Stolen Away

A doctor interrupted us to read Means’s charts, and we stood to one side and waited; a not unattractive nurse brought him some pills and a cup of water and he smiled at her and called her “my dear” and harmlessly flirted.

When they’d gone, he said to us, “I’m suffering from high blood pressure of the brain, you see. It’s a direct result of that fall from the Pullman berth. It made me develop this fantastic imagination, which has gotten me into so much trouble. I’ve never profited a dime from any of my bootlegging or blackmail schemes, because I’ve always returned the money…except in your case, Eleven, because I simply can’t remember where it is.”

“That’s not why we’re here,” I said.

“Oh?” he said. Interested. “And why are you here, Heller?”

“I’m working for Governor Hoffman.”

He lit up like a Halloween pumpkin; the dimples in the hollows of the cheeks asserted themselves. “Splendid! I’ve sent numerous letters to Governor Hoffman. I’m delighted that he’s decided to help me in my mission.”

Evalyn blinked. “Your ‘mission’?”

Means nodded solemnly; he folded his hands prayerlike on what remained of his once formidable belly. “I have decided to dedicate all of my efforts to aid that poor, so unfairly maligned soul, Bruno Hauptmann.”

I sat on the edge of his bed. “No kidding. Your sense of justice is offended, is it?”

“It most certainly is. I’ve written not only to Governor Hoffman but Prosecutor Wilentz and Colonel Lindbergh, in England, and many other of the principals in the case. I’m doing my level best, in the midst of my illnesses, to help secure a stay of execution for Mr. Hauptmann.”

“You’re quite a guy, Means. Why are you doing this?”

“Because,” he said, with a simple shrug, “I masterminded the Lindbergh kidnapping.”

Neither Evalyn nor I reacted.

That disappointed him; he seemed almost hurt. “Did you understand me? I said, I am the man. Hauptmann does not deserve the blame, nor for that matter the credit, for this elaborate crime. A simple ignorant carpenter. Ludicrous. The crime of the century was masterminded by the criminal mind of the century: Gaston Bullock Means!”

“That’s not what you told us a few years ago,” I reminded him.

He waggled a finger in the air. “Ah, but I was lying then, at least in part. Why do the two of you take this admission of mine so lightly? This is the most important confession ever made in the history of American jurisprudence.”

“Means,” I said, “I told you I was working for Hoffman. He showed the several of your letters. I know about your claims to have ‘masterminded’ this thing. So does Evalyn—that is why we’re here.”

“Oh. Then I suppose you’re hoping to fill in some of the details.”

“You might say that. You claim you built the ladder yourself?”

“Absolutely, in my garage at home at Chevy Chase. Hauptmann would have done a more professional job of it; he’s a carpenter, after all. The ladder, by the way, was used only to look in the window and see if the child was in the room, not to bring him out—the child was handed out the front door to operatives of mine by the butler. That’s why the ladder was found discarded seventy-some feet away.”

“What about Max Greenberg and Max Hassel? I thought they were the ‘masterminds.’”

“They worked for me. I had my connections with all of those rumrunners and bootleggers. The gang that Curtis came into contact with, they worked for me, too. It was my show from the start.”

Evalyn moved nearer the bed. “In one letter to Governor Hoffman, you claimed you’d been hired by relatives of Mrs. Lindbergh, to take the child.”

“Ah, yes—because the boy was retarded. And I was aided by Greenberg and Hassel, and that pair on the inside, Violet Sharpe and Ollie Whately.”

“Are you saying that’s true?” Evalyn asked.

“Which part?” he asked innocently.

“Which part isn’t true?” I asked.

“The part about the retarded baby. It’s a rumor I heard once, and liked the sound of.”

I wondered if they had an extra bed open in this mental ward.

“Your friends Greenberg and Hassel,” I said, “somebody murdered them, you know.”

He nodded slowly, gravely. “Life can be so unkind.”

“Death, too,” I said. “Funny thing: they were murdered shortly after you gave me their names. After you fingered ’em as the real kidnappers.”

“Coincidence has a long arm.”

“Maybe you do, too, Means. Or people you’re allied with.”

“Means,” Evalyn said harshly, “is that baby still alive?”

His smile was angelic. “Let me first say that the body of the baby found in New Jersey was a ‘plant’—not the Lindbergh baby at all.”

“Why was that done?” I asked.

“To bring certain things to a halt,” he said. “For example, bootlegging activities in the Sourlands hills had been much disrupted. Too many troopers, too much activity, too much company. With the discovery of the child, things could go back to normal. Business as usual.”

“Is that baby still alive?” Evalyn repeated.

“My dear,” he said, “to my knowledge he is. I took that child to Mexico and left him there, unharmed. As God is my witness.”