Chapter 23. The Confession

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_ CHAPTER XXIII. THE CONFESSION

Dorgan was putting up a bold fight, at any rate. Everyone, and most of all his opponents who had once thought they had him on the run, was forced to admit that. Moreover, one could not help wondering at his audacity, whatever might be the opinion of his dishonesty.

But I was quite as much struck by the nerve of Carton. In the face of gathering misfortunes many a man of less stern mettle might have gone to pieces. Not so with the fighting District Attorney. It seemed to spur him on to greater efforts.

It was a titanic struggle, this between Carton and Dorgan, and had reached the point where quarter was given or asked by neither.

Kennedy had retired to his laboratory with the photographs and was studying them with an increasing interest.

It was toward the close of the afternoon when the telephone rang and Kennedy motioned to me to answer it.

"If it's Carton," he said quickly, "tell him I'm not here. I'm not ready for him yet and I can't be interrupted."

I took down the receiver, prepared to perjure my immortal soul. It was indeed Carton, bursting with news and demanding to see Kennedy immediately.

Almost before I had finished with the carefully framed, glib excuse that I was to make, he shouted to me over the wire, "What do you think, Jameson? Tell him to come down right away. The impossible has happened. I have got under Dopey Jack's guard--he has confessed. It's big. Tell Kennedy I'll wait here at my office until he comes."

He had hung up the receiver before I could question him further. I think it cured Kennedy, temporarily of asking me to fib for him over the telephone. He was as anxious as I to see Carton, now, and plunged into the remaining work on the photographs eagerly.

He finished much sooner than he would, otherwise, and only to preserve the decency of the excuse that I had made did not hasten down to the Criminal Courts Building before a reasonable time had elapsed. As we entered Carton's office we could tell from the very atmosphere of the halls that something was happening. The reporters in their little room outside were on the qui vive and I heard a whisper and a busy scratching of pencils as we passed in and the presence of someone else in the District Attorney's office was noted.

Carton met us in a little ante-room. He was all excitement himself, but I could see that it was a clouded triumph. His mind was really elsewhere than on the confession that he was getting. Although he did not ask us, I knew that he was thinking only of Margaret Ashton and how to regain the ground that he had apparently lost with her. Still, he said nothing about the photographs. I wondered whether it was because of his confidence that Kennedy would pull him through.

"You know," he whispered, "I have been working with my assistants on Dopey Jack ever since the conviction, hoping to get a confession from him, holding out all sorts of promises if he would turn state's evidence and threats if he didn't. It all had no effect. But Murtha's death seems to have changed all that. I don't know why--whether he thinks it was due to foul play or not, for he won't say anything about that and evidently doesn't know--but it seems to have changed him."

Carton said it as though at last a ray of light had struck in on an otherwise black situation, and that was indeed the case.

"I suppose," suggested Craig, "that as long as Murtha was alive he would rather have died than say anything that would incriminate him. That's the law of the gang world. But with Murtha no longer to be shielded, perhaps he feels released. Besides, it must begin to look to him as though the organization had abandoned him and was letting him shift pretty much for himself."

"That's it," agreed Carton. "He has never got it out of his head that Kahn swung the case against him and I've been careful not to dwell on the truth of that Kahn episode."

Carton led us into his main office, where Rubano was seated with two of Carton's assistants who were quizzing him industriously and obtaining an amazing amount of information about gang life and political corruption. In fact, like most criminals when they do confess, Dopey Jack was in danger of confessing too much, in sheer pride at his own prowess as a bad man.

Outside, I knew that it was being well noised abroad, in fact I had nodded to an old friend on the Star who had whispered to me that the editor had already called him up and offered to give Rubano any sum for a series of articles for the Sunday supplement on life in the underworld. I knew, then, that the organization had heard of it, by this time--too late.

Most of the confession was completed by the time we arrived, but as it had all been carefully taken down we knew we had missed nothing.

"You see, Mr. Carton," Rubano was saying as we three entered and he turned from the assistant who was quizzing him, "it's like this. I can't tell you all about the System. No one can. You understand that. All any of us know is the men next to us--above and below. We may have opinions, hear gossip, but that's no good as evidence."

