NOW it was that in secret my ambition took a hearty start and would
vine-like creep and clamber. My triumph over Jimmy the Blacksmith added
vastly to my stature of politics. Moreover, the sly intrigue by which I
conquered began to found for me a fame. I had been locally illustrious,
if I may so set the term to work, for a granite fist and a courage as
rooted as a tree. For these traits the roughs revered me, and I may
say I found my uses and rewards. Following my conquest of that
under-captaincy, however, certain upper circles began to take account of
me; circles which, if no purer than those others of ruder feather, were
wont to produce more bulging profits in the pockets of their membership.
In brief, I came to be known for one capable and cunning of a plot, and
who was not without a genius for the executive.
With Big Kennedy I took high position. His relations with Jimmy
the Blacksmith never had been close; he had never unbuckled in any
friendship and felt for him nothing nearer than distrust. But for me
he held another pose. Big Kennedy, upon my elevation, fair made me his
partner in the ward, a partnership wherein, to speak commercially, I
might be said to have had an interest of one-fourth. This promotion
brought me pleasure; and being only a boy when all was said, while I
went outwardly quiet, my spirit in the privacy of my own bosom would on
occasion spread moderately its tail and strut.
Now, as time passed, I became like the shadow of Big Kennedy's authority
throughout the ward; my voice was listened to and my word obeyed. I
should say, too, that I made it a first concern to carry the interest of
Big Kennedy ever on the crest of my thought. This should be called the
offspring neither of loyalty nor gratitude; I did it because it was
demanded of my safety and to curry advantage for myself. For all that
attitude of confident friendship, I was not put off my guard. Big
Kennedy never let my conduct roam beyond his ken. A first sign of an
interest outside his own would have meant my instant disappearance. He
would have plucked me of my last plume. With a breath he could reduce me
to be a beggarman where now I gave alms. Having, therefore, the measure
of his fell abilities, I was not so blind as to draw their horns my way.
Still, while I went tamely to heel at a word from Big Kennedy, I had
also resolved to advance. I meant before all was over to mount the
last summit of Tammany Hall. I laid out my life as architects lay out a
building; it would call for years, but I had years to give.
My work with Grocer Fogel had ended long ago. I now gave myself entirely
to the party, and to deepen the foundations of its power. Inside our
lines a mighty harmony prevailed. Big Kennedy and those headquarters
enemies who once schemed for his defeat had healed their differences and
the surface of events showed as serene as summer seas. About this time
a great star was rising in the Tammany sky; a new chief was gaining
evolution. Already, his name was first, and although he cloaked his
dictatorship with prudence, the sophisticated knew how his will was even
then as law and through his convenient glove of velvet felt his grip of
steel.
For myself, I closely observed the unfolding of his genius. His methods
as well as those of Big Kennedy were now my daily lesson. I had
ever before me in that formative, plastic hour the examples of these
past-masters of the art of domination.
It was well for me. A dictator is so much unlike a poet that he is made,
not born. He must build himself; and when completed he must save himself
from being torn to pieces. No one blunders into a dictatorship; one
might as well look to blunder upon some mountain peak. Even blunders
are amenable to natural law, and it can be taken as a truism that no one
blunders up hill.
Wherefore, he who would be dictator and with his touch determine the day
for pushing, struggling, rebelling thousands and mold their times for
them, must study. And study hard I did.
My Red Jackets received my most jealous care. They deserved that much
from me, since their existence offered measurably for my support. When
the day arrived, I was given that twelve-hundred-dollar place with the
docks, whereof Big Kennedy had spoken, and under his suggestion and to
the limits of my strength made what employ of it I might for my own and
my friends' behoof. But those twelve hundred dollars would not go far
in the affairs of one who must for their franchises lead hither and yon
divers scores of folk, all of whom had but the one notion of politics,
that it was founded of free beer. There came, too, a procession of
borrowers, and it was a dull day when, in sums from a dime to a dollar,
I did not to these clients part with an aggregate that would have
supported any family for any decent week. There existed no door of
escape; these charges, and others of similar kidney, must be met and
borne; it was the only way to keep one's hold of politics; and so Old
Mike would tell me.
