You Play the Black & the Red Comes Up Up (17 page)

MEA CULPA

I
spent most of the time sleeping or just lying on the cot in the death row. Mostly I didn't know whether I was sleeping or not. That's the way it was until the day before the execution. Then it was night and I really went to sleep, only waking up every hour or so and taking a smoke and then going back to sleep again.

I was asleep when Beckster's yelling waked me up. He was at the bars, yelling and shaking them and shouting, "Wake up, wake up!"

And then the turnkey came down and the head warden and they took me up to the office. Beckster kept slapping
my back and saying, “You're going to go free, you're going to go free!"

Then they got me in the office and the District Attorney was there and two detectives, and the State's Attorney was getting the Governor on the telephone.

I kept asking what it was all about but nobody paid any attention to me, all yelling and shouting and Beckster running to the man on the phone and saying, "Have you got him?" and then running back to me and slapping my back. After a while they got the Governor and he talked to the State's Attorney and the warden and to Beckster and then they hung up.

I said, "What's going on?"

"You're going free," Beckster said.

“Wait a minute," the State's Attorney said. “Hold your horses." He made me sit in a chair.

"Now," he said. "Do you know Quentin Genter?"

"Sure. He was in to see me a week or ten days ago."

"How long have you known him?"

"Oh, gees, I couldn't tell exactly. Ever since I came to California."

"Before you met Sheila Devon?"

"Sure. He was the first person I met in California. He gave me a lift down to San Diego the first day I was here— the time I went to see Lois."

Then they started arguing. Beckster said he had a right to talk to me first, and the State's Attorney said he couldn't. And then they argued about a stenographer. They yelled at each other and nobody paid any attention to me. Then it was decided that they'd have a stenographer in, so they brought in a cop who was police stenographer, and it was agreed that Beckster could tell me not to answer if he thought it would tend to incriminate me.

So they asked me all about Genter and where I'd met him. Then they got excited about the time I took Sheila up to see him. Then they asked me if I was sure Genter knew the way up to the top of the chute. Then they asked if I was sure I was asleep when Sheila fell off the chute. Then they asked if I ever heard of Sheila making a date with Genter.

I got plenty sore.

“She hated him, but don’t tell him so," I said. And I told
them how she'd taken the things he'd given her and thrown them from the car.

"Look here, what's wrong?'' I asked Beckster.

"Nothing's wrong," he said. He was grinning like an owl. "Just tell these gentlemen the truth as you've always told it to me. All I want my client to do, gentlemen, is just tell the truth. Ask him any question. I have no fear."

They went on asking me questions all night. They asked me about the arsenic bottle. I looked at Beckster, and I told them the story I'd told at the trial—that I'd found it on top of the chute.

"Was that after Genter had been up there?" the State's Attorney asked,

"I guess so," I said. "I couldn't say for sure."

"Well, you must remember."

"I don't remember for sure," I said.

"My client's answered," Beckster said. "He found the bottle. The symbol for arsenic meant nothing to him. It was just an unimportant bottle and there was no reason why he should attach Importance enough to it to remember the date. He merely put it on a crossbeam and forgot it. Isn't that it?" he asked me.

"I guess so," I said.

"But you did take Sheila Devon to the cabin in the mountains?" the State's Attorney asked me.

"Oh, we admit the seduction," Beckster said. "We've never denied it."

They asked me questions until morning, and then they seemed satisfied, and Beckster slapped me on the back.

"We've got them on ice," he said. "You're free."

"For what?" I said. "What's the idea?"

He said to the State's Attorney, "Okay now?"

"Sure, spill it," the State's Attorney said.

"Well," Beckster said, "Quentin Genter has committed suicide and left a full confession of the murder of Sheila. And you're going free."

I didn't know what to say. Then my mind got working again just as they were locking me in the cell.

"But he couldn't have done it," I yelled. "He couldn't have done it"

Beckster came back. "Listen," he whispered, "will you pipe down? And keep your tongue quiet!" He sounded real sore. "Now just keep your damned trap shut. If you're nuts yourself, just remember there's other people in this. There's my reputation—and there's Mamie—and Patsy's reputation and the Party's trust in you. That Party's a great organization, and it's stood by you, and now you want to spoil the parade."

I didn't know what to say.

DR. GENTER AND MR. HYDE

T
hey didn't turn me free right away. First they had to get a reprieve so I wouldn't be hanged, and then they had to have a hearing on the death of Genter and then they had other hearings. They had a lot in the papers about the hearings, and how every time things didn't suit him Beckster charged that the octopus of the movie industry was trying to whitewash one of the foulest spots in its nest. There was even more in the papers about that.

Then all of a sudden there wasn't much in the papers any more.

They took me in to the hearing and asked me if I was asleep when Sheila was killed, and I told them just what I'd said at the trial and they read out what I'd said at the trial too.

Then they asked Smitty if anyone could have gone out on the lookout porch without him seeing them, and Smitty said they could, because he knew I was having a date out there and he kept his back turned so's he wouldn't see us.

