Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

by Jack Martin

  Bierce jabbed a forefinger at Purvis. “He must be taken alive, if at all possible. Once he has testified about … about another case, he will be bent sent to the electric chair.”

  Cumpanas had not yet decided whether she would help finger her lover. As the two G-men conversed, she looked at the sea of faces passing her into Wrigley Field. Like a flash, there he was, bold as brass, jacketless in the Chicago heat, straw boater perched jauntily on his handsome head, a loose white untucked shirt. Almost in a hypnotic state, she quietly walked away from the agents, feeling her way through the packed crowds. She touched his arm, and he whirled around in surprise.

  “Johnnie, the Feds are here. You gotta run.”

  At the same moment, Bierce became aware Cumpanas was no longer at his side. He scanned the crowd franticly. His pale blue eyes locked on Dillinger.

  Dillinger did not speak, did not hesitate. Grabbing Cumpanas roughly by the arm, he dragged her through the crowd, using blows and kicks to clear a path to the turnstiles, elbowing his way past the astonished ticket-takers. Bierce drew and cocked his .45 Colt automatic, and began fighting his way forward, shouting in a surprisingly loud and deep voice for so slight a person, “Out of the way! Federal Officer!” He was closely followed by Purvis, who in turn, was trailed by his three agents.

  Running at full tilt, the crowds on the other side of the turnstiles cleared the way for him. Dillinger, hampered by the high-heeled Cumpanas he dragged along behind him, swerved left onto the first aisle, forcibly shoving past the relatively few fans who had not yet found their seats. Still, he could not go as fast as the unencumbered Bierce, who ran with the shocking fluidity of a mongoose. When a space cleared between them, Bierce’s now deep voice boomed, “Halt or I’ll shoot!” Bierce paused for a second to decide how best to inflict a nonlethal wound on Dillinger. It was a second too long.

  Moving with the speed of a striking cobra, Dillinger released Cumpanas and grabbed a pregnant young woman who had been trying to settle into a seat in the front row of the section. He swung the shrieking woman in front of him, and as Bierce hesitated, the gangster produced an automatic from under his shirt and fired a single shot at Bierce. He then released the young woman, grabbed Cumpanas, and darted down a connected aisle leading into the bowels of the stadium.

  Bierce was standing stock still as Purvis and his agents reached him. “Where did he go?” screamed the frustrated, red-faced Purvis as he swiveled his pistol around in all directions, much to the terror of nearby baseball fans. Bierce did not answer. Instead, his automatic slipped slowly from his hand to clatter onto the concrete of the aisle. He brought his hand up to the section of his expensive double-breasted coat that was right over his silk handkerchief, and brought away fingers dabbled in blood. As the horrified Purvis looked on, Bierce smiled weirdly and murmured, “It has been a long time, but I am finally coming, my love.” Then his eyes closed and he collapsed to the concrete. like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

  “Go get that bastard and his bitch and kill them both!” screamed an enraged Purvis to his men. He then grabbed a terrified hot dog vendor, shoved his pistol in the young man’s face, and yelled. “Go find whoever’s in charge! Close the gates! Then call the Bureau Office and have them send an ambulance and every man they have! Now move, or so help me God I’ll make it a bad day for your mother!” Purvis then dropped to his knees and setting his gun aside, commenced doing everything he could to stop the bleeding.

  Dillinger and Cumpanas were sharing a dingy room in a no-questions-asked downtown hotel. Dillinger was busy cleaning a Springfield rifle with a telescopic sight that he had stored in the room some days before.

  Cumpanas was chain-smoking while sitting on the bed, her hands trembling with delayed shock. Finally, she broke the silence. “Johnnie, there was no need to shoot that G-man. You had a hostage. You could’ve demanded that he throw his gun away, and then we could have made our escape.”

  “No time for that,” Dillinger responded sourly. He then placed the cleaned rifle across the room’s desk and turned in his chair to face Cumpanas. “I’m more interested in what you were doing with the Feds. Thinking of selling me out?”

  “It wasn’t like that, honey,” she replied, a tremble of fear in her voice. “After you took off from my place, shooting the young punk on your way out, the goddamn dagos took me to Nitti.”

  Dillinger gave a low whistle. “Frank Nitti himself. That’s quite an honor.”

