afraid he’ll run?” I said. “You can’t watch him night and day, and he’ll give you the slip.”

“No fear of his side-steppin’,” replied Big Kennedy confidently. “He’s only got six weeks more to go, an’ it wouldn’t pay to slip his collar for a little pinch of time like that. Besides, I’ve promised him five hundred dollars for this job, an’ left it in th’ warden’s hands.”

“What’s his name?” I inquired.

“Darby the Goph.”

Big Kennedy now unfolded his plan for making Darby the Goph useful in our affairs. Foxy Billy would allow himself to get behind in his labors over the City books. In a spasm of industry he would arrange with his superiors to work nights until he was again abreast of his duties. Foxy Billy, night after night, would thus be left alone in the Comptroller’s office. The safe that baffled us for those priceless documents would be unguarded. Nothing would be thought by janitors and night watchmen of the presence of Darby the Goph. He would be with Foxy Billy in the rôle of a friend, who meant no more than to kindly cheer his lonely labors.

Darby the Goph would lounge and kill time while Foxy Billy moiled.

“There’s the scheme to put Darby inside,” said Big Kennedy in conclusion. “Once they’re alone, he’ll tear th’ packin’ out o’ that safe. When Billy has copied the papers, th’ game’s as simple as suckin’ eggs. We’ll spring ‘em, an’ make th’ Chief look like a dress suit at a gasfitters’ ball.”

Big Kennedy’s programme was worked from beginning to end by Foxy Billy and Darby the Goph, and never jar nor jolt nor any least of friction. It ran out as smoothly as two and two make four. In the end, Big Kennedy held in his fingers every evidence required to uproot the Chief. The ear and the hand of Darby the Goph had in no sort lost their cunning.

“An’ now,” said Big Kennedy, when dismissing Darby the Goph, “you go back where you belong. I’ve wired the warden, an’ he’ll give you that bit of dough. I’ve sent for a copper to put you on th’ train. I don’t want to take chances on you stayin’ over a day. You might get to lushin’, an’ disgrace yourself with th’ warden.”

The police officer arrived, and Big Kennedy told him to see Darby the Goph aboard the train.

“Don’t make no mistake,” said Big Kennedy, by way of warning. “He belongs in Sing Sing, an’ must get back without fail to-night. Stay by th’ train till it pulls out.”

“How about th’ bristles?” said the officer, pointing to the two-weeks’ growth of beard that stubbled the chin of the visitor. “Shall I have him scraped?”

“No, they’ll fix his face up there,” said Big Kennedy. “The warden don’t care what he looks like, only so he gets his clamps on him ag’in.”

“Here’s the documents,” said Big Kennedy, when Darby the Goph and his escort had departed. “The question now is, how to give th’ Chief th’ gaff, an’ gaff him deep an’ good. He’s th’ party who was goin’ to leave me on both sides of th’ street.” This last with an exultant sneer.

It was on my thoughts that the hand to hurl the thunderbolt we had been forging was that of the reputable old gentleman. The blow would fall more smitingly if dealt by him; his was a name superior for this duty to either Big Kennedy’s or my own. With this argument, Big Kennedy declared himself in full accord.

“It’ll look more like th’ real thing,” said he, “to have th’ kick come from th’ outside. Besides, if I went to th’ fore it might get in my way hereafter.”

The reputable old gentleman moved with becoming conservatism, not to say dignity. He took the documents furnished by the ingenuity of Darby the Goph, and the oil-burning industry of Foxy Billy, and pored over them for a day. Then he sent for Big Kennedy. “The evidence you furnish me,” said he, “seems absolutely conclusive. It betrays a corruption not paralleled in modern times, with the head of Tammany as the hub of the villainy. The town has been plundered of millions,” concluded the reputable old gentleman, with a fine oratorical flourish, “and it is my duty to lay bare this crime in all its enormity, as one of the people’s Representatives.”

“An’ a taxpayer,” added Big Kennedy.

“Sir, my duty as a Representative,” returned the reputable old gentleman severely, “has precedence over my privileges as a taxpayer.” Then, as though the question offered difficulties: “The first step should be the publication of these documents in a paper of repute.”

The reputable old gentleman had grounds for hesitation. Our enemy, the Chief, was not without his allies among the dailies of that hour. The Chief was popular in certain glutton circles. He still held to those characteristics of a ready, laughing, generous recklessness that marked him in a younger day when, as head of a fire company, with trousers tucked in boots, red shirt, fire helmet, and white coat thrown over arm, he led the ropes and cheered his men. But what were excellent as traits in a fireman, became fatal under conditions where secrecy and a policy of no noise were required for his safety. He was headlong, careless; and, indifferent to discovery since he believed himself secure, the trail of his wrongdoing was as widely obvious, not to say as unclean, as was Broadway.

“Yes,” said the reputable old gentleman, “the great thing is to pitch upon a proper paper.”

“There’s the Dally Tory?” suggested Big Kennedy. “It’s a very honest sheet,” said the reputable old gentleman approvingly.

“Also,” said Big Kennedy, “the Chief has just cut it out of th’ City advertisin’, d’ye see, an’ it’s as warm as a wolf.”

For these double reasons of probity and wrath, the Daily Tory was agreed to. The reputable old gentleman would put himself in touch with the Daily Tory without delay.

“Who is this Chief of Tammany?” asked the reputable old gentleman, towards the close of the conference. “Personally, I know but little about him.”

“He’d be all right,” said Big Kennedy, “but he was spoiled in the bringin’ up. He was raised with th’ fire companies, an’ he made th’ mistake of luggin’ his speakin’ trumpet into politics.”

“But is he a deep, forceful man?”

“No,” returned Big Kennedy, with a contemptuous toss of the hand. “If he was, you wouldn’t have been elected to Congress. He makes a brash appearance, but there’s nothin’ behind. You open his front door an’ you’re in his back yard.”

The reputable old gentleman was bowing us out of his library, when Big Kennedy gave him a parting word.

“Now remember: my name aint to show at all.”