The Cincinnati Red Stalkings (27 page)

“There’s more,” I said. “Charlotte Ashby—the woman who shot Dick Hurley—was a friend of Sarah Devlin’s. She’ll confirm a lot of what Mr. Whitaker is saying.”

“Like what? That some girl met a fellow who claimed to be Dick Hurley in 1869? Hell, that could have been anyone. Including you, Whitaker.” Despite his defiant words, Bonner’s expression was downcast and his tone lacked conviction. I had the sense that he was starting to realize that what Ambrose Whitaker was saying was the truth.

I took a small notebook from my pocket, and pulled a scrap of ancient paper from the protection of its pages. “Got this at the library,” I said. “It’s the newspaper account of the banquet. Says the players were given pins in the shape of red stockings. Also says toward the end of the party, Dick Hurley was so grateful to your father for including his name on the big bat that he gave him his pin.” I held out the paper. “Read it yourself. The library has more copies, by the way, so there’s no sense destroying it.” As he studied the clipping, I added, “Charlotte Ashby will testify that the ‘player’ Sarah met was wearing such a pin.”

He looked at the paper long and hard, then handed it back to me. I quickly slipped it back in the notebook before Bonner could notice that his thumb had smudged the ink.

“So what?” Bonner said stubbornly. “My father isn’t competent to stand trial. Doesn’t matter what you say, or what kind of evidence you have, no judge in this county is going to let a murder charge against him proceed.”

“You’re quite right,” Whitaker said. “My intention is to testify at
your
trial, to describe the origin of your extortion scheme. And I am prepared to show where your father and I buried Sarah Devlin. I’m sure an exhumation would provide further evidence to support my story.”

“And what about your mother,” I said. “You told me how hard your father’s illness has been on her. What do you think it would do to her to find out that the man she’s been married to for forty years is a murderer?”

Nathaniel Bonner was no longer defiant. We let him think for a few minutes. “And if I do confess,” he said, “then nothing about my father comes out?”

Whitaker and I both promised we would reveal nothing about what happened in 1869.

His head low, Bonner nodded. “I’ll make a statement.”

We’d all moved to a larger room in the station, and had been joined by Detective Forsch, two patrolmen, an assistant district attorney, and a stenographer.

Bonner began by confessing to the murder of Oliver Perriman, giving the same account he had in Adela Whitaker’s office. His objective, he admitted, was to find the Red Stockings accounting ledger so that he could use it to blackmail the Whitakers.

He continued, “So Perriman was dead, and I still didn’t have the ledger. That’s when I thought up the idea of presenting a bat like my father did and getting involved with the exhibit—that way I’d have a chance to look around some more.

“But Lloyd Tinsley caught me going through Perriman’s desk. I swear he could read on my face what I’d done. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m no cold-blooded killer. I was angry at Perriman ... frustrated . . . that’s why I shot him. It wasn’t something I planned.”

“Yes, you mentioned that before,” Forsch said. The detective was unmoved by Bonner’s attempts to diminish the severity of his crime. “Go on.”

“Tinsley got me to tell him what I was looking for. But he didn’t want to turn me in. He said Perriman was going to stay dead no matter what, so there was no point worrying about it. The question was what to do next—and that was to find the ledger. He didn’t say so, but I think Tinsley was expecting a pretty good cut for himself. He told me that Perriman had given some things to Rawlings and that I should check it out. I didn’t have it in me to go through that again myself, though. So Tinsley told me he knew somebody who could help: Rufus Yates. I gave Yates the money to get out of jail, and he broke into Rawlings’s house.”

Forsch raised the question I’d asked him to. “How did Tinsley know Yates?”

“Yates played for Wichita when Tinsley ran that club. Then in 1919, Yates was here in Cincinnati. When New York gamblers were looking for locals to lay down bets on the Reds for them, Yates convinced Tinsley to put down twenty grand. Tinsley got ten percent for doing it.”

“Tinsley told you this?” Forsch asked.

Bonner shook his head no. The assistant district attorney instructed him to avoid answering with gestures. “No,” Bonner said. “Yates told me.”

“After you had Yates search Rawlings’s house, then what?” Forsch asked.

“Then it was out of my hands. At first, I was glad to listen to Tinsley. He had a clear head, and I was pretty nervous about things. But then he kept calling the shots, and there was no way I could refuse him—he could have turned me in at any time.

