Boston a novel
morning.
But it took the enemy only a few hours to counter that move. They
came to the woman and frightened her, and the Boston newspapers
carried a story to the effect that the telegram had been sent, not by
Mrs. Berardelli, but by an unknown woman from a railroad depot. The
ladies made another trip to New Haven--but only to discover that Mrs.
Berardelli wouldn’t “have anything more to do with it.” Returning to
Boston, the ladies called upon the Associated Press representative,
explaining the circumstances, and asking him to correct the error.
The response of the Associated Press was to put on the wires all over
the country the statement that Mrs. Berardelli declared she had never
seen the telegram which had been sent in her name. It happened to be
strictly the fact; but it wasn’t quite the truth!
Edward Holton James was a New Englander of the old sort; he lived in
Concord, just across the field from the home of Emerson, which possibly
had affected his mind. He was a nephew of Henry James, the novelist
who wrote like a philosopher, and of William James, the philosopher
who wrote like a novelist. His wife was a Cushing, and wealthy, so
he had everything that a citizen of Concord could have to make him
respectable; but it didn’t keep him out of jail.
Mr. James had spotted certain flaws in the “theory.” He had noted the
fact that the so-called “bandit-car” with the bullet-hole through
the door had been in the hands of the police for hours before any of
the numerous examinations had revealed the conspicuous bullet-hole;
also he had measured the “Coacci shed,” and proved that you couldn’t
drive two cars into it, as the “theory” required. Now he went down
to South Braintree to reproduce the events of the hold-up, and prove
that some of the witnesses could not have seen what they claimed. But
the selectmen of South Braintree were not going to let the streets of
their town be used for Bolshevik propaganda if they knew it, and they
arrested Mr. James, in spite of both his ancestry and his money.
And then a little later Beltrando Brini had a bright idea: if the story
he had told at the Plymouth trial was fiction, then he was a perjurer.
He had told the story to the Governor, and had not been believed; so he
drafted a letter to the Governor, asking to be arrested, and he took
it about among the other alibi witnesses, and fourteen of them signed
it, including Bosco and Guadagni, the two editors. Trando delivered it
at the State House, and when no policeman came for him, he went back,
with his mother and half a dozen of the other witnesses. It was near
the end of the case, and the corridors were crowded with detectives and
secret service men, with swarms of reporters--a sensational scene. The
Governor was not in, said the secretary; and took the youth off into a
room by himself for a “grilling.” Who had sent him, and what was this
scheme for publicity? “This hurts you more than it helps.” And when
Trando undertook to explain, “Don’t try to make a stump speech; the
place for that is the Common.”
Said Trando, “I tried to speak on the Common yesterday, and I was
stopped.”
“Don’t try to be a hero!” sneered the secretary. Heroes were not wanted
at the State House, and Trando could not get arrested. Too bad he did
not know about the room full of booze in the cellar! If he had told
about that, he might have got his desire. As it was, he went away with
tears in his eyes, his mother sobbing on his arm.
XIII
And yet there were moments of hope. Impossible to believe that a great
business man and statesman could be such a hypocrite! Members of the
defense committee came to see him, having heard the wild rumors,
started from the State House, as to the millions that had been raised
and expended for bribes. They offered to put their records at the
disposal of the Governor; they had raised some $325,000 in seven years,
and had vouchers for it all--bundles and bales of them stacked in a
closet. Gardner Jackson and Mary Donovan had worked for nearly two
years without a cent. The Governor was surprised to hear it--he had
been given to understand that they got fifty percent of every thing
they raised. Little Joe Moro, the secretary, had worked for thirty
dollars a week, and the only other wages paid in the office were for
typists. The Governor was cordial, he seemed to like Joe immensely,
shook hands with him several times--he was a good fellow, and
everything was all right, don’t worry!
But that was in the privacy of his office, the tricks of a
supersalesman; molasses catches more flies than vinegar. Publicly the
Governor said nothing, and the rumors continued to fly. Professor
Frankfurter had got fifteen thousand dollars from the New York _World_
for writing an editorial; he had got one hundred and fifty thousand
from the committee for writing the _Atlantic Monthly_ article. The very
dignified editor of the Springfield _Republican_ was accused of having
received twenty thousand dollars from the committee for one famous
editorial. The “State House crowd” lived in such an atmosphere of
cash payment that they could not imagine how gentlemen felt about such
matters.
Also they lived in an atmosphere of terror. It seemed as if there were
as many detectives as real workers under the golden dome. Assuredly,
there were more spies than there were friends of the defense; one of
them put on a Windsor tie and got himself regularly arrested with the
pickets. Every one who had anything to do with the case was shadowed;
servants would be offered money for the contents of trash-baskets. All
officials having to do with the case, the Supreme Court judges and
later on even the jurors, had guards on their homes day and night, and
wives trembled every time their husbands went outdoors.
