True Detective (31 page)

"I'm Walter Winchell," he said, extending his hand, which the sheriff, whose mouth had dropped open, took. "Let me in there for five minutes with that lunatic and I'll put your name in every paper in the world."

The sheriffs expression had shifted from foul to awestruck and, now that fame was pumping his hand, to a fawning, simpering grin.

"Glad to have you in my jail, Mr. Winchell."

"As a temporary visitor, I hope," Winchell said, spitting words like seeds. "What can you tell me about the guest you just checked in?"

"He says his name's Zangara. Giuseppe Zangara. That's about all we got so far. His English is pretty bad. But I'm something of a linguist myself… speak a little Italian. I can translate for you, if you can't make out what he's trying to say in American."

"You're a gentleman. Sheriff. Lead the way."

"Wait a minute," the sheriff said, and turned to me. I was standing just behind Winchell, trying to be inconspicuous. "Who are you?"

I told him; the cop standing nearby, who had been one of the three I'd helped in wrestling the assassin onto the limo luggage rack, confirmed what I said.

"No Chicago people." the sheriff said, waving his hands. "We don't want any of you Chicago cops in here. We'll handle this our own way."

Winchell said. "Sheriff, he's with me."

The sheriff thought about that, said, "Well, okay, then. Come along."

We followed the sheriff, and I said to Winchell, "Thanks."

"Now we're even," he said. "Or we will be when you cough up that fin I gave you."

I gave him his five back.

The sheriff and the cop, the gun the assassin had used stuck in his belt, led us down a cellblock lit only by the lights coming from the corridor behind us. The individual cells stood empty, for the most part; we walked past one where a Negro squatted on his cot, watching us, mumbling. He was the only other prisoner on the floor.

At the end of the cellblock corridor, standing naked in the middle of his cell, was the man named, apparently, Giuseppe Zangara. He stood erect, unashamed. But not exactly defiant. As we joined two cops standing staring at their prisoner, I got a good look at him: about five feet six inches tall, weighing perhaps 115. with a wide scar across his stomach; his face long, narrow, square-jawed; his hair jet-black: his eyes bulging, dark, intense. That faint smile was still on his face; when he saw me- recognized me- that smile, momentarily, disappeared.

The sheriff looked through the bars at the calm, detached prisoner. He said, "I'm going to put you in the electric chair, friend."

Zangara shrugged. "That's okay. Put me in chair. I no afraid."

The sheriff turned to Winchell and said, "That's what you're up against, Mr. Winchell."

Winchell moved in, stood as close to the bars as he could get. "You know who I am?"

"No," Zangara said.

"My name's Walter Winchell. Ever hear of me?"

Zangara thought about that. "Maybe."

"Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. America, and all the ships at sea…'"

Zangara grinned. "Radio. Sure. I know you. Famous man."

"You want to be famous, Giuseppe?"

"Joe. Call me Joe. I'm American citizen."

"You want to be famous. Joe?"

"I want to kill president."

"To be famous?"

He thought about it.

"You talk to me." Winchell went on, "and you'll be famous. Talk. Joe."

Zangara looked at me. Waiting for me to spill the beans, I guess. I wasn't talking.

He was: "I try kill president. I try kill him because I no like government. Capitalists all crooks. Everything just for money. Take all president- kings, capitalists- kill. Take all money burn. That's my idea. That's why I want to kill president."

"But you didn't kill the president, Joe."

Zangara didn't seem too broken up about that. "I failure," he shrugged.

"You shot a lot of other people. They may die."

Another shrug. "Too bad."

"Then you're sorry?"

"Yeah. sure, sorry like when bird, horse, cow die. Not my fault. Bench was shaky."

"What do you mean?"

"Bench I stand on to kill president, it shaky."

"It wobbled, you mean? That's why you missed?"

"Sure." He looked at me again, puzzled this time. He wondered why I wasn't asking him about seeing him at Cermak's son-in-law's place; he wondered why he was getting away with his "Kill-the-president" routine. I let him wonder.

Winchell got out a notebook, finally, said, "Let's start from the beginning, Joe."

"Fine."

"How old are you?"

"Thirty-three."

"Where were you bora?"

"Italy."

"How long have you been in America?"

"Been here, 1923
_;
September."

"Ever been married, Joe?"

"No."

"Your parents living?"