"I understand," reassured Carton. "I don't expect that. You must tell me the gossip and rumours, but all I am bartering a pardon for is what you really know, and you've got to make good, or the deal is off, see?"

He said it in a tone that Dopey Jack could understand and the gangster protested. "Well, Mr. Carton, haven't I made good?"

"You have so far," grudgingly admitted Carton who was greedy for everything down to the uttermost scrap that might lead to other things. "Now, who was the man above you, to whom you reported?"

"Mr. Murtha, of course," replied Jack, surprised that anyone should ask so simple a question.

"That's all right," explained Carton. "I knew it, but I wanted you on record as saying it. And above Murtha?"

"Why, you know it is Dorgan," replied Dopey, "only, as I say, I can't prove that for you any better than you can."

"He has already told about his associates and those he had working under him," explained Carton, turning to us. "Now Langhorne--what do you know about him?"

"Know about Langhorne--the fellow that was--that I robbed?" repeated Jack.

"You robbed?" cut in Kennedy. "So you knew about thermit, then?"

Dopey smiled with a sort of pride in his work, much as if he had received a splendid recommendation.

"Yes," he replied. "I knew about it--got it from a peterman who has studied safes and all that sort of thing. I heard he had some secret, so one night I takes him up to Farrell's and gets him stewed and he tells me. Then when I wants to use it, bingo! there I am with the goods."

"And the girl--Betty Blackwell--what did she have to do with it?" pursued Craig. "Did you get into the office, learn Langhorne's habits, and so on, from her?"

Dopey Jack looked at us in disgust. "Say," he replied, "if I wanted a skirt to help me in such a job, believe me I know plenty that could put it all over that girl. Naw, I did it all myself. I picked the lock, burnt the safe with that powder the guy give me, and took out something in soft leather, a lot of typewriting."

We were all on our feet in unrestrained excitement. It was the Black Book at last!

"Yes," prompted Carton, "and what then--what did you do with it?"

"Gave it to Mr. Murtha, of course," came back the matter-of-fact answer of the young tough.

"What did he do with it?" demanded Carton.

Dopey Jack shook his head dubiously. "It ain't no use trying to kid you, Mr. Carton. If I told you a fake you'd find it out. I'd tell you what he did, if I knew, but I don't--on the level. He just took it. Maybe he burnt it--I don't know. I did my work."

Unprincipled as the young man was, I could not help the feeling that in this case he was telling only the truth as he knew it.

We looked at each other aghast. What if Murtha had got it and had destroyed it before his death? That was an end of the dreams we had built on its capture. On the other hand, if he had hidden it there was small likelihood now of finding it. The only chance, as far as I could see, was that he had passed it along to someone else. And of that Dopey Jack obviously knew nothing.

Still, his information was quite valuable enough. He had given us the first definite information we had received of it.

Carton, his assistants, and Kennedy now vigorously proceeded in a sort of kid glove third degree, without getting any further than convincing themselves that Rubano genuinely did not know.

"But the stenographer," reiterated Carton, returning to the line of attack which he had temporarily abandoned. "Something became of her. She disappeared and even her family haven't a trace of her, nor any other institutions in the city. We've got something on you, there, Rubano."

Jack laughed. "Mr. Carton," he answered easily, "the police put me through the mill on that without finding anything, and I don't believe you have anything. But just to show you that I'm on the square with you, I don't mind telling you that I got her away."

It was dramatic, the off-hand way in which the gangster told of this mystery that had perplexed us.

"Got her away--how--where?" demanded Carton fiercely.

"Mr Murtha gave me some money--a wad. I don't know who gave it to him, but it wasn't his money. It was to pay her to stay away till this all blew over. Oh, they made it worth her while. So I dolled up and saw her--and she fell for it--a pretty good sized wad," he repeated, as though he wished some of it had stuck to his own hands.

