Murderers, Scoundrels and Ragamuffins Read online

  Hannah rose to her feet. “I have to leave now, Ruth. David will soon be home from school. Thank you for the lovely tea.”

  “Oh my, have I offended you, dear?” Ruth asked sincerely. “That was not my intention.”

  “Why no, of course not. I...I just have a small headache. I’ll be fine once I get a little food in me.”

  “Oh no, what was I thinking? Can I offer you something, dear? I have a fresh box of Oysterettes I haven’t opened yet!”

  “No, no. Thank you. I’ll call on you again soon, Ruth. Bye-bye.”

  It couldn’t have been more obvious that Hannah was anxious to leave.

  “Goodbye Hannah. I’ll see you soon, dear,” Ruth called after her apologetically.

  I don’t know about that, Hannah mumbled to herself as she descended the porch steps and headed back home along the river.

  “Out o’ the way, gobshite!” shouted an old marine to the operator of a smaller craft in his tug’s path.

  Ruth watched from her window as Hannah took out a handkerchief and held it tight over her mouth and nose just as a cloud of black coal smoke spat out by a passing steamer obscured her from view.

  Franz & Johanna Frehr

  ◆◆◆

  As Detective Jim Sullivan entered the Flint & Kent store on Main St., a man who he had previously arrested in the same establishment for shoplifting exited with a bundle wrapped and tied. Jim grabbed his arm. “Hey there! You been behavin’ yourself?” he accused more than inquired.

  The man reached into his breast pocket with two fingers and produced a receipt for the shirts he had just bought. He scoffed.

  “What a miserable existence ye must have,” sneered the accused, ”believin’ that everyone ye see is some criminal that ye just haven’t gotten around to arrestin’ yet.”

  He yanked his arm forcefully from the detective’s grasp and disappeared around the corner, sneering. Jim scratched his head, wondering in the back of his mind if the man might just have a valid point there, then entered the store.

  Detective Sullivan may be an accomplished fly cop, but merely dressing himself in street clothes wasn’t enough to fool the experienced thief. The true professional could spot him a mile off. So it proved a strange encounter indeed when an attractive young lady of about 20 years of age standing at the glass display case near the main entrance looked him dead in the eye while she brazenly stuffed ladies’ silks into her coat.

  “What in the name of blazes do think you’re doin’ there young woman?”

  She said nothing. She maintained eye contact and defiantly continued stuffing. The sales lady ran up to her and began scolding her loudly. The thief proceeded undaunted. Jim didn’t know what to make of the girl.

  “Come with me, young lady. You’re under arrest,” he barked.

  She obediently complied, looking quite contented.

  “Open your coat.”

  She did as ordered.

  “Thank you officer, for arresting me,” she said as Jim and the saleslady removed the merchandise.

  She did not appear at all to resemble the standard category of cutpurse that Detective Sullivan was accustomed to nabbing.

  “Yes. Thank you very much,” she repeated.

  “What are you thinking, stuffing all these expensive items into your coat in full view of everyone? Are you mad?”

  “Oh yes, quite mad! Will you be escorting me to Headquarters now?”

  “I’m afraid so,” replied Jim.

  “Fine. In that event I will at long last have the full attention of the police! It’s about time!”

  Jim hooked his right hand tightly into the crook of the crook’s accommodating elbow. As the pair headed down Main Street in the direction of Police Headquarters, she began to relate an astonishing tale.

  She told of the disappearance of her grandparents, Johanna and Franz Frehr, back around November 20th. On that day her uncle, Philip Bundschu, had arrived at her door in the late afternoon right before dark inquiring after them. He said he had not been able to contact them, and did she know anything of their whereabouts?

  She immediately became concerned about the elderly couple. Her grandmother had been sick with a bad cold and sore throat and was unable to walk without the aid of a cane or by hanging onto chairs and tables as she went about the house. The old folks owned two houses. They kept large sums of greenbacks in a satchel under their bed and a thick roll in a cigar box on the bedroom dresser. They hoarded gold and hid it in their walls.

  “One hour later I arrived to their house with my two brothers. It was early evening. We rapped at the side door. It was opened by a very old man as mean and ugly-looking as a canker blossom. None of us had ever seen him before. I was very surprised. I asked for my grandparents. He said they were gone. When I asked where he said: ‘None of your business.’ That made me angry, so I said, ‘I will make it my business to report the matter to the police if you don’t tell me.’ Then he told me to go right ahead and do that and after laughing at me he slammed the door in my face. We immediately departed for the police station on William St. to report the disappearance of my grandmother and grandfather and the shock of learning that their home of more than twenty years yet contained their possessions, but was newly occupied instead by an insolent stranger. The police did not think it interesting or worthy of their attention! I was horrified at how the officers conducted themselves and of how dismissive they were of me. I said, ‘Who do you think you are working for, sirs? Is it not the imperative of your employ to investigate reports of crimes?’ They responded, ‘Bring us proof that any crime has been committed and we will then investigate.’