They asked him why he did that, and Smitty said:

"When a fellow has a date it's only etiquette to look the other way and give him all the privacy you can."

That made everyone laugh, and Beckster looked happy.

Then they brought in the arsenic bottle and proved that it belonged on Genter's shelf, and showed how it matched the other bottles.

After that they read out some of Genter's plots and how he had written down an outline about a man being falsely imprisoned for murder and how the man that really did do it wanted to get him free. It was the idea of the fake plot I'd told him when the Mex was in prison for the holdup of Gottstein, but they said it was his own feelings when I was in prison and he knew I was innocent and he was guilty. It was funny how that fitted in.

Then they read his confession letter, which said in the beginning that he was in his right mind and confessed that he was ethically, morally, and actually responsible for the murder of Sheila. He had written down there how it was his desire to make life different from a movie plot that had first got him interested in the love triangle between Mamie and Sheila and me, and how he wanted to be God and arrange the ending differently because he saw it coming out just like a movie script, and he wanted a different ending.

He said how when he came up the stairs that day and saw her by the rail and me asleep he'd pushed her over, and then had run down the steps again unobserved.

They figured that all out, about how he could have escaped, and that
I
didn't wake up until some time after when the screams of the people below woke me.

They had in the cop I fought with, and he was very friendly now, and he told how he had met me on the very last turn of the steps and how if anyone had been just a few seconds ahead of me he wouldn't have seen him.

I thought it was much higher up I met him, but I didn't remember clearly anything about that time, knowing Sheila was down there dead and only wanting to get at her.

Genter also had in the confession that I wasn't really married to Mamie, and that he'd played God again and staged the wedding for a joke, and that the people who had married us had just been dressed up and acting a part for a big laugh.

Then they had in Jira and another actress named Sylvia Carlin who testified that Genter had them in to witness a paper, and that he seemed happy and sane. Then they looked at the confession and said the signatures were theirs. The newspapers had a lot more pictures when Jira and Miss Carlin testified. They said they'd witnessed another paper, too, and they found that and it was Genter's will.

His will said that he had no relatives alive, so he left his entire estate as a fund to build a primary school for the education and enlightenment of the motion-picture executives and producers, except that the sum of ten thousand dollars should be set aside and paid directly to me to repay me for the mental suffering and anguish he had caused me, and another ten thousand dollars to pay for a memorial to Sheila. He had all the plans drawn for the memorial. It was to be set on a rock that stood in the sea on some property he owned by the beach, and it was to be the bronze figure of the young goddess Venus standing in a shell, and the figure was to be done by a Japanese sculptor named Togomi, and he had down how it was to be set so that at high tide the waves would lap around the feet of the figure, and that underneath there was to be a bronze plate that said on it just:
To Beauty.

Then he had a fund set aside to maintain it forever, and he had down the name of a trust company that was to do all that he said.

They took a long time getting through it all until Beckster made a speech and said Genter was a combination of genius and maniac and how he had delusions of grandeur and had wanted to play God and had failed, and how he had even come to the cell to gloat over the sufferings of an innocent man.

Then he said that Genter was a sadist and pervert and took dope and that he had two sides, and a split personality because of schizophrenia. Finally he explained that Genter was just like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in the movie. And then everyone seemed to understand better and looked like they knew what he was talking about, so he stopped.

Then they brought in a verdict that Genter was guilty.

NO TIME FOR CRIME

T
he day I was freed I went right down the shore and walked along and walked for hours, till I got to Palos Verdes and sat there looking at the waves like I used to do with Sheila. And I knew Genter's letter was something he'd made up. I knew that, because it was just like the case they'd proved against me. Some of it was true and some of it might have been true and some of it was lies, and it was fitted together so that the true parts made the untrue parts look straight.

I knew it had to be haywire, because Genter must have known I took his arsenic bottle, and when he said he left it up on the lookout at the top of the chute he knew I had taken it.

I sat there all night, looking
at the waves and trying to fig
ure it out. I tried to think I was talking to Sheila and asking her what I should do. But I could only feel that Sheila wasn't there, and I'd never see her any more. And I couldn't do anything any more. Even looking at the waves didn't work out right.

I sat all night trying to think, but all I could do was want to see Sheila.

In the morning I watched the pelicans flying in a line like seaplanes. Then, suddenly, I knew what I had to do, I got up and walked up the shore and went to the police station. I said;

"I've come to give myself up for the attempted murder of Mamie Block."

So they phoned the District Attorney and he came in, and I made a confession to him of how I'd tried to murder Mamie—how I'd tried to drown her and the straight about how I'd tried to poison her and then how I'd planned to push her off the chute.

They had a conference, and then finally the District Attorney said: "Go on. You've had your headlines, brother. Now give someone else a chance. Beat it."

I could see they didn't believe me. So I told them to get Mamie and I'd prove it to them—how I'd tried to drown her and how she'd been sick the morning after I'd given her the arsenic.