We fairly gasped at the ease and simplicity with which the fellow bandied facts that had been beyond our discovery for days. Here was another link in our chain. We could not prove it, but in all probability it was Dorgan who furnished the money. Even if the Black Book were lost, it was possible that in the retentive memory of this girl there might be much that would take its place. She had seen a chance for providing for the future of herself and her family. All she had to do was to take it and keep quiet.

"You know where she is, then?" shot out Kennedy suddenly.

"No--not now," returned Dopey. "She was told to meet me at the Little Montmartre. She did. I don't think she knew what kind of place it was, or she wouldn't have come."

He paused, as though he had something on his mind.

"Go on," urged Kennedy. "Tell all. You must tell all."

"I was just thinking," he hesitated. "I remember I saw Ike the Dropper and Marie Margot there that day, too, with Martin Ogleby-- "

"Martin Ogleby!" interrupted Carton in surprise.

"Yes, Martin Ogleby. He hangs about the Montmartre and the Futurist, all those joints. Say--I've been thinking a heap since this case of mine came up. I wonder whether it was all on the level--with me. I gave the money. But was that a stall? Perhaps they tried to get back. Perhaps she played into their hands--I saw her watching the sports, there, and believe me, there are some swell lookers. Oh well, _I_ don't know. All I know is my part. I don't know anything that happened after that. I can't tell what I don't know, can I, Mr. Carton?"

"Not very well," smiled the prosecutor. "But you can tell us anything you suspect."

"I don't know what I suspect. I was only a part of the machine. Only after I read that she disappeared, I began to think there might have been some funny business--I don't know."

Eager as we were, we could only accept this unsatisfactory explanation of the whereabouts of Betty.

"After all, I was only a part," reiterated Jack. "You better ask Ike--that's all."

Just then the telephone buzzed. Carton was busy and Kennedy, who happened to be nearest, answered it. I fancied that there was a puzzled expression on his face, as he placed his hand over the transmitter and said to Carton, "Here--it's for you. Take it. By the way, where's that thing I left down here for recording voices?"

"Here in my desk. But you took the cylinder with you."

"Haven't you got another? Don't you ever use them for dictating letters?"

Carton nodded and sent his stenographer to get a new one.

"Just a minute, please," cut in Kennedy. "Mr. Carton will be here in a few moments, now."

Carton took the telephone and placed his hand over it, until, with a nod from Kennedy as he affixed the machine, he answered.

"Yes--this is the District Attorney," we heard him answer. "What? Rubano? Why you can't talk to him. He's a convicted man. Here? How do you know he's here? No--I wouldn't let you talk to him if he was. Who are you, anyway? What's that--you threaten him--you threaten me? You'll get us both, will you? Well, I want to tell you, you can go plumb--the deuce! The fellow's cut himself off!"

As Carton finished, a peculiar smile played about Rubano's features. "I expected that, but not so soon," he said quietly. "New York'll be no place for me, Mr. Carton, after this. You've got to keep your word and smuggle me out. South Africa, you know-- you promised."

"I'll keep my word, Rubano, too," assured Carton. "The nerve of that fellow. Where's Kennedy?"

We looked about. Craig had slipped out quietly during the telephone conversation. Before we could start a search for him, he returned.

"I thought there was something peculiar about the voice," he explained. "That was why I wanted a record of it. While you were talking I got your switchboard operator to connect me with central on another wire. The call was from a pay station on the west side. There wasn't a chance to get the fellow, of course--but I have the voice record, anyhow."

Dopey Jack's confession occupied most of the evening and it was late when we got away. Carton was overjoyed at the result of his pressure, and eager to know, on the other hand, whether Kennedy had made any progress yet with his study of the photographs.

I could have told him beforehand, however, that Craig would say nothing and he did not. Besides, he had the added mystery of the new phonograph cylinder to engross him, with the result that we parted from Carton, a little piqued at being left out of Craig's confidence, but helpless.

As for me, I knew it was useless to trail after Kennedy and when he announced that he was going back to the laboratory, I balked and, in spite of my interest in the case, went home to our apartment to bed, while Kennedy made a night of it.

What he discovered I knew no better in the morning than when I left him, except that he seemed highly elated.