“Anyway, with the Sox trial going on, Tinsley’s main interest became protecting himself. If it came out that he’d fronted for gamblers in ’19, he’d be out of baseball for sure, and probably in jail. One of the things he worried about was Rawlings poking around—thought he might have found something on that World Series. So he had Yates and me set him up. I took the picture of the two of them and sent it to Garry Herrmann.

“Then Yates caught on to how worried Tinsley was about being found out and he started blackmailing Tinsley. So Tinsley had me . . .” Bonner’s voice faded and he looked away.

“Had you what?” Forsch prompted.

“Lloyd Tinsley had me kill Rufus Yates.”

“Thought you weren’t a cold-blooded killer,” Forsch said. “How’d he get you to do that?”

“He told me that Yates already knew about me killing Perriman. I asked him how he found out, and Tinsley said he told him. Tinsley set it up so I
had
to kill him.”

“Rawlings had nothing to do with it?” Forsch asked.

“No. Tinsley paid that Knucksie goon to say that Rawlings tried to hire him to kill Yates. He figured that way both Yates and Rawlings were taken care of, and nobody would find out about him taking Arnold Rothstein’s money.”

Forsch and the assistant district attorney asked a few more questions, Nathaniel Bonner answered every one of them, and the stenographer got it all on paper. But I’d already heard enough to know I’d be able to make the case I needed to Judge Landis.

T
he train ride to Chicago Sunday morning was one I actually enjoyed. I was confident with the knowledge that Lloyd Tinsley and Nathaniel Bonner were both behind bars and that a copy of Bonner’s statement had been sent by special messenger to Judge Landis. Only one development was disappointing: because of all the negative publicity surrounding the collection, Garry Herrmann had decided to postpone indefinitely the exhibit to honor the 1869 Red Stockings.

The return trip Monday was even better. Landis had cleared me, and even said a few words that came about as close as I expected he ever got to apologizing. And I’d be back in time for the Tuesday game in Redland Field against the New York Giants.

Ambrose Whitaker came to the game as my guest, and afterward the two of us took a trolley to Eden Park.

We walked along a lane north of the reservoir. Soft, warm breezes rippled through the trees. A number of picnickers were in the park taking advantage of the mild weather and late sunshine. Two small boys were flying a kite, and several other children were playing a game of tag.

As we neared the water tower, Whitaker drew to a stop. With his cane, he pointed to a grassy area where a young couple were eating a basket dinner in the shade of a magnificent oak tree. “That’s where Sarah Devlin is buried,” he said.

“By the tree?”

“Directly under it. I planted that oak as a seedling a few months after we buried her. My intention was to hide the crime; I thought nobody would dig underneath a tree. I’ve come here often since then, seen it grow over the years. As time passed, I stopped worrying about anyone finding her body. I got to thinking of that oak as a monument—a living headstone.”

“It’s prettier than any headstone I’ve ever seen,” I said.

We stared at the burial spot for a while, then resumed strolling. “I’ve made another confession,” Whitaker said. “Went to see Charlotte Ashby in the Work House. I explained everything that happened.”

“How’d she take it?”

“Not too badly. I asked her if Sarah Devlin left any family that she knew of; I wanted to tell them what happened, too. Mrs. Ashby says the family’s all gone by now; there’s no one to tell. And she didn’t seem to hold it against me that I’ve never come forward before now. She says it’s probably best to keep it a secret at this point. Poor woman’s feeling like a fool herself for shooting that Dick Hurley impostor. Letting something fester for years like that can certainly warp your judgment.”

“She’s probably going to spend the rest of her life in jail for it,” I said.

“Perhaps not. Mrs. Ashby said she will talk to the police now, and tell them that she thought the man she shot was somebody else—won’t mention anything about Sarah or Hurley, though. She’ll try to make them think she’s just a dotty old woman and hope for mercy. The fellow didn’t die, so maybe she has a chance.”

“He won’t be testifying against her, either,” I said. “He’s left town.” John Cogan had decided to end his Dick Hurley impersonation; he’d sent me a note, telling me he was going back home to Indiana, and thanking me for not exposing his charade.

“Well, then she might only receive a light sentence.”

“I hope she does get out again.”

“So do I,” said Whitaker. “When she does, I’m going to bring her here to see the tree.”