So they went out and found Mamie, and she came in with Beckster. They asked her all about it, and she looked me square in the eye and said it wasn't so,

"He's gone haywire," she said. "How could he try to drown me when I was a champion swimmer and swum all the way round Manhattan once? He knows that."

So the District Attorney said:

"Listen, brother. You'd better go somewhere and rest for a while. Go on a trip, or something, and get your mind straightened out."

And Beckster laughed and said, "It's the old publicity complex. It gets them all."

And the police captain said, "Sure, why we have nuts in here every day confessing to every murder from here to New York. One guy the other day had a line about how Dillinger wasn't really dead because he was Dillinger and could prove it."

I could see they didn't believe me.

"All right," I said. "Then here's one. I was the guy that held up Gottstein the night he was killed by the cops. And I got his money, too."

When I said that they all started to laugh as hard as they could. They just sat there and laughed till they were crying.

"Okay, laugh, you bohunks. I'll prove it to you. She knows," I said, pointing at Mamie. "That's what she had on me. She still has part of the bag cut up in strips. She's kept them so she'll have something on me. She has one part of the bag home now."

She shook her head at the D.A. pretending she was sad for me.

“You can search my home at any time, Mr. District Attorney," she said.

"That won't be nccessary, madam," he said.

"Okay, then," I said, "That means you've got scared and ditched them. But you can prove it another way. There were two fellows and two girls down the street when I took the bag off Gottstein. Get them. They saw me."

That stopped the D.A„ and the police went out and showed up with two of the witnesses. They couldn't find the other two. The witnesses, a fellow and a girl, looked at me and then said I didn't look anything like the guy. They said they were sure he was smaller and darker—just like the Mex that they'd pinched.

"They're wrong," I said. "I can prove it. You know that movie plot that Genter had about a man being in jail and another man did it."

"Don't tell me that was your plot," the captain said.

"Sure it was," I said. But when I said that they all lay back and laughed till the tears came and the captain said:

"
T
ake him away, he's killing me."

Suddenly he got serious and told me to scram.

"And don't come back any more," he said. "If you do, you'll be sent up to the booby hatch for a rest cure."

Mamie said, "I'll take care of him, Captain."

He said, "You're a straight ace, lady. Especially after the way he treated you."

So I said "All right, then. There's the bigamy charge, if you want."

"You never committed bigamy" Beckster said, laughing. "You've only had one wife, because your marriage to Mamie was one of Genter's big jokes."

"Then how about desertion from the Marines?" I said.

They all started screaming, laughing again.

"God, this man does want to get back in them sweet little cells," the captain said. "Take him out of my sight. Let the Marines come after him if they want him."

And they led me Out with Beckster and Mamie holding my arm like I was an invalid. We walked home and I didn't say anything. We went into the house and sat down there a while and they watched me.

Finally Beckster said, "Now, Richard, you've got to stop carrying on like that, or you'll be adjudged incompetent to handle your own affairs and it gives our Party a bad name, too."

"Our Party?" I said. I started laughing. It reminded me of the story of the orange peel on the Mississippi. "Where do you get that 'our' stuff?"

"Oh, I'm working with Patsy and Mamie," he said, and he grinned. "Since your escapade the Party has become nationally known and
now we've got two hundred thou
sand members, and don't you forget that two hundred thousand votes are an important weapon. You may not realize it, but With good handling the Ecanaanomic Plan can become a national iss
ue in the next Presidential cam
paign. That's how important it is. And it will be an issue. I'm going to see to that. I'm going to be adviser to Patsy and Mamie."

"That's no skin off my nose," I told him.

"But there's other things. You know, since your delivery a lot of members are now convinced of the efficacy of prayer and the particular potency prayer under Patsy, You see, now the plan has all the advantages of a religious movement plus the strength of a political party. That's why you're important. So you've got to behave, or else."

"Or else what?"

"Well, there's Genter's will. It leaves you ten thousand dollars, you know."

"If I get it."

"Well, that's it. I can get it for you, but we'll have a long fight. You see, we've got to see if there's any contest on the will, and if there is it will be a hard fight and mean lots of legal work."

"And you want your share."

"Well, if you put it that way. I didn't say anything about money when I was defending your life, did I?"

I saw what he was after, so I thought,
Let him have it.
Then I had an idea, so I told him I wanted part of it to go to Dickie when he got of age. And he said he could do that but it would take a lot of work and everything, and then, too, Mamie ought to receive something for the suffering I'd caused her. I couldn't argue with him. So I let it go, and right off he called up his office and a g
irl brought up agree
ments for us to sign. The agreement said Beckster was to get half of whatever money came to me from the Genter will, and Mamie was to get a quarter of it, and the other quarter was to be placed in a trust for Dickie. It took a long time to get it fixed up.

All of a sudden I was sick crazy just to see Sheila's face.

But I couldn't think about it, because Mamie and Beckster were there, watching me, and I didn't want to think about Sheila as long as anyone could watch me.