“But it's better,” said that deep one, “to lind people money than give
it to'em. You kape thim bechune your finger longer by lindin'.”
It was on the Red Jackets I leaned most for personal revenue. They were
my bread-winners. No Tammany organization, great or small, keeps books.
No man may say what is received, or what is disbursed, or name him who
gave or got; and that is as it should be. If it were otherwise, one's
troubles would never earn an end. For the Red Jackets I was--to steal
a title from the general organization--not alone the treasurer, but the
wiskinskie. In this latter rôle I collected the money that came in.
Thus the interests, financial, of the Red Jackets were wholly within
my hands, and recalling what Big Kennedy had said anent a good cook, I
failed not to lick my fingers.
Money was in no wise difficult to get. The Red Jackets were formidable
both for numbers and influence, and their favor or resentment meant
a round one thousand votes. Besides, there stood the memorable Tin
Whistles, reckless, militant, ready for any midnight thing, and their
dim outlines, like a challenge or a threat, filled up the cloudy
background. Those with hopes or fears of office, and others who as
merchants or saloonkeepers, or who gambled, or did worse, to say naught
of builders who found the streets and pavements a convenient even though
an illegal resting place for their materials of bricks and lime and
lumber, never failed of response to a suggestion that the good Red
Jackets stood in need of help. Every man of these contributing gentry,
at their trades of dollar-getting, was violating law or ordinance, and
I who had the police at my beck could instantly contract their liberties
to a point that pinched. When such were the conditions, anyone with an
imagination above a shoemaker's will see that to produce what funds
my wants demanded would be the lightest of tasks. It was like grinding
sugar canes, and as easily sure of steady sweet returns.
True, as an exception to a rule, one met now and again with him who for
some native bull-necked obstinacy would refuse a contribution. In such
event the secret of his frugality was certain to leak forth and spread
itself among my followers. It would not be required that one offer even
a hint. Soon as ever the tale of that parsimony reached the ear of a Tin
Whistle, disasters like a flock of buzzards collected about the saving
man. His windows were darkly broken like Gaffney's. Or if he were a
grocer his wares would upset themselves about the pavements, his carts
of delivery break down, his harnesses part and fall in pieces, and he
beset to dine off sorrow in many a different dish.
And then and always there were the police to call his violative eye to
this ordinance, or hale him before a magistrate for that one. And there
were Health Boards, and Street Departments, who at a wink of Red Jacket
disfavor would descend upon a recalcitrant and provide burdens for his
life. With twenty methods of compulsion against him, and each according
to law, there arose no man strong enough to refuse those duties of
donation. He must support the fortunes of my Red Jackets or see his
own decline, and no one with a heart for commerce was long to learn the
lesson.
The great credit, however, in such coils was due the police. With them
to be his allies, one might not only finance his policies, but control
and count a vote; and no such name as failure.
“They're the foot-stones of politics,” said Old Mike. “Kape th' p'lice,
an' you kape yourself on top.”
Nor was this the task complex. It was but to threaten them with the
powers above on the one hand, or on the other toss them individually
an occasional small bone of profit to gnaw, and they would stand to you
like dogs. I soon had these ins and outs of money-getting at the tips
of my tongue and my fingers, for I went to school to Big Kennedy and
Old Mike in the accomplishment, and I may tell you it was a branch of
learning they were qualified to teach.
Blackmail! cry you? Now there goes a word to that. These folk were
violating the law. What would you have?--their arrest? Let me inform you
that were the laws of the State and the town enforced to syllable and
letter, it would drive into banishment one-half the population. They
would do business at a loss; it would put up the shutters for over half
the town. Wherefore, it would be against the common interest to arrest
them.
And still you would have the law enforced? And if it were, what, let me
ask, would be the immediate response? These delinquents would be fined.
You would then be satisfied. What should be the corrective difference
between a fine paid to a court, and a donation paid to my Red Jackets?
The corrective influence in both should be the same, since in either
instance it is but a taking of dollars from the purses of the lawless.