  “They wanted me to give you up. They beat me pretty good. I think they had decided to take me for a ride, when Agent Bierce—the G-man you shot—showed up. It was strange. He took me away from them, just wanted me to identify you. I went along with it, but only to warn you when they caught up to you. That’s what I did.”

  Dillinger gave her a long, hard look, then his features softened. “Okay baby, I believe you. This will be our new plan. You stay here. Only go out for food and such. I got things to do, people to see. I’ll be dropping in from time to time. When I finish my job, we’re out of here and off to Canada. Got the picture?”

  “Sure, Johnnie, sure.”

  “All right then, come here. I’m in serious need of some loving.”

  The room in the west wing of the seventh floor of Chicago Memorial that Melvin Purvis was approaching resembled an anthill that some kid had disrupted with a stick. Purvis stood still for a minute, watching white-clad doctors and nurses scurry in and out, strange looking expressions on their faces. He had left here just four hours before, desperate for some sleep in one of the bunks reserved for the night interns, leaving strict orders to be awakened when it looked like Bierce was about to die. He had awakened on his own, looked at the clock on the wall and decided the staff had ignored his request, and had allowed Agent Bierce to leave this world with no fellow agent to witness his leaving. Now, staring at the commotion in Bierce’s room, he realized Bierce had not yet died, although he suspected the end was imminent. He jogged the rest of the way to the room, and grabbed one of the doctors at the entrance. Shaking the man by the shoulder, Purvis asked, “When will Agent Bierce … pass on?”

  The young doctor stared at Purvis, then bit his lip before saying, “I think you should talk to Dr. Stein. He’s in the room.” Then he pulled free of Purvis and ran down the hall as if he were in fear of his life.

  Purvis paused for a moment, then entered the room. The pale, still form of Harry Bierce lay motionless on the bed, an intravenous line snaking into each arm. Two doctors and two nurses hovered over Bierce. “Which one of you is Stein?” asked Purvis with more harshness than he had intended.

  They all turned to look at Purvis. The elder of the two doctors said, “I am Stein.”

  “What is happening to Agent Bierce? I was told four hours ago that he had only a couple of hours to live.”

  The balding Stein turned to his colleagues, and in a voice tinged with a German accent said, “Please leave for a few minutes.” They glanced at each other, but filed out of the room wordlessly. Stein closed the door behind them and turned to face Purvis.

  “Frankly, this case baffles me, Agent Purvis. When I initially examined Agent Bierce, I was amazed he had lived to reach the hospital. X-rays confirmed that the bullet had transited the left lung, exiting under his shoulder blade. It had nicked his pulmonary artery; internal bleeding was extensive. Frankly, all I did was stop the external bleeding and administer morphine, so that he would be comfortable while he died—yet, he has not died. In fact….”

  Dr. Stein closed his eyes for a moment and reeled. Purvis reached forward to catch him, but the doctor’s eyes flew open and he steadied himself. “Pardon, but what I have witnessed has shaken my belief in medical science.” The doctor hesitated, as if deciding how to say what he’d seen. “When I changed his bandages, the entry and exit holes were almost completely … healed. And it seems unlikely that any substantial scar tissue will form.” He shook his head, still in disbelief, and spoke as if trying to convince himself. “His internal bleeding appears
to have stopped. Even less believable, his collapsed left lung has spontaneously re-inflated. Of course, I ordered additional X-rays.” Then looking directly at the agent, he said, “You know, Agent Purvis, if I were not a man of science, I would say that this man isn’t—”

  “Isn’t what, doctor?” asked a thin but firm voice from the bed.

  Dr. Stein jerked his attention over to the bed. Harry Bierce’s sky-blue eyes stared at him calmly. Visibly swallowing, Stein replied, “It’s not important, Agent Bierce. What is important is that you are making an astonishing recovery.”

  “Harry, this is amazing!” exclaimed Purvis, moving closer to the bed. “Dr. Stein and his staff have performed a miracle!”

  “We cannot take the all the credit,” said Stein. “Much of this recovery seems due to a remarkable immune system. When you are better, I would like to run a number of tests on you.”

  Bierce’s attention had drifted from the doctor. Seemingly to himself, he murmured, “Still here … still here … still not done.” He looked back at Stein and said, “Doctor, I would be very grateful for a glass of water.”

  “Of course.” Stein opened the door to the room and barked some orders.