"My father living. My mother die when I was stepmother. Six sisters."

"Where is your family now?"

"Calabria."

"In Italy?"

"Yeah." wo years old. I no remember my mother. I have

"What have you been doing since you got to America, Joe?"

"Oh, work. Bricklayer." He glanced at me. smiled briefly, nervously, rubbed his small hand over his stubbly chin and cheek with tapering fingers, added, "Sometimes gardener."

Winchell kept shooting questions, taking the answers down with the fastest pencil I ever saw. "Where have you lived in America?"

"Lot of time in New Jersey. Sometime Miami, sometime New York. I suffer with stomach"- he pointed to the six-inch scar across his belly- "when cold, so I come Miami."

"What have you been doing since you've been down here?"

"Nothing. I have little money."

The sheriff touched Winchell's arm. He said, "He had forty dollars on him, in what was left of his trousers."

Winchell nodded, filing that away, went on. "Ever been in trouble before, Joe?"

"No, no trouble, no, no. I not been in any jail. This is first time."

"Did you ever try to hurt anybody before?"

"No, no. no."

"How long did you plan this shooting? When did it first come into your mind?"

"All the time my stomach is in my mind." He held two hands like claws in front of his scarred stomach and frowned; this much he seemed to be telling the truth about.

"Tell me about your stomach, Joe."

"When I work in brick factory, I burn my stomach. Then I become bricklayer."

"Your stomach still bothers you?"

"Sometimes I get big pain in my stomach. I suffer too much. Fire in my stomach. Make fire in my head and I turn 'round like I am drunk man and I feel like I want shoot myself, and I figure, why I shoot myself? I am going to shoot president. If I was well, I no bother nobody."

"Don't you want to live, Joe? Don't you enjoy living?"

"No, because I sick all time."

"Don't you want to live?"

"I don't care whether I live or die. I don't care for that."

"Joe. there's something I gotta ask."

"You famous man. Ask what you like."

"Is there any insanity in your family. Joe?"

"No."

"Nobody crazy?"

"Nobody in crazy house."

"Are you a drinking man, Joe?"

"I can't drink. I can't drink. If I drink. I die. because my stomach is fire. I can't drink nothing."

"Can you eat?"

"I can't eat. Eat just a little bit, hurt me. Burn me. I come Miami for specialists but nobody can help the trouble."

"You said you're a citizen, Joe?"

"Yeah. Bricklayer union make me."

"Anybody in this country ever harm you?"

"No. nobody, no."

"You made a living here, didn't you? What kind of trouble did you have here?"

Zangara grimaced, impatient with Winchell for the first time; he pointed a finger at the scar. "Trouble is
here
. What is use of living? I better dead, suffer all the time, suffer all the time."

That stopped Winchell; amazing that anything could stop him. but it did, momentarily, and I stepped in and said, "Are you dying, Joe? Did you come here to Miami to die?"

His teeth flashed in the whitest grin I ever saw. "My job done," he said.

Winchell glanced at me, irritably, probably wishing he hadn't allowed me along, and started back in. "Why did you wait till Mr. Roosevelt had finished speaking? He was a better target when he was sitting up on the car."

That threw Zangara, just a bit, and he almost stuttered as he said, "No have chance because of people in front. Standing up."

"They were standing up when you shot at him. You had to stand on a bench to do it, right?"

"I do best I can. Not my fault. Bench shaky."

"That's where I came in." Winchell said to himself, glancing at his notes so far.

I said. "Did you know Mayor Cermak?"

The hand nervously stroked the rough chin and cheek again; the dark eyes avoided mine. "No. I didn't know him. I just want to kill the president."

"You don't know who Mayor Cermak is?"

"No, no, no. I want just the president. Just know president because I see picture in paper."

"Cermak had his picture in the paper lately. A couple of times."

Winchell butted back in, but picked up my thread. "Are you worried that Cermak might die?"

"Never hear of him."

"Joe, what's the Mafia?"

"Never hear of him, either."

Winchell looked at me; I smiled at him blandly.

He said, "You didn't shoot at Mayor Cermak? The Mafia didn't hire you to shoot at Mayor Cermak?"

Cocky now, almost laughing, Zangara said, "That's a baloney story."

"Why didn't you try to get away in the park, Joe?"

"Couldn't get away there. Too many peoples."