And yet, you clamor, “One is blackmail and the other is justice!” The
separation I should say was academic rather than practical; and as for a
name: why then, I care nothing for a name.
I will, however, go this farther journey for my own defense. I have not
been for over twoscore years with Tammany and sixteen years its head,
without being driven to some intimate knowledge of my times, and those
principles of individual as well as communal action which underlie them
to make a motive. And now I say, that I have yet to meet that man, or
that corporation, and though the latter were a church, who wouldn't
follow interest across a prostrate law, and in the chase of dollars
break through ordinance and statute as a cow walks through a cobweb.
And each and all they come most willingly to pay the prices of their
outlawry, and receivers are as bad as thieves--your price-payer as black
as your price-taker. Practically, the New York definition of an honest
man has ever gone that he is one who denounces any robbery in the
proceeds whereof he is not personally interested, and with that
definition my life has never failed to comply. If Tammany and Tammany
men have been guilty of receiving money from violators of law, they had
among their accomplices the town's most reputable names and influences.
Why then should you pursue the one while you excuse the other? And are
you not, when you do so, quite as much the criminal as either?
When I was in the first year of my majority we went into a campaign
for the ownership of the town. Standing on the threshold of my earliest
vote, I was strung like a bow to win. My fervor might have gained a more
than common heat, because by decision of Big Kennedy I, myself, was put
down to make the run for alderman. There was a world of money against
us, since we had the respectable element, which means ever the rich, to
be our enemies.
Big Kennedy and I, after a session in his sanctum, resolved that not one
meeting should be held by our opponents within our boundaries. It was
not that we feared for the vote; rather it swung on a point of pride;
and then it would hearten our tribesmen should we suppress the least
signal of the enemy's campaign.
Having limitless money, the foe decided for sundry gatherings. They also
outlined processions, hired music by the band, and bought beer by the
barrel. They would have their speakers to address the commons in halls
and from trucks.
On each attempt they were encountered and dispersed. More than once the
Red Jackets, backed by the faithful Tin Whistles, took possession of a
meeting, put up their own orators and adopted their own resolutions.
If the police were called, they invariably arrested our enemies, being
sapient of their own safety and equal to the work of locating the butter
on their personal bread. If the enemy through their henchmen or managers
made physical resistance, the Tin Whistles put them outside the hall,
and whether through door or window came to be no mighty matter.
At times the Red Jackets and their reserves of Tin Whistles would
permit the opposition to open a meeting. When the first orator had been
eloquent for perhaps five minutes, a phalanx of Tin Whistles would arise
in their places, and a hailstorm of sponges, soaking wet and each
the size of one's head, would descend upon the rostrum. It was a
never-failing remedy; there lived never chairman nor orator who would
face that fusillade. Sometimes the lights were turned out; and again,
when it was an open-air meeting and the speakers to talk from a truck,
a bunch of crackers would be exploded under the horses and a runaway
occur. That simple device was sure to cut the meeting short by carrying
off the orators. The foe arranged but one procession; that was disposed
of on the fringe of our territory by an unerring, even if improper,
volley of eggs and vegetables and similar trumpery. The artillery used
would have beaten back a charge by cavalry.
Still the enemy had the money, and on that important point could
overpower us like ten for one, and did. Here and there went their
agents, sowing sly riches in the hope of a harvest of votes. To
counteract this still-hunt where the argument was cash, I sent the word
abroad that our people were to take the money and promise votes. Then
they were to break the promise.
“Bunco the foe!” was the watchword; “take their money and 'con' them!”
This instruction was deemed necessary for our safety. I educated our men
to the thought that the more money they got by these methods, the higher
they would stand with Big Kennedy and me. If it were not for this,
hundreds would have taken a price, and then, afraid to come back to
us, might have gone with the banners of the enemy for that campaign at
least. Now they would get what they could, and wear it for a feather
in their caps. They exulted in such enterprise; it was spoiling the
Egyptian; having filled their pockets they would return and make a brag
of the fact. By these schemes we kept our strength. The enemy parted
with money by the thousands, yet never the vote did they obtain. The
goods failed of delivery.
