possible that enough did not exist.
* * *
After leaving Remus, Smith walked several blocks north and west, stopping at the Little Green House on K Street. There he met Gaston Means, his partner in collecting graft payments. Formerly a private detective and at present a special agent with the Bureau of Investigation, Means was a controversial figure, a confidence man whose list of transgressions included a murder indictment and accusations of fabricating elaborate plots involving German spies. Still, his murky history did not trouble the current director of the Bureau, William J. Burns, who believed it only enhanced his skills as a sleuth and, when necessary, extortionist.
Means and Smith had developed a system: Means worked mostly behind the scenes, gathering federal files on bootleggers and figuring out whom to shake down for withdrawal permits and protection payments. He then shared this knowledge with Smith, so that the latter could prepare to meet the bootleggers in person, using his connection to Attorney General Daugherty to enhance his credibility. Occasionally Means collected graft payments directly from bootleggers, but only after Smith had made the requisite arrangements.
Means had just returned from one such trip to New York. At the Vanderbilt Hotel in midtown Manhattan, the agent always occupied the same room, number 518. On the table in the center of the room sat a large glass fishbowl, green with currency. Means then adjourned to the adjacent room, 517, and peered into 518 through a peephole he’d drilled. In addition to studying bootleggers’ files, Means employed twenty-five “tipsters of the underworld” to deliver reports of profits so he could calculate the appropriate graft. At the appointed hour, bootleggers entered the empty hotel room, approached the fishbowl, and deposited a predetermined amount of money, a sum that in total averaged $60,000 per day.
Back in Washington, Means logged each contribution in his notebook and turned the money over to Smith, who combined it with his own payments from Remus. Smith took a cut for himself, another cut for Prohibition Commissioner Roy Haynes, and went home to the suite he shared with Attorney General Daugherty.
Means also viewed Remus’s conviction as an opportunity, a chance to collect graft directly from the biggest bootlegger in the country—without having to share the profits with Smith. He invited Remus to his home. They had met a few times before, always with Smith present, but Means had never seen the bootlegger in such a state: “almost a nervous wreck,” crimson-faced and swinging his arms with the urgency of a matador.
Means gave his pitch, arguing that Smith had failed to prevent the conviction and that he himself was best suited to fix Remus’s case on appeal. The cost: a modest one-time payment of $125,000. One quarter would go to the Bureau’s director, one quarter to Daugherty, one quarter to Supreme Court Chief Justice William Howard Taft, and one quarter to Means himself.
Remus considered the offer. While the director and attorney general might partake in such a scheme, he was certain that Chief Justice Taft would not. If Means did approach Taft, it might only exacerbate his legal concerns. The more likely scenario was that Means planned to tell no one of this deal and pocket all of the money for himself. At this juncture, Remus had no choice but to trust in Jess Smith.
He declined and took the next train back to Cincinnati, eager to get home to Imogene. As he approached the mansion’s iron gates, Remus realized that his conviction had had one clear benefit: The Prohibition agent was no longer parked outside his home, watching and waiting.
For now he was out of Remus’s mind.
Q. I will ask you if you ever saw Franklin L. Dodge in New York?
A. I did see him in New York.
Q. Now where did you see Franklin Dodge in New York?
A. He came to my office at 1841 Broadway in New York and told me that he had some whiskey certificates for sale. And I said, “Those are Remus’s certificates.” And he said, “Yes, I want to sell them; I have got about two hundred thousand dollars’ worth.”
Q. Did he deny that they were Remus’s certificates?
A. He did not.
ALL REMUS COULD DO that summer was wait for his lawyers to prepare his appeal. Imogene did her best to distract him, suggesting a trip to Chicago. He agreed, and she, Remus, and Ruth each packed a valise. They took off in a touring car, with their driver at the wheel. Ruth sat shotgun, and Remus