  “I replied that it was not my job to accumulate evidence, that it was the job of the police to investigate once the suspicion of a crime had been reported. Furthermore I strongly stated that the unassailable suspicion regarding the sudden disappearance of two elderly people and the occupation of their homestead by a stranger having an evil countenance should be sufficiently alarming for them to act.

  “The officer I was speaking to laughed and said, ‘Well, looky here, won’t you? This young girl thinks she knows our duties better than we do ourselves!’ Then the two went about the station as if on a lark, including the other officers occupying adjacent rooms on the joke, all of whom thought it extraordinarily amusing. I felt as if I had wandered into some terrible nightmare, or an insane asylum.”

  Jim was deeply disturbed hearing this. He’d taken notice of callous behavior among some of the younger police officers in more recent times. The woman’s story only verified his own discouraging observations.

  “Out of desperation,” she continued, “I hatched a scheme of causing my own arrest so that I could not be turned away any longer, so that the police might be forced to finally listen to me!”

  At that Jim released her arm. They stopped walking and faced each other.

  “This man who slammed the door in your face at your grandparents’ house—had you never seen him before? asked Jim.

  “No, Detective, but I was told by my uncle that he was a frequent visitor to my grandparents’ home in recent months and was trying to get my grandfather to sell him the property.”

  “How old was this man did you say?’

  “Very old. Eighty years perhaps.”

  “Eighty years! Did your grandfather ever tell you that he had any intention of selling?”

  “No he did not. Never. My uncle told me that one day a few weeks back he was saying goodbye to grandfather out front of his house and grandfather saw the man approaching and said, ‘Here comes that old Mecklenburger, Bonier. That fool wants to buy our house but he hasn’t got even a penny!’

  “I know that man did something terrible to grandmother and grandfather, Detective. Won’t you please, please help me? I implore you!”

  “Yes, of course I will,” Jim responded. Whats your name, young lady?”

  “Mrs. Charlotte Girtens.”

  “We’ll go to Precinct 8 right now and see Captain Regan and g
et to the bottom of this. Mrs. Girtens.”

  Father Bernard McGill

  ◆◆◆

  “I just don’t understand myself, Father. Why I keep listening to her, except that much of what she says makes rather good sense,” Hannah said. Her struggle to reconcile the opposing forces within her head had brought her to Father McGill.

  Hannah sniffed. The cramped confessional smelled of incense and stale tobacco and farts.

  “It’s foolishness! My child, this woman you speak of is defiling the teachings of the Holy Church! By continuing to seek her counsel and her friendship you are acting as an accessory to the crime! If you wish for God’s forgiveness you must shun this woman and make spiritual restitution to the Church, to God’s word.”

  Hannah usually felt more or less anonymous there in the dark, but at this moment Father McGill was looking through the woven screen as if he could clearly see her reddening face.

  “Yes, Father, I will.”

  “What is this woman’s name, Hannah?”

  The priest’s lecturing tone and casual familiarity were both highly inappropriate. He had always previously addressed her as Mrs. Sullivan. Her friend’s name? Hannah was stunned that a priest would overstep in such a personal and strident manner. She would certainly never expect the priest to reveal what was said to him in confidence within the confines of the confessional. Why would he not have the same expectation of her? He was demanding that she give up her new friend. Even more disturbing, she thought, was this young inexperienced priest’s shameless sense of entitlement.

  “Rachel Stein,” she lied.

  “My God in Heaven! She’s a Jew? Is it any wonder?”

  The people waiting their turn in line outside the confessional had surely heard that.

  “Um, well, I don’t know. We’ve never spoken of her religion.”

  “I’m not talking about her religion. I’m talking about her race. Where does she live?”

  Hannah felt insulted now, that this very priest about whom frightening rumors were currently flying would ask such personal information of her.

  “It is not for me to say, Father.”

  “You refuse to tell me?”

  “I do.”

  “Then go. If it were up to me I would not absolve your sins. I would send you away and allow you to persist in unrighteousness.”

  Silence.

  Did he really just say that? Is he threatening me? She blew up so unexpectedly that she surprised even herself.

  “Father McGill, your questions are out of order! You have no right to have me in the role of an informant. I don’t know what to say I am so shocked at you!”

  “Dear girl, you are harboring the enemy, a cancer that is a threat to our parish, to the children!”

  You’re a fine one to be concerned about the children, she hollered inside her head, after the rumors I been hearing!

  “Say ten rosaries and an Act of Contrition.”

  His fury was barely disguised.

  She began reciting the words, but her mind was elsewhere: “O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins because of Thy just punishments …”

  As she left the church and walked down Alabama St. past the rectory she recalled again the troubling story that Ruth had told her about little Georgie Shaw and Father McGill. Hannah had confided the same in Annie but her sister-in-law would hear none of it. Annie’s explosive reaction was out of character for her, especially as a mother of young boys. When Hannah told Ruth about Annie screaming at her in anger, Ruth said something that explained quite a lot. She said “That wasn’t anger, Hannah. That was fear. People scream only when they’re frightened. They might wish to explain away it as anger, but that’s because fear is perceived as weakness.

  “Your sister-in-law knows, Hannah. Yes she does. She knows.”

