Blue Moon (15 page)

“The physical evidence won't allow any jury to convict you. But the prosecution already knows that. In fact, they probably know the identity of the real culprits who hired Mr. Romanelli. That's
irrelevant to them. They need a conviction and, by their lights, you must suffer because you began the whole godforsaken mess. You are a fallen woman and, in a twisted sort of logic, you must—as far as they are concerned—be punished. Now that the war is over, the newspapers are desperate for copy. A murder involving a call girl is perfect for them.”

He handed me a copy of the report by the coroner: “Hair, eyes, ears, teeth and features were missing. The severing of arms, neck, and legs and a transverse cut 12-inches across—which penetrated the belly wall and caused three perforations of the bowel—had the appearance of having been made with a saw rather than with a keen cutting instrument. The right arm had been severed by a slightly diagonal cut and the upper arm bone partially splintered, as if the bone had been almost sawed through, then bent, splintering the remaining bone.”

Perhaps against his better judgement, he next showed me the photographs. “It is obvious that a woman of your height and build could not have done this.” In one picture—taken at the crime scene—the torso, surrounded by leaves, lies flat on its stomach, giving the impression of a doll that, having displeased its owner, had its extremities removed. On closer inspection, the area around the neck is blood-stained, the lower portion of the neck is visible, and the mangled remains of the right arm forlornly rests on the ground. In the morgue photo, the side of the body is shown—the pearly white skin of the upper torso contrasts sharply with the red meat-like look where the head, arms and legs were ripped off; the stomach area looks like a piece of liver one buys at a butcher; in his photos, the coroner has been careful to exclude the penis from view. He obviously did not wish to be accused of venturing into pornography.

My lawyer continued to whirl around the room, his felt hat in hand, his undone overcoat revealing beneath it a completely crumpled suit, a shirt with a week's worth of sweat on it, and a necktie that looked like a hangman's noose. I wondered if I so upset his Catholic-family-man approach to women that he could not bear to discuss the murder with me. Yet, as he declaimed, I realized that even more important to him was the desire to best the prosecution, to find a way to render them powerless.

“Evelyn, I have an idea. Your mother will have to help us, if she is willing.”

“I imagine she'll do everything in her power to assist me.”

He shot me a funny look, obviously not at all taken in by this vague assurance. “The way to win this case is to make you look like an innocent victim who has been manipulated to appear a guilty woman. Most of the jurors will know you worked as a call girl, a fact that will heavily prejudice them against you. I have to encourage them to overlook your profession.”

Once again he paused, looking me over as one might a piece of cattle. Then, he smiled. “There's a lot of movie pictures in which a fallen woman is unjustly accused of a crime, often murder. Force of circumstances is always against such ladies, but they triumph over adversity when it becomes obvious that reputation and guilt are not one and the same. Do you follow me? A criminal lawyer can learn a lot at the Tivoli”

I smiled in agreement. “I understand what you're saying, but I'm not sure what this has to do with me.”

“Everything. You look a bit like Bette Davis, one of the great wronged women in the pictures. She looks like a hard dame, but in the end she is shown to have a heart of gold. Wouldn't hurt a fly.”

“I'm still confused.”

“Every day of the trial you are going to be carefully dressed. Expensive, conservative clothes. Dark colours. Only your hat is going to be stylish. Some will have veils, some not. You will always wear white kid gloves. Your hair is to be marcelled every day after court has finished. You must be careful not to sleep on your perm, never allow it to be mussed.”

“I still don't understand.”

Without paying any attention to me, he continued: “You are never to look at the jury, even if you give testimony. You are never to appear even the slightest bit upset, no matter what any witness says. You are to have a slight—very slight—smile on your face, as if you are above everything that is happening around you. You speak only to me—and only when I signal you to do so.”

“Sounds like a role in a melodrama.”

“More of a movie. Think of it like that. You must do exactly as I instruct you.”

“Do you think we can influence the jury?”