  “Harry, I’m damned glad to see you conscious,” said Purvis. “I’ve had to bury too many Bureau men. Didn’t want you to be another.”

  “Did you capture Dillinger?”

  Purvis contorted his face as if he’d bitten into a lemon. “No, and I blame myself. Should have had more men waiting outside the park. We had the place locked up tighter than a Scotsman’s wallet, but it was five minutes too late. Looks like his love of baseball paid off. He seems to have known every nook and cranny at Wrigley Field.”

  Bierce nodded slightly. “The woman get away as well?”

  “Yeah, the bitch as well. Don’t worry, Harry. They’re dead—they just don’t know it yet.”

  “I need them alive!” snapped Bierce with surprising emphasis for someone who’d just been so close to death’s door. “Take them alive, and bring them to me. I need your word, Purvis.”

  With visible reluctance Purvis said, “If I can do it with no risk to my men, I promise. But I’m not letting Dillinger kill any of my men. I’m not going to bury another comrade!”

  “Fair enough.”

  Stein re-entered the room with a carafe and a glass. “Here is your water, Agent Bierce.”

  “Excellent, Doctor. Also, could you have some food brought to me? I’m famished. Preferably steak, as rare as possible.”

  Ana Cumpanas was lingering on one of Chicago’s busiest thoroughfares, window shopping the various dresses on display in various shops, painfully aware that she could afford none of them. Dillinger had barely given her enough cash to pay for a meal before he had taken off early in the morning. Her clothes that she had worn the day before were decent enough in appearance, but they were the only clothes she had. She had just decided she was going to have to beg Dillinger for enough cash for a couple of decent dresses when a rough hand nearly jerked her left arm out of its socket. Simultaneously, she felt the barrel of a gun jabbed into her lower back.

  “Take it easy sister,” said a man in a low, gravelly voice. “Federal agent. Damned if Purvis wasn’t right, that you would still be wearing that orange number. Stands out like a socialite in a strip joint.”

  Harry Bierce was sitting up in bed, to the utter amazement of Melvin Purvis, Doctor Stein, and various nurses. They all knew the wound he had sustained was fatal, and that if Bierce had pulled through at all, he should have been crippled for life. Yet the latest set of X-rays confirmed what the doctor had suspected—the internal bleeding was not only stopped, all the blood enmassed in his gut had been completely reabsorbed into the agent’s body. Although it was harder to interpret the soft tissue of the lung, it seemed, too, that the damage was healing itself with inhuman speed. All those around him, save Stein, felt an increasing uneasiness in the presence of Bierce. As to Dr. Stein, he occasionally muttered in his native German tongue which often contained the words “Nobel Prize.”

  Bierce handed the seated Purvis his food tray. Purvis grimaced as he placed it on the table to his right, the bloody residue on the plate disgusting him almost as much as had the sight of Bierce devouring the near-raw steak. Sated for the moment, Bierce leaned back into his pillows with a sigh. He then turned his attention to Purvis.

  “Not the slightest clue as to Dillinger’s whereabouts?”

  Purvis shook his head dejectedly. “None. And we’re fairly sure that he hasn’t left Chicago. We’re watching the airport, the train stations, and the major roads out of town. With his face in all the newspapers, we should trace him down soon. It’s only a matter of time.”

  Bierce removed the gold-rimmed glasses from his face and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “We do not have time, Purvis, three days at the most. If he is not apprehended within that time, there could be the most horrific consequences.”

  “I keep hearing refer to such ‘consequences’. What the hell are those consequences?”

  “I have told you before, I am not at liberty to reveal—”

  There was a commotion at the room’s door. A thickly built agent entered, roughly shoving Ana Cumpanas before him.

  “Here she is, Mr. Purvis. We should be able to shake something about Dillinger out of the bitch.”

  Frowning, Purvis asked, “Why did you bring her here? Why didn’t you throw her in the can?”

  The agent shrugged. “Well, Mr. Purvis, you know that the Bureau don’t have its own jail in Chicago. Chicago police run the jails here, and I don’t trust them as far as I can throw them. Thought you might have a quiet place where we could put the questions to her, with no one to interfere or complain if the questioning gets a little … loud.”

  At that, all the medical staff exited the room quickly, not wanting to know the rest.