His pace picked up, and I asked him something I’d wondered about for some time. “I understand you retired from business for health reasons,” I said. “If you don’t mind me asking, what’s wrong with you?”

“Not a thing.” He smiled wryly. “When Josiah Bonner became ill a few years ago, it started me thinking. One thing I thought about was the past; that’s when I decided to leave some record of what happened in 1869, so I put that note in the baseball. And I also thought about the future. Nathaniel Bonner, I knew, had a great deal of difficulty when he replaced his father as head of the lumber company. Josiah had left it in poor financial shape and had never taught his son the skills necessary to run a business. By the time Nathaniel had to assume control, Josiah was no longer capable of helping him learn the ropes. I didn’t want that to happen with my children. So I decided to let Aaron and Adela think I was too ill to continue working, and let them take charge of the business. In the event anything went wrong, I could still step back in and help them out.”

“Maybe it would be a good idea to tell them what really happened,” I said. “They’re probably imagining some pretty bad things right now, after all they heard from Nathaniel Bonner. Might be better that they know the truth. I think they can take it.”

“I suppose you’re right. It has been good to be getting things out in the open.”

He turned to me. “Now I’ve got a question for you.”

“Yes?”

“I realize my memory isn’t what it used to be, but I’ve been trying hard as I can, and I don’t remember Dick Hurley giving Josiah Bonner a red-stocking pin at the banquet.”

“That was a bluff,” I said. “I thought something in print might help convince Nathaniel Bonner of your story. Looks more like solid evidence.” I’d torn a blank page from one of the old guides Perriman had given me, Karl Landfors wrote a revised report on the banquet, and his friend printed it up to look like a genuine newspaper clipping.

I reached into my jacket pocket, and handed Whitaker the pages from the accounting ledger. “These are for you.” I could see no reason why his embezzlement from the Red Stockings should ever be revealed. “Might want to make a little fire when you get home,” I suggested.

After leaving Ambrose Whitaker at Eden Park, I walked home. In front of our house, Erin Kelly was jumping rope while her brother and several playmates watched from the stoop. Margie twirled one end of the rope, and Karl Landfors, looking as animated as a hitching post, held the other. From his expression, I had the feeling he was wishing that he was already back in Boston.

The game stopped when I arrived. The children all ran off to play elsewhere, and Margie, Karl, and I went into the parlor.

Over a round of lemonades, I told them about my talk with Whitaker.

Karl said, “There’s something I don’t understand. How did Nathaniel Bonner get the idea to try blackmailing Adela Whitaker?”

That was something Ambrose and I had asked him. “Soon after he took over Queen City Lumber,” I said, “he checked the accounts and found that his father had been getting regular ‘consulting fees’ from the Whitakers’ company. He asked his father about it. Never got a single coherent answer, but he kept trying until he had enough bits and pieces to put it together. He understood that his father had blackmailed Ambrose Whitaker for embezzling from the old Red Stockings and that the Bonners had the accounting ledger to prove it. Nathaniel decided it should continue to the next generation, and went to Adela Whitaker. It wasn’t until Adela told him to show her proof that he looked for it. What he didn’t know was that his father hadn’t kept the whole ledger. Josiah had put the account pages in the back of the score book—that way if the Whitakers ever tried to find the ledger, they’d come up empty.” Bonner hadn’t included this in his official statement because he would say nothing to incriminate his father.

“Was it because the lumber company was in financial straits that he needed the money?” Karl asked.

“That’s what I assumed,” I said. “From seeing the lumberyard, I could tell that business was way down from earlier years. But Bonner said even if he didn’t need the money, he’d have done it because it was ‘his due.’ ”

Margie asked, “How did Ollie Perriman end up with the accounting pages in the first place? If Josiah Bonner had been using them to blackmail Ambrose over the years, how did Perriman get them? And how did Nathaniel Bonner know Perriman had them?”

“Bonner told me his mother was the baseball fan of the family,” I answered. “When Perriman started putting his collection together, Mrs. Bonner donated a box of material that her husband had from the old Red Stockings. Josiah was in a home, and Nathaniel had no interest in baseball, so she decided to give everything to Perriman for the exhibit. She didn’t know what was in the score book.”

I smiled, remembering two months ago when Patrick Kelly uttered the lament so many boys have spoken over the years: my mother threw out my baseball cards. Then I imagined Nathaniel Bonner in prison, and wondered if he would be voicing a similar complaint to his fellow inmates.