“Of course we can. If you sit there looking like a wronged Barbara Stanwyck, they will become convinced you're being framed. Which is exactly what is happening to you.”

“Yes. I guess so. It seems overly contrived.”

“Take it from me. All the best criminal lawyers do what I'm doing. Baiting the trap, it's called. We just have to be sure the trap doesn't get sprung on us.”

So Mr. Sullivan prevailed upon Mother to be my wardrobe mistress and makeup artist; he paid one of my fellow inmates to do my hair. My costumes were chosen well in advance—usually three or four days—and I was given careful instruction on my posture and other aspects of my physical presence. My lipsticks were to be dark but never lurid: very deep reds, never scarlet. In place of the image of the fallen woman was substituted the picture of the wronged ingenue. On the eighth of November 1946, the columnist for the
Spectator,
a man with an excellent eye for detail, provided a vivid, accurate description: “Shiny black curls beneath her sequin-studded skull cap; a beauty spot on her right cheek; finely shaped nose, large dark eyes. Her dress: black, sleeveless toeless, heel-less shoes; matching lipstick and nail polish.” Was Mr. Sullivan blissfully unaware that a similar scheme had initiated the downward spiral in my existence? Did he simply have a mind that thought like Mother's?

Unfortunately, Mr. Sullivan was trying to bar the door well after the horse had strayed from the stable. I had already—under instructions—given three different versions of the torso murder to the police. These were the first short stories I ever concocted.

At first, I told the police exactly what happened. My husband had been kidnapped, I was summoned to fetch him after he had been warned about his big mouth, and only then discovered that he had been murdered. On the day after, one of the investigators, Mr. Wood, began with an extremely commonsensical question: “Mrs. Dick, why would this man call you to get you to drive him in your car with part of a body, when he already had it in his car?”

“The car couldn't stay. They had somewhere else to go.”

“It is pretty hard to believe that this gang, having murdered your husband, having cut him up, and having got the body half way up the Mountain, would call you to drive the rest of the way. Why bring you into it at all?”

“They had a job to do in Toronto and alcohol to get in Windsor.”

“But if they had the torso in the car up on the Mountain, they could have, in the time they waited for you to get there, driven along and dumped it over the embankment.”

“Well, they claimed they had an another errand to do.”

Annoyed but a bit triumphant in having demonstrated to me the illogicality of what I was telling him, Wood pressed me further: “When Romanelli told you it was part of John in the bag, were you glad that your husband had been done away with?”

“No, it was a pretty mean trick to break up a home.”

“But he was your
husband?”
He said the last word as if he meant
enemy.

So I answered him in kind. “Yes, but he had so many enemies.”

Finding it impossible to keep the sneer out of his voice, he got to the heart of the matter: “Mrs. Dick, did you conspire with this man, this Romanelli, to murder your husband?”

“No.” I answered him very deliberately.

“Were you to get any money for your part in it?”

“Well, I didn't like the idea, but he said something about settling up with me in a couple of weeks. I don't know why he said that.”

“How much did he say?”

“Two hundred dollars … 'For my trouble/he said.”

“When did he tell you that?”

“While I was driving.”

“Up to that time you didn't expect any financial gain?”

“No.”

“Did you get the two hundred?”

“Not even the smell of it.”

Impatience now replaced sneering in Wood's voice. “Mrs. Dick, did you take any actual part in the murder of your husband?”

“No “ I assured him.

“I understand, Mrs. Dick,” Wood began, “that you have been talking to my colleague Detective Preston and you want to give us some information in connection with the death of John Dick. Now, go ahead and tell us, so we can get it down on paper.” This was Wood in his kindliest manner.

“Well, as you know, Bill Bohozuk detested my husband. They were bitter enemies.” I paused: “Bill borrowed two hundred dollars from me.”

“Did he say what he wanted the money for?”

“Yes, he was expecting a job to be done. The men doing the job needed two hundred as a down payment.”