  Precinct 8

  ◆◆◆

  Captain Mike Regan was not entirely surprised when Detective Jim Sullivan entered his station house with young Mrs. Girtens. Regan had just received an anonymous phone call saying that there was great excitement in the neighborhood regarding the disappearance of an elderly couple and the occupation of their house by a shady old character purported to be a scoundrel.

  Dismayed, Regan slowly shook his head as young Mrs. Girtens told her story of the senseless treatment she’d received at the hands of the night patrolmen there at Precinct 8. As she began to relate the history of what had transpired in regards to her grandparents’ disappearance, Regan called in his trusted underling, Detective Emmanuel Schuh, to sit in on the meeting.

  “I am Mrs. Charlotte Girtens. I am twenty years old. Franz Frehr is my grandfather and Mrs. Johanna Frehr is my step-grandmother. I last saw them alive on November 15th. My grandfather is nearly 83 years old and my step-grandmother will be 84 in July. I usually call on them twice or three times a week.

  “On the evening of November 20th, between 7 and 8 o’clock I went to their home in company with my two brothers ages 18 and 17, and a young man named Rosenow. We had heard that grandpa and grandma were missing and went to see about it. It was almost dark when we got to the house and I was afraid to go there alone. Mr. Rosenow stood on one side of me and my two brothers back of me. Mr. Rosenow knocked at the door, which was opened by an old man whom I did not at that time know, but who I now know as a Mr. Bonier. ‘Where is my grandpa and grandma?’ I asked.”

  “They’re gone,” was his reply.

  “Where have they gone to?” I asked.

  “They’re just gone, that’s all I know.”

  “But where have they gone to?” I asked.

  “None of your business,” was the answer.

  “But I want to know,” I demanded.

  “Well they’re gone. I can say no more,” he answered.

  “Will you please tell me where they are? I’m anxious to find them!” was my retort.

  “I know but I won’t tell,” he replied.

  “You may be forced to tell by the police,” said I.

  “You can get all the police in Buffalo if you like,” said he.

  “Don’t you know?” I asked.

  “What do I know about them?” he said, and slammed the door in my face.

  We immediately left and came here to the No. 8 Station and attempted to enter a complaint. The police who were on duty refused us, saying that unless we could prove a crime had taken place they could do nothing.”

  Regan was deeply concerned about both wrong-doings now laid at his feet.

  “Schuh, you go over there to the house at—what is the address, Mrs. Girtens?”

  “339 Jefferson Street,” she informed.

  “339 Jefferson,” repeated Regan, “and question that man occupying the premises. In the meantime I’m going to get to the bottom of the other scandal transpiring right here under my very nose. ”

  Schuh left immediately.

  “Mrs. Girtens, I promise that I will contact you personally as soon as I learn anything in regards to the whereabouts of your grandparents,” stated Regan.

  “Oh, please Captain! Too much time has passed already! I know that old man has harmed them! I’m very frightened of him! He knows where I live!”

  “As soon as I have some news for you I will come pay a visit to your home to report what I know, young lady,” promised Regan.

  “Thank you Captain,” she said through grateful tears, and left.

  Regan turned to his old friend.

  “The officers who ridiculed her will be soundly reprimanded,” he pledged.

  “Soundly whipped would be more appropriate. I suspect they’d have to be drunk to be so callous,” Sullivan raged. “Now, what do you say I go over to that house and have a good snoop around for myself?”

  “No, let’s wait to see what Schuh finds out first.”

  Jim considered for a few moments.

  “You know what? It’s time Fingy Conners did something for us for a change. Can I use your telephone?”

  “Sure,” sa
id Regan.

  Jim clicked the hook a few times to summon the operator.

  “Yes, operator. William J. Conners at the Buffalo Courier, please. Seneca 2786.”

  ◆◆◆

  The following morning a story appeared prominently in the Courier questioning the mysterious absence of the Frehrs. Police Superintendent Bull scanned the heading, dismissed it, and moved on to the sports section.

  The Buffalo Police Department had endured embarrassment so frequently under the enduring Supt. Bull’s command that Capt. Regan proceeded more cautiously in confronting his boss than he formerly might have. Bull had already once stripped Regan of his Captain’s stripes and turned him out to patrolling the freezing cold streets; he could do it again. Regan’s animosity toward Bull stretched back to the crooked Sheehan machine election of 1893. At that time Regan had, at Supt. Bull’s orders, commanded the police at the 4th District Illinois Street polling place in a regretful alliance with Fingy Conners and his murderous goons. Regan had his men stand idly by while legitimate voters opposing Conners’ hand-picked candidates got pummeled, brutalized and unlawfully prevented from casting their ballots by Conners’ hired thugs. Regan did as ordered only to find himself the following day solely accused. The uproar in the newspapers as to the polling place riot caused Bull to single out Regan as both culprit and sacrificial lamb. Regan was demoted. He lost his stripes and a quarter of his salary and was sent back to walking the teeth-clatteringly frigid streets in the Canal Street District for three solid winters. His humiliation had been announced on the front pages in black headlines.

  “There’ll be no my forgivin’ nor forgettin’ that shit,” he promised Jim Sullivan. “Not never.”

  Land Jobbing