The Penny Ferry da-2 Page 25

  "Eureka!" I whispered.

  "What?" asked Susan Petri, who stood, white-smocked and plastic-aproned, to my immediate right. "Did you ask for a beaker?"

  "No. I said Eureka. That means 'I found it.' "

  "I know. Found what?"

  "The place where the negatives are hidden. I think I've found it."

  She stared at me. I couldn't see her lower face since it was hidden by her surgical mask. The eyebrows went up; the forehead wrinkled in a frown. "Swell, Doctor Adams."

  She dipped her siphon tube into the patient's open mouth to draw off the blood that was fast collecting there. Fortunately the patient was asleep, having been given a shot of sodium pentothal. Mrs. Habersham couldn't hear us. I withdrew the bent and buried tooth, which I had twisted up with the cowhorn forceps.

  There was a deep, sucking, squishing noise as the molar came out, then we sutured and packed the wound, injected Mrs. Habersham with a hefty slug of penicillin, and watched her carefully while she came to. You must be really careful with a general anesthetic so that your patient doesn't choke or drown. This is especially true if you've worked in the mouth. She woke up without a hitch and we sent her on her way. On foot.

  At the earliest opportunity I returned home to the darkroom (which I was painstakingly rebuilding) and got an eight-inch strip of 35mm film. I headed out to the Concord Rod and Gun Club and the outdoor range. I heard those big Magnums blasting off long before I reached it. Then another sound: the thump of iron silhouettes being hit by slugs and slamming against the ground. Silhouette shooting, imported from Europe in the sixties, is all the rage now at gun clubs. It consists of shooting at thick metal plates cut out in the shape of animal profiles, at long range, using big-bore Magnum handguns. No rifles. It's a silly sport, I guess. But then so is chasing a little white ball around on grass and whacking at it until it falls into a cup.

  I was out at the silhouette range because I needed a big-bore revolver to experiment with. I found Chuck Norgaard at one of the stations, poised at the line with a revolver held out in front of him with both hands. There was a blast I felt in my chest, and the gun and his arms went up. He stepped back and flipped out the cylinder, pushed the ejection rod, and dumped out the spent shells.

  "Hiya Doc. What brings you here?"

  "I want to borrow that thing when you're finished."

  He nodded, and I saw him drop six more silver rockets into the cylinder. I was sick of looking at big handguns.

  "Got any idea what those things do when they hit people instead of steel plate?" I asked.

  "I can imagine."

  "No you can't," I said, and waited for him over at the bench. I should have brought earmuffs.

  Half an hour later I left the club, went home, and got hold of Joe.

  "What do you mean, not there?"

  "All Johnny Robinson's personal effects went to Sam, except for the stuff his sister took. It's all at Dependable, or Sam's apartment."

  "Okay; I'll get in touch with Sam. Meet me at Brian's office at six tonight. I think I know where the hot item is."

  ***

  "Okay, sport, strut your stuff," said Brian Hannon, leaning back in his armchair. He glanced over at Joe, who was lighting a Benson 8c Hedges 100 with the new gold-and-blue lighter. A look of confusion crossed Brian's face.

  "Hey, that lighter looks different, Joe. Not as fruity. What happened?"

  "This is a new one. Classier."

  "Where'd you get it?"

  "I got it, if you must know, from a Mafia chieftain."

  "No, really."

  "Let's talk about something else. C'mon, Doc, I'm getting starved. Sam's late, but tell us anyway. Where the hell's this filmstrip?"

  I laid Inspector James Bell's Smith 8: Wesson on the desk, and next to it a new, unsharpened pencil. I explained that I'd gotten the idea while fitting the barrel of my tooth extractor around an old lady's molar. They weren't impressed. I handed Brian the revolver and asked him to check it out. This he did in standard fashion by swinging out the cylinder, which was empty, and looking down the chambers as he spun it on its crane arm. Then, the cylinder still out, he looked down the muzzle of the barrel and handed it to Joe, who repeated the procedure, then stuck his thumbnail under the barrel throat so the light would reflect off it up through the tube.

  "Empty," he said, handing it back. "I don't have a screwdriver to take off the grips or sideplate. I assume that's what you're going to do."