“What kind of job?”

“John had to be fixed.”

“In what way?”

“Put out of business, and they had to have….”

He interrupted me: “What do you mean by that, put out of business?”

“Well, murdered, I guess.”

“And who was to get the two hundred?”

“Well, I was to give it to Bill, and he was going to give it to the gang that had come through from Windsor. The two hundred was only a down payment. I gave Bill the money, but he returned it to me a few days later saying the men were too busy to do such a small job. He also told me the price had gone up to a thousand dollars.”

“Did Romanelli tell you anything else about the murder when you were joyriding with him on the Mountain?” Wood now inquired, injecting a sarcastic tone into his voice.

“Yes, he told me that he and an associate had met John at the King George Hotel at 1:30 in the afternoon, had several beers, and offered to drive him to the top of the Mountain for another drink when the pub closed at two. The three of them drove and drank. John didn't notice the time until about 3:30; his shift began at 4:11. By now, they were on a deserted road, and he began accusing his companions of purposely keeping him late. John apparently cursed
them: “I won't come out again with you sons of bitches, Dagos!” At that point, Romanelli let him have it.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“He shot him, once in the back of the neck, once through the right eyeball.”

“OK. Go on.”

“From Glanford Street they came down to the city and went down to a home in the north end, where the Italians live. They stayed there for a little while disposing of parts of the limbs as there was no one home, and then about a quarter to five they had to start cleaning up.”

“Why did they have to start cleaning up?”

“Because the person who lived in the house was arriving home.”

“Now were you in the car with these men when this happened?”

“No, officer. Romanelli told me all this during the drive.”

Changing his approach in order to confuse me, he asked me about John's missing limbs. Did I know where they were?

“They were burnt in a furnace. I don't know the address.”

I made this statement to the police, replacing the first two.

“On the day of the murder, I borrowed Bill Landeg's car and did some shopping. I met John on McNab between King and Market streets at 1:45 in the afternoon. He told me he had just returned from the Regal Hotel. He wanted to borrow twenty-five dollars. I told him I had no money. He went to the beverage room at the King George Hotel saying he had to meet a couple of fellows. I went to do some more shopping. I later saw my husband come out of the hotel with Romanelli and another man. I saw Bill Bohozuk's car on James Street near the Virginia Dare store. John and the two men were walking east. I wondered if John was about to be murdered.

“After I finished shopping I drove home, arriving there at four. Bohozuk called me: 'We've got him at last.' He wanted me to meet him at the Connaught as soon as possible. When I arrived at the Connaught, I was met by Romanelli and his companion. They gave me John's watch
chain, some streetcar tickets, and a paper bag. “These are some mementoes Bill thought you'd like to have.' Romanelli then asked to borrow the car. I agreed to this. He drove me home, let me out and drove away. Later, he called to tell me he was returning the car.

“He brought the car into the back lane. I remarked that there was a lot of blood on the car and he said that would come off all right. There was a blanket in the back of the car and it was covered with blood. Wrapped up in a piece of the cloth was a part of the face which was all smashed, and some other parts which he said they had tried to burn without success. Romanelli removed the parts from the car and put them in the garage. He told me I was too bloody slow and was very mad because he wanted to go back uptown. He was cleaning a gun and a knife and he also used some IT cleaning fluid to remove blood from his gabardine coat. After he had cleaned himself up he locked the door to the garage. The parts of the body he removed from the car were placed inside a bushel basket.

“We both got into the car. I intended to drive, but he got behind the wheel and backed the car southward out of the lane and drove to the Royal Connaught where he got out. I returned the car, parking it by the Grafton Garage. I walked up to the Royal Connaught alley and took a taxi home. I arrived home about 7:15 p.m. I went into the house and saw my mother. I told her John had been fixed, put out of business and she said, 'I knew Bohozuk was after him. So was your father.' I was expecting Bill or Romanelli to come and clean up the garage, but they didn't show up.”