Mr. Mooney had a large following and many defenders whose animosity or gullibility led them to look upon him as a personage of great import. He was unquestionably a shrewd and able manipulator, one of the finest quacks I ever saw. He would race up and down among the members of his large audience in his spiritualistic “church meetings,” his fat waxy eyelids closed, his immense white shirt-front shining, his dress coattails flying like those of a bustling butler or head-waiter, the while he exclaimed: “Is there any one here by the name of Peter? Is there any one here by the name of Augusta? There is an old white-bearded man here who says he has something to say to Augusta. And Peter—Peter, your sister says not to marry, that everything now troubling you will soon come out all right.”
He would open these meetings with spiritual invocations of one kind and another and pretend the profoundest religiosity and spirituality when as a matter of fact he was a faker of the most brazen stamp. As Wandell afterward showed me by clippings and police reports from other cities, he had been driven from one city to another, cities usually very far apart so that the news of his troubles might not spread too quickly. His last resting-place had been Norfolk, Virginia, and before that he had been in such widely scattered spots as Liverpool, San Francisco, Sydney, New South Wales. Always he had been immensely successful, drawing large crowds, taking up collections and doing a private séance business which must have netted him a tidy sum. Indeed in private life, as I soon found, he was a gourmet, a sybarite and a riant amorist, laughing in his sleeve at all his touts and followers.
For some time I was unable to gather any evidence that would convict him of anything in a direct way. Once he found the Republic to be unfavorable, he became pugnacious and threatened to assault me if I ever came near him or his place or attempted to write up anything about him which was not true! On the other hand, Wandell, being equally determined to catch him, insisted upon my following him up and exposing him. My task was not easy. I was compelled to hang about his meetings, trying to find some one who would tell me something definite against him.
Going to his rooms one day when he was absent, I managed to meet his landlady who, when I told her that I was from the Republic and wanted to know something about Mr. Mooney’s visitors, his private conduct and so forth, asked me to come in. At once I sensed something definite and important, for I had been there before and had been turned away by this same woman. But today, for some reason she escorted me very secretly to a room on the second floor where she closed and locked the door and then began a long story concerning the peculiar relations which existed between Mr. Mooney and some of his male and female disciples, especially the female ones. She finally admitted that she had been watching Mr. Mooney’s rooms through a keyhole. For weeks past there had been various visitors whose comings and goings had meant little to her until they became “so regular,” as she said, and Mr. Mooney so particularly engaged with them. Then, since Mr. Mooney’s fame had been spreading and the Republic had begun to attack him, she had become most watchful and now, as she told me, he was “carrying on” most shamefully with one and another of his visitors, male and female. Just what these relations were she at first refused to state, but when I pointed out to her that unless she could furnish me with other and more convincing proof than her mere word or charge it would all be of small value, she unbent sufficiently to fix on one particular woman, whose card and a note addressed to Mr. Mooney she had evidently purloined from his room. These she produced and turned over to me with a rousing description of the nature of the visits.
Armed with the card and note, I immediately proceeded to the west end where I soon found the house of the lady, determined to see whether she would admit this soft impeachment, whether I could make her admit it. I was a little uncertain then as to how I was to go about it. Suppose I should run into the lady’s husband, I thought, or suppose they should come down together when I sent in my card? Or suppose that I charged her with what I knew and she called some one to her aid and had me thrown out or beaten up? Nevertheless I went nervously up the steps and rang the bell, whereupon a footman opened the door.
“Who is it you wish to see?”
I told him.
“Have you an appointment with her?”
“No, but I’m from the Republic, and you tell her that it is very important for her to see me. We have an article about her and a certain Mr. Mooney which we propose to print in the morning, and I think she will want to see me about it.” I stared at him with a great deal of effrontery. He finally closed the door, leaving me outside, but soon returned and said: “You may come in.”
I walked into a large, heavily furnished reception-room, representing the best Western taste of the time, in which I nosed about thinking how fine it all was and wondering how I was to proceed about all this once she appeared. Suppose she proved to be a fierce and contentious soul well able to hold her own, or suppose there was some mistake about this letter or the statement of the landlady! As I was walking up and down, quite troubled as to just what I should say, I heard the rustle of silk skirts. I turned just as a vigorous and well-dressed woman of thirty-odd swept into the room. She was rather smart, bronze-haired, pink-fleshed, not in the least nervous or disturbed.
“You wish to see me?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“About what, please?”
“I am from the Republic,” I began. “We have a rather startling story about you and Mr. Mooney. It appears that his place has been watched and that you——”
“A story about me?” she interrupted with an air of hauteur, seeming to have no idea of what I was driving at. “And about a Mr. Who? Mooney, you say? What kind of a story is it? Why do you come to me about it? Why, I don’t even know the man!”
“Oh, but I think you do,” I replied, thinking of the letter and card in my pocket. “As a matter of fact, I know that you do. At the office right now we have a card and a letter of yours to Mr. Mooney, which the Republic proposes to publish along with some other matter unless some satisfactory explanation as to why it should not be printed can be made. We are conducting a campaign against Mr. Mooney, as you probably know.”
I have often thought of this scene as a fine illustration of the crass, rough force of life, its queer non-moral tangles, bluster, bluff, lies, make-believe. Beginning by accusing me of attempted blackmail, and adding that she would inform her husband and that I must leave the house at once or be thrown out, she glared until I replied that I would leave but that I had her letter to Mr. Mooney, that there were witnesses who would testify as to what had happened between her and Mr. Mooney and that unless she proceeded to see my city editor at once the whole thing would be written up for the next day’s paper. Then of a sudden she collapsed. Her face blanched, her body trembled, and she, a healthy, vigorous woman, dropped to her knees before me, seized my hands and coat and began pleading with me in an agonized voice.
“But you wouldn’t do that! My husband! My home! My social position! My children! My God, you wouldn’t have me driven out of my own home! If he came here now! Oh, my God, tell me what I am to do! Tell me that you won’t do anything—that the Republic won’t! I’ll give you anything you want. Oh, you couldn’t be so heartless! Maybe I have done wrong—but think of what will happen to me if you do this!”
I stared at her in amazement. Never had I been the center of such an astonishing scene. On the instant I felt a mingled sense of triumph and extreme pity. Thoughts as to whether I should tell the Republic what I knew, whether if I did it would have the cruelty to expose this woman, whether she would or could be made to pay blackmail by any one raced through my mind. I was sorry and yet amused. Always this thought of blackmail, of which I heard considerable in newspaper work but of which I never had any proof, troubled me. If I exposed her, what then? Would Wandell hound her? If I did not would he discover that I was suppressing the news and so discharge me? Pity for her was plainly mingled with a sense of having achieved another newspaper beat. Now, assuredly, the Republic could make this erratic individual move on. To her I proceeded to make plain that I personally was helpless, a mere reporter who of himself could do nothing. If she wished she could see Mr. Wandell, who could help her if he chose, and I gave her his home address, knowing that he would not be at his office at this time of day, but hoping to see him myself before she did. Weeping and moaning, she raced upstairs, leaving me to make my way out as best I might. Once out I meditated on this effrontery and the hard, cold work I was capable of doing. Surely this was a dreadful thing to have done. Had I the right? Was it fair? Suppose I had been the victim? Still I congratulated myself upon having done a very clever piece of work for which I should be highly complimented.
The lady must have proceeded at once to my city editor for when I returned to the office he was there; he called me to him at once.
“Great God! What have you been doing now? Of all men I have ever known, you can get me into more trouble in a half-hour than any other man could in a year! Here I was, sitting peacefully at home, and up comes my wife telling me there’s a weeping woman in the parlor who had just driven up to see me. Down I go and she grabs my hands, falls on her knees and begins telling me about some letters we have, that her life will be ruined if we publish them. Do you want to get me sued for divorce?” he went on, cackling and chortling in his impish way. “What the hell are those letters, anyhow? Where are they? What’s this story you’ve dug up now? Who is this woman? You’re the damnedest man I ever saw!” and he cackled some more. I handed over the letter and he proceeded to look it over with considerable gusto. As I could see, he was pleased beyond measure.
I told my story, and he was intensely interested but seemed to meditate on its character for some time. What happened after that between him and the woman I was never able to make out. But one thing is sure: the story was never published, not this incident. An hour or two later, seeing me enter the office after my dinner, he called me in and began:
“You leave this with me now and drop the story for the present. There are other ways to get Mooney,” and sure enough, in a few days Mr. Mooney suddenly left town. It was a curious procedure to me, but at least Mr. Mooney was soon gone—and——
But figure it out for yourself.
CHAPTER XLIII
Two other incidents in connection with my newspaper work at this time threw a clear light on social crimes and conditions which cannot always be discussed or explained. One of these related to an old man of about sixty-five years of age who was in the coffee and spice business in one of those old streets which bordered on the waterfront. One afternoon in mid-August, when there was little to do in the way of reporting and I was hanging about the office waiting for something to turn up, Wandell received a telephone message and handed me a slip of paper. “You go down to this address and see what you can find out. There’s been a fight or something. A crowd has been beating up an old man and the police have arrested him—to save him, I suppose.”
I took a car and soon reached the scene, a decayed and tumbledown region of small family dwellings now turned into tenements of even a poorer character. St. Louis had what so large a center as New York has not: alleys or rear passage-ways to all houses by which trade parcels, waste and the like are delivered or removed. And facing these were old barns, sheds, and tumbledown warrens of houses and flats occupied by poor whites or blacks, or both. In an old decayed and vacant brick barn in one of these alleys there had been only a few hours before a furious scene, although when I arrived it was all over, everything was still and peaceful. All that I could learn was that several hours before an old man had been found in this barn with a little girl of eight or nine years. The child’s parents or friends were informed and a chase ensued. The criminal had been surrounded by a group of irate citizens who threatened to kill him. Then the police arrived and escorted him to the station at North Seventh, where supposedly he was locked up.
On my arrival at the station, however, nothing was known of this case. My noble King knew nothing and when I looked on the “blotter,” which supposedly contained a public record of all arrests and charges made, and which it was my privilege as well as that of every other newspaper man to look over, there was no evidence of any such offense having been committed or of any such prisoner having been brought here.
“What became of that attempted assault in K Street?” I inquired of King, who was drowsily reading a newspaper. “I was just over there and they told me the man had been brought here.”
He looked up at me wearily, seemingly not interested. “What case? It must be down if it came in here. What case are ye taalkin’ about? Maybe it didn’t come here.”
I looked at him curiously, struck all at once by an air of concealment. He was not as friendly as usual.
“That’s funny,” I said. “I’ve just come from there and they told me he was here. It would be on the blotter, wouldn’t it? Were you here an hour or two ago?”
For the first time since I had been coming here he grew a bit truculent. “Sure. If it’s not on there it’s not on there, and that’s all I know. If you want to know more than that you’ll have to see the captain.”
At thought of the police attempting to conceal a thing like this in the face of my direct knowledge I grew irritable and bold myself.
“Where’s the captain?” I asked.
“He’s out now. He’ll be back at four, I think.”
I sat down and waited, then decided to call up the office for further instructions. Wandell was in. He advised me to call up Edmonstone at the Four Courts and see if it was recorded, which I did, but nothing was known. When I returned I found the captain in. He was a taciturn man and had small use for reporters at any time.
“Yes, yes, yes,” he kept reiterating as I asked him about the case. “Well, I’ll tell you,” he said after a long pause, seeing that I was determined to know, “he’s not here now. I let him go. No one saw him commit the crime. He’s an old man with a big wholesale business in Second Street, never arrested before, and he has a wife and grown sons and daughters. Of course he oughtn’t to be doin’ anything of that kind—still, he claims that he wasn’t. Anyhow, no good can come of writin’ it up in the papers now. Here’s his name and address,” and he opened a small book which he drew out of his pocket and showed me that and no more. “Now you can go and talk to him yourself if you want to, but if you take my advice you’ll let him alone. I see no good in pullin’ him down if it’s goin’ to hurt his family. But that’s as you newspaper men see it.”