  Cumpanas paled at the last comment. Purvis thought it over, and then nodded. “Right. The Bureau has a safe-house over in Cicero. We’ll take her there and get to work on her.”

  Surprisingly, Bierce said, “I would prefer if you leave her with me. I have errands I need to send someone on, and she will do as well as another.”

  Purvis’ eyes narrowed to slits. “Have you lost your mind, Bierce? This is the whore who ruined our bust on Dillinger, not to mention got you shot!”

  Bierce turned his attention to Cumpanas. “You love John Dillinger, don’t you?”

  Cumpanas lifted her face and for the first time looked Bierce in the eyes. “I did. I still do, I think. People outside my profession think we are not capable of love, but we are … sometimes. But Johnnie does not love me. I see that now. I gave him warning so he could get away, but he dragged me along so he could use me as a shield. Then he used that pregnant woman as a shield, then he fires into crowd, where if he missed you, he maybe would kill some good man or woman or child who were there only to see game. I knew him to be bad man, but didn’t care. But he is worse than a bad man—and he does not love me.”

  Bierce replied to her in what was for him a surprisingly gentle voice. “Mrs. Cumpanas, if John Dillinger is not stopped, at least one other man will die. A good man, on which many other good people rely. Can I count on you to help us catch him?”

  She waited for a long moment, then said, “You promise not to kill Johnnie?”

  “Yes. I need him alive.”

  “Then I’ll help, but with one condition: you let me stay in this country. I do not want to go back to Roumania.”

  Bierce gave a short, barking laugh. “Yes, I imagine not. You have my word.”

  Through gritted teeth Melvin Purvis swore creatively and at length. Then he stood and growled, “All right, Bierce, it’s on your head.” Then he and the other agent stomped out of the hospital room.

  Bierce laughed again as the men left. “Mrs. Cumpanas, I assume that Dillinger only visits you irregularly, and does not care much where you go when he isn’t around?”

  “That’s Johnnie.”
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br />   “Very well. Please reach into the bedside table drawer and hand me my wallet.”

  Cumpanas did so. Bierce extracted a hundred dollar bill and handed it to her.

  “I’m afraid that my clothes were ruined by my last encounter with Mr. Dillinger. I will need something presentable for when I leave here. Go to the Brooks Brothers store and buy me a suit and shirts. Size 36 short, I believe; it will be close enough. Dark blue, pinstriped, double breasted. Come back when it is safe to do so.”

  Cumpanas looked strangely at Bierce, then rose, tucked the bill in her purse, and left the room without a word, just before the bustling Dr. Stein entered, charts and X-ray plates in his arms.

  “Dr. Stein.”

  “I would like to run a few more tests.”

  Bierce shrugged. “No need. I should be ready to leave in about two days.”

  “Oh surely not, Mr. Bierce, surely not. You have miraculously survived being shot through the lung. We cannot afford for you to being released early, only to relapse. Now, let us see the chest wound. We do not want an infection to develop.”

  Dr. Stein placed his bundle of charts and X-rays on the table, then laid out a small pair of scissors, bandages, and a bottle of iodine. Without asking permission, he drew back the top of Bierce’s hospital gown, to expose the chest bandage. Swiftly he loosened it with the scissors and carefully drew it back. Then he shuddered, literally hissed, and drew back. His widened eyes focused on where there should have been a bloody, jagged hole drilled deep into Bierce’s chest. Instead, the doctor was looking at an expanse of smooth, healthy skin, with only the slightest impression of a dent in the middle of his torso. Wordlessly, he looked at Bierce, who was smiling in a way that disturbed the doctor.

  “I heal rather fast, Dr. Stein.”

  The following morning one of Chicago’s notorious summer heat waves clamped down on the Windy City. By ten o’clock, both temperature and humidity were in the nineties. Ana Cumpanas’s orange dress was light, but it was already soaked with sweat. As she entered the hospital, struggling with the clumsy parcels she was carrying, she had hoped to find it was one of the few buildings in the city that had the new-fangled air conditioning. Her hopes were immediately thwarted. If anything, it was hotter and more humid than outside. She passed by sweating, red-faced doctors and nurses in the corridors, too miserable to pay her any attention. As she came up to the door of Bierce’s room, she could hear him in quiet conversation with Melvin Purvis. She hesitated, not wanting to go in while the unsympathetic Purvis was there, but Bierce noticed her in the doorway.