Leisurely he dressed, none the worse for his late work and after devouring the papers as if there were nothing else in the world so important, he waited until the middle of the morning before doing anything further.

"I merely wanted to give Dorgan a chance to get to his office," he surprised me with, finally. "Come, Walter, I think he must be there now."

Amazed at his temerity in bearding Dorgan in his very den, I could do nothing but accompany him, though I much feared it was almost like inviting homicide.

The Boss's office was full of politicians, for it was now approaching "dough day," when the purse strings of the organization were loosed and a flood of potent argument poured forth to turn the tide of election by the force of the only thing that talks loud enough for some men to hear. Somehow, Kennedy managed to see the Boss.

"Mr. Dorgan," began Kennedy quietly, when we were seated alone in the little Sanctum of the Boss, "you will pardon me if I seem to be a little slow in coming to the business that has brought me here this morning. First of all I may say that you probably share the idea that ever since the days of Daguerre photography has been regarded as the one infallible means of portraying faithfully any object, scene, or action. Indeed, a photograph is admitted in court as irrefutable evidence. For, when everything else fails, a picture made through the photographic lens almost invariably turns the tide. However, such a picture upon which the fate of an important case may rest should be subjected to critical examination, for it is an established fact that a photograph may be made as untruthful as it may be reliable."

He paused. Dorgan was regarding him keenly, but saying nothing. Kennedy did not mind, as he resumed.

"Combination photographs change entirely the character of the initial negative and have been made for the past fifty years. The earliest, simplest, and most harmless photographic deception is the printing of clouds in a bare sky. But the retoucher with his pencil and etching tool to-day is very skilful. A workman of ordinary ability can introduce a person taken in a studio into an open-air scene well blended and in complete harmony without a visible trace of falsity."

Dorgan was growing interested.

"I need say nothing of how one head can be put on another body in a picture," pursued Craig, "nor need I say what a double exposure will do. There is almost no limit to the changes that may be wrought in form and feature. It is possible to represent a person crossing Broadway or walking on Riverside Drive, places he may never have visited. Thus a person charged with an offence may be able to prove an alibi by the aid of a skilfully prepared combination photograph.

"Where, then," asked Kennedy, "can photography be considered as irrefutable evidence? The realism may convince all, except the expert and the initiated after careful study. A shrewd judge will be careful to insist that in every case the negative be submitted and examined for possible alterations by a clever manipulator."

Kennedy bent his gaze on Dorgan. "Now, I do not accuse you, sir, of anything. But a photograph has come into my possession in which Mr. Carton is represented as standing in a group on a porch, with Mr. Murtha, Mrs. Ogleby, and an unknown woman. The first three are in poses that show the utmost friendliness. I do not hesitate to say that was originally a photograph of yourself, Mr. Murtha, Mrs. Ogleby, and a woman whom you know well. It is a pretty raw deal, a fake in which Carton has been substituted by very excellent photographic forgery."

"A fake--huh!" repeated Dorgan, contemptuously. "How about the story of them? There's no negative. You've got to show me that the original print stolen from Carton, we'll say, is a fake. You can't do it. No, sir, those pictures were taken this summer."

Kennedy quietly laid down the bundle of photographs copied from those alleged to have been stolen from Carton. He was pointing to a shadow of a gable on the house.

"You see that shadow of the gable, Dorgan?" he asked. "Perhaps you never heard of it, but it is possible to tell the exact time at which a photograph was taken from a study of the shadows. It is possible in theory and practice, and it can be trusted absolutely. Almost any scientist, Dorgan, may be called in to bear testimony in court nowadays, but you probably think the astronomer is one of the least likely.

"Well, the shadow in this picture can be made to prove an alibi for someone. Notice. It is seen prominently to the right, and its exact location on the house is an easy matter. The identification of the gable casting the shadow ought to be easy. To be exact, I have figured it out as 19.62 feet high. The shadow is 14.23 feet down, 13.10 feet east, and 3.43 feet north. You see, I am exact. I have to be. In one minute it moves 0.080 feet upward, 0.053 feet to the right, and 0.096 feet in its apparent path. It passes the width of a weatherboard, 0.37 foot, in four minutes and thirty- seven seconds."