"Wasn't that suicidal, Joe?"

Zangara blinked.

"Risky, Joe," Winchell said. "Wasn't that risky?"

The naked little man shrugged again. "You can't see presidents alone. Always peoples."

"Are you an anarchist, Joe? A Communist?"

"Republican," he said.

That stopped Winchell, too.

Then he said, "So you wouldn't try to kill President Hoover, I suppose."

"Sure. If I see him first, I kill him first. All same, it makes no difference."

The sheriff interrupted. "Zangara, if Mr. Roosevelt came in this jail and you had your pistol back in your hand, would you kill him now?"

"Sure."

"Do you want to kill me? Or the policemen who caught you?"

"I no care to kill police. They work for living. I am for workingman, against rich and powerful. As a man. I like Mr. Roosevelt. As a president. I want to kill him."

Winchell jumped back in. "Do you believe in God. Joe? Do you belong to a church?"

"No! No. I belong to nothing. I belong only to myself, and I suffer."

"You don't believe there is any God. heaven or hell or anything like that?"

"No. Everything on this earth like weed. All on this earth. There no God. It's all below."

Winchell had run out of questions.

Zangara turned and walked toward the window in his cell. He could see Biscayne Bay out of it. A gentle breeze was coming through: I could feel it from where I stood.

The sheriff said. "We'll get you a lawyer tomorrow, Zangara."

His bare back still to us. he said, "No lawyer. I don't want nobody to help me."

The sheriff asked Winchell if he was done, and Winchell nodded, and we walked back out through the cellblock, our footsteps echoing, the black man still sitting on his haunches on his cot; he was laughing, now. to himself. Rocking back and forth.

At the elevator the sheriff shook Winchell's hand and spelled his name for Winchell three times; and we went down.

Winchell was silent in the elevator, but outside, in the Miami night air. he put a hand on my arm and said. "What's your name, kid?"

"Heller."

He smiled; showed some teeth for a change. "Aren't you going to spell it?"

"I don't want to be in your story."

"Good, 'cause you're not. You're Chicago, right?"

"Born and bred."

"What do you make of that back there?"

"You're New York. What do
you
make of it?"

"Hogwash."

"Is that what they call it in New York?"

"It's one of the things you can call it in print. Bullshit by any name would smell as sweet."

"That scar on his stomach isn't bullshit."

"No. It's real enough. Ever hear of Owney Madden?"

Raft's gangster friend.

"Sure," I said.

"He's a pal of mine," Winchell said. "He saved my life when Dutch Schultz got mad at me. I got a little fresh in my column, where Schultz and Vince Coll were concerned. Predicted Coil's murder the day before it happened."

"And Schultz didn't like that."

"No, and I was on the spot. I lived under the threat of a gangland execution for months; I had a goddamn nervous breakdown from it, kid. I ain't ashamed to say."

"Your point being?"

"I'm a public figure. They shouldn't have been able to bump me off without a major stink. I pointed this out to Owney. You know what he said?"

"What?"

"They could find a way, he said. They could find a way and nobody would even know it was them who bumped me off."

We stood halfway down the steps of the courthouse, the balmy breeze fanning us like a lazy eunuch.

"I think that little bastard hit Cermak," Winchell said. "I think he thinks he's dying from that stomach of his anyway, and they probably promised to support that family of his back in Italy in return for him taking Tony out. and for his silence. What do you think?"

"I think you're right on the money." I said. "But if you print it, nobody'll ever believe it."

"What's a guy to do?" Winchell asked. "The bullshit they'll believe."

And he walked off. looking for a taxi, now that traffic was moving again.

The next morning around seven. I read the
Herald
over breakfast in the Biltmore coffee shop: peeking out between the eyewitness accounts of last night's shooting at the park was an item about General Dawes. He was finally testifying to that Senate committee about the Insull case. Yes, it was true that he had loaned Insull eleven million dollars of the twenty-four-million-dollar capital and surplus of the Dawes bank; and he copped to "putting too many eggs in one basket." Puffing his pipe and nodding ruefully, he admitted, "The bankers of this country in retrospect look pretty sad." When asked for suggestions for new banking laws, he said, "I don't want to give any half-baked views on new laws- though that is a habit not unknown in Washington." The latter apparently got the General a laugh from the gallery. But not from me.