“The Kingfish had followers all over the country,” Murphy said. “His Share the Wealth Clubs…”
“Eight million strong. Impressive number. But not enough votes to put a man in the White House, not by a long shot. And just recently Huey’d come a cropper trying to put his man in power in neighboring Mississippi-and if the Kingfish couldn’t sway his own next-door neighbor, if he couldn’t even guarantee carrying the South, what in the hell was the point of a presidential push?”
“Some say he was setting the stage for 1940,” Murphy said.
“And maybe he was. Trouble is, it was 1935 and the federal tax boys were breathing down the Longsters’ collective necks. Now, Seymour knew that without the Kingfish around, he could deliver enough votes to FDR to end both the federal tax probe and the pending congressional inquiry into the constitutionality of Long’s dictatorship.”
“All of a sudden you’re an expert on Louisiana politics.”
“I’m from Chicago, Murph. I’ve been an expert on corrupt politics since grade school. Anyway, it’s just a little over a year after the assassination, and where are we? The Long machine is backing the man Huey used to affectionately call ‘that crippled fucker.’ Federal money’s flowing like water into the Pelican State, and all the tax investigations and congressional inquiries have mysteriously shut down.”
A smile twitched. “You know what they say about politics making strange bedfellows.”
“I sure do. And Seymour has a long history of strange bedfellows-like Louis LeSage, for instance, lobbyist and vice president of Standard Oil. Standard, Huey’s arch enemy, who on the eve of Huey’s murder were just champing at the bit to make a backroom deal. A deal Governor Leche, of course, has since cut. You see, Seymour is one savvy character-he could read the handwriting on the walclass="underline" the Long machine could run much more smoothly, and profitably, without the Kingfish around. After all, the Long machine was designed to work on the state level, not national. Huey’s megalomaniac ambitions were derailing that smooth-running machine.”
Murphy smirked dismissively. “But without Huey, where did that leave his ‘machine’?”
“Well, it’s running on all cylinders right now; I saw Leche’s little hunting lodge. It’s as simple as this, Murph: at some point last year, it became clear to Seymour that Huey Long would make a better martyr than a leader.”
He was shaking his head, no. “Seymour and Huey were like brothers.”
“Cain and Abel were brothers. Seymour was also Huey’s treasurer, and he alone knew how much unrecorded cash money was in Huey’s ‘dee-duct box’…it was at least a million. Probably much more…and all that money disappeared when Huey was murdered.”
“Murdered,” Murphy said, “by Dr. Carl Weiss.”
“No. Somebody else, Murph.”
“Who then? Overzealous bodyguards? Even if that were true, it wouldn’t be ‘murder’….”
“Oh, it’s murder, all right.”
He smirked. “Yeah? Then who ‘done’ it?”
“You done it, Murph.”
He blinked. Laughed. “Me?”
“Not you alone, of course.”
He shook his head, laughed again, harshly. “Of course not! It was a conspiracy, right, Nate? And everybody in that crowded corridor was a conspirator!”
“Not everybody. Just you and Big George McCracken…who I’ve helped you conveniently remove…and maybe Judge Fournet.”
“Judge Fournet? Now you’ve completely lost your mind.”
“Well, maybe you can find me a padded cell next to Joe Messina-who wasn’t in on it, by the way. He truly loved the Kingfish. Seymour, of course, the master puppeteer, made sure he wasn’t in that hallway at all; he didn’t even come to town. As for Fournet, I’m honestly not sure about him. At any rate, there were enough people involved for a lawyer pal of Huey’s to warn him about a ‘murder plot.’” I managed a shrug. “Anyway, this is a case with many a loose end. But I’ve tied one hell of a lot of ’em up….”
“Really? Then, tell me-how’d we pull all this off?”
“It began with a phone call or two from a ‘friend’ from within the Kingfish’s inner circle to Dr. Carl Weiss. Getting that idealistic young doctor all riled up about the ‘nigger blood’ issue was the first step. Then Dr. Carl was contacted by this same ‘friend’-you, possibly McCracken, maybe even Fournet, or another party-and told to come to the capitol, and wait at a specific place, the corridor outside the governor’s office. Dr. Carl was told the Kingfish was willing to listen to him plead his case; this embarrassing subject was not one the young doctor would likely discuss with his family. This was something he had to do on his own. Now, Dr. Carl had to know he couldn’t stop the gerrymander of Judge Pavy…but he could appeal to Huey’s sense of decency not to defame his family with this racial slur.”
Murphy said nothing; he had stopped turning his hat.
“Somebody-probably Big George-held a parking place right out front for Dr. Carl…if the doctor had stopped on impulse, as he’s supposed to have, it’s highly unlikely he would’ve lucked into such a prime parking place right out front. The lot was packed, and the show inside was in full sway, with a full house.”
“Supposition,” Murphy muttered.
“Perhaps,” I said. “But Big George wasn’t in the House with the rest of us in the bodyguard contingent that night-he slipped away…though he did turn up later, in the hallway. Only he wasn’t carrying his usual toy: that submachine gun in the paper sack.”
“So what?”
“So, maybe he already knew there was going to be gunfire in that narrow passageway, and didn’t want to take his tommy gun into such close quarters.”
Murphy swallowed. Said nothing.
“As Huey stepped out of the governor’s office,” I said, “Judge Fournet attracted his attention, stopping him…and that’s when Dr. Carl Weiss stepped forward, thinking he had, essentially, an appointment with Huey. Huey, knowing nothing about it, probably brushed him off, rudely…and the doctor hauled off and slugged him-the perfect cue for you to go into your act.”
The brown eyes widened. “My act?”
“You dove forward, coming up alongside the doctor, shooting Huey point blank with your own.38, and tackling Dr. Carl, as if he were the assailant.”
The brown eyes narrowed. He was slumped in the chair.
“Then as you wrestled him down, you shot Dr. Carl in the throat, killing the poor ‘sumbitch,’ making him an instant dead patsy….”
He was looking at the floor. Turning the hat slowly in his hands.
“But you took a hell of a risk, didn’t you? Maybe you hadn’t figured on your trigger-happy brothers turning that hallway into a living hell. They almost blinded you, didn’t they, with their muzzle flashes, so anxious were they to help you drill that poor little doctor. In fact, one of ’em…probably Messina…accidentally nailed the Kingfish in the back, as he was fleeing.”
“Bullets were ricocheting,” Murphy said hollowly.
I tried to get more comfortable; it didn’t work, but I could see him better. “You obviously had a throw-down gun, the doctor had to be armed, but later…when Big George moved the doctor’s car around back, to a less suspicious position, he found the doc’s own weapon in the glove box. Since the word from the hospital mistakenly confirmed the notion that the bullet had gone through the Kingfish, this was perfect: after somebody fired a round or two out of it, you substituted Dr. Carl’s real gun for the throw-down piece.”