Kennedy was talking rapidly of data which he had derived from the study of the photograph as from plumb line, level, compass, and tape, astronomical triangle, vertices, zenith, pole, and sun, declination, azimuth, solar time, parallactic angles, refraction, and a dozen other bewildering terms.

"In spherical trigonometry," he concluded, "to solve the problem three elements must be known. I know four. Therefore, I can take each of the known, treat it as unknown, and have four ways to check my result. I find that the time might have been either three o'clock, twenty-one minutes and twelve seconds in the afternoon, or 3:21:31 or 3:21:29, or 3:21:33. The average is 3: 21:26 and there can be no appreciable error except for a few seconds. I tell you that to show you how close I can come. The important thing, however, is that the date must have been one of two days, either May 22 or July 22. Between these two dates we must decide on evidence other than the shadow. It must have been in May, as the immature condition of the foliage shows. But even if it had been in July, that would be far from the date you allege. Why, I could even tell you the year. Then, too, I could look up the weather records and tell something from them. I can really answer, with an assurance and accuracy superior to the photographer himself, if you could produce him and he were honest, as to the real date. The original picture, aside from being doctored, was actually taken last May. Science is not fallible, but exact in this matter."

Kennedy felt that he had scored a palpable hit. Dorgan was speechless. Still, Craig hurried on.

"But, you may ask, how about the automobile picture? That also is an unblushing fake. Of course I must prove that. In the first place you know that the general public has come to recognize the distortion of a photograph as denoting speed. A picture of a car in a race that doesn't lean is rejected. People demand to see speed, speed, more speed, even in pictures. Distortion does indeed show speed, but that, too, can be faked.

"Almost everyone knows that the image is projected upside down by the lens on the plate, and that the bottom of the picture is taken before the top. The camera mechanism admits light, which makes the picture, in the manner of a roller blind curtain. The slit travels from the top to the bottom and, the image on the plate being projected upside down, the bottom of the object appears on the top of the plate. For instance, the wheels are taken before the head of the driver. If the car is moving quickly, the image moves on the plate and each successive part is taken a little in advance of the last. The whole leans forward. By widening the slit and slowing the speed of the shutter, there is more distortion.

"Now, that is just what has been done. A picture has been taken of a car owned once by Murtha, probably at rest, with perhaps yourself, Murtha, Mrs. Ogleby, and your friend in it. The matter of faking Carton or anyone else is simple. If, with an enlarging lantern, the image of this faked picture is thrown on the printing paper like a lantern slide, and if the right-hand side is moved a little further away than the left, the top further away than the bottom, you can in that way print a fraudulent high-speed picture ahead.

"True, everything else in the picture, even if motionless, is distorted, and the difference between this faking and the distortion of the shutter can be seen by an expert. But it will pass with most people. In this case, however," added Kennedy suddenly, "the faker was so sure of it that he was careless. Instead of getting the plate further from the paper on the right, he did so on the left. It was further away on the bottom than on the top. He got the distortion, all right, enough to satisfy anyone. But it is distortion in the wrong direction! The top of the wheel, which goes fastest and ought to be most indistinct, is, in the fake, as sharp as any other part. It is a small mistake that was made, but fatal. Your picture is not of a joy ride at all. It is really high speed--backwards! It is too raw, too raw."

"You don't think people are going to swallow all that stuff, do you?" asked Dorgan coolly, in spite of the exposures. "What of it all?" he asked surlily. "I have nothing to do with it, anyhow. Why do you come to me? Take it to the proper authorities."

"Shall I?" asked Kennedy quietly, leaning over and whispering a few words in Dorgan's ear. I could not hear what he said, but Dorgan appeared to be fairly staggered.

When Kennedy passed out of the Boss's office there was a look of quiet satisfaction on his face which I could not fathom. Not a word could I extract from him on the subject, either. I was still in the dark as to the result of his visit. _

Read next: Chapter 24. The Debacle Of Dorgan

Read previous: Chapter 22. The Canard

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