  "No," I said, taking the pencil and inserting it into the barrel. I pushed it down carefully. The coiled celluloid sprang out of the barrel throat like a jack-in-the-box, and there was the film-strip on the desk.

  "Sure looked clean to me," said Joe.

  "That's because the film was rolled emulsion side out, leaving the inside of the roll shiny-slick. When you roll up the film this way and stick it in the muzzle end, which is nearest the viewer's eye, he's got to be looking very closely to see it. In regular room light, like this, it's just about invisible."

  "Hmmm. And Johnny put Santuccio's film there? You sure?"

  "Just about positive. He was carrying it the day he was killed. From his phone message to me it's clear he knew he was being tailed. .. and he knew why, too. He didn't leave it at the office, or in his car. Those places were searched thoroughly by DeLucca and you guys. It wasn't in his apartment. Not only was the place searched several times, but the killers nailed him as soon as he o walked in. I thought for a while it was tucked away somewhere on his apartment's porch, or in the stairway hall going up to his place. But I was wrong. All I got out of that expedition was two broken heads: mine and Brian's."

  "Tell me about it," the chief growled. "Although I admit this is kinda clever, Doc. Now it'll be even better if you're right."

  "Where else can it be? He didn't put it in his shoe. Joe, your men checked his clothes. He didn't mail it to himself; we've watched his mail. He wanted it ready to deliver. But I'll tell you something else: this is my second experimental filmstrip. The first one disintegrated. When you put a roll of film inside the business end of a thirty-eight, there's nothing left of it after you touch the gun off'. It shreds and burns into vapor."

  "When we found Johnny's body up in Lowell, Mary noticed that the carrying strap of his sidearm was unfastened."

  "Uh-huh. Which meant that if indeed the film was in there, Johnny knew he could both conceal the evidence and destroy it immediately if he had to."

  "Sounds too good to be true," said Brian as he swiveled in his chair and watched a red Buick Regal swerve into the CPD lot I beneath his window.

  Well, it was. Too good to be true, that is. As for the film negatives which should have been tucked neatly, invisibly, into the barrel of Johnny Robinson's S amp;W model ten, they weren? They weren't hidden in his little leg pistol either. They also weren't in any of the clothes and shoes that were in the cardboard carton that Sam hauled into the office with him.

  "Well close, but no cigar," said Brian, drumming his fingers on the desk. "Sorry to have brought you all the way out here, Sam."

  I cussed. Sam folded up his dead partner's clothes and placed all the belongings neatly back into the carton.

  "My guess is Johnny ditched the stuff somewhere on his way home, at some drop, intending to return to the drop later Friday night or Saturday morning when the heat was off and retrieve it. Of course he never got the chance."

  Following this bit of deduction, which seemed plausible, we called the Lucky Seven tavern again, just to make sure nobody there had seen Johnny that day, or whether indeed a letter, package, or message had arrived there with his name on it. The answer was no.

  "I'm back to first base," I said.

  "Wrong, Doc. You're back in the dugout," said Joe. "Now Brian and I have some paperwork to do for the DeLucca thing. It's just routine and will take about an hour. Let's meet afterwards in case there are some last-minute questions."

  "Yeah," said Brian, "minor things like dumdum bullets and breaking and entering?

&n
bsp; "Mary and I are going to buy Sam a big dinner at Yangtze River. Brian, seeing's how I accidentally banged up your head, I think I owe you one too. Why don't the three of us wait for you two at our place?"

  They said it was the first good news they'd had all day. So Sam and I left. At home Mary set a blood-rare round steak down in front of Sam's big pooch. Turns out he is not a fussy eater.

  "It's the least we could do for him, Sam," she said. "And now Charlie, you want to show Sam his present from us, since we're still alive?"

  It was sitting behind the little tool shed with a canvas cover over it. A new Honda CX-500, with full fairing and a special platform for Popeye covered with thick acrylic carpeting in silver-gray, which matched the bike. Sam rubbed his hands over the satin finish of the tank, the brightwork of the cylinder casings, the flat black of the cockpit instrument panel. He was speechless. The big dog at his side sniffed the machine and waggled his fat butt.