There was fear; and there were newspapers printing headlines and
selling editions, making every bomb-scare into a gold mine. Relatives
of the Johnson family, the garage people who had testified against
Sacco and Vanzetti, had had their rear porch blown up while they
were in bed. That made a newspaper story, and helped to damn Sacco
and Vanzetti. The police decided that it was a bootleggers’ quarrel;
but that fact was not revealed--the bootleggers being such liberal
paymasters of the police. A threatening letter was mailed to one of
the witnesses, and this turned out to be a prank of some boys; the
newspapers published the letter on the front page, and never published
the true story. Such is journalism, which lives upon sensation, and
prints its enormous editions with blood instead of ink.
XIV
The Lowell Commission had finished its hearings and retired into
privacy to deliberate. But meanwhile the Governor went on hearing
witnesses. They streamed through his office, as many as thirty in one
day; all sorts of persons who claimed to have information about the
case. Many came secretly, and went away, their names known only to him;
they whispered into his ear, and he was supposed to sort out truth from
rumor. A hundred times over, in conversations and arguments, he would
show that he could not do it, that he had, in fact, no idea of the
difference. “Why, I heard it right here in this room!” he would say;
and that proved it true.
On the other hand, impossible to satisfy him with any evidence that
proved what he did not want to believe! He had got his mind fixed on
the Bridgewater conviction, which would prove Vanzetti an habitual
criminal. You pointed to Vanzetti’s eighteen alibi witnesses, all
decent working people, and the Governor would find it suspicious that
they talked so much about eels. “But where is the express receipt
showing that he got the eels?” The case seemed to hang on that,
so the defense set out to look for express records in Plymouth.
They discovered that the records, nearly eight years old, had been
destroyed. Incidentally, they discovered that a state detective had
already made an investigation, and ascertained that they had been
destroyed.
They decided they would outwit him, even so. They would look for the
receipts of fish-dealers who had sold the eels. Herbert B. Ehrmann,
junior counsel, went to consult Vanzetti in Charlestown prison. It
was hard for him to remember--he had been accustomed to buy fish
from several dealers in Boston. The lawyer went according to his
vague description, with Felicani for translator; they hunted at the
“fish-pier” in South Boston, but found no one who remembered selling
to Vanzetti. Joe Randall got another Italian--two gangs searching. At
last, after visiting seven Italian fish-dealers on Atlantic Avenue,
the “Guinney market,” they found one who said that “B. Vanzetti of
Plymouth” had been a customer of his. Had he any records? For a year or
two, yes--but seven years, eight years--no, no, giammai! He had changed
his partnership in the meantime.
But they argued--could they make a search? The life of two compatriots
might depend on it! Yes, there were old papers up in the loft. So up
they go, among dust and cobwebs, with an electric flashlight. Old boxes
of papers, in bad Italian script--sheafs of loose ledger leaves, but
the earliest date is January, 1920. “For God’s sake, haven’t you got
any before that?”
The Italian has got interested--it is a story! “There’s an old case,
maybe stuff in that.” A big box shoved under the rafters, tightly
nailed up. “Must have a hammer to open it.” Stacks and stacks of old
papers: and among them blocks of American Express Company receipts,
signed by the expressman, day by day as he called for shipments. And
the dates--here are some for 1919--and here is December, 1919! And in
the middle of the block, one reading: “B. Vanzetti, Plymouth, one
barrel eels!”
Hurrah! We have it! We have them licked! The date is December 20th,
which was a Saturday, the very date Bart claimed the eels had been
shipped, to be sure to reach him on Tuesday, and got ready for selling
the next day! And they are live eels, so the dealer says, you can tell
that by the weight of the barrel! Dead eels would be heavier!
Young fellows dancing in a dusty loft! Our wops are saved! They go back
to the office with shining eyes. They go to the Governor’s office. “We
have found the evidence the Governor asked for.” This to the private
secretary--the Governor himself is busy. “Indeed?” says the secretary.
No shining in those hard eyes! “When are you going to stop bringing
evidence?”
They will not trust the precious papers to him, but insist upon seeing
Wiggin, the Governor’s counsel. Then they go away, and wait--and
nothing happens; the next time they see the Governor, they mention the
matter, and he says, “What does that prove? What evidence is there that
Vanzetti ever received the shipment? I understand that the eels were
never claimed; they were frozen in the depot.”
Says Joe Randall, gnashing his teeth: “It is like that fairy-story we
used to enjoy when we were children--how the little tailor wooed the
king’s daughter. ‘Go slay me the dragon,’ says the king--so the hero
goes and slays the dragon, and comes back, but he doesn’t get the
king’s daughter. ‘Go slay me the three giants,’ says the king--so he
goes and slays the three giants, and comes back, but he doesn’t get the
king’s daughter. ‘Go slay me the man-killing boar,’ says the king--and
the longer the story, the more fun it is.”
XV
The supersalesman had evolved a regular set of formulas, by which he
challenged the witnesses who came to him. Of Italians he would ask:
“Are you an anarchist? Are you a friend of Sacco or Vanzetti? Are you
a member of the committee? Have you any friends on the committee?
Who sent you here?” To be “sent” was a sinister thing, a sign of an
elaborate conspiracy in operation.
For Americans the procedure was more subtle. The first question was: