by Behn, Noel;
Media preoccupation with Mule had borderline advantages for the FBI, helped divert attention from the fact that four men thought to be gang members were actively being sought. So far the names Cowboy Carlson and Sam Hammond had not been revealed. Nor had the media learned who Elmo Ragotsy was or where he was being held. The less the media knew of any of this, the better for Romor 91. The FBI needed time.
Jessup sat up front. Strom Sunstrom and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jules Shapiro rode in the back. Yates drove but had not been brought along merely as chauffeur. Jez had suggested Billy help them work out a strategy. A strategy was needed desperately.
What had sent the three FBI men and the Assistant U.S. attorney speeding south this midafternoon was official word that Mule Corkel would be proclaimed fit to stand trial and discharged from the hospital the day after tomorrow. He must then be immediately rearraigned before Assistant U.S. Magistrate John Leslie Krueger so bail could be set, as well as a trial date. Mule’s lawyer would unquestionably demand low bail. Worse than that, from the government’s standpoint, he might demand specifics on the charges against his client. Might want to be told the names of other co-conspirators, in custody or being sought, as well as anything else the government possessed which might prove detrimental to his client in a court of law. The government, in the person of Assistant U.S. Attorney Jules Shapiro, who would be prosecuting the case when the trial began, would press for high bail and attempt to divulge as little as possible. Assistant Magistrate Krueger, still smarting over media criticism of his handling of the earlier arraignment for Mule … of chaining Mule, as the assistant U.S. attorney and the FBI had suggested … might side with the defense lawyer, might lower bail … might, and these were the two worst fears of Strom and Jez, set an early trial date and want to know if any other co-conspirators were in custody.
Trial, under present circumstance, meant action against Mule, Wiggles and Ragotsy. Jules Shapiro was content with this. He considered the three to be highly prosecutable. True, no strong corroborating witness would be presented other than Ida Hammond stating Mule, Wiggles and Ragotsy had been at her house with the other members of the gang. And Ida’s reliability was a concern. She had wavered before. Had voluntarily told police Lieutenant Ned Van Ornum who the perpetrators were, then denied their complicity when talking to Cub Hennessy a few minutes later. But Van Ornum’s testimony in court of what Ida had told him would account for a great deal, should she renege. So would her daughter-in-law Natalie’s statements. Jules Shapiro put trust in the thesis that bank-theft prosecutions were exercises in circumstantial evidence. The evidence provided him by the FBI, circumstantial as it was, to his way of thinking would do the job. Even so, he reviewed aspects of it at the start of the auto trip with Strom and Jez and Yates.
Of paramount importance was the whereabouts of the three defendants at the time of the perpetration. Ragotsy, Mule and Wiggles all appeared to have been in Prairie Port. Ragotsy had admitted so in his coerced confession. Crew members of his boat confirmed that Ragotsy left on a trip Friday noon, August 20 … as had been stated in the confession letter. A waitress in a Prairie Port diner frequented by Cowboy Carlson had identified a photograph of Wiggles as being the same man she had seen having breakfast with Carlson early Friday morning, August 20. Three different witnesses attested to Mule having been in Prairie Port the same morning.
No one had been developed who had seen any of the three from Friday afternoon through Sunday evening, August 22. Late Sunday night Ragotsy returned to his boat briefly, gathered up a change of clothes and left. Was gone five days. Gone until August 27. Mule wasn’t seen in Prairie Port until August 28. Cowboy Carlson, following his breakfast with Wiggles on Friday, August 20, was never seen again.
The missing gang members, Bicki Hale, Windy Walt Sash, Meadow Muffin Epstein and Worm Ferugli, were all from out of state … had last been seen in their home areas a week before the robbery, over the weekend of August 14 and 15. The only eyewitness to their whereabouts after that was Ida Hammond, who confessed all were at her farm the week prior to the theft. Following the theft only two spottings had been made. The night clerk in Baton Rouge had thought Bicki might be the man with five suitcases. The most recent sighting came from a travel agent in Key West, Florida, who reported Meadow Muffin Epstein looked like the man who tried to charter a boat to fish the waters off Cuba.
Jules Shapiro didn’t feel Ragotsy’s coerced confession was as inadmissible as Strom did. Excerpts of it could always be alluded to. It might even be allowed in toto. The physical evidence found inside Warbonnet Ridge, added to everything else, made a strong case, in the estimation of the government’s prosecuting attorney. Shapiro had no doubts that he could win in court. Should one of the suspects turn government witness, as Strom hoped, so much the better. If it didn’t occur, no matter.
Strom Sunstrom had more than prosecution on his mind. He wanted the rest of the gang: Bicki Hale, Wallace Sash, Thomas Ferugli, Lionel Epstein. He wanted more physical evidence … equipment with which the actual robbery had been perpetrated. Wanted to find the missing millions. Only fifty dollars in currency had been recovered. Recovering stolen monies was J. Edgar Hoover’s passion.
Ragotsy, as Strom saw it, might be the solution to everyone’s problems, might simultaneously enhance Shapiro’s prosecution and help the FBI investigation. If Ragotsy turned government witness and merely restated what he had told County Sheriff O. D. Don Pensler under duress, little would be accomplished. Ragotsy, after all, had denied being able to identify any of the other bank thieves aside from Cowboy Carlson. However, should Ragotsy know more than he had divulged in his blood-splattered statement, as Strom and Jez and Yates suspected he did, much might be achieved. How to induce Ragotsy into such cooperation dominated conversation over most of the two-hundred-mile auto trip to the Army hospital.
Shapiro, Strom, Jez and Yates conferred with the doctors attending Ragotsy, and viewed photographs and X-rays and medical charts while being briefed. They saw as well as heard what had happened in the county jailhouse of O. D. Don Pensler … that Ragotsy had nearly been tortured to death … that whereas his face was relatively unmarked his torso and groin had sustained savage beatings and near mutilation … that Ragotsy was in shock for the first few days at the hospital, could or would not speak for the next few days, could or would not eat and had to be fed intravenously … that over the last nine days he had made astoundingly good progress … that yes, he was clear-minded enough to be talked to at length now … that no, he had had no visitors, had made and received no phone calls, had mailed no letters or gotten any … that all in all, he was one tough cookie to have sustained what he had and come through this well this quickly.
Shapiro never considered speaking with Ragotsy. Doing so, while not illicit or unethical, could draw criticism. He had no intention of taking such a risk. Jules waited with Yates in the hospital cafeteria. Strom and Jessup headed for the officers’ wards.
Ragotsy, thin and tremulous and wearing blue slippers and a blue hospital robe, sat in a slant-backed wood chair on the observation deck off his private room. Lush and rolling terrain shimmered beyond in the dying reds of sunset. A hill breeze wafted. A far-off hoot owl began.
“We are sorry about the jail house business,” Strom said after introducing himself and Jez. Jez went to the bench along the sidebar and sat down. Strom leaned against the railing in front of Ragotsy. “We will register a complaint with the U.S. attorney general if you like.”
“A complaint?” Ragotsy watched the setting sun behind Strom.
“Against the county sheriff.”
“What’s that get me?”
“Revenge. Justice. Peace of mind.”
“How about the letter they made me sign? Does it get me back the letter? Unsign it?”
“No.”
Ragotsy’s smile was slight and mocking.
“We don’t believe that letter, Mister Ragotsy.”
The smile lingered.
“Mister Rag
otsy, you are a valuable piece of merchandise, make no mistake about it,” Strom told him. “Valuable to us, the FBI. We spent most of the drive down here concocting ways to win you over. Be warned, an approach has been decided on and will be tried out here and now. We intend it to work. To win you over. Not by the means employed by County Sheriff O. D. Don Pensler, if I have my say, but by logic, Mister Ragotsy. Logic and the call of mutual interest. It makes no sense for either of us, the federal government or yourself, to remain at variance on this issue. In a word, Mister Ragotsy, we have you by the balls and intend to squeeze only gently.”
“There ain’t much of my balls left,” Ragotsy told him.
Strom nodded sympathetically. “We arrested Mule.”
“Arrest a mule? What for?”
“Wiggles is under arrest too.”
Ragotsy shrugged, betrayed no sign of recognition.
“We have a very bright young fellow with our office, Mister Ragotsy,” Strom said. “His name is Yates, and the agents joke about him knowing everything. He has an interesting theory about you. Would you like to hear it?”
Another shrug was shrugged.
“Mister Yates read your letter with great interest. Particularly the part about you not recognizing anyone else in the tunnel or cave the night of the robbery. Mister Yates, by the way, certainly believes much of what you said in the letter was so … that you were there and took part in it. Mister Yates believes that Sheriff Pensler might even have put in things he read in the newspaper about the robbery on his own. But there was one thing he couldn’t have put in. That you had to get out into the river in time to catch the Treachery. Only someone who knew that river well would know about the Treachery. That came from you, Mister Ragotsy. Our Mister Yates says so.
“… Getting back to the point, what Mister Yates wonders is how you could not have recognized Wiggles down there. Wiggles walks with a limp. Wiggles also worked on your boat, Mister Ragotsy. So we all think you fibbed a little bit in that instance. We think that if you fibbed once, you may have fibbed a second time. Was it just coincidence that brought you to Baton Rouge the same time as Wiggles and Mule?”
Ragotsy continued staring out at the fading sunset.
“Oh, by the way, Bicki Hale was also there in Baton Rouge.”
Ragotsy, for the first time, looked directly at Strom, then quickly glanced away.
“You missed Bicki, Mister Ragotsy. He left Baton Rouge just before the three of you got there. Checked out of his hotel carrying five large suitcases with him. Have any idea what was in those suitcases?”
Ragotsy shook his head. “I don’t know” what the hell you’re talking about. I don’t know no Bicki or whatever. I don’t know them other names you spoke.”
“Would you like us to leave?”
“Yeah, that’s what I’d like, if you don’t mind, for you to leave.”
“Before we say what happened to the money?”
“… If you wanna tell me what you got on your mind, tell me. I’ll listen to anything. I don’t get to see many people. Only don’t think I know anything about what you’re saying.”
Strom moved from the railing, took a seat to Ragotsy’s right … a seat from which he could clearly see Ragotsy’s profile in the young darkness.
“Our man Yates thinks, and we agree, that you went to Baton Rouge to get money owed you from the robbery,” Strom said. “Your share of the money. Following the robbery Mule and Cowboy were supposed to get off the Mississippi early on, go into the Big Muddy River and land at a place where Mule’s truck was waiting. They were supposed to have a third man with them only he didn’t show up. Where did you get off, Mister Ragotsy? Did you go with Mule and Cowboy when the wizard didn’t show up? It was the wizard who was supposed to be with them, wasn’t it? When the wizard walked out on you, all kinds of trouble started … like too much water being let into the tunnels?”
Ragotsy said nothing, stared rigidly ahead.
“Obviously, Mister Ragotsy, we know what went on that night in the tunnel and beyond. Obviously, someone connected with the robbery had to tell us. Don’t forget, we’ve had Mule and Wiggles in custody for almost three weeks now.”
No reaction from Ragotsy.
“I don’t think Bicki Hale ever meant to give you your money, Mister Ragotsy. I believe he misinformed you about the time the money was to be divided up. The men from the Prairie Port area, yourself and Mule Corkel and Wiggles, whom you brought in, were all told to be in Baton Rouge a week later than the other gang members. The one person Bicki wouldn’t cheat, his nephew, was planning on being in Baton Rouge a full weekend before any of you. Do you think Cowboy may have assisted Bicki in the holding out? Wasn’t that what you suspected Wiggles of as well, being in with Cowboy on the holding out?”
Ragotsy wet his lips in the darkness.
“If you don’t do something, Mister Ragotsy, Bicki Hale will get away scot-free … with your end of the money. He may be out of the country already.”
Strom was on his feet, pacing. “As matters stand now, only you, Mule Corkel and Wiggles Loftus will be going on trial … and soon. While you do, Bicki and the other men will be spending money like water. Will be millionaires. And out of our reach. I can’t say that the charges against you will be dropped or substantially reduced. But they might be if you suddenly remember seeing Mule and Wiggles down in the tunnel. Under those circumstances you would be a government witness … and entitled to extra considerations. We’ll be making the same offer to Mule and Wiggles when we leave here. There’s room for only one of you.” Strom stopped directly in front of Ragotsy. “Well, what do you say? Can we count you in?”
Ragotsy lowered his head, remained silent.
“Thank you all the same for your time. For hearing us out.” Strom walked from the observation deck.
Ragotsy turned and watched him go.
“Asshole,” Jez Jessup said, standing up. “The man does something no FBI man I’ve seen does, and you ignore him. He gives you your life back and you treat him like he doesn’t exist. He gives you your life and a chance to shag after some of the money with no questions asked and you sit there like Joan-of-fucking-Arc. Nah, you’re dumber than an asshole. You don’t even make the rank of enema. You’re what they call you, a river rat.”
“I don’t have to take your shit,” Ragotsy told him.
“You’ll take anything I give you, rat ass, and love it. We own you. Mormon State’s the best thing that ever happened to you. You’re going to crawl on your belly begging for more of my shit … begging I don’t give you up.”
“My lawyer will think different,” Ragotsy told him. “I got a right to lawyers. I wanna see him now. I want you outta here!”
“A lawyer? What kind of lawyer, homicide?”
“Homicide?”
“Like in murder.”
“What the fuck you talkin’?”
“For one thing, Cowboy Carlson. Remember, he was your roommate.”
“What about him?”
“You tell me.”
“You know something about Cowboy, say so!”
“The question is, what do you know?”
“Hey, fed, can the games. You seen Cowboy?”
“In the morgue with half his head blown off,” Jez said. “You musta been out of town when they fished him out of the water. He was weighted down and dumped in the Mississippi.”
Ragotsy reached into his pocket for a cigarette. “Who’d wanna kill the Cowboy?”
“You tell me.”
“… This is more of your bullshit! No one would kill the Cowboy.” Ragotsy lit the cigarette, puffed nervously. “And if he was killed, I didn’t know nothing about it. Hey, you don’t think I’d let the Cowboy get hurt, do you?”
“Somebody did.”
“You wouldn’t be prick enough to tag me for slamming Cowboy?”
“Not if I can help it.” Jez smiled. “I still want you for Mormon State. ’Course Baton Rouge may want you worse.”
“Baton w
hat?”
Jez grinned. “Dum-dum, what kind of looney-toon are you? Mister Sunstrom just told you all about Baton Rouge. Don’t pretend you never heard about it.”
“Yeah, Baton Rouge. That’s down south, ain’t it?”
“It sure is … and you were seen there, asshole. Not only when you checked into the Packard Arms hotel under the name of Kenekee, but later. You were seen talking to Mule in the park. The day after that two eyewitnesses watched while Wiggles and Mule started fighting in the zoo. Then a zoo ranger comes along and tries to break it up and they attack him. Attack him just when you show up. You see them beat hell out of the ranger. You warn them another ranger is coming. That’s abetting a murder, rat ass. Abetting a murder in Louisiana is the same as committing it. The ranger they hit is still in a coma. If he dies, you’re up for homicide one. If he lives, you’re up for attempted homicide. Either charge supersedes federal bank theft … Mister Ragotsy, if I may call you that, you’re on a one-way ticket back to Louisiana. And while you’re being held for trial down there, guess what jail house they’re gonna stick you in? You got it, the county lockup belonging to O. D. Don Pensler. Whatever is left of them balls of yours, you better take a photograph of … for memory’s sake.”
Jez was halfway to the door before stopping and turning back to Ragotsy on the dark observation deck. “By the way, those two eyewitnesses to the assault on the ranger were FBI agents. If it was worth their while, they might not remember seeing you there. Call me if you have a change of heart.”