  "She's quiet as a graveyard, Sam; I took her for a little spin yesterday. With this you won't give away your position to the enemy."

  He and the dog walked in silence around the bike. Something looked different about the dog. I couldn't figure out what it was. We had drinks on the terrace. Sam couldn't seem to take his eyes off the bike. We let our doggies out of their runs and watched tensely as they approached the big bull mastiff, who was reclining sedately on the flagstones, digesting twenty ounces of steak. Danny, the yellow Lab, approached growling with a lot of braggadocio. Popeye looked at him through slit eyes over a wide mouth, bored. What was different about Popeye?

  After fifteen minutes of bluffing and retreating, charging and dodging, the four dogs reached a truce and began to play.

  "I know what's different about our friend," I said at last. "He's got a new harness on."

  "Oh yeah," said Sam, taking the set of keys Mary handed him. "He got that last week; I threw the old one out. Doc, I've had a drink, but you think it's all right if I take it down the end of the drive and back?"

  "Sure. But watch it- you've got about twice the power of your old bike, and a shaft drive too. It'll feel different."

  Sam started the bike, eased it off its stand, and purred down the gravel drive slowly. He scarcely made a sound. He came back grinning from ear to ear.

  "Doc, Mary," he said, "I just don't feel right about taking it without paying you. It's so nice and I just feel-"

  "Cut it, Sam," snapped Mary. "It's really quite simple: if you hadn't been here, risking your own life, we'd be in the ground now. So let's not hear any more about it." She went inside to freshen up our drinks, and I patted the huge dog and scratched his ears. Popeye was used to all of us by now. The new harness he wore was about the scale of those used on Budweiser draft horses.

  "This doesn't look new," I said. "It looks bigger and better than his old collar, but it's not new."

  "Naw. It was Tommy's. It's heavyy-duty and cost Johnny a bundle to have it made, as I remember. So instead of throwing it out like I did Susie's, I kep' it. Makes him easier to control; he's got plenty a power."

  "And Johnny had it custom-made?"

  "Um-hmmm. Can't buy those."

  "Take it off a minute. I may want to get some made for our dogs."

  Mary brought the drinks and said she wondered what was taking Joe and Brian so long. She and Sam sipped and talked and played with the dogs. I turned the big harness over and over in my hands. The strap that held the lead ring was three inches wide and very heavy, with a lot of coarse stitching done in heavy welting twine. Strong enough even for a dog who could smash through doors.

  A car door slammed out front and we heard low chuckles and guffaws coming to us on the cool evening air.

  "Out here you guys!" yelled Mary, and the footsteps approached. I was fiddling with a rivet snap on the underside of the big leather strap. The men came around the corner, smoking. They oooh'd and ah'd the new Honda, and ordered drinks. Mary went, and came back with a mineral water for Brian and a Campari for Joe. We all toasted Sam. Then Popeye. We settled back in the redwood lawn furniture.

  "Well," groaned Brian tiredly, "so what else is new?"

  "This," I said, leaning forward with the leather harness in my hands. I had unsnapped the rivet fastener, which held the folded-back leather upper in place on the underside of the wide top strap. Unfolding this flap revealed another one, done in thin, fine leather, underneath. Snaking my index finger down inside, I realized it concealed a slip wider than a matchbook that ran the length of the big strap. It was like a money-belt slip, only bigger. I felt something in there. I pulled at it, and it slid. Soon we were all staring at the yellowish glow of manila paper. A thin envelope, whose flap I peeled back. Another envelope inside. Glassine. The old heart was thumping away now like a pile driver. I could feel my pulse in my neck. I slid out the gray glassine envelope and looked in. Inside was the slick, smoky-gray sheen of photo film.

  "It appears we've just found the hot item," I said.

  "Hot damn!" said Sam.

  Carefully, I pulled out the filmstrip. Four frames. One of them was a picture photo. The other three appeared to be documents of some kind. I slid the strip back into its casing and stood up.