Sheeny Joe was a handy man to Big Kennedy. He owned no rank; but
voluble, active, well dressed, and ready with his money across a barroom
counter, he grew to have a value. Not once in those years which fell in
between our encounter on the dock and this time I have in memory, did
Sheeny Joe express aught save friendship for me. His nose was queer
of contour as the result of my handiwork, but he met the blemish in a
spirit of philosophy and displayed no rancors against me as the author
thereof. On the contrary, he was friendly to the verge of fulsome.
Sheeny Joe sold himself to the opposition, hoof and hide and horn. Nor
was this a mock disposal of himself, although he gave Big Kennedy and
myself to suppose he still held by us in his heart. No, it wasn't the
money that changed him; rather I should say that for all his pretenses,
his hankerings of revenge against me had never slept. It was now he
believed his day to compass it had come. The business was no more no
less than a sheer bald plot to take my life, with Sheeny Joe to lie
behind it--the bug of evil under the dark chip.
It was in the early evening at my own home. Sheeny Joe came and called
me to the door, and all in a hustle of hurry.
“Big Kennedy wants you to come at once to the Tub of Blood,” said Sheeny
Joe.
The Tub of Blood was a hang-out for certain bludgeon-wielding thugs who
lived by the coarser crimes of burglary and highway robbery. It was
suspected by Big Kennedy and myself as a camping spot for “repeaters”
whom the enemy had been at pains to import against us. We had it then in
plan to set the Tin Whistles to the sacking of it three days before the
vote.
On this word from Sheeny Joe, and thinking that some new programme was
afoot, I set forth for the Tub of Blood. As I came through the door, a
murderous creature known as Strong-Arm Dan was busy polishing glasses
behind the bar. He looked up, and giving a nod toward a door in the
rear, said:
“They want you inside.”
The moment I set foot within that rear door, I saw how it was a trap.
There were a round dozen waiting, and each the flower of a desperate
flock.
In the first surprise of it I did not speak, but instinctively got the
wall to my back. As I faced them they moved uneasily, half rising from
their chairs, growling, but speaking no word. Their purpose was to
attack me; yet they hung upon the edge of the enterprise, apparently in
want of a leader. I was not a yard from the door, and having advantage
of their slowness began making my way in that direction. They saw that
I would escape, and yet they couldn't spur their courage to the leap.
It was my perilous repute as a hitter from the shoulder that stood my
friend that night.
At last I reached the door. Opening it with my hand behind me, my eyes
still on the glaring hesitating roughs, I stepped backward into the main
room.
“Good-night, gentlemen,” was all I said.
“You'll set up the gin, won't you?” cried one, finding his voice.
“Sure!” I returned, and I tossed Strong-Arm Dan a gold piece as I passed
the bar. “Give'em what they want while it lasts,” said I.
That demand for gin mashed into the teeth of my thoughts like the cogs
of a wheel. It would hold that precious coterie for twenty minutes. When
I got into the street, I caught the shadow of Sheeny Joe as he twisted
around the corner.
It was a half-dozen blocks from the Tub of Blood that I blew the
gathering call of the Tin Whistles. They came running like hounds to
huntsman. Ten minutes later the Tub of Blood lay a pile of ruins, while
Strong-Arm Dan and those others, surprised in the midst of that guzzling
I had paid for, with heads and faces a hash of wounds and blood and
the fear of death upon them, were running or staggering or crawling for
shelter, according to what strength remained with them.
“It's plain,” said Big Kennedy, when I told of the net that Sheeny Joe
had spread for me, “it's plain that you haven't shed your milk-teeth
yet. However, you'll be older by an' by, an' then you won't follow off
every band of music that comes playin' down the street. No, I don't
blame Sheeny Joe; politics is like draw-poker, an' everybody's got a
right to fill his hand if he can. Still, while I don't blame him, it's
up to us to get hunk an' even on th' play.” Here Big Kennedy pondered
for the space of a minute. Then he continued: “I think we'd better make
it up-the-river--better railroad the duffer. Discipline's been gettin'
slack of late, an' an example will work in hot an' handy. The next crook
won't pass us out the double-cross when he sees what comes off in th'
case of Sheeny Joe.”