  "I could perhaps make a silly joke and suggest that this could wait till after dinner, but I know where that would get me. Besides, two good men were killed because of this little strip of celluloid. Shall we?" I walked toward the kitchen door, and the little ragtag procession followed close at my heels.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  The darkroom hadn't been totally restored since the burglary, but it was certainly operational enough to run some big prints from the negatives. It was obvious to me immediately that the film was not old. If the shots were of old things, then they were copies, and probably made within the past five or ten years. After running a test strip I made a big print of each negative on sixteen-by-twenty-inch Brovira paper. I put the prints into fresh developer, then stop-bath, and then fixed them. We tried to decipher them in the dim illumination of the safelight but couldn't. Then I took them from the fixer and put them in the wash tray. I had to stack them to fit, so we could only see one print at a time. I lit up the room. The five of us crowded around the wash tank when I was finished. We looked down at the first of the four big sheets that lay stacked underwater when I turned on the light. Well, it was hot all right. It was so hot I'm surprised the wash water didn't start to simmer. Here's what we saw:

  The first print was a photograph of an old letter, written in longhand and without letterhead, to Frederick Katzmann, the prosecuting attorney. It was from John Vahey, the attorney for the defense who was later replaced by Fred Moore and finally by William Thompson. It was Vahey who told Bartolomeo Vanzetti not to take the witness stand in his own defense for the first crime he was tried for: the attempted holdup of the White Shoe factory in December1919. Vahey told Vanzetti, an accomplished orator, that to speak in his own defense would only prejudice the judge and jury against him. Wishing to cooperate, Vanzetti finally agreed. His failure to speak on his own behalf was later mentioned- twice- by Governor Fuller as the single most incriminating piece of evidence in the entire trial. Apparently his special commission agreed with him, and as a result they supported the earlier convictions of the Dedham courtroom. The letter proved beyond any reasonable doubt • that Vahey, the defense lawyer, and Katzmann, the prosecuting attorney, were in cahoots. No surprise then that they later became law partners. • that the trial was rigged from the start, with the prosecution and defense planning and executing an entire scenario that would railroad Sacco and Vanzetti straight to the electric chair. This, then, was the origin of the orchestration, the smoke-filled room and the mysterious "third hand" that I had sensed from the moment I began to read the histories of the case. • that Judge Webster Thayer knew of this cabal and perhaps even had a hand in its formation. The letter was not clear specifically as to the second point, but left no doubt as to the first one. • finally, that Katzmann and Vahey owed much of their plan's ins
piration and execution to a brilliant and energetic young industrialist-lawyer: Joseph Carlton Critchfield.

  We read and reread the letter, which was copied in typescript underneath the original photographed copy of the handwritten note. Brian broke the silence with a low whistle.

  "Unbelievable! Dynamite, eh? The whole damn thing was rigged. Except I can't believe that stuff about Critchfield. That's hooey. Pure bull."

  Joe looked at me quickly. We didn't say anything. We read the next letter. This was typed, and bore the letterhead of Whitney amp; Steele, a textile firm in Fitchburg, now defunct. The letter was written to a Mr. Lloyd Prill, Katzmann's assistant, and was dated January 23, 1927. It explained that the greatest obstacle to the final conviction of Sacco and Vanzetti, which, as the assistant prosecutor knew, was vital to the interests of' American democracy and industry, lay in the broad sympathy the pair of renegades had managed to stir up in the working class. This must be undermined, the author of the letter said, and at the same time the alibis of both men must be discredited. He then proceeded to outline two alternative plans to accomplish these goals. The letter mentioned several other actors in the drama of Dedham by name, among them Brockton Police Chief Stewart; Harry Ripley, the jury foreman who hated Italians; Judge Thayer, who apparently was a close family friend of the letter writer; and others. It was signed by the house counsel for Whitney amp; Steele: Joseph Carlton Critchfield.

  Underneath, instead of a typed copy of the letter, which was unnecessary, were three affidavits from handwriting-analysis institutes in Albany, Paris, and Toronto, stating to Mr. Dominic Santuccio that the signature affixed to the letter matched other specimens known to be those of Mr. Critchfield and that it was genuine. Below these were two notarized statements, one from a museum and one from a laboratory, attesting to the authenticity and age of the letterhead, paper, and typeface.

  We stood in silence reading and rereading